You are currently browsing the monthly archive for November 2006.
Cincinnati sports are full of a lot of tradition, a lot of hardships, winning and losing, and a strong fan base.
But that no longer seems to fully be the case with our local teams, Bengals included. Even local sports writers seem to be sliding off the boat.
I have been a University of Cincinnati Bearcats basketball fan since my brother first started attending the school. I don’t really remember how or when I got into the team, I just know I did. I watched through the Kenyon Martin era, I consider myself fortunate to have been able to experience that kind of fight from a team. It’s the kind of fight our current Bearcats team doesn’t seem to have.
It’s well known local news that University of Cincinnati President Nancy Zimpher along with a myriad of others, are very much responsible, on a level, for the firing/letting go of former UC Head Coach Bob Huggins. A lot of Cincinnati loved the temperamental Head Coach as much as they hated him. But he changed our basketball teams reputation, he made UC Basketball a consistent winner, the team to beat. No matter what happens, it won’t ever be the same regime it was under Coach Huggins. Which is why I will eventually be sporting a “Huggieville” shirt, of the bright Kansas State purple variety. Loyalty to a coach, no matter where he ends up.
Due to that loss, along with key players, some would say UC is no longer a team to worry about, too many new players, a new Head Coach, that’s just simply a concotion for disaster in the sports world. But just like those people that are attacking the Bengals for their losses, I feel it’ll play out the same with my Bearcats. We’ll face losses, some easier than others. But we’ll have wins and we’ve been having them. The current record stands 3-1, hopefully soon 4-1. Announcers on the TV are announcing that UC is about to reach the highest turnover rate in UC history. Yet we still stand a chance of winning. With every negative there can be a positive, if you look for it. A rough win is still a win.
Perhaps I’m just such a loyal person that I refuse to believe that Cincinnati sports teams are done and over with for the season. Basketball just started and football isn’t that close to ending, so what’s the point of giving up? Fans seem so eager to jump on other bandwagon, at least some of them. I simply can’t do that. You’ll never see me sporting “SUPERBOWL CHAMPION” shirts for anyone but the Bengals. My favorite college team will always be UC, no matter whether I attend there or not.
I had it pointed out to me that being a loyal fan to a struggling team is much more rewarding when that struggling team wins. I’d have to say that’s very much the case here in Cincinnati. Our teams may be struggling, but every win is that much sweeter when it happens.
And if any local Cincy people see Deonta Vaughn jersey’s floating around, do let me know. This guy is averaging 18+ points a game. Amazing. Also remind me to write a thank you letter to Indiana for letting us have this guy. He’s probably going to end up carrying a large portion of our season.
And as the buzzer signals the end, UC Bearcats now stand 4-1. A 60-50 game.
See, I told you we’d win. 
Edit: Hm. A sad quote from a post game press conference..
“We just wanted to win our fans back,” said freshman guard Deonta Vaughn, who led UC with 19 points. “We were talking about it in the locker room.”
The fans shouldn’t of ever needed to be won back. I certainly haven’t had to be.
About a week ago, my brother informed me of a local marathon, the Thanksgiving Day 10k. 10k being 6.2 miles. He offered to pay for it if I was up for running it.
I debated back and forth a couple of days, then on impulse told him to sign me up. I hadn’t ever run 6.2 miles consecutively before, so I was nervous. I had already been averaging 2-3 miles a week for the Flying Pig, so what was another 3 miles?
So I got up about 6:30 this morning, got dressed, ate part of a bagel and sipped some orange juice, and went for a quick little jog outside. Boy, I was nervous. I couldn’t even remember my usual stretching routine. While I waited for my brother to get ready I concocted my post-marathon drink. (Shaklee’s Performance. I highly recommend it to any athlete, runners in particular. It works so much better than Gatorade or Powerade.)
We drove to Paul Brown Stadium, where the race would start and fought our well through the mass of traffic and one lane entrance to park. I stretched a bit more while overlooking the ever beautiful Bengal’s playing field, then headed to the starting point. My brother headed off to explore the stadium and watch the race.
As I neared the mob of runners and walkers, I over heard local news figure Cammy Dierking announcing that there was a record 12,000+ runners participating today. I looked down at my bib to see that I was runner #961 out of 12,000. There were makers for a 7 minute mile pace, 8 minutes and so forth. The best spot I could secure was the 11 minute pace, I planned to move up anyway. After a 3, 2, then 1 minute countdown the gun went off. I didn’t hear it because it was so far up. It took about 7 minutes and some odd seconds before I actually started running from the starting line.
The course itself was pretty nice, although to be perfectly honest, I didn’t get to look at it much, at least not enough to really describe it now. I do remember running across two bridges, and nearly decapitating myself with a cup of water as I jogged past the 3 mile marker. As well as people in turkey hats, a half naked guy, and a lot of Bengal jerseys.
The first mile was what I shall call “THE BLOB OF DOOM”, which basically was everyone just trying to move along. By the second mile I’d secured a pretty steady pace. Once I got water at the stopping station, that’s where I started to feel the strain on my muscles. And a cramp because I drank the water too quickly. The coolest part about the water station is the thousands of cups littering the ground and mini-water explosions as people in front and behind you throw their cups down.
I did have to walk for a few 30 second breaks here and there, mainly because I had a nagging cramp under my ribs and my ability to breath seemed almost non existant. I kept reminding myself that in May I’d have 26.2 miles to deal with and that this was a mere baby step in that direction.
Once Paul Brown Stadium was back in distance, I picked up the pace a bit more. I could hear the announcers as people finished, and then realized that I was about to finish my first marathon. The last mile stretch was filled with people and camera guys. I couldn’t actually see the finish line as I crossed, but I do remember sprinting and Cammy Dierking saying something about my good effort. Thanks Cammy!
Supposedly everyone gets a finish line photo, but depending on how it turns out, you may not see it. I’m a runner, but 6.2 miles was a strech for me. It did feel really awesome though, but we’ll see how I fair tommorow morning.
The results page isn’t working currently, but I finished 6000 something out of 10,000. 144 out of 213 in my division. 2000 something out of 4000 women. And I can’t remember the rest of the stats. My average pace was a 10 minute mile. I’m not that thrilled with where I ended up, but I am glad I finished and ran my first marathon.
So for the Flying Pig I’m estimating I’ll finish somewhere near 4 hours. As always, I’m looking for people to run part or all of the marathon with me. It’s kind of boring running by yourself.
To everyone, have an amazing Turkey day!!
To my Mom, I ran this race for you and I’m doing it again in May. The last 6 months will follow me those 26.2 miles as they did today, but by then, hopefully, it’ll all be done and over. I love you!
Dad, thank you for helping me prepare for the race today without a complaint. I know it cost a lot of money and I appreciate it a ton. Love ya!
Tim, thanks for bringing this race to my attention, paying for it, driving me there, and basically being the coolest brother ever. Love ya and WHO DEY!
Grandma and Grandpa, thank you for being such avid readers, I love you and miss you tons!
Aunt Lesa and family, I love all of you and hope to see you soon! My little cousins, I hope you’re all behaving.
To my friends, thanks for saying I could do it when I thought I couldn’t and for keeping my away from Starbucks..kind of. 
Love you all!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Here’s the first installment of Steph’s News Breakdown. (Translation: Steph hasn’t had any time to write a proper article and is attempting to make up for lost time.)
-OJ? Oh No!
OJ Simpson, once a football player and suspected killer of his wife Nicole Brown, was planning on releasing a TV special/book on how he would’ve gone about the murder, had he in fact been responsible for it. News Corportion, the parent company of the books publishing company, Harper Collins, nixed the entire operation as of today. News Corp. chairmain Robert Murdoch stated, “I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project.”
OJ simply wished to straighten out misconceptions, as he told the press via a phone conference Monday. But quickly said he was probably going to be legally muzzled on the situation.
STEPH SAYS: Here is one book Harper Collins doesn’t need to publish. Needless to say, I’m sure they have better books to be considering than a book about how a man would’ve killed his wife, you know, if he’d been responsible for it. That’s not WEIRD OR ANYTHING. Goodness.
The TomKat Wedding
Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes wed in Rome this past weekend after an 18-month courtship.
STEPH SAYS:Ok. Got it. No need to further go on that article. Analysts say it’s the end of the Cruise era, while others debate over whether it was legally binding or not. Really, I don’t care. He creeps me out, even if he can slide on a wood floor wearing nothing but tighty whitey’s. He jumped around on Oprah’s couch like a little five year old. Mere thought of that Oprah episode sends me into a fit of guffaws. The man is down a few screws in his head. And now he’s married to a girl who dreamed about marrying him as a young girl. Whatever.
Rangel Calls For Reinstating Military Draft
Senior house Democrat Charles Rangel has once again said he will try to introduce legislation to reinstate the draft early next year. Rangel, in his defense, says that President Bush and his administration wouldn’t of set a foot in Iraq if they felt a draft that could potentially affect their families would be a factor. Rangel also said that young men and women drafted would not necessarily to serve, but instead serve in hospitals and other areas of need.
STEPH SAYS: I hope this doesn’t pass. Drafting will not help us fight the war in Iraq. There are much larger issues outside of depleted or apparently depleted military forces that need to handle. One represenative says we have enough forces, another doesn’t. One is republican, one isn’t. There is an issue in itself. All this proposition does is frighten teenagers around the world into wondering if they’ll end up in a military rank. Count me in on that.
Five People Receive Group Kidney Transplant
For the first time ever, five people were involved in a simultaneous kidney transplant lat week. The process involved a whopping six operating rooms, twelve surgeons, 11 anesthesiologists, and 18 nurses, hospital officials said. Four of the five recipients approached the hospital as individual cases with willing relatives, but were deemed incompatible to donate.
STEPH SAYS: Wow. That is science and technology at it’s absolute finest right there. Here’s to hoping that more cases of this type can efficiently happen and to the advantage of those who’ve been on the transplant waiting list, just hoping for that one phone call.
I apologize for my lack of blogging. Senior year has started kicking in a lot more in terms of homework and college. Not to mention, the marching band took it’s traditional trip to Disney World and I’m still playing catch up. Eventually, I’ll get back into the swing of the thing.
The Disney Trip was probably the most amazing four days of my life, minus some drama and the bus ride home.The band and orchestra left Wednesday afternoon and drove for 19 hours, with a few stops in between. I ended up catching a mini-cold on the way down, (charter buses are always FREEZING cold!) so I was miserable by the time we got to Disney. But the fact that we were in sunny Florida and at the most magical place ever, well, that takes care of a lot in itself. We spent the first day at MGM Studios. We refers to myself and several awesome friends of mine. (Matt, Whitney, Ali, Lauren, Sam, and the rest of the gang.) We shopped, ate, rode a few rides, one of those rides being the Tower of Terror. (If you don’t know what it is, visit waltdisneyworld.com and watch the video. My description wouldn’t do the ride justice.) Now, I’m afraid of heights. And dropping. I mean, REALLY afraid of heights. Elevators make me nervous, honestly. So I was scared out of my mind the entire 1 minute ride. My knees were knocking together so badly after wards the group in itself vowed to keep me away from the ride. But it was fun, in a “Wow, my heart is STILL beating like crazy 45 minutes after” kind of way. We ended the night with an absolutely AMAZING Fantasmic show at the amphitheater. Hopefully I get my filmed developed soon because there’s so much to show and describe about it. Disney doesn’t hold back when they put on a show, I can tell you that much. Seeing all the characters of movies I used to obsessively love made me feel so five years old again. SUCH a great feeling. We also had a pizza/pool party, but it was freezing cold and we were exhausted, so it didn’t hold much merit.Second day, we went Epcot! (The giant golf ball place.) Part of Epcot is a display of many countries around the world. They’re all grandly built, so accurate you feel you’re actually there, and posses souvenirs and restaurants galore. We visited the countries, or as many of them as we could, shopped at other places, and rode a few rides. This was also the day of our “Disney Magical Music Days” clinic. (Basically, we got to go behind the scenes and produce a cool music video that only we get to see.) Minus having to sprint “around the world” to get to the meeting place, it was fun. (We get free lunch every day and had to enjoy it!) We played Carnival of the Animals and Firebird Part II, which are songs from Fantasia 2000. Then we went and shopped some more before heading to watch our Orchestra perform, which took place in Downtown Disney on the riverfront. An awesome performance at a great location.
Afterwords, we then proceeded to shop some more before walking to Disney Quest. Disney Quest is basically four or five floor of virtual reality rides/games. Ourgroup started out on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Matt, Whitney, Lauren and myself got to be “special pirates” for the day. Basically we dressed up as pirates (I was a “goofy pirate”..goofy ears and all.) and got to play the game while dressed up. We were geeking out and it was amazing. SO fun.Our last day in the park was spent at none other than the Magical Kingdom. My pictures of the castle are kind of sucky because they had a giant crane in the way.. :(But this is the place where ALL the characters were, which I got a lot of pictures of. And where Pirates of the Caribbean hosts it’s ride, which was amazing, mainly because of the added Johnny Depp parts. Oh, Johnny Depp. (I am now the owner of a nicely crafted Johnny Depp/Pirates coffee mug. Love. You can never have too much Johnny Depp.) Near the end of the day, after visiting Tom Sawyer’s island (VERY cool!) and shopping, Whitney, Lauren and myself waited for a half an hour or so in line so we could meet characters. Our waiting and tattoo drawing paid off-we got to meet Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, and Goofy.The funny thing is, all the characters, no matter your age, act interested and friendly to you. It’s great. We got our picture taken with them and even got a note from Goofy. (Lauren told Goofy she thought he was a cow and he got all offended. Whitney and I informed him that he was very much a dog. Goofy sealed our debate by asking the guards for paper and a pen, then proceeded to inform us that “When Uncle Walt first created me, I was a cow. He later changed me to a dog.” Getting a note from Goofy? Priceless. That’s not the exact writing, but it was something to that effect.
After all was said and done, we headed to backstage Disney. Now, I could go into inept detail on how crazy and out of place backstage Disney is, and how perception is the biggest deal ever at Disney. But I’m not. I’m not going to ruin the magic for any of you. Unless you really want me to.
Basically we got to see how the floats of the Specto Magic Light Parade are put together and how the characters, erm, “prepare”, so to speak. I was the banner holder for the band, which was kind of fun but nerve wrecking, since we dictated the parade pace and were the core of the thousands of people’s pictures. Talk about an adrenaline rush. Not to mention worry of how nervous and uptight I look in the aforementioned pictures. If that’s any of you out there, I apologize! The helpers for Disney opened the gates while our announcement was occurring and the first thing you see is thousands upon thousands packing the streets. Light bulbs going off everywhere. Kids freaking out over the uniforms and noise. It was AWESOME. Best way to end the Disney experience and my time as a band senior. We watched the fantastic fireworks show afterwords at the Castle, which was indescribeable in itself as well.
Disney is simply amazing and fun no matter your age. I got to feel five years old for awhile and it was refreshing. I had hardly any stress, didn’t give a damn about school, and just enjoyed myself. My group I walked around with was an absolute blast. Even the bus ride wasn’t so bad.
If you ever get the chance to go, do so. You won’t regret it.
Here is the infamous Tower of Terror.. more pictures will follow once I get them all developed. (3 cameras worth!)
