a great day to be a mountaineer

Bowling Green head coach Gregg Brandon and Erique Dozier (30) celebrate after beating No. 25 Pittsburgh 27-17 in a football game Saturday Aug. 30, 2008 in Pittsburgh. Bowling Green won 27-17. (AP Photo/Don Wright)

it's a muggy last saturday of august. the backyard is alive with the whirring and chirping of bugs and birds. and the mountaineer sports network is on the air.

living in a home without television, kris found a way for me to watch the regional cable broadcast of west virginia university's season opener online at espn360.com. (i wound up listening to tony and hoppy on msn anyway because of the few minutes of delay between the radio and the webcast -- but i watched the espn to watch scoring plays afterward.)

we ran a test watching the virginia tech-east carolina game, which led to a surprising upset of the hokies. 

normally, i'd be happy, given that tech chose to bail on wvu and the big east conference that helped bring them to prominence in favor of the atlantic coast conference.

and while i dearly love my sister joy, a virginia tech alum, i felt kinda worse for my new friend marc, who, in addition to being a real good guy, totally bleeds maroon and orange. it's a rabid, knowledgeable and wonderfully unreasonable obsession that i can get behind. so, yeah, i really do feel bad for the guy.

on the other hand, the no. 25 ranked university of pittsburgh, poised by many pundits for a breakout year in the conference, lost to unranked bowling green today.

it's been a long time since i've had a great hate-on for our "backyard brawl" rival, but last year's dream-crushing upset totally stoked my ill will for those panthers. and having to read how hapless coach dave wannstedt's great program plan is purportedly coming to fruition just threw gasoline on the fire.

so while there's still 30 more minutes of football left to play in morgantown, barring injuries or implosions with my mountaineers, (as well as a nov. 28 date in pennsylvania) all i have to say after that pitt game is -- ha!

filling the bill

seriously, i think i just want to be the media clearinghouse on all things bill stewart from the past few weeks. 

i guess the major sports outlets and national papers are as curious as i've been as to how well the new captain can pilot the battleship of west virginia university football now that he has full command.

last year, i pored over pages and pages of predictions predicated on greatness in order to boost my confidence in the team -- to reassure myself that it was ok to have hope for success beyond my wildest dreams.

this year i read in a search for certainty or assurance that everything will be all right or even spectacularly great, but of course no one is foolish enough to unequivocably forecast success or failure. 

they, like i, sit on the fence, full of compliments for a personable fellow who happens to have the keys to a most formidable arsenal. but until that first series is over, no one really knows.

journey to center of the pinoy heart

this is for my friend carrie, who loves the classic rock band journey. she's probably heard of this new guy, arnel pineda, taking over for original lead vocalist steve perry.

i think i heard about this filipino guy who gets discovered on youtube and lands a record deal with the band, but i didn't believe anyone could get hooked up to a pop supergroup based on some goofy video from a web site. seriously, how good could he be?

well, i heard a song sunday on kfog that had to be by journey, but it wasn't one from their familiar oeuvre. i figured it was an obscurity that only diehards would know.

it wasn't -- it was the first single from the band's new album, "revelation", called "never walk away," which features pineda. well, they could have fooled me. it sounds like the real thing.

as i always say when an outbreak of karaoke strikes at community gatherings, "a filipino and a microphone will soon be together."  i think deep within the quiet of the filipino soul is a pop star wannabe waiting for a chance to shine. 

listening to mr. pineda, i'd have to say this one has struck karaoke/tribute band gold.

rock on, my pinoy brother.

for the record

the smidge likes arugula, what can i say?

melting away

this is a peach ice cream cone from the berry patch, a roadside produce stand off hwy 220 near rockingham, n.c. it is arguably one of the best fruit-flavored frozen desserts i've ever had. 

the missus seems to feel the same way. we were particularly enamored of the sweet hunks of peach incorporated into the ice cream, which was artery-clogging rich and possessed of the fruit's mild, yet succulent flavor.

dad pulled us over to sample their fine confections not long after he took the wheel on the way home from myrtle beach.

by the time we gassed up again later that night in wytheville, va., the temperature had dropped 30 degrees from the low 90s in south carolina.

the situation didn't change much by the time we hit west virginia. during kris' and my decompression at flat top, the weather was perfect -- low 80s and little humidity -- but i could already feel a touch of fall in the air.

every year, i dread the coming of summer and its sticky, oppressive heat; but at the end of each beach trip, without fail, i mourn its winding down. 

for some reason, the season seems to turn the corner right after our vacation while i'm taking a breather at the lakehouse. i don't know why, but it bums me out a little.

maybe, in the way that birthdays or new year's depresses other people, it's a tangible reminder of time passing by -- the fullness of nature's ripe power ebbing into senescence.

and especially this year, away from the activity that i'd grown used to over previous summers running in the streets of charleston -- and last year in particular, when the air conditioner was down the whole season -- i felt i'd missed out on the total immersion into its insufferable communal misery by being cocooned in climate controlled comfort.

it's as though the parade of panting, sweat-stained humanity passed me by. i would have complained a lot, but i probably would have enjoyed the company. 

i hate to say it, even with more than a month left in the season, but i think the summer has come and gone without one shell in my beach bucket.

you need breaks on vacation, too

p & layla
Originally uploaded by grumpnet

for most working folks, 9:30 a.m. has the day getting on track -- at the paper, we're stretching for the tape at the finish -- but here at the beach, it's the first break of the day.

after getting up for the first exercise since the honeymoon, shower and breakfast, had to help feed my brother's kids and give my sister-in-law an assist so she could get some breakfast, too.

already on my third break of the day -- and, since discovering a wireless internet connection here in the condo, am taking advantage to upload a couple of pix -- and i'm getting ready for another trip to the resort water park.

i suspect i'll be sleeping real well tonight, too.