Braum’s is an unusual fast food concept.
I think of it as a go-to place in a small town, if there is no Bluebell ice cream at the supermarket. But it is so much more. Great hamburgers … generous fries … and a decent selection of necessity-type groceries and a few odds/ins mixed in … on the counter tops and at the end caps above and surrounding the ice cream freezers.
There are wine stores, and there are wine cellars.
There are bookstores, and there is Booked Up.
Like some quaint, dark, quiet tasting room, Booked Up is filled with racks and racks of aged, premium, rare and limited edition treasures … lots and lots of old books … classics and not-classics. Something for every palate. Booked Up began more than 30 years ago in Washington, D.C. before moving to … well … almost the middle of nowhere.
Have you been there? Moreover, have you been to Archer City? The town has been on that list of cool small Texas places circulating on Facebook as of late, largely I am sure, because it is the boyhood home of Pulitzer-winning, Oscar-toting, Larry McMurtry and the location of his bookstore(s). Booked Up is slightly off the beaten path in the not-so-thriving not-so-Metropolis rural heartland, about 25 miles southwest of Wichita Falls? You know Archer City … that Texas Town where Cybil Shepherd first caught everyone’s attention with her diving prowess in The Last Picture Show. That Archer City.
No worries …
It’s no stress to cover a football game with no vested interest … The outcome didn’t matter for me at the cold and drizzly Jan 2 Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth. My school had packed up for the winter. Jan. 2 bowl … no great expectations either …
Then a funny thing happened. The Houston Cougars, who barely mustered six points in the other three hours of play, realized they had The Pittsburgh Panthers right where they wanted them. At the first of the fourth, it was 31-6 Pitt. All that would change. Houston scored for the first time in more than 10 minutes – a touchdown and then kicked to Pitt.
Quick Pittch Wall
The score was 31-13 with 6:48 left in the game.
As is the custom, Pitt went into eat-the-clock mode and made little happen on offense after that – other than a field goal. 34-13, Pitt.
Would you rather attend a bowl game with one big name program dominating in a blowout, or two midlevel squads duking it out? (… Squads, not the coaches or coaching assistants, the players … figuratively.)
I’ll take the latter.
Thus, once again, PingWi-Fi finds itself on the sidelines of the Zaxby’s Heart of Dallas Bowl (previously known as TicketCity). Our team has had a ball during bowl season over the years … still shooting selfies and hyping the crap out of the fact that we were the very first to #tweet an entire bowl game from the press box … while others laughed at us and Twitter back then. Look at the bowls tweeting their brains out now. I digress …
So what about this ZHOD14 bowl game?
Jameill Showers, Having Launched 53-Yard Completion
ALBUQUERQUE — The 2014 Gildan New Mexico Bowl was the antithesis of the previous version. Last year — an air-it-out/shoot-em-up, between Colorado State and Mike Leach’s Washington State. This year … a much more physical, grueling, slightly conservative style of play pitting the Utah State Aggies (10-3, Mountain West Conference) vs. The Miners of UTEP (7-6, Conference USA) … Of course there is no fair comparison of an air raid and a running attack … neither style is better. Just different.
As evidence: the ’14 edition was 7-3 into the third quarter, before Utah eventually pulled ahead and recorded the win, 21-6. In the first quarter, there were 6 passes … total. Ha! That’s about the equivalent of one offensive trickplay these days.
But there were plenty of interesting story lines, despite no passing records set this day. Take for instance that Kent Myers, the starting quarterback for The U-S Aggies was the fourth to start in that position this year. Then, when Myers was shaken up, a fifth QB emerged — receiver Ronald Butler took the snaps and tallied 69 yards on two rushes.
Heading north out of Fort Worth toward my two favorite playa lakes in the world, my little SUV crossover was filled with great expectations … and camping gear. The Panhandle weather was unseasonably mild and sunny. November can be a beautiful time of the year, north of “North Texas” … plush, green winter wheat everywhere, white fluffy cotton bolls exploding all over the fields and just about as much autumn color as New England has foliage … albeit the golds, reds, oranges, and yellow hues are packed into the grains of every head of maize, corn and grain sorghum from fencerow to fencerow.
My expectations included a great sunset followed by an equally stunning sunrise, the cedar- and mesquite-powered aroma of a campfire, moonlight bright enough to cast shadows and a billion stars, ever so clear and sparkly, all in their places where I had left them on the last trip.
The forecast said “lows in the 40s.” I answered, “I can do this.”
You meet the nicest people on motorcycles … and sometimes it leads to blogs about nothing.
Those among my inner circle of trust – ha — the 20-some-odd friends on Facebook — have already read a couple of pieces of this story. First, I posted the story of the crazed neighbor on the morning of the lunar eclipse — “The Blood Moon.” Some of you may recall that I was out early with my Nikon and tripod trying to capture a celestial selfie during the event. Ha … up early, wide awake and doing something I enjoy had made me extra positive. So, inadvertently in a great mood, I said hello to several people on the street, and “Did you see the eclipse?,” to a neighbor on the street.
Her response?
She gathered up her robe or night gown ever so tightly — or whatever she sleeps in and apparently waters the grass in — and yelled at me, “Don’t come any closer!”
Man. I don’t know who Number 12 was at Texas A&M, but they sure sell a lot of his jerseys.
I jest. The 12th Man … what a cool tradition — one of so many at this great school. One so cool it has been “rebranded” (stolen) by an NFL team. Gotta love that, Aggie Nation.
But for all the Aggie jokes I have ever heard, and all the times I have seen them on TV or on the field of my own alma mater, I had never been to College Station, Texas — despite the respect I have for them. Well, I don’t have a bucket list, but I guess I can now scratch Farmers Fight off my Aggie List.
For Texas Tech:
It is annoying, but more importantly, extremely damaging to our university that many “Tech fans” think that being a malcontent is normal. I just read a piece by a “journalist” attacking the hiring and decision making of Coach Kliff Kingsbury.
We’ve all seen hundreds of negative comments about Davis Webb by all the “arm-chair” coaches out there. It seems no matter what happens, many of these people are not going to be happy and they apparently “know more than KK” who spent time in the NFL and groomed two of the best college quarterbacks in history before he took over at his alma mater (where of course he helped to take our program to the next level).
Before I finish the PingWi-Fi blogging assignment for Detroit … I can’t help it. I have to comment on the news flowing from Motor City. Thousands of residents had their water shut off for not paying they bills … for months. And can you believe the United Nations waded into the muck to point out “wrongdoing?” … “How dare a city expect people to pay for the water they use?” (I type in jest …)
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