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Hayduke

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Everything posted by Hayduke

  1. No idea. Had never heard of the guy and your question made me curious, but it's hard to find much info, especially as the Butler County football roster appears to have been taken down from the school web site. He is from Powder Springs, GA, which is about 20 miles from Atlanta and which apparently was founded on land owned by a couple of Cherokee leaders, around the time of the Trail of Tears. Powder Springs also produced NFLers Kenyan Drake, Evan Engram and Chuma Edoga (not to mention Mark Day, guitarist for the Christian rock band Third Day ... never heard of him/them, either). All of those names are from Wikipedia, and that's about as far as I want to research.
  2. https://www.butlercountytimesgazette.com/2025/07/seven-cloud-facing-domestic-battery-charges/ Huh ... whaddaya know. A Georgia commit, JUCO AA defensive tackle Seven Cloud, is in legal trouble.
  3. Agreed. One of the great things about hiking is most folks are respectful of privacy but happy to meet new people. Got a couple of hiking buddies who are always really good at that part of it and because we pretty much always find a nearby bar afterward, we get a lot of conversation both on and off-trail. Met a bar owner off the Ice Age Trail not too long ago who had been in Sheriff Joe Arpaio's jail and her stories were a riot, including the pink underwear Arpaio made everybody wear. Not on a trail, but I met the author of the trail book I screenshotted on the other post when I heard her and her husband talking German as they stopped for coffee while passing through town. So now I've got two more hiking buddies, a good book and the German amnesty offer to boot.
  4. FIFY. (*and live in constant fear of you finding one of my typos 😁)
  5. You just gave a serious jolt to my Camino planning process, @tomahawk dunk. Thanks for posting those.
  6. I'm still looking for a place that will sell singles of all three of the OMs in @Al_4_ISU's uncle's beer fridge to try at happy hour. I could go to Milwaukee, I guess, or just buy a sixer of each -- likely not to cost much more than three decent craft singles. But then we'd have to drink 'em all, because we don't even throw out frozen beer.
  7. To be fair, there was probably a short period when it actually was. Thankfully, it was a relatively short time when Texas was a job that relied on potential as a sales point. Historically, of course, there's no question.
  8. I, for one, am in favor of Manziel living for a long time, because that probably means he'll keep doing stuff to keep us entertained between games. He dies and then we've got nothing but memories to rehash.
  9. Most (or all) of those big labels with "ice" on them aren't ice beers, are they, @utee94? I figured that one isn't and looked it up, but that's going to be the extent of my looking or I won't get anything done today that's deserving of an evening beer.
  10. Hayduke

    xTx Trail

    Definitely not hardcore. Maybe middle -- a section-hiker and the biking equivalent, but mostly hiking. Going to do more European stuff at some point -- did a little there in my 20s and ready to go back. Have an acquaintance who wrote a book about walking the former border between East and West Germany. Not gonna take them up on their recent offer of helping me seek asylum in Germany, but would like to visit them and do some hiking. The wife, a journalist, appears to have taken up hiking/biking various trails as a near full-time gig and is apparently biking in Estonia today. (Title of the book is roughly "Without Borders: Encounters on the Green Band."
  11. Hayduke

    xTx Trail

    That's been mostly my thought, partly because I'm wary of the readiness of each potential participant. My wife is very Catholic and so are some of our mutual friends (mostly her friends, really), and they're all from Latin America. Their motivations for the trail are more spiritual. My friends who are interested in this are gringos and the husband, at least, is with me when I say, "I'm going for the beer and wine." We're going to leave it up to the serious folks to decide how much of a spiritual pilgrimage it will be.
  12. Can negatively affect carbonation and flavor, but not necessarily and sounds like it probably didn't have enough time in this case to cause issues. Some beers are purposefully ice-distilled to concentrate flavor, just as wines can be fermented from the must of frozen grapes (which I was a lot more familiar with). Our weekly happy hour started just before the pandemic, with a short hiatus during the initial stages and then our wives' strictly-enforced six-foot summer spacing on the patio. We drank in the garage during that full Wisconsin winter of 2020-21, which was relatively mild, and had a couple of doors open for air exchange. We usually kept some beer in the fridge (which was really insulation against freezing the beer at that point -- we researched freezing points of various styles and kept a close eye on the stuff in the fridge, which basically didn't run for a few months). We've had a few that froze, but usually from getting pressed up against the back of the fridge in summer or other bad fridge monitoring. It's less waste than just throwing it away, but not especially good. Even when we were looking into freeze points, I don't remember reading about ice beers, which I was first exposed to during a trip this May to Leinie's Lodge in Chippewa Falls. They had an ice beer, but it's already off their web page and I'm wondering if they'll do it again. I thought it was pretty solid.
  13. Hayduke

    xTx Trail

    Are you posting elsewhere on Surly about this? Wife and a couple of our friends are wanting to do this, and we're just starting to explore the idea. Here would be a good place, too, I think, but the Camino probably has or deserves its own thread.
  14. Hayduke

    xTx Trail

    Having a single-state trail in a place with as rich a heritage as Texas is pretty appealing, which is why I'm surprised to find no earlier references to this trail on Surly. But you're right -- this isn't like most of the famed national trails with logical paths across lots of public land (and which could rely on eminent domain like around 16 percent of the Appalachian Trail did). Most of them also avoid large urban/suburban areas, which xTx will have a harder time doing. I live about 10 miles from the closest spot to me on Ice Age Trail, which is entirely in Wisconsin. That particular stretch has been both road walk and tread through private land in the time I've been here. It's gone back and forth because the tread portion had no formal easement agreement and the landowner had a beef with the state's Department of Natural Resources after getting fined for deer baiting. Unfortunate, because that piece of land has some of the best glacial drumlins anywhere on the trail (with those geological features being the organizing theme for the entire trail). Other beautiful stretches, like one on the Fox River that used to be a Boy Scout camp but then got bought privately and also had no easement, have also been taken out. Others are still being added, because about 500 miles of the trail are still road walking. A lot of nice country roads, but some aren't. Both easements and the problem of water in the western stretches of this trail are going to be massive logistical issues. That will be a mess, but some folks will do it. The appeal of finishing a big challenge like this always grabs a few. And if it's well planned, the trail will get some good bike traffic out of those same urban areas into the surrounding country -- assuming there's enough of it that's relatively easy to get to. Agreed -- love the idea and he deserves huge credit. But it looks like the Trans American Trail is not at all intended for hiking. I hadn't really heard about this trail, but I'm starting to think about doing stretches of some of American bike routes in retirement. I'm wondering if some of the western xTx stretches could even be hiked (and if other stretches could be biked). Not sure that any other national trail has a combination of that little water and public access for such a long stretch. Will be incredible to pull this off. (BTW, @Bevo&Pevo, thanks for bringing this up -- enjoyed reading about the TAT and its similarly named precursor, which was also unfamiliar to me.)
  15. Seems that A.J. McCarron is trying to set the record straight on his role (or lack thereof) in one of Manziel's past screwups. McCarron relives story of Manziel getting kicked out of Manning Passing Academy For background, here's one from a few years after the fact when Manziel apparently tries to throw McCarron under the Manziel bus for not making sure little Johnny made the counselors' meeting. Manziel insinuates McCarron sabotaged him at Manning Academy Aggy wouldn't ever do it, but they probably need a new yell for Manziel: "Sit down, drunk bus driver!"
  16. It's hard for them. They camembert a time when our cheddar meant more in recruiting.
  17. Hayduke

    xTx Trail

    Have read one or two things about this recently but saw a piece from Gear Junkie last week that said this trail is opening in spring 2026. I'd imagine that means it's only an inaugural stretch of the Cross Texas Trail. Would run from Orange to El Paso and through some iconic places -- Concan, Utopia, Big Bend, Fort Davis, Guadalupe Mountains. It's a fine idea, but I'm not sure of the practicality of it, especially once it gets to the further reaches of the Hill Country and westward. It will be a hell of a challenge, both to put it together and to hike/bike it. Thought about adding this to the thread on thru-hiking from a few years back or the active backpacking thread, but given that this also involves biking and is also a very specifically Texan thing, it would be interesting to track it here. I can't find any Surly references to the trail. And apparently the guy spearheading the effort, Charlie Gandy, is a UT alumnus. Thoughts? Anybody involved in this? Can it work? Would you do it?
  18. Thanks for that info, @Biff Tannen. I'm not deep into that world at all. Big Ed Abbey fan, but I'm more philosophically aligned with the Hayduke character than in lifestyle. Have been mainly a car camper and section hiker; I'm more than halfway into the Ice Age Trail, but have never been in the right juncture of mental space, finance, marriage/family and opportunity to really dedicate myself to consistent, serious backpacking or thru-hiking. As a for-instance, this would be my first trip where I'd need a water filter. Bro-in-law recently retired and he's been wanting to do part of the JMT, so we're planning to do southbound, departing from near Bishop. Ending at the Whitney Portal, probably over eight days. He's former military and recently recruited a church buddy who's also ex-military to come along. For me, it will be a test of my two new knees, so I'll probably do one or two shorter backpacking trips up here between now and next summer. My son is also planning to join us, and he's a reservist/ROTC senior next year who just finished his advanced training at Fort Knox and will run his third Bataan Memorial Death March next spring. Don't know BIL's buddy, but confident that both BIL and son will be mentally and psychologically ready for the challenges of the JMT. We old guys are all fully aware of the challenges of that area and understand the need for training and prep. Glad my son is coming, though. He'll be the guy we put in charge of running down the escape route if we need him to! I'll keep you posted, so if any of your time coincides we could be on the lookout for you. We're shooting for July, and BIL and sis are actually on the road as I write, headed to King's Canyon and Sequoia, where he'll do some scouting. I'm also pretty sure the others would say you're welcome to join us for any of it.
  19. What are you using for that? I use FarOut to keep from getting off track in the North Woods on the Ice Age Trail, especially when there's logging. But it never occurred to me that I should have my wife track me when I'm hiking (generally with hiking buddies; actually, not being tracked is half the fun). Not even sure FarOut has the function of allowing others to track and haven't looked into different means. Planning to do about half of the John Muir Trail next summer and we'll need a resupply at Kearsarge, so we could use some kind of tracker to coordinate. I guess he's off the trail now? How was it? Or are they taking their time?
  20. Every school can spend up to $20.5 million of its athletic revenue this year ... assuming they have said revenue ... on the athletes. NIL is separate. I haven't seen anything definitive on whether the Canady and Ojo contracts (if they are contracts) are Tech athletic revenue, NIL, or both. Regardless, there will be a lot of accounting tricks going on. Schools don't have to spend $20.5 million from revenue, especially if they don't have enough excess revenue. A lot of them won't. And they don't have to spend it equally among programs, which would seem to have some implications for Title IX. At the same time, Congress (having implemented Title IX and, now, revenue sharing) has set up itself, and the rest of us, for interesting times. They've admitted revenue is a huge part of what's driving all of this, when Title IX generally ignored the realities of which sports generated excess revenue (football and men's basketball -- and virtually nothing else, with very rare exceptions). Haven't seen some of this info before and it was AI generated, so take it for what it's worth: "The initial cap for this compensation is set at $20.5 million per institution for the 2025-26 academic year, based on 22% of the average revenue from Power 5 conference schools [emphasis mine]. This cap is projected to increase by roughly 4% annually, potentially reaching $33 million by 2035." Because it's average revenue from P5s, we know that below-average schools are going to have to be more creative. Those are just some of the reasons why this is so confusing. And interesting. As you noted, it's hell breaking loose.
  21. It appears that the CSC has taken it upon itself to define collectives as not providing a "real," profit-driven product or service; therefore, the collectives paying athletes to appear/post/etc. on behalf of the collective -- rather than on behalf of a business providing any other products/services to the public -- is not a valid business purpose. That's a point made over and over (and over and over) in that Reddit discussion and people still keep asking the question and giving that answer. While there's a certain logic behind that CSC definition, it ignores the fact that collectives ultimately do promote an underlying product/service (entertainment -- i.e., collegiate sporting events that depend on public interest and attendance). Streamers, rappers, etc., usually hawk products and services for outside entities. But the question becomes whether the middlemen (agencies, representatives -- the equivalent of NIL collectives) who employ endorsers to hawk stuff are, in general, providers of product/service themselves. Clearly, as middlemen in the marketing business, they are. It's a fine distinction that may not hold up, and the House attorneys now going after the CSC are doing what legal middlemen everywhere do: making money out of the business of law by arguing about definitions of stuff. And the money keeps flowing upward to the attorneys, the marketers, the elite athletes, elite programs (including the athletic directors and all those employed under them), yada yada yada. Maybe the CSC is just trying to prop up the disappearing belief that college sports are not a business, but an important educational activity driven by other purposes and values.
  22. Me too. Me too. I'm a thousand miles away and was so disconnected yesterday that I never heard of any of this until just before bed. My sister's down there at an HEB Foundation camp but thankfully well off the river. She missed the family 4th because she couldn't get out of Kerrville, but that's nothing. I've avoided this thread and board for the most part, but finally decided to check in because I realized the Surly community would probably be fairly well plugged in. I'm stunned by the extent, though. Annabelle, whoever and wherever you are, you're a hero. Thank you and everyone else for what you're doing for all our loved ones.
  23. Yep ... Tech came damn close to taking it in two games. If Canady didn't screw up that intentional walk, Tech may very well have done it, and basically with one purchased player. We may never see a more clear indication of how to buy a championship, and that's saying a lot after decades of watching OU and SEC football. My biggest question in all of this is not so much how things shake out athletically over the next couple of years, but how colleges and the public react to the realization that we've torn down the last big walls between higher education and complete professionalization of sport. Not many folks talking about that right now, but it's a sea change. I wonder how it's impacting things at Tech, where Campbell, as chair of the board of regents (who's also got a business to run) seems to put most of his concern and time into athletics. When the enrollment numbers really start dropping in the next couple of years, a lot of schools will be reassessing. The SEC and BIG won't suffer as much -- they'll just siphon off folks from the other schools. Tech and other second-tier schools will face interesting scenarios, as will all those lower-tier institutions.
  24. Riverfront Rendezvous in Stevens Point, WI. Bluegrass with Armchair Boogie, one of many great free bands to go with local beer over three days of festival. Happy Fourth to all.
  25. I'm torn between seeing this question as a serious one or trolling. Because of your post numbers, I'm leaning toward the idea that you're poking the bear here, but it's not a strong lean (and apologies in advance whether you're serious or if I've just let the joke fly over my head). Regardless, here's a link showing NCAA athletic revenue and expense data from 2024. Using $50 million in revenue as a cut-off figure, there were only 69 US universities who had at least that amount in 2024. Regardless, virtually every school listed the same expenditures as income. I suspect that once a school is anywhere below $100 million in revenue, sharing $20 million of that with the athletes directly is going to take some serious and painful shifting. That part won't be painful for Texas or Ohio State. Probably a lot more painful for Tech, Arizona, Arizona State and Kansas, all ranked in the 35-40ish range in revenue (likely BYU in here, too, but as a private, it wasn't listed). And once a school gets down to around $50 million total revenue, I'd guess they start taking a much harder look in the coming years at what intercollegiate competition means to them.
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