I'm ready for some football!

Here's the thing. I don't have cable.

But I don't really watch much TV, so this doesn't pose much of a problem. Except for a small number of days a year, when it poses a BIG problem. And those days are upon us.

Fortunately, my gym has ESPN on one of the TVs in the cardio room. (Don't get me started on their poor channel selection and/or terrible/non-existent-on-most-the-machines sound hook ups.) And I have friends who have cable AND want to watch football with me. (Well, I assume I do. I still need to figure out who they are.)

Saturday afternoon, I watched most of the first half of the Texas game at the gym. Then down to DC to watch the BYU/Washington game with my good friend Rachel, who was visiting from Florida.

Monday night was the Boise State/Virginia Tech game, and I was really anticipating watching this one! My solution? I got to the gym shortly after the 8:00pm kickoff and parked myself on the elliptical right in front of the ESPN TV (and it actually had working sound connections! Score!), and pedaled during the entirety of the game. Except halftime. I took a short break to walk around, stretch, lift some weights, and get some water (a lot of water). When the game resumed, I was right back on there, pedaling and watching the game.

If I keep this up this season, I may be in the best shape ever by bowl season.

A couple things:

(a) I wear a heart rate monitor when I work out. By the end, it had recorded that my max HR was 180. (Too bad it didn't tell me WHEN that happened. Probably at the end.) I usually only achieve that when running sprints on the track. And watching heart attack inducing football, apparently. I noticed that my HR also jumped several times into the 170s during intense plays. Ha! (Makes me wonder where it would have gone had it not started already elevated.)

(b) I tried to be discrete, but sometimes I couldn't help it. Especially at the end. I had several reflexive outbursts. Fortunately, at the end when BSU scored their miracle touchdown, the cardio room was pretty empty.

(c) I'm really thankful the game didn't go into overtime. I could have kept going, but the gym closed at midnight and we were already pushing it on time. I was the last person to leave the cardio room.

(d) My feet really hurt by the end.

(e) And yet, when the game was over, I still stayed there to watch the highlight reel on Sports Center. (Which was pretty long, by the way. That game had a lot of highlights!)

(f) I'm really, really happy that Boise State won. :D

(g) I think I'm going to sleep really well tonight.

(And a picture to close: me and one of my favorite football buddies, back during our Austin days!! At a Longhorns game at DKR Memorial Stadium with Shaleen!)