Six Crooked Highways

I don't have a lot of time on my hands, so I'm going to tell you what I can right now, and I'll fill in the rest next week.

NCAA Division III Cross Country Nationals took place on Saturday in Hanover, Indiana. Sixteen athletes (seven runners and one alternate for each gender), two coaches, and one athletic director flew there. The rest of us drove. According to the infallible Google Maps, Hanover is 874 miles and 13 hours, 56 minutes away from Middlebury by road. That wasn't too far of.

We did a similar thing last year to Terre Haute, Indiana, which is a little bit farther, so you could say we were experienced in the ways of the grueling road trip. This year, we got up just before 7:00 on Friday and drove all day to teammate Sebastian's house in New Albany, Ohio. With minimal stops, we got there around 8:00 pm. The car I was in consisted of Chuck, Mark, Brendan, and myself. Chuck doesn't have a license (island folk, psst), so we split driving three ways, and not equally. I did the most over the course of the trip. Brendan also did a lot. For the second straight year, I was the only one who did not at any point sleep in the car. Because I'm bad at doing that.

Sebastian, it ought to be known, is one of our top seven, so he flew out and therefore was not present as we descended upon his family. It also ought to be known that Sebastian is one crazy dude (and not coincidentally one of my all-time favorite human beings). We now understand where that came from. His dad is his spitting image, more in personality than in body, but that's more important anyway. His mom and siblings all have little parts of him, some more than others. Very nice people, very nice place to live. Ohio, just like every other place in the world, does not conform to all, or even most, of its stereotypes. (Except Boston. Boston absolutely conforms to its stereotypes. Don't let anyone ever tell you otherwise.)

On Saturday, we got up at 6:00 and drove to Hanover. On the way, we saw the beauty you see to the left of this text. More on that subject (i.e. crazy religious people leaving their mark on the landscape) later.

We then drove through Cincinatti and a small swath of Kentucky, which was a lot more topographically interesting than Ohio had been. The Ohio River Valley is a very cool place. On the north side, once you go far enough west, you're in Indiana, and there are a ton of ugly factories there (see picture), but none on the Kentucky side. Not sure why that is, but I'm sure there is a reason.

The race itself . . . could have gone better. The women got 3rd overall, and the men got 7th. Really good, but could have been better. The best part was a beyond beastly performance by our top guy, Greg. Best nationals performance in Midd history, actually.

On the way back, we stopped at the Creation Museum, which I alluded to earlier. And . . . I really don't have the time right now. I've spent too much already. I'll leave you with a picture of part of their gift shop. These little books are all titled "A Pocket Guide To _______".

Righto. Things I need to cover next week (more notes to me than to you):

• More on the Creation Museum. Lots to be said here.
• PKI (maybe).
• The weather. Both along Lake Erie and back at Midd.
• A record-smashing performance at Mt. SAC by the best male cross country runner in CdM history.
• Sunday FunDay. No, I shouldn't say anything about that here. Only that it happened, and it equalled its name, and more.