Kentucky blogging

This is another post filed under "and other ephemera", so consider yourself warned if you're looking for a lot of movie-related content. I haven't been to a theater since November 18, which might as well be considered a fast considering it's easily the longest movie-free stretch I've had all year. (If one wants to get all technical, which my brothers would surely insist upon doing, I have seen snatches of the DVDs playing on the team bus, although I've ignored most of those choices except for getting pulled into NAPOLEON DYNAMITE occasionally.)

Yesterday was a long day on the road from Memphis to Lexington. The experience must be akin to being on tour. When I arrive home, I'll have spent seven consecutive nights in seven different cities that span five states.

I've been surprised that all five hotels have provided free high-speed internet connections. Except for the one in Memphis, all of them have been wireless too. I suppose it's a necessity these days if you want to attract customers.

I don't travel a lot, but one thing I've noticed from these stays is that the size of the rooms are inversely proportional to the size of the cities. For instance, my room in Memphis was, at best, half the size of my room in Sulphur Springs, Texas. Biggest city, smallest accommodations. It makes sense, but I'd never given it any thought.

It's always nice to meet people you "know" but have never actually met--people you converse with in discussion groups but might not recognize if they were sitting next to you--and I had the good fortune to do that on Monday. Noel Murray and Donna Bowman are Arkansas-based critics. Both write for the Nashville Scene, and Noel's work can also be found in The Onion's AV Club. They were gracious enough to take me to dinner at a local Mexican place, a nice change of pace from a travel diet mostly consisting of fast food and continental breakfasts. The time we had was too short--I needed to get to Hendrix College to do the radio broadcast of Otterbein's basketball game--but it was my pleasure getting to meet them.

The last game is tonight at Transylvania University. If you must know, I probably won't be able to resist making at least one vampire joke. All this time away has probably been a good purging of all the cinema I've absorbed during 2005, making room for the onslaught that December brings. This year I'm receiving a fair number of "for your consideration" screeners, which are on top of the regular crop of theatrical moviegoing, so a break is good for hunkering down to make it through awards season.

(Addendum: My Otterbein basketball three-game recap is now online, for those so inclined.)