Saturday, December 3, 2011

Bonus Road Trip- (6 of 10) Charleston, WV, to Charleston, SC





As we are posting this the West Virginia University's women's basketball team is beating Boston University 63-46 late in the second half at home in Morgantown. We mention this, even though the school is a good two and half hours north of the West Virginia state capital, because the team was giving away free mustaches to the first 1,000 fans in attendance. And, our image is of one of the home team Mountaineer's stand-out players Natalie Burton, a senior from Australia.

We also wish to extend our greetings to those of you who are reading this blog in Armenia and Mongolia today (yes, we are not making this up!). Of course, this means people in my own backyard are likely ignoring us.

Since we went with an image of the Mountaineers, we thought it was only fair to go with the mascot of the University of South Carolina Gamecocks, even though the school is in Columbia, which is about two hours from Charleston, SC.

If you are confused, you are not the only one. We believe that the Southern Atlantic League, a single-A minor league in baseball, decided two teams couldn't be called Charleston; so there is now the Charleston River Dogs, the team in South Carolina, and the West Virginia Power, for the team in West Virginia (obviously), which is perhaps one of the oddest names in all of sports. Assuredly, someone probably thinks it's also the name of a utilities industry.

Charleston, SC, was recently (and reportedly) named the best city to visit in North America by "Travel and Leisure," beating out the likes of San Francisco, New York, New Orleans and Montreal. Dinning is one of those main reasons, so we are chooing Magnolia's as our point of destination for the caostal town. Charleston, SC, is also the hometown of political comic/actor Stephen Colbert.

For the other Charleston, the one in West Virginia, we are simply going with Main Kwan Chinese Restaurant. Charleston, West Virginia, is also known for its music scene and the documentary film director Morgan Spurlock ("Supersize Me!") is from Beckley, W.Va., which is 45 miles south of West Virginia's capital.

So, is the distance between the two Charlestons?:

A) 8 hours even

B) 8 hours, 15 minutes

C) 8 hours, 30 minutes

D) 8 hours, 45 minutes

E) 9 hours even

SIDEBAR: We loved this tweet from Lorna Appleby, a resident of Vancouver, Canada, that was posted yesterday: "The main problem with hunting your own turkey is that the gun shots scare the other shoppers."

SIDEBAR TWO: We imagine that University of North Carolina men's basketball fans are bemoaning the Tarheels' 73-72 loss to the University of Kentucky Wildcats in Lexington, Ky. But, it was a much worse day for the men's basketball team from the New Jersey Institute of Technology; they lost to the Georgetown Hoyas 84-44 today.

No comments: