Is anyone else following that Sox fan who's hiking the Appalachian Trail? I found out about it through Joy of Sox (check the March archives). I guess the dude is a SoSH poster, and he wanted to change his lazy lifestyle, starting (!) by suddenly making the 2,000-some-odd-mile trek. I've always wanted to say "some-odd." Anyway, I'm glad this person decided to do something about his situation, and quite impressed that he hoisted his middle finger straight up at the average workaday American lifestyle.

However: I've noticed that since he started his hike a month ago, he's been eating at Domino's, he's eatin' McDonald's, he's staying at Super 8 and Clarion motels, he's drinkin' more Coke than water... isn't this kind of cheating?

I live a mile from work, and I walk there and back every day. I've probably walked as much as he has this month, and I can go to Domino's and McDonald's right here in my neighborhood. All while earning money, going to Red Sox games, etc. I'm just saying, maybe a treadmill would've sufficed for this man.

I have to say that I'm a little worried about him. It's quite amusing reading his tales--he seems to be the "Bad News Bears" of hiking: Not being able to find the trail on the first day, then going down the wrong one; breaking his flashlight the first night; not having enough tent poles and having to use his jackknife to keep the tent up. But for this guy to not get eaten by a bear--or at least have a bear take all his clothes, leaving him to hike naked and then realize he's going in circles--would be a miracle.

I also imagine him hearing whipping noises and children screaming in the night, then finding a piece of Josh's flannel with eye-gut inside.

I just wonder if he's going to make it all the way. The way I see it, the trail is about 2,000 miles long, and the trip is supposed to take about 200 days. That's ten miles a day, a rate he's doing about half of. I think. Oh, and he's going north. Springer, Georgia to Maine. (If only the finishing point was called Drinkwater, Maine.) So he better get a move on. You don't want to be in Maine, well, you don't really ever want to be in Maine, but you definitely don't want to get stuck in the woods in Maine past October.

But, hey, there's always the Super 8.