What's Another Number?

At my alma mater, Syracuse University, 44 is a magic number. It is Jim Bown, Ernie Davis, Floyd Little, Larry Csonka. The city changed its zip code to include "44" and the student phone exchange prefixes begin with 44.

Today, this Syracuse grad turned 44 with very little fanfare. I was in Clemson and got a call from the kids in the morning, singing "You're growing old, you have gray hair...and dirty underwear."

I didn't tell any of my crew, and despite a couple of odes to me on Twitter and Facebook, nobody noticed. I don't make a big deal about other people's birthdays (or any of the Hallmark holidays) so I don't expect any well wishes in return. It's not the roadmap to a healthy relationship (or maybe it is, I'm still figuring that all out).

The last day of February is just another day on the calendar, or as I learned today, Dean Smith's birthday. But he's 82, much closer to the median age of a Fox News viewer than I.

I did spend my day in Clemson with a great lunch at The Esso Club and a late dinner at 356 Sushi. In between was a very mundane win for North Carolina over Clemson. It was a pretty typical day on the road and never felt like a special day.

It's just another day and another year removed from my youth, never more evident than on a stop-over on a fun college campus. And it's a number that reminds me I haven't changed the world in any meaningful way.

Biggie Smalls kicked in the door, wavin' the four-four. I went quietly into March 2013.

An Alma Mater Hit and Run

I lived in the Northeast from when I was born until 2002. During that time I graduated from Syracuse University in 1991, and returned several times to cover college football and basketball games.

But since moving all over the country, I hadn't been back in 5 years and my 42 hours in town felt very familiar.

First, our group stayed at the Genesee Grande Hotel, which was the first hotel my Dad took me to when I first visited the campus in 1986. It was the Genesee Inn at the time, and a little more spartan than the boardroom suite I commanded on this trip.

We were there long enough to hit an excellent dinner at Phoebe's. And before heading to the Dome, I got my dome shorn up at a barber shop that was open at 7 AM on a Saturday.

I walked through campus to work, picked up some Orange gear for the kids, and remembered the 44-degree weather wouldn't be so cold without the 20 MPH winds, an observation I made many times in my 4-year (no summer classes, no 5th year) tenure.

Syracuse football is back on the map this year, with 7 wins and their first guaranteed winning season since 2001. And I was there to cover it - and in the press notes to prove it.

I'm sure my parents, who paid 6 figures in tuition, would've felt some sense of payoff for their investment. But as for the emotional investment in the football team, it was an uninspiring 23-6 loss to surging Connecticut.

There's always next year. Besides I never made it to Cosmo's - my first trip back to M Street without a signature tuna bomber.

Backtime Road Trip Day 12: Zoo Times Two

That stuff I said last week about New Yorkers being wimpy about the heat - that lasted until the Monday morning downpour. The rain didn't cool things off, just made things steamier.

Who knew a family trip to the Central Park Zoo would include the "Rain Forest" package free of charge.

The kids wondered where all the animals were, but they were only doing what all our instincts were telling us to do: find a shady spot and take a nap.

The penguins have the right idea for July. I know I told you the one about the guy who was supposed to take the penguins to the zoo, but he had some money left over, so he took them to the movies.

But others are just meant to triumph over the dog days of summer:

As evening rolled around, it was time to visit a very different zoo. This one located in a Rockwellian manor on an acre of land just off the Saw Mill Parkway in Mt. Kisco. But don't let the serene setting fool you.

Inside there was another kind of zoo, where two solo Dads armed only with their Syracuse education took on four little critters from dusk through dawn.

In this case, feeding the animals was required. And some fat and happy animals were successfully tamed.