And the crowd goes wild!

Roughly 300 days after the contract was signed, I'm thrilled to announce the first-year editions of the Huddle Up series (2009) are done and turned in to my publisher, Triumph Books. The last, Alabama, easily beat the March 1 deadline and was completed at about 3 a.m.

For those of you scoring at home (I still love that cliche), that's nine versions: Alabama, Georgia, Michigan, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and the New York Giants.

They add up to 376,732 words. To put that into perspective, my last book "100 Things" was roughly 70,000 words, and "Who's No. 1?" was 122,794.

After a nice celebration later this week, I'll start putting together the bonus version, Auburn. I've also already decided on which editions I'll be pitching to add for 2010, but I'll save that for another time. I'm exhausted, time to crash.

Oklahoma DONE!

Whew! ... and I mean that.

The 2009 editions of Huddle Up (my handbook series on college football, with one pro football edition) is drawing to a close and right on schedule.

Not only am I on pace to beat the March 1 deadline, but poised to get the extra Auburn edition done around mid-March. Considering how late I've been up the last couple of nights, I'm thrilled, and ready for a break, even if it's only for a day or two while I concentrate on some things for work.

The last edition is Alabama, which theoretically should be the easiest to polish off (and yes, that was by design). This was also the prototype for the entire series, so I'm kind of curious to see how things have changed from the initial pilot version, if you will.

A quick note, of all the versions so far, Oklahoma was by far the hardest when it came to finding certain information, confirming items, and finding second and third sources. Go figure.

Texas Done!

Another brutal week. In addition to finishing the Texas book late Friday night, I also had a nasty case of bronchitis, which is still lingering around a bit. Pretty much all I want to do is sleep, although at this point I think that's more from the antibiotic I'm on than anything else.

Yuck.

I kind of wish I had the same "What, me worry?" look as Bevo here, but I did manage to get through the week without having to use a sick day. Of course, that means this next week is going to be rough.

Oklahoma this week, then, finally, Alabama for the home stretch.

Ohio State Done!

What an unbelievably brutal week. In addition to National Signing Day and the first of two deadlines on the Huddle Up series, I also had to try and keep up with getting the next one done.

Ohio State is now officially signed, sealed, delivered.

That leaves Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama and Auburn to go, and then I'll be looking like Jim Tressel here only without the sweater vest.

By the way, the first four editions (Tennessee, Georgia, Michigan, Notre Dame and the New York Giants), totaled 205,264 words. That's a lot.

Special delivery

It's 1 a.m. Wednesday night, oops, Thursday morning, and I have somehow managed to survive both National Signing Day (which is an absolute nightmare for sportswriters in the Deep South), and the first of two deadlines in the Huddle Up series.

As I sit here and sip an adult beverage in celebration/relief, I'm happy to report that I turned in four editions (Georgia, Tennessee, Michigan and Notre Dame) on time, and an extra one as well (New York Giants).

I'm on target to finish Ohio State during the next day or two, and will then get started on the two Big XII versions, Oklahoma and Texas. Unbelievable, but I'm thrilled to get past such a huge hurdle, and can't wait to finish the whole thing.

P.S. For those of you who are doing "25 Random Things" on Facebook, here's one I missed on mine, I had a relative (I believe it was my great grandfather) who rode for the Pony Express.