Bonus Road Trip (7 of 10)- Columbia, Mo., to The Indepence Bowl

Since we originally started the Road Trip series back in the spring of this year, we set out to try and cover every state, including Alaska and Hawaii (for the Aloha State, we used a short drive on the island of Maui). And, we think got all the states except for possibly Missouri.

So, we are including the Show Me State here just to be 100-percent certain. Since we are sort of based in North Carolina, this may seem like high treason as the University of North Carolina Tarheels will face the Missouri Tigers for the Independence Bowl in Shreveport, La.

This is actually an early bowl as it will be played on Monday, Dec. 26, at 5:00 p.m./Chapel Hill, NC, time.

For this entry, we chose two Mexican restaurants as our points of destination. La Siesta on North 9th Street in Columbia, Missori, the city where the Tigers are based, is the Mexican restaurant for Mizzou. And, for Shreveport, we have chosen Superior Grill, which also has three other restaurants in Louisiana and one in Alabama. In Sheveport, the restaurant can be found on Lime Avenue.

If you are in Chapel Hill, NC, we saw that our friends at the Turkish restaurant Tallula's on Franklin Street about 15 hours and 30 minutes from the Superior Grill in Shreveport, La.

But, we are looking for the distance between Columbia and Shreveport; and the answer is:

A) 9 hours, 45 minutes

B) 10 hours

C) 10 hours, 15 minutes

D) 10 hours, 30 minutes

E) 10 hours, 45 minutes

SIDEBAR ONE: Lots of books with very long titles are out these days, including this one we saw mentioned in "Rolling Stone" and later at a book retailer in Washington, DC: "Free Ride: How Digital Media Parasites Are Destroying the Cultural Business, and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back" by Robert Levine, who is also a contributing editor to "Rolling Stone."

SIDEBAR TWO: We love headlines from the satirical news publication "The Onion," and this header from today's edition was as always quite funny and very dark: "(Detroit) Tigers Sign Jim Leyland Through His Death in 2012."

It should be pointed out that the legendary baseball manager Jim Leyland is alive and well; in fact, he turned 67 on Dec. 15th.

Special Quote of the Week- Dominique Dawes

Today, in honor of Black History Month, we are going to start a month-long series of quotes from African-American athletes, past and present.

In may sports, an athlete can still compete at age 34, but that's not the case with gymnastics!

Nevertheless, Dominique Dawes, who won Olympic gold at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, is still very active in the public speaking circuit.

Her alma mater, the University of Maryland (Dawes did not compete for the school) faces their EAGL rivals from the University of North Carolina on Saturday. The meet between the Terps and the 'Heels will be at 7:00 p.m. in Chapel Hill.

Last week, Maryland finished third (in a four-school meet) in Ann Arbor, Mich., in which the host Wolverines won. But, the Terps had standout performances from Kesley Cofsky, who scored a 9.8 on bars. Gymnasts Kaitlin Joseph and Ally Krikorian scored a 9.7 each on the same apparatus.

As for UNC, the 'Heels beat William and Mary at home last week with solid scores from Morgan Evans, Elizabeth Durkac (who happens to be from Yorktown, Va., which is near the campus of William and Mary) and Emily Cornwell. Alas, our favorite Tarheel gymnast Christine Nguyen graduated last year.

Dawes has been very vocal about the need for young women to view themselves positively and her quote here certainly reflects that:

"I found through research that between 50 and 70 percent of young girls who describe themselves as overweight are actually normal weight."