Alma Mater! I actually graduated from Fort Johnson the first year of its existence in 1970. We still had combined sports with James Island. The next year the two schools were AAA arch rivals which continued until they rejoined in 1982. The new school took one color from James Island (orange) and one from Fort Johnson (blue), and took the name from James Island (James Island High School) and the mascot from Fort Johnson (Trojans). Today, they are the James Island Charter High School Trojans and I have a niece, Katie, who was homecoming queen just a few years ago, and several other nieces and nephews who have graduated from there. I am proud that, in 1970, WE voted on the mascot, Trojans, soundly defeating the cobras!

Love the Trojans but will always be a RAM! And speaking of Rams . . .

. . . This drawing was discovered by the British in a prehistoric cave on James Island in the late 1700s during the Revolutionary War. It was unquestionably the inspiration for the RAM mascot of mid-twentieth century James Island High School. Go RAMS, 1968 State AAA Football Champions winning 9-8 over Woodruff in Spartanburg!

James Island High School Student Council, 1968. I'm on the top row, far left, the best looking guy out there!

My senior picture, in the Fort Johnson High School
Iliad, 1970. No wonder girls used to SWOON!

Three or four years later I was married and living in the
Sea Cabins on the Isle of Palms with my wife, surf board and fishing rod! What more could a man want!

"Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk, I'm a woman's man, no time to talk. . . ." from Stayin' Alive by the Bee Gees. Ushered in the disco era a couple years later in Columbia going to the University of South Carolina, Gamecock U! I'm standing next to my gorgeous black Cutlass Supreme with maroon landau top and bucket seats. Loved that car! I used to smoke three packs of cigarettes a day back then and loved every puff.
 

Soon quit smoking and started running. Ran four marathons and
around fifty 10Ks. This is me finishing my first marathon, the
Island Marathon on the Isle of Palms, in the early 1980s, when it was three loops through Wild Dunes. Today, the race is on Kiawah. I nailed my best marathon time this day -- 3 hours, 23 minutes -- which averages to 26.2 seven-minute-and-forty-five-second miles, though my first miles were much faster (around 6 minutes), and my last miles, after hitting the wall, much slower. I was in my early thirties. I wish I had bought the photograph above but thank GOD I found this proof! Photos like this are why God created Photoshop!

The Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, DC a few months later. Drank too much scotch two nights before with my brother, Ricky, and an old guy from England, and was still severely hung over.

Another picture of the Marine Corps Marathon. It ended in
Arlington National Cemetery. I took that American flag from my headband and held it high above my head as I crossed the finish line to the wild cheering of scores of United States Marines helping with the race.

Was fascinated by acting for a lot of years and thought hard about going for it. In this picture, I'm an Irish gigolo, McDermott, and I'm sword fighting with the leading man in Workshop Theatre's The Royal Family, Columbia, SC in 1989. Also did several episodes of Crime to Court for SCETV. My oldest son, Trey, was a baby just a few months old when this play took place and was an actor in the play, same as his mother and I! The script called for a baby to come on and be oogled over at the end, and ex-wife Donna did an outstanding job having Trey fed and napped so that during the entire two-and-a-half week run, he did not cry a single time! He was adorable on stage in front of hundreds of people.

I've done 15 Bridge Runs in a row and 21 overall. My best time was 41:12 across the old Old Bridge in the mid-1980s, soundly whipping a friend of mine, Dennis, who tried to catch me at the finish chute. He was coming up on my left, trying to sneak past me at the very end, but I caught him out the corner of my eye and turned on the afterburners and smoked him! We had a great rivalry.

My two boys, Trey and Travis, and I were written up in Bridge Run Magazine in 2005 for running 10 Bridge Runs in a row. I started Travis when he was two-years-old, on my shoulders most of the way. The Bridge Run is a sacred tradition for us staring with Chumbawumba's Tubthumper ("I get knocked down, but I get up again!...") loud at 4 a.m. race day.

I make the newspaper at a running clinic in Mt. Pleasant! David Quick, the Post and Courier's running and fitness writer, is also an outstanding runner and excellent journalist on all things running.

Gutting out the last mile on King Street in the 2009 Bridge Run, camera in hand. I shot video of 2009 and 2010 from inside the race, stopping for a moment at every mile marker to shoot a clip and especially shooting the great BANDS that played along the way in 2010. Both videos feature my world famous KICK which is 2/10ths of a mile of flat-out hauling butt inside the pack toward the finish line, from the 6 mile mark to the end.
 

Ran this ad in various publications in 2006 when working at Prudential Carolina, the Wappoo Creek office.
 

Self-portrait of my girlfriend Frances, and I, on a windy day at Folly Beach a couple years ago, the east end down by the lighthouse. She was the last president of Condon's Department Store. She owns Condon's Bridal Boutique, which was spun out of Condon's Department Store when it closed. If you are getting married or know someone who is, Frances is exceptional in the bridal business and would love to help you. Her boutique is the only place in Charleston where one can get the popular and gorgeous Alfred Angelo wedding gown line. Please visit her website at www.CondonsBridalBoutique.com or go by the boutique at 1901 Ashley River Road, just down from Total Wine and Barnes & Noble, by the Crab Shack.

VIDEO, including the singing of our FABULOUS alma mater
at the James Island High School RAM Reunion August 21, 2010