LIVE BLOG: Walking 16 miles to Downtown Cleveland...again: FINAL UPDATE: 2:25 pm

So today we're going to try something different.

I plan to walk this morning from my house in the beautiful metropolis of Wickliffe, Ohio, to Tower City in not-quite-as-beautiful-but-still-nice downtown Cleveland, Ohio. A distance of about 16 miles.

I've taken this walk twice before. I actually enjoy the experience, particularly having several hours with just me and the iPod.

Only this time I'm going to chronicle the journey for anyone who, for whatever reason, might care. Check back here throughout the morning as I attempt to navigate the thumb-breaking process of Blogging by Smart Phone while I walk.

I'll post updates throughout the trip, which I expect to begin around 8:30 a.m. EDT and to take somewhere in the neighborhood of four hours.

I'll try and change the headline to this post every time I update it (with the approximate time of the update). That's assuming I can walk and type at the same time without killing myself and others.

I hope you'll join me!

8:29 am -  And we're off! Game time temperature: 41 degrees. The shorts may or may not have been a good idea...

8:43 am - Are we there yet? Walking and typing = hard.

9:14 am - 3.16 miles down. About 14:15/mile. No chafing. Yet. Hello,  Richmond Heights!

9:54 am - Will be meeting my wife and daughter for lunch at Tower City.  Brought snacks, but that Subway sub sounds awfully good about now. 5.75 miles covered in 1:23.

10:45 am - In beautiful Cleveland Heights. Always seems like a nice place. Also, I have to pee. 9.01 miles down.

11:15 am - Crossing into the City of Cleveland proper. Next up: Little Italy. 11.06 miles covered.

Noon - East 71st and Euclid. Legs hurt a little. 13.72 miles down. People looking at me strangely. Need a second wind!

12:45 pm - Done! 16.58 miles. 4 hours, 10 minutes. Just over 15:00/mile for the walk. Let's eat.


FINAL UPDATE 2:25 P.M. - SAFE AND SOUND AT HOME:
Terry, Elissa and I had a very nice lunch. We dropped Elissa off back at her dorm (she joined me for the last mile or so of the walk) then drove back here to Wickliffe. My quadriceps muscles are killing me. Good gracious they hurt. Hamstrings, calves, etc. are all fine, just the quads. Ouch. That's going to take a few days to recover from.

I have to say that while it was fun, I have to retire that particular walk after three successful attempts. It's not the safest route (parts of it, anyway), and I think I want a new challenge. Maybe a 20-miler. We'll see. In the meantime, thanks for checking in! We'll see you tomorrow for a post in which I mindlessly complain about red lights...

People sure do love their daddy-daughter songs...

I find this amazing:

The second-most-read post in the history of this blog is, for reasons I cannot fathom, one titled "Street Walking," which I wrote last year after I walked 17 miles to work. It has received 837 page views, meaning that particular page has been viewed 837 separate times.

OK, fine.

What, then, is the most-read post in the history of this blog? That would be one headlined "Five Songs That Make Dads of Daughters Start Blubbering," which appeared here a little over a year ago on April 6, 2012. That was one where I listed five of the top daddy-daughter songs that are sure to bring on the tears. Fun, a little sentimental, but certainly nothing special.

Or at least I thought so.

How many page views has that daddy-daughter post received? In a little more than a year, that one post has been viewed 9,319 times. Yes, 9,319 (or 11 times more frequently than the second-most-read post).

I cannot begin to explain this. Or I suppose I can. But it would be a total guess.

For one thing, the daddy-daughter bond is a sacred one. Dads love their sons, no doubt, but their love for their daughters is, while no more intense than what they feel for their boys, different. It's just different.

It's a clinging, protective bond, and our society encourages it. It expects dads to hate their daughters' boyfriends. It expects them to put their little princesses on a pedestal. It expects them always to look on their daughters as "Daddy's Little Girl."

I'm not sure if this is all good or bad. But I do know that people are interested in getting ideas for daddy-daughter songs, and I can only assume it's to play at weddings or other special family events. I mean, really, why else do you need a daddy-daughter song?

Other than to start crying randomly as you're driving along and, say, Bob Carlisle's "Butterfly Kisses" comes on the radio. Or at least that's what I've heard. From a friend.

Go to Google and search for any of the following phrases, and you'll see this little blog appear on the first page of results for all of them (or at least the last time I checked it did):

• "daddy daughter songs"
• "songs about daughters"
• "songs about dads and daughters"
• "songs about fathers and daughters"
• "songs about daughters and dads"
• "songs about daughters growing up"
• "songs for dads from daughters"
• "songs from daughters to fathers"
• "songs for dads and daughters"

Like many webmasters and bloggers, I use Google's popular Analytics tool to keep track of visitors to "They Still Call Me Daddy." It tells me how long you all spend on the blog, what you read most, where you live, what operating systems you're using, what links or websites brought you here, etc.

I don't even bother checking the section of Analytics that tells me which search engine keywords bring the most traffic to my blog. Because it's always (always) those phrases above.

I would like to think that sometime in the past year, a wedding has taken place somewhere in the world that featured one of the five songs from my list. And that the bride and groom secretly thank me for making their special day perfect with the ideal Father-Daughter Dance song.

I will, in the interest of making their joy complete, accept a cash donation in return for this service. It's the least I can do.