Vandy Beats #6 South Carolina!

These are the days for which Vandy fans live. Many of us have learned to live with victories like this for an entire season, or sometimes much longer. For the first time in seventy years, Vandy has beaten a sixth ranked team. That previous victory was a 7-6 win against LSU in 1937. This is also Vanderbilt's first victory against coach Steve Spurrier, who began his fourteen game streak as the Duke coach in 1987. Not enough sevens for you? Well how about the final score today: 17-6.

It is the first victory against the Gamecocks since 1999 when Widenhofer was the head coach. South Carolina is now out of contention for the national title since they now have two losses. It is the second upset of the week with number two South Florida falling to Rutgers on Thursday night.

Coach Bobby Johnson has put together a great football team. It is hard not to be excited as a Vandy time. We beat Tennessee in 2005, Georgia in 2006, and now #6 South Carolina with still plenty of games left in the season. This is even more impressive considering all of Vandy's opponents in the SEC East division are in the top 25 this week.

The 'Dores need two more wins to be bowl-eligible, which is something they haven't been since 1982. The path won't be easy. The remaining conference games are against Florida, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Out of conference games are against Miami of Ohio and Wake Forest. Still there is a chance and a hope and that is all a Vandy fan needs.

Read more at my Vandy Football site.

Thoughts on the Vandy-Georgia Game

It was another heartbreaking loss for yours truly and the fellow Vanderbilt fans (the few but faithful). Vandy was leading 17-10 at the half, just like South Florida was against Rutgers last night. Unfortunately, both Vandy and South Florida suffered defeat when the game was over.

In hindsight, I am still proud of how the Commodores played during this nationally televised game. Unlike Vandy teams from a few years ago, we did not seem like an inferior team. There weren't many boneheaded calls or head shaking blunders in play execution. Granted the two fumbles we had, especially the one by Jackson-Garrison in the UGA red zone late in the fourth quarter, were very costly. But even the best of teams can fumble the ball a couple of times. Match that with only four penalties for 16 yards and you have a pretty good game.

QB Chris Nickson continues to have a disappointing year, going only two-of-five for a paltry six yards. The good news is that sophomore Mackenzie Adams had a strong showing with seven completions on ten throws for 125 yards and 46 yards rushing including a 21 yard run. I strongly disagree with Coach Johnson's decision to swap quarterbacks throughout the game. Adams was clearly having the better game and putting in Nickson just disrupted the flow and caused many three-and-outs.

D.J. Moore was very impressive with his kickoff returns and the double-reverse touchdown with Walker in the first half. On defense, senior middle linebacker Jonathan Goff continued to show why he is considered one of the top five linebackers in the upcoming NFL draft. He racked up 14 tackles, including 12 solos.

There was some confusion in the press following the game. Initial reports had that UGA coach Mark Richt and Coach Johnson were yelling at each other during the post-game handshake. In reality, it was Richt yelling at his players to stop dancing on the Vanderbilt star logo at mid-field as it was unacceptable and disrespectful behavior. I have a lot of respect for Richt and I suppose I should be upset at this incident. But the way I see it, for the Bulldogs to do that means we had them worried about losing this game. They didn't see us as the doormat of the SEC. I like that.

Fun & Free Halloween Games

Looking to get into the mood for Halloween? This fun, free, and family-friendly game is worth checking out: http://www.ytv.com/gamepad/play/games/jinx/episode1/play.asp

Here is one imitating the 1980's cartoon arcade game, Dragon's Lair - but in stick figure form. A lot of fun: http://www.studiohunty.com/dungeon/

A Billion Dollar Redo

In case you missed it, Disney announced that they will be spending around $1.1 billion to remake Disney's California Adventure. This is the theme park they built right next to the original Disneyland in the hopes of making the area a mini Walt Disney World (WDW).

This new park was originally intended to be the Epcot of the West Coast (dubbed Westcot). However, when then CEO Michael Eisner met with his senior executives together in Aspen, Colorado, they decided to change course. What resulted was a theme park concept utterly devoid of anything related to Walt Disney or the company he founded. When it opened in 2001, it's headlining attractions were a vegetable garden, a tortilla factory, and carnival rides including a roller coaster.

This last element particularly disgusted me when I learned of it. Those who have read any of the many Walt Disney biographies know that it was the insipid and nasty carnival rides that provided the creative spark that eventually resulted in Disneyland. Even the concept itself was prima facie a failure. Disneyland draws primarily from its local region of California and the West Coast (as opposed to WDW, which is truly global). Why in the world would people living in or near California want to pay $66 for a synthetic California experience when the real one is right there? It is almost as if these executives intentionally decided to do everything the opposite of what Walt did half a century ago. Why are they surprised it has been such a spectacular failure?

Now their $1.1 billion dollar investment needs another $1.1 billion dollars in renovations. This time the renovations will focus on infusing Walt and Pixar themes all over the place. While I think this is a step in the right direction, do we really need Cars land? It's a great movie and all, but I don't think its smart to dedicate an entire land to just one film.

Time will tell if they can turn things around. I think their best move is to convert it over to something like the Disney-MGM studios in Orlando, but focus it more heavily on Walt Disney.

You can read the news article here.

A New Blog: Biztory

I've started a new blog today. This one, called Biztory, looks to draw analogies from history on how to survive and succeed in the business world.

Take a look and leave a comment on what you think!

http://biztory.blogspot.com/

My Haunted Yard

Okay, so apparently I have an audience for my blog and have been fussed at for going too long without a posting. So I will fix the situation now! It's not like I haven't been busy. In fact one project I recently finished is the subject of this post.

I love decorating the house and yard for Halloween. It's the one "holiday" where I can really get creative. One dream job I've always had was being an Imagineer for Disney. So, I use this opportunity to try my own hand at creating an entertaining environment. My challenge is coming up with ideas that aren't gory. I want my work to be family and kid-friendly, but still spooky, like Disney's Haunted Mansion.

You can find plenty of Web sites of people with similar Halloween decorating interests. You should see this huge list of projects! It can be a little overwhelming, so I just pick one or two projects to try out each year. This year's project is a graveyard fence.

You can see all my work on my Web site: The Haunted Yard.