Another Week, Another Project

With Cherry back at home now, we've started fleshing out the house to make it look more like a home instead of the vast 1900 square foot cave that it was for the last few years. Hence, the new living room set, re-mulching, and the mulch-bed borders.

Well, we undertook another small project this past weekend. Our house has a small screened-in patio overlooking the lake. Up until yesterday, said small screened-in patio has been devoid of any form of seating or furnishings. In this time of year, it's especially nice to sit outside, so we started looking for patio set to take advantage of the remainder of our 70 degree Florida winter!

After going to my first company photography club meeting, we headed to Bed, Bath and Beyond and found the patio set for us - a six-piece set including two lounge chairs, two ottomans, a loveseat, and a coffee table. Amazingly enough, all of this fit in the back of my super-snazzy Scion tC, with the hatch totally shut! We had to scoot up the front seats a bit, but it is still pretty impressive that I was able to squeeze six pieces of furniture into the little car.

Of course, that was due largely to the fact that the set was in pieces requiring fairly substantial assembly:

But now, we can enjoy a nice cup of hot cocoa or Vita-Mix blended fruit-and-veggie smoothie in the comfort of our own patio!

Comfy!

Who Needs a Smart Phone?

I recently missed out on getting my very first smart phone for the fantastic price of FREE. However, since I had already gotten my Samsung SHG-t349, it didn't make much sense to get another phone, especially since I am not quite ready to make the jump to pay an extra $10-$30 per month for a data plan.


That said, I still did what all men (and women) do - covet what I didn't have. Namely, the convenience of being able to look up information on the Internet on the fly and having GPS in your pocket at all times (a convenience that I admittedly scoffed at less than two years ago but have since grown to understand and appreciate its indispensability).


As I coveted, I decided to try to make the best of it with my SGH-t349, which, by the way, gets a both thumbs way, way up from me in spite of the fact that it isn't a smartphone by any stretch of the imagination. As it were, my new phone (also acquired at the fantastic price of FREE) has full e-mail support for non-business e-mail (which is both a curse and a blessing), full support for chat using AIM, MSN, and Yahoo! chat networks, a music player (made especially cool with the ability to assign songs individual ringtones and alarm tones), SDHC support (making storing music/photos/other media a breeze), a Blackberry-like TruType quasi-QWERTY keyboard that makes texting super easy, and contact list syncing with the T-Mobile website, making it very easy to update and manage my contact list.

Still, I wished deep down for the cababilities of the snazzy smartphones my co-workers and classmates sported. And then, I discovered the enormous capabilities of text messages. As the article below states, text messaging is not just for teenagers to OMG their way to the mall and back ROFLMAO the whole way. No, it has evolved (and for quite some time, I might add - I'm just slow to the party) into a very developed information system, rendering the economically driven decision of not going with a smart phone even better.

Take, for instance, that AT&T commercial where Luke Wilson touts their network's superiority over that of Verizon because of their service's ability to allow their callers to look up the capital of Peru whilst on a phone call. Well, believe it or not, with just a plain ol' texting phone, I can do the same thing! While on a call, I can send a text to GOOGLE (466453) that reads "Capital of Peru", and within seconds, Google will send me the same reply The Godfather got, and even tell me where its source was (in this case, Wikipedia - go figure!)


What about synced scheduling? Plain-Jane text messaging has got that covered too! Just text "Next", "day" or "nday" to GEVENT (48368) to pull your next appointment, the appointments for the day, or the appointments for the next day from your Google Calendar. You can also create events easily - just text a message stating time, date, and place, to GEVENT and Google Calendar will create an event for you on the spot! Want reminders? Set up your Google Calendar to send SMS alerts and you're golden!


All fine and dandy, but then you say, oh yeah? What about directions? Once again, Google comes to the rescue. Text your starting and ending destinations to GOOGLE and Google will text you back turn-by-turn directions in seconds.

Wondering if it's raining at your destination? Text "w" followed by the city and Google returns a brief forecast. Looking for a restaurant? Text "Italian" followed by your zip code and it will text you back a list of nearby Italian places.

And this is all just using Google-related texting tricks. Social websites like Facebook allow you to receive status updates in the form of SMS messages and update your own status through text messages. Blogger has let me post photos and blog entries by text for years. The article below goes over several other tricks that can hold you over in case you don't yet want to spend hundreds of dollars on a data plan and a smart phone! Check 'em out if you're a dinosaur like me!

Killer SMS Text Message Tricks

Koi!

Big fish in the pond in the courtyard at work!

Say Farewell to the All Season Tree!

One of the nice things about living in Florida is the great weather we get during months where the rest of the country is freezing their delicate parts off. That said, we had an unusual two week stretch this year where temperatures remained in the 20-30 degree range, and not just at night - all day! There were even reports of snowflakes in the Cape Canaveral area!

Though it didn't get as cold where I live, I still got to see the "season change" for once. You see, many of the former Northerners that live down here complain that they never get to see the seasons change in Florida, referring of course to the leaves turning red and the grass turning brown. Well, we got to see both, as the weather shocked our lawns!

Fortunately, the weather warmed right back up to the high 70s within a few weeks, making it ideal time to get yet some more projects around the house done. For literally years, I resisted Cherry's pleading to place brick borders around our mulch beds, citing their insane heaviness and the sheer number of bricks we'd have to buy. Well, I finally gave in and I was wrong about neither the heaviness of the bricks nor the number of bricks we had to buy. I pretty much knew the cashiers and loaders at Lowe's by name by the time we were through with the project. But after 6 hours and over 120 bricks, it is now complete, and it looks pretty good! And as a side bonus, I'll finally be able to keep the grass from growing into the mulch beds!

My latest project is far less ambitious, but significant nonetheless. Visitors to our house no doubt have seen our "All Season Tree", the artificial Christmas tree we got during our first winter in the new house which I never took down after that holiday season. As a result, it adorned one corner of the family room for years until we moved our new furniture into that room, at which point we moved the tree to the living room. I finally got up the nerve to put it away and try to move it into the attic, but I wasn't able to negotiate my way into the attic with a 7" tree, so we just boxed it up and relegated it to the garage. But now, there is a big open space in my living room!

Guess I'll have to keep an eye out for something else to put there!

Hype 1, Trying to Resist the Bandwagon 0

Today's post is being brought to you by Windows Live Writer, a neat web-publishing tool included with the ailing Windows Vista Ultimate operating system. To be honest, I never truly understood why Vista didn't turn out as good as hoped, and, having had a brief glimpse of Windows 7, I'm not sure I see all that much benefit with that either, but that's likely as much due to my lack of computer smarts as anything.

Alternatively, it's possible that my personality just tries not to buy into the hype all the time. Case in point, the film Avatar. I first saw trailers for it several months ago when Cherry and I went to see the woefully over-the-top 2012.

Much like 2012, the trailers showed a film that looked to be incredibly over-the-top, littered with special effects. In other words, it seemed to be yet another case of "All style and no substance" that is often the case not only in films, but also in other forms of expression and entertainment, including my own passions of martial arts and video games. Who hasn't seen a martial arts form that is "just for show" or played a video game that had pretty graphics but crappy gameplay and/or story?

Well, despite my efforts to stay off of the bandwagon (fortunately for us, we fared pretty well against the whole Twilight phenomenon), we finally went to see Avatar this evening. And in 3D, no less. Actually, it was Cherry's second time, since she had just watched it with her friend Anna earlier this week in Gainesville.

I'm not sure how much of it had to do with coming in with low expectations, but, all said and done, I was very impressed with the movie! Of all things, I actually think the 3D bit was the main point of complaint for me - I honestly think it would have looked even better without the muted colors and occasional floating objects. That said, the production values are simply through the roof. The environments are gorgeous, and the soundtrack top-notch.

But, of course, pretty picture and nice music make not a great film. The story was something of a cross between the classic Dances with Wolves and perhaps Star Wars or another similar science fantasy film. It sends a nice message about conservationism and respecting others' cultures (and I'm usually not much of a sucker for those tree-hugger type themes) and has a nice mix of romantic sub-plots and epic battles, all in a fictional world that is lovingly developed, not unlike that of the Star Wars saga, complete with alien languages, cultures, and flora and fauna.

I spent a good deal of effort thinking of loopholes or scientific inaccuracies, but from this engineer's mind, while there were some pretty far-reaching concepts, I actually think that, in theory, much of the science touched upon in the movie is actually possible, and the film does a great job reconciling possible loopholes.

All said and done, it was a good 2 hours and 45 minutes spent, and it has my vote for the best film of 2009! Give in to the hype and go see it!

Winter Break 2009, Part III

On the last day of our short trip, we headed back East, but not before first stopping at a nature center called the Conservancy of Southwest Florida. This nature preserve is currently under reconstruction, so we got free admission. Inside, a bunch of volunteer guides educated visitors about reviving the various ecosystems that comprise the Everglades, Big Cypress, and Biscayne national parks as well as about much of the wildlife in the area, particularly snakes and seat turtles!


The main event at the Conservancy, however, was a canoe trip that ended up being a kayak trip. Mom and Dad took one two-seater kayak and Melinda and Cherry took a second two-seater karak, while I went solo. The trip was unguided, so we were left to our own devices to navigate the Gordon River without flushing ourselves out into the Gulf of Mexico. After about an hour and a half of paddling, we turned back towards the Conservancy, but Cherry and Melinda were so burned out that they latched their kayak to the back of mine and I towed them back!


We had actually planned one additional activity after the kayak trip - we wanted to go for an airboat ride in the Everglades - but due to some poor planning, that didn't happen, and instead, we headed back home to Boca to watch the strange movie, [500] Days of Summer, and otherwise get some rest.

We stayed in Boca for a New Years' eve party at my parents' friends' house, then stayed through New Years' Day, when we watched the Gators trounce Cincinnati in the Sugar Bowl. The day after, we decided that we had to get some Dim Sum while in South Florida, so we stuffed ourselves silly at the renowned Toa Toa restaurant. Full as we were, we stayed for an one last night before heading back to Melbourne!

Winter Break 2009, Part II

In my mad rush to try on my new Mario pants, I managed to wash my cellphone and cease it from working. So, I invoked my right to a free upgrade and got a new Samsung SGH-T349! w00t! Of course, I started personalizing it right away, starting by making my ringtone the classic theme song from Chrono Trigger!


Anyhow, on with the story!

Dad left the day after Christmas leaving Melinda behind to stay with us for the next couple of days.

The first day was pretty uneventful, with us spending a lot of time playing Wii Sports Resort and not much else. Day 2, however, I took advantage of having an extra body around the house and we set out on a mission to clean up my shrubberies (including the decapitation of the sick-looking tree in my backyard) and re-mulch the mulch beds. Melinda, not known for expending energy for physical tasks, even contributed. I took the photo below to commemorate this rare occurence:


With the mulch beds looking satisfactorily red, we were instructed to get back down to South Florida early the next day so that Melinda could get an extra dance practice in. After dropping her off at the dance teacher's house, Cherry and I headed to the mall in Wellington, a nice, big mall unlike the one we have in Melbourne. We picked up a few things, then went back home for dinner with the family.

Early next morning, we would embark on what would be one of the more physically demanding family trips we've gone on in recent years. We piled into the van and headed southwest to Shark Valley in the Everglades National Park. Despite its name, there are no sharks in Shark Valley. Rather, there are tons of birds and more than its fair share of alligators! There are a few ways to tour Shark Valley's 15-mile-loop - by tram, on foot, or by bike! We opted to go for the bike ride:



At the midway point of the loop, there was an observation tower highly reminiscent of the one Cherry and I visited at the Great Smoky Mountains last Fall:



After three long hours of riding, we arrived back at the Visitor's Center to accomplish those most important tasks of getting our National Park Passports stamped and collecting our Junior Ranger badges for the Everglades National Park!


Our next stop was an adjacent National Reserve, the Big Cypress National Reserve, where we were able to get yet another stamp for our National Park Passports, which, despite being right next to the Everglades, featured much heavier forestation with their signature tall cypress trees, some different birds and wildlife, and even a Bald Eagle's nest! Moments after I took the picture of the nest below, we even saw the eagle return to its nest! Darn my poor photo-taking-timing!




Our last stop of the day was the beach on Marco Island. We tried to get there to watch the sun set (we don't get to see sunsets on our East Coast beaches), but we did not make it on time. Still, we got a few good shots of the fab condos in the area:


We capped off the day with a great dinner at a local country restaurant nearby!

Stay tuned for the finale of Winter Break 2009!

Coolest. Toy. Ever

Might have to pick one of these up...

Thank You, But Your Princess Is In Another Castle

Just one of the fun things I picked up over the record cold weekend:


I can jump higher already!

Also, for those of you who had any doubt, cell phones don't work too good after you wash them in the washing machine...

Awesome Percy Harvin 2009 Highlight's Vid

A fantastic compilation of Percy Harvin's Rookie of the Year campaign.



Vote for him for the Pepsi NFL Rookie of the Year!

Jordan's Wedding - Part V: Finale

It's pretty nice actually being home on a Friday night, especially now that the house actually has some furniture in it. We can start having real visitors now! Last night, Shawn and Nick came over to watch the football game, and today, my wife's friend Jeong Hee is spending the night... I feel all grown up now!

Now that's out of the way, it's time for the finale of our St. Louis Chronicles!

It was finally The Big Day. The day that gathered the lot of us in the cold Midwest in the middle of December. Jordan's Wedding was today!

Of course, since we were out until 5AM the night before, we all got up with just under two hours to go before the wedding, which, of course, was a bit of a drive from the hotel yet. And, since we were so dead tired after coming home the previous night, of course all five of us had to take showers and get cleaned up before the ceremony!

We finally made it out the door with just about 10 minutes to go before the start of the ceremony, but Lucas, who lives in the island paradise of Hawaii and has no need for a suit and thus borrowed his suit from his brother, found out after all these years that his brother was taller than he was, so the pants were too long! With no time to spare, we just borrowed some tape from the hotel lobby and piled into the car, where George and I performed "Operation: Tape Up Lucas' Pants", as shown in the video here: Operation: Tape Up Lucas' Pants

We made it just on time, as Jordan rushed us into the chapel, where his family was waiting for us in the front.


Moments later, the wedding procession began. Truth be told, this was the first wedding I'd been to outside of my own, and my first in a church, so I was pretty interested in all of the customs. Beth's family had specifically picked this day, December 12th, to pay homage to Our Lady of Guadalupe, a Catholic icon. The wedding itself was not too big, not too small, and had a nice bit of live organ and flute music too!


After the ceremony, the guys went to grab some lunch and unwind a little before heading out to the last part of our mission - the reception dinner. Of course, the reception was at yet another location that we hadn't scouted out before so, as had become our signature style, we arrived late yet again! The dinner was nice as we got to talk to the family and some of their friends. There was also a DJ and a lot of the guests, joined Jordan and Beth on the dance floor after dinner.


And with that, our time with Jordan and Beth was over. Feeling hungry, we headed to Steak and Shake just like the good ol' days in Gainesville, where we coincidentally ran into Jordan's brother, Derek, and his girlfriend Amber, who helped us to deliver a special pack of photos from the college days that we had wanted to share with Jordan but never got a chance to do so. We went home feeling accomplished and slowly wound down and played some more Street Fighter II for the last time before we went to bed one by one, getting ready to go back to our respective homes the next day.


Lucas was the first to go, leaving with one of Beth's friends from Spokane (pronounced SpoCAAAAAN), Washington at around 4 in the morning. Pablo left next, taking our beloved Rav4 back to the airport with him. Paul, George, and I were the last to go. But, as such, we were tasked with finding some way to (A) deliver the two coats Jordan had lent us ill-prepared softies for the cold and (B) get breakfast and get to the airport on time, all without a car! Fortunately, Jordan's parents, Al and Sharon were kind enough to pick us up from the hotel (thereby picking up the coats of course), treat us to breakfast, AND send us off to the airport! Very, very nice of them!


And that, my friends, is the end of our saga!

SEC 6-0 in BCS Title Games!

And... the 2009 College Football Season ends with Alabama defeating Texas 37-21 in Pasadena.

Texas came out moving the ball, but lost star quarterback Colt McCoy to injury in just the second possession of the game. Alabama then took control, much like they did against Florida one month ago, beefing up the score to 27-6 by halftime as McCoy's true freshman backup Gilbert struggled in his first meaningful game as a college quarterback against the number 1 team in the nation in the biggest game of the season.

However, Texas receiver Jordan Shipley was not going to give up so easily. He racked up 10 catches, over 100 yards, and two touchdowns in the second half, bringing Texas to within three points following a two point conversion. But alas, the rookie quarterback would lose a fumble deep in their own territory and throw two more interceptions, with all three turnovers leading to scores, as Alabama won the SEC's fourth consecutive BCS national championship and its sixth of the 11 national championship games in the BCS era!

I just wish it were Florida that represented the SEC again!

Jordan's Wedding - Part IV: Up in the Arch and Take 2 on A Night Out

After leaving Jordan's house, we finally made it to the arch at about 2PM. However, the rest of the group was hungry (Pablo and I, not so much, thanks to our hearty hotel breakfast!), so we first went to get something to eat. We stopped in at Max & Erma's, a chain diner that I once had at Cincinnati airport, where we each had one of their signature burgers - most of the group went with their "Garbage Burger" but I think I ended up going with the "Cajun Burger".

Finally, made it inside the mighty arch, the Gateway to the West. For those of you not as well versed in U.S. History, St. Louis was the approximate location of the beginning of Lewis and Clark's quest to survey and map out the land Thomas Jefferson bought from France, called the Louisiana Purchase, which marked the first great expansion of the United States. Of course, something so significant to American History is obviously registered by the National Park Service, and as such, I made sure to get my Passport To Your National Parks stamped!


With that all-important task out of the way, we were finally ready to board the awesome car that takes you all the way to the top of the 630-foot arch.


630 feet doesn't really sound that high, it certainly does offer some outstanding views of St. Louis, especially at that time of night, as you can see below!


After visiting the Arch, we hustled our way back to our hotel to get ready for Jordan's rehearsal dinner, which was held in a church a pretty good distance away. Of course, we showed up unfashionably late, but it was a pretty casual affair, so no major harm was done. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the Gator-themed cake that Jordan had selected as dessert, although the cake maker had apparently confused Gator colors with Miami Hurricane ones!


After the rehearsal dinner, we met up at a bar near our hotel and hung out until we could finally get Jordan by himself again. We were so disappointed with our failed attempt at a bachelor party the night before, so we had to go out and try it again. We headed back to Illinois in search of the finest Adult Entertainment establishments in the Midwest, but instead ended up here:


Fortunately, Jordan knew where there was a much, much nicer venue (I guess he's been around this part of town before!), where we were finally able to get our fill of nekked boobage for the trip!

Stay tuned for the finale of the St. Louis Chronicles!

Percy has no Mercy, even in the NFL!

He's done it! Garnering 41 of 50 possible first place votes, Percy Harvin was the runaway Offensive NFL Rookie of the Year for the 2009 season! Read all about his and other Florida receivers accomplishments here: Florida Receivers

UPDATE 5:26 PM Eastern
Harvin was also added to the Pro Bowl roster earlier this week, according to this Nice new writeup from Forbes on Harvin winning the award

Those Crazy Arab Emirates!

A few days ago, the world's newest tallest building held its official opening ceremony in Dubai. Presenting: the Burj Khalifa Burj Dubai!

Note how those big rocket fireworks explode at less than half of the building's height! The Burj Khalifa is not only the tallest building in the world... it is the tallest by a long shot. Former tallest building Taipei 101 stood at about 1,670 feet. The Burj Khafila shatters this by over 1000 feet, setting the new record at an astounding 2,717 feet! An engineering marvel to be sure, but is it anticipated to be so expensive to maintain and operate that it may never turn a profit.

Here's a photo in daylight, to show some perspective of just how tall it is:

Winter Break 2009, Part I

This year, my dad and sister came up to Melbourne for Christmas. We didn't do much, but given the busy December that I've had up until this point, what with weddings and classes and moving back from Gainesville, it was a welcome relaxing change of pace.

The week began rather frantically, with me going up to Gainesville once more to take finals. Rather, we had just one final and two presentations, but our group performed exceptionally once again, and we took a little celebratory tour of campus for those of us who hadn't much of it before (unfortunately, Don isn't in the photo, since he was taking the picture of us at Tim Tebow's now immortalized "The Promise" because, as an FSU grad, he didn't want to soil himself with such sacrilege):


On Monday, Cherry and I spent the day finally moving her back from Gainesville.

A few days later, Cherry and I spent most of the day during Christmas Eve unpacking her things and otherwise cleaning up the house and getting ready for Dad and Melinda to arrive. Once they came, it was time to cook! Dad brought us a Chinese hot-pot set, which we made use of right away:


After the scrumptious meal, we watched the (relatively) new Vince Vaughn and Reese Weatherspoon movie, Four Christmases. I've come to the conclusion that, whilst Vince Vaughn plays his character quite well, he is adept only at playing that same character in every movie he is in! That said, Four Christmases was rather forgettable.

On Christmas morning, we got up bright and somewhat early at around 10AM to have a wonderful breakfast of fruity pancakes and take a photo in poses suspiciously similar to our hot pot pose the night before:


After breakfast, it was present opening time! First up was Melinda, who opened up her brand new iPod Touch! We spent several minutes opening it up and showing her its many awesome features.



We also got the awesome VitaMix blender, which can blend just about anything. It will come in super handy when I am trying to eat icky vegetables! Just blend em together with some strawberries and Voila! it tastes good!


The last gift of note was not one, but two copies of Wii Sports Resort with Motion Plus, the great new Wii game that builds on smash hit Wii Sports with new and improved motion sensing capability! Turns out word got out that I really wanted this game, so I got two of em!


We spent much of the rest of the day playing Wii Sports until night rolled around, when we went to see Sherlock Holmes, the new movie starring Robert Downey Jr. The movie was a bit confusing, but I loved the cinematography and the overall presentation of it, and will be waiting to see it again once it comes on DVD so I can try to see all of the things I missed the first time around. I'm sure there will be plenty!


It was a long break, so be sure to check back and read about the rest of my holiday coming soon (and don't worry, I haven't forgotten about my St. Louis Chronicles yet!

Santa Came... again!

I haven't gotten around to writing about my Winter break yet, so I haven't really even been able to tell you about some of our awesome new toys that we got over the holidays. But, when I came home today, there was yet another gift under the tree!


That's right, Cherry got me my very own Iron Gym! I've been coveting one of these ever since Ed got his own wall gym and we started working on our pull-up and chin-up prowess. I'm happy to say that my workout plan using Arnel's I Want Six Pack Abs program paid off and I'm actually a lot better at pull-ups and chin-ups than I thought I would be, but it will be very handy to be able to just go and pop a full reps whenever I am feeling bored at home!

Get yours today, right here!

2009 Sugar Bowl: UF 51-Cincinnati 24

Sorry for the huge delay between posts... I've been a busy bee for the past few weeks, and as a result, I have a lot of posting about the winter holiday, St. Louis, and the Gators to catch up on!

I'll start with the Gators, since the news is the most recent and since it should not be episodic, unlike the other two categories of posts I plan to catch up on.

Through the last month, the University of Florida football program has been in a state of disarray. The Gators lost their last game against Alabama in the SEC championship game, but the chaos had really started before that, as many of the players partied hard the week before and focus was all but lost. Following that game, Urban Meyer was hospitalized for a night, and wide receivers coach Billy Gonzalez left the program, some say allegedly because he was presiding over the excessive celebration leading to the DUI charges. Stud defensive coordinator Charlie Strong finally got a head coaching job and announced that he would be leaving after this season, taking along with him defensive backs coach Vance Bedford, who transformed the maligned 2007 secondary into the vaunted unit featuring first-team All-American corner Joe Haden. Earlier this week, Urban Meyer added to the drama by first announcing that he was "stepping down" as the head coach of the Florida Gators, citing health concerns, only to retract the statement 20 hours later, downgrading himself to a leave of "indefinite length", during which time offensive coordinator Steve Addazio would serve as "interim head coach". The coaching chaos was not limited to just the Gators - Cincinnati head coach Brian Kelly had accepted the head coaching post at Notre Dame a few weeks before and would not be coaching the final game against the Gators, opting instead to get an early start on recruiting for the Domers.

Amidst all this drama, I felt legitimately concerned that the Gators would come out uninspired, similar to last year's SEC conference runner up, Alabama, who lost in embarrassing fashion to an undefeated Utah in last year's Sugar Bowl. The setup was eerily similar - we had coaching changes, off-the-field distractions, some player injuries, and were playing in a bowl that we arguably didn't want to be in. Fortunately, the Gators were too big, too fast, and too strong as Tim Tebow, sporting eye black referencing Ephesians 2:8-10, routed Cincinnati for a career high and Florida Football record 482 yards passing, three touchdowns, and nearly 90% completion rate on his way to a BCS game record of 533 yards and four total touchdowns of total offense, smashing Vince Young's record set in his memorable victory over USC in the 2005 National Championship game. It was a great way to end an amazing college career for one of the sport's all-time greatest players!

Other notable offensive performers were WR Riley Cooper, who caught Tebow's season-long 80-yard touchdown pass early in the second quarter on his way to 180 yards on the day, starting RB Jeff Demps, who went out early in the game with a fractured arm, RB Emmanuel Moody, who tallied two rushing touchdowns in relief of Demps, Mike Gillislee, who romped for over 80 yards in mop up duty at the end of the game, Deonte Thompson, who showed off his bottled-up talent , and first-team All-American tight end Aaron Hernandez, who once again put his great hands and open-field moves on display yet again on another 100-yd day.

The Gator defense held Cincinnati's vaunted 40-point-per-game offense nearly scoreless in the first half, letting up in the second half as game unraveled out of reach. Key defensive performers included Carlos Dunlap, who recorded multiple sacks, and Major Wright, who had the most action he'd seen in a while, blowing up several Cincinnati receivers along the way. Linebacker Brandon Spikes also had a good outing, as did most of the defense all night.

At the conclusion of the game, Urban Meyer was asked what was next for him, and he replied "I'm going to be the coach of the Florida Gators!" Hopefully that will be true, but his health and family should come first. Either way, last night was a great end to the 2009 Gator season. The 2009 UF senior class will leave with the winningest record of all SEC graduating classes, and also left Florida with two back-to-back 13 win seasons, a first in NCAA history.

Go Gators!