GO PANTHERS!

When people ask me where I work and I say, "Georgia State" they generally reply, "Where? Never heard of it." That's a strange statement considering we have 30,000 students and are one of the leading research institutions in the US, and in fact even made a Michael Crichton book! I've always believed no one knew about Georgia State because we had no football team. It seems the higher powers thought this too, so last year they announced we would have our first ever GSU Football Team Fall 2010. Of course along with the football team we also gained the first ever GSU MARCHING BAND!

GSU plays in the Georgia Dome - talk about a spoiled football team! This was our view of the marching band in their pre-game show.

The MegaTron shows some better pictures of their formations. How cool is that?


And that?


And that? (PS. That is our GSU emblem)


My very good friend Robert Ambrose, director of GSU bands and fellow Peachtree City Resident, conducting the band during Pre-Game.


The trumpet professor and I went to say hi to the band. Greg is taking these pictures from the opposite side of the field. I am in the stairwell in the blue shirt, and if you can zoom up on this picture you will see that I am staring DIRECTLY at Greg, trying to call him on the phone, and sending him brainwaves to pick up his phone. He never got those brainwaves. He did, however, get some good pictures of my rear-end.



Robert invited us to sit on the sidelines with his wife Sarah and daughter Isabelle. We got kicked out after about 10 minutes.

Oh yeah, there were football players there too.

Um...a football picture. I had to ask Greg numerous times, "Are we rooting for the guys in the blue shirts or the white shirts?" And even when I knew the answer, I kept forgetting to watch the game.

This is what I came for -- the half-time show. The theme was "Welcome to the Jungle" and I love that their pit was a rock band instead of those lame marimbas/bells/xylophones I used to play. Check out the flag twirlers and straight lines! We managed to get great seats for half-time by sweet-talking a security guard.

This is my oboe student Bridget, who is the first female drum major ever in the history of Georgia State. I am so proud of her! Way to represent the oboes!

The American Flag in the background was brought out during the national anthem in rememberance of the events of Sept. 11, 2001.

One of the most amusing aspects of the game was the fact that nobody knows the fight song. Apparently it used to sound like a bad waltz, so they paid the big bucks and had a professional fight song writer to write a new one for GSU. Check out this link on youtube for a good laugh.

I had to google the final results since we left after half-time. 23-14, Panthers lost, Lambuth won (who in the heck is Lambuth anyway!). That's a shame, since we totally creamed the opposing team in the first football game of the season.

Best line ever today from the MegaTron: Continuing the tradition...

The tradition of a week? Awesome!

Check out how great they look!