USC is Pandemonium!

As usual, Angela and I made our annual trip to Los Angeles to take in a USC Football game and to enjoy the good weather. We do so enjoy going to L.A. and going to the games. They truly are a huge party!

On campus, it's a complete circus. There are people everywhere, there are lines to get into the bookstore (yes, lines) and everyone has these enormous set-ups complete with big-screen TVs, stoves, refrigerators and more food than you can shake a stick at. I even saw one tent with a chandelier. A chandelier I tell you!

On the way into the stadium, you pass the USC rose garden and let me tell you, it is stunning. The picture above doesn't do it any justice, but it is gorgeous. It's a surprisingly peaceful setting what with all the hoopla just on the border of the garden.

Once you step into the L.A. Colosseum (that's where USC plays it's football games) the one thing that I marvel at is it's size. The stadium seats about 100,000 people which is enormous. As a point of reference, The Old Mile High Stadium in Denver sat a little less than 70,000 and the Delta Center in Salt Lake seats about 17,000. So, yeah, it's huge.

But the picture of me above is in the famous arch ways at the north end of the stadium. Outside the archways are images of famous sports people in America (Knute Rockne, Pop Warner, and a few others) as well as a wall of all the winners during the 1984 Olympics. It was cool to walk around and see that.

As we got to our seats, we gave the traditional Trojan hand symbol for their motto which is "Fight On!" It's essentially a peace sign, but at USC it's meant to be a V which, as you might guess, stands for victory. Fortunately, the football team does a lot of that victory-ing.

When night falls on the stadium, the lights come on and combined with all the smoke from all the grills that surround the stadium because of the tailgating parties, an eerie look surrounds the field. It's almost surreal--as if you were watching something that wasn't happening. It's tough to describe unless you're there, but man is it an odd site.

The game was a blast (we played Oregon State and won, 24-3) and we enjoyed being back in California together. We visited a couple of our favorite eatery's (dad will be jealous that we had the Japanese curry--yum!) and just soaked up the California sun. While it was a short trip, it was most enjoyable and I, for one, can't wait to get back.