Lots of changes have been made to update the site. This page is a catch-all for items of interest. Links to family member pages, football bowl scores, photo-links on the web, etc.

Photo Links on the web

Occasionally some of my (and other Family members) have requests to use their photos someplace else. Here is the current list:

Banded Bald Eagle - a photo taken of a Bald Eagle with a leg band at Conowingo Dam.

Tundra Swan - photo of a Tundra Swan on South Carolina DNR website.

Whistling Duck - photo of a Whistling Duck taken by Lisa in Green Pond, SC.

Bowl Game Results

Click here to link to single page for all bowl results

Historical results from the various Bowl Game rivalries over the past 10+ years - but first the cumulative results from recorded history:

Years Won:

Kevin - 6, Dad - 3, Ties - 2

Bottles Won:

Kevin - 25, Dad - 9

Games involved in bets: - 350

History

The history of the College Bowl Game prediction effort goes back a long time - to the mid 1970s to be exact. No one knows the exact year of the first competition.

It all started as a friendly rivalry between Kevin and his Father over who could predict football bowl games most accurately. In the first year every game as a negotiation over point spreads with a lot of give and take. This approach was too time consuming and could have gone on indefinitely without a more objective approach.

The second year the current approach was adopted where each of the competitors would select the winning team and score independent of the other. Then, on a given date before the first bowl game occurred the two competitors would send their predictions to each other through the mail. If one competitor received the other's predictions before sending their own predictions they were under very strict honor not to open the competitor's files before finalizing their predictions.

This approach lasted for many years, until the age of electronic communications (for the purpose of these two protagonists this was the late 1990s). At that point electronic communication resulted in instant communication of the predictions so both competitors had to rely upon the honor principle as it was nearly impossible to transmit the scores simultaneously.

Scoring

Figuring out an objective approach to scoring was difficult. Any system devised would have to give credit to the more accurate predictor, but point spread alone was not sufficient since picking a losing team should not result in a victory even if the point spread was closer. Selecting a winning team was deemed more important than being close to the point spread. The predictors should be rewarded for accuracy as well and the system has a method (albeit somewhat arbitrary) of enhanced scoring for accurate predictions. Following is the scoring mechanism.

One point is awarded if the predictor is the only one who picks the correct team. The point is awarded regardless of point spreads selected.

If both predictors select the same winning team (or both pick the losing team) then one point is awarded to the predictor with the closest point spread. If both predictors have the same winning team and point spread the result is considered a tie and no points are awarded.

A predictor who correctly selects the winning team and the correct point spread is awarded two points.

Links to Persons of Interest on the web

Links to some of Darren's projects from his interactive computing class:

Here are some links to Evan unicycling and juggling:

Please make any comments on the author's blog as listed above.