30 Before 30: Fun & Fancy Free in Happy Valley!

Well, football season is back and so far everything is rosy for the University of Alabama! Roll Tide! Of course... we've only played Kent State and that was a bust. 48-7. Roll Tide again!
This weekend we go to Happy Valley and play the Penn State... well I'm not sure what they are. Panthers? Patriots? Amish? Who knows?
Funny story about Penn State. When I was interning in Cuba (yes Cuba) this man came into my office and was asking me where I went to school. So I happily replied "I go to the University of Alabama." Because why wouldn't you say that happily? He gave me a funny look and told me to come closer. This sent off major red warning lights, but considering he was older and I was stupid, I moved closer. He was, actually, holding his hand up to show a large class ring. I immediately thought "Great, he went to Auburn. Time for a show down at the OK Corral" but decided to put on my Alabama classiness and smile politely at him. The ring, however, said "Penn State." Enter total confusion and more polite smiles. Apparently he was at Penn State in the late 70s and early 80s. For those of you who do not know your Alabama history, clearly as I did not back then, we beat Penn State in the 1979 National Championship.

This is the second time I will get to see Alabama take on the Penn State... what are they?! I should look this up. Anywho... as I mentioned earlier we will travel to Happy Valley, which reminds me of this Mickey Mouse cartoon that we had on video when I was little.

My dad was in the Marines before I was born and didn't get out until I was 3, so we moved quite a good bit. When I was 2 he was stationed in Okinawa, Japan and, while there, my parents bought several bootlegged Disney movies for me to watch. One of them had Peter Pan, Dumbo and Mickey and the Beanstalk. And in between Dumbo and Mickey was this gem:

Back to Happy Valley. Mickey and the Beanstalk appeared on something called Fun and Fancy Free, which I believe was a video of this man telling a story to this little girl and these creepy puppets.

I, however, am just now learning this as Juicy Fruit took over that part of our bootleg tape.

See, once upon a time, Happy Valley was beautiful, yada yada yada and there was this magic harp that sang. Then a giant stole the harp and the land became poor. We all know the story of Jack and the Beanstalk, so just insert Mickey, Goofy and Donald into the story and it's about the same.

So of course hearing that Penn State was referred to as "Happy Valley" I immediately thought how funny it would be to use Mickey and the Beanstalk for my predictions for the game:

The day before the game the boys of the University of Alabama Crimson Tide are treated to a meal before flying out. While there is a delicious brunch prepared for them, unfortunately some of them will be on very strict diets so as not to weigh them down.

When the Crimson Tide boys get up to Happy Valley, they will be excited because for some of them this may be their first time to ever travel from the state of Alabama, much less so far north.