Throughout the week leading up to the Culligan Holiday Bowl, Texas sophomore safety Nathan Vasher will be keeping a diary about his bowl experience.

On Monday, we went to the San Diego Zoo and it was a lot of fun. My favorite animals were the snakes, exotic monkeys, lions and brown bears. The trip wasn't a whole lot different from our visit last year, but I still enjoyed it because it had been a full year since I'd been able to see all the different types of animals. You don't get to see animals like that every day no matter where you live. But it was also great to get out of the hotel and spend some time with my teammates too. They're my family away from home and everyone had a good time.

	Richard Hightower, Nathan Vasher, Ahmad Brooks and Roderick Babers (l to r) enjoy a trip to Sea World.

One of the real funny things at the zoo was to watch Ahmad Brooks feed a mountain cat. The cat was licking his fingers when he was feeding it raw meat and he said felt kind of weird. It was pretty funny to watch. I wouldn't mind feeding a cat, but I'd be kind of hesitant to pick up a snake like Mike Williams did. I'd probably do it though because that's a once in-a-lifetime sort of thing.

On Christmas the team and coaching staff had our Christmas party. The Christmas party is always hilarious. All the guys get to perform skits and show different sides of themselves by imitating other coaches and players. A couple of guys even sang some Christmas songs, and I'll tell you right now that none of our guys will be pursuing careers in the music business. My favorite act though was the skit by our wide receivers. They did a meeting room skit and Richard Hightower impersonated Coach Drake and it was all really funny.

I was part of a skit that impersonated our linebackers. We just kind of joked with them and had a lot of fun. Everyone laughed so I'm guessing they thought we were funny. It really was a special day.

I miss my family because nothing can take the place of spending Christmas with your relatives when all your little cousins are running around and your mom keeps checking on you and loving you all the time. But this team is my family too and they help make anywhere we go a home away from home. I love these guys to death and spending Christmas with them is special.

Today we had our final full practice. Things have been going really well on the field. We had a lot of emotion and we've been studying film hard so we can make adjustments and be as prepared as much as possible. Washington is a very good team and we're not taking them lightly. I kind of look at this game as not only the end of a good season, but something we can build on for next year as well.

We're trying to get as focused as possible. Our coaches tell us not to get too intense or focused for the entire trip because there's still a couple days until we play, but you always have to keep the fact that you're here to play a game in the back of your mind. We're all very careful to do the things that will keep us prepared to play. I'm trying to relax but stay prepared at the same time.

We finished Wednesday by going to the USS Nimitz. We got to tour the ship and meet the crew. It was a great experience and makes me really proud to be an American to see all those men and women on the ship who are defending our country.

For more on the Longhorns, check out www.mackbrown-texasfootball.com!