January Highlight of the Month

The last weekend of the January I took a weekend trip to Charlotte, NC to see my friend Casey.  it was so much fun and I love Charlotte, it's such a great city.  Friday night we went to a great Mexican restaurant called Cantina 1511.  It was so good, the margaritas and guacamole were my favorite.  But margaritas and guacamole are always my favorite and I'm pretty sure they should be in their own category on the food pyramid.  After dinner we headed to a little bar to meet up with some other friends.  We're definitely getting older, we didn't stay out too long and were home by midnight.

Saturday we hit the gym for a little bit then went to get pedicures at this place called Polished.  The best thing about polished is that they serve free wine (and water) while they do your nails.  Free anything is always a plus in my book and free alcohol is even better!  After our toes were looking nice we headed to the mall where I bought a new watch.  I LOVE my watch, I've had my eye on it for close to 3 years now.  I am not going to post a picture or link to in online for fear that my parents and sisters, specifically my sister Merrie, would give me a talkin' to about financial responsibility and the difference between "wants and needs."  It is a very nice watch though and it should last me a long time, I made sure to have it registered and get all the warranty information just in case it doesn't last as long as the sales lady told me it would.

Saturday night our friend Megan met us in Charlotte, she lives in Elon, NC, a little more than 90 minutes away.  We headed to dinner with some more friends then 5 of us headed to the Corey Smith concert.  I LOVE Corey Smith.  

He plays music that reminds me of college, I also happen to love college and if I could go back and relive those 4 (ok, 5) years over again I'd do it in a heartbeat.  He plays music that is a little country, a little rock and all Southern.  This was my 2nd time seeing him live.  The first time I same him was in Raleigh, NC with Megan.  After that show we were standing around finishing our beers when Corey Smith came out and started taking pictures with fans.  He was about 20 feet from us and I froze, I was completely star struck.  And it's not that I even think this guys is attractive, he's not that good looking at all, I was just completely in awe of his musical talent and the songs he writes/sings.  Megan thought this was hilarious and commented that she hadn't seen me that speechless since an unidentified football player walked by us in the hall and said "Hi" our freshman year of high school.  Fortunately for me we didn't get that close this time and I was able to speak/sing throughout the show.  I think Casey was a little disappointed that she didn't get to see me freeze up like that again because the times I'm speechless are really far and few between.

Corey's core audience is made up of about 16-20 year olds, my friends and I were well on the older end of the age spectrum.  It was funny watching all the youngsters try to pass off their fake IDs as their own.  Oh the days of having to use a fake ID, good times.  But we weren't the oldest people there, our other friend

 Meggan's (yes that's Meggan with 2 Gs) boss was there with his wife, and the best part was he knew all the words and sang along.  Overall the concert was great, Corey didn't play a few of my favorite songs but as Casey and Megan reminded me, I have a tendency to say "Oh, THIS is my favorite song," about almost all of his songs so the fact he missed one or 2 wasn't that big of a deal.

Sunday morning we got up and went to one of my favorite places..... WAFFLE HOUSE!  I love 

the cheesey eggs with hash browns (scattered, smothered and covered).  We don't have WH in the DC area so every time I go to Charlotte we make sure to fill up on the hash browns.  Casey and Megan claim they don't like it that much but they never put up a fight when I suggest we go.  In college I had the phone number to the WH in my cellphone and we would call and place an order as we were leaving the bar on Friday and/or Saturday nights.  The WH was located just down the street from my apartment so we'd just call ahead and pick it up on the way home.  I think my proximity  to the WH in college spoiled me, now the closet WH to where I live is 50 miles away and I miss those hash browns like crazy!  Ha ha!  After we finished our gourmet meal it was time to hit the road and make the drive back to DC.  I made it back in a little over 6 hours, just in time to see the kick off of the Super Bowl.

Long Awaited January Recap

Ok, I admit it, I've been a slacker on my blog lately.  I guess I can't be perfect all the time, right?  So here's a quick recap of the status of my resolutions.

#1 Save Money:  I did pretty good on this one, well better than I'd actually thought I'd do.  I kept to eating dinner at home most nights.  I brought my lunch to work for the first 2 weeks, after that I got in the habit of going and grabbing lunch with co-workers, going for lunch gives a nice little break from the office.  I'm really going to try to get back into bringing my lunch more this month.  Most importantly I think I might have tamed my shopping habit, well at least for a little while, I didn't really buy any new clothing or unneeded items this month.  I did splurge and buy a watch while I was in Charlotte visiting my friend Casey, she helped me justify the purchase so I didn't feel as bad buying it.  I guess that's what friends are for!  I also signed up for mint.com,  it's a website that allows you to categorize your spending and sends you neat little pie charts weekly on your spending trends or if you have exceeded your budget in a category.  Best of all it's free!

#2 Lose Weight:  I'm not going to give you actual numbers but I can tell a 

difference.  I've been going to the gym at least 2-3 times a week and since I've been better at not eating dinner out as much my eating habits are better as well.  I'd like to start doing a little weight training, my arms are flabby so that's going to be a mini goal for February, tone my chubby arms.

#3  Be a Tourist:  I was a tourist this month.  It helped that my sister, bro-in-law and nephew were in town for MLK/Inauguration weekend.  Despite the way below freezing temps we made our way down to the National Mall on Saturday and took a tour of the Capitol Building.  It was interesting but 

I was glad it was a free tour, they limit the areas they'll actually show you (no House or Senate Chambers) but the movie they show at the start is pretty good.  The movie was probably my favorite thing.  We also walked through the Capitol Visitor Center, that's pretty cool.  You get to see a history of the Capitol and they have replicas of how the building and the area around it have changed over the years.  The replicas start when the Capitol was first built and progress to the what it looks like today.  This would have been even better if we would have walked in on the right side of the exhibit, we did it backwards by mistake and started at the present day model.  Oops!  But there wasn't really a sign that said what way to start so I'm sure we weren't the only ones to make this mistake.  

#4  Read a Book:  I complete this one!  I started and finished Chelsea Handler's book My Horizontal Life.  It was so funny, I wouldn't recommend it for kids but if you like stories about random nights at bar and the "love" affairs that follow you should make sure to read this book.  It's a  little over 200 pages and had me laughing out loud at some points.  In fact I enjoyed reading Chelsea's book I have picked her second book Are You There

 Vodka?  It's Me Chelsea as my read for February.

#5  Keep On Bloggin':  I started strong and then slacked off.  I'll do better in February...I hope.

Bye Bye Fisher-Price, Hello Cool Phone

I've been saying for months that I need a new cellphone, this week I finally did it, I broke down and went to the Sprint store and got a new phone.  Now I'm not one of those people who's all big on technology and special features, my requirements for a phone are pretty simple, I need to be able to talk, text, look up scores and take/send pictures (just incase something really funny or exciting happens and I need to document it).  I also need a phone that has speakerphone so i can use it while driving in DC, there's a "no cellphone  while driving" law in DC, it's a good law (I guess), but it's really kind of a pain to follow all the time.

One other requirement is that my phone has to look cool, and this was my main objective in getting a new phone.  I used to have very bad luck with phones, I would drop them (usually ending up with the phone in 2 pieces) or they'd just stop working.  After about 3 phones in a 6-8 month time period I went to the store to replace my phone but instead of getting the hot 

new phone I told the guy I just wanted a simple phone,

 nothing fancy, and I wanted it to be cheap.  

I ended up with the Sanyo 3200, in a lovely shade of blue.  This was not a "cool" phone by any stretch, it was basically made out of plastic but met my requirements for a phone (minus the coolness factor).  I called it my Fisher-Price phone.  And considering my track record with phones I thought I'd probably only have it for 6 months tops...that was almost 2 years ago.  Wouldn't you know the one time I get the cheap, ugly blue phone it never breaks.

So this weekend I decided it was time for a new phone, I've been doing a pretty decent job of saving money (resolution #1) so I decided to treat myself.  I did my research and had my checklist of things I wanted and didn't want/need on a phone.  I talked to some co-workers, most of whom thought my FP phone was hilarious, and got their opinions on phones.  Of course they all suggested the i-phone/blackberry style, personally I can't stand those phones.  I think they have way too many features that I would never use and the idea of access to my work email 24 hours a day is not appealing to me at all.  Honestly, I don't get paid enough to be chained to the office through a blackberry and I really don't think there's ever going to be a reason where someone is going to need to email me and need an immediate response after office hours, if it's that big of an emergency they can call me.  So the i-phone/blackberry was out, not to mention those things are EXPENSIVE!  So after extensive time on the Sprint.com website reviewing my options I finally reached a decision, got in my car and headed to the Sprint store to make my purchase.

I am now a proud new owner of a Samsung M520.  So far it's great, I can talk, text and take/send pictures, but most importantly it's cool!  It's a shiny silver, not plastic blue, and has a large color LCD screen one the front.  It has a GPS feature, which I don't know how to use, and an "on demand" feature that I think just tells me the weather.  It also has instant access to the Sprint TV store incase I  miss an episode of my favorite TV show I can watch it right there on my phone, for a small fee of course.  My only complaint so far is the it doesn't have the same ringtones as my old Fisher Price phone had, so now I'll have to find a ring/message tone that I like.  Oh, and it also has a feature where I can access my email, but I'm not telling my boss about that feature, no need to be able to check work email all the time.

Season of Change

Today was the inauguration on the 44th President of the United States of America, Barack Obama. I live about 7 miles from the Capitol and the excitement and energy surrounding DC over the past few days was really a very cool thing to witness. Millions of people braved the cold and went down to the National Mall to be a part of history, I sat comfortably in my living room and watched the event on TV. I heard on the radio sometime last week that if you wanted to be a part of history go to the Mall and the events, if you actually wanted to see history stay home and watch it on TV. I did go down to the Capitol on Saturday and took in some of the sights and walked the grounds that today was the site of the swearing in our first African-American president.

Over the past week or so I've been thinking a lot about this great "change" coming to DC, it's exciting and scary at the same time. I know things in our country can't get much worse, we're currently fighting 2 wars, there's a recession and people are losing their jobs and homes at an alarming rate, but with a new president and administration taking over there's a fear of the unknown . Now since I am obsessed with college football and the Tennessee Vols I couldn't help but notice the fact that I had similar feelings to the coaching change the Vols made this season, it's exciting and scary. The Vols had a losing season and were blown out by rivals Florida and Alabama and suffered an embarrassing homecoming loss to Wyoming, things couldn't get much worse. The Vols hired Lane Kiffin as the new head coach, he's young and was an accomplished assistant coach at USC and a not so accomplished head coach for the Oakland Raiders, his ability to be a head coach in one of the nation's toughest collegiate conferences remains to be tested. Exciting and scary, all at the same time.

A Return to Greatness: President Obama enters the White House on the promise of change and a renewed hope for a better tomorrow. Coach Kiffin enters Neyland Stadium on the promise of turning around a program that has hit a low point in it's storied history.

Out with the Old, In with the New: President Obama (age 47) replaces former President George Bush (age 62), who at one point in during his presidency had the highest approval rating of any president, of course at the end of his second term in office President Bush's approval rating was the lowest of any president. Coach Kiffin (age 33) replaces former Coach Philip Fulmer (age 58), a man who gave over 30 years of service to the Vols, winning 2 SEC Championships and 1 BCS National Championship but had 2 losing seasons in his last 4 and was fired with 3 games remaining in his final season.

Build a Star-Studded Staff: There's nothing more important than having good people around you, in presidential terms it's called the Cabinet, in coach speak you have the assistant coaches. President Obama is putting together a cabinet of advisers to help guide him in making decisions that will effect each and everyone of us. He has to pick people that will represent our country to the world. Coach Kiffin is putting together a staff in Knoxville that could be considered the who's who of football minds. His staff needs to be knowledgeable and able to represent the university with class. Most importantly both the Cabinet and the assistant coaches need to believe in the philosophy of their leader, whether that means supporting a health care bill or running a spread offense. Neither man will be successful if they don't have the support of their staff and the ability to listen to their advisers.

Recruiting: President Obama based his campaign on the slogan "The Change We Need" and over the past 2 years he has been traveling the country convincing voters that he was the better candidate. He was on a mission to get every vote he could, the more voters he could attract the better his chances at success in the election. Obama's recruiting efforts were effective and did indeed lead to a successful bid for the White House. Since Coach Kiffin took office just over 6 weeks ago he too has been traveling the country talking to high school football stars convincing them that the University of Tennessee was the best choice for them. He is on a mission to get every top recruit in the country, the more top notch recruits he can lure to Knoxville the better his chances for a successful season come fall.

Evaluating Talent That's Still There: Both Obama and Kiffin are coming into systems that

already have major players on the roster. President Obama will go to work with a congress that is already in place and he will soon need to figure out who will help him and his administration pass the bills he wants and who will hinder his ideas and programs. Kiffin will start spring practice and have a chance to evaluate the players that have been left over from the Fulmer era. He'll quickly need to learn their abilities and figure out where they can best help his new offensive and defensive systems.

In the end both men have daunting tasks in front of them, granted I know President Obama's challenge is much more daunting than that of Coach Kiffin's but still they both are facing an up

hill battle. So to President Obama, best of luck to you, I look forward to seeing the change you have in store for our great country. If you can live up to half the expectations people have set for you I am sure your presidency will be a success. And to Coach Kiffin, best of luck to you as you work to return the Vols to national prominence and bring a championship back to Rocky Top.

God Bless the USA and Go Vols!

Resolution Update

Here's the latest on my 2009 resolutions.

1: Save Money. I brought my lunch to work everyday last week and only ate dinner out 2 nights. I know goes against my "once a week" rule but 1 of those dinners out was for a friend's birthday so I'm going to say birthday outings fall into a special category. Considering I usually eat out 8-9 times a week (lunch and dinner combined) eating out only twice is pretty good for me. I also went to Target this week and only got the things I actually needed...and used coupons for those items. This is a major accomplishment for me seeing as I am obsessed with the pajama pants Target has and I usually can't leave the store without at least seeing if there are any that I absolutely have to have. I have a theory that one can never have too many pairs of polka dotted pajama pants/capris/shorts.

2: Lose Weight. Not only have a cut down my eating out but the lunches and dinners I'm making are actually pretty good for me too. No frozen dinners for me. I found the website hungrygirl.com and it has some pretty good recipes. I've also gone to the gym 2 times the past week, not as often I should but it's all about baby steps, I'll try to go more this coming week.


3: Be a Tourist: I haven't done anything touristy yet, but my sister, bro-in-law and nephew are coming to visit this weekend and we have plans to visit one of the Smithsonian museums and take a tour of the Capitol on Saturday afternoon.



4: Read a book: I started reading Chelsea Handler's My Horizontal Life, my friend Jackie recommended it. So far I'm about 5 chapters in and it is pretty funny. I love Chelsea Handler, she's so funny, if you don't know who she is check out her nightly talk show on E!, it comes on every night at 11:30pm.

5: Keep on Bloggin': So far so good, this is my 3rd entry for 2009. That beats my total entries from 2008 by 300%!

Tattoos and Basketball

Tonight is the Tennessee vs Kentucky basketball game in Knoxville. GO VOLS! And one thing that stands out as I watch the game on ESPN, besides Bruce Pearl's Tennessee Orange blazer, is the amount of tattoos some of the players have. They have them everywhere, arms, legs, shoulders, necks, one guy even has one on his face.

Not the I have anything against tattoos, I happen to have one myself. I skipped math class one day my freshman year of college and went with one of my friends to Saint Tattoo, about 45 minutes later I had a tattoo. I can't say it was the best decision I ever made, I probably would have been better off going to math class, but if a tattoo on my lower back is the only permanent scar from my college experience I'm not that bad off. And just to clarify the tattoo is not in the center of my back so it does not qualify as a "tramp stamp", my tattoo is on my lower back above my right hip. I had 2 rules in mind when I was deciding where on my body to have my ink done: #1, it couldn't be anywhere that was visible in a wedding gown, and #2, it had to be easily concealed for job interviews. It's the Chinese symbol for happiness and only about 2.5 inches big. When I first showed my parents my dad said it probably meant "stupid American" but I did some research and it definitely means happiness.

Anyway, back to my observation of basketball players and their tattoos, it seems like the players fall into 2 categories, tattoos covering their entire upper body or no tattoos at all. I just don't get covering every inch of your upper body in tattoos. What happens when your basketball days are over and you have to get a job? I'm thinking wearing a shirt and tie with the top or your "survivor" tattoo peeking out above your tie probably isn't a very good look. Sure those barbed wire bands and intricately designed crosses look great on nice toned muscular arms but how about when your 60 and those muscles aren't as tight? I'm thinking that's not going to be such a good look. I think when it comes to tattoos the less is more philosophy is a good one to follow.

Blogging- Take 2

I started my blog about a year ago after reading a few friends blogs, I haven't written in my blog since. So as we usher in 2009 I'm going to make another attempt at blogging to see what the fuss is all about.

This time I'm going to use my blog as a way to keep me on task with my "new year resolutions". I usually think that new year resolution are a good idea but sometimes not all that realistic. It seems like people always make the effort... for the first month, then it's back to normal. I know I'm guilty of making good on the resolutions for the 1st month of the year, it's the other 11 months I seem to have trouble with.

With that said I'm now publicly (I guess posting it on a blog is publicly) making my resolutions known. And yes I know some of my resolutions are very cliche.

Resolution #1: Save Money.

After looking at my spending I realized there are a number of things I spend my money on things that aren't completely necessary and then I complain that I don't have any money. From now on I'm only going to eat lunch out 1 day a week, I normally eat lunch out 5 days a week because it provides a good break from the office and there are a number of quick lunch places around my office. Same goes for dinner out, once a week that's it. I also plan on limiting my shopping, I do love shoes but I figured out you can only wear one pair at a time so owning 30+ pairs is a bit excessive.

Resolution #2: Lose Weight.
I know it's cliche but my goal is not only to drop the pounds but get in better shape. I used to be pretty athletic, now well, I'll be honest exercise always sounds like a good idea but there's usually some life changing show on TV that I need to watch (think Rock of Love or the Real Housewives of the OC). I have a gym membership that I pay for every month so I might as well use it, and I'm hoping that my new dining out rules will help with this resolution as well (see Resolution #1).

Resolution #3: Be a Tourist.
I have lived in the DC metro area for 3+ years, I've seen the monuments 2 times and I've been to the Smithsonian once. My goal is to make it to one tourist attraction a month. I (hopefully) won't be in DC for the rest of my life so I think it would be a good idea to take advantage of all the District has to offer while I'm here.

Resolution #4: Read a Book.
Not to say I don't read books, I do pick up a book every now and then, I'm just not a very "consistent" reader. I usually read about half the book and never finish it, it's kind of like going to the gym, every time I have a chance to pick up a book there's usually some train wreck of a reality show on that I watch instead. I should make a resolution to turn the TV off... but that would be crazy, I love TV. I'll just cut down on the tube and make my goal to read one book a month.

Resolution #5: Keep on Bloggin'.
This time I hope to post more than one blog a year. I'm going to use this blog to track my progress on my goals and keep everyone up to date on what's going on in my world.

Looking at the goals I've set for myself this year I have a feeling 2009 will be pretty busy. Well, that's all for now I need to start clipping coupons, hit the gym, take a tour and make a stop by the bookstore.