Monday, Monday

Just so you know, I'm only updating this thing because it's been several days. I really have nothing to say. I know... what else is new?

Work is still going swimmingly well. All of my afternoon meetings were canceled, so I crossed 10 things off my to-do list. Then I had to add some more so that I could cross them off, too.

Weekend in Tulsa was great. We had brunch on Saturday morning at Queenie's, went shopping at Utica Square, then I took a three-hour nap. Dinner was Cheesecake Factory, followed by a dip in the pool. I came back early yesterday, just in time to take another three-hour nap.

I was productive last night, however. I unpacked, did laundry, and cleaned up the house so that I could take pics for the website. FSBO sign went in the ground this morning.

Happy birthday, Tom Brady! I don't care what Jen says, you're hotter than Peyton Manning.

Good news, bad news

First, the bad news... Evidently my former future husband Tom Brady took a wife. Guess that dream is dead.

The good news? Taylor is playing in the finals of the regional tournament tonight. They're now 30-1. (The only team to beat them is who they're playing tonight.) Oh, and I get to eat Whattaburger again tonight. More good news!!

25 Things...

Several people have tagged me on Facebook to do this list, but I thought I'd post it here instead.

25 Random Things You May or May Not Know about Me

1. I love to play "Rock Band" with my nephews and can score a perfect 100% singing "Wanted Dead or Alive." I'm that good.
2. I am obsessed with celebrities and talk about their lives like I know them personally. I subscribe to both "People" and "Us Weekly" so that I can keep up with how many kids Brangelina have this week.
3. I once ate an entire box of Krispy Kreme donuts in two days. By myself.
4. When I look in the mirror after a shower and see the hail damage on my thighs, it makes me want to throw up.
5. I would have married 5 or so of my ex-boyfriends if they would've asked. Thankfully God protects the stupid from themselves.
6. When I got my first portable cell phone, I talked to my mom and my niece every day after work. I really, really miss talking to both of them.
7. My musical taste is so varied that I have everything from Miley Cyrus to Ozzy Osborne to George Jones on my iPod.
8. I love to read. I own hundreds of books and re-read books all the time. Not the classics... romance novels.
9. I watch way too much TV. I own two DVRs and have 29 shows on my series record list.
10. I cannot get a pedicure or go to the doctor without first shaving my legs.
11. I drove the getaway car in college for what could be legally construed as criminal mischief.
12. There are 5,172 songs in my iTunes library.
13. I used to have a crush on my friend the lawyer, but I'm kinda over it. And I realize he wasn't that good of a friend.
14. I never thought I'd be 36 and unmarried, but it's not as bad as I thought it would be.
15. If I had my life to live over again, I would have chosen a career as a sideline reporter for the NFL.
16. I need to buy new pants because mine are too big and that makes me really, really happy.
17. They posted and mailed my diploma before I rewrote my master's thesis, so I never fixed it or put a copy in the library.
18. I drink way too much Diet Coke... 8-12 cans a day most days.
19. I can watch football non-stop for days on end, but I don't like baseball at all. Or pro basketball.
20. I don't like Oprah. Or any of the books she recommends.
21. I have never owned a car for more than four years with the exception of my last vehicle, the TrailBlazer that I had for 5.5 years. (which is why)
22. There have only been six months in the past 20 years that I, or my parents, didn't have a car payment on my vehicle.
23. My three dream dinner guests, living or dead, are George Bush (#41), Tom Brady, and the Apostle Paul.
24. I am a very good cook, working my way to great.
25. I own every episode of "Friends" on DVD and I kick butt on the trivia game.

I'm not tagging any of you, but feel free to post your list on your blog... or on mine.

Stay warm, peeps!

Sleepy weekend

I've been home for 48 hours and asleep for about 30 of them. Today I cleaned the house a bit and did some laundry, but other than that, I've spent most of the past two days snoozing.

The few hours I have been awake I've been missing Boston, wishing I were walking down the streets of Cambridge, eating lobster bisque and watching the crew on the Charles River. I guess the only solution is for Tom Brady to marry me and move me to Massachusetts.

Boston tea party

I'm positively giddy. I just drove by Fenway Park. Saw the Green Monster. As I write this, I'm looking out at the Charles River, eating sushi and watching the World Series. And drinking tea. Don't you have to drink tea when you're in Boston? As I rode from the airport and saw the skyline of Boston for the first time, I could hear the theme to "Boston Legal" in my head. It's such a beautiful city!

To be fair, my day has been less than stellar. The flight from XNA to Charlotte was packed, and the lady behind me had a two-year-old who kept kicking my seat and an infant who kept crying. That was a L-O-N-G two hours. The plane from Charlotte sat on the tarmac for over an hour waiting for clearance, but I did finally make it to Boston just past seven.

I've always heard that people in New England are rude, but my cab driver offered to give me a "very personal" tour of Boston tomorrow. Um, no. But I do have a 90 minute break for lunch and I'm thinking of heading over to see Fenway up close and personal. Then it's off to Harvard Square for dinner. The leaves have turned and it's autumn in New England.

I can't believe I'm in the same city as Tom Brady! Yeah, he could be someplace else and wherever he is he's probably hanging out with this supermodel girlfriend, but still, I'm in Boston! It's 45 degrees right now. Brrr....

Off to Beantown

In just a few short hours, I'll be on my way to Boston. Home of Tom Brady. In the fall. Can't wait!

I'll be two miles from Fenway Park and two miles from Harvard. You know what they say, sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name.

Where did the weekend go?

While I realize that the work week is five days and the weekend only two, it seems those two blessed days are much less than 28% of my week. The time from Friday at five until Sunday at ten seems to fly by, and I'm often left wondering how in the world I wasted the past 52 hours. Don't get me wrong, I love my job and thank God for it every single night, but still... I'd be lying if I said that I never considered what it would be like to be a lady of leisure. I live for my weekends and days of watching football (hooray for the first full weekend of the pigskin!), reading books, visiting friends, and sleeping in. Hey, 8 a.m. is sleeping in these days.

Last week was quite busy, so I was in bed before 9 p.m. on Friday night. Yesterday I slept in, watched football all day, then headed over to Rogers for church. I've been looking for a church home for over a year, first in Conway and now in NWA, and have never found a place where I belonged. Every time I get to go to chapel at work I leave filled with the Spirit and full of peace and joy, and I really want to find that same feeling someplace on the weekends. Oh, I know worship is about Him and not about me, but still, I really want to be someplace I can be happy.

So yesterday I crossed the county to meet a coworker and his family for Saturday night church (and no, it wasn't LDS), and I loved it. The praise and worship was awesome. The message was inspiring. Granted, it was only my first trip, but I think it's a great start. So I'm praying for God's guidance on whether that will be my new church home.

After church I went to visit some friends who recently moved to Rogers who paid $35 to watch the Hog game on PPV. Yeah, we won, but it was not pretty. It's going to be a loooooong season, Razorback fans.

Now I'm gearing up for the week. I'll be traveling to all four of our offices in 24 hours, so it will be a crazy few days. Oh, and I have 300 bags of microwave popcorn in my trunk, so now my car smells like butter. Hmm...

The good news is that the Cowboys looked great today (yeah, they played the Browns, but still), and Felix had a TD. The bad news is that pretty boy Tom Brady is evidently out for the season with a torn ACL. Guess the MVP award is officially up for grabs.

Later, kids.

Nobody's Perfect

Evidently no one told the New York Giants that the Pats were unbeatable. With words like "history" and "dynasty" dying on the lips of New England fans everywhere, Eli didn't choke. The Manning brothers won back-to-back world championships, and the NFC won the Super Bowl for the first time in a long time. I'm sad for Tom Brady, though. Wonder if he needs me to go to Boston and comfort him...

I can't believe the weekend's gone. I spent most of it feeling like poo and lying around coughing and sneezing, so you'd think it would have been relaxing. Yeah, not so much. So tomorrow it's back to the old grind. I figured out this weekend that I had about 7,500 more days to work in my lifetime. That's really depressing.

Tonight Dad and Vickie brought the kids up to watch the game. I made ribs, pulled pork, fries, corn on the cob, baked beans, biscuits, no bake cookies, and brownies for dinner. It was yummy, if I do say so myself. The game... not so much. This is me and the kids at halftime.



I just started reading Beth Moore's book about John the Baptist, "The Beloved Disciple." I'm a huge fan of her books; she always has such great insight and wonderful words. The first chapter discusses all of the people who followed John the Baptist, and she points out that he was a good leader because of who he was following. "John the Baptist turned out to be a man worth following precisely because they followed him straight to Jesus," Moore states. What a leadership model. Only if we're leading others to Christ are we worth following. Otherwise we're just leading them astray.

The new MVP

Congrats to Tom Brady, the new NFL Most Valuable Player, who garnered 49 out of 50 votes (one goober voted for Favre, who most likely would have won by a landslide any other year). He awesome... and he's hot. Have I said that today?

Everytime a bell rings....

A world without Tom Brady? Unimaginable! Check out "If athletes were Christmas characters" to see the Brady vs. George Bailey comparison. Oh, and since we're discussing the future league MVP, anniversary wishes go out to him and Giselle, otherwise known as BradyBundch. Or, as I call her, the world's luckiest lady.

Lori's Christmas List

Only 20 more days 'til Christmas, so here's my list for Santa:

• Tom Brady in a big, red bow (and nothing else!)
• Tickets to Super Bowl XLIII, where the Cowboys play the Pats
• A private Bon Jovi concert, where Jon sings my favorite song to me, "Bed of Roses" (it has that great line... "tonight I won't be alone, but you know that don't mean I'm not lonely")
• A red Hermes Birkin bag
• One week with no news from Britney, Lindsey, or Angelina
• A trip to Italy with someone tall, dark and handsome
• Lasik eye surgery
• Liposuction
• A good coach for the Hogs
• A 42" flat screen TV for the living room
• A facial (never had one!)
• Season 3 of "The Office" on DVD
• Sirius satellite radio
• "Sixteen Candles" on DVD
• Saute pan from Williams Sonoma
• A really amazing new job in 2008

I've been really good this year!

So hot even the men love him...

And to continue our discussion of the Sexiest Men/Women in the World, according to another blog, Esquire magazine is soliciting input from its readers for the 2008 Sexiest Woman Alive contest. The finalists? Jessica Alba, Adriana Lima, Salma Hayek, Beyonce, and TOM BRADY. Yes, really. I'm not sure what that means, but I choose to believe that he's hot to both genders. Hotter than Giselle. The other interesting thing? Not a blonde in the bunch.

I love the smell of beets in the morning

Evidently nerdy is the new sexy. Yes, fellow "Office" fanatics, it's not Jim in People's "Sexiest Man Alive 2007," but Dwight P. Shrute. Rainn Wilson is indeed on the list, as are Masi Oka from Heroes and Zachary Levi from Chuck (who was MUCH sexier on Less Than Perfect). Also included? Dorky accountant Henry from Ugly Betty.

The sexiest man alive? Matt Damon. Where's Tom Brady on this list?

This one's for the boys...

Ladies (and some of you guys) look away. This one's for the sports fans.

Well I guess Ricky Williams will be back in the Dolphins' lineup soon. (Imagine my best raggae voice here) Welcome back, mon. The winless Fins can certainly use a boost, and Ricky can really light it up (pun intended). Suddenly I'm craving rum punch and Bob Marley.

And at the end of the day, wouldn't you rather have a teammate who contributes on the field but likes to party a bit too much than a teammate who, unless he can't start, will take his paper dolls and fly home first class? (Yes... I'm talking to you, Stephon Marbury.)

So what do you think Stephon has on Isaiah? Will Ricky smoke (hee hee) the defense and bring South Beach its first win? Can Sexy Rexy finally have a good game for Chi-town? And will Tom Brady finally tire of his supermodel and give the girls with some extra cushion a chance? These are the questions that plague us, sports fans. That, and why are the Hogs favored against a team that beat Auburn, Kentucky and Alabama (all of whom beat the Hogs)?

I've been a very good girl

Holy boxer briefs, Batman! One of my Christmas wishes may be coming true!

Sick of being sick

Another weekend, another 48 hours of feeling like poo. I'm really sick of being sick, but as my pal Alisa said, " 'tis the season." So I've been in the bed/on the couch since Friday night. And neither the Hog game nor the Cowboys game did much to make me feel better.

Taylor informed me that I shouldn't be too bummed about the Pats/Cowboys since I like both teams. He, on the other hand, hates the Pats, so he's upset. I told him that he'd have to learn to like New England when Tom Brady becomes his uncle, and he's assured me that, should that happen, he'll work on it.

This is going to be a strange week at work. My boss left around 11 a.m. on Friday for good, and my new boss isn't planning to be in the office 'til next week, so this will be a long five days, especially since Thursday and Friday are fall break and I seem to be the only person planning to work. At least I won't have trouble finding a parking place.