In Other News...

Music City Adventures

I am in Nashville for the Presidential Debate tomorrow.  We had an incredibly smooth trip here and setup went fabulously.  My hotel room is the bomb.  Awesome King size bed.  HDTV.  Oh, how I wish I had these things at home! 

The wireless internet is pretty sweet, too, so even though I'm pretty exhausted and we have an early call tomorrow morning - I have to share a great story with you.

Wes, Sally & I met Wes's friend Eric out tonight on Broadway for dinner.  We went to this great BBQ restaurant called Jacks.  It was perfect.  BBQ served on styrofoam plates.  Yum-o!!

So, we're sitting there, eating and talking and I realize people keep walking by the window to the outside and stopping and taking pictures.  I say out loud "What are all of these people taking pictures of?"  I was puzzled.  I looked around for anything out of the ordinary but I couldn't spot anything.  Just a neon sign that said "open" but hello, that's not out of the ordinary!

Then Eric realized that Gene Simmons was sitting in the booth next to us, alone.  Ahahaha!!  So then, we went from talking pretty loudly to whispering about him and formulating our plan to have our picture taken with him.  Then, Gene Simmons turns around and STRIKES UP A CONVERSATION WITH US!  I am not even kidding you!  We talked about a lot of things.  Richard Simmons (how he's not him and I told him he has way better moves than Richard Simmons!), the Presidential Race, how he likes his chicken... I mean we're like pretty good friends with Gene Simmons now.

So, Sally and I got in a picture with him.  Wes took it.  Eric witnessed it all.  So, there you have it.  My first night in Nashville and the celebrities are approaching me.  Oh yeah, baby!

Sally and I both had the urge to open our mouths in the picture, but we're classy ladies, so we held back.

My favorite part of our dinner conversation with Gene (yep, we're totally on a 1st name basis) was when he was telling us about how he is sometimes mistaken for an Elvis impersonator.

Then he sang "Don't be cruel..."  and he actually sounded really good!

I think he enjoyed us!  It was a fun encounter!

After Jacks, we went to a Honkeytonk Bar and heard a bit of live country music.  I definitely want to come back to Nashville for a visit.  It is a great town!  I didn't hear any Kenny Chesney cover songs, unfortunately.  I *may* have seen a guitar hanging on the wall that had been signed by Kenny, but I wasn't wearing my glasses, so I'm not exactly sure.

That's all for now, kids.  Tomorrow - McCain vs. Obama, part 2.  I'm looking forward to the debate! 

Happy Birthday Mom!!

Tomorrow (Monday, October 6th) is my Mom's birthday!! Everyone join me in wishing her a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

I will be in the air tomorrow, headed to Nashville for the 2nd Presidential Debate.  So, that's is why I am posting this now.  I am the video girl in my family.  Last year, when my mom turned 50, I put together this video for her but my stupid computer had something against me and even though I was up all night working on it before we went to Ocracoke last year, it didn't end up working.

Soooo..... It's back.  And better than it was last year!  It even has some updated pictures :)

Mom - I love you so, so, so much.  Happy Birthday!

I hope you like your video!  I love you!

A Fabulous Fall Weekend

Greetings, my loyal readers!  This is a special edition.  On a SUNDAY night!! Yes.  That's right.  I get to enjoy a whole Sunday!  It is GRAND not having to go to sleep at 5pm on Sunday.  I'm going to actually watch some FOOTBALL!!  I may even put on my Steelers jersey... if I can find it...

I have some pictures to share with you from last weekend (just a couple) and from this weekend - which, looking back - was filled with fall-ness.  (shout out to my fall loving friends!)

First of all, before you read this, if you missed SNL last night, do this first: go to NBC's website and watch the spoof of the VP debate.  It's much more entertaining than what you're about to read here, I promise.

Okay, now that you're back, here are the pictures...

Brokaw doesn't know he cant catch squirrels.

Please don't tell him.  When he sees a squirrel, he goes after it with all that he has... and perhaps if he wasn't always attached to a somewhat heavy human, he'd get one!

I think he'd definitely TRY to climb a tree in order to do so.

Saturday, I switched my closet over.  Sigh.

I packed up the yellows, pinks, and whites.

Pulled out the browns, reds and more black.

I usually don't do this until after my birthday but the next three weekends are going to be super busy so I had to go ahead and get it out of the way.

I have such mixed emotions switching out the closet.

I LOVE SUMMER!!  Sorry, I just do.  I even love summer clothes.  So, when I do the switch over, I always have a lot of empty hangers :(

Yes, my closet is color-coded.

What can I say?  I like to have a cute closet.  It's genetic.  You should see my mother's closet.

Goodbye, Summer!  Goodbye, summer dresses and capris and skirts.

I'll see you in a few months, when I will undoubtedly pull you out too soon and force Spring upon the world.

Brokaw was being quiet when I was doing the closet switch-over....

When I can't see him and I can't hear him... SOMETHING is up.

Yep.  He was chewing on a sandal.

BUSTED!

I had to get him to give it back.  I needed collateral, but I was out of dog treats.... so....

Atta boy!  Brokaw loves 100 cal packs.

I got my sandal back.

Phew.

After church on Sunday, I set out to make something I had never made before - pumpkin pasta!  

I found the recipe online.  The ingredients were pretty mainstream... nothing I needed to make a trip to a gourmet market for or anything... or so I thought.

Too bad I had to go to THREE GROCERY STORES to find canned pumpkin!!!

I was beginning to think it had been recalled or something!

Anyway - after all of that, I decided to reward myself with a Pumpkin Spice Latte for lunch.

I think Rachael would have been proud of me.

I whipped this thing up pretty quickly!

And I used a "garbage bowl!"

Check me out!  I was REALLY COOKING here.

Wisk and all!!

I even shredded my on Romano!

Oh, yeah, baby!!

I topped off my Creamy Pumpkin Sausage Pasta off with fresh parsley and organic pumpkin seeds.

Mmmmmmm!!! It was a giant hit at the church event I carted it to this afternoon.

I expect my voicemail will be filling up with calls from producers from the Food Network.

Sigh.

When I downloaded these pictures, I realized I did have a couple of pictures from last weekend, so here you go:

Here is Pastor Mike introducing Ann to be commissioned at last week's service at Rainbow Forest.  Jonathan knelt to pray with her.  This was just before almost everyone got out of their seats to join Ann in prayer.

It's not the best picture (sorry, Ann) but at least it's something.

Check out how organized Ann's yard sale was!!

She's such a teacher!

Oh, and I have to show you this!  So, this house where Ann is staying right now is on top of a mountain in suburban Roanoke.  It's pretty much on a farm or part of a farm, or something.  I don't know.

All I know is there are cows everywhere!  I woke up to "moooooo" Sunday morning and I didn't know what the sound was.

At first, I thought it was my blackberry buzzing on the table.

Uh.... no.  This is pretty far from a blackberry!

I think all the "mooing" was because this baby got out!  

I saw him standing in the driveway as I was leaving!

Poor little guy - he must have slipped under the fence, but he couldn't figure out how to get back.

I don't know if this cow was the Mama or not... but it was really sweet.  She was walking along the fence with the baby.

It was really sweet.

Ann called the man who owns the cows and he came and let the baby back in, so that's good!

Mooooooo!!!!  hahahaha

It's Friday, I'm in Love

The way I celebrate Friday, you'd think it was some kind of holiday or something.  But I really, REALLY look forward to weekends because that's my only chance to sleep - in the DARK - like a normal person and I love it.

I'm in love with sleep.

I'm in love with Fridays.

I'm also madly in love with a beautiful man I will see 2 WEEKS FROM TODAY!

I ate ice cream cake for breakfast.  I think I've worn make-up MAYBE twice this week (I always bring it to work, it almost never makes it onto my face).  I wear all black when I'm too tired to put an outfit together - I'm wearing all black today (with the exception of my green trench coat) and it's the second time this week I've done that.  I need a break!

Pardon the grumpyness.  I didn't sleep much because I got up to watch the VP DEBATE last night and I'm glad I did!! I don't like to wax all political on my blog (for obvious reasons) but I'll just say that It definitely beat what I saw of the first presidential debate!  I'm looking forward to Tina Fey on SNL this weekend - she definitely has some new material to work with!

I leave Monday for Nashville to cover the 2nd presidential debate.  I'm so excited!! And I'm praying for good weather because if it's all rainy and gross it will be hard to make beautiful television!

Happy weekend to everyone!! It's a lovely Fall weekend here in DC.  I'm hoping to enjoy some time outside.

Random note: Last night I went to McDonalds, where I saw a sign for a pumpkin shake and some kind of pumpkin pie turnover or something.  Has anyone tried this stuff?