Creature living in our grill....

Steve and I decided to grill out the other night- It has been such an awesome November .... NO SNOW ... which means, lets have steak on the grill!! OK!!

So I am not doing anything to help- Steve is pretty much the cook in the family so I am in the kitchen keeping him company and reading some magazine. Steve goes outside to light the grill. Man I would LOVE to work for Rolling Stones...."Dre, come out here."

I go outside on our little pourch.

"What do you think happened here?" Steve says. I look at the grill which he is pointed at and from afar and in the dark- it looks like someone piled a bunch of little fire logs IN our grill. "What is that?" I ask.....

Steve goes over to it and turns on our grill light that we got for our wedding. (I love wedding presents) so this .... thing .... lits up in the light. It is a pile of leaves. What in the hell?

We are both staring at it. "Who would put a pile of leave in our grill?" These leaves are the shape of the grill. There is SO many of them. Steve gets one leaf off of the top of the grill. The pile of leaves move. "Holy shit it moved." I say. "What?" like Steve does not believe what I just said ... or maybe with his shitty hearing I need to say it louder. "It just MOVED." Sure enough- that was like a roll cue for the thing to move so it moves. We both RUN back in the house- I am pretty sure I scream. We shut the door.

We are both starting at the pile and we are now inside both creeped out. I tell Steve he needs to do something about it and he says, "F that! I am not going out there!!" He goes back out there to shut the grill and turn off the gas. He comes back in, "They can have the winter! We will just get a new grill!!" We get out the Forman that we got for a wedding present (I love wedding presents) and cook up our steaks.

Seriously? So we have to let the thing just live in there?!

So DAYS later I make him open the grill again. Maybe if it gets cold enough it will leave. I hope.

So after a few days of having the grill cover OPEN (which- what will that do or prove to our creature anyway?) we are good to go knowing that .... maybe ... this thing will pack up and move. SO it starts snowing tonight .... Steve and I start talking- We know feel bad for this creature in the grill- its little head is getting snowed on and now it is cold!! So I look out and the nest is COVERED in snow, I tell Steve we need to put the grill top down so he can have his home again. (sidenote: we need a new grill)

I go outside with Steve behind me saying "MAN UP!!" Excuse me? Last time I check you had the balls in this relationship. SO I tell him I cannot do it- I cannot get that close to the grill without losing my shit. SO I come in the warm house, Steve puts on my shoes and goes out there. He is approaching the grill (at this point I wished I would of had my video camera rolling) and puts down the grill top- when all of a sudden creature comes FLYING out at him!! Steve's face was nothing I had never seen before- the look of fear, the look of I may or may not shit myself and I am leaning towards MAY at this point of my life. The look of HOLY SHIT is on his face. I have never seen Steve move or react to ANYTHING that fast in the 4 years I have known him. He is seriously scared. I am freaking out just as much- but I am on the safety zone. The creature cannot touch base .... I am safe!! I fear for Steve- I look really hard to see this THING that has been taking up space and I see that it was a squirrel. You know that one part in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation where the crazy ass squirrel jumps out of the tree?! THAT was this moment right before my eyes. The squirrel jumped out at Steve and then took off on the fence. The thing was pissed off and now we know that this squirrel is in our grill storing his damn winter food. Now what? We did not clean it up- We were both too freaked to go touch it again. Steve keeps saying, "he can have the winter!" I really want to clean it out. But then I see Alvin, Simon and Theodore just sitting there coming up with a bad ass Christmas album .... How can I kick them out? Maybe my grill is their recording studio.

All in all....the creature still has its nest. For now.

Madonna Concert ...

For Jessica's birthday ... her beloved husband gave her two tickets to see Madonna live in concert at the Pepsi Center here in Denver. This would be only the second night (the night before being her first) that Madonna has EVER been to Denver. Why has the material girl never been in Denver?! Could it be the altitude making it really hard for singers to wail? Could it be that she thinks of Colorado like most people do .... skiers and cowboys and that no one here in this great city would want to see her roll around the stage? For whatever reason her 20+ singing career has kept her from Denver .... we were not about to miss this like a virgin step foot on to stage for the first time. Well second.

I go to work getting pumped about the show that night telling everyone about it. Bill Doleman (one of our anchors at the network) tells me that last night she did not go on stage till 9:30 when it was supposed to start at 8:00. So I think that that is kind of BS- but at the same time we are talking about the material girl that is living in a material world. She can really do what she wants- and if it is a good show- screw it, right?! I tell Bill and Marius (the other anchor) that I have inside information (from brother in law, Kelly) that I know when her plane is leaving. I tell them our grand plan of leaving the concert as fast as we can to see her leave- or in the best case scenario to see her get on the plane and make her sign my chest. I tell them that we think that her plane leaves at midnight. Then we all start laughing at the sight of Madonna's plane leaving at midnight .... with or without her. "This is the final call for flight number .... MADONNA ...." There is Madonna in her small little outfit looking up at the screens-then down at her ticket. "SHIT- my plane is leaving!!" Then she starts to run in her high heel shoes-with her bags ... you know like NORMAL PEOPLE DO!! Then she has to go through security ..... then SHE is the one that gets the random search. "Excuse me miss, can you step over here for me....." then SHE gets the stupid air blows on her. "But I am going to miss my flight!!!" AHHHH.....famous people are funny.

So work is now over with- I spend a few minutes with Steve and then I meet Jess for dinner. Now at the moment I am walking out the door I think I should do something funny. Do I wear a small skirt with leg warmers? Do I wear a tore up wedding dress in the Like a Virgin video? Do I plant a mole above my mouth? No- I have no time for jokes .... I am running a few minutes behind. SO I meet Jess and she is in her teacher clothes so she needs to go change into a Madonna outfit and for Jess and I that means hoodie and jeans. So I am sitting there .... Drinking my drink. Thinking it is taking awhile. No big deal. Maybe Jess is taking a shit.....Man I am hungry. Jess comes back, sits down. DAMN IT! She has a mole!!! That is damn funny!!! So we start laughing so hard- I tell her I was MOMENTS away from doing that myself and I tell her NICE WORK!! We are just chatting. Damn. I cannot stop staring at that mole. It is kind of talking to me. Its like when she talks- the mole is talking. Thank GOD she does not have a real mole. That would put a big wedge in our relationship. "I seriously cannot stop staring at your mole..." she laughs. I pay the bill thanking her for taking me to the concert and we move on. Jess checks to make sure we have the tickets for the tenth time and we leave the restaurant.


We get in my car..... Enjoy this video ....




So we are now on our way to the concert. BUT wait.....we need something. we need shooters. We stop at a liquor store that has a sign outside of it that said, NO HOODIES ALLOWED. Huh. we are clearly wearing hoodies. Maybe they mean something else.
We get our shooters ... NOW we are in action.

We are pulling into the parking lot of the Pepsi Center and we are seeing A LOT of old people getting out of the car. And I mean like 70 year old people....THAT is old.

Now .... enjoy THIS video.




After THAT debacle.... we head in. We find our seats, and we sit. We are people watching - it is 8:13 and NO ONE is there. I would say it is 3/4 empty. The fact that she did not come on until 9:30 the night before is definitely impacting people.

Then at 9:14, the lights go down. Everyone screams .... Madonna is about to go on. The opening is awesome. I cannot really describe it and I captured it on my phone ... which SUCKS compared to my flip so imagine, if you will, something awesome.

The show goes on for 2 hours ... Jess and I get up, dance, sing ... and then sit for some of the stuff we don't know but still jam and just look at her in awe. She comes out in soccer socks and jump ropes at one point. When I am 50 I pray to GOD I am doing that. Not really wearing my soccer socks to play soccer because I should just quit that NOW ... but I DO hope I am in those tiny ass shorts, jump roping across a stage singing my heart out.
At one point she is talking to the crowd. She gets mad at us when we stop clapping. She REALLY gets mad a one row that is sitting. She even says, "What the fuck do you think this is, a Barbra Streisand concert?! No offense." She ask the crowd what to sing, she sings Like a Virgin. We sing with her. Then she stops after the first verse and tells the crowd that is all she remembers and she never can remember the second verse. Second verse .... Same as the first!! Oh wait. Pretty sure that is Henry the 8th song. Anyway, she keeps going ... she sings Like a Prayer- which is one of my favs, and I really do not want that song to stop. Ever. She sings her last song- goes back in the vanishing door .... and ... scene. There is was. I told Jess before the show that Steve and I always know when a band is NOT doing an encore. And THAT is when the house lights come on. People think the show will still go on. Not when those damn lights go on. Sure enough the lights go on - even though Holiday came on, and Jess and I looked at each other. We got to bust a move out of here! So we leave our row. This is the part I hate about concerts. There- in the sea of "cows" and no one is moving and everyone is all jacked up on the concert they just saw. Not Jess and I, we sprinted out of there ... take the stairs down .... we are flying down them. We are now pretty much running to the car - which is in Lot A thanks to Sam and his free parking. We get to the car and we are the only car that is backing out. NICE! We speed out of the parking lot, which is RIGHT next to I-25 and we are now on our highway! I give my phone to Jess who can get Kelly's text message of directions. Now we are going to see Madonna's plane leave. Hopefully we can see the material girl herself.

Now watch this video won't you?





Now the rest of the night will probably be best summed up in videos. We like to call them VLOGS in the biz. BUT unfortunately they are "too big" for blogger- so I will just explain what happened.

We get to the airport in probably about 15 minutes. We were FLYING down I-25- I have never driven that fast (THAT is a lie) and we thought for sure we beat the Virgin to the airport. We talk to mom on the phone who says that we have to go through some security and that we should just tell the guy that we are seeing one of Kelly's friends. Well we get there and there is NO security or gates of any sort so we keep driving. Jess is reading the text from Kelly, "Go to the end of the street- that is where her plane is." So we do what he tells us do and there is only two planes. A small jet like plane and a bigger plan that is a little further away. We pull in and think- this is it....this is where we see Madonna!!

The engine on this little plane is going and it is loud. We think that it is NO DOUBT it is her plane! We are just sitting in the car just staring at this plane. We are slightly disappointed that there is no glitter, no big "M", no pink ANYWHERE- just a plain white plane. ("Looks like a big Tylenol." - Airplane BEST movie ever) We just sit there. I decide that I need to get out of the car and get a closer look. BUT Jess reminds me that mom almost got bitch slap taking pictures of John Kerry so I get back in the car real quick. We see a nice Escalade leaving the area. THAT has to be Madonna's car that she SPED in because we were just as speedy and now Madonna is in the plane enjoying some peanuts. The plane starts to move. "We are following that plane!!" I start to follow the plane with my car!! I am getting turned around- I am pretty much going in a circle until I decide to follow another Escalade. Jess tells me that we would probably just follow it back to a rental car place.
Oh wait- there is the plane on the right hand side of us. See?!?! we ARE following the plane!! As the plane is taxing- we are just following it. We are talking about how Madonna would love us if she only just met us!!
The plane takes off and we are just sitting in the middle of the road SO disappointed. That was it. That is all we got. We got no autograph, no picture, NOTHING.

The show was awesome and I would see her again in a heart beat. All in all, dancing around in our house when we were little pretending to be the material girl- 22 years later- we see her live. Then we see her leave in her plane. Or so we think.

History hangover

Last night was history in the making. We elected the first African American president of the United States- and how excited were we?!? So excited that we needed to have an election day party.

I woke up feeling different. Feeling happy and excited about the day. One day I will tell my kids about this. One day I will look back and tell everyone what I was doing when Obama and McCain were going head to head in the biggest presidential race in history.

I get up and run- running to songs that will pump any American up- "We will rock you", "Baby got back", "Sign" by Ace of Base- you know...the usual. After my run I jump in the shower, get my VOTE NOW shirt on and wake Steve up.

We eat Alphabits because that is the best American meal and damn it that they have not been around for the past 10 years of my life. (side note: they got ride of NEW! on the box. Damn straight.)

We walk Mr. Bo- the air is clean and ready for a new president!

I have to go to the police station to get my fingerprints. yeah....I got into some bad stuff and have to clear my name but that is a whole different story. OK- No, I had to go get fingerprints to get a substitute teaching license and what better day to do it!

We drive up to the police station and there are people in red, white and blue with signs that say, "DROP OFF BALLOTS- THIS WAY"

Everyone is honking and waving. How exciting. I have never known this many people to get this excited or to vote for that matter!

We park and go in to the police station where there were these two older gentleman asking what my business is. I tell them and they help me fill out my fingerprint card. They tell me to put a "C" or a "W" for my race and a "F" for my gender. Really? How cute were these two old men?! I wanted to squish them up and take them home! I pay at the counter and away we go. This guy is getting my entire hand black and of course Steve is cracking jokes like, "this is not her first time doing this...." or "Now you know how I feel....." the usual jokes coming from Steve. The old guys are telling us stories about how people leave shoes, socks, watches, rings....you name it- they leave it at this police station while getting fingerprinted. I look down. Speaking of rings- mine is now black! I did not care because at this point- this guy could have covered my face with black ink and I would have laughed and still wanted to take him home. Once I was done- he coved my hands in a lemon scented goo- "Now rub yer hands together like yer washing them- but don't let your ring go in the trash." Thanks buddy. Thanks.

We leave the police station with my fingerprint card in hand and go back home where I had to drop off Steve so he can get the house clean and ready for our election day party and so I could go to work.

I get to work- get some of the "full screens" (its what we say in the bizz) I have to build for all these shows coming up. I go to a meeting- we are voting for who will win the Thursday nights game. TCU or Utah? I pick Utah but I just really do not care. I want to get home to start watching TV. We finally start taping (or shooting- if you will) some of our shows. I get calls and text's from Steve saying that Pink is at the house with him and that he is getting an early start on his celebration for Obama. He sends me a picture of Pink. It is a Pink holding up a vodka bottle that they have decorated. It says OBAMA '08 all over it. Wow- it is around 2:00 and he is going to town already!!

I finally get off work- I am running to the store to get snacks and Steve at this point is drunk. I need snacks to make him sober up!! ;)

I get home and he is probably the worst I have seen him. His friend Pink and him are downstairs in the basement playing fooseball table complaining that the need more beer. They leave to go get more beer after Steve tells me about 5 times that they drank a whole bottle of vodka. Why do they need more beer? Oh screw it- this is going to be a good night with history in the making!!

They go get beer, I am alone putting chips into bowls- listening to the TV. Mom calls. She stops by for a minute and we talk about Obama. We both think that if he can just hit 220 electoral votes, he will win. California is a lock with 50 electoral votes, so we just need him to get that. So far he is leading Florida AND Ohio which is huge! This is so exciting. Oh wait....VOTER ALERT!!! McCain won Kentucky. NO surprise there.

Mom leaves and Pink and Steve come back but Pink actual leaves to go home- so it is just Steve and I. Steve is mad that my mom left so he tries calling her but she did not pick up- so he closes his phone and pouts about it. Drops his phone in the salsa. He graps his phone out of the salsa and says, "crap- my phone has salsa on it..." and goes to the faucet to WASH IT OFF!! I grab him before he ruins his phone and I wipe it off for him. Could be a long night.

Moose finally comes over- THANK GOD and we make our shirts that we got FREE from Gap. It says Vote for _____. So of course we put in - Vote for HERB. and Vote for SOME DRE. Because why not put that on a shirt!?!? Steve strips for the both of us and says, "Put my shirt on for me!" What is he, 5??!!? Moose and I just laugh!

People start showing up- it was awesome. We are sitting there watching TV- but it is on CNN, not ESPN, not FOX SPORTS, not NBC on Sunday nights for football- we were actually watching a news channel. This is amazing! I am looking around the room and I am in awe of all of us so in to this election. We are not watching one of our teams looking to go 8-0 or make the hail mary pass to the end zone- this is history. This is the stuff that you read when you are 16 or 17 in your history class that you do not care about.....and we are watching it on our 47" (thats what she said) TV.

The electoral votes for Obama keeps going up, we are all getting so excited. I tell Moose my grand idea of hitting 220 (ps- I LOVE calling it MY grand idea when it is simple math) and she is nervous- she cannot even think about it! Steve is now in bed- drinking that early made him sleepy. (I have kept waking him up telling him he has to get up, if he misses it- he will be so sad) "Wake me up in 10 minutes." SO I go back downstairs.

VOTER ALERT! Obama wins Florida AND Ohio- our polls are now closed- Kevin says- "Man whichever party is YELLOW- they are winning." LOVE HIM. They have now put down a countdown clock for the polls closing on the west coast. This is it. This means California. Obama hits 220. California immediately turns BLUE- VOTER ALERT! OBAMA WINS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES- I say, "Holy shit- they just called it!" Everyone was shocked and did not want to believe it.....They did! Sure enough- There is a check mark by Obama!! We start jumping up and down!! We start high fiving and hugging like our team just won the super bowl- This is awesome!! I have to go wake up Steve! Moose wants to come with so we swing open the door- "Steve OBAMA WON!!" Moose and I dance while Steve is slowly opening his eyes (super sleepy AND drunk)- "They called it?" So I explained the whole 220 thing and he said, "Well McCain has to ok that." (why is it on Steve's drunkest of days he can rattle out something actually smart and relative to the situation)

Anyway, Moose and I continued our dance and then went back downstairs. Everyone got on their phones to call someone. Mostly, their parents. Being in our 20's it is amazing to see the world for what it is and to see how far we have come. Sharing it with our parents and their parents is the next best thing when we think "history." Times like this I wish my dad, grandpa and grammy were still alive to see something this amazing. Well maybe not grandpa- he was not a huge fan of "the black folk!" ;) But to come this far in this country is so powerful and so moving.

McCain gives his speech. (He still cannot wave to the crowd. I'm sorry- too soon?) No for real- it was a great "exit interview" and I wrote it down for when I quit the MTN. He is an amazing solider and a brave soul- I am just glad he does not have that pin head crazy ass bitch with him to ruin this country. Sarah Palin waves- you can see it in her eyes. I wonder what she is thinking. "Can I go back to Alaska? Will they still love me? I still need to get that Mama Moose that has been dodging my bullets for awhile now- I guess that is what Tom and I will do tomorrow morning. Remind me to fuel the helicopter tomorrow morning- I need to vent."

We are all just waiting around for Obama's speech. The poor guy just lost his grandmother a day ago- She was the cutest thing ever.

The guy that loves the touch screen comes back on telling us about the demographics of the voters. "Lets go to age shall we..." PRESS- then the screen transforms into a pie chart. "Ya see here? The ages from 18-32- 58% voted for Obama while the rest- 41% voted for McCain- Now lets go back out here...." PRESS- I swear this guy has NO idea what the hell he is talking about he just wants to press the damn touch screen. (Side note: when we had to go through "telestrator training" at work- I was this guy. I was circling players, putting in arrows in the shape of a smiley face, I wrote HI MOM on top of the video- I was all over the place. And here I sit- making fun of this old dude. EVERYONE should play with a telestrator or a voting touchscreen once in their life)

FINALLY Obama comes out. His family is so cute. He looks so tired. But happy. To be honest- I think HE is even shocked he won.
His speech was amazing. He had me at HELLO CHICAGO. I had tears in my eyes....words cannot express his speech. I do not care who you voted for- his speech made you love America. Every America has been pissed off the past 8 years. We have been taken granted for. We are the power house and every other country is laughing at us because of one single man. This is the time were we get back up and we stand up for what we believe in. We all have to remember how it is to be an American and this is a huge start for a change.

I look behind me at Moose to smile at her. We smile at each other (never mind that Steve is sucking on a cigar- THAT is a whole different story!!) and I just keep thinking how weird it is to have a different president. Bush was elected before I could drink alcohol. Now I am married to an alcoholic- No I am just kidding- But think about how long we have had ONE MAN in that White House. Finally EIGHT years later it just feels different. It feels amazing.

I drove into work today and it felt better. I have no idea why- it just did.



Obama wins OHIO


Ashleigh and Kevin


HE WINS!


Musou and I


Ernie, Ash and Kevin


Meghan, James and GARY!