Sports Guy

As if Joe didn't have a long enough day with work and school, we picked him up and went to Matchbox for dinner two weeks ago. I think I've blogged about Matchbox once or twice, but let me just tell you again: Loves it!

JJ, showing us the score of the Monday Night Football game on his iPhone

Marc & Emily

Britt & Joe

Yummy, yummy sliders

After dinner, Joe and I went to ESPNZone to meet Bill Simmons (the Sports Guy) and buy his book. Unfortunately, his book wasn't being officially released until midnight, so we were forced to watch the un-watchable Eagles vs. Redskins game while we waited in line. Bill was a great guy; here are some pictures of the top of his head.

I'm wearing a pink Favre jersey 'cause Sports Guy hates Favre and pink jerseys. I had three people ask me if I was going to the next Packers/Vikings game.


Happy to have our book!

The Sports Guy was funny 'cause he would write anything in your book. So Joe had a book and knew what he wanted, and I had a book that we were getting signed for Joe's cousin Greg. Joe told me about 5 times what I was supposed to get on the inside of Greg's book, but I kept forgetting. Then when I got up to Sports Guy, I was like "This is for Joe's cousin Greg...um...what was I supposed to put?" (looking at Joe). This is what we got:

He wrote "Cousin Greg," which is awesome...and then totally added his own parentheses :)

Training For The Circus

A few weeks ago, I emailed some of my girlfriends to say was going to sign up for a trapeze class through TSNY, and they were all invited to join me. Five of them did, and 2 weeks ago we were on a trapeze in Chinatown!

From left to right: Lytle, Britt, Katie, Alex, Ashley and Emily

I was REALLY excited to not do this by myself, but SUPER DUPER excited that all these totally awesome ladies joined me. LYTLE and I go way back to Freshman year. She accompanied Joe, Jacob and me to a concert in SLC once, and had to hide a disposable camera in her hair so we could sneak it in. Later, Joe put a deer head in the trunk...we have some awesome pictures. I'm so glad she's in the DC area now!! KATIE and I used to work together at GWorld. We had many days where one of us would end up on the floor laughing while the other one had to leave the room. My favorite memory of Katie was hearing her on the phone with local non-English-speaking vendors, asking what their hours of operation would be over Inauguration weekend. "Inauguration...in-aug-yur-a-shun...the swearing in of the President." Awesome. ALEX is also a GWorld friend, but is currently one of Joe's co-workers. She plays a mad game of Blokus and can ROCK the mic on Rock Band. Alex also left a whole container of brownies at my house, so I blame her for my current non-weight-loss. ASHLEY is another friend I met Freshman year. I made her call the bowling alley where Joe worked to reserve lanes for our blind date. This is the night Joe let me borrow his bowling shoes and I got a kiss on the hand, so pretty much Ashley facilitated all that. Additionally, she helped transport 300 balloons to my wedding reception (and did a few more traditional bridesmaid duties,) so she's definitely a friend for life. Ash came down from NY for trapeze, but I'm pumped for her to move out here next year!! EMILY is my newest BFF; her husband Marc and Joe are GW buddies, and she got me my job so now we're co-workers. We have tons of fun every day and (hopefully) help keep each other sane.

This is Ashley, but you can see me climbing the ladder. Climbing the ladder was probably the scariest part...once you're swinging around, you don't think about things too much.

Joe was a great supporter and photographer. Thanks for supporting your crazy wife!

With the "original" crew for a celebratory dinner at Five Guys. I might have put chalk all over my arms then crossed my arms across my chest when I got nervous...but you can hardly tell ;)

Alex, Emily and I each bought 2 more classes (to get the 3rd one for free!) I will definitely post more photos/videos when they happen. For now, you can see the goods HERE

Happy Halloween!

Love, Lucky

lol

Hey everyone,

Sorry I haven't posted much this semester, it's been crazy. Pretty much every day something bizarre and funny happens at this office. I don't know if it's our location or what, but if all I did was post the weird things that happen here, I wouldn't have time to do anything else. That being said, I have a funny story from today to share.

So, last week Jeb Bush (not this Bush brother) was on campus at our Media and Public Affairs Building giving a speech about how the GOP can remake its image. It was a pretty big news on campus and around town, because Jeb has been keeping a low profile, and lots of people had initially hoped he would be the Bush son to be president.

Anyway, we've got a crazy guy that comes to our office a lot. He apparently used to work at the Library of Congress, and is on medical disability. He demands random information about scholarships, and the paralegal certification / Master's degree program. The school advertises their paralegal and other professional certification programs heavily in the newspaper because they are profitable programs for the University.

So today he came in with a newspaper, and was livid. He had circled the time and room of the Paralegal program information session, but had apparently got it mixed up with the Jeb Bush speech. He came in today to the office and was yelling "I sat through the whole Jeb Bush program but he never got around to talking about paralegal studies!"

PS - after typing this out I realize it doesn't read as being very funny. But it was hilarious to me that a 40 year old man who knows who Jeb Bush is would think he was going to do a presentation on a paralegal certification, and that all the press would be here to cover it.

I <3 my cats

I don't care if all these posts makes me a crazy cat lady or not...these two rock my world.

Lesson Learned

One really bad habit of mine is to lock my car door before I close it. Yeah I have the keyless entry clicker and all that...but for some reason, I just open the door, lock it, then get out and close it. This sometimes results in me frantically looking for my keys just after getting out of the car, which is so lame. Anyway, today this happened:
My keys were locked IN the door. Luckily, the key and the clicker ended up on the outside of the car, so no problem. But still. Me + rain + Trader Joe's parking lot + Joe not home for another 5 hours = quick panic. WHEW. Lesson learned.

Tried and True Ideas I Found on the Interwebs

Dipping apples

Easier than caramel apples, I tried this at preschool:
apple chunks...covered in
nutella, peanut butter, or marshmallow fluff...then dipped in
chopped up candy, chocolate, cinnamon sugar, or dry jello mix
Success! (and HUGE sugar high)

"Smart" ice bucket

Put ice in a colander, then in a bigger container. Your guests end up with ice, not ice water.
Success!

Blink, Beach and 'Burg

Unplanned coordinating outfits, 2002

Blink 182 has influenced my life more than any other band...they gave my brother a job, which got me 1) super-cool status in high school when I got to hand out leftover Hurley and Blink bumper stickers, 2) backstage access to Warped Tour 2000, and 3) my awesome sister-in-law Carter (who met Jake on the road).

When Joe and I started chatting it up Freshman year at BYU, our similar tastes in music was a big plus. We talked about the concerts we went to, downloaded literally thousands of songs (thanks BYU's internet and audiogalaxy,) made each other awesome mixes, and made plans to attend a few shows together.

It's been 7.5 years, but we finally got to see a Blink show together! It was at the amphitheater in Virginia Beach...which is pretty much the coolest place to see a show ever. We had lawn seats, (but we mostly stood,) a great view, and tons of room to move around. Cons: the 3.5-turned-6.5-hour trip to get there, missing the opening band (Asher Roth,) the next band (All-American Rejects,) canceling due to a wrist injury, and parking five million miles away. Pros: Watching Fall Out Boy and Blink rock their little hearts out, knowing the words to every song, and dancing in the rain.

That night we stayed in Virginia Beach, and the next day enjoyed riding a 2-seater bicycle thingy up and down the boardwalk. We saw a pet adoption fair, leftover sand sculptures and a jetski contest.

Then we went to Williamsburg for a night. We walked around William & Mary and did whatever free stuff we could downtown. It's weird to go places where Joe applied to law school and think "We could have ended up here..." It was a beautiful campus, but we really enjoy ourselves here.

And that was our quick trip last weekend! This was actually my first time out of the "NoVa" (Northern Virginia) area since we've moved here (other than plane trips across the country). We definitely need to do it more often. Tons more of Virginia to enjoy!

What We've Been Up To...

I realize this is not at all "what we've been up to," because if we wrote:

7:00am-Joe and Britt wake up
7:45am-Joe to work
8:15am-Britt to work
4:30pm-Britt home
6:00pm-Joe to school
9:00pm-Joe home

y'all would be like "BORING!" (p.s. doesn't Joe's schedule suck and my schedule totally rule? Just remember that today I had to pick up poop, so don't be too jealous).
*****
So the Halo 3 ODST gamey thingy came out last week. There was a midnight release, and we went to it.
See? We're wearing Halo shirts 'cause we're cool. This reminds me of our last Halo-related midnight relase: November 2004 to get Halo 2 at the Media Play in Orem. Joe chillin with Master Chief. Wow, I can't believe Halo has played such an important part in our lives for this long. Crazy.
*****
On Saturday Joe had some law school friends over to watch cool 80's movies (of the Arnold Schwarzenegger/Steven Seagal variety); they do this every few months and rotate living rooms. Fun idea. Anyway, I used it as an excuse to make some pretty unhealthy snacks and to use our keep-food-warm thingy. Those are little smokies, stuffed potato skins and quesadillas. YUM. When is the next party? I will pretend to tolerate those movies if I can make junk food again.
*****
I know you guys have really missed the cat pictures, so here's one. Remember Joe's schedule? Sometimes he falls asleep on the couch. Wherever he is, Lucky finds him and cuddles up. Cute.
*****
And finally, I present to you: Photos hung in living room. We wanted to go a little "DC," so we enlarged our own photos of the Washington Monument, the Capitol, and the Iwo Jima Memorial. This took me way too long to not post a photo showing off my work.
I also put those LED-candles in the fireplaces because we never use it. They're on a timer, so every night from 7-midnight they "flicker". Way better than fake logs.*****
By this time tomorrow we will be on the lawn of the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Virginia Beach, getting ready for the Blink 182 concert. I can't wait.

lol

For some reason when I read this headline: "Sting catches alleged terrorist in plot to blow up courthouse," I thought in my head that the singer Sting from "The Police" had caught the terrorist. The funny thing is, it didn't even seem that weird to me.
We all know he would be good at spying on people.

45 hours in Texas

*Joe here - I didn't want to write this post, thinking it would jinx the Cougars. Well it looks like they did a good enough job jinxing themselves. It doesn't take anything away from the Oklahoma game, which is the most fun I've had at a sporting event in my life. Now onto Britt's write up...

So we went to this football game over Labor Day weekend...you might have heard of it...

We were greeted at our gate in Dallas by Greg and Tiffany, then took take the shuttle to the Avis desk and are told were cars are available. Bummer.

I asked Tiffany to check avis.com on her iPhone while Greg looked for taxi numbers on his. Guess what? We made a reservation on avis. com, and I walked back to the same desk 5 minutes after being told no cars were available. I casually looked at the desk and realized my reservation had JUST printed off. "Oh, that's me!" I exclaimed. How convenient. As a Preferred Member, you just flash your ID and you're off. I was in and out in 2 minutes. I pulled out and picked up Joe, Tiff and Greg on the street. A pretty awesome start to the weekend.

Greg did all the legwork to find a motel that was really close to the game. They offered a free shuttle, and we got to the (gorgeous) new Cowboys Stadium around 4:30. It was pretty hot, so we tried to stay in the shade while saying hi to other friends before going inside. Eventually we got to our great seats (thanks Jack & Greg!) in a mostly BYU section. We enjoyed our $7 hot dogs and $5 drinks, stared in awe at the 60-yard-wide screen, and watched the stands fill up with Oklahoma fans.

The game was really fun; the fans in our section were pretty pumped up. A few plays brought us to our feet, but I was nervous Oklahoma would just stomp all over us at some point. Nope! The stadium got SO LOUD, each side yelling at the others' offense. I really couldn't believe we pulled it off, but am so happy we did. We stayed around in the stadium for quite a while after the game, just jumping up and down and taking pictures. We sang the fight song and watched the players do the Haka. Walking out of the stadium, we had tons of Oklahoma fans come up and congratulate us. We finished off the night with cheap Mexican food next to the motel and called it good.

Sunday morning Greg and Tiffany went back to Iowa, and we went to Austin with Liz and Reed. We caught up on a little sleep, played with Eva, and enjoyed some great ribs courtesy of Reed. As good as dinner was, Eva was definitely the highlight of the Austin portion of our trip. She is a very happy girl, and was taking out every book from her room and stacking them in the hall. Joe would put his shoe on top of the stack while she was gone, and she would just throw it back at him and continue her tower. After a while, she went back into her room and we heard a rustling sound. I looked in to see her grab a Costco-sized bag of Cheerios stashed behind her crib. She was hiding food in her room! She was very cute and walked around with her bag for awhile.

The trip was way too short! We had to come back to real life, but are SO happy we got to spend some quality time with family. Go Cougs!

p.s. Does anyone else think that the week after Labor Day was the LONGEST week in the history of life? Geez.

PHOTOS...

Joe & Britt outside the new stadium

Liz & Reed

BYU fans drinking pre-partying outside with their Coors Light. Classy.

More stadium

Met up with friends Jake & Nani

So mad I forgot my gameday dress and cowboy boots

Stands filling up with Oklahoma fans

Tiffany & Greg

Oh, hi amazing screen.

I like those numbers.

Celebrating

Happy campers

SuperGreg

Eva and her books

Chattin it up

Wouldn't let go of the Cheerios for awhile.

Looks like she's up to something :)

Reed & ribs

Austin's bats

$6 Bedroom Makeover

A few months ago Glidden was offering free paint samples so I ordered Deepest Aqua with no real plans for it. When it came in the mail, I realized it would actually look good with our new bedding. So after obsessing and over-thinking about what exactly to do with it, I went a little craft-crazy this week and came up with the following:

This is an old cake pan...I painted it, glued some scrapbook paper to it, and now it's a magnet board. $1 for the cake pan at a thrift store.

We have lots of random things in our storage unit from the last homeowner. I finally went through it and found extra shelves. So I painted the racks and hung the shelves. FREE.

See all the stuff on the shelves? Those are office organizers, cardboard boxes, soup cans, Trader Joe's plastic containers, etc. I just painted everything aqua or white. Funny how a cardboard box can look okay if you paint it. $2 for the sample of white paint at Home Depot.

The plate idea came to me at the thrift store. I got 2 plastic and one tin plate, then painted with the aqua, white, and some leftover green from the rest of the bedroom. $3 for plates.

I'm patting myself on the back for this one. Thanks to Joe for staying out of my way, repeating "Yes, Dear" a lot, and looking impressed when it mattered.

Takes the Cake

Because I work in a public area, I get a lot of stupid questions. My favorite one is when people ask, "Is this the bookstore?" I never understand why people would ask this. A bookstore requires books, and things for sale, and our office has neither. This morning, a traveling European student asked me if our office is a hostel. It's not.

Blink and you'll miss it

Some people love malcolm gladwell. Some people like to hate on him. And some people like to hate on the haters. I saw him speak at a conference, and didn't think he was a very good speaker. He also wasn't very nice when he signed my book, and looks like a mole. But, I love his theories in "Blink" about subconscious thinking. I had one such moment today.

At my job I talk to hundreds of people each day. Most of them lie to me, and all of them want money. They always say that they turned in their forms, that "someone" told them they would be getting more financial aid, etc. etc. Today I talked to a student who told me that he didn't owe the remainder of his tuition money, because someone at financial aid had promised him that the remaining balance would be covered. Nothing in our system backed up what he was saying at all. But unlike 99% of the students I talk to, there was just a more legitimate feel to what he was saying. It wasn't anything conscious, just a gut feeling. Anyway, I ran it all the way up to the assistant director, and we did some digging, and found a letter from the director himself promising the remainder of the payment. Someone had just forgot to key it in. That's all. Not sure what the point of this post is. Go Cougars!

My Humor

I laugh a lot. So many things are funny to me. I laugh when I trip; I laugh when others trip. I laugh when things start going wrong. I laugh when someone mis-speaks...like so much that I usually have to walk away from the situation, bent over, gasping for breath.

I'm so lucky Joe is funny. And that we think the same things are funny. And that he got over the fact that my laugh is so loud it sometimes hurts his ears.

I decided to make a little "best of" list; wrap it all up in a nice little package. I don't expect many of you to "get" it, but in case you were wondering, I like to:

WATCH Arrested Development


LOOK at Pearls Before Swine

from here

LISTEN to Mitch Hedberg


READ BYU's Police Beat

and STUMBLE UPON gems like this...

I might have seen that last one about ten times. Maybe more.

Cups are not for drinking out of

Last night Joe and I ended up in Chinatown after school. It was late enough that we could just walk into Matchbox without waiting, and we had one of my favorite meals in DC yet. I got the mozzi carrozzi and chopped salad. Joe strayed from his usual order of sliders and got the real deal: the bistro burger. We even got dessert!! The trio included molten chocolate cake, sorbet trio, and house-made (warm, delicious) doughnuts.
And this is when a classic Britt moment occurred. See that little cup next to the doughnuts in the back? Well, at our favorite steak place, Rays the Steaks, they sometimes give you a little cup of DELICIOUS hot chocolate at the end of your meal (or if you go to Ray's Hell Burgers when it's cold outside, they have it in a dispenser and you can get lots). So I sipped a little; not bad. Then our waiter comes up a few minutes later and is like "Make sure not to drink that; that would be disgusting. It's for dipping your doughnuts into." Well, duh...I would never drink something THAT CAME IN A CUP. Geez, false advertising. Then he told me it was kahlua-flavored coffee, and my bubble-burst was complete. Still the best dessert ever.

This reminded me of my surprise birthday lunch at Kinkeads. I got halibut, and they give me the fish and this lemon inside a little net. I had no idea what to do with it, so I rubbed it on my fish. Joe about fell off his chair, and showed me how to SQUEEZE the lemon on the fish. I told him it was his fault for not taking me to swanky places to eat more often. I grew up on McDonald's and the buffet at Sizzler; some things just go right over my head.

Anyway, you know you're in a cool restaurant when they have these hand-blowers in the bathroom. I love these things; you feel like there is no possible way for your hands to be any drier after a hand-washing.
Yeah, I took a picture in the bathroom.

Yummies

I subscribe to 95 blogs in my Google Reader. Half of them are blogs from friends and family; the rest are a pretty good mix. I read blogs about what's going on in DC, fun projects to do with the preschoolers, cooking ideas, coupon/internet deals, decorating/uncluttering ideas, modest fashion, consumer blogs, a few tech-y sites, and then I round it all out with a bunch of dumb humor blogs.

I digress.

I got the idea for the treat shown above from Conversations with a Cupcake. It's more of a summer-y snack, but you should still try it sometime. I cut pieces of bread into fourths (tangent: there is an Entenmann's outlet in town that I just discovered. I walked out with 12 english muffins, 6 subs for sandwiches and this high fiber Arnold-brand bread used in the picture for $3. Yeah, $3), then made little sandwiches with peanut butter, marshmallow fluff, nutella, bananas and strawberries. I used a toothpick to keep them together, but it really isn't necessary 'cause you'll just eat them really fast.

Creepy McCreeperton

While driving home the other day, I felt like something was watching me. I pulled over and looked closely to find THIS, and it totally reminded me of the Twilight Zone movie with the gremlin. So many similarities, really.

I told Joe I was freaked out 'cause it was looking right at me, and Joe said "It doesn't have a choice!" Touche.

Bear Lake

Joe and I had an awesome week with the his family at Bear Lake. Barb took care of everything, so it was up to us to relax and enjoy hanging out with parents, siblings, in-laws, nieces and nephews. Some highlights included: riding the Sea-Doos on the lake; going to the local theater to see "Annie Get Your Gun"; playing in the pool; playing tennis, frisbee, kickball, etc; sleeping in (!)

These are just a few photos from the fun. The rest are on Flickr here

A Few Days in Oregon

It was great to be in Oregon for a few days...this was my first time back in 2 years! My cousin Erica was married in the Portland temple, so I was able to see a lot of my family from my dad's side. Then I went back to Lincoln City for a few days to help my mom organize a few things and visit some friends. It was so nice to be home.

All photos are here

Molly gave me a ride from the airport to the family dinner. We are airport-ride buddies!!

Cousin "Cow" and me

With Grandma at the temple

Erica & Isaac

Just married!

Kyle with "Taylor"...he's on a mission in Germany, so a cutout was a good substitute

Erica with her cousins

My sister Melanie and me

Dinner with the Gettys

Catching up with old friends Tara and Sydney (and new friend Emerson, Sydney's adorable baby)