Auburn Rules

War Eagle fly down the field, ever to conquer never to yield, War Eagle fearless and true, fight on you Orange and Blue, Go Go Go! On to victory, strike up the band, hit 'em high, hit 'em low, Go tigers go! War Eagle win for AUBURN, power of Dixieland!

Monday, February 27, 2006

Cinderella Man



I know this movie is not new, but here is my review: I watched Cinderella Man this past Friday night on DVD. I thought it was a great movie! It was perfect for guys and girls, because it has the action that the guys love and it has the love story that the girls love. It was the perfect depiction of a man's love for his family (girl's perspective). I dont even know what the guy's perspective would be, but it made my eyes well up with tears a couple of times.

The basic premise of the movie is about this boxer who was hot stuff in his day, but then the Great Depressin happened and he turned into a "has been". When he was in his prime, he was livin' large in a nice house with plenty of money, but when the stock market crashed, he moved his family of five into a one bedroom basement apartment. The story is about him taking risks for the betterment of his family. Well, not only did his family benefit, but those who watched him fight benefitted as well because they felt like he was fighting for them. The people who came to watch him were the same type of people that he worked with every day at the loading docks, so he was the people's fighter.

I must say that Lauren is correct in saying that Renee Zellweger was meant to live in the 20's and 30's. We decided that she looks her best when she plays roles in this era.

So, women if you can stand the brutality of the fighting, and men if you can stand the sappy love scenes.....go rent this movie! It is worth it!

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Treasures

Have you ever lost something really precious to you? Something that maybe was a gift from a special person, or something you inherited, or maybe it was something you worked really hard to obtain. Well, this has happened to me several times, because lets face it....sometimes I am absent-minded (stop nodding your head dad!)

About two years ago, I started to save up my money because I wanted to buy a really nice digitial camera. I started putting a little money back each paycheck and then I was able to get quite a bit of $$ back from my tax returns. I was about to leave on a trip to go to England for three weeks and I knew that I wanted to make the best out of the trip and have lots of quality pictures to remember the trip by. One reason was because I went to England my Senior year of high school and I left my camera in the Gap in the city of Windsor!(does anyone see a pattern here?) So, I didnt have a lot of pictures from that trip. To buy this new camera, I went to several stores to try and understand how many pixels was best and what type of camera I wanted. Finally came the day when I bought the camera, and it has been one of most used purchases. I love taking pictures to capture moments.

Well, I realized on Friday that I could not find my camera!! Ahhhh, I was so distraught. I completely turned over everything in my apartment and in my car. No camera was to be found! I soon realized that the last time I had used it was on Super Bowl Sunday and we went out to eat at La Playa Maya that day after church. I knew I left it in the restaraunt, but it had been two weeks since I had been there, and I thought the camera was a goner for sure! But I couldnt get it out of my mind, so I decided to call the restaraunt and sure enough they still had my camera!! I was so surprised and so elated! I love my camera and I love sharing pictures with my friends on here and decorating my home with pictures. So, though this may be boring to you all, it was a major high for me yesterday and I had to share my excitement.

The picture below is the last picture that I took before I lost my camera. This is of me and Lauren on Super Bowl Sunday. Our church asked us to wear our favorite team's colors, so I have adopted Lauren into the Auburn fan club (much to the chagrin of Chris and Michael) and so here we are sporting Orange and Blue for good ole' Auburn!





p.s. I fell again on Sunday

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Birthday

Well, I guess it is about time for me to update this thing! So, what better to talk about than the best day that I have had in a long time. Yesterday was my birthday! It was a wonderful day and I was able to spend the evening with Chris, which was wonderfully unexpected.

I started off my day receiving some birthday calls, so thanks to Dena and Lauren for that! I then received a birthday call from my wonderful boyfried who sang to me! It was so great that I made him do it twice! I then received a birthday comment from Sherri, props to you!! I then received an email and phone call from my dad (sorry I missed your call dad!). Then I received a beautiful bouqet of flowers from my boss which was completely unexpected and very nice of him! All of the staff get together and sing to people on their birthday, so I received about 10+ people in my office singing "Happy Birthday" in a whisper because Dr. Allen was having a meeting in his office, which is right next to mine!

I then thought I was going to have to go home and be by myself on my birthday because Chris was supposed to have to work, but......he surprised me and got off work and I didnt know he was gonna do it until I walked into my apartment. I then received some verrrry nice presents. He got me a chocolate on chocolate cake!!! (chocolate cake, chocolate icing and even the words written on the cake were in chocolate, he knows me so well!!) Then he gave me my present and I must say how proud I am of him for keeping it a secret for so long, you did so well! He bought us tickets to see the Fort Worth Symphony play "Shakespeare in Music" at Bass Hall. I am sooooo stoked about this! This means so much to me because I love stuff like this and he likes it too but it isnt his favorite, but he knew that I would enjoy it and I toooootallllly will!

Then Chris and I went downtown to eat at a Mexican place that we have been wanting to try for a long time, I believe the name was Cabo Grande. Well folks, though the company was great, the food was a let down. I had been told that this restaraunt was really good, but we could of had a lot better for the same or cheaper price elsewhere. But you live and learn! Then we went back to my apt to chill for the rest of the evening, he even let me watch "The Bachelor", ah what a wonderful evening.

So, thanks to all who made my birthday a wonderful experience, and a special thanks to Chris for making this a very special day for me!

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Ok, so #1 I am bored….#2 I haven’t done a post like this in a while, so props to Ginny, here ya go….

In Random Order…..70 things you may have never known about me


1. I have a Tennessee license plate, I have an Alabama address on my driver’s license, and I live in Texas.
2. When I was in high school, I would sometimes get Otis Spunkmeyer chocolate chip cookies during lunch and I would put ketchup on them…somehow it made the best taste to mix the salty with the sweet.
3. In high school, I was in National Honors Society, Beta Club, and Mu Alpha Theta.
4. I have been to England (twice), Scotland, Wales, Germany, and China.
5. I started snow skiing at the age of eight.
6. I fell off of a horse and into a barbwire fence on Thanksgiving Day when I was seven.
7. I love olives….black and green!
8. Until, I went away to college, every home that I lived in had a swimming pool in the backyard.
9. I love four-wheelers!
10. I played golf on the varsity team in high school and I almost decided to pursue a collegiate career in golf.
11. I had six different roommates over the course of 3 ½ years at Auburn.
12. I am scared of snakes. I almost ran over a snake one time when I was younger. We had a dirt road in the woods behind our house and I was riding my bicycle on the road. I came across what looked like a big stick in the road, but as I drew closer, I realized that it was a snake. The snake was so big that I couldn’t see its head or tail because the only part of the snake that spanned across the road was the middle part of its body. Yuk!
13. My middle name is DaShadra. My mother made it up when I was born. She combined her parents names, Dolly and Shadrach, to make my middle name. I used to not like this when I was younger because it wasn’t like everyone else’s name, but I like it now for the exact same reason.
14. I love to swim and I love to lay out by the pool (what girl doesn’t???).
15. Like Ginny, I did expose myself accidentally! I was laying out with Emily and Jacki last summer and I exposed myself and didn’t even know it! Luckily, no one else saw!
16. The best time of my life was when I was in college, especially my last year and half.
17. I didn’t have my first date until I was 22.
18. My earliest memory is of a couple of my sleeping spots. First of all, I had a gigi, which was my security blanket. The first sleeping spot was under our coffee table. All of the corners on the bottom of the coffee table were connected, so it pretty much mirrored the top of the coffee table except that it was open in the middle on the bottom, does that make sense?? Anyway, I would lay in the middle under the table and be surrounded by the edges of the table. My second sleeping spot was on the floor in between my night stand and my bed. I think that I liked to be closed in and surrounded by things when I slept.
19. I like to alphabetize.
20. My mother was the youngest of 12 children, so I have like 30 first cousins. It has been ten years since I have spoken to any of them.
21. My grandfather was older than my dad’s grandmother, figure that one out!
22. My mother taught 8th grade English and Spanish.
23. When I was in third grade, we had an exchange student live with us from Barcelona.
24. Whenever I would hold my aforementioned gigi, I would suck my thumb, which led to a terrible overbite. So, I had braces from the 5th grade to the 8th grade.
25. When I was in Elementary school, my mother bought a bedroom suite from a friend of hers and refinished it. The bed was a canopy bed, every little girls dream! It was covered in pink!
26. I will do most anything for a laugh, which has gotten me in trouble a time or two. I was at youth camp one year and it was the type of camp where many churches come together. So, we had a talent/entertainment competition. Some folks in our youth group decided that we would do a skit called the “human milkshake”. Basically, we use the human mouth as the blender. So, one person had a egg in their mouth, one person had the ice cream, one person had the chocolate syrup, etc. Then, they all spit their portion into a glass and had someone drink it at the end of the line. Guess who drank it?? Yours truly. (maybe this is why I didn’t have my first date until the age of 22).
27. I don’t like pulled pork barbeque.
28. But I do LOVE ham!
29. I am a University of Tennessee fan and an Auburn University fan. How can this happen?? Well, I grew up in Tennessee, so all of my family are UT fans. I actually still have the ticket from my first UT game that I attended at the age of two. Then, I moved to Alabama, and I went to visit Auburn with a friend and fell in love instantly with the school.
30. My favorite pastime: sleeping, ahhh the sweet bliss of ultimate surrender.
31. I am not sure that I really have a favorite food, I just love food, but here are some of my favorites: chicken fettuccini alfredo, a good juicy steak, ham that my dad cooks for me especially on Thanksgiving and Christmas, chicken croissants, mac and cheese, broccoli and cheese soup in a bread bowl, shrimp cooked in all ways, lobster, a big fat juicy cheeseburger that is made to order (not the kind you get at McD’s), chocolate cake, chocolate brownie, chocolate cheesecake, chocolate pie, chocolate ice cream, chocolate in general.
32. I am so excited about Valentine’s Day this year. This is the first time that I will actually have a valentine! I know this holiday has become so secularized, but I look at it as a day to celebrate that special person in your life.
33. I actually went to Auburn as a chemistry major but ended up getting a degree in behavioral sciences. How did that happen?! Oh yeah, it was the LORD!
34. My dad used to be a football official for the Southern Conference. When I was younger, I would travel around to all of the colleges where he would have a game. So, I was able to visit many different universities and many wonderful city.
35. Out of all of the cities that we traveled to Charleston, South Carolina was my favorite and I always used to say when I was younger that I wanted to live there when I grew up.
36. The ring that I wear on my right hand is an heirloom that I inherited from my great-grandmother. I was named after her (my first name).
37. I am a secretary, so I sit at a computer for 8-9 hours a day.
38. I love to bake and try new recipes.
39. My last semester of college was an internship that I did at my church back home in the youth ministry.
40. About a month after I started my internship, the youth minister resigned and the week that he left, we found out that our pastor had cancer. The Lord did amazing things in my life and the lives of others through those two traumatic events.
41. I like the Harry Potter book series.
42. I am in love with a man named Chris!
43. One of my closest friends in the whole world lives over a thousand miles away from me. She and I only lived in the same town for one year but we have been friends for over ten years. That is what happens when the Lord is the center of your relationship.
44. I am afraid of heights and one way that I am trying to overcome this is to sit on the first row in the balcony during chapel.
45. I love to go out on a boat on a river in the summertime. I don’t like to water ski or swim in the river, I just like being out on a boat.
46. One time when I was in college, some friends called me and my roommate in the middle of night to see if we wanted to go muddin’ in the woods, and we were like “heck yeah!” Does that make me a redneck?
47. My mother passed away from cancer when I was ten years old. It was the hardest thing in my life to experience and still is, but the Lord has done so many amazing things through that experience.
48. I have a brother who is nearly nine years older than me.
49. I have never gotten a speeding ticket.
50. I have never broken a bone or had a cavity.
51. My favorite beach is Pensacola Beach in Florida. It used to be so peaceful and not really crowded, but now I think it is destroyed because of the hurricanes.
52. I think that I could definitely live overseas if the Lord called me to do that.
53. I wish that I could play the piano or had a descent singing voice.
54. My spiritual gift is the gift of helps. I am training to be a counselor to utilize that gift the best way that I know how.
55. My co-counselor and I have five clients that we counsel every Tuesday night. The counseling center owns my soul until August.
56. Right now, my favorite color is pink…..humph I am girl.
57. I hate it when people lie. Because I feel like I have been lied to a lot, I have a trust issue, I am working on that.
58. I am relatively passive, nearly to the point of letting people run over me, I am working on that too.
59. I want a dog, a chocolate lab. Chris tells me that if I get one, I have to get up at 6am on Saturday to take it for a walk, maybe one day I will have enough energy to do that.
60. I hate it when someone “talks out of both sides of their mouth”. Like when they basically tell you what they think you want to hear, but then totally tell someone else something different. I think that is cowardly and it only embarrasses you.
61. I think that I am good judge of character and sometimes that is a curse. I can usually tell when someone is playin’ somebody else or a group of people and so I sit out there alone not buying into that person’s garbage, but soon enough that person will show their true colors and will be recognized for what they truly are. If you cannot tell, this has happened before.
62. I want to adopt a little black baby.
63. My birthday is in 12 days.
64. I think that I have my mother’s eyes, which are my favorite feature. Every time I see family or friends who knew my mother, they say that I am really beginning to look like her. Yeah!
65. I used to fall a lot, no really, physically fall. I can remember when I was elementary school, and we were standing in a line, and I was standing still and I just fell over. I didn’t grow out of this. One summer when I was in college, we were in the woods at a retreat center and I was walking along a flat, smooth path, but yet I just fell. Nothing to trip me up, no rocks, sticks, or roots, I just fell.
66. I remember my first day of school. This was unlike any other day to follow because my mother was a teacher, so she was never able to take me to school. I always had to ride the bus from her school to my school, but on the first day she took me to school. I remember we sat in the car together in silence for a long time before she took me in. I think it was hard for her baby to be in school.
67. Some of my favorite times in college were the cookouts that Jessalee and I would have. We lived really close to campus, so after every home football game, all of our friends would come over and cook out. She was the perfect hostess and we always had so much fun!
68. I used to call water “sky juice”.
69. When I was living in TN, we had very good neighbors. Our neighbors to our right had two children. The boy was around my brother’s age and the girl was about two years older than me. Both of the families had swimming pools, so in the summer we would constantly be at one another’s house swimming. Well, I like frogs, they don’t scare me or gross me out, but they did scare the neighbor boy. So, I thought it would be funny if I would chase him around with a frog. Imagine if you will a six year old girl chasing a around a fourteen year old boy with a frog. It was classic.
70. I have a couple of favorite TV shows: All time fav would be “Friends”, but I am also really into “CSI:Miami” and unfortunately I am into “The Bachelor”, don’t hate me!


Ok, that is it….wow lots of stuff. That isn’t the entirety of it, but it will do for now!