Happy Anniversary Melanie and Nathan!

Two years - is that all? Hope your day was great :-)

No, I did not fall off the face of the Earth

Sorry I haven't been around in, oh, ten days. Had a busy couple of days in Syracuse last week and then headed home to Cleveland for the holidays and long weekend, where Internet access is minimal. I will try to be better during December since I only have TWO more days of class! Yay!

Go Buckeyes!!

Ohio State 37, Michigan 21. Enough said.

What a fight!

Did everyone see or hear about that fight at the Pacers/Pistons game Friday night? Wowza. It started with Piston Ben Wallace getting annoyed by a foul and shoving Pacer Ron Artest. And then it just exploded from there. The players were throwing punches and shoving each other for awhile. Artest, who actually tried to stay out of the melee on the court and laid down on the scorer's table to calm down, I suppose, got a couple drinks thrown on him by fans and that was it. Artest bolted into the stands to go after the schmuck-o who threw the drinks at him and really punched the daylights out of him. Some of his teammates' headed into the stands to go after other fans, too. It was way CRAZY! They ended up calling the game early (there was like 45 seconds left) and then as the Pacers were corralled into the locker room, they all got drenched by all these a-holes from the stands, who continued to throw drinks and bottles on them. It was seriously insane. Today, Commissioner David Stern issued indefinite suspensions for three of the Pacers and Ben Wallace of the Pistons. Indefinite suspensions! That's got to be a HUGE blow to the Pacers team, which started last night's game with only 10 players anyway. It's like their three best players who are suspended, too. But, come on. You don't go into the stands to start fighting with fans, no matter how big of an asshole they might be. Oh, and as Brent Musburger said, "Now Ron Artest will have all the time off he wants to promote his album."

Double whammy

And, how about that episode of The Apprentice? I knew from the moment that team got rid of Kelly that they were going to lose and I just knew it was finally going to be Maria's turn. There was no way she was winning this game and it would just be a matter of time before she got her due. So, no shocker there? But a double firing?! How exciting was that? I laughed when Wes said, "I would have at least liked my own cab" at the end. I can't wait to see the others' faces when they find out two people are gone.

Just as an aside, Jennifer really bugs me. I don't like how she is constantly sliding by, either. Or getting all the credit by the Levis guys. What was up with that? And, what is so difficult about understanding how a wheel works? Ugh. She sure did look pretty while posing for those pictures, though.

Survivor week 10

Well, another episode and another man is gone. Chad. I liked Chad but he really didn't have much of an impact on the game, when you think about it. He was just one of a crowd. As is typical at this point in the game, I wish somehow things would just get mixed up a little! Oy. At this point, I really see Leann winning. Not sure why. Because she's quiet and likable, I guess. Anyway, my recap should be up sometime tomorrow (well, later today), whenever they get to it. I feel like I added a lot more commentary than I usually do, but I know I was definitely a little goofy. That's what happens on four hours of sleep. So why am I not in bed, then? Good question!

In Communicado

Oh I've been so busy the last few days, all because I had a huge major project due in one of my classes. I basically spent the last five days working on it non-stop. I'm CIPA-ed out. Now I have to get caught up on all my television-watching from the last week. Plus, I have to catch up on sleep (four hours just doesn't cut it), write my Survivor recap tonight, and do something about my mess of an apartment! Oh yeah, and I might try to find a job, too.

One thing I did sneak in during a break was Dream Job. Congratulations to Dave Holmes! I'm happy for him. Grant really choked, didn't he?

The Amazing Race news...

Don't forget that the new season starts tomorrow night. At 9pm, EST. But, before that, two of the hosts from The Early Show are going to take part in the first leg of the race, too! Harry Smith and weatherman Dave Price participated in the first leg and, while they aren't an official team, of course, it's going to be a great way to see behind-the-scenes of the show. Here's the info about that (via Futon Critic), which starts airing tomorrow morning. And, of course, it begs the question: When are they going to have a celebrity version of that show? That would be awesome! Of course, maybe not fair because the celebrities might be recognized in the other countries.

Meet Brian...

I like this article (via MediaBistro) that sort of atttempts to introduce us to Brian Williams, who will be taking over the NBC Nightly News from Tom Brokaw on Dec. 2nd. I've always really liked Brian, for some reason, so I'm happy for him. Although slightly disturbed to find he's a NASCAR fan...

The Apprentice

I haven't talked much about The Apprentice this season but I guess I will tonight. It was a pretty predictable episode, too, but I found it pretty amusing. I liked how Chris basically gave up as soon as he found out what the task was. Come on! What a quitter! All he needed was some marketing ideas and they could have won! That woman was out of control in offering help! But how funny was it when they showed all the people lined up waiting to get into Mosaic's sale and then switched to Apex and Ivana running to open the doors - to two people in line. Just funny! I also liked Wes helping the girls shop - "You look like a princess!" He made me laugh. This is the one time I really didn't understand why the project manager didn't bring three people into the boardroom, either. But I guess when you think that Chris was the project manager and made bad decisions from the start (from last week, really, when he called out his team in front of Trump), then it makes more sense.

Survivor episode 9

Well, I wrote my latest recap and hopefully it will be up sometime soon. Who knows? This episode was okay. There was lots of discussion of something different happening but in the end, exactly what was expected is what happened: Sarge got voted out. I'm kind of annoyed with all the talk about "gender wars" or the boys vs. the girls and stuff. This one article I read refers to Ami as a "man-hater" because she's been voting off the men. Give me a break! It's only a war of gender because the two original tribes were divided by gender! No one had a fit when the original members of Tagi stuck together in the first Survivor. Or how about when Lex-Tom-Ethan-Kim made it to the final four together in Africa? Same thing with Thailand. It's not unheard-of that a tribe sticks together throughout the game. In fact, it's kind of expected. It's called an Alliance! Anyway, it just annoys me that they are making a bigger deal out of it than need be. The girls aren't sticking together solely because they are all women - they are sticking together with the people they bonded with on Day One!

Happy Birthday Melanie!

Another day, another friend's birthday! Happy Birthday Melanie! She is a friend I used to work with and this is her first birthday as a mommy so I'm not sure any gift can ever be better than that :-). Hope your day was great!

Reading...

Ah, there used to be days when I read for pleasure. Sometimes I could read a whole book in one day. Lately, the only reading I've been doing is for school, though. So, when my classload dropped to only three classes last week, I was intent to read for pleasure again. I got a chance to finish a book I'd started in August, pre-grad school. Yay! Anyway, I read The Full Cupboard of Life by Alexander McCall Smith. It's in the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series, which I got started on in my old book club, probably about a year ago. Anyway, I think it was the last book in the series and it was okay. Once I start a series, I feel compelled to read all of them. So, I did. So-so.

Happy Birthday Marci

Today is my friend Marci's birthday, so, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU! Marci and I have been friends since freshman year of college, so that's actually quite some time! We have kept in touch all this time despite living in different states and she is still one of my good friends! Anyway, I hope she has a great day :-)!!

Day of registering...

Today was the first day to register for courses for Spring Semester and luckily, everything went off without a hitch. Yay! I got into all the classes I wanted - and needed - unlike this current semester. I haven't entirely decided if I'm going to keep my schedule the way it is right now, but at least I'm enrolled in four classes.

IP article

Here is my latest column for Inside Pulse. I look ahead to The Amazing Race 6, which starts next week. Seriously, if anyone has ideas for columns, let me know because I am seriously stumped for ideas.

Dream Job

I'm enjoying this season of Dream Job and now we are down to two: Dave Holmes and Grant Thompson. I really thought Dave was going to be a goner after he totally f'ed up the assignment but luckily, Anish did also. He is the luckiest guy in the world because I'm sure he thought he was a goner, too. I honestly don't care which of the two of them wins because I like them both. But, truth be told, does anyone ever catch last season's winner Mike Hall on any Sportscenter telecast ever? Because I don't.

SNOW!

Well, gang, the first snowfall has hit my new city. There were a few flakes flying through the air as I headed to class but I wasn't really prepared for after class, when there was a measurable amount on the ground and on my car! Probably not even an inch, but still. It's snow. November 8. It looks like it is supposed to be warmer the rest of the week so I don't think this is the start of anything big. I hope. I'm not ready. I don't even have a snow brush.

Good grades

It's been a good 24 hours grade-wise. I got some scores back from my management class yesterday and I ended up getting 160 points out of 166 from three assignments. My "interview of a person in management" paper earned me 97 out of 100 points, but better than that, I was apparently the best in the class. Ha! Not that it really surprises me that I wrote a paper well, and especially comparing it to the others in my class. It's an online class and I can see how the others post. It's frightening, actually. This is graduate school so these people all somehow made it through undergrad.

In the class from hell, Intro. to Competitive Intelligence, I learned that I finished with an 'A' (that's all he would say) so that makes me happy that I've struggled through that class mentally but still ended up with an 'A'. We had the final 50% of our grade due last Monday so I've been waiting a week to hear my grade.

I'm addicted to...

Candy corn. Yep. I didn't have any all pre-Halloween when you could find them anywhere but then I got a big bag of it for 99 cents at Target (after-Halloween markdown) and I swear I ate the whole big bag in about two days. And now it's gone. Looking at the bag options, I think maybe it was the 24 oz. I refuse to believe it was the 50 oz. bag but honestly, I have no idea. It could have been. The bag itself is long gone. I ate them by the handfuls. And now, I feel like I'm going to go into withdrawal. Seriously. Yesterday, as my supply was dwindling down, all I thought about was which Target should I try to get more from but today, I was out running errands and I decided to just refrain. Now, I'm thinking that was a bad decision. Ugh. My favorite part of that site is the link for the nutritional information. Uh huh. Hey, at least they are fat free. Also interesting: serving size is 22 pieces. Where else can you find that? 22 pieces! That's probably close to TWO handfuls.