Songs to Make You Smile

I went on a quick run tonight for the first time in about a week and a half and covered about 2 miles.  I've had that crappy cold lingering so running with a wad of phlegm in your throat doesn't exactly feel that great (TMI, sorry!) and I've been mostly walking at tonight instead of running.  I didn't wear my Garmin, but I could just tell my pace was pretty slow, which is ok.  Getting started was kind of rough, but eventually I got in to the groove and part of my groove was definitely due to my playlist.  A couple happy songs came on and I realized they were really making a difference in making my run a good one. 

I thought I'd share a list of songs that pretty much always get my smiling and are great for a run, a car ride on a sunny day, or if you just need a pick me up.

Click to enlarge

Do you have any songs that are guaranteed to make you smile?

With that, the rest of my evening involved tacos, heavy on the guac....

And I'm about to go do some snuggling with Clyde while catching up on Glee.

Hiope you guys have a great night!



If We Took A Holiday...

I actually had the day off Monday since my job gives us holidays that not everyone else gets off.  This was SO AWESOME, because I really needed it.  Really, I need about a week or even two weeks off, but since I'm a hoarder of leave (I can accumulate leave at work), I have been saving my leave up for an exciting trip and/or a baby.  Neither of which is happening right now.  I really just take a day off here and there and really never get a good break.  It's kind of bad...  

So I started my day off with french toast kind of inspired by Caitlin's Grilled Banana Sandwich.  Except, I actually put Nutella in mine for the hubby, since he pretty much requests Nutella EVERY SINGLE DAY for breakfast!

This was pure decadence.  I barely finished two slices because it was so rich.  It was like eating dessert for breakfast.  VERY YUMMY though!

I also had pumpkin spice coffee with FROTHY milk (I like using all CAPS).

My morning at home was spent alternating between laziness and productiveness.  I read a lot of the Chicago Marathon blog recaps, which totally inspired me!

Then hubs and I got some things done around the house: laundry, dishes, bills, lawn maintenance...

Later I fixed us a quick lunch of leftovers.  We split a tuna melt (I had a little tuna leftover), each had a slice of pizza from Luisa's, and a salad of lettuce, apples, feta, and balsamic/EVOO.

We headed out to get some errands done.  I went to the eye doctor to get a new prescription for contacts as I'm down to my last spare pair.

  

Exciting news: I recently won an IPod Touch on a blog contest!  It was a photo contest, and I had submitted this cute picture of Clyde:

I was surprised and excited to win!

The IPod came last week :)

Being the cool wife that I am, I decided to let Greg have the IPod for a while, because he's been DYING for an IPod touch or an IPhone for a while now, but couldn't justify getting one til he goes back to Continental.  He's got a really old PC Phone that he's had for YEARS, but the cool thing about it is that he got a phone with internet before smart phones really took off and is grandfathered in paying only like $10 per month for internet on his old school phone.  He really just wants the IPod to play games on when he's sitting in the airport in between flights.  The plan is that once he goes back to Continental, he'll get an IPhone and then I'll take the IPod.  While out yesterday we also found a case for the IPod so it will be better protected while Greg is traveling with it. 

For dinner we met up with friends at Big Daddy's.

Diana's hubby, Michelle, and Caitlin.

Katie, Stew, Matt, and Kath.

I had a Boddington's beer since they were the special.  I also had a build-your-own-salad with romaine, tomato, corn, cucumbers, avocado, and Monterrey jack cheese topped with a black bean burger and vinaigrette on the side.

We parted ways with about half the group after dinner, but Caitlin, Kristien, Kath, Matt, and I went to a concert at Tremont, and were joined by Nicole and Isaac.

Tremont is a smaller concert venue, but sometimes those are the best.  It's cool to be up close in a more intimate setting.

I had some camera fun before the show started.

We were there to see Brendan James!  If you haven't heard of him, go check him out!  He's REALLY talented!  Kristien and I think he sounds a lot like David Gray.  

We found out about him from our yoga studio.  I downloaded a bunch of his songs off ITunes and have had them on repeat for weeks now.  

Before the show started, we actually talked to Brendan briefly and Kath got a picture with him!  That's another cool thing about small venues- accessibility!  I had noticed on his website that Brendan is from New Hampshire (like me!) and we talked about that for a minute before he went up on stage to start the show.

On the way out, we got in one more blogger group shot!

Then we called it a night!

Back in Business!

Sooooooooooooo, I got a new camera- YAY!  It's a Nikon - Coolpix S3000.  I debated and researched and talked to other bloggers (well mostly Jen) and decided this was the camera I wanted for the price and specs it included.  I really haven't had much time to play with it yet, as 12am last night was the first time I laid eyes on it.  I ordered it on Best Buy and Greg picked it up at the store for me while I was at work yesterday.  Here is the first test shot (Greg took this one):

Hi Clyde!

My first test shot, also of Clyde.

Here's my first test shot with food:

Mmmmmmm blueberries!

I made blueberry pie oatmeal again for breakfast today.

Another shot in more natural light...

Moving onto my morning coffee.  I sometimes use one of these "frothers" in my milk to make my milk nice and frothy.  I got this at TJ Maxx or Marshalls for under $10 a couple years ago.  I like frothy milk...

You just put a small amount of milk in a mug, use the frother in it, then microwave the milk for about 30 seconds (you have to watch it though because sometimes it overflows), and voila:

You have frothy milk on your coffee!  I also like a hit of cinnamon...

I like the camera but I still have A LOT to learn about it.  There's supposed to be a "Food" setting on it, so I'm looking forward to trying that.  There's also a bunch of different flash settings and stuff like that, and I really haven't played with any of that yet.  So far so good though! 

Ok, now that you have seen all my beautiful new pictures, I'll catch up on what I've been up to this busy week!  Rewind to Tuesday night.  I went to a yoga.  The studio actually combined hot yoga and power yoga due to staffing, so it was kind of a hot power yoga class.  It was a tough one.  I don't know that someone totally new to yoga would have liked that class, because the instructor didn't always explain the moves and used the "yoga terms" for a lot of the moves rather than the plain English term.  Luckily, my former yogi enthusiast self knew what she was talking about most of the class.  It was another sweat fest too, and I totally forgot to bring a towel to wipe my sweaty head off with so at one point I booked it to the rest room to grab a wad of paper towels and winged it (I really need to stop talking about how sweaty I get during yoga, I know).  When I got home, hubby and I had pizza and salad and the pizza was actually FREE from Donato's because they had some kind of promo going I heard about.  I love Donato's and love it even more when it's FREE!

Last night I went to the Dave Matthews Band concert with Kelly (check her blog out, there may be a recap and pictures since she had her camera!).  I was actually her stand-in date, as her hubby had to go out of town for work and was unable to join her at the last minute.  I happily accepted her invite!  I've actually seen DMB twice before last night, but the last time I saw them was ELEVEN years ago!  And guess where I saw them?  In CHARLOTTE!!  Random right?  I went with my brother when we were living with my parents for the summer during college in Hilton Head.  We made the drive up to Charlotte to see them at the same venue as last night.

Anyway, Kelly and I went to The Flying Saucer for dinner on the way to the show.  I had a pear cider and she had the Sam Adams Summer Ale, and both of us got variations on a veggie sandwich.  I had a veggie burger and she had a veggie wrap, both with salad on the side.  I love Flying Saucer.  They have at least 200 beers to choose from and the food is always great too.  Win!

After dinner we sat in traffic for about an hour to get less than 2 miles and that was pretty damn frustrating, but finally got parked and got inside RIGHT as the DMB was going on.  We completely missed the opening act though.  Kelly got us two of the biggest beers I've ever seen while I was in the bathroom.  They were these GIANT Coors Light cans.  I probably drank a little over half of mine before I called it quits. 
I'm actually a big fan of DMB's older stuff.  Under The Table And Dreaming (their first album) came out when I was in High School and I remember it being on my mix rotation heavily.  I also liked the next couple albums, but haven't been quite as into their newer stuff.  They played a decent amount of old stuff and I definitely sang along and enjoyed myself.  It was a late night!  I got home just before midnight and was out!  Thanks for the invite Kelly!  I had a great time! :)

Daughtry

I'm kinda behind in posts here, but I thought I would share my exciting Friday night festivities first.  Jen is like the biggest Daughtry fanatic I've ever seen.  She's seen him 6 times!!  As a present, she got VIP tickets to see Daughtry Friday night, and when I say SEE Daughtry, I not only mean sit in a crowded arena and watch a concert, I also mean MEET Mr. Chris Daughtry himself!  I am also passionate about the music I love, but I have never gone as far as to get VIP tickets to meet anyone.  Not only did she do this for this particular concert, but this is actually the SECOND time she has met Chris!  She is truly dedicated!  haha!  Anyway, she invited me to come with her!  Wow! 
So Friday I left work early, went home and changed, and Jen and I headed to our VIP experience.  We got to the arena right on time.  We ended up waiting outside the arena for about an hour to be let in.  Good thing we are talkers and have lots to chat about all the time :)

Finally they let us in to the lobby of the arena, and we waited a little more.  We were given our VIP pass lanyards (which we kept on for the rest of the night, even at dinner!)  Then a security guy tried to go through "the rules" while yelling loudly over the soundcheck going on inside.  Basically he said not to trip and fall, not to try and kiss Chris, and not to touch his head.  I was most worried about tripping.  Cuz I'm klutzy like that.  We finally got let in and all gathered around the stage. 

Chris and the band played two songs.  We were like 12 feet from him.  Really really cool!

The soundcheck was neat.  I've never been that close to a famous musician playing before.  Totally cool!  After the soundcheck, they had us go back into this hallway to wait for the meet and greet.  We were thinking we were going to end up meeting him almost last because people rushed in there (there probably about 100 people at this thing!) and we were at the end of the line.  Well, once in there the guy turned us around and the last people in line actually went first!  So that worked out well! 

The actual meeting went by SO FAST.  I got in there and one of the bandmates approached me.  I really just said "It's so nice to meet you guys!" and that was about it.  The guy asked if he could hug me, and I said "of course" and then went down the line hugging all the guys including Chris.  Jen and I both remarked after that neither of us really made good eye contact with Chris or anything.  It was akward!  Then they put me in the middle and we had a professional picture taken.  It'll be online to download soon.  I keep checking, but it's not up yet!

After that they whisked us out the door, had us grab our swag, which was a Daughtry T-shirt and guitar pics and then we were out the door.

(this pic was taken at home later and Clyde was up for the photo op as well)

We made a quick trip to Target for some flip flops (standing in sandals for two hours might not have been the best plan), and then decided on Thai for dinner at Basil.  YUM!  I had the ginger chicken and Jen got the Pad Thai.  We shared and also each had a Mecklenburger beer, made locally by Old Mecklenburg Brewery (their summer brew):

Summer - "Mecklenburger" Bavarian Lager. Just like a Frankfurter comes from Frankfurt, a Wiener come from Wien (Vienna), and a Bitburger comes from Bitburg, Mecklenburger comes from Mecklenburg...Olde Mecklenburg that is...fresh from our lager tanks. This Helles-style golden/straw blonde lagerbier is super smooth, slightly malty and easy to drink. The perfect finish after a round of golf, day on the boat, or just out mowing the lawn. Cool down the scorching summer heat with Mecklenburger.

The food and beer was great.  Totally hit the spot. 

After dinner we headed back to the Arena for the actual concert.  The opening acts were CAVO and Lifehouse.  I LOVE Lifehouse, and this was actually the second time I've seen them.  Last summer they played at Speed Street, which is our festival the week before the Nascar race each spring.  Cavo was pretty good too.  We both recognized their last song, called "Champange".  Jen excitedly rocked out when they played that :)

Here's a couple shots of Lifehouse:

Love them!

Then it was time for the main event- Daughtry!

We were both having serious problems getting good pictures of Daughtry.  I messed around with the night setting on my camera and kept trying, but most of my pictures were this bad or worse!  Oh well.  The music was great and the crowd LOVED him.  Chris is from Greensboro, NC area and is kind of a local God. 

The show was great!  I had a blast with Jen.  She's so fun to go to a concert with.  This girl is exciteable at a level you can't even understand :)