We Are...ROCK BAND!!!

We had a rockin' good time playing Rock Band at Mike and Shannon's last night! Sam and I got in touch with our punk rocker side, which is always lurking just barely beneath the surface for me but has to be prodded a little deeper out of Sam! Sam looks wicked sexy though sporting his guy-liner and black lipstick! Mike and Shannon were rockin' it out pretty hard too with their wigs and tattoos - although I think Shannon's going to try to get Mike to get his arm band tattoo inked over for real! Aaron was a natural on the drum set, but Megan's true calling turned out to be vocals! Her new signature song has got to be Sabotage by the Beastie Boys, which interestingly enough she performs with a Boston accent! If only the Beastie Boys had thought of that! The song might not have sucked so much to begin with (sorry Aaron and Sam!) The big surprise of the night came with Sam actually agreeing to do vocals for Dani California by the Red Hot Chili Peppers! I think that's the first time EVER Sam has debuted his wicked vocal talents! The highlight for me was rockin' out on guitar to Sweet Child O' Mine by Guns N' Roses - the best rock song EVER!!! Little Benjamin has rockin' in his genes too! He was an equal opportunity rocker, kickin' it on the drums, guitar and vocals! Man, we should have forgone all of the education and college degrees and started our own rock band years ago! We were made for this!

Emily and Sam - punk to the core!

Yeah, I'm just that cool.

Ben with a little help from dad!

Just chillin' with my homies!

We're taking this gig on the road!


This is what cool looks like!

Em rockin' it out on the drums!


This way to the gun show!



I make guy-liner look good! Damn good!

Total Eclipse of the Moon

Don't you just totally want to start singing that old Bonnie Tyler song now, "Total Eclipse of the Heart!" Hang on...spontaneous outburst of song...okay, I'm back now! So tonight beginning at 9:00 p.m. there was a lunar eclipse and apparently there won't be another until 2010 I've read. It was pretty cool to see. I set up the tri-pod and tried to get some cool pix of it but it was too dang cold and I nearly froze my arse off fooling around with it, so I only got a couple of pictures. They're not too clear, but still kind of cool nonetheless.

If you've got that song in your head now like me you can watch the video at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55nTwg5NIPM

Don't you just love 80's power ballads!

Happy Birthday, Mom!!!

Today is my madre's 51st birthday! Although as you can see from the pictures, she doesn't look anywhere near that! =) We suprised her by going to Bella Vita, a nice Italian restaurant on Geist. Tonight they had live jazz musicians (yes, ha ha Robyn and Shannon, as opposed to the dead jazz musicians they normally have)playing and the atmosphere was great! The food was really good too! I was quite proud of the birthday gift I procured for her as well! So here's the background: there are certain people in our family (eh hem....daddy, Lindsay) who feel mom has a very small number of...shall we say... eccentricities, that are perhaps teetering a bit too closely to the obsessive compulsive line. Nothing bizarre or anything, just things like how she HAS to have a Dixie cup 3/4 full of ONLY Lifesavers jelly beans and a Diet Coke in a small glass filled with CRUSHED ice EVERY night before she goes to bed. Hey, I come by my peculiarities honestly at least! So anyway, mom always gets a little...shall we say ...irritated when anything is said about "addictive behaviors." So, as a gift to show mom that just like Mr. Rogers always said, "I like you just the way you are!" I presented her with a Bucket O' Vices a.k.a. Bucket of Addictive Behaviors. It was filled with all sorts of things to help enable her, like bags of Lifesaver jelly beans, hot romance novels, and gardening supplies - the Big 3 as Daddy refers to them. I know, we're sick, but it's also frickin' hysterical in that weird, creepy, kind of awkward way! Anyway, she really liked her bucket and was eager to get home to start reading about somebodies bulging loin and heaving bosoms. I love my mom, weirdness and all! Happy Birthday, Mom...I love you 709.

Girls Night Out!!!

My lovely ladies and I (accompanied by our handsome escort, Sam) had a GREAT night out on the town last night! Shannon, Robyn, Robyn's friend Tatiana visiting from Chicago, Robyn's brother Josh, Josh's girlfriend Shauna, Sam and I started the night off at D'vine A Wine Bar. We had a lot of great food and even more good wine! I actually accomplished a near impossible feat of drinking two ENTIRE drinks! My legs and arms were pretty warm and tingly but I managed to work through it! After we finished up at D'vine, Robyn, Shanon, Tatiana, Sam and I headed out to Claude and Annie's to play pool and do a bit of karaoke! Robyn kicked off our night with her own sultry rendition of Stevie Wonder's "You Are The Sunshine of My Life." And with a shout out to one of my favorite girl groups, The Judds, I took us on home with my very first karaoke solo, "Have Mercy." I'm told it went well, although you can't hear a thing when you're up front singing! We had a great time together and I can't wait to do it again! Check out the pix below to see our night out on the town!!!

Valentine's 2008 - 10 years and counting!!!

Wow!!! I can't believe we've been meeting with the same group of friends (Shannon, Mike, Megan, Aaron, Sam, and Em) at Benihana's every year for 10 years for a Valentine's day celebration! Time has absolutely flown by! The food was great, as usual, and our chef even had a few new tricks up his sleeve! We had a great time, but alas, the age old question arises..."What should do after dinner?" Jeez, if only there was some where we could go hang out and play Guitar Hero!!! What, you don't have Guitar Hero? Well, there's a Wal-Mart on your way home! Thanks to Shannon and Mike for buying Guitar Hero for us to rock to! Sam's and my master plan has now come to fruition...we have successfully "planted" a Guitar Hero in all of our friends houses where we hang out the most! hee hee Anyway, we had a blast playing, even though Shannon has threatened to send me her doctor bill for the carpel tunnel syndrome she'll have to now be treated for from playing so much! Check out the pix and videos of our night!



Rockin' out to Guitar Hero!!!

Sam & Em's "Red Neck" Valentine's Day!

Well folks, we have definitely started a new tradition! Every year Sam and I go out with a group of friends to celebrate V-day to Benihana's on the weekend after Valentine's Day. So that evening is like our big, expensive celebration night. That means that every year on the actual Valentine's Day itself we never have much going on, nor does Sam really want to considering the money we'll spend the following weekend. So a few weeks ago, we were driving along, minding our own business and...I see it! The sign sitting in the White Castle lot advertising Valentine Day dinner reservations!!! Well, needless to say, I had never in my life heard of anything so funny and I immediately turn to Sam and say, "Oh, we have GOT to do that!" Sam gave that awkward Sam laugh that he does to humor me when he thinks I'm being an idiot but doesn't want to say that to my face. And I said, "Oh no! I am totally serious!" His response, "Oh, I know you are." Well, it only took a little prodding - you see, Sam doesn't see the point in doing things merely for the sake that they're frickin' hysterical, he does, however, see the point in me spending as little of his money as possible - so he was in! So we caught a matinee ("Jumper" - see my movie review column for this one) and made it just in time for our 6:30 dinner reservation at White Castle! The first thing I noticed when we walked in? It was absolutely packed! We had to wait 20 minutes for a table even with a reservation AND apparently White Castle closes down the restaurant for the night and ONLY accepts reservations! The ambience was great! The room was dimly lit and the tables were covered with table cloths and candle floating water centerpieces. We were given a little menu from which to order and the ladies (dressed in nice dresses and heels) waited on us! We went all out, ordering slyders, onion chips, and cheese sticks! And to top off our delicious meal they served cake! Your choice of white, chocolate, or carrot! Sam chose carrot and I chose chocolate and we were both pleasantly surprised that it indeed tasted like cake and not the sauteed onion confection we were expecting! With dinner finished and off to such a great start how could we let our Red Neck V-day end here? So, we decided to go to our favorite little dessert place - Ashley Home Furniture Store. Yes, my friends, a little known secret of ours that I'm going to share with you! In the back of Ashley's they have a little cafe where they actually bake cookies that are free for the patrons of the store! So after a couple of minutes talking to Richard, a customer service VIP, as to what furniture needs we were anticipating, we wove our way back to the cafe for our warm, fresh baked cookies! They were exquisite! And with that our night came to a close. I, however, thought it would be a fun new "game" to go around to all the stores in the area and just see what else we could get people to give us for free. But alas, you know Sam and doing things just because they're funny. All in all we had a great night, for a grand total of $10.30!!! Let us know if you'd like to join us next year, because you know we'll have a table already reserved!


Sam & Em dining at White Castle!

Yum, these are tasty!

More slyders please!

Wrapping up dinner. Dessert anyone?



Ah, here we our at our special dessert cafe!


A great Valentine's Day!

Make a free ecard - it's easy!

GOD ANSWERS PRAYERS!!!

Praise God! Today God answered our prayers in a HUGE way and Daddy finally got a job! He's been out of work for over 8 months and it's been a really long and difficult struggle for our family. He starts in two weeks as a salesman for a company that sells semi-permanent fabric building structures. We are so relieved and grateful that God has answered our prayers and provided this job for him!!! Praise God!

ELLIOTTS GONE WILD!!!

We finally did it! Well, Aaron finally did it anyway! Aaron, accompanied by his five best friends - Shelli, his wife, and Margie, Dan, Sam, and yours truly went to Metamorphosis in Broadripple last night for Aaron to be inked with his very first tattoo! While we waiting for his tattoo artist, a very nice guy named Joe, to get things ready, Shelli got a little work done on herself! She's now the proud new owner of a super cute, and superbly placed diamond stud nose ring! It looks great and I enjoy having a nose ring buddy! =) Well, after a lot of preparation (getting the design worked up and figuring out the exact best placement for the tattoo on Aaron's foot) we were finally ready to begin the tattooing! Aaron sat in the hot seat while the rest of us huddled around him watching, taking pictures, and goofing around like a bunch of 18 year old kids! Aaron took it like a man and with the exception of a bit of leg and jaw twitching didn't have any complaints at all! The tattooing only took like 15 or 20 minutes and the results are awesome! All of us, especially Aaron, love his tattoo! Margie and Sam have been bitten by the tattoo bug and are currently looking and thinking about designs they want to get tattooed on their shoulder blades! I think it would be cool to get one too at some point, but I'm pretty sure that Dan and Shelli will stay out of the tattoo business. Afterwards, we celebrated with a quick stop by Hot Box Pizza for a bunch of breadsticks to hold us over until we got to D'vine A Wine Bar. We had a great time at D'vine! As the designated driver I only had one Vanilla Sex martini (like I could have handled anymore anyway even if I'd wanted to!) Sam and Aaron began with White Russians and Whiskey Sours respectively, while Shelli and I enjoyed our flavored martinis! Dan stuck with beer and Margie's the only one of us who actually drank wine - although after getting over the initial coughing, hacking, and gut burning of tasting Sam's Scotch, Margie seemed to enjoy it! Shelli on the other hand did not have such a good experience with the ole Scotch, alleging that it interacted with the lip gloss she had on to create a searing, flesh-burning sensation on her lips! =) Ahhhhh, the wine was flowing, the music was mellow, and the conversation easy - what a terriffic night with great friends! We've made a pact - we'll all go together again when it comes time for the next person to be inked! Check out the pictures below for a look at our evening together!

Aaron and Joe designing his tattoo!

Is Margie picking out her own tattoo design?

Shelli waiting to be pierced!

Shelli's sporting her kickin' new diamond nose stud!

Aaron waiting for the inking to start.

The inking has begun! We all lend moral support

while Sam and Dan plot to "set" Aaron's new tattoo!

Joe working his mojo!

Almost finished!

All done! Aaron sporting his awesome new tattoo!

Time to celebrate! Sam and Aaron gettting there drink on!

Next Step...TATTOOS!!!

So I think the body modification bug has finally bitten Sam! We went down to Metamorphosis (in Broadripple) tonight because I had to have a small adjustment made to my nose ring (which by the way...I LOVE!!!) Anyway, as we're driving down Sam starts talking about maybe getting a tattoo! He looked at quite a few samples but didn't find anything he absolutely fell in love with. He's thinking about getting some sort of cross on his shoulder blade. I told him that he should get a celtic cross with three Greek words underneath it (p.s. that was for you Aaron! We both got a big laugh at that one!) Anyway, we're going back down to Metamorphosis this Friday because our good friend Aaron is finally getting a tattoo (yup, you guessed it - a celtic cross with three Greek words underneath) and our other good friend Shelli (Aaron's wife) has decided to get her nose pierced! We've got the coolest Community Group ever!!! GOD ROCKS!!!

Woo Hoo Eli!!!

Give it up for the Giants!!! Sam is wicked happy that they won because he says the Pats and Bill Belicheat are a bunch of Sony-toting cheaters. I don't know anything about that; I'm just glad that Eli won! Hey, if Peyton can't win this one, I guess Eli's the next best thing! I guess you could say the Giants pulled a "Greg Ballard"! You know, no one really knew who they were and they kind of came out of nowhere and you wake up one morning and they've unexpectedly become the (mayor of Indianapolis) Super Bowl champs! I guess I am just a tiny bit sad that the Pats lost, I mean it must be hard to have your perfect season end like this! Oh well, at least Tom Brady has his wicked sexy Stetson ads to fall back on. And believe you me I'd rather see Tom lounging around bare chested and wearing a cowboy hat than running around on the field with a bunch of other sweaty guys, tackling each other, in those tight white pants....oh, wait a minute...on second thought.

Check out the latest "trouble" I've gotten myself into!

Hey ya'll, check out the first photo posted below to see the latest and greatest "trouble" I've gotten myself into! My mom blames Sam for my wayward and deviant ways! =) hee hee The ol' madre took it pretty well considering when I told her I was considering it she told me she'd never talk to me again if I went through with it! Needless to say she is still speaking to me; however, the phrases "Why are you slowly trying to kill me?" and "How did I raise such a deviant and defiant child?" and lastly "I'm not mad at you but I'm very disappointed in your choices" were used abundantly! =) Anyway, check it out below!