Battle Studies

John Mayer's new CD came out yesterday. I picked it up at Barnes & Noble on my lunch break. It's excellent. I think my favorite so far is the first track - Heartbreak Warfare. It's not as good as the Grammy winning Continuum, but still great. Check it out!

I'm currently reading "An Irish Country Doctor". It seems to be set in the 1970's. A story of a fresh-out-of-med-school young man that finds himself in need of employment and ends up paired with a cantankerous country doctor in rural Ireland.

I picked it up at the recommendation of the B&N store manager. I figured she knew her stuff. Also, I like to read fiction mixed with a little medicine. All the gory situations in medicine make me cringe, but it can be educational. After all, I worked in healthcare for three years and was clueless about the field most of the time. My default was just smile and nod... I hadn't a clue. The jargon, the matter-of-fact way doctors discussed patients.

Books like this tell and story and make it real. I'm enjoying it so far and there's also a love interest!

Michael Buble

Pronounced [boo - blay]. I bought Michael Buble's new CD Monday night. It's excellent. He's like a modern crooner. I saw him in concert about 3 years ago in Little Rock. It was excellent. He's like a mix of Elvis and Frank Sinatra. Check it out.

I have arrived

It's official. Autumn is here. It's been raining for what seems like 3 weeks straight in NEA. I haven't blogged in a while. I guess I've been busy enjoying the fall festivities.

Hannah, friend Amanda & myself at a football game. Go Red Wolves! After the game Hannah and I had a little birthday party for our friend

Brittney. Oh, and before the game I went with my sis & mom to look at wedding dresses. Hannah

's getting married!!! in June. I'm going to be maid of honor. Very exciting. She was able to narrow it down to the type of dress she's wanting, but we did not make a purchase that weekend. We're going to Memphis for a girls' weekend in a few weeks and we'll go to David's. They've already decided to have the wedding at church, then have the reception at the new Hilton Garden Inn in Jonesboro. It just opened and it's a wonderful alternative to The Holidome. You J-town folks know what I mean. :) It's new and modern and hip.

The next weekend was Pumpkin Hollow, a place in Piggott, AR for families and people of all ages. This is a picture of my assistant, Kelsey. She grew up in Piggott and has worked at Pumpkin Hollow since she was old enough to pick up a pumpkin!

We went at night and went through the 3 haunts - Forest of Freight, Mad Skull Mine & Bubba's Butcher Barn. We went for my friend John's birthday and the poor guy... he probably had bruises from me gripping his arm in terror. I do not do well with scary things. However, this was a really cool get-out-of-town-for-the-evening trip. The folks at Pumpkin Hollow do an excellent job. It wasn't cheesy or cheap. Believably scary.. and here's a picture of the full moon.

And last weekend I went to my friend Amanda's for chili and scrapbooking. It was supposed to be an all-night craft-fest, but we were tired. But I did get my spread for Little Women finished. Hard to believe this time last year I was playing "Marmee" in Little Women. Oh, that was so much fun, but so much work! The Jonesboro Foundation of Arts, of which I am now a board member, is doing "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" this weekend. I'll be in Little Rock for Race for the Cure, but I'm going on Sunday when I get home. I've never been to Race for the Cure, but I'm very excited!!

The Lost Symbol

I'm currently reading "The Lost Symbol" by Dan Brown. If you've been to Barnes & Noble at all in the last 6 months, you've seen the posters for this book... or Kroger or Wal-Mart. Dan Brown also wrote the suspenseful "Angles & Demons" and "DaVinci Code". I had been looking forward to this book for several months. I'm about 3/4 through it and so far it's suspenseful, but not as intellectually stimulating as "DaVinci Code". Quite frankly the book makes Brown seem a little crazy in my opinion. What with his fixation on the Masons.

The book reads well. Brown is a gifted author. It's entertaining and I enjoy reading it. I'm just hoping for some kind of curveball in the end to really spice it up!

"Time of My Life"

I just finished reading "Time of My Life" last night. It was a book that I literally grabbed from the shelf at Books-a-Million one Sunday afternoon. They say don't judge a book by it's cover, but that's exactly what I did with this one and I'm glad I did.

It's about a young woman that's in an unhappy marriage. Living in the suburbs of NYC in the year 2007. She has a toddler and an immaculate home.

Then one morning she wakes up in 2001. In her apartment in the city. She's still with her former boyfriend. An interesting turn of events leads her back to 2007 where she reaps the benefits of her second chance and better decisions & choices.

I recommend it!

Country Bumpkins

I spent Labor Day at my grandmother's house with my aunts, uncles & cousins. We hadn't all been together since Christmas I guess. So, it was a good day. I took these pictures at the garden the oldest two girls have as their 4-H project. They had okra and eggplant left. The picture above (which took about 15 minutes to capture) is Abby in the green, Emily on top and Rileigh in front.

Sadler Cole almost 2 years old.

Rileigh and Jay

Abby & Rileigh

The chickens. Also part of the 4-H projects.

ASU v. Mississippi Valley

Ok. So, I lost my camera. BUT I Found my old camera a couple of months ago. I had given it to my dad. Call me an Indian Giver, but I took it back. I'll spare you the camera story, but I haven't been boring since my last post. I just don't have the pictures to prove it, so I'll move on.

Saturday was the first home football game for the Red Wolves, formerly the Indians, at Arkansas State. I went to the tailgate festivities with my friend Amanda. Pictured at left. I wore a Michael Kors top that I bought last winter. I bought it marked down and specifically for a football game. Mission accomplished. :-)

Pictured at left is junk food I ate from the concession stand. Oh, to have my college metabolism back. I drank a Mt. Dew everyday in college... However, I woke up sick in the middle of the night Saturday. ...as a result of this indulgence.

Ok, I sat behind this fella. The guy that had the nerve to wear a Razorback cap to an Arkansas State game. Big pet peeve of mine. I have nothing against the University of Arkansas. Why would I right? But my thought is this: If you are a huge fan of the Hogs; Then why didn't you go to school there???

Oh, and apparently I also sat behind a girl named Candace. Either that or she got taken for by a tatoo artist. Tramp Stamp on a Very large white girl. Lovely...

Oh, and we killed 'em. 61 - 0. Followed up by a casual evening at Amanda's. The Bishops were in town for Labor Day.

Mount Vernon colors

This morning I found this on a blog I follow. Right up my alley since I love history & houses. Paint colors found at Mount Vernon, President George Washington's home. Check it out here.

A Question of Character

Yesterday I received a package in the mail. Which is always exciting. It's a book written by a father-son team in Jonesboro. The son is an acquaintance of mine - John Abernathy. He lives out west now.

Here's a link to the book. I'll let you know how it goes. It's a political thriller, which is right up my alley. I like to read books by David Baldacci, so I'm hoping this will be a good one.

My Aunt Jackie's

On Monday night this week I went with my parents to visit my Aunt Jackie and Uncle Tommy. Tommy had worked on an antique ice chest my mom bought in

Nashville a few weeks ago. Mom and Dad went for their anniversary. As long as I can remember, my mom

has wanted one of these ice boxes -- just like her grandmother had. And she finally got it!

I got to visit with Jackie & Tommy out on their deck for a while before my mom and dad showed up. It was a gorgeous day. We've been fortunate to have some unseasonably pleasant weather this August. Then we walked down to Tommy's shop to see the ice box. He's got a really nice set-up.

I took this picture of my mom and (obviously her sister) Jackie. They sound almost just alike now that they're older. My grandmother, their mother died in May this year.

This is just a flower I thought was pretty. :-)

My Weekend

The weather was beautiful this weekend! I slept in Saturday and caught up on things around the house. Then I went to my grandmother's house. My little cousins Chance & Cody were there with their little friend Zach. They were into everything and my dad was hanging out with them.

This is a trellis with grapevines in my grandmother's back yard. We set here for a while.

My grandmother's house is about 100 years old. My dad's parents bought it in the 60's and did some modernization. It's where he grew up. This is the living room. Not to be confused with the "den". This is where we all gather on Christmas Eve to open presents & sing. I took a picture because she had someone come out and do some decorating. It looked really nice.

This is a VERY funny, but cute picture I found in one of her albums. She's trying to get organized so they were laying out on the sofa. This is at Christmas when I was probably in the 2nd grade. My mom made us matching Christmas sweat shirts. You can't really tell, but those are holly leaves & packages painted on there with fabric paint. OH yeah! I thought it was sooooo cool. Jen, you know you probably helped make this.

And speaking of family, I was looking through some of those albums and found one called Cole Family History. Cole is my great-great grandmother's maiden name. I never knew her. There's still a plot of land in our family called Cole Hill. Anywho, I was looking through it and it's really cool because it traced the name/family back to the 1400s in England. There was even a family crest. I'll have to look through it better some other time.

After grandma's I went to Andy's house. His dad made ribs. This is for Richard & Laura.

Saturday Morning

Saturday Morning

I made homemade blueberry pancakes Saturday morning. Delicious! Recipe here.

Hot Tamales!!!

The Hispanic Community Center in Jonesboro had a fund raiser recently and sold homemade tamales. 9$ for a dozen in chicken or pork. Wrapped in corn husks and everything.

So, I had the Hurdles over and Hannah and her boyfriend ate too. It was yummy! Amanda helped us clean up. Awesome!

We will definitely be ordering more in the future.

Take me out to the Baaaaallll Game! Take me out to the Crowd!

So, I don't know if I mentioned this in the previous few posts, but the main event while visiting Molli & Marty was to attend a Texas Rangers v. Boston Red Sox baseball game. This is a picture of Molli, Amanda and me Saturday before leaving the house.

It was so nice having their nice new house to spread out and enjoy. Here are "the kids" watching TV and playing games.

We went shopping in Arlington before the game. It was incredibly crowded.

And here we are at the stadium. It was a good time. Our seats included an all you can eat buffet. Hot dogs, chicken sandwiches, nachos, peanuts, hot dogs, soda. None of it was all that great, but it didn't cost anything. That was nice.

Me & my good friend Shaun - the ultimate Red Sox fan.

Visiting the Bishops

Well, I made it to Texas! All by my little self. :) I drove from Jonesboro to OkCity to Aubrey, TX without getting lost really. Thanks to my sis's trusty GPS. I met up with my friend Molli and got a tour of her new house in Aubrey, TX. I love it! Here is a picture of her and her husband Marty. She cooked brownies and served it with ice cream. Yummy!

We had dinner at Mr. Chopsticks. It's a delicious hole in the wall place near the the University of North Texas campus in Denton where Marty is in the the PhD program. I love that place. I had a Philadelphia Roll & some fried rice.

About to hit the sack and wait for the rest of the crew to arrive. They'll be in late tonight. So glad I was able to drive down from OKcity today.

Blue Skies

Here we are cooking fish for the Oklahoma Sheriffs at a park. Chris, Chad (my boss), Dean, Todd {a.k.a. Ladies Man and the guy that heroically removed the snake skin from the bathroom} and me.

Cookin'!!! I helped cut up the raw catfish. Yuck! I don't really even like catfish, but I pretend I do for these events. Just stay busy cooking and cleaning so I don't really have time to eat.

Buffet! Also pictured here in the background is a poster I made. It is a county map of OK with our client counties hi-lited in yellow. I missed several counties because I got some incorrect information. We bought come Crayola markers and fixed it.

On Thursday I went down to our booth, but it

was slow because the sheriffs were in class.

Here is a picture of our booth.

One of the nicest there.

Since it was slow I decided to go with the sheriffs' wives on a short field trip to The Oklahoma History Center. What a wonderful tribute to the history and people of Oklahoma! Here is a picture in the foyer. A view of the state capitol.

This was one of, if not the, most valuable exhibits in the museum. And my favorite. What can I say? I am my father's daughter. It is a decree/certificate of sorts from President Thomas Jefferson to some Indian tribe. {and yes, they call them Indians in Oklahoma, not Native Americans} The two silk ribbon & wax seals at the bottom are the seals of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. This document was signed by all three infamous men. Jefferson, Lewis & Clark. Very cool. Can't wait to show my dad.

Ok, this exhibit made me feel old. Displayed in a glass case along with all of the artifacts was this Nokia Phone and Doc Marten boots. I hope all of you Gen Y-ers out there can appreciate this. I thought I was sooooo cool with my new Docs and my cell phone that was just like everyone else's.

And this was my view at approximately 7pm last night. Hanging at the hotel pool with a book.