The I Heart Trent Edwards Club

Last Friday before Matt and I left for training camp, I received a call that Ryan was in great distress.

I offered to send Matt over to hold him, but he said it was only a flat tire and as much as he appreciated Matt, could I just pick him up.

Once I had him in the car with me, he told me a deep dark secret which I then decided to share with the Internet. He has a bucket list for my life. Not his own life, mind you, but mine. From what I can gather, there is only one thing on the list: Get a picture of myself with my arm around Trent Edward's neck, possibly with Trent and myself flashing a thumbs-up at the camera. Ryan has big dreams. Who am I to not achieve them?

I wasn't 100% sure how I was going to achieve Ryan's goal, but I took my camera anyway. When you first arrive at St. John Fisher's College for training camp, you are ushered into a tent full of sponsor tables. At the second table Matt and I arrived at, a  middle-aged women offered me a bag that said VERIZON/BUFFALO BILLS, and I accepted. Honestly how could I not? I'm fairly certain that I saw a picture of Lindsey Lohan carrying the same exact bag when they released her from jail last week. Fashion scores aside, the women with the bag says to me, " I really hope Trent plays well this year."

Me too, lady.

Then, with no prompting whatsoever she launched into the following conversation to with me: "I really worry about him. I hope he doesn't get another concussion. He's such a good guy. He's such a good role model and a good person. I would be so worried if he got another concussion. He's such a good Christian man. He such a wonderful person..."

I couldn't figure out why she was gushing about Trent to me, but I do have a few ideas.

One: she's his mother, and he got her a job handing out bags at the Verizon booth. He's a self-proclaimed "mama's boy," so this is a viable option.

Two: The Verizon woman could feel that she and I were kindred spirits. Eternally linked by our love of all things Trent Edwards. Or,

Three: God sent me the Verizon woman to aid in my quest for a picture of myself with Trent. Even though I'm confident that God cares about Ryan's bucket list for my life, Verizon lady failed to get me close to Trent. This is why I use AT&T.

I did manage to get a picture of Trent. We were so close together. He was totally into me.

Here he's walking between the other red shirted QBs asking them for advice about ways to impress me. He's got it bad.

He decided to play it cool and try to impress me with his NFL caliber QBing skills.

I know you are disappointed that I didn't meet Trent and also that I failed to take a picture with him, but don't worry, all hope is not lost. If you recall, last year at the Hall of Fame game, I only got pictures of the back of Trent's head. This year, I got a picture of his side instead. Baby steps, my friends, baby steps. Next year: Face. You heard me right. I'm totally getting a picture of his face next year.

In the meantime, I'll have to settle with this picture of the sidelines I took by accident when Trent was close enough for a good picture.

 I think I can see his shadow in there somewhere.

A Romantic Getaway With My Husband To Visit The "Other Man"

Every year for the past few years whenever Matt has asked me where I wanted to go on vacation, I've answered the same thing: Rochester, N.Y. in August. Finally, after years of begging and crying and suffering, Matt has relented and is taking me to Rochester. It's only a day trip but I am unreasonably excited. Why would someone be so excited to go to a hot, humid, beach-free city for vacation, you ask?

Because that's where my Buffalo Bills are right now. In case you are wondering what they are doing there, it's training camp time. Training camp is when they start to implement what the team will use in the coming season and practice that as a team. They let the fans come and watch. For free.*

I know you are already in your car, GPSing directions to St. John Fishers College so you to can experience men practicing football. All those repetitive drills and whistles blowing. Oh my gosh, I want to sniff the inside of a sweaty helmet. It's almost more than I can handle.

Just as my obsession excitement hits fever pitch, I talk myself down by reminding myself of a story my brother stopped by to tell me this week. It's amazing how people just show up when you don't expect them and say just what you need to hear when you need to hear it.

Justin recently went to Nashville for a Christian Music Conference of some kind that I'm not totally familiar with, but he informed me that he was the chaperone for twelve teens. When they met up for the first time, Justin sat them all down and looked them each in the eye and said to them, "I cannot guarantee that you will meet anyone famous this week. I cannot guarantee that you will make contacts in the music business that will further your career. But what I can guarantee is that tonight while you are asleep, I will pee in every single one of your mouths."

Such rational and calming words of wisdom. While I didn't need the part about further my career as I have no immediate plans to pursue a career in the NFL, the rest speaks to me. Actually, I'm so afraid that some stranger that I've just met will attempt to pee in my mouth while I'm away, Matt and I have decided to drive home after the practice rather than stay in a dive-y  high-end hotel. Finally, even though it's not a guarantee, I'm bringing my camera should I get the opportunity to get a picture with a sweaty, hairy QB at any point.

Fingers crossed.

*I realize that going to observe training camp is the equivalent of coming to your office and sitting next to you while observing how you accomplish your daily tasks and that being this excited about it makes me a dork of tragic proportions. In spite of this, I don't care. I'm excited to watch grown men work. It's kind of like a Diet Coke break really.

Celebrities Are Liars

Someone in my house who is not me, of course, may or may not have spilled roughly ten ounces of ice water on my computer desk. The result of this alleged incident that was, as I've already stated, clearly not my doing is that only about half of the letters in my keyboard still work. I'm going to be honest with you: it was tempting to still blog with that keyboard as if it were still functioning properly and then post the unintelligible post that resulted. I decided to blog from my Touch instead. My sincerest apologies to all of you that are disappointed to not be "reading" the letterless post.

Blogging on the Touch can be tricky due to the automatic Spellcheck that changes words to completely different words that I personally have never heard of. Also, it's nearly impossible to proofread which should make reading this post that much more enjoyable for you. Anyway, I figured with all of these things working against me, I would keep this post short and just give you the bulletpoints of my day.

1. I followed a twitter link that promised to let me in on true secrets of how celebrity moms have such toned arms. Would you care to know the big secret? They carry their babies/children around and -- voilà -- perfect arms. Yeah, I have two kids of my own, and I've carried them around, and my arms still jiggle. I'm going to go ahead and call this out as a falsehood. Kind of like the time Gwen Stefani claimed that she lost all her baby-weight by breast-feeding. Mmhmm. I breast-fed my kids too. J.I.G.G.L.E. In their defense, perhaps the trick to great arms is in handing your baby to your nanny when your trainer shows up for your private
session.

Have you ever noticed that after you read something like that, you feel dumber? I decided to take yet another online IQ test to see if I was, in fact, dumber for having allowed a celebrity's thoughts and opinions in my head. The answer: Yes, I am dumber than the last time I took a fake IQ test. I declare these findings to be as accurate as those produced by Sports Science.

I ended my day with a fat lady run.(FWIW my Touch just tried to change the word lady to party. Do what you will with that.) Generally, I can't run, not because I'm out of shape but because I get shin splints, and they hurt, and I'm a whiny baby. So I heard in a few places that running barefoot, you won't get shin splints. I walked to the high school track and gave it a shot. I enjoyed myself immensely. The jury is still out on whether or not it will solve the pain issue. I did discover, however, that running barefoot on a track will earn you blisters, and furthermore, if said track is blue, the bottom of your feet will turn that color too. Just a little wisdom I picked up today to replace the brain cells I lost earlier in the day.

I feel that it would be best if I quit while I'm ahead and call it a night.

The Productivity of Procrastination

It is my hope to have our downstairs completed in time for the start of the school year. Since that time is quickly approaching, I began to nag patiently pressure my darling husband to help me with this task. He, of course, agreed to help, but before we could get started he made me agree to watch LOST with him.

All. Six. Seasons.

And then July was over. Not that the month was a complete waste. It was a month full of intrigue, mystery, suspense and Jack face.

 

We learned about the mystical Jackface and it's many purposes. It is appropriate to use when you are angry, shocked, happy, confused and dead.

We also learned that fat people love chicken.

This insight answered a lot of questions I had. Not about the show's story line, but about my waist line. Thank you, writers of LOST, I feel such clarity now.

Once Jack Shepard had successfully saved and killed the appropriate people, I said to Matt, "So we are going to work on the basement tomorrow, right?  

"Sure," he said, "We'll get started on that tomorrow after I drop the neighbor's dog's great-aunt's owner off at the bus station."

 By the time he got back, Mallory had informed him that today was the first of August. Apparently this means we need to go for a hike. Since we let the six year old call the shots around here, we went for a hike at a local preservation.

We walked the nature trail singing about the first day of August. I gazed off the edge of the rocks into the water and reminisced about that time that Sawyer and the bullet ridden Kate cliff jumped so that they could catch their flight. Oh and remember that time that Jack made his Jack face while Kung Fo Pandaing (yes I made that a verb) Locke? Oh this cliff brings back so many memories.

The point of all of this is: my basement is not done. Shoot, it's not even started, but I've experienced LOST, hiked with my kids, written this incredibly life-altering post and made big plans with Matt for Friday. I suspect said plans are just another of his procrastination ploys to distract me from the unfinished basement, but I don't care because Matt is taking me away to a place I've wanted to go for years. I'll tell you all about it. But first I'm going to get some sleep.

That There Is Some Bad Hair

So I'm totally back from my philanthropic expedition to India. I feel good about my time there. I adopted all the orphans they had and then fed them using only a banana and a kids healthy eating cookbook. I'm like the MacGyver of good deeds. I realize that about now you are thinking to yourself that I'm amazing and you wish you could be as awesome as me, but here's the truth. My trip to India was totally selfish. I needed a distraction. What did I need to be distracted from you ask? (Yes, I do realize that I'm conversing with myself. If you'll excuse me I'm going to answer myself now.)

Football. Or rather the lack thereof. You see even though they only play games in the fall, there is really something going on in the NFL all year. After the season is the postseason, then the Super Bowl, the draft and finally OTA's and minicamps. After minicamps the teams "break" for five weeks. It's like a deafening silence falls over the NFL. It's so inconsiderate of them to vacation. To add insult to injury Coach Hackman decided to not name a starting QB until Training Camp starts. So now not only am I left writhing in agony over what kind of hairstyle Trent will bring to camp, but also will he even be playing?

After five weeks of suffering, I finally got all my answers today. Yes, Trent will be starter through training camp. As for his hair:

 You cut me deep there, Trent.

Where to start? The borderline mullet? The sideburns? Or...or..the goatee?  Part of me wants to believe that his face looks like that  because they ran out of razors in Western N.Y. and he had no choice, but that two inch patch of skin between his sideburns and goatee give him away. He did this to himself on purpose.

Obviously I couldn't just let this slide. I had to set him straight.

You can see it in his eyes, Trent was a little hurt by my honesty at first. But then we talked it out and it turns out the "hairstyle" is a good thing. If you remember, last year I told him to keep growing his hair because his hair is the key to winning a Super Bowl. I might have forgotten but Trent is still holding the faith in his hair. Since I started this I have to respect that, but Trent, the goatee and burns?  My best guess is he must have lost a bet or something.

For those of you that are worried that my feelings on Trent's hair caused a rift between us, you can rest easy. Once we straightened out the whole hair fiasco, I made sure to mention to him that he had a nice tan. 

And it made him happy.

Now if he could just get some of that hair off his face, I'd be happy too.

They Don't Cover Sex on the SAT's Anyway

I've been taking the saying, Lazy Days of Summer, quite literally lately. I've found that there are a lot of wonderful ways I can spend my time that don't serve any good or fruitful purpose. For example, the other day I googled PSAT tests. Why? So I could test how smart I am, of course. I realize that the PSAT is an aptitude test for 16 and 17 year olds trying to enter college and I'm 30 and well, not headed to college. It's just that I was curious how I would do and quite frankly I couldn't think of anything better to do with my time. For what it's worth, according to the PSAT questions I answered, my reading comprehension and writing skills are AWESOME. My math skills on the other hand, well, um, they were... less awesome.

Fortunately for my kids my math skills don't have to be SAT good to follow a recipe.

That's right, the kids and I totally made our own ice cream.

One of New York's many requirements for what I teach my six year old is Health. Since I was feeling kind of clueless as to what a six year old should be taught in health I did a search for 2nd grade Health Ed at an online homeschool bookstore. They suggested  "What's the Big Deal? Why God Cares About Sex." Did you just recoil at the idea of teaching a six year old about sex too? We are going to learn about eating nutritiously instead. I realize that good eating habits aren't as much fun as sex, but since I've decided not to let my kids know sex exists until they are capable of doing SAT caliber math, nutrition it is. I did a little more research and found "Kids Fun and Healthy Cookbook."

Now you may recall that I've attempted to cook with my kids once before. You may also recall that that recipe was barflicious. Because of this I was understandably cautious, but this book is wonderful. The recipes are easy and quick to make and as an added bonus, my kids have eaten every healthy recipe we've made from the book without crying or vomiting.

Actually the recipes are so good I've taken to making them without the kids. It can be a little difficult to get Mallory out of the kitchen. She likes to help. So I've taken to distracting them by letting them go outside barefoot and climb trees. The higher the better.

I wonder how well those branches will hold. Well let's just do the math and see: y = (x + 3)2, then (-2x - 6)2
 

Right, I'm too lazy to do that math. I'm sure she'll be fine. That's what ER's are for anyway.

We'll Totally Have World Hunger Solved In No Time

So I've been thinking. I know, it's terrifying, but stick with me here. A few years ago I started walking regularly. Well, as regularly as the northeast's mood swingy weather will allow. I did this because I remember when I was a kid my Aunt Margie used to walk every evening, and it was just the thing she did. It was her habit. However, the objective of my walking was not to build my own habit but to create one for my kids. My hope is that when they are grown, going for walks will just be the thing they do.

Since we are a few years into building that habit, I thought it might be a good time to start building another. (I believe in pacing myself.) I briefly considered teaching my kids ways to waste their time using only the Internet but decided instead to go with volunteer work. (I didn't want to have to share my computer with those pip squeaks.) Since my kids are only 4 and 6, I'm struggling to figure out a good way to get all of us involved in helping others. I want the kids to be able to participate, and it's stumped me a bit. Then I had a genius idea: why not ask the kids themselves how they'd like to help others. (Told you it was genius.)

Our first brainstorming session went something like this:

Anthony: We can let them watch T.V.

Me: Good idea, buddy, but how does that help people exactly?

Mallory: Well, maybe they don't have a T.V., and they could come to our house, and we could let them watch the news?

It was at this time I felt it might be wise to discuss what kind of situations that people might find themselves in that they would need help. We talked about the homeless, the hungry, the elderly, and when we were all done, the kids sat over their breakfast bowls deep in thought about ways to help others. Actually, I'm pretty sure Anthony was thinking about toys, but Mallory was still trying to figure out how to help. I know this because a minute later, she looked up at me and said, "We should go to India. Lots of people in India need help."

"Right, right. You're right," I said to her. "But there are people here in the U.S. that need help too." (It's not that I don't care about the people of India; it's just that Mallory's passport is expired, so I'm thinking we are going to have to do something a little closer to home.) She seemed to grasp the concept of helping locally because later she looked out our kitchen window and saw a women sitting in her car by the mailboxes. The woman was just sitting there, and Mallory put two and two together and said, "We should go help her. I don't think she can get her key to work in her mailbox." I peeked out the window and sure enough there was a woman in her car by the mailboxes, but she wasn't struggling with her key. Nope, she was reading her mail in her car.

At least her heart is in the right place.

So to review my options: We could invite strangers over to watch T.V. at our house. We could go to India, or we could read mail to people (or check their mail for them).

It's kind of starting to look like I should renew Mallory's passport.