Tube Socks.

So. My football team is imploding before my eyes (In parentheses summary:  They found all of Blake/Wichard's financial records.  Not good. Awful. Terrible), so I thought I would write about something else.  For those of you who want to know what's happening with my football boys, go to Yahoo Sports.  There is a very detailed article there that can enlighten you.  I, on the other hand, want nothing to do with it, so I'm going to talk about socks.

 You know what I love?  Affordable pleasures.  Of course I want a Range Rover and a new tv and a house and a hot tub and 20 different pairs of Louboutins, but those are pleasures I can't afford.  Tube socks, on the other hand, I can.  I really want some tube socks to wear around the house.  Maybe with Carolina blue stripes (can't keep me too far away from my beloved football team). I don't know why, but something about the nostalgia of tube socks is calling my name.  And if there are silly little affordable pleasures that make you happy, by all means go for it. Life is much too short (and filled with too many football scandals) to deprive yourself.

Monday Morning Review

A VICTORY! Saturday my (depleted) boys, beat Rutgers 17-13.  It wasn't pretty, but we'll take it. Thank goodness for Bruce Carter who blocked a key punt and got a huge interception. (and TJ, always thank goodness for TJ really.) Matt also got an INT which made my brother very happy! The fam came over to watch the game as their big screen died the night before! We had yummy food and cocktails and it was fun to host a little "game day" party.  Can't wait to have more of those in the new house.

The NCAA has made rulings on Deunta and Kendric... both of which we have appealed.  If the rulings stand, Deunta is out one more game (returning for Clemson) and Kendric is out two more (returning for Miami).  I'd LOVE to get one or both back for ECU this weekend.  Keep your fingers crossed.

Personally, I think both are a little harsh, but especially Deunta's.  Deunta went to CA to visit a former player (not an agent, not in any way affiliated with anything), paid for his own flight, hotel, etc.  The former player just paid for Deunta's ticket to Disneyland.  Now please, please tell me how a friend paying for another friend's ticket to an amusement park in CA relates to football at all.  I'd love to hear anyone's insights on that.

In sad news, the farmer that owns the real life Ramses fell off his tractor and is in critical condition.

In happy news, countdown to playing those dirty pirates is ON!

Monday Morning Review

We lost to GT Saturday 30-24 (same score as our loss to LSU).  We played well, but we could not stop the GT run - we are definitely missing our defense, especially our secondary.  Here's hoping some more players get cleared this week.  Despite the loss, it was a gorgeous day and I am beyond in love with Carolina and Kenan Stadium.  I know that's nothing new, but there is no where, NO WHERE, I am more sublimely happy than Chapel Hill and Kenan Stadium.  We had a great tailgate and it was a wonderful time with friends and family.  We're away at Rutgers this weekend and we really REALLY need the W.  Let's do it, boys!!

Return to Kenan...

Saturday marks the first home game of the season for the Heels, after the season opener in Atlanta and a bye week last Saturday.  Words cannot describe my excitement.  Shaun Draughn was cleared on Monday (HUGE) and word is a few more players should be cleared before Saturday's game.  Absolutely cannot wait.  I've been planning the tailgate menu, the 2010 Football mixes,etc.

It's a noon game - which I love!! Most people hate noon games, but I love them because I can never sleep in on football Saturdays anyway.  Might as well get up and go enjoy some food, drink and FOOTBALL! I remember in college I would go out on a Friday night and still be up and at 'em by 7:30 on Saturday for a noon game playing the fight song and cooking in my baby kitchen in Spring Lane.  Ahh, I miss that!!

Anyway, I know the football season already started, but since we've only had one game and it wasn't at Kenan, I sort of feel like it's starting Saturday.  I absolutely cannot wait to see my boys at Kenan Saturday.  I'll update on any more players getting cleared, but until then, enjoy your week and check out UNC football alum Chase Rice on Survivor tonight! :) Go Heels!

XOXO...

New episodes of TV shows start coming back this week, the first of which is GOSSIP GIRL! I absolutely love Gossip Girl. It is beyond my guilty pleasure. The clothes, the romance, Chase Crawford... the clothes. Cannot wait to get on the couch with a glass of bubbly and indulge in the latest drama of New York's upper elite!

Monday Morning Review

Well, there isn't too much to review sports-wise as my Heels had a bye week. Which, normally, would have made me very depo because I just got back into football season, but since we are in the middle of this NCAA mess, I'll take as much time as possible to get some players back and eligible for GT on Saturday. Word on the street (and by street, I mean the premium IC message boards) is 6-7 players are to be cleared this week. That would be AMAZING. Seriously. Shaun Draughn and Deunta were the first names I heard.

State won, Wake beat Duke and ECU beat Memphis.

In other news, the weather around Ral is absolutely gorg. After such a H-O-T summer, a high of 83 is absolutely welcome. Saturday Mom and I walked up to 5 points where they were having a little block party and did some shopping and got lunch. So much fun.

Last night I tried a new pizza place with friends. It was the perfect night to sit outside and enjoy a glass of vino.

Overall, it was a relaxing, excellent weekend. Time to start tailgate planning for Saturday. :) Have a great week y'all. Lovelovelove.

ATL Review

I got down to Atlanta about 6:00 Friday evening after perhaps the most fun plane ride ever. I was seated near about six other Carolina fans. All we did was talk football the whole time and one man treated us all to beers that we happily cheered to our football team. After arriving, I had to manage the beast that is the Marta, but I managed (I managed... after asking a woman who offered to drive me in her car and then told me she could tell I was from a small town and not to talk to strangers on the Marta. Okay, Raleigh may not be Atlanta, but it's not like I haven't traveled around the world... but I digress). Anyway, I found my family and we went to an amazing dinner at Canoe! So delicious! When we got back to the hotel and were getting off the elevator, we overheard a woman say, "I rode on the elevator with them! They've been cleared!" That is how we found out Bruce and Quan were cleared for the next day's game and we did a little happy dance in the middle of the 8th floor of the Renaissance Waverly.

The next day we got dressed in our game day attire and took the Rams Clubs bus down to the area near the GA Dome. We then went to the Peasant Bistro and had a lovely "tailgate" of wine, frites, gourmet grilled cheeses, steak, beer, prosecco... It was lovely :) After our lunch, we headed to the Fan Zone where the Heels were going to do a version of the Old Well Walk. Our team finally came out and so many were missing... like more than were supposed to be missing. We were so nervous!

We headed to the GA dome and watched warmups. Lis and I had some wine and Daddy had some beer. We never ate anything because, well, I know this doesn't seem possible (and I didn't believe it was until Saturday), the GA dome has worse/less food than Kenan. Daddy sat next to Anoop Desai which was exciting for my American Idol crazed family.

We started out the game well and were leading 10-7 in the second quarter. Then Lis and I went to the bathroom and to get more wine. Kiss of death. At half time the score was 30-10 and everyone had counted us out. In the fourth quarter we made the most incredible comeback lead by this week's passing leader in all of football, this week's ACC offensive back of the week, none other than TJ Yates. We had a chance to win it with two last plays, but couldn't complete. We lost 30-24, but I have never been more proud of a Carolina team. Way to do it Heels! :)

We ended up heading back to Raleigh a day early because of this crazy festival taking over our hotel called DragonCon. On the way back we found out that John Blake resigned... not a good thing. Will keep y'all updated over the next few days.

Lovelovelove and thank GOODNESS it's football season! :)

Distracted from Countdown

Y'all, I am so sorry that I got distracted from this countdown, but Thursday afternoon we found out that the football boys were involved in an academic scandal. The word is a tutor wrote papers for some of the team - names being thrown around are basically all of our NFL prospects on D. In turn, I have been distracted reading the boards and trying to figure out who will be on the field Saturday in ATL. Sigh, sigh, sigh.

The University held a press conference Thursday night to tell us that there was an ongoing investigation involving academic improprieties. Thorp began the press conference with the words, "If you love this University, then I'm sorry for what I'm about to tell you." And that's when I lost it. Sobbing. Everywhere.

Saturday was Meet the Heels. I didn't know what the atmosphere would be like going in, but it turned out to be a great time. We went to Top O first and had some Old Well Whites. Then I got pictures with Teej and Deunta at Meet the Heels.

We have no idea who will be playing in Atlanta, but whether its Bruce Carter or the little Broughton walk-on I will be cheering like crazy in my football dress. GO HEELS, see you Saturday! :)

Single Digit Countdown: 9

We are now in the single digits for our countdown to football season, to the glorious day of Sept. 4 when my Heels take on the gross LSU Tigers in the Chick-fil-a Kickoff in ATL. I've decided for each of the nine days remaining, I will give a reason why I love Carolina football.

Reason #9: (I'll start with the most trivial.) Dresses.
Football is the only sport where it is perfectly acceptable to wear a dress to the game (at least at Carolina... I know some lesser schools that roll their eyes at the idea of dressing up to go to a football game, but that is why they are not among the top schools in the nation). I love the idea of the football game as a social event. One where everyone dresses up, makes tons of southern delicacies for the tailgate, drinks bourbon out of a flask, and then proceeds to cheer like heck for their team of choice. I love things that are perfectly southern and dressing up for football is one.

On a more personal, vain note, dresses look pretty good on me. I tend to live in them. I hate when the weather turns cold and I have to wear jeans out on the weekends. Most of the time, I just ignore the weather and wear dresses anyway.

This year I have a killer football dress. I mean, perfection. It is about knee length, completely Carolina blue, sleeveless, v-neck. Perfectly comfortable, perfectly classy. Thank you Brooks Brothers.

And thank you Carolina football for deeming it not only perfectly socially acceptable to wear dresses to football games, but smiling upon it. The world needs more people (...errr... things) like you. :)

Jackson Simmons and the Scaredy Cat Volunteers

The Hardwood Heels got some great news yesterday as Jackson Simmons agreed to come on as a walk-on. Simmons averaged nearly 20 pts per game and had several scholarship offers from some great midmajors (I know, I know, what does midmajor even mean anymore? - he had offers from Charlotte, Davidson, ODU..), but chose to walk-on to the Heels instead. This is a huge pickup for us... I love to see the Carolina name meaning something to an in-state kid.

In other news, the Tennessee Volunteers are cowards. Seriously. They are willing to pay $750,000 to back out of a football game against us in 2011. Their reasoning -- they want to break up a really tough stretch of games. A stretch that includes, Bama, UGA, Pitt... so pick one of those games to back out of! Come on Vols, the Heels want to play!

Living the Dream

Do you ever have those moments where you realize you are, in fact, living your dream? I'm having one of those moments today. It's funny because when you are thinking about your dream life - you know, the dream job, your own place to live, a healthy and happy social life, inner peace, a fully stocked fridge and wine cooler (whatever your particular dreams are, mine just happen to include a nice brie and sauvignon blanc) you think it's going to be this groundbreaking insanely exciting thing. And it is, in a way. But life being as it is, and people being as they are, the "omg this is it," feeling fades quickly. Today I'm taking the time to step back and really look at my life. Upon doing this, it's clearly obvious that I AM living my dream. I am smack-dab-in the middle of my dream life. That, my friends, is insane.

When I first got out of school (two years and three months ago, le sigh), I was slightly lost. The economy was awful and I had some idea of what I wanted to do - but I wasn't sure. I knew writing had always been a love of mine and I hoped to get into some communications field, but besides that, I was lost. The summer before I got my first job, I lived at home (God bless my mother, I know I was difficult to live with coming off of a senior year of going out, only twelve hours of classes and more going out). That summer I made a "vision board." I really didn't know what I was doing, I just wanted to move out and into a place of my own. On the board there were apartment layouts from three different apartment complexes in Raleigh, there was a picture of me and my boyfriend, pictures of me and my family, and a fake business card I made dubbing myself a "PR specialist" or something similar.

Wow. Two years later and look where I am. I live in one of the three apartment complexes that were on my vision board (with plans to move into a cute house in a few months), my relationships with family and friends are stronger than ever and I am an account associate at a pr agency. AND I just got my first ever business cards to prove it. Hello dream!

Now, this post is most definitely not a "go make a vision board" post. I don't really think the vision board had much to do with me being where I am today. Honestly, the biggest thing I can credit is learning more about who I am (which at times takes some pretty serious and scary soul searching) and coming out the better for it. I don't have everything right now, but for now, right now is a pretty good place to be. :)

The letter B

Lately I've seemed to have an affinity for the letter B. Seriously. I really want a Bike with a Basket that I can ride to my local Butcher -- this isn't a joke -- I really do. I also really want to go to Bickett Market, a new farmers market in town. And then there are the perpetual standbys - Boys (always frustrating, sometimes worth it) and Birthdays (never frustrating, always worth it). Just a random observation.

I'm off to the lake in about an hour for my birthday weekend. All the boys (see what I mean about these b words) are coming up too. I hope Daddy doesn't get too stressed. I am craving some sunshine, beach music, and yummy food and drink. The new job is great so far - and my main client starts with a B!

Happy Weekend y'all!

Thank you...

As I'm sitting here on my second to last day of work, so many thoughts are coming through my mind. I am going to my dream job, but it's so bittersweet. I wanted to do PR out of school, but now I see things have happened just how they should (haven't I learned this lesson yet?!?). Getting the job here has prepared me for this new PR job. I have learned SO much in my time here, both life lessons and career lessons. There is one lesson, however, that stands out above all of them. On that note, thank you SA, for teaching me:

OPENMINDEDNESS. I remember when I first started here, I was shocked. There were two of us from the South. The rest were from England, Italy, even... New York. Even though I've travelled all over the world, I have been in a certain environment most of my life. Broughton and Carolina are both very southern, old money schools. And because of my family, I've been surrounded by those type of people often. Before SA, I felt a certain superiority for being from this background. Not in a financial sense - just in a "I'm Southern, I'm better," sense. I often found myself not relating well to people not from this same type of environment. Now I realize it's because I didn't try to relate. While I will always be a proper Carolina girl who loves her mama and daddy, can't get enough bbq, appreciates wine and cheese, would do anything for her Tar Heels, and puts college football before most other things in her life, I've learned that different types of people are what make the world go round. I have met some of the most amazing people here - people I never thought I would be friends with that I now cannot imagine my life without. Now when I'm not cheering for my Heels, I'm cheering for Inter-Milan. Instead of fighting with the nearest Duke fan, I'm fighting with an Ohio State fan. Instead of a sandwich from the perpetually Southern classic Village Deli, I'm getting a turkey club (so much better than Village Deli's) from Meridian Cafe, a local cafe owned by a Greek family from Jersey. While this job has not made me so openminded as to like Durham, it has opened my eyes to the beauty of difference and for that, I am forever grateful.

Some good news and vacay recap...

I got a new job. :) Junior Account Executive for a PR Firm in Raleigh. It's sort of my dream job. I start next Monday. I'm so nervous, but so excited to be starting on a career path. And to all you people still searching for jobs, don't lose hope! It's all about timing and not getting one now just means there is a better one waiting in the future. I'm proof of that. :)

Vacay was amazing. Lots of sun, food, and drinks. The Ritz was gorgeous as usual. I think I've forgotten how to open a door for myself. I've come back deciding I want to take singing lessons and surfing lessons. I know -- I've got lots of plans. <3 Lovelovelove.

Noooooooooooooooooooo

The NCAA is investigating our football program. The accusation is (please please please just be an accusation) that Marvin Austin and Greg Little talked to/received gifts from/did something illegal with agents in the off-season. THIS IS AWFUL.

The guys could get suspended or we could get sanctioned and they could take away wins from the upcoming season (these investigations usually last a while) or we could lose post-season eligibility. I want to cry just thinking about it. All before a season with incredible potentional. Ugh. I can't talk about it anymore.

"Dark Horse National Contender"

Oh.my.goodness!!! I just read an article that said we are a "dark horse national contender" in football this season. National contender???!!???? Whofreakingcares about the dark horse part... National Contender and North Carolina (football) have not been used in the same sentence since... well.... never. ANDDD the article said we would keep that status regardless of TJ's performance. THIS IS CRAZY. I absolutely CANNOT WAIT!!

Vacay I Can Almost Taste You...

I'M SO EXCITED. I'm officially four days away from spending a week at the Ritz in Amelia Island, Florida. This is my first week long vacay since I've had a big girl job and I plan on taking full advantage of it. Tanning, cocktails, dancing, shopping, food... all on Daddy's dime :) Thanks Daddy!

I'm trying to put together a few playlists for the drive down there (le sigh, I know, but we are stopping in Savannah to break up the trip)... Any suggestions from creative music people out there? (I really long to be a creative music person, but don't think I'm really cool enough to be...)

Happy Tuesday y'all! Lovelovelove.

Expectancy v Expectation

I was reading The Shack last night (again, I know) and I was particulary struck by a discussion of expectancy versus expectation. The excerpt was specifically in reference to friendship and how when we put expectations upon one another, we begin to live in the "noun" format, with laws and rules. When we live in expectancy, however, we are in the "verb" format, in a dynamic relationship that can grow and change without expecation and law being placed upon it.

Whoa... I LOVE THAT. I can think of several friendships I place expectation upon. I only end up disappointed and the person had no idea he was even doing anything wrong! I must must must learn to live in the verb format. In expectancy.

If I could make every student coming into college read a book, it would be the Shack. (I know that would never fly, but it would be sooo much better than whatever book I had to read about the army...)

Love and relationship over power and hierarchy. Expectancy not expecatation.

BRILLIANT.

Lovelovelove!

Entrepreneur Envy

I, like most, have always been jealous of those amazing women who can run their own business. Sure they work like heck and get little thanks, but they get to set their own schedule, make their own business decisions, and work with something about which they are truly passionate. Lately I've been wondering... could I be one of these women?? It's time to stop dreaming of it and make it happen.

I'm going to start small, of course. There's no room for quitting my current job to take on my dreams and falling flat on my face. But I'm going to start a catering service. Something small. Maybe a service where apt residents can buy frozen dishes to stick in the oven when they feel like a hot meal? Or maybe some delish tailgating treats? The details still need to be ironed out, but here goes quitting daydreaming and forging ahead. Happy Tuesday y'all!

I Know, I Know...

I'M SORRY. But when the only sports happening are the NBA playoffs (read: gag me as we remove every ounce of greatness from the sport of basketball and replace it with ugly uniforms, outrageous contracts, one-on-one flashiness, and a league that has never heard of the word "defense") and my money is running low (read: no money for Banana Republic or even banana splits) then my blogging topics come to a halt.

Friday night I saw Deon Thompson out in Chapel Hill. I, of course, pretty much attacked him as he was getting money out of the ATM, but he was very sweet and took a picture. People don't understand how I can get so excited about seeing Carolina basketball and football players, but to me, those guys are celebrities. Think about it: I tune into Carolina basketball at least twice a week during the season... that's more than my weekly visit with the stars of Gossip Girl or Law and Order.

I saw my first real life pair of Louboutins last week. Of course, I've seen them online and in stores, but last week my company's President from Italy came in wearing a gorgeous basic (can you even say basic when it comes to Louboutins? I think not) pair of black Louboutin pumps. I was in love the minute I saw those red soles as she walked down the hall. In love. Who needs boys when you have Christian?