NOLA!

Just got home from an incredibly wonderful weekend at the boat....... to learn that NOLA is more than likely going to be devastated by Hurricane Katrina! The Rock Boat cruise is scheduled to depart from NOLA on Thursday, September 29. We can all only hope that the hurricane changes direction or lessens as it approaches land.

I hope that they remain safe through this terrible hurricane which inevitably looks to be headed their way. I can't even begin to imagine what is going through the people's minds. We, in NE Ohio, are very fortunate that we don't have to face anything like this. Sure, we get some MASSIVE snowfalls during the winter... but, nothing as devastating as some of the hurricanes in the southern US in recent years.

My thoughts and prayers go out to all the people who live in and around the NOLA area. STAY SAFE!

Emm & Tricia!

Haven't posted in awhile.

The Living Room Concert was AWESOME!! (despite the fact that there was a very small crowd!) The lovely Emm and Tricia were fantastic, as usual. I have some photos that I will post soon, and I recorded both performances. Bob's going to try to figure out how to upload the video, and hopefully I'll be able to post it for everyone to download! :-)

Bob and I got to spend some quality time chatting with Emm and Tricia prior to their performances. He was extremely impressed with both of their talents... and kept saying, "I can't believe that I have such talented ladies playing in my living room." :-) Emm wanted to know all about how we met and ended up moving in together. She's such a wonderful, down-to-earth person. The 3 of us stood in our kitchen for at least 45 minutes talking. I still get "star-struck" sometimes when talking to Emm even though over the years I've talked to her numerous times --- and even stored her keyboard in my condo for a few months.

Emm posted about the Living Room concert in her journal.

It was a wonderful evening! It's been sooooooo long since I've seen Emm (Oberlin College - fall of 2003) and Tricia (Toledo Living Room concert - winter 2001??). Hopefully it won't be so long before our paths cross again! :-) Emm says that she might be traveling to Columbus for a Living Room tour at Laura's place. (Funny... Laura's parents' house in Toledo was the first place I ever saw Emm!)

It's been a long week. Lots still going on at work. My job is in "limbo" still. My annual review was due on Monday. And my "future plan" for the department is due tomorrow. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll get a promotion. :-) (*Knock on wood*!! Hoping I didn't jinx it....)

We'll be spending the weekend at the boat! :-) This is the first weekend in 6 weeks that I don't have to work. Yeah!!! I don't know what to do with myself! :-) I have a stack of magazines that I haven't read that I'll be bringing with me. And, I'm sure there's a very comfy lounge chair calling my name on the back of the boat where I can sun myself all weekend. Hopefully the weather will be nice and we can take the boat to the north side of Kelley's Island to swim. It might be one of our last chances this summer......

For now... it's getting late.... and I must be off to bed. I'll try to post concert photos soon! :-)

Today's the day!!!

Emm and Tricia will be here tonight! VERY EXCITED!!!!!! :-)

I spent yesterday shopping at Crocker Park with Pat. We finished the other half of the stores that we didn't get to last month. I found a pair of jeans for $16 at Eddie Bauer!!! Yeah!! :-) And they're long enough!! :-) We enjoyed lunch at The Cheesecake Factory and I brought home a piece of Coffee Heathbar Crunch cheesecake. Then it was off to work for another In-Park Auction... and an hour rain delay! :-( BUT, we had our highest to-date auction! :-) VERY COOL!!

Now, I need to spend some serious time cleaning up the condo for the concert. And rearranging the living room!

I'll post details later about the concert!

Beer Men!

I LOVE this photo!! :-)



This photo was taken at the brewery in 1979 of Bob and his brother, Keith! Aren't they cute???

Matt Nathanson!!!

Matt Nathanson is coming to Cleveland!!!!!!! :-) Yeah!!! Tuesday, October 25 @ The Odeon!! So excited!!!! Not only is he going on The Rock Boat specifically to hang out with Michell and I (LOL!!!), but he'll be at the New Orleans HOB the night before The Boat leaves (which is where we plan to be since we already have tickets) AND he'll be coming to Cleveland!!! :-) I have to convince Bob to go to see him at The Odeon! :-)

Emm and Tricia's concert is in 4 days. Hooray!!! That's going to be much fun! There are 11 people coming, so it'll be a nice, intimate show. And, good news... Emm's guitarist, Jordan, will be coming too!! I think I've only seen Emm with a "band" once or twice, so this will be a new treat!

Lots and lots to do to prepare for the big shindig! :-)

Bob and I went to Gill's tonight and picked up sandwiches and then took them to our favorite park in Olmsted Falls... and ate dinner on some rocks near the waterfalls. It was really nice. Then we went to play miniature golf and I bought ice cream at Diary Queen because I lost! :-(

Well, off to bed. Long day...

It's over!!!

The golf outing was a HUGE success!!!!!!!!! Everyone had a great time and the weather was absolutely perfect!!!!!!!!! We couldn't have asked for a better day!!!!!!!!!!! I'm so excited that everything went well. This is a huge bonus for me. Hopefully things are going to happen for me now... :-) Reviews are due in one week, which is another good thing.

But for now... no more thinking about work. I've put in about 50+ hours over the past 4 days and I'm TIRED!! So, it's off to bed for me. And, I get to sleep in tomorrow morning. Bobby D gave me the day off. Hooray!!! I'm going to sleep in, and sleep some more and then get up and have lunch with my sweetie and then veg out for the rest of the afternoon. We're off to a Berea Power Squadron picnic in the evening, which will be a nice end to the day!

Golf outing in t-miuns 24 hours...

It's 9am on Sunday. This time tomorrow, the golfers will all be piling into their carts to embark on what's sure to be an absolutely gorgeous day of golf! (Oh no! Did I just jinx it!?!?!?) Anything would be better than last year's crappy rainy day. No thunder or lightening, but a crappy drizzle all day... until the dinner and then bright sun and heat! Go figure!

Anyway, I worked another 10 hour day yesterday and I'm looking at another 6-7 hours today. Tonight is the annual "Caravan to Quail"! It'll be different this year without Melissa... but, I have my "new peeps" to help me out. Crystal and Melissa (from HR) have gracious agreed to come to the ballpark and stuff their cars full of whatever needs to get to Quail. And, of course, my sweetie being the wonderfully thoughtful boyfriend that he is, has agreed to join us tonight and tomorrow to help out! I can't wait until we're kicking back in the lounge tonight having dinner and drinks to cap off a very long couple of days!

I'm so anxious for tomorrow to come... I can hardly stand it! This is my BIG chance!! If all goes well, all the "bigs" will be there to see it and I'll look really good and hopefully good things will come for me at work!

Side note: Zelie just jumped up on my lap to say hi! :-) He's my adorable kitty! (Here's a pic of Zelie. I call this hangover kitty! LOL!!)




It's looking like another long week for me. 5 days of work, plus Saturday night is another In-Park Auction night. Another weekend home alone for me! Bob's off to Put-in-Bay (PIB) for the weekend for a bachelor's party. I might be heading up to Port Clinton Friday night to see Oval Opus at Mr. Ed's. I LOVE THEM!!! :-) And, Saturday before I work, I might be visiting Crocker Park again with Bob's mom to finish shopping in all the stores. And then, Sunday is the big Emm Gryner and Tricia Concepcion concert. YEAH!!! I'm VERY excited!! There are about 10 people coming, which is a pretty decent crowd. Hopefully more will come!

Well... I'm off to breakfast, alone. I'm a "boat widow" again this weekend since I had to work. Looking forward to going up to the boat again in a couple weeks. Bob finally replaced the motor for the dinghy from the robbery incident, so it'll be nice to use it again!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

iPods

I just wanted to say how much I LOVE my iPod! I wasn't to sure about the whole MP3 player thing. Bob kept saying he wanted one and I kept saying "why?" But, after he brought one around Christmas time, I started to think more and more that I'd like to get one. I finally broke down in March and I've loved mine ever since! I got a 40G iPod photo! :-) I still haven't put all my CDs on it, but I'm working my way through my collection. I'm about half way through and I don't think I've filled 5G.

And speaking of things that I didn't think I'd like... let's add TiVo to that list! I couldn't understand what the big deal was... even when we went to visit Alex and Maggie in DC and Bob couldn't get enough of it. I didn't think it was all that special. (Sorry, Alex! I know you read this...) But, after listening to Bob talk about it nonstop, we were on one of our many shopping trips to Target and saw them for $150 with a $100 rebate (speaking of which... I STILL haven't received the check!)... I told him to just get it already!

And now, I'm totally hooked!! Although, I think he's WAY MORE hooked than me! Can we say Stargate?!!??! I swear that's the only thing TiVo knows how to record. Oh, and Seinfeld! Doh!!! :-)

Sorry for the tangents... only 4 more days until the golf outing and my brain is in total "golf mode". I had to think about something different for awhile.

BTW... if you're reading this through www.zeliecat.blogspot.com... feel free to add your comments! I know people are reading it because I have a tracker at the bottom of the website, but no one seems to leave comments! :-( Getting comments is almost as good as getting e-mails. (Yes I know I'm strange...)

I'm done with tangents for this evening. Goodnight!

Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip...

Just got home from a trip aboard the Nautica Queen. Our monthly Executive Women International meeting took place on the dinner cruise this evening. A 3-hour cruise! Any other week, except the week prior to the golf outing which is THE MOST important event of the season... THE event that could make or break my chances of an awesome promotion... I would've been happy to spend 3-hours cruising Lake Erie's shoreway. (Side note: Ohio has over 262 miles of shoreline with over 200 marinas! It's amazing all the interesting facts you learn on this cruise.)

It was a nice cruise and I met a really nice lady from Harry London Chocolates (who are producing the Wahoo Bar with partial proceeds benefiting Cleveland Indians Charities -- VERY COOL)! So, it wasn't a completely lost evening.

6 days until the golf outing. I can't believe it! There's still much to do. So, I must be off to bed.

Kitties, Kitties everywhere!

Our amusement in the morning is the 3 kitties waiting to be feed milk from the cereal bowl. This morning they amused themselves with a milk ring. Keep in mind --- there are at least 5 other milk rings laying around the house, but each time a new one is introduced, it's the most fascinating thing in the entire world! I am talking about cats afterall... whose life consists of sleeping, eating, using the litter box, eating some more and of course, sleeping some more!

Tuesday night we went to HOB again. (It seems like it's becoming the Tuesday Night Event.) We saw Hootie and the Blowfish (remember them?!?!), with Ingram Hill. I love Ingram Hill! They were on The Rock Boat last year, and were scheduled for The Boat this year; however, backed because they were going to be opening for a few "major acts" who were on tour this summer and fall. (I guess Hootie is one of those "major acts".) I missed the first couple songs Ingram Hill performed because I thought they came on at 9pm, but they came on early at 8:30pm.

Bob and I met John Carter, and Melissa & Dave Painter at the concert. It was MUCH fun!! But, HOB was PACKED and it was about 1000 degrees in there. I've seen Hootie twice at Blossom (summer of 95 and summer of 1999). They were equally as good this time. The crowd was really into it, which made for a good concert. If it wasn't SO HOTand CROWDED, it would've been even more enjoyable! (I think I'm getting old. UGH!!)

Speaking of music... have you heard Emm Gryner is coming to play at our house??? :-)

Emm @ our house UPDATE!!!

Ok... here are the details!

Emm Gryner AND Tricia Concepcion will be performing at our place on Sunday, August 21 @ 7:00pm! (Double treat!! Yeah!!)

I'm soooooooo excited!!! I haven't seen Emm since the fall 2003 and I haven't seen Tricia in years and years!

If you want to come, e-mail me! This is one concert you WILL NOT want to miss!

I can't wait!!! It's going to be much fun!!

Emm Gryner is coming to our house!!

Check this out!!

One of my ALL-TIME FAVORITE artists -- EMM GRYNER -- is coming to our house as part of her "Great Lakes Living Room Tour"! How cool is that!?!??!

AND... you are all invited!!!

Tentative date is Sunday, August 21... SAVE-THE-DATE! You won't want to miss her!!

More details to come... I'm so excited!!!!!

Burned to a crisp!

Another gorgeous weekend at the boat!

Well, partially at the boat... I spent 8 hours at work on Saturday outside in the sun. And Friday night, Michell and I had our FAVE pizza --- Donatos thin crust with black olives -- while we dined outside and watched a guy sitting in the back of his pick-up truck in the parking lot, talking on his cellphone.

And then on Sunday, Bob and I took the boat to East Harbor Beach to spend the afternoon swimming with his friend Tommy, his wife Jennifer and their daughter Jillian.

Much FUN!! BUT, to much SUN!! Ouch.......................

I got to throw the anchor again!! :-) YEAH!!!

We ended the night at Terry's Tavern. It's a little "hole in the wall" place in Bay View. But, it has great food and AWESOME "fair" fries with vinegar. YUM YUM!!! The service was sooooooooo slow. It took almost an hour to get our food... but the fries were definitely worth the wait!! :-)

Can you believe it's August 1?!!?!? Where is this summer going!??!!?