Lora's United States of Whatever

Even though last night was the American Idol finale, I'm still hearing singing in my house. Every year when American Idol starts, I try to convince Greg to audition for the show. It would be such a fun little road trip to drive to the nearest tryout destination... and if anything, maybe it would get him to stop singing during the commercials. It never fails. Every year during American Idol, Greg belts out Meatloaf's "I Would Do Anything For Love..." during EVERY commercial break. Sometimes he'll change it up. And sometimes he sings "Jericho Road." Backstory on "Jericho Road": Nope, you've never heard this song before. It's a song that's been forever in the making. Well, at least since I've known Greg. He wants to write a song and that will be the name of it. Jericho Road. He'll play the guitar and hum and then sing "it happened on Jericho Road," or "all because of Jericho Road." There's no more or les...

Grandparents are pretty much the greatest thing in the world. I might be a little biased since I have the world's best grandparents. But, seriously, some of my greatest memories are those I shared with them, and some of my greatest characteristics are the ones I obtained while striving to be like them. Greg and I talk about our grandparents a lot. It's fun to swap stories and hear about things we each did as a little kid. It's weird though because our grandparent-centered stories are freakishly similar... that got me thinking that there's something going on with the grandparents of our generation. I told Greg about the time that my grandpa asked my sister if she wanted a drink of his milkshake, but it wasn't a milkshake it was a huge glass of buttermilk. My grandparents always had a carton of buttermilk in the fridge in addition to regular milk... so did Greg's grandparents!  Then there was the time that my grandpa asked my sister if she wanted a bite of celery....

Graduation announcements are all over my refrigerator, and that got me thinking. How long have I been out of college now? Five years. Wow!  FIVE years!!!  Five years ago, my last name was at the end of the alphabet, I didn't know Greg, and I had no idea that a little princess named Izzy would one day rule my life! Five years ago, my grandpa was running alongside my car every time I left his house (just like he did when I was a little girl), and we had no clue that he had cancer. Five years ago, Lucy was only eight years old. (Fifty-six in dog years.)  Five years ago, I stopped working for minimum wage at The Northeastern , my college's newspaper and started my first 'real' job working at KOTV. Five years ago, I thought 30 was old... now that I'm quite a bit closer to it, I think 40 is old. Five years ago, my little sister, Nikki, who now has three kiddos, was kid-less. Pregnant with Addison, but still kid-less!   Five years ago, I had never tried sushi. Boy, I was ...

Ever since I was four years old, I knew I was lucky. I'll never forget that day. I was outside swimming with my sister when the phone rang. My mom said that we had to get out of the pool and go to the dentist's office. What?! The dentist's office? My name had been drawn out of the fish bowl at the dentist's office, and I had won a giant pink stuffed hippopotamus. I was so, so excited.  That was a defining moment in my life. I had been chosen; I was lucky. From that point on, lots of lucky things happened to me. I made cheerleader every year from 4th to 12th grade. I won lots of awards in school and even a few scholarships. Then I named my chocolate brown Chihuahua puppy, Lucky. Big mistake. You'd think with a name like that he'd have luck on his side. Not the case. I'll never forget sitting at the computer and feeling something warm and wet on my ankle... Lucky had hiked his leg and peed on me! That little dog was rotten! Not too many months later, Lucky had...

Three bottles of hand sanitizer, two thermometers and more than a dozen freaked-out phone calls. That is how the swine flu has infected my husband! While the swine flu is a little scary, especially with our proximity to the first two cases in Houston, I'm very annoyed with the way that this "pandemic" has been expressed by the media. I am dealing, first hand, with the result of the out of control, non-stop production the local newsies have made of this. Every fifteen minutes, my scaredy-cat husband takes Izzy's temperature, douses the thermometer in alcohol and takes mine... first with an old school thermometer and then with a digital one. And sanitizing is becoming just as normal as breathing. I think I am permenantly anti-bacterial hand sanitizer scented. I'm not trying to make light of the swine flu, but I worked for a TV station. I know exactly how they operate and how excited they get over things like this. Right now, about half of the newscast is dedicated t...