Friday's Fun Facts

I will be on hiatus for a couple of weeks as I am going on vacation starting today. You will still get Friday's Fun Facts though. Be good until I get back.

• If all the diamonds stored by major diamond companies were released, a perfect two-carat diamond would be worth about three dollars.
• Within the industry, rubber band manufacturers refer to the elasticity of their products "Stretchy", "Extra Stretchy" and "Super Stretchy". At the last trade show the hot rumor was that "Super Extra Stretchy" was about to be introduced by one of the companies.
• In mid-August 2003, the world's largest collection of arctic ice core samples, stored at the State University of New York at Buffalo, completely melted due to the prolonged power outage affecting Eastern North America.
• Starting with elementary school and going all the way through a four year college program, the average student will carry five times their adult weight in class related books on their back.

Can I talk about IT yet?

Has enough time passed to talk about what happened on Sunday? If you're not from Minnesota, a lot of us from here have been down and depressed about what happened to The Minnesota Vikings last Sunday. The Vikings lost in heart breaking fashion, 31-28 in overtime against the New Orleans Saints. The Vikings beat themselves with five fumbles and 2 interceptions. Every time a Vikings player carried the ball, I was just praying that they wouldn't fumble, especially Adrian Peterson as he fumbled three times throughout the game. Besides the fumbles, we had the lead the majority of the game and was obviously still tied at 28 going into overtime. First, I've never liked the Saints. I don't have valid reasons really but I just don't like them and I don't like Sean Payton, their coach. I thought the Saints played dirty and did multiple things throughout the game that weren't necessary, such as beating up on Favre as much as they did. I avoided all media regarding the game for the first two days but as more and more reports come out during the week, it was the Saints intention all along to basically hurt Favre. It's out, they've admitted it and they have the same intention to do it to Manning in the Super Bowl. Darren Sharper, safety for the Saints (former Vikings and Packers player as well as friend of Brett Favre) had this to say about their mission against Favre: "Cut off his head and his body will die"

I HATE that they are playing with this mentality. Maybe it's the girl in me that makes me think like this but I think it's completely wrong to go about trying to win a game like that. That's playing dirty. It doesn't matter anymore though. The Vikings have lost 4 Super Bowls, all in the 1970's. The Vikings have not been in the Super Bowl since before I was born. The last Super Bowl they were in I was still cooking in my mom's oven and would be born 11 days later. (Remember, I just turned 33 last week) We've been to the Championship game (like Sunday's) 5 times that we've lost....1978, 1988, 1998, 2000 and 2009 football seasons. So we've been to 9 championship games and made it to the Super Bowl 4 times with no rings. That's the history of the Vikings for you in a nutshell.

I'm not bitter....anymore. I'm not sad....anymore, but I think it is foolish when people say, Oh well, better luck next year. There will be no next year like this year. This was it. The dynamic and chemistry of this football team will be no longer. This was our chance and we blew it.

As for the Super Bowl, I am a complete Indianapolis Colts fan and I hope that Peyton Manning gets another ring.

In the meantime, we've got the Pro Bowl coming up on Sunday. Who cares you say? Yeah, most people don't care about it but it will be fun to watch a game after what's happened knowing that it means nothing and it's just for fun. Oh yeah, it might a little more fun watching it IN PERSON. Yep, M and I are going to the Pro Bowl in Miami. We leave tomorrow so I'll be gone for quite some time from blogging. See you in a couple weeks!

Still a Vikings fan and proud of MY team,

Dana Leigh

My Birthday

Despite one MAJOR disappointment this weekend, I have had a fantastic birthday celebration since Thursday, which was my real birthday. I turned 33 years old and woke up with a super nice massage from M and a card. I spent my day at work and had a birthday celebration with people at work and then came home to another card and a couple of presents. M got me a very nice gift card to IKEA and an electric toothbrush. (Yes, I wanted both of these items.) We went out to Red Lobster for dinner and I ate as healthy as possible since I'm on the Biggest Loser contest at work again. (I never mentioned that after week 1, I was in 1st place!) We then came home and watched the remainder of a documentary. On Friday night, we watched a movie and we both stayed up until after 4 am. That is not typical for us. On Saturday, I went by myself to see "It's Complicated" at the movie theatre. I love all the actors in that movie so I really enjoyed it. Later in the evening, I went to my parents house for a birthday celebration of food and games. We all made some sort of appetizers that we picked on all evening and played games. I got a nice bracelet and some much needed moola from my parents and a perfume set and another IKEA gift card from my sister and brother in law. Again, M and I stayed up until after 3 am.

It was a perfect few days and I am so lucky to have my family and M in my life. I appreciate and love you all! And thanks to all of you that gave me birthday wishes by card, texts, email, Facebook, my blog, phone and by every other way you did! I felt very special on my day.

Me with cucumbers in my mouth

Jamie, I know you didn't want this picture posted before I even took it but you guys look so hot that I had to.

Friday's Fun Facts

Have a great weekend!

• People with more than ten toes are eight times more likely to be left-handed.
• The game of foosball was invented in mid-16th-century Germany, predating soccer (football) by nearly 200 years. (That one's for you, Kristi)
• If the average American driver were to aggressively invest the money currently used for gasoline, they would have over $118,000 in that investment after 10 years.
• Since Franklin D. Roosevelt's election in 1933, the incumbent presidential candidate has won if it rains on election day in Washington, D.C.

Rob Schneider

M and I went to see Rob Schneider on Friday night at the Burnsville Performing Arts Center. I had never even heard of the place so it was it a surprise to see a very nice theater. It has been open for a year but it still had that "new" smell. Rob Schneider was our choice for January's Quest for Comedy, our own monthly outing for comedy. You know him best for his time on Saturday Night Live as a cast member from the late 80's to early 90's and his movies. The comedian that opened for him was Jeff Richards, who was also on SNL for a few years and is known best for his "Drunk Girl" character. Jeff had some very funny impressions and Rob was also funny. You can tell by his act that he is an intelligent person. My favorite joke from him that night was he was imitating those guys on the gold commercials asking you if you have any unwanted gold. Unwanted gold. He went into a big joke about that. The pictures I took were low quality. There was no photography allowed so of course I had to sneak in a picture or two whenever I could. We were in the 4th row, center section and the spotlight on him was so bright so the pictures just show him as one big glowing face.

After the show, we met Tanya and Chris at Tavern on France in Edina for some dinner and drinks. Tavern has an awesome menu idea where you can Build Your Own (BYO) Salads, Burgers and Pizzas. It was nice to see these two finally. We hadn't seen them since Cherrie's tailgate party!

PURPLE

M and I went to the Vikings game yesterday to see an explosive win against the media-loved, red-hot Dallas Cowboys. The Vikings won 34-3. The Vikings offense and defense were great. Tony Romo was sacked 6 times and we got past an O-line that many don't get past. Ray Edwards had 3 sacks! Brett Favre had 4 TD's with 3 of them going to Sidney Rice, which both of them set records for playoff touchdowns. Rice had the most touchdowns by a Viking in a playoff game and tied the NFL record for 3rd (I think) for most TD's in a playoff game.

The crowd was loud and made a difference for the majority of the game. It was very electrifying to be there yesterday. While in the car on our way to tailgate, M asked me how many playoff games I had been to. This was my 5th, which actually surprised me that I had been that many since 1999.

As season ticket holders, M and I were allowed an experience this year that was fantastic and a dream of any true football fan...we never saw a loss at home throughout the whole regular season, nor the playoffs. We never had to hang our heads walking out of the dome. It was a rare year. We did lose our last preseason game to Dallas on Labor Day weekend but that doesn't count. We beat Dallas in the game that mattered.

And now we head to New Orleans to battle the Saints in the Superdome for the NFC Championship game. We've been there twice before since I can remember....the 1998 season and 2000 season and have obviously lost both. I had a feeling that we would win over Dallas. I unfortunately do not have that same feeling for next Sunday against the Saints but will be having plenty of (good) anxiety leading up to the day, but I hope my feeling is wrong. We play at 5:30 pm, Central time. We do not play well during that time of day.

Regardless of what happens, it has been a great year with addition of 40 year old Brett Favre and his ultimate playing ability. I'm grateful that we were able to have him for the best year of his career.

And finally, this post couldn't be complete without some photos from yesterday's tailgating experience. January 16th and the weather was warm by January standards. It was 34 degrees and sunny and we couldn't have expected anything better.

The cupcakes the Biggest Loser contest won't allow me to eat

My high school buddy Chris

My high school buddy Scott

Me and Jared Allen....ok, just his look-a-like---They did a split screen of this guy and Jared Allen on the jumbotron in the dome and Jared Allen actually noticed what they were doing and just laughed.

M needs to get the Vikings monkey off his back!

Friday's Fun Facts

• Musician magazine has estimated that only one in 6,500 people who buy a harmonica will ever be able to play even the simplest song on it, making it the musical instrument with the lowest proficiency. The kazoo, on the other hand, has the highest proficiency.
• The average novel takes twice as long to write as it does to edit.
• Wales has the most Rugby pitches per capita with one pitch for every 1287 people. New Zealand is second: one for every 1528 people.
• The average, natural grass, professionally-maintained baseball infield contains 1,707,000 blades of grass.

Random Schmandom

I thought I'd write about the last few days all at once since the content of each activity isn't enough on its own. M and I went to O'Gara's in St. Paul for dinner and a drink on Friday night after work. It was still so cold out but it was nice for him and I to go out to a bar and just talk as we don't do that much very often by ourselves. I love just sitting there talking to M as we never run out of things to say to each other. I love his company, and I do love O'Gara's onion rings! They are the best. Terrible for you, but delicious.

On Saturday morning, ok, it Saturday afternoon, M and I ventured out for breakfast at one of the places we've been wanting to try on the "Best of..." list from the City Pages from last year. Good Day Cafe was voted for the best pancakes, specifically their glazed doughnut pancakes. I didn't get them although M did I tried his. I had Eggs Benedict instead. M also got a half order of bacon and chorizo and hash browns. The whole meal was very expensive for breakfast but very worth it (not for every weekend). The quality of the food was just fantastic. The restaurant itself is so appealing for some reason and it seemed to be somewhat trendy and a Minneapolis crowd. The guy next to us was in his 50's and looked like he had just rolled out of bed but had an Ed Hardy hoodie on. M and I thought this to be hilarious and M said he definitely got it for Christmas from one of his kids. I would highly recommend coming to try this place at least once.

Mmmm, freshly squeezed grapefruit juice

We spent the rest of the evening sitting on the couch watching playoff football. We were supposed to go out for Tanya's 30th birthday but I wasn't feeling good so we cancelled. Tanya, you know we're going to make it up to you though!

Sunday was much of the same...watched football all day long and watched the Packers lose in overtime 51-45. It was an awesome game and very fun to watch, especially when Rodgers fumbled the ball and Arizona ran it in for a touchdown. I was worried about you Packers making it to the Super Bowl and now my worries are gone. Now I can focus on The Purple and Dallas this weekend. Yes, of course we'll be there.

Yesterday I went out to the monthly happy hour with the Alphabet Gang. No pictures because I always forget to take them but 2 of our members didn't show up. We met at Bulldog in St. Paul. I typed in bulldog.com at work trying to get the menu before we went there and do not, I repeat, DO NOT type in that address at work!!! It was a porn site and I was mortified. In case you are looking for the real bulldog restaurant, here's the real address: Bulldog It was Catha and myself that met and later was joined by Aaron and his girlfriend Bobbi. I drank water and had a salad because yesterday was also the day that we started The Biggest Loser contest at work again. Yes, we are doing that again and I paid and signed up for another round. Back at it being strict and eating as best as possible and working out as much as I can. Maybe I will win this time. I don't plan on blogging about it each week as I did before but will keep you updated with my progress.

Some other tidbits that have happened over the last week or so:

My nephew lost his first tooth! I asked him if the tooth fairy came and gave him a quarter and he said he got a dollar! We used to get a dollar when I was a kid also. The tooth fairy does not experience any sort of inflation or cost of living increase it seems. What is the going rate for teeth these days?

And finally just some pictures while I was in the car and stuck in traffic last week when it snowed and took me two hours to get to work. I cringe just looking at these pictures.

The week's almost over again...enjoy it!

Lemonade Stand Award

I was awarded a blogger award called the Lemonade Stand Award from Ang. The award is passed on to "bloggers who demonstrate great attitude and gratitude" and must be passed on to 10 others however I don't follow 10 blogs so here are my choices for the award:

I have to give the award back to Ang @ Football, Sushi, and the Pursuit of Happiness. Ang was a mutual friend of a few of my friends and we got to meet last year. I am nominating her because she has a good sense of humor when she writes and also writes about what is truly on her mind without a filter and I admire that.

The next person that deserves this award is Kristi @ Mi Vida Ocupada, which translates to My Busy Life which is exactly what she has. I've known Kristi since high school and she's always been the over-achiever and she does the same with all the blogs she maintains. I also like her blog because she likes to do many of the same activities as me and it's fun to see how another 30-something girl who doesn't have kids lives their life.

The next award goes to Jenny @ Stickyfeathers. She's a fellow Minnesotan who lives up in my favorite area of the state, the North Shore of Lake Superior. I love her sense of humor and the sarcasm she writes with as well as I admire her eye for photography.

The next Lemonade Stand Award is for Tanya @ Our Zen Life. Tanya is my real life friend and I love the fact that she started a blog in December 2008 and it part of the blogging community. I enjoy looking what she's up to, even when she writes about experiences that I participated in. I always like her perspective on things for the same shared event.

The fifth award goes to Dennis @ Vignettes. Dennis is my uncle and also started a blog just before Tanya. Dennis mixes his passion for being an artist and writer by combining the two into engaging stories with illustrations and paintings of his own work. I enjoy reading of his stories of his younger years, which has often included my Dad.

The final award goes to Michelle @ Curls, Spunk and Monkey Chunk. I enjoy looking at all the every day pictures she takes of mostly her children, which all three of them are very adorable. I appreciate her honesty in her writings about her struggles as a mother sometimes and reaches out to the blogging community and other mothers for advice. She is not afraid to say what she feels about motherhood, the good and the not-so-good, her struggles and successes with losing weight and working out and is an inspiring young woman who has started her own photography business and is becoming very successful in doing so. Bring back W.O.W., Michelle!

So for those listed above, it is your duty to pass on the award to the bloggers you follow and feel deserve the award.

Friday's Fun Facts

• The first home pizza delivery service that allowed ordering by phone was started in 1927 by now-defunct St. Mark's Pizza in New York City. Deliveries soon fell prey to the Great Depression, and weren't revived until after World War II.
• Swiss cheese is the most popular cheese worldwide.
• 1 in 12 Americans will never consume alcohol.
• Every year, seemingly due to New Years' resolutions, sales of cigarettes drop by about 30 percent in January, but then regain half that in February, and are back to normal levels in March.

Photo Hunt

I failed miserably for December's Photo Hunt. I knew I wasn't off to a good start when it was the middle of the month and I hadn't taken a single photo. I did take some towards the end of the month but not very satisfied with my results, therefore I am not submitting any photos. I feel like I failed but I'm not going to beat myself up over it. In case you are interested in taking a look at the other participants entries, go to Photo Hunt Challenges and take a look.

One of the categories was a macro shot and I took a picture of my nephew's wrestler action figure and a votive candle holder. The other one was for the ornament category.

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday usually means stuff your face for M and I. Have you ever been to Yarusso's? It's one of my family's favorite places to eat and our families have eaten there in some capacity for decades. The first Monday of every month they celebrate the birthdays for the month. Monday, January 4th was the day to celebrate January birthdays. Anyone with a January birthday can show up and get a free meal with the purchase of one. Since M and I are both January birthdays, we had to get on someone else's bill so we could eat for free. We celebrated my grandpa's (6th), M's (5th) and my birthday (21st) on Monday with a group of 16 of us that could make it. Even though it was my sister's 7th wedding anniversary that day, her hubby couldn't make it as he is on the city counsel for the city he resides in. You should go to Yarusso's for your birthday too!

So now here's for the stuffing your face part....M's real birthday was yesterday and he turned 36 so we went downtown to Fogo de Chao. We first visited Fogo in June and you can read about it here. The restaurant is just fantastic and it is now one of my favorite places. I would love to take my parents here, especially my Dad as he loves meat, (what guy doesn't) and he has quite the appetite so I know he'd get his money's worth. I have to save some pennies to take them there though. It's not cheap! At the end of the meal, we were stuffed and offered a free dessert for M's birthday and even though we could have gotten it to go, we declined. See, we don't eat at every chance we get! M said he had a fantastic birthday, one of the best he's ever had, which makes me feel happy as I wanted to make him feel as special as I could on his day. ♥

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, Everyone! I hope you had a great 2009 and I hope that 2010 is even better. I wish good health for you and your family and nothing but the best all year long.

I have become a slacker when it comes to blogging but I am really going to try and keep up with writing and posting pictures about all my activities in a timely manner. That is my resolution to you this year. So even though I've been extinct for a few weeks, I still have been busy. Not wanting to bring many of my 2009 activities and writings into 2010, I have spent a lot of time catching up on all my posts since basically Thanksgiving and posted them all for December 31st so please scroll down and look at all of them, which there are 11 of them!

So what did you do for New Year's? M and I spent our sixth NYE together. We have always stayed home for New Year's including eating dinner, drinking, dancing, TV, music, etc. but we started our night going to dinner. We had an early dinner at Flame in Roseville. We started off with a drink, a flavored martini for me and a beer for M. We had a couple of appetizers (1/2 off!) including Caprese, which I love. We also had the filet mignon with bearnaise sauce and potatoes and finished off with Creme Brulee, which neither of us really ate because we were stuffed. It was a beautiful dinner with my honey.






After dinner, we went home with a trip to the liquor store first. We lit candles and turned up the music. M made a playlist of all our favorite songs from 2009 for us to listen to. I drank flavored UV Pink Lemonade and Seven UP and M drank Basil Hayden's, a whiskey bourbon with ginger ale. We also took a couple 99 Bananas shots with a kiwi strawberry vitamin water chaser. :) We finished up with a cheap champagne that has been in our fridge since last NYE! I made it to midnight...til 1:35 am actually, before falling asleep. M made it about an hour longer and we went up to bed and woke up with amazingly strong headaches. We are not young anymore! We nursed our hangovers with water, ibuprofen and cheese and crackers. After a long day of recovery and me getting out of bed for the second time around 5 pm, I was ready to go and became very productive, considering. M and I each have a room for ourselves, other than our bedroom. I organized my room and consolidated all that I could. That was my resolution last year and it will be again this year. I have been going through my stuff throughout the whole year and getting rid of any excess that I don't need. I already have a garbage bag full of clothes that I will get rid of in a garage sale later this year. It feels good to be clean and organized. We finished the night watching two movies, All About Steve (skip it) and 500 Days of Summer. (watch it)

Saturday we bummed around and went to Noodles and Company for lunch and just drove around. We ended the night with another movie, The Knowing, which was pretty decent.

A very cold St. Paul skyline

It was cold all weekend and I ended up jumping M's car three times in two days. The temperatures have been as cold as 18 degrees below zero. With temperatures like that, tailgating for Sunday's Vikings game is limited. We got down there much later than normal and stayed in the car for a little bit before walking to the dome. While it we were COLD outside, the Vikings were on FIRE inside. The Vikes slaughtered the Giants, 44-7. It was such a fun game to watch with my excitement, for Vikings fans anyways. When the score was 24-0, I said to M that the score would be 41-0. Put on your Vikings thinking cap...Does the score 41-0 ring a bell to you? That is what the score was for the Giants/Vikings game in 2001 for the NFC Championship game, except the Giants beat us. Well after a few more Vikings scores, the score was 41-0 and then 44-0 and finally 44-7. With that win and Philly's loss to Dallas, the Vikings secured a 1st round bye in the playoffs! The Vikes don't play until Sunday, January 17th at home against either Dallas, Arizona or yes, Green Bay. In order for us not to play Green Bay, Dallas loses to Philly and Arizona loses to Green Bay. So Vikings fans, your two favorite teams this coming weekend are Dallas and Arizona if you want to knock the Packers out and avoid having to beat them for the third time this year. Yikes.

So again, remember to look at all my posts for December 31st. I'll get better at blogging, you get better at leaving comments. Happy New Year!