JustLisa

As much as I love the cinderella story the Saints have going, I gotta say

GO BEARS!!!

And the same whinefest today as last Sunday. Damn Sinclair!!! I hate listening to football. I wanna seeeeeee!!

A game which I can watch... Colts vs. Pats. GO TOM BRADY!

I am sooo happy for the Bears. I really hated to see that matchup happen as the Saints have overcome so much. It felt wrong to root against them but my Bears loyalty runs deep.

Stupid Patriots. ugh. Now it's Bears and Colts to the Superbowl. blech.

Funny thing popped into my mind when the Colts won. Someone dear to me used to say "The sun's gonna shine on every dog's ass sooner or later." I guess so.

Tank Johnson, a defensive end for the Bears, may not be able to play in the Super Bowl because he can't leave Illinois without a Judge's permission. What is with these star athletes and trouble with the law? UGH!

Cool depth chart to see who is second and third string for the Bears in each position.

Yes, this place is overrun with football with commentary but it's that time of year.

There's a NFL message board that hasn't been completely overrun with wiseasses yet. The last NFL board I belonged to got so full of guys talking smack that there wasn't any room for real conversation. I've prowled around this board this evening and it seems very civil. There is even intelligent conversation regarding Superbowl predictions.

The board is split into divisions for each of the AFC and NFC teams and shows the team logos in each. That's handy if you are like me and can't remember exactly who goes into NFC North or AFC East. I get a lot of grief for not knowing but I just love the game so those specifics aren't really important.

They also have college football areas and "other" which includes arena football. Too bad Iowa lost the Iowa Barnstormers arena league. Anyway, footballboards.com looks to be a nice place to get info prior to the big game I hope.

BTW, did you know there was a rumor that Dungy would be fired if he didn't take the Colts to the Superbowl this time? I hate the Colts but that is ridiculous. Surely they are smarter than that. He's a good coach. Did I just say that??

Went on a road trip this morning to take C. to his dads then to watch Emily play basketball. It was sort of a basketball, football, boxing match kinda sport today. There was a boys team from another town sitting near us and I heard their coach say "The girls play tougher ball than you guys do! Look how aggressive they are?" The first team they played seemed to be made up of college freshman. Girls bigger than I am! Our little Em charged right up to the biggest one and ripped the ball away! They lost that one.

Next game was more evenly matched and better played as far as actual skills. It's so fun to watch and Emily really hustles.

My team is the underdog going into today's game. I like that because if they do lose, they've met everyone's expectations. If they win, they've surpassed the expectations. SCORE!

I just hope it's a good, clean game with lots of fun plays.

I've heard people say that hell will freeze over before the Bears win another Super Bowl. Well, I'm hear to tell you that I've done the preparatory work. I cleaned woodwork today and I cleaned behind stuff, people. BEHIND. Not just around. I actually took the time to pull things away from the wall and cleaned behind it.

Is it a little cold in here?

Hate that guy and when he came out for the coin toss, I screamed "NOOOOOO!!!! JINX!! I'VE BEEN JINXED!!!" Bears came out looking awesome (just had to yell SHUT UP!!! at Marino) but I think I've been jinxed.

Too many turnovers so far on both sides. As Shannon Sharpe said "Youse gots to hold onto your luggage!"

Todd says he won't watch Prince. I reminded him that Prince is my friend Lori's favorite so he had to watch. He said "If she wants me to watch, she'll call right before he takes the stage." If she paid attention to her phone, I'd text her and tell her to call him. haha

Clearly, the Colts are hungrier for a Super Bowl win. Notice I'm not making excuses that one of my key players is out with an injury. I hate that mentality. Second string knows how to play ball, too. Grossman is going to take a beating in the press tomorrow for sure. Poor guy. We are just being outplayed. I still have hope. Dear Lovie, please tighten up the defense. Thank you. Defense, please do your damn job!!

Can I hate the Colts and love Bob Sanders? He's awesome. He just needs to trade. ha!

C's dad used to always say "This is the year of the Colts." I guess it finally was. I am thankful that my team made it to the big game again and mostly thankful I no longer live with a Colts fan.

I am exceptionally happy for my cousins in Indiana who are diehard Colts fans. They've waited a long time for this.

Browsing a Cristiano Ronaldo fansite and wishing I knew more about soccer. This site doesn't have a lot of pictures but it does have a lot of video. He plays for Manchester United. I guess I have never heard of that either so it gives me something else to look up and educate myself about. I was a big fan of Brazilian soccer when Eva was over there. Matter of fact, she brought me back a Ronaldo jersey. Different Ronaldo though.

This year has gone by so fast. Time for districts again. I really want to go see Eva play since the season is winding down but it's damn cold out. I have not been warm since yesterday. I suppose a good way to get warm is to go into a sweaty gym full of people.

Guess who's on the radio?? Rod Stewart! Seriously, how can people (MEN!!) not like him? I think it's gotta be jealousy. I bet he makes an awesome Valentine. Todd brought me daisies yesterday and a card. This morning I found a heart shaped box of M&Ms on my desk. Tonight, he's grouchy. Go figure. I should play Rod really loud and see if that brings him out of it.

True story from today: C. and I went to the store to find something to surprise Todd and the kid at the computer/register was having problems. He called the manager over and the manager reset it. The kid said "I think this one freezes up so much because it's close to the doors and the cold." I almost erupted into laughter but I managed to giggle quietly on the inside instead.

The girls play again Saturday night so it'll be all basketball Saturday as Emily plays a tournament during the day. I checked the scores from last night and the school that has beat us both times this years was defeated last night. That should shake things up as we go on through the bracket.

I woke up this morning and the temp said -6. I started to groan but my new way of thinking took over. I may have to spend an hour outside this morning but I have a warm coat and a nice, warm house to come back to. Some people aren't so lucky.

I didn't take my camera this year so of course they do the whole award presentation, line them up for pictures, and let each girl take a turn cutting down part of the net. Eva's mom forgot her camera, too. Now we move onto regionals Tuesday night. I hope I can make it.

Since when did they start calling Tony Stewart "Smoke"? I asked Todd this question after they said it during pre-race and he answered, "Today apparently." NASCAR is on it's last leg with me. I started watching when Davey Allison drove the #28 Texaco Havoline Ford. Davey died and I learned to love Ernie Irvan. Ernie was hurt and retired so I took on Ricky Rudd and Dale Jarrett. I've stuck with DJ through the transitions to the UPS sponsorship but now he's in a Toyota. The Texaco Havoline Ford is now a Dodge driven by a guy from Columbia named Juan. It's just too much change to appeal to the masses and less appealing for me.

That was an exciting finish to the Daytona 500. I am not known for staying in my seat during race endings or the last two minutes of ball games of any sort. Tonight was no exception. I was up and yelling "Oh damn you Harvick! Get! Your! Ass! Back!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" Yup, my ladylike behavior goes right out the window. I wanted Mark Martin to win that. Actually, I wanted Carl Edwards to win but it would've been sweet for Mark as well.

In other news, my personal race car seems to be running. It's been in the garage, waiting on money to rain down from heaven so it can get fixed. It's not been started for quite some time so the battery had totally died and the front tire was flat. Todd put the battery charger on it yesterday and today and just went out to start it. My poor old car.

Pretty, isn't it? I hope I can get it fixed but it's hit that stage where it's draining resources and would probably be better suited for a high school kid to finish it's trip to the junk yard. I'm not ready to give up on the ol' girl yet so we'll keep starting it and waiting for the magic money to fix it one more time.

I couldn't make it to the regional basketball game tonight as I used up all my gas money going to the toe doc yesterday. Instead I am getting scoring updates via text messaging and relaying the info via email to my boss in Boston. Not only is he a Cardinal alumni, his brother-in-law is the girls' head coach.

FYI, we are in overtime. AAAAAAAAAAAA GO CARDS!! I told Eva to play like she had to get me a day off to go to state tourney again this year.

We won in double overtime 62-57. On to Pella for regional finals Friday night. wooohoooo

We lost the game tonight but still, it was a good season overall. I thought we were gonna really do something but the second half went into the crapper. It was one reallllly long drive over there and back. Neither of us had been to Pella before. Not for lack of trying as I always want to go to the tulip festival. I want to see wooden shoes on feet.

It was almost dark when we got into town but it still seemed like an interesting place to visit. Todd said it's too far to take the kids. I pointed out Springfield was way further and they all made that trip. Of course he wrongly thinks that Bass Pro Shops is better than wooden shoes and dutch people and tulips. I am tired. G'nite everyone.

Today Em had a ball tournament (the last one!!) in Missouri, a little over an hour away. Her team ended up finishing third out of ten teams. On the way home, we stopped at Taco Bell where I had the following discussion with Ben.

Me: Benj, we should take a long trip this summer.
Ben: Yeah! We could go to Kansas City!! (KC is less than two hours away)
Me: Noooo, think BIIIGGGG, dude. Like Florida to the beach or something.
Ben: Oh, I could live with that.

Then I told him I wanted to go to Saint Augustine, the oldest colony in the US, blah blah blah and how it would be educational and fun. He said "Lisa, you lost me at educational." HA!

Tonight was the local Pheasant's Forever banquet and we decided to take C. since he's a teenager this year. We bought a bunch of raffle tickets and he bought one for a pellet gun. Todd bought some tickets to win the big Browning Gold Fusion something or other rifle. For all of our raffle tickets we ended up with a giant spray can of lubricating oil and a "hoot flute" turkey call thing. C. did win the pellet gun but that's it. No new rifle for Todd. Oh darn.

Came home and opened the big box that Faith had sent to Em for her room makeover. Pink goodness inside that made Em very happy. The most important piece was broken so we have to figure out how to salvage that. The box was packed very, very well and I have never had UPS deliver anything broken before. Frustrating.

Received my first complaint(?) about justlisa being an informercial pimped out to sell links or something similar to that. It was from a friend who I've told to kiss my ass on many occasions. This time will be no exception. Anyone who doesn't like it is more than welcome to send $60 a month for the orthodontist payment and I'll stop pimping links. Simple as that. I do what I have to do and try to make up for it with interesting entries such as this one. haha

I'm doing some running again after a winter of walking only. It's about to kill me but I've lost a couple of pounds in the last two weeks. Stubborn, stubborn pounds that wouldn't succumb to regular exercise. Now if someone would just tell my knees that 40 isn't *that* old and they need to buck up and tough it out...

One more night of finger therapy unless Dr. Not So Nice orders more when I see him on Friday. It hurts just as he promised and there is a point in every session where my fist doubles up (on the good hand) and she knows it's time to quit for the evening. Even though I am quite thankful that it can be fixed easily, I will be so glad when this is over.

Christopher has decided he wants to participate in school golf in the Spring. My mother, being the supportive grandma she is, paid for golf lessons for him and he wanted me to go, too. Ben wants to learn too so we all decided to do it. Last night was lesson #1 and it was so much fun. All we did was stay on the green and practice putting but it was still a blast. There were 7 of us aiming at a tee stuck in the green and it was so silly that we managed to keep laughing and playing for over an hour. A pro golfer I will never be but it's always fun doing something with the kids.

At one point our teacher said something about "separate your balls" and I guess I giggled outloud. He said "Are you the adult here?" I told him I didn't recall putting that down on paper. I take my laughs wherever I can get them. I know some of you will frown when you read that but you know what, you can get over yourself already. Life is too short to play hardass all the time. You'll see. I'm laughing all the way to my grave, baby!

Whenever I put golfing in a sport category, I think of my friend Lori telling me that she hoped I knew golf wasn't a real workout. Oh yeah? Tell that to my back! I have been working on my swing by smacking around a bottle cap. Tonight I found practice balls and hit until my hands started to hurt. I wish I could say I'm getting better but... well, I suppose I am a bit. The other night I had 6 on a par 4 hole. They tell me that's pretty good for the first time. Christopher had par his first time though. Gotta beat that soon!

I never thought I'd say that but it's true. Both the boy and myself have succumbed to the game where you chase a little white ball around in an attempt to get it in the hole. I always thought it was such a stupid game but once you start hitting decent shots, you can't wait to try and do it even better.

I have been working on proper golf swing and remembering not to watch the ball. For some reason if you raise your head to watch where the ball goes, it will mess up the follow through I guess and the ball won't travel where it should.

This "swing up" approach is different than what we do for sure. One only need to look at the divots in our yard to tell we hit down on the ball. I'm going to show this to the kid since he forgets the rule about replacing divots, especially in our own yard. I love sites like this that show in graphics and video so you can actually see someone else doing it a few times.

Yay for the Packers! I am so glad Brett Favre came back for another season. It wasn't the big shutout I'd have liked to have seen but a win is a win. My Bears and Chiefs just gave it away today. I still don't have much of a voice but I did a fair amount of trying to yell at the television.

Watching the finals since my Celtics made it. Wish these games would start earlier. I am tired and feeling out of sorts but who can go to bed when the game is so close?