Weekly Roundup

It's been kind of a busy week this week. First, our friends Janell and George were here with their adorable daughter Madison. Keds really misses having Janell around and Madison is too cute for words. We are getting to know George better as well. George and I are both tech-heads, so we were able kill sometime at the AT&T Wireless Store and Best Buy. We enjoy having houseguests. Our house is pretty big and will continue to be until we have kids.

If having houseguests wasn't enough, we decided to have a Super Bowl party. About 10 folks showed up and it was the perfect sized crowd with the perfect mix of people. I really need to apologize to my Dad, though. He was the only guy rooting for Pats (sorry Vegas Princess). The rest of us were rooting for Giants. Well, not so much rooting FOR New York as much as rooting against New England. With each sack, I kept coming up with a new insult for Tom Brady. So, sorry Dad.

Wednesday was Ash Wednesday. I didn't make it to church to get ashes, but we are giving up soda and had some yummy tuna for lunch and salmon for dinner.

Thursday night, I had the steal of the week. I got a pair of Levi's (size 34 mind you) for $4! That was so awesome. We thought the price tag was a mistake, but it certainly wasn't.

Friday night we had Casey's birthday party. We love spending time over there and we played Casey's favorite game Cashflow. It's a little bit involved and takes a little getting used to, but it is a fun game.


Saturday I spent most of the day in Pahrump at the quarterly meeting of the Nevada State Democratic Party Central Committee. My name was being placed in nomination to become a member from Clark County. It was an interesting meeting - a lot of post-caucus wrap up and some cheerleading. The mood was definitely lifted by an article in that morning's "No New Taxes/Less Government Spending No Matter What the Situation" Newsletter that showed continued momentum going into the Caucuses and coming through January without the new registrants on Caucus day. There were a host of initiatives to help ensure the momentum keeps going. Oh, and my nomination was approved so I am now a full voting member of the State Democratic Party's Central Committee. I'm already a member of the Clark County Central Committee, so I'm excited about being more and more involved.

Saturday night, we went over to Lora's house for dinner and spent time with her husband and her little Madison. Karl and I watch the Bud Shootout while Keds and Lora spent some girl time together.

Today is a whole lot of nothing. It's the first Sunday in a long time that we don't have to be somewhere, so we watched a little Food Network, ate breakfast, enjoyed some coffee. We might go do some cardio or just take the dogs for a walk later to help them burn some of their energy since they spent most of yesterday alone.

How was your week? Any exciting plans for Valentine's Day (or Friendship Day, depending on your PC perspective)?

So I've been busy...

Sorry it's been so long since I've blogged. Again, it was one of those things where I was wanting to blog, started a half a dozen posts and then ditched them.

It's been a crazy, but absolutely amazing couple of weeks. How so? Let me count the ways.

First, as many of you know, I was both a Temporary Chair for the Nevada Democratic Presidential Caucuses and a Precinct Captain for the John Edwards for President Campaign. I've spent a lot of my free time since the beginning of the year canvassing my precinct (I got lucky and had a small precinct - just four communities) trying to make sure folks knew about the caucus and to try and sell them on my candidate. Unfortunately, I was finding a lot of support for Sen. Obama, some for Sen. Clinton and some for my guy with a chunk of undecideds. I definitely got to know my neighbors and I'd say it was a good experience.

Caucus Day was insane. With such a small precinct (200 or so registered Democrats) turnout was projected between 20 and 40. Eighty-four people showed up. It was impressive. No one expected that many. It was a little chaotic as folks were trying to either figure out of find their precincts. Unfortunately, John wasn't viable. I'm still kicking myself a little bit (I'll get over it soon, I promise) for not making a deal with the Clinton people to ensure our viability so we could have gotten a delegate, but oh well. It really wouldn't have made a difference statewide.

With all the campaign appearances this week, we saw John twice. Once at the Egg and I. We met Madeline Stowe from Last of the Mohicans and his national campaign manager Rep. David Bonior. Keds and I were interviewed by NPR. Keds actually made it on the radio. we had pictures taken with the Senator and made in on the Channel 8 News. We went to a pre-debate rally that was cool, but we left with a little less of our voice. We saw John again at a town hall meeting in Henderson with Madeline Stowe and James Denton from Desperate Housewives. I sat behind the Senator, and made it in a couple of shots, again on Channel 8. Finally at the "after-party" on Caucus day I met Jean Smart, of Designing Women, 24 and Samantha Who? fame. I got my picture taken with her as well.

This past Sunday was Keds' birthday. On Saturday, we had a group outing to Samba at the Mirage. It's her favorite restaurant and a number of our friends were there and she had a blast. Then it was back to our house for some fun with our new Wii. On Sunday, I took Keds to a movie and dinner. Then back to the house for Costco Birthday Cake.

In the middle of all this, we got to see some out-of-town friends. Shawn was here for a few days from Reading. She stayed here and it was good to visit. Keds' friend Marc from Phoenix was here and he came by for dinner on Monday. My friend Darrell was here from Nashville, and we had dinner with him Tuesday night. Oh, and did we mention we had two guys from the Edwards campaign staying here? They really just used us as a place to crash, but that weren't intrusive. This being said, we'll be happy to get our house back.

Sorry for the marathon post. I'll try and post a little more often so I can keep the posts more manageable. For those of you that caucused, how was your experience?