The Story of “The Board”

2010
05.08

As may know, I have a very guilty pleasure that I occasionally talk about on the blog….Days of Our Lives. I’ve been watching since I was 15 years old, and since 2006 I’ve been a fan of the characters EJ and Sami (EJami) in particular. In 2008, when it got super exciting between my favorite couple, I found a fan board called “Forbidden Love.” I joined up and started chatting with these fabulous ladies. I had never been part of an online community, and so I was surprised to find that I was forming true friendships in the process. These women are great. They are hilarious and fun and sometimes moody. They aren’t saints, but they aren’t sinners either. You see, it takes a special kind of person to be a true EJami. EJami is a controversial couple due to a past indiscretion on EJ’s part and a few very bad deeds on Sami’s part too. While we believe the general audience agrees that EJ and Sami are amazing together, there is this vicious little group of people that go to great lengths to bash them, harass the fans, and quite frankly harass the actors.

Anyway, chatting with my EJami friends is a daily occurrence, even when EJ and Sami are on the outs (which happens way more than we like). I’ve grown to love quite a few of these friends, and the emotional support they can provide on the turn of a dime to one of their friends in need is incredible. It’s the most good natured set of folks I’ve ever come across.

Over the past couple of years, the board has raised thousands of dollars for various charities, and in the past year has created it’s own charitable organization that is putting on a fan event with our favorite actors in Los Angeles. I’ve been drawn to this event for a long time. Not because I want to party with my favorite actors (although that does sound fun), but because I want to meet all of these wonderful friends in person. Unfortunately I was unable to afford it, so I had to decline the opportunity….until, like a strange sign, I just received an influx of cash. It’s a long story, but just very recently I got myself into a situation that provided me this possibility. So now this money is going to the Cancer Research Institute by me having a very good time in Los Angeles June 3-6.

I’ll be flying in Thursday and checking in, and then on Friday we’re going on a studio tour and then out to lunch. That night there’s a dance party with a few of the actors, which should be fun. James (the actor who plays EJ), along with Molly and Casey (Melanie and Chad on the show) will be there. Supposedly, Molly and Casey will judge some sort of dance off. They are really funny, you’ll see in this video they made below.

Alison Sweeney at spin class. Taken from her Facebook page. If you like her, you should become a fan. Click on the picture.

Then on Saturday things get really fun! I won a twitter contest that @Ali_Sweeney (Sami on Days, and host of the Biggest Loser) is doing in celebration of the events that weekend. She thought it would be fun to take 35 girls to a special spinning class at 8:30 in the morning! Yeah, I won this. Holy crap! So I’m in super training mode to get ready for that, because I’d like to be able to walk later that day. I’ll talk more about that in another post.

That afternoon is the main charity event sponsored by For Love Charitable Events, which is with Ali and James, and another actress. There will be a Q&A and then a meet and greet. Right after that, I’m then going on this crazy stretch hummer limo ride, also put on by For Love Chariatable Events, that will drive us around LA for an hour and will stop at a different hotel where another charity event, this time by Days Charity Events, is having a cocktail party with a whole slew of actors from the show.

So. Much. Fun.

So I’m pretty stoked! I’ve never done anything like this before, and more than anything I am so excited to meet these online friends. I can’t wait!

Finally, I must give a shout out to one of my favorite EJami friends — Jen. She’s also a blog friend and a Project 365 friend. Amazing mother, photographer, scrapbooker, and well — snarky goddess. She does this fun thing for us every now and again where she transcribes the show for us because in most of Canada they see DOOL one day ahead of the US. We call it the “Play-By-Play”, and the hits to the board’s server triples when she does it, because we’re all refreshing the page, waiting for her next hilarious summary of what she’s just seen. Her commentary is classic! HUGS Jen, wish you could come out to LA too!

Related materials!

Get to know EJami.

One of my favorite videos, only 5 minutes long shows the basis for why we love them. In brief – Sami has always been the bad girl with issues, and she’s struck out in romance repeatedly. Mostly, because the first two guys in this video (Lucas and Austin) don’t accept her for who she is. EJ came along and totally gets her, because he’s cut from the same cloth. I really recommend you watch it, you’ll get what a good chunk of my life is all about!

This video begins with Sami trying to marry Lucas, which doesn’t work out because he found out about her schemes. Then she connects with Austin and tries to marry him too. That doesn’t work out either for essentially the same reason. Finally, she has EJ because he’s the one that accepts her.

It’s way more complicated and has evolved a lot since then, but you get the gist.

If that didn’t get you liking EJami, maybe this will. THIS just happened yesterday on the show!! Talk about hot!

Also…here’s EJami’s Wikipedia page.

And here’s our board: Forbidden Love.

Molly and Casey

Watch Molly and Casey’s DOOL dance off video. We love it! Friday night is going to be such a blast!

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A pictureless entry

2010
04.17

Something that prevents me from posting — and this is stupid — is not having a photograph to add. I’m just a little bit too lazy to do photo editing and truthfully there isn’t much to display at the moment.

April has been good and quite honestly gorgeous in Colorado.

After Easter with my mom, I saw my father the very next weekend. He came to stay with me and then we went to the Rockies game on Sunday. We had great seats, great weather, and a great win by the Rockies. Spending time with my family is such a joy. I love them so much.

As April winds down though, I’m saddened that I won’t be out in California to attend my friend Jay’s wedding. I had been planning on going all along, but when I took a look at my finances, I just couldn’t make it happen. It was tempting to break out the credit card, which is essentially locked up. I’m making good progress on getting out of debt and so it would set me back. I’m living by a cash only philosophy as much as possible. So when I knew I wouldn’t be able to afford it, I opted out and sent them a very nice present instead. The best I could afford with cash. I hope they enjoy it, although I’m sure they’d enjoy having their friend there more. I guess that’s life and being responsible.

Life at home is serene. Time off is a blessing.

Shifting gears, to not be too serious….my newest obsession (there are always so many) is Keith Olbermann. I’ve loved Keith for years. If you know me, you know that I swing his way politically, so I enjoy his show every now and again. I know that he goes a bit too far sometimes, but I just find it adorable. Sickening, I know. Especially if you disagree with his views. I hear about people loving Beck or that other guy on Fox. What’s his name, the dark haired commentator? I find it awesome I can’t remember his name. Anyway — I get sick to my stomach when I hear people gush about those guys, so this is very hypocritical and I apologize if you feel sick now too, but I can’t help it. Turn away!

So what’s with the sudden love fest? He’s on twitter! And his posts make me so happy. I don’t know what it is. It’s not even that cool really, but I just dig it.

Random enough for you?

If it’s not, I could go on and on about my almost lesbian love for Rachel Maddow. So much that I love this Tumblr blog devoted to her. She’s adorable and so freaking smart. In an alternate universe I would legitimately fall for her. But, alas, in this world I just like boys. Shucks.

Finally, I picked a new (bright and busy) blog template. We’ll see how long I keep it. One day I’m going to really design my own. But today that seems hard.

And with that, I hope you all are well and I promise better blogging — even if I don’t have pictures.

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Easter 2010

2010
04.04

Sorry for the unimaginative blog post title, I’m a little knackered after this jam packed weekend. Today, was Easter and it was a very nice day. I didn’t get it spend it with my whole family, which would have been awesome, but I did get to spend it with my mom, step-dad, Marissa, and Johnny. We had a really nice afternoon.

There was food….

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

And there was lots of sitting around the table…

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

And there was our traditional egg cracking game….

Which I have to tell you a side story about. My father’s side of the family has been playing this game forever. It’s traditional Lebanese or more likely Mediterranean, because it was in the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding. But it’s flat out a thing that most Malouffs do at Easter. Even Malouffs, that I’ve never met, who I’m not even really related to, like the Maalouf and Maloof families. And because of the wonder of Facebook, I’ve friended a few Malouffs that I’ve never met. There’s a million of them all over the world. Our crazy Lebanese clan is just everywhere. So, I saw this woman post about the game and it made me so happy. She also describes how it’s played.

Well, even without my dad here today, we played the game.

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

Michael had the winning egg, which is one that Johnny decorated the night before. He beat Johnny to win. The irony!

And of course there was a lot of love….

Easter 2010

Easter 2010

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iGot It

2010
04.04

Yes, I am one of those Apple evangelists and I’m going to catch a lot of crap at work for this on Monday from the hard wired Microsoft nerds, but I just couldn’t help myself. I had to get an iPad. It was actually a last minute decision. Friday, I was watching Charlie Rose and the iPad was the topic. They sold me on it. When I woke up early on Saturday, I decided go for it. I live right by an Apple store, so it was no big deal, and only had to wait for a little over an hour.

The past 24 hours has been a ton of fun. It’s a very cool device, perfect for consuming media and the perfect size. Browsing is fantastic, and it’s so fast. There’s a lot of cool apps, but I can’t wait for more. Netflix watch instantly is very nice. There’s a great NPR app, and Twitterific is well designed. The new interfaces for mail and calendar is a huge selling point, and I really can’t wait to use this at work. Not having to lug my laptop to meetings will be awesome. Not having to rely only on my iPhone, when I didn’t feel like lugging my laptop will be even better. The fact that this can just slip into my purse is the best of all.

It’s not perfect though. There’re could be more apps, there could be better productivity tools, and of course, more multi-tasking. I bought a low end one, because I know there’s more down the road.

I love technology!

iPad - April 2010

Ps: this post was typed on the iPad. It definitely takes some getting used to, but it’s not too bad.

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Spring Break

2010
03.28

Spring Break is as good as it can be for me at this point in my life. First, the students are away, so campus is nice and quiet. And then we get the Friday off, so there’s a nice three day weekend to be enjoyed.

When I look back on this past week, it’s be completely random and long and crazy and slow.

First, the weather was up and down like mad. We had a huge blizzard on the front range, and I had exceptionally poor timing. I got stuck in it and it took me three hours to get home. I’m truly surprised that I didn’t get physically stuck like so many of the cars and buses that I passed in my little blue Civic. I love my tires.

When Friday arrived, I felt like I had lived two weeks in one. So this weekend has been all about relaxing. I’ve done some baking and a lot of reading. Truthfully, if it wasn’t for this blog post, this weekend would be forgotten away, that’s how low impact it has been.

I did snap some pictures though…

First, I couldn’t resist capturing one of the meals we had. Pigs in a blanket. I had never had that before, and I was promised that they’re very good. They were indeed.

March 2010

And then the cats. Persephone was incredibly needy. I say that past tense, which is a mistake. Even at this very moment, I’m pleading with her to give me a little bit of space. She’s wanted to be in contact with me this whole weekend.

March 2010

And Callie has been resting on her blanket, which is truly her blanket. The other cats don’t want anything to do with it. She spends eighty percent of her time on it. When she’s not there, she’s getting herself into trouble one way or another. I love her kitten-tude.

March 2010

And Penny. The scavenger. I locked the cats out last night because I needed a break from them. Because both doors were closed, they were really unhappy they couldn’t sleep with somebody. Especially Penny. She woke me up this morning and compelled me to open the door. She was so happy to get into my room. She’s so sensitive.

March 2010

So the furry ones have made their mark on the weekend.

Then, last night was one of my favorite hours of the year….it was Earth Hour! It’s where you turn off your lights for one hour. I love this! Last year was so great, and I got all ready for this year. I decided to once again write during that hour. The words didn’t quite flow like they did last year, but it was a good start.

March 2010

Next year, I’m thinking about throwing a party. I think it would be great to enjoy the company of friends (well, more friends than I had last night) to sit around and drink wine and talk by candle light. Is that too silly? It sounds like perfection to me.

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