Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Celebrity Sightings....from South Africa

Hi everyone,

I'm in South Africa today and wanted to brag about my celebrity sightings on the flight over. I was in business class with Mike Tyson in the row behind me and Kristin Davis (Charlotte from Sex and the City) in the row in front of me. Very exciting!!

Friday, January 25, 2008

Censorship

I thought that we needed to consider some serious issues on this blog, and a friend of mine sent this to me. I think it raises some interesting questions about censorship and its ability to actually create different discourses simply because it exists; is the absence of speech in fact a form of speech? If something is bleeped out, does it make it less or more visible?

(I'm going to try to embed this from youtube. It might work. In case it doesn't, I'll put in a link as well.)



or see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AXPnH0C9UA

Hope this spurs debate. Or at least that it makes you laugh as much as it did me.

Beth

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Update on Mini-Marathon in May

Dear Family,

In case some of you are thinking about making travel plans soon... We've made arrangements to have a carb-loading dinner at Rick's Cafe & Boatyard on Friday, May 2 (night before the mini-marathon). The dinner will probably start sometime between 6:30-7:00 pm (eastern time zone). We will also have a post-race bbq at my house on Saturday afternoon/evening. Nothing is planned for Sunday.

Sincerely yours,
The Party Planning Committee

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Series on Suspended Drivers

Hi everyone,

For the last several months, these articles have
sometimes been the bane of my existence, but I'm
relatively proud of how they came out. I thought you
might be interested in reading at least some of them.

The main articles are titled "Illegal, and Lethal,"
"Cracks in the Crackdown," and "Putting on the
Brakes."

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/news/dangerousdrivers.html

Talk to you soon.

Love,
Kevin

Monday, January 14, 2008

irony? or just weird . . .

I had lunch at a hookah bar in Salt Lake City last week. That was peculiar. But a good sandwich!

Beth

Happy Birthday Molly!

Friday, January 11, 2008

Happy Birthday Mom/Marka!

Mary Dana is 65 today! Happy Birthday Mom!

Love
Julie

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Hotels for Indy

Hi all,

I just reserved a block of 10 rooms for you at the Radisson Hotel near the Indianapolis airport (http://www.radisson.com/hotels/inindair). The rooms ($99+tax/night) are currently reserved on my credit card. By March 1st the hotel booking service requires me to fax them a list of the primary guest in each room as well as credit card information for each room. If you don't feel comfortable sharing your credit card information with me, I can use my own card to guarantee your reservation and you can use your own card to pay for the room when you get to the hotel. And now seems like the appropriate time to inform you of their cancellation policy:

Cancels after 03/12/2008 will be charged a $25 cancellation fee.
Cancels after 04/21/2008 will be charged a $50 cancellation fee.
Cancels after 04/28/08 may be charged a cancel fee by the hotel.

I will email each of you to confirm your hotel reservation sometime late next month in time to prepare the required guest list.

I'm sure the actual weekend events will be much more fun and exciting than this email message! :-)

Best wishes,
Tonya

Ravioli

Chris Dana had 18 ravioli for dinner last night.

Friday, January 4, 2008

Maybe because it's the lower right hand corner....when you run your cursor over the lower right hand corner of the photos that are there you'll see a weeble-looking yellow thing, and a link to more photos. Click on that, then go to "My Public Galleries"
Julie*
Why can't I see your other photos? Can't find "Photos" in upper right hand corner.
M

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Photos

Hi Em! Come down to D.C. and I'll help with your camera! :) I don't have any good pictures of Tom and I yet, but hopefully soon. For anyone's who's still learning how to navigate the website, I posted a lot of pictures from India, and a few more from Christmas, as separate albums in the picasa website, which can be accessed within Gmail (logging in as *** - then hitting the "Photos" button at the top right of the screen). There are two separate albums there that won't appear directly on the website. Em, you should post your pictures to Picasa once you figure it out. Tom, thanks for the recipe - didn't know Brooklyn boys had so much spice! (6 cloves of garlic!!)
- Julie
***Doesnt really matter, but its a password I get the feeling it should be a secret.
Thanks for the new pictures Julie and Marka. Julie, why no picture of Tom? I am still trying to figure out how to download pictures from my camera.

Emily L.

A blog ain't a blog without a shared recipe

Tom's a"tom"ic chili:

1 tbsp of olive oil
6-8 cloves garlic: minced
1 large white or yellow onion: chopped
1 jalapeno: diced (keep seeds in for increased heat)
2 chile peppers: diced (keep seeds in for increased heat)
1 red bell pepper: chopped
1 green bell pepper: chopped
1.5 - 2 lbs of ground beef
chili powder
cracked black pepper
hot sauce
2 tomatoes: diced
1 28 oz can of diced tomatoes
2 cans of black beans
1/2 package of frozen corn (thawed)
1 beer

Heat the olive oil over medium heat in a large stock pot. Mince the garlic and saute for 2 minutes. Add the onions & saute for 2 minutes. Add the jalapeno and chili peppers and saute for 2 minutes. Push all the vegetables to one side of the pot and add the ground beef, slide the half of the pot without the beef off of the burner, break up the beef and cook until browned. Cover the browned meat with chili powder, cracked black pepper, and hot sauce. Mix the beef with the added seasoning, then mix with the rest of the vegetables and return the pot to its normal position. Add the tomato and mix, letting it cook for about a minute. Repeat this process with the can of diced tomatoes and the 2 cans of black beans. Add the corn. Heat the chili thoroughly, then add the beer. Bring the chili to a boil. Let it simmer for at least an hour. Serve with shredded cheese and sour cream. Enjoy.

Tom

New Pictures

Wow, I love the new pictures Julie added. I mean, family photos are nice and all that, but there aren't enough cobras.

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Hmmm...

Witty bloggers? Musically-inclined xmas carolers? Physically-fit half-marathoners? It appears that '08 is the breakthrough year officially making us the coolest family ever. I like it...a lot.

Tonya, count Tom and me in for a room at the airport hotel for both nights. Can't wait!

The Wire Season 5


For anyone comfortable illegally acquiring media through bittorrent, the first 7 episodes of The 5th season of The Wire are already available on most websites.

Indy Mini 500 Update

For those of you who are intending on participating in the Indy Mini-marathon in May... I called the hotel hotline and the only hotels left with a big block of rooms are near the airport (rooms with 2 double beds ranging between $99-119 per night). There will probably be public transportation from the airport to downtown for the race - I'll look into it. You could probably book a room at one of the downtown hotels on your own, keeping in mind that you'll pay the premium price.

If you'd like to be included in the block of hotel rooms at one of the hotels near the airport please let me know asap:
1) how many rooms you need, and
2) how many nights you need (I'll assume May 2-4 unless you tell me otherwise).

If you'd rather try your luck at a downtown hotel, you're on your own!

Tonya

p.s. Other events that will likely take place over the weekend include: carbo-loading dinner at a local restaurant the evening of Friday, May 2, and some sort of picnic/bbq after the race at my house on Saturday, May 3. If you have other fantastic ideas I'd be happy to hear them!

-Tonya

Tuesday, January 1, 2008

Congratulations!

Way to go Jane! That is really exciting news about the Sesquicentennial news story! -Helen

MN Sesquicentennial

Hi all: Great to see everyone at Christmas! We had a wonderful start to
the New Year here in the Lippert-Leonard household -- front page,
top-of-the-fold lead story on the MN Sesquicentennial in the Minneapolis
StarTribune (and included in the paper version a nice summary of key
events).

After the morning hoopla, Lori and I had a beautiful time x-country skiing
in 5 degree air and sunshine -- two hours of that to start to get ready for
the mini-marathon in May!

Here's the link to the story in case you want to see it:
http://www.startribune.com/local/12950676.html

Love,
--jane