A Country Tune

"There's no dollar sign on a peace of mind." -Zac Brown Band

Dog Days

Whitney: I don't think those little dogs can get up those big stairs.

Clara (age 9): We'll carry them. They're travel size.

A Real Cowboy

"I do all my best work with a beer in hand." - Beau, catching horses in the middle of the afternoon, rope in one hand, a bottle of Bud in the other.

Happy Turkey Day

"Small cheer and great welcome makes a merry feast." -William Shakespeare

Thanksgiving Tomorrow!

"Missouri ranks 5th in turkey production across the U.S. and producers raise 21 million turkeys each year." -Director of the Missouri Department of Agriculture.

Doesn't this picture (taken on I-70 between St. Louis and Columbia) make you want to chow down?!

Dating Drama

"If you guys think the guy I'm marrying might be gay, will you please tell me?" -Drea's attempt to avoid a disaster further on down the road. What are girl friends for??

29 Years

"The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds." -The Notebook

Happy Anniversary Mom & Dad x

Cold Turkey

"Eternity: the length of time frozen turkeys can be kept in the freezer." -a fast fact from Vox Magazine. Good to know, especially since I won a frozen turkey yesterday for my speedy performance in the Freeze Your Gizzard Off 5k. Also, check out my Vox Thanksgiving article here.

Athletics v Life

"I am delighted to have you play football. I believe in rough, manly sports. But I do not believe in them if they degenerate into the sole end of any one's existence. I don't want you to sacrifice standing well in your studies to any over-athleticism; and I need not tell you that character counts for a great deal more than either intellect or body in winning success in life. Athletic proficiency is a mighty good servant, and like so many other good servants, a mighty bad master. " - Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt’s Letters to His Children

Agree or not?! Either way, big games today for UVA (v Clemson) and Mizzou (v Kansas). Go get 'em boys!

Old Dominion

“Tough girls come from New York. Sweet girls, they’re from Georgia. But us Virginia girls, we have fire and ice in our blood. We can ride horses, be a debutante, throw left hooks, and drink with the boys, all the while making sweet tea, darlin’. And if we have an opinion, you know you’re gonna hear it.” -Ashley Judd

Virginia bound today ...

Mmmmmm

Keep Looking

"For there is nothing lost, that may be found, if sought." -Faerie Queene, Edmund Spenser

Oh Dear

"We still have the same deer from last year in the freezer, except for what I threw out." -my mom arguing with my dad about what to do with Jackson's rapidly accumulating venison stock (perhaps the most redneck conversation ever, captured by Bea via cell phone and emailed to his siblings ... I'd post the entire thing here but I'm technologically challenged).

Winter

"The sky is an empty hopeless gray and gives the impression that this is its eternal shade. Winter's occupation seems to have conquered, overrun and destroyed everything, so that now there is no longer any resistance movement left in nature; all the juices are dead, every sprig of vitality snapped, and now winter itself, an old, corrupt, tired conqueror, loosens its grip on the desolation, recedes a little, grows careless in its watch; sick of victory and enfeebled by the absence of challenge, it begins itself to withdraw from the ruined countryside." - A Separate Peace, John Knowles

Xtreme XC

Apparently, the weather gets cold and Missourians get crazy: "Zombies, cereal mascots and other costumed runners dealt with snow flurries Saturday while taking part in the Cross Country Xtreme run held at Midway Sandbar. The runners also had an obstacle-laden course to contend with, which included men with chain-saws and crawls through the mud while firecrackers bursted nearby." -Missourian article. Click here for the really funny stuff.

Time

-Da Vinci

Can't Touch This

Spotted on my way to school:

And for those wanting the full experience:

Happy Friday!

A Thursday Thought

"But if our philosophy tells us that each man is only a small part of the world, that his intelligence catches at best only phases and aspects in a coarse net of ideas, then, when we use our stereotypes, we tend to know that they are only stereotypes, to hold them lightly, to modify them gladly." -Walter Lippemann, Stereotypes

Style Woes

"I can't be held accountable for this skirt, it was a present from my mother-in-law. We're in a recession and I can't afford new clothes." -a professor reflects on one impact of the financial crisis.

Remembrance Day

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
- Lt. Col. John McCrae

A Bountiful Burden

"Pressure is nothing more than a shadow of great opportunity." -76 year-old XC Coach Joe Newton in the Long Green Mile. A great movie and a great quote (applicable to many areas of life besides running!).

(Don't) Show Me?

Story here.

Die Running

"I've told my friends if I die here on this track do not call 911 because I do not want to be revived ... I say, wait a half an hour, maybe 45 minutes, then call the mortician. That's the way I want to go." -81 year-old Joy Johnson, who ran the NYC marathon last Sunday. What a rock star. Read the WSJ article here.

Cranberry Crawl 10k today. Wish me luck.

Mizzou Frat Boys

(so says the t-shirt, but I have yet to see actual evidence)

Ninth Grade Naivete

Funny because none of them can drive ... and also, aren't Canadians more liberal than Americans?

A Green Ticket

"Righteous! Biking and voting!" -a ballot-bound cyclist to Kristy (also on a bike).

Election Day

Free Wheeling

"It was kinda like a float trip on bikes." -Kristy describes Sunday's Tribute Ride to Rocheport. Drinking, dancing, good company and gorgeous weather for miles and miles along the Katy Trail.

Cookie Monster

"Grover!" -a girl's excited reaction to seeing a big blue creature walking down Broadway on Halloween. She obviously didn't watch enough Sesame Street growing up.

M-I-Z Z-O-bama

"I'm by proxy smoking with the President." -some kid at Obama's Columbia rally, smelling pot wafting through the air.