Need to Brag About My Twin

My twin sister, Erin, plays for The Baltimore Blues in the Eastern Women's Baseball Conference. The Washington Post did a story about their league.

Yay, Air!!

New Pictures

I've uploaded pictures from this month, including Mothers' Day and Memorial Day Weekend.

From Steve & Kathy's BBQ on Sunday, pictures at Flickr.

From Mothers' Day & Memorial Day with my family, pictures at Yahoo Photos.

Congrats to My Sis

My sister, Kelli, graduated from high school this past Friday. It was a very nice ceremony and a beautiful day. Something very funny happened when one student's name was called out to receive his diploma...someone in his family blew an air horn in the church! Fortunately, it wasn't a mass, just a ceremony, so most people laughed.

Anyway, below are just a few of the pics taken after the ceremony.

Kelli, the Graduate

3 Sisters - Colleen, Kelli, Erin

Kelli with her friends, Mari & Meghan

With our Mom, Dad, & Mom-Mom

Peace, Air

The Twins

My Eventful Week

I just got back today from visiting my sister, Erin, who lives outside Baltimore, Maryland. She's been bugging me for quite some time to come down and stay for a few days, so we finally made it work for the both of us. While I was there, I went to the community college where she works as an Athletic Trainer. She even put me to work on the computer for a little bit...well, actually, I volunteered. It was very impressive to see her in her element. She's very good at what she does (which I already knew), which has earned her the nickname, "Dr. Erin."


She, of course, apologized for dragging me to work with her, but it wasn't all day long...really only a few hours on each day, Tuesday and Wednesday. With all the new things to look at, and the overall quiet in the training room, it gave me plenty to learn about while I was there. And well, I somehow always manage to keep myself busy.

I met some of her co-workers and colleagues, and saw some of the facilities. Her friend & co-worker, Kate, stopped in a few times to say hello, and we visited her as well. Overall, I didn't mind being there because I received some much-needed therapy on my lower back. So, I can't complain.


Going to Erin's training room wasn't the only thing we did...far from it, actually. On Tuesday night, we went to see Pearl Jam at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. I had bought a pair of Fanclub tickets and decided to take Erin as an early birthday present. She hasn't seen them since 1998 (yikes)...and so, it was about time! This also worked out perfectly in planning my visit. We took the Metro down to DC a little ahead of rush hour, and made it down there around 5:15. After picking up my tickets at the Will-Call window, we had to wait until just about 6:40 for them to open the doors...people outside were hot and tired of waiting. Upon getting in, we rushed to the merchandise stand so I could get my poster and a t-shirt.

We then went to get some food to bring to our seats, in hopes of catching an acoustic pre-set by Eddie Vedder. When we got down to the floor, I was happy to find out exactly where my seats were (as I had not looked at a seating chart since I picked up my tickets)...we landed 10 rows back from the stage, dead-center! I was flying high (on life only!). While we waited, I pointed out some of Pearl Jam's road crew and security to my sister, who looked at me with a mix of marvel and fright. Not more than 20 minutes after we sat down, sure enough Eddie came out and performed a cover of Cat Stevens' "Don't Be Shy." Many seats around were still empty, so we were happy to catch the pre-set with a great view and without being bothered.

They played a very good mix of songs...hitting every album from their first, Ten, to their current self-titled one. The setlist was as follows:

Set 1: Release, World Wide Suicide, Severed Hand, Corduroy, Animal, Do The Evolution, Given To Fly, Low Light, Unemployable, Grievance, Even Flow, I Got Id, Present Tense, BetterMan, Inside Job, Wasted Reprise, Life Wasted, Why Go, Rearviewmirror

Encore 1: Man Of The Hour, Masters Of War (by Bob Dylan), Small Town, Come Back, Alive

Encore 2: Comatose, Leash, F***in' Up (by Neil Young), Yellow Ledbetter/Star Spangled Banner

A note about "Betterman"...it was a beautiful, re-worked version, starting out slower with a piano intro by Boom Gaspar. Because I can't comment on all the songs, I'll say the highlights for me were: the overall mix of songs, calling the opener ("Release"), hearing the intro music to Ten as the band walked on stage, the re-worked Betterman, Matt Cameron throwing drumsticks out to the crowd and them landing not even 5 feet from our seats, hearing "Leash" live for my first time, hearing "Inside Job" live (amazing!!) and, of course, seeing the concert with my sister. Even though the guy behind me spilled beer on my chair and the back of my leg, I had a great time...Pearl Jam never disappoints.

Wednesday was my last full day in Maryland. In the morning, I had an opportunity to meet some people at an educational writing/editing company that I've done some freelance writing for. Erin's friend, Jocelyn, works there...she's the one that got me started on the freelancing, so she invited me to come in and see around her office. Then, the three of us spent the late afternoon and evening walking around the Inner Harbor. It was a beautiful night considering we had sweltering hot days this week. We had hoped to make it into the Baltimore Aquarium, but we ran out of time. That will be the plan for the next time I visit my sis...Thanks again, Air!!

You can see the above pictures and many others from the concert in my online photo album.

Family Pics

As is the tradition for most Sundays with my family, we get together for dinner, usually at my grandparents' house. Here are a few pics I took this afternoon as we enjoyed the beautiful weather outside.

Poppy & Mom-Mom

Me and my cousin, Gina

My sister Kelli, Gina, and my Mom

My cousin, Julianna and her cousin, Timmy

Some Garden Pics

Garden stones that the 7 grandchildren
made 8 years ago!

Am I a Music Snob?

Okay, so if you were reading carefully in my previous post, I talked about how some family members have never heard of many music groups that I listen to. This seemed to be the general concensus on Christmas Eve. So, here's what happened. Before my cousins and I opened our polyanna gifts, the kids were playing some music on the radio. A song by the pop group Fall Out Boy came on and, immediately, my younger pre-teen cousins as well as my 17-year-old sister, Kelli, started singing along and professing their love for their music. I just kinda rolled my eyes and made some kind of noise that showed my obvious distaste...Kelli immediately starts questioning me, "What, Col, you don't like them?...What's wrong with them?"...and so on.

Now, fast-forward to about 45-minutes later...the polyanna gift-opening has begun and it is my turn to open. On top of the packages is what appears to be a wrapped CD...so, I go for that first. I have about half of the paper off when I see the words "...Out Boy" appear under the partially-ripped paper. I immediately freeze and carefully look over to my Aunt Mary who does all the wrapping for her kids' polyanna gifts. She wasn't paying attention at the time, so I lean over to my cousin Julianna (Aunt Mary's daughter) and say "Jules, is this gift supposed to be for me from Frankie, or is it supposed to be for Kelli from you?" She stammers (knowing full well that I didn't like this group) and then whispers something to her Mom. Aunt Mary instantaneously pipes up that she must have gotten my CD mixed up with the one meant for Kelli. So, of course, everyone had a good laugh at my expense...Kelli found it hilarious that I received a CD of a group I had slammed not an hour before. When I finally got the right CD, it was The Shins, Chutes Too Narrow...this led to even more snickers and questions from the peanut gallery..."What's a Shin? Are they anything like 'The Elbows?'" So, Kelli starts spouting off that I am a music snob because I like bands like Pearl Jam, The Beatles, Neil Young, Death Cab For Cutie, The Who, etc... My Dad immediately backs me up and says, "She just has good taste in music...she gets that from me..."

So, what do you think? Is there such a thing as a music snob? Am I one?

Holiday Pictures

These are just a few of my recent pictures from Christmas and New Year's Eve. You can see all of my crazy holiday pictures in my Online Photo Albums. I never realized how many times my camera was hijacked...

The Good and The Bad

Penn State Takes Orange Bowl Victory

What can I say? I'm proud to say PSU is my alma mater. I stayed up for the entire game last night...it was impossible to sleep because I was so riled up from all the excitement. I'm not going to recap all the highlights for 2 reasons: 1-I am not known to be a sports whiz, and 2-There are many sports writers out there that have already done that job well enough.

I do want to say though that I thought both teams fought the good fight. However, the multiple missed field goals by both teams' kickers were unbelievably frustrating. The last time Kevin Kelly missed a field goal, I punched my thigh so hard, I nearly saw stars.

The fact that it went into triple-OT was mind-blowing, which made it all the more frustrating, yet exciting...so many ups and downs. It also took me awhile to get the rule changes in OT because, well, again...I am not a sports aficionado...plus anyone I could ask had already gone to bed. I managed to figure it out on my own though...I catch on quickly!

After the game, Bobby Bowden had nice things to say about JoePa and the Lions, which I thought was very respectable. I've gotta comment though...I don't know the name of this one guy on the Seminoles' sideline...he was one of the team coaches or something, wearing a headset. Every time they showed him on camera, I was distracted by his frog-like gum-chewing...I kept waiting for his tongue to lash out of his mouth to catch a passing fly. I know, I know, that's horrible to say...but, I notice things like this...I can't help it! There now, I feel better. Congrats JoePa and PSU!

(Frank, looks like it's time to get rid of that Florida State gear and throw on some Blue & White!)


My First Bad Day of the New Year

Yesterday was a bad day...although, yes, I have had much worse. The only thing that went right about the day was that PSU won the Orange Bowl, which did make me feel better! Anyway, I'll spare you all the details, but what I will say is that I haven't been feeling so hot since last Friday. I've had a head cold and cough, which made me feel even worse by Sunday. So, this week hadn't started off great as it is. I've been very sleepy, probably from the cold meds I'm taking, which makes we want to do nothing all day. So, imagine my feeling when I had to go out yesterday, when I didn't want to. Regardless, though, it was necessary. Basically, it involved a lot of waiting around on my part (or chauffeuring as I call it), when I all I wanted to do was be at home, as well as my annoyance at my sister's irresponsibility. That led to getting in an argument with her and with my dad, for something indirectly related to the whole thing. It was one of those days I felt like crawling into bed and starting it all over. However, I did manage to get an apology from my sister and patch things up with my dad. Now, what to do about those New Year's Resolutions? I'm thinking I need to bring "Move Out" to the top of my list...

Some Love For My Team

Just wanted to quickly wish good luck to my Penn State football team. I'm hoping this game will make me feel better, after the crappy day I had...more on that later, though. Anyway, as an alum, I gotta support my Lions in every way. I am also taking this as an opportunity to broadcast to my fellow PSU friends that my cousin, Frank, has allegiance to Florida State...no, he is not a student there...he is still in high school...but hopes to go there eventually. He is wearing his Florida gear and rubbing it in my face as I talk to him online. (I can forward any hate mail to him...hehe).

Here are his exact words as I told him I will get my Penn State posse against him:
"well i will sick chief osceola on you and the rest of the seminoles with their bows and arrows and spears."

Frank, all I gotta say to you is............Your Seminoles are going down!

WE ARE...


PENN STATE!