onemattDOTcom

Christy and I both would like to send our congratulations to our good friends, Katie and Hani, on the birth of their first born, a son, Lucas John!  He is absolutely adorable!  Mom, Dad and baby are all home safe and sound and things are going great!  Congrats guys!  You can check them out on their blog, which is www.katieandhani.com.

We are also preparing for our beach trip coming up next week!  That’s right, we’re under single digits on the Countdown clock for Beachapalooza 2008!  Yay!  I know that we cannot wait to get down to Seagrove with all our friends and just relax and take it easy.

Also, you will probably notice a design change (again).  Sorry, but I’m still trying to find one I like and that I want to stick with.  So forgive the new paint on the walls yet again.

It’s Monday, and a good Monday to all!

I recently added a new link to the list and I wanted to give it some personal attention.  Prescott Place is the online home of Owen & Jessica Prescott, recently married and friends of mine.  Jessica is a very close friend to my sister-in-law Lindsay, and as such, I’ve gotten to know Jessica by proxy for many years.

Jessica is new to the blogging scene, so hop on by her blog at http://prescottplace.blogspot.com/ and check out the goodness.

Less than 3 weeks away from Beachapalooza 2008!

In keeping with the updateing trend that’s happening on onemattDOTcom, let’s catch you up on the last few weeks.

Things are going great at the new job.  I’m really enjoying what I’m doing, and I think it has real potential.  Christy and I just got back from the beach with my folks and brother, which was big fun…outside of my experience at The Track in Gulf Shores where some punk kid rammed me from behind in my go-cart and caused my leg to slam into my steering wheel, causing a huge bruise to form on the inside of my leg.  But the rest of the trip was great.

Christy and I are leaving for Atlanta tomorrow afternoon.  We’ve got a George Michael concert we’re going to tomorrow night at Phillips Arena, then we’re going to see my beaten down Braves play on Friday night against Milwaukee.  Then we’re driving back Saturday morning in time for Christy to prepare things for my 80’s themed birthday party that night!

Gifts aren’t expected, but if you’d like to make a donation to the PayPal as a way to say thanks for all I’ve done to keep you hip this year, you can do so by donating to mattplanet@gmail.com.  I’ll personally thank you in a column next week if you donate!  What could be sweeter?!?

Anyway, that’s about it.  Thanks for checking out onemattDOTcom.  American Idol auditions are happening right now in preparation for the new season…I can’t wait!

Hey, what’s this?!? A post that’s not about American Idol?? Sure you jest.

Nope. I jest not.

It’s the weekend, and it’s the last weekend in March. I cannot believe how quickly 2008 is going. Baseball season starts this weekend as the NCAA Tournament is wrapping up, then it’ll be time for our trip out to California to see our friends Hani and Katie (hey guys!), then down to Orlando for a long weekend at Disney World. After that, it’ll be time for lazing by the pool with friends as the summer drags on…and before you know it, it’s going to be my birthday (August 2nd, I accept Paypal donations and Best Buy giftcards) and then Katie will have her baby (it’s going to be a boy, BTW…congrats Katie!!!), and then football will be here.

Football season will be full of fun as it always is as my Auburn friends try to convince me that Alabama isn’t coming back into prominence and that Auburn is going to be SEC Champions. And before you know it, September will pass into October, and Halloween will be here. And then in a blink of an eye, Thanksgiving and Christmas will be upon us and cold weather will welcome itself back to Alabama.

See how quickly time passes? Do me these three favors:

1) Download some Jack Johnson for your music player of choice (any album will do, but his latest “Sleeping Through The Static” is pretty darn good).
2) Block off a couple days and head down to the beach. I prefer Destin, but others prefer Orange Beach. You can’t go wrong either way.
3) Take your favorite beverage and a beach chair at sunset to the beach and sit down and listen to the waves and drink your beverage, listening to a little Jack Johnson and the sound of the waves crashing.

Enjoy life. You only get one. However it is you enjoy it…just do so.

And with that, I’m to do just that with some friends at a couple’s baby shower. Take care friends…Top 9 Week on Idol is only days away!

I simply cannot believe it’s November 1.  You say it every year (I know), but this year has passed by so fast!

So I’m heading up to Tuscaloosa (aka Football Heaven) this weekend and it’s LSU Week.  Some friends of mine are going up with me (big ups to Trish, BD, A-Will and Sarah), and we’re tailgating with some good friends of mine.  It should be a raucous good time, and T-Town should be absolutely hopping!

All 2024 pictures from the Trip of a Lifetime are up on my Flickr account.  I invite you all to go check them out… you can do so by going here.

The Christmas Party plan is in full effect now, with the 7 couples involved renting a stretch SUV limo, heading to our house for pre and post-game cocktails, including a possible trip to the hot tub.  It should also be a super-delicious good time.

Speaking of Trips of a Lifetime, one of the couples we met on the trip has their own website.  There are a ton of pictures on their website from the trip as well, so I encourage you to point your browsers to www.katieandhani.com today.  You won’t be disappointed.

I wanna go back again…please let me go back again…

Back from The Trip of a Lifetime!  Why am I putting an exclamation mark there?  I’m not excited about it.

I have to say, it is nice to sleep in my own bed again…but it is NOT nice to have to think too hard about dinner, and groceries, and all of what life is all about.  While on the trip, Christy and I met the most amazing people that have become our good friends from all of our adventuring together!  So a big shout-out goes to Hani & Katie, Denise and Luis, Joe & Amber, and Russ & Lindsay!!!  We miss you guys and can’t wait to travel again!

Work is good…we’re in a new office now, and I took yesterday to come in on my day off to set up my desk (which I’ve changed already), so that’s good.  It’s nice catching up with my work people…I do work with a bunch of great people so I’m lucky in that way…even if the work is a bid tedious at times.

My fantasy teams went undefeated while I was gone, as did Alabama, so on that front I’m totally happy!

Enough of this update…Bus 2 people!  Come my flowers!

We leave for ours in a little over 24 hours!!!!!

So between now and Sunday evening, I will probably incommunicado through the blog here, but I do plan on blogging a bit during the trip. There are a few days at sea where it will be nice to get out all my thoughts to the three of you that read this thing.

We’ve got a couple of nice bon voyage things planned. Firstly, there’s dinner at Rusty & Gina’s tonight, where we’re having Costa’s and opening up a few bottles of their Napa wine that they got on their most recent journey to wine country. Then tomorrow morning before our shuttle leaves for Atlanta, we’re having a bon voyage breakfast with Christy’s family at McDonald’s (they have the play area…it’s a must with a 2 year old).

Then it’ll be boarding our shuttle, arriving at Hartsfield International Airport, boarding our Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt, and away we go!

Thanks again to Abi at HeatEatReview for sitting down with us this week at onemattDOTcom for an interview. And hey Abi, if you’d like a reviewer for Imbibable.com, give me a shout…I’d love to write for you.

And as you can plainly see, I’ve gone Pink for October.  I apologize for getting this up a little late (okay 5 days late), but I’ve been a bit busy.

I hope you know…that this is nothing to do with you…

Okay Gina…I know it’s late, but it’s growing on me.

By the way…we’re under 2 weeks now until the Trip of a Lifetime.  It seems ages ago that I told the world about this trip.  I’m going to be blogging a bit on this trip, so I’ll try and update it at least once every other day with a chronicle of our adventures.

The new TV season started this week, and already waiting on me on the DVR at home is the premiere of Heroes.  According to some who’ve watched it, it was quite different but good from last year’s finale.

Oh, before I go…one last shout-out to April who likes to read my blog from the comforts of her palatial Homewood estate…thanks for letting Ramey out of the house last night. 

In case you haven’t heard yet (or you live under a rock, totally cool btw), the trailer for next summers blockbuster superhero action movie, Iron Man, is out!  Most of it is footage they showed at ComicCon this year, with a bit of ol’ Ironface flying through the air at the end.

If you want to revel in all the Iron Man goodness, go to http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/ironman/ and click on your trailer of choice.

26 days left!

The countdown is officially under a month to go until the Trip of a Lifetime!  Christy and I are pumped…I mean, really psyched!

On the “not psyched” list is the VCO softball team I’m managing…we have a problem with the girls not showing up or just out and out quitting.  It’s discouraging, and it makes me never want to mess with anything like this again.

In the category of “things that are back to how they should be”…Auburn lost it’s football over the weekend and Auburn fans everywhere are already calling for Brandon Cox (the 5th year starting QB) to sit in favor of one of their younger QBs.  I’m not sure having a different QB in there on Saturday night would’ve made that much of a difference…the O-line isn’t blocking like they should and their RBs are fumbling it too much.  The QB doesn’t have anything to do with that.  That being said, I’m sure Auburn could do with a dose of confidence, and maybe starting a younger, more exciting player would help do that.

I spent Saturday watching college football all day, and I have a few observations:

• Notre Dame is not good, but they aren’t as bad as people think.
• Michigan is that bad.
• LSU might beat everybody they play by 40 points.
• Texas woke up in the 2nd half against TCU on Saturday.  Be afraid, Big 12…unless you’re…
• Oklahoma, who took care of business against a beleaguered Miami team.  Oklahoma is back.
• Georgia is the “what team are they?”team so far this year…beating a pretty good Oklahoma State team, and they lost to South Carolina this weekend.

That’s all I got…oh, and ROLL TIDE!