Today I am suppose to tell about my best friends… I am super lucky to honestly be able to call my husband my best friend. I mean, he IS. He accepts my faults… ALL of them. He spoils me and treats me so well. He’s seen me at my best and my worst. He supports me and loves me unconditionally. He makes me laugh every single day. We have FUN together. And we’ve been thru more in the last 10 years and survived- so I know he’s here to stay. 
(haha SUCKA!)
He's mine.
Stacy has been my “BFF” since 7th grade. We’ve raised hell together, had babies together (ours are 3 days apart!) and are still super close today. I never feel judged when I’m with Stacy. I feel like I can be myself and make no apologies. I can also be a total re-re spaz and she loves it. (“re-re” is her word…) My parents weren’t always thrilled with Stacy because we got in so much trouble together. They always said she wasn’t my friend because she let me be stupid- haha. But when my little sister died out of all my “friends” in high school, Stacy and one other girl came to the visitation or whatever it’s called. None of the “friends” my parents would have preferred came. But STACY was there. That always meant so much. I love my Stacy and I’m glad we always make time for our friendship.
That mannequin had ginormous boobs!
Tara, my sister, is also my best friend. She’s the more mature of the two of us. 
Even when I was a total loser she was always my advocate and tried to keep me in line. She can always make me feel better about myself and point out the good she sees in me. She’s a great mom and an amazing sister. I also have a great set of parents as well. I joke that I am adopted because I’m pretty different than the rest of my family, but I can see characteristics of each of my parents that I have inherited. They are supportive of me and have helped our family in more ways than I can count. I am blessed.
Dinner at Pompano Joes with Seiuli, my parents, sister, & bro-in-law
![[Facebook]](http://swampbrat.net/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/facebook.png)
![[MySpace]](http://swampbrat.net/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/myspace.png)
![[StumbleUpon]](http://swampbrat.net/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/stumbleupon.png)
![[Technorati]](http://swampbrat.net/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/technorati.png)
![[Twitter]](http://swampbrat.net/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/twitter.png)
![[Email]](http://swampbrat.net/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/email.png)
“Mom, I wanna listen to “Cuz I’m just a teenage dirtbag baaaaaby….”
-Taj
“I kissed a girl and it’s yucky. I wish I had listened to Mommy…”
-Me, singing my new version of “I Kissed a Girl” for Tristan
———————
Heard last nite during the 4th quarter of the Lakers/Nuggets game:
“Tori, you know if they win you’ll get LU-CK-YYYYYYY.”
-Sei
“Man, if they lose I”m gonna have to cut you off babe.”
-Sei
**ROLLING EYES REALLY LOUDLY**
-Me
————————————
Heard everytime I walk in the bathroom… still
“Pee or poop Mom?”
-Liv
————————————–
Heard ’round the world and blogosphere:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY NO COOL STORY!!!
I ? ya!!!!
(ps. I mailed your gift late. UPS should deliver it by Monday. That is all…)
————–
You can go to Reidsupply.com and check out the free cad drawing designs!!! It’s a super cool site and easy to navigate.
So… as many of you know I was blessed (yes- I used the word “blessed” and I totally mean it) to have 2 great friends come all the way to Texas to visit me. ME. I’m still in shock over that. My online twin, NCS and Nobody hung with me for 4 days straight y’all (maybe 5, but I got there later on Thursday). FOUR days I had them all to myself other than when I shared them with a couple of Nobo’s old friends from when she lived in Texas (who were totally cool!!) I had a blast meeting them. We are planning a trip to Sprinkles and a tattoo shop…
We went for Pho where I ate chicken.
It sparked my interest enough that I checked out a book about the whole conspiracy behind the JFK assassination. Um, yeah… I could say more but I don’t wanna die. So…. moving on.
We stayed up late, talking, playing truth or dare and watching trashy reality shows. It was awesome. I was sad to take Nobo to the airport on Monday morning. I showed my great hostessing abilities by taking NCS to Burger King for lunch. We were suppose to meet Sei who was an hour late because he is apparently the only cop in the entire city so everyone needs him. Then right after he took this pic of us: 
he got a call to look for a particular truck- which happen to pass us at that exact moment- and he jumped in his car, lites and sirens, and sped off. Taj and Liv are still talking about it. “Daddy catched the bad guys??”
*So… yesterday a certian Mama of Glitter stopped by my house. Yes- I got to hang with Glittersmama for a few hours at my house!! Jealous?!? I had the honor of meeting GM in Oregon this past summer. I really like her. She’s very mellow and has a good sense of humor. I liked having the 1-on-1 time with her. I also got to meet the famous Glitter. Livie couldn’t stop talking about “playing with her friend.” While they were playing Liv kept calling Glitter “friend.” “Friend, come here.” “Friend, wanna play with my kitchen?” I corrected her several times, but by the time GM and Glitter left, Glitter was answering to “Friend.” It was pretty cute! Thanks GM for making time for me in your awesome road trip! What a fun adventure!! (Pictures will be here soon. GM took some…)
* 4 out of 5 of the Jones Quints are home now. Welcome home Jack, Ryan, Brooklyn and Lila!!
* Livie went with Sei to my dad’s office the other day and has been talking about playing with the rubber stamps since then. She brought home a paper stamped with my dad’s signature, “TAXPAYERS COPY”, etc… and she thinks it’s the coolest thing. I’ll have to get her some stamps.
*There’s still some questions I need to answer from my post a few posts back…
Glittersmama asked:
What do you eat for breakfast? What are good Atkins-worthy snacks?
Well… when I wasn’t totally cheating like I have been for 2 weeks I would eat some bacon or eggs for breakfast. But right now I’ve been stuck on Rice Krispies and I really need to get back on to Atkins. For some reason when I cheat I cheat BAD. BAD. So… I need to reign myself back in. Favorite snacks on Atkins: Bacon. It’s like candy when you can’t have candy. I also like devilled eggs and you can eat jello too.
Nancy asked:
How often do you floss?
I’m really bad about flossing. Maybe once a month? But everytime I go to the dentist they say “Wow! Your teeth look great. We can always tell the flossers from those that don’t.” Yessssssssss…. On the otherhand, Sei is a maniac flosser. I gave him a bag of floss at Christmas.
Do you ever go to bed without washing off your makeup?
NEVER. It grosses me out. Even if I fall asleep on accident if I wake up I will get up in the middle of the nite, wash my face and brush my teeth. I MUST!!!
Lauren asked:
Do you like meat loaf?
Well… generally I’d say “no” because anything named “Meat Loaf” has to be gross. But I do like MY meatloaf.
Or did you mean the singer???
————
I’ll answer some more later. I’m taking it sloooow.
Could I ask for prayers from y’all? There’s some major crap going on here. No details- sorry. But I will say it has to do with a stack of papers (filled with a load of lies) we were served from Canada a few days ago. Seiuli’s an awesome father- no matter what kind of crap some people want to make up. Y’all all know that, as does ANYONE who knows Seiuli. It makes me sick that people would tell lies just to get more money??? And by taking all that money a family is left wondering if they are going to have to sell their home, uproot their family yet again, etc… No Tad Award is big enough.
So… the concert was wonderful. We got home late. When I went to bed I thought I’d be up so early since that’s what I was used to. Um, ok, NOT. I slept until 9:50am!! I haven’t done that in FOR.EV.ER. It was wonderful, refreshing, yay! I almost felt guilty because I knew Sei was up early with the kids. But that feeling passed quickly.
Independence, Missouri is not far from my sister so I asked S if she’d like to meet us there. There’s a lot of history in Independence so I wanted to go even if just for an hour. We met at an angel store- everything was an angel. I bought a few things including a policeman angel. It didn’t hit me until I gave it to Sei that it was like a dead cop. I told him it really meant, “Cops are angels…” We drove around Independence. I learned that Harry S. Truman lived there and helped run out black people. So, black people were run out and Mormons had an extermination order against them. Niiiiice. We drove by the RLDS temple that looked like a screw:
We also saw a van with a sign on the side that said “Please take a picture of this sign.” So, I did.
These guys wouldn’t get out of the way when we were trying to go to the candy store:
And I took this pic to humor my husband & Omar:
After the quick tour I bid S farewell and headed back to my sister’s to get ready for my flight home. All in all it was a great, fun, re-energizing trip. And I again want to thank NCS, Suzanne, S, Nobody, and Klin for the plane ticket to make this trip possible. Y’all are awesome. Thanks also to Sei for being so supportive and gladly watching the kids for the 36 hours I was gone. (Even though you didn’t really have a choice since you left me for 5 days while you went to Hawaii.) I ? you.
Now, in Day I I left off with my sister and I going to the concert. The concert was GREAT. Even if you aren’t a NKOTB fan- it was fun. They sang a ton of their old stuff and a few of their new songs. I really liked some of their new stuff. I have it on my iPod, so I was familiar with it. They made jokes that only diehards would get like, “I need to ask you a serious question. Not to be confused with a serious message…” I started to cry when they came out on stage which didn’t surprise me because I cried when they came out at my first concert. I didn’t realize, however, that I was standing “in awe” as my sister put it, for most of the concert. Thinking back, yep- I was. Our seats were AWE.SOME. We were in the lower level and only 6 rows back and 2 sections over from the stage. I could see their faces clearly. (YAY for Lasik!) I couldn’t believe how close we were.
They also did new dance moves, but threw in some of their old. I was dying when they did this one move on “Favorite Girl” because it’s the move I’ve been practicing for my promised NKOTB Dance video I am going to post.
And, yes, they are older now but they could dance. And Donnie and Danny were lookin’ hot. Danny was buff as usual- I always loved his body. He breakdanced some too. I caught a little bit, but I am slow to find the video thingy on my camera.
And this is Donnie’s butt on the big screen:
“I’ll Be Lovin’ You Forever“
Me- looking all happy. 
Danny is in white. The stage in the center of the floor rotated.
“Step 4… I can give you more.”
Encore to “Hangin’ Tough” which is what the encore was 18 years ago! They all came out dressed in Boston Celtics jerseys since they are from Boston.
All and all it was WONDERFUL. The stadium was full of 30-something year old women and like 12 men. Donnie even gave a shout out to the men telling them they were the smartest men alive because “15 years of pinted up love was gonna be released tonite!” It was awesome. My sister and I had a great time!! THANK YOU AGAIN!!!
I still need to post about the next day when I got to meet another blogger and hang out with S again. Stay tuned.
I leave you with this short video from the concert….
Tuesday my sweet husband put me on a plane and I headed to Kansas. My awesome sister picked me up and we headed to lunch to meet…. S!!! Her blog is private right now, but this is her in the middle:
S is totally cool. She was funny and warm and sneaky!! She paid for my lunch and my sister’s lunch without us knowing. NOT cool S! I told you I was paying for you!! She also got to watch me eat my weight in cream puffs. (They were deluctible!!) I had so much fun hanging with her, so we planned to meet again the next day. I had never been to Independence and it wasn’t far from my sister’s home, so we decided to meet at this cool angel store the next day.
That nite was the concert. I was so excited. My sister and I got ready. (Ok, I just changed shirts & my sister pulled her hair up but whatever…) Then we g00gled directions to head to the concert. Then we got totally lost. Stupid g00gle. 
Thanks to my BIL we made it and wow- it was so funny to see the crowd. It was all 30-something year old women and like 12 guys. There were a few women dressed in totally 80′s clothes- like leg warmers and Flashdance shirts. That would have been more appropriate for Madonna’s Like a Virgin tour considering NKOTB were hot in the late 80s early 90s- NOT 1984. Before the concert you could text to a certain number and your text might show up on a screen above the crowd. I can’t tell ya how many posers spelt “Donnie” wrong. Hello- it’s IE not Y. We weren’t there to see Donny Osmond. Anyway… Natasha Bedingfield opened for NKOTB and I really liked her. I’m gonna download some of her songs later for my iPod. Then… it was time. The moment I had been waiting 18 years for…
Here’s me seconds before NKOTB hit the stage. Yes, my eyes are teary. I was ready to bawl.
And… that’s all you get today. I shall post more tomorrow.
Widgets & Flash Toys
The final countdown to the New Kids on the Block concert is here!! I leave Texas on Tuesday morning, have lunch with S and my sister around noon and then that evening I will party at the concert. I was thinking of making a sign to hold up that said
Christmas Morning 1989- see I got cool stuff for Christmas. No english saddles or Barbie houses for me. Straight up NKOTB stuff and I was set.
Random ugly picture of myself. I bought that Larry Bird shirt with my own money. Holy ugly. I look like one of those fish with eyeballs on the side of its head…
So… apparently my undying love for New Kids on the Block was portrayed sufficiently enough in my blog for my friends to know and understand how bummed I was that I missed the concert on Sunday.
I had offers of a home to stay in if I flew to Salt Lake for the Saturday concert. I had trip itineraries planned out for me with the flights, tickets costs, ride to and from airports, etc…, and I had a rad call from Nobody.
I didn’t answer my phone because I didn’t recognize the number. I listened to my voicemail and it said, “You’re just not answering because you didn’t recognize the number. But it’s Nobody. Call me back. Bye.”
Wow. She knows me so well. I had her cell phone number in my phone, but she was calling from her home. I called her back, talked to Avee for a while (I was star struck and totally was like “I carried a watermelon…” when Avee answered) then I spoke with Nobo.
“So, what would you say if I told you I had some airmiles just lying around I’d like you to use towards a ticket to Kansas City so you can see NKOTB?” (My sis and her sis live in KC area.)
Wait a minute, only my husband has friends that call and offer him plane tickets, right?
WRONG.
So, since I was wanting to help Nobo use her airmiles I totally accepted.
“I don’t have anyway to repay you…”
“Just let me stay with you when I come to Texas.”
“Deal! You can even have the CLEAN kid’s bedroom.:)”
Fast-forward to today….
Nobo is full of it. I mean, she really had the airmiles, but in reality that was the cover story to see if I’d be down with going to KC. Since I was TOTALLY down Nobo called me again today. This time I had her number programed in my phone. The screen lit up “NOBO” and started ringing “Summer Girls” by LFO.
Now she told the real story. She and her sister, S of S Sister to Nobody, had concocted a plan. They emailed my friends to see if they wanted to help send me to KC to see NKOTB. My online twin, No Cool Story, Suzanne, and Klin, along with Nobo and S, all chipped in for my plane ticket to see NKOTB. How cool is that? I was stoked before, but when Nobo told me this… I cried. I did. I cried because I really, really, really felt loved. Wow.
How cool is that? Are you so jealous?? Sei said he would blog about how jealous he was while I was lusting at Donnie doing pelvic thrusts. I will be opening my blog to him while I’m gone.
Anyway… that’s all. I just had to brag about the awesome friends I have. I was so surprised and I… wow. Y’all rock. Thank you SOOOOO much. You have no idea how loved you have made me feel. Thanks to you I will be sitting in section 117 on Row 11 on Nov. 11 wearing my old concert tee. And I’ll probably be crying.
I dedicate this video to you, my friends. It’s one of my fave performances- I still have the video from when I taped it on tv. And just a little bit of trivia- this was at the 1990 AMA awards- the nite after the concert I went to in Oklahoma City (and met Donnie). Notice Donnie is hoarse from singing to me the nite before. And not only do I dedicate THIS video to you- I will make a new video of me doing random NKOTB dances from different videos. This is HUGE because I CANNOT dance. So… you certainly can look forward to that.
Thanks y’all. So much. Tori ? her friends.
This will be my last post with pics from Oregon. It was just an awesome, awesome weekend. I told Sei it was probably the best weekend of my adult life that didn’t involve him. There are tons of great recaps- I’m kinda lame at stuff like that. I just know I enjoyed myself so much. I loved meeting Aubrey, Yvonne, Heffalump and Glittersmama for the 1st time. And I was stoked to be able to hang out with my twin, Nobody, Annie, Millie, Carronin, Klin, Amanda, Elastic, Carrot and Suzanne once again. I can’t wait til next summer!! Thanks again NCS for organizing the entire weekend. You are so awesome and I am blessed to call you my friend. ???
Chillin’ out, maxin’, relaxin’ all cool… at Seaside with my triple chin.
The Gang (Carrot is hiding behind Klin.)
Outside the candy store at Cannon Beach. Because I’m a cool mom, I bought my kids a huge gummy rat, sour candy in a toilet with “plunger” suckers, and marshmellow pizza, hamburger and hot dog that looked, just…. wrong!!
Beautiful Multomah Falls that is all natural- except for the bridge. 
My new IN REAL LIFE friend, Aubrey I ? Aubrey!!A lot of these awesome photos were brought to you by my Ghetto Fabulous camera. Livie broke the battery door off and my genius twin gave me an idea how to fix it. Hairband + driftwood = The Coolest Camera at the beach! Don’t hate.
