I Know What You Did Last Night

During a regular work week by Friday morning I'm feeling enough sleep deprivation that I need an extra shot of coffee to keep it rolling along. This week, there isn't enough coffee in all of Columbia to keep me going. I need a serious nap, but I can't stop watching the Olympics. And from what I can tell from the status updates of my friends on Facebook -- they can't either. Here's just a sample of the updates I've seen this week:

has cleared her calendar for the next two weeks to watch the Olympics.

has three words for you. Men's, Synchronized, Diving.

is watching the Olympics and thinking about sex.

doesn't want to go to bed for fear he'll miss something fun.

is wondering what he will do with his free time when the Olympics are over.

has just been handed a copy of "Breaking Dawn" and is wondering how much this will cut into her Olympic viewing.

is still watching the Olympics.

is staying up way past her bedtime watching the Olympics.

is exhausted from staying up too late watching the Olympics.

is loving the swimming & gymnastics...but hating that I'm getting very little sleep. ZZZZZZZZZZZ!

is done being on Beijing time and will now use her Tivo for its God-given purpose.

is certain that Michael Phelps can't be as tired from winning Olympic medals as she is from staying up late watching him.

is totally psyched for the Giant Slalom and the Luge.

Morning Hot Flash August 15, 2008

• Breaking News: Cinderella, Snow White and Tinkerbell have been arrested. Peter Pan and the dwarfs are attempting to raise bail money selling apples. Prince Charming, as expected, has been completely useless.

• When I was in junior high school, Demi Moore was eighteen and a cast member on "General Hospital." Currently, Demi and I are the same age and she's married to Ashton Kutcher. I'm all about 'you're just as young as you feel'...but shaving 14 years off your chronological age takes the cake.
  
  
• I didn't know it but I've been involved in a scientific experiment for years. Haven't we all?

• Are you still watching the Olympics? I'd like to speak to the head of programming at NBC, or whoever made the decision to put the marquee event of the games on AFTER 11:00 p.m. On a school night. I have a 4:30 a.m. wake-up call and even though I tried to stay awake -- I was unconscious by 10:30 p.m. Everyone I know is bleary-eyed from staying up late watching the Olympics. Michael Phelps won another gold medal. Yawn! He wasn't in a starring role last night. He was just a supporting player. The real stars were two chicks from the U.S. I've seen the highlights from Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson's performances last night. They make tough look easy. And they do it all with their toes pointed. Way to rock it, ladies!

• It's almost the weekend, and so as a little treat, I give you one of my favorite things...a peek at stars without make-up...it doesn't get any better!

Morning Hot Flash August 14, 2008

• Last night I was talking to my best friend on the phone for the first time in like FOR-evah when she says, "Honey, I love you, but the swimming is on." I hung up immediately. The girl's got the fever. I confess that I've had impure thoughts about Michael Phelps in his swimming ahhhh...attire...and yes, you don't have to remind me that I'm old enough to be his mommy. Oh Mommy! We've all got the FEV-ah! I'm exhausted from monitoring the Olympic activities round-the-clock, and now they tell me they're going to add a little more eye candy to the closing ceremonies. I can't take it!
  
  
• It was my favorite angry chick you-done-me-so-bad song. It was such a let down to learn it was about one of the guys from Full House.
  
  
• Ask her if she wants to go to the mall. If she can text her answer back to you faster than she can talk, she's thirteen.

• Turns out my idol, chef Julia Child, was poaching more than salmon during World War II...she was poaching secrets too. The lovely Julia was a spy. I remember reading in her biography that she had worked for the OSS in China...I just assumed that meant she was a spy, but I'm going to act surprised so that I can be like everyone else this morning.
  
  
• A woman has won the hog-calling contest for the first time ever. Doris Probst entered the contests for both the hog-calling and the husband-calling at the Illinois State Fair this year. I'm not sure how things turned out for her in the husband-calling contest, but I think her triumph in the hog-calling is proof that bacon is better. Rock on, sister!

• Older chicks know that we don't have to pay a lot for fashion. It's our attitude that makes us look so goooooood!

I'm Olympic-addicted!

This commercial has been running during the Olympic Women's Softball competition on Universal HD. I love it because it celebrates women -- chicks who compete with passion. It's a beautiful thing.

Two weeks ago I told someone that I wasn't really looking forward to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. I'm sure I said it in a superior and sarcastic tone. Like I've been there, done that...can't impress me. I'm much more interested in winter sports and I just wanted it all to be over so that we could get back to the U.S. presidential race. All I wanted to know was when Barack Obama would announce his running mate, and who would he pick? Well, it's two weeks later, and I couldn't care less who Obama picks in the Veepstakes, at my house it's all Olympics, all the time.

I have the Olympic FEE-Ver, and the only cure...is more Olympics!

Last Friday night, saintly John Edwards admitted he had cheated on his beautiful and cancer-stricken wife right there on the prime-time television -- and no one watched. The ratings were terrible. Why? We were all watching the fake fireworks over Beijing. Two hours of nameless people from every country in the world wandering slowly into the stadium -- I couldn't look away. It was riveting television!!! Did you get an eyeful of the Romanians' flower dresses? I almost called people on the east coast and woke them up to discuss. Who cares that a seven year-old girl's self-esteem may have been crushed when there's 2008 choreographed drummers pounding out a beat?

If you have only been watching the Olympic sports that are broadcast on NBC, you're doing yourself a disservice. I've watched Water Polo on MSNBC, Equestrian events on Oxygen, and Women's Softball on Universal HD. My new favorite sport -- Synchronized Diving! Best. Sport. Ever. How do they do that? And I love when you can hear each team countdown in their own language. The Mexican divers said, "uno...dos...arriba!"

The first Olympic games that I remember was the Summer of 1972. The games were in Munich and Mark Spitz was the Michael Phelps of those games. I was nine and I watched the Olympic competition on the television in my Grandma's living room in northern Michigan. While I know I was glued to the competition, I don't have a clear memory of the tragedy that unfolded during those games in Munich. I'm afraid that the Russians are counting on the world being as Olympic-addicted as I am as their tanks roll into Georgia.

Just before the Olympics started this year, I clearly remember telling someone that the only sport I liked less than Track...was Field. Yes, I was going to watch some of the first week's gymnastic competition, but I doubted I'd still be watching the Olympics during the second, and more boring, week of competition. Yesterday, KLAC did a preview of next week's Olympic long jump competition. I sat in my car with the engine running for 15 minutes after I got home listening to it. With the price of gas these days, that should tell you how passionate I am about the Olympics.

Morning Hot Flash August 13, 2008

• The Women On The Web website has come up with a list of the best breasts on women over 40. Unfortunately, a few of the picks probably made it onto the list because they're friends with someone on the panel...but I think it's nice to celebrate boobies of every age. Click here to see if yours made the cut!
  


• I didn't even know we had a Stoll, and now he's marrying Rachel Hunter. You go, girl!
  


• More and more reasons to smile in the face of your future. Rock on!
  


• No one could possibly be enjoying the Olympics more than I have been loving them, but it is dis-heartening to learn about all the fakery going on behind the scenes. It's an athletic competition, not Hollywood.
  


• See...you're getting older and better...that's why there's more of us at the Olympics this year.
  


• One of the most interesting articles I've read recently is this Atlantic monthly feature about why Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign failed. I'm a big fan of Hill, but if she wasn't able to get her house in order, I'm almost glad that she didn't get the nod. The United States has been operating without a Big Cheese that actually knows what's going on for too many years -- it's time for someone who knows what they're doing to run the show.

Morning Hot Flash August 12, 2008

• My current must-see television show is "House Hunters International." I might have missed this episode...
  


• Arianna's got one. Tina's got one. Now Bonnie's gotta get one.

• I started this blog to celebrate women over 40, but this morning, I've got a few bones to pick with some ladies. I'd rather hear about these women than listen to what they have to say. Alanis Morrisette, who is currently in her mid-thirties, wants to talk to us about aging. I must say, I love Alanis when she's singing angry songs, but I do feel that her telling me about aging is like me giving Michael Phelps a few tips that might improve his swimming. Celebrity stylist and another under 40 chick Rachel Zoe -- her clients include the most talented and troubled members of young Hollywood -- says that sometimes she forgets to eat. Thanks! For those of us who aren't on drugs -- that is not an option. And then there's the lovely and tragic Lynne Spears. She's the mother of the talented child actors Britney Spears and new mom and eleventh grader Jamie Lynn Spears. Lovely Lynne wants you to buy her book to understand how hard her life has been. I'm without words.

• I don't know what disturbs me more about this article. That a man thinks that women want to read about how he left his wife to date "hip-hop intellectual twentysomethings" or that Elle magazine paid him and published the article. Or, is it that I'm so old that I'm not supposed to be reading Elle magazine anymore, so I shouldn't know how people view women who are over 40 and single...Or...well I'll stop there because I think I could go on and on for a while. And I'll just get more angry and more angry...and I really am trying to be happy and upbeat this morning. Happy and upbeat...it'll catch on eventually.

• Just to make sure that I leave you laughing, I leave you with this little gem from The Onion. No one does it better.

Extra Tit-Bits

• When I first saw this photo, all I could think was there, but for the grace of God, go I...but then I realized that not even the grace of God can hold me back when it comes to George Clooney. I pray that on the day that I give chase, I'm wearing better hair and a better dress.

• These are my kind of people.

• The argument in the newsroom this morning is how to pronounce the name of the whore...oops...the lovely woman...that John Edwards had an affair with...The AP says it sounds like Riley. Maureen Dowd thinks it rhymes with teal...Your thoughts?

• I have no words for this. I ask only that if you take the challenge and write a caption that you email me and let me enjoy a brief giggle.

Morning Hot Flash August 11, 2008

• Sorry I missed you on Friday. My schedule was thrown off because I attended a cool digital conference. I'm back and it's Monday, so it's time for the morning sing-along with one of the guys who could be the next President of the United States.

• I have a new favorite spot: Synchronized Diving.

• Which is harder to believe -- that John Edwards had an affair or that the National Enquirer doesn't actually make up all the stories that it prints? I know. I'm still on the fence.
  

• Here is the house where you wished you and your family spent their summer vacation when you were a kid. It would be the perfect place for the kick-off of a great kids' adventure novel...in the middle of dark foggy night...a pirate ship runs around...

• Do you Twitter? If you do this will be interesting to you. If you don't,why not?

• I thought when Paul McCartney got rid of the golddigger...I'd at least get my chance.

• Is this proof that The Rules works? You decide.