Walking in Memphis

I headed to Memphis last weekend to visit my best friend from high school, Catherine, and her family. They just recently moved there from Raleigh and I was anxious to go see them in their new surroundings!


I've been to Memphis once before (maybe another time when I was really little but I don't remember) but only for the day but it goes down as one of my most fun trips in my career!! This is another instance where it's a sad, sad thing that I didn't blog back then because it would have been quite the post!! It was a trip to Graceland with POTUS 43 and Laura, and the Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. PM Koizumi was a HUGE Elvis fan and so Dubya decided to take him to Graceland on one of his visits to the US. I have never really had "Go to Graceland" on any bucket list but I got to go and cross it off in royal fashion. I was with them and Lisa Marie and Priscilla were there too. Our workspace was in the Elvis Car Museum which was sooo fun to be working right next to his cars! We got to go on the tour for free which was a good thing because I can't really imagine spending that much money to see his house. But it was fun nonetheless and at the end of the day PM Koizumi gave us all gold Elvis sunglasses!!

So since that visit to Graceland can't really be outdone or repeated, I decided I didn't need to go to Graceland with Catherine and her family. This weekend was about one thing- hanging out with them!! And that's what we did! I loved seeing their new house and just playing with the girls who are 4 and 1. The weather was a bit nasty 95% of the time I was there so it just forced us to stay inside and play and read books! I loved it!!! On Monday, we did go to the Memphis Zoo which was fun!! I had no idea we were talking about such a major zoo! There are one of four zoos in America that have pandas and they were actually out and about eating and playing while we were there!! We had a wonderful time walking around and looking at all the animals and the sun even came out in the afternoon!

We also met up with another friend of mine from high school, Shannon, and her boyfriend. Catherine and Shannon didn't know each other but it turns out that Shannon works at the same company as Jason (Catherine's husband) and we had a great time hanging out!! Maybe the four of them will hang out again in the future! We had some good barbecue but we missed going to Beals Street. I'm more than okay with that. It's not really my thing and I have to leave something to do the next time I'm in town!!

The trip was so fun and just a reminder of how blessed I am! Catherine and I have been friends since high school and I'm so blessed that we have been able to stay in touch and despite living far away and being in different life stages. I am so thankful for her and so many other friends that are in my life! Even if Lisa Marie and Priscilla had personally invited me over to Graceland, I would have still given Catherine and her family priority!! :)

P.S. I did get to see the King while I was in town. I had to meet Jason so he could take me to the airport and the best place to do that was in a parking lot of an Elvis souvenir shop. And within a few seconds of us being there, the King was walking to his Ford Taurus. I think it really was him!! But I wasn't quick enough to think to go get my picture with him!

Hola, el Presidente!

On Thursday, I saw POTUS again and frankly I was a little more focused on what he was saying and less distracted by the fact that I might have booked my wedding singer. It was also the first time that POTUS was taking questions from the media about Libya. I knew it was going to be a pretty big deal when I walked into the briefing room and there were approximately 1000 members of the Mexican press taking over the room!

I remember some of them from when el Presidente de Mexico (I have no idea if that is the right Spanish term. I took French in high school!) was here for his state visit last summer. So POTUS and the President of Mexico had another meeting and talked about all kinds of things like drug violence, immigration issues, trade, etc.

Each president took one question from their respective press corps. It used to be in these situations, that each president would take two questions each but not anymore. But the WH press corps has overcome this obstacle by tacitly agreeing to asking a multiple part question if you are called on. This time from the US side of things, the reporter of course asked about Libya but also surprisingly asked about the NFL players union strike. POTUS said he would hope they would work things out on their own because he has a lot of other things going on! It turns out that el Presidente de Mexico's wife is a huge NFL fan! Who knew?!?!

New Press Secretary/Wedding Singer

Wednesday was the first time I have seen POTUS all week. He's been kind of quiet all week, having meetings behind closed doors. But there is a new press secretary in the house, Jay Carney. I've actually known him for years when he used to do guest segments on the show I was an associate producer for. I mic'ed him up for years! I wish him the best of luck in his new job!

But that's not him behind the podium in the above picture. Yep, you're seeing it correctly. That's James Taylor!!!!! I got to meet him on Wednesday!!! He came to the briefing room and I got to talk to him!!! I even booked him to sing at my wedding!!!! (Well, sort of.)

No. I am not engaged. You didn't miss that announcement.

But let me back up and start from the beginning.

The real beginning. Well, like many Americans I have always loved James Taylor. I can't tell you how many times I've listened to his Greatest Hits. I love that CD!!! And for a long time, I've wanted James Taylor to sing for my wedding! At one point, I had a plan of marrying his son, Ben, so I could be sure that James would sing at my wedding. Well, Ben doesn't know that I exist and I have someone much more awesome in my life now so that plan went by the wayside. But having Sweet Baby James sing at my wedding has still been in my plans. :)

Well, fast forward to Wednesday when James Taylor was at the WH to receive his National Medal of Arts from POTUS. It was the first time in a while I had seen POTUS but I didn't care about him. I was just excited to be in the same room as James! POTUS said nice things about him and the other 19 winners of the Medal of Arts and the National Humanities Medal. (I didn't get one but I put it on the list of my life's goals!) And then POTUS handed out all the medals. I'll be honest. I didn't know who most of the people were. Lots of poets, authors, dancers. I obviously knew who Meryl Streep was but she wasn't there. And I knew who Harper Lee was but she wasn't there either. I was bummed about that because I wanted to tell her that her book was one of the few books I actually read completely in junior high and high school and actually liked. Oh well. I did recognize Quincy Jones. But the rest were poets and other artsy people. I guess if you're a world famous poet and you're getting a medal from POTUS, you don't care what you look like. Anyway, back to James. After it was all over, I went back to the booth and had a lot of work to do. But a few minutes later, one of my camera guys called to tell me that James was upstairs in the briefing room! So of course, I ran upstairs and started taking pictures of James. Soon, there were tons of reporters and photographers taking pictures and it turned into somewhat of a small press conference with James!! He was showing off his medal and chatting with us. I'm not sure exactly what he was saying but at one point things got too serious and James was pontificating about politics and POTUS. All I could think about was asking him to sing at my wedding!! So finally, I decided to jump in the discussion and yelled out, "James, will you play at my wedding??" Everyone just laughed! He said "Sure! When's the date?" Unfortunately, I don't have a date because I'm not engaged yet. Instead of just making up a date and discussing it with Brian later, I just said, "I'm not sure. But I can work around your schedule!" James said, "Ok, let me know!!!" Seriously, I think he agreed to it!! Once I do get engaged, after calling our parents, I think the next phone call will be to James!!! :)

Well, after all was said and done and James had agreed to be my wedding singer, I went back to work and just thought "Wow!! I just met James Taylor!! He might play at my wedding!" This was one of those days where I realize how cool my job is!! A few minutes later, I was giving one of our interns a tour of the briefing room and showed her the wall of the old swimming pool under the briefing room where everyone signs when they come to the White House. As we were leaving, I looked over and saw the fresh signature of my James!! It's hard to read in this picture but he said "Got my medal. Feel so proud" Signed James "Fire & Rain" Taylor. I'll guess I'll get him to give me a personal autograph at my wedding. Whenever that might be!!

Hearts, the Red-Eye, and More!

Wow! I can't believe that it's been two weeks since my last posting! I'm so sorry! Let me see if I can catch you up in a concise way. I'll let you know the good and the bad but I like to get the bad news out of the way and focus on the good!

THREE HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE PAST COUPLE OF WEEKS:

1) VALENTINE'S DAY:
Bad news: spent my first Valentine's Day with Brian with twenty boys at basketball practice
Good news: Brian is an awesome guy!!

The last time I liked Valentine's Day was approximately 25 years ago when I was in elementary school and everybody sent everybody in the class a little Valentine and if you were lucky, someone went all out and put a piece of candy or a lollipop with their Valentine. Ever since then, I have not liked Valentine's Day. Beyond getting the annual cards from my mom and sister, I've never had a reason to be a big fan. This year was obviously different but I didn't want to put any pressure on poor Brian. On Valentine's Day evening, we had basketball practice with 7-8 year-olds and 11-12 year-olds. Not exactly how I was planning on spending our first Valentine's Day together. The good news was that the bar was pretty low so he really didn't have to do much to exceed my expectations. But he did such a great job!! Not only did he give me a card, chocolates, etc., he took me to Ruth's Chris steakhouse for a wonderful dinner on Sunday night. He had beautiful flowers delivered to me at work on Monday. And he had gifts for me on Monday night, including a beautiful sapphire/diamond necklace. He is such an awesome guy!! I told him he more than made up for all those other Valentine's Days and he really never need to go to such lengths again in the future (although who am I to turn down gifts?!?!)!!

2) TRIP TO PORTLAND:
Bad News: Commercial airline travel is for the birds
Good News: I got to see my friend Cindy!!

Last week, POTUS headed to the other coast for a couple of events in San Fran and Portland, OR. I skipped the San Francisco part and went straight to Portland for the extremely quick trip. The two down parts for this trip was that it was so short and there was no charter. As you know, I am not a fan of commercial travel but it's becoming increasingly clear that I will have to suck it up and deal with it because it's here to stay for the most part! At least I get the miles. But I continued by quest to be okay with commercial flights with a trip to Portland. It was a direct flight but I was in the back of the plane and in the middle seat. It's hard to change your attitude while sitting in seat 29E.

But Portland (and the entire Pacific Northwest) is such a beautiful part of God's landscape that I love being there. I had only been to Portland one time, almost three years ago, but I think it's a great place! POTUS had an event at the Intel factory. It involved the science and math fair with middle school and high school students and I'll be honest, I didn't understand pretty much anything they were talking about. Those kids are incredibly smart cookies. Some middle school girls were showing off their Lego Robots who were doing bio-medical engineering research. Seriously? You can make Legos into things that do research? And they were in middle school? Hello!! That's insane! I feel like I was a fairly bright middle school student and I can tell you that no one I know was doing that!!! Turns out they all have science coaches. Seriously? I didn't even know that existed! I think my parents failed me with not providing a science coach. I could have really accomplished things in life had I had one! :)

After the event was over, we tied up a few loose ends for work but we still had a few hours before our red-eye flight took off. So it turned out that I was only a few minutes from my friend Cindy's house!! My correspondent dropped me off in a random parking lot and I called Cindy for her to come find me. We had a great time hanging out for a few hours and she and her husband and son were such wonderful hosts! We had a lovely dinner and just had fun hanging out until it was time for me to find my way back to the airport. I just LOVE those friendship that can pick up right where we left off even though it's been years since we've chatted. I am sooo blessed by Cindy and other friendships exactly like that!

Oh and about the red-eye. I wanted to get back to DC in time for the weekend so taking the red-eye was my best bet. But I have to say... there's nothing pleasant about it, especially in the middle seat. I have long been proud of being able to sleep on a plane and drug myself appropriately. And I was well on my way to keeping that streak alive until about 3a when the man next to me, who was sleeping, moved his arms to stretch and in the process elbowed me pretty hard right in the face. Needless to say, that woke me up and unfortunately, I was never able to really get back to sleep after that. So call me mean or vindictive but once I figured out that I wasn't really going back to sleep, I decided to get up and go to the bathroom just to wake him up. I didn't really have to go. I felt slightly guilty about that but then the throbbing in my face took those feelings away rather quickly!

3) BASKETBALL SEASON:
Bad News: We didn't make the playoffs! :(
Good News: I'm a natural basketball player/coach!

As I've mentioned previously, this is my first year coaching youth basketball. I use the word "coach" very loosely. The season is almost over but I have had more than a girl's fair share of basketball in the past couple of weeks. It's a really good thing that I actually like the game. And after spending the past few months under Coach Brian's tutelage, I actually understand what is going on. And I've seen a TON of games in the past couple of weeks- at least a dozen games since the last post! For our youth teams, only the older kids have a playoff and the sad news is that we didn't quite make it. We lost our game last weekend which was the determining factor. But the kids played hard and Coach Brian's strategy almost worked. Tomorrow is our last game for both teams plus the end of the season celebration. Both teams will have winning records at the end of the season. Last year, Brian's little kids' team never won a game and only scored 8 points the whole season. This year, they lost the first two games (still scoring more than 8 points) but have won all the rest of them. I'd like to say that I'm the differing factor and can take all credit for their success this season. But that wouldn't be true. Except for the snacks. I will take partial credit for those!

And while I'm talking about basketball, Brian and I have been shooting baskets at the gym after our workouts lately. And part of that is a free throw contest. Best out of 10. Keep in mind that I have never played basketball before. I have gotten 7 out of 10 shots more than once!!! Not even cheating!! Seriously!!! I really think I might have missed my calling and could have been a WNBA star!! Maybe next week I'll work on my dunking!

Working on the Low Wave?

Lately at the White House, POTUS has been hiding a bit. Not hiding from anything particular. But just not as many open press events in the past couple of weeks. Usually when he's come out to cameras, it's been about Egypt and all of those speeches/remarks are carefully planned out. It reminds me of the weight of any POTUS's words, no matter what the subject!

So I was at the WH for a few days this week and only saw him once. That's when he was coming home from a trip to Marquette, Michigan. I think he was actually happy to be home considering it was 5 degrees on the Upper Peninsula and it was a warm 34 degrees here. Maybe even 37! It was the same day that Egyptian President Mubarak stepped down so of course we shouted questions to him as he exited Marine One and walked across the lawn. He, of course, ignored the questions and went straight inside to meet with his National Security Team. But on his way by, he waved to me. Well, it might not have been completely directed to me alone but it was a start. It's no low-wave like POTUS 43 but baby steps!!
Also, on Thursday when I got to work, I was told that I was the pool for the VPOTUS event of the afternoon. I was caught a little off guard but recovered. :) You see, with POTUS events, we always know when we are pool for the day. It's a simple 5-day rotation so I can tell you when we'll be pool until the end of time (only if no other networks join the pool!) But with VPOTUS, it's on an ad-hoc basis. Not really but the ins-and outs of how that works is just too much inside baseball. It's just not on a regularly scheduled basis. So if I had known, I would have dressed up just a little bit more to be the one person representing the US media in the event. It wasn't like I was wearing pajamas bottoms and a ratty T-shirt. I always make sure I am not wearing jeans and I am presentable when I work at the WH. You just never know when you might get called on to go into the Roosevelt Room for an event with some world leaders. This event was only a photo-op with the Prime Minister of Slovenia. I attempted to ask VPOTUS a question on Egypt but he ignored me too. He heard my question. He just chose to not answer it. Instead, he and the PMoS talked about the Balkans and working together with the European Union. Blah, blah, blah. (No offense to any Balkan friends out there... it just wasn't newsy!) The funniest part of the event was when the PMofS joked that he could create a controversy so that VPOTUS could visit Slovenia again. I think there is enough world news going on that creating news isn't necessary!

A Trip to Happy Valley

For those who know me (and even those who don't), you know I am a die-hard Hokie fan. Nothing will ever change that. I truly believe that it was God's will for my life to go to school at Virginia Tech and I value my education and cherish the friendships that began there. So just to make clear, I still love the Hokies.

But in the last six months or so, I've come to learn that there is in fact more than one awesome school in the U.S. :) as Brian has introduced me to one of his alma maters, Penn State. Honestly, the only thing I knew about PSU before I met Brian is that Joe Paterno is the football coach. I think pretty much everyone in America knows that so I had a lot to learn. But now I have grown to become a Nittany Lion fan (second to the Hokies, of course!). I've been to Penn State twice- once for a football game and once when Brian gave a lecture to a bunch of smart engineering grad students. And during my those trips, I've really come to like it. Really, it's for one reason...

Penn State reminds me a lot of Virginia Tech!! They are both big schools (PSU is bigger). Blacksburg and State College are very similar towns. Both schools have huge football programs (I'd argue the Hokies are better!) with longstanding coaches (Frank has a waaaaaays to go to catch up with Joe Pa.) Both have mascots that people have to ask about. "What is a Hokie?" or "What is a Nittany Lion?" Both have four syllable cheers at football games. "Let's Go! Ho-kies!" or "We are! Penn State!" Both have great engineering and agricultural science programs. And even two of my favorite COMM professors from VT now teach at PSU.

So this week, I was super excited to learn that POTUS was going to visit Penn State! And even more excited when I learned that I got to go! It would have been a lot more fun if Brian had been able to take the day off and come with me but I still had a great trip. First of all, on paper, things didn't look good. Instead of chartering a plane, the networks and press chartered a bus. That left DC a little after 4a. Yeah, that's early. That involves setting an alarm for sometime in the 2AM hour which is just ridiculously early. And it was a four hour bus ride with my colleagues. But in all reality, it wasn't bad at all. Setting the alarm was the most painful part of the process. I ended up sleeping most of the way to the Happy Valley which made me very happy. And when I woke up, I actually recognized how close to campus we were!

POTUS showed up a few hours after we got there (he obviously didn't have to take a four hour bus ride!) and toured some lab with a lot of smart stuff going on about thermal technology and energy efficiency. Those engineers weren't the same kind of engineer that Brian is so I'm a little clueless to what they were talking about. (Actually, even if they had been the same kind of engineer as Brian, I would probably have still been clueless!!)Then he came to Rec Hall to give a speech on energy efficiency. The speech was uneventful except that Joe Pa was there. And the most significant thing was that Rec Hall was one of the buildings where Brian played a lot of intramural basketball during his time in school! It had been part of the Brian-tour when I first visited campus! I don't think that's why POTUS chose to speak there but you never know!!So here was my favorite part of the day: When we got there, I asked the presidential advance person if we were going to get ice cream from the Creamery. He didn't know what I was talking about. You see, this might be the one way that Penn State far exceeds Virginia Tech. PSU is known for the Creamery which is a student-run ice cream (and dairy) store. After football games, people line up for blocks to get some! Anyway, they teach classes on how to make ice cream (and other dairy products)!!! If VT had that, I'm not sure my career path would have been the same!! And it's sooo yummy. When we were there in October, I had the best pumpkin pie ice cream ever!! So I strongly suggested to the WH aides that we needed some in the workspace. And lo and behold, a few minutes later I get the message delivered. "Becky, your delivery will be at 1p." Talk about serious power!!! Well actually, they brought three enormous tubs of ice cream- chocolate, vanilla, and a flavor called "Alumni Swirl" which had blueberries and chocolate chips. I guess real power would have been to have my own personal serving of pumpkin pie ice cream but I guess beggars can't be choosers!! :) But the opportunity to enjoy the Creamery's ice cream once again (even though it was 23 degrees outside) made this trip go down as pretty darn cool!!

Watching from afar...

I'm really bummed that this blog didn't exist back in 2007, when I went to visit my friend Kristen, who was living in Cairo at the time. I started the blog in May of that year and I went to Egypt in March. That's too bad because I have so many awesome memories from that trip and trust me, there would have been several really cool blog posts from back then. I feel like I've blogged a little about Egypt before but I can't find it in the archives. So bear with me if you have already read this and just treat me like the little old lady who can't remember anything and tells the same story over and over.

Anyway, fast forward to now, and I'm watching the coverage of the crisis in Egypt through a totally different lens than normal. I actually recognize (or at least I think so) many of the places where those the historical protests are taking place. And even if it's not the exact same place that I have in my mind, it's similar enough.

I absolutely loved being in Egypt for my vacation. My friend Kristen was such a gracious host and we had THE BEST TIME! We took in all the tourist attractions which provided lifelong memories and quite possibly the top of the list of cool things I've done in my life. Of course we saw the pyramids and climbed all over them. Saw the Sphinx. It was all surreal. I felt like I was on some movie set and had to keep reminding myself that it was real. We rode camels around the pyramids which was quite honestly perhaps the coolest thing I have ever done!
We went to the Egyptian Museum which was exceptionally cool. The stuff in there is OLD. I mean ANCIENT. There were rooms and rooms of things from 2000 BC or 2 AD. I'm used to going to a museum where the "old" things are from the 1700s and this place didn't have anything so new! This stuff was around when Moses was alive. It's almost too much for me to really grasp!! To be honest, at first glance, it seemed like an unorganized garage. Huge sarcophagi all around mixed with some other artifacts. And you could touch the stuff. Very few glass barriers. In fact, one family was having a picnic on some old tomb from B.C. It was crazy!!
They have an exhibit there that we paid a couple of extra Egyptian pounds to see which was well worth it. They have a dark room with a dozen or so mummies in there. Not only are we talking old but old and famous. Like the kings from the Old Testament. I was so saddened to hear that there was some looting in the museum over this weekend due to a handful of protesters and they cut the heads off of two mummies. I mean, it obviously didn't kill the mummies and I'm guessing you can just glue them back on but it just made me sooo sad that this treasure chest of history wasn't respected.

As Egyptians gather for the protests, I think I know where they are. I got to see real Egypt while I was there. I rode the subway in an all female car, shopped at their bazaar, went to their fast food restaurants, had coffee at their cafes. I thoroughly enjoyed their culture and would have never come close to seeing all of that had I been on some type of tour and even more so, had I been there for work.

More than the tourist attractions and doing every day normal things like Egyptians, the thing that stood out to me the most were the people. While I stood out from the crowd with my blond hair and received several stares in my travels, the majority of people were really friendly. These people I met represent the real people of Egypt. Many of whom are protesting for real change.*

I floated down the Nile on a felucca (Egyptian boat) on two different occasions. The sun setting on the Nile was breathtaking!! But on one of those trips, it was just Kristen and me and man running the boat. I don't remember much about him or quite frankly having a long conversation with him (there was obviously a language barrier!) but I talked to him long enough to hear about his family and his many kids. I saw families like his living in a small boat on the Nile, washing out their clothes. Clearly this man was doing his best to provide for his family.
I also met a young woman (I can't remember her name since it's been almost 4 years!) who Kristen had known during her time living there. We were invited up to her apartment for Kristen to say good-bye to (she was moving back to the States the same day I was ending my vacation.) Since we were inside her home, she didn't have to cover her head and her beautiful hair flowed all the way down her back. She was married and I believe her mother lived with them or nearby or something. It was clear that she and her husband were fairly well-off and they lived a rather comfortable life. I got to hear about her life and some of the challenges she faced. I realized how different her life was from mine even though we were roughly the same age. She couldn't understand how I wasn't married because basically everyone her age is married in Egypt (and let's face it, pretty much around the world!!!). I remember she served me some awesome fruit juice while we talked and it was a really neat visit learning more about their culture.

Right after that, as we were leaving the building, Kristen said we had one more stop. We went to basically what can be described as the crawl space under the building. Under the building is where the building superintendent and his wife and several small children lived. It was dark, dirty, and dusty and frankly not a place where one would want to spend a lot of time. But the family was happy and so nice. The wife even fixed us tea and gave us a snack and we sat and talked for a while. They were so hospitable and the kids were running around playing. But it was definitely less than sanity living conditions. The father worked hard to provide what little his family had. It was a touching experience to say the least.

These people were just examples of those hard-working Egyptian people that I had the honor of meeting. And they are likely the kinds of people who are out on the streets protesting for a new form of government. I won't express an opinion on what the US government should or shouldn't do but watching it does make me thankful for being able to live in the United States where I am thankful for true democracy and the rights that we have. It also makes me long for the same for the people of Egypt.

*Obviously I have no way of knowing if any of these actual people actually have been protesting in the past few days. And clearly I have no idea what their feelings towards their government are and honestly I have no way of finding out.