Everything is bigger in Texas

So I feel like I might hit this guy next to me on the plane. He plops his happy a** down in the middle seat next to me in the exit row (on a NOT full flight)and goes "ahhhhhhhhhh leg room ..." Then after we reach 10,000 feet he whips out his laptop and Blackberry and plugs his earbuds in his ears and starts tapping his unlaced sneakers and banging his hands on his laptop like it's a set of drums a la Kerry Smith. 

I got a bunch of stuff in my head I need to get out. Get out of my head you things!!

First of all ... drinking. Why do I do it?? It eats my money, it makes me feel like ca-ca. And yet I do it. Makes me wonder if I'm an alcoholic. My dad is, I'm pretty sure and I know it's genetic. I don't feel like it's that I need it, it's just that i have a hard time saying no to it. I keep telling myself I'll stop drinking for a bit to test the theory and it never happens.

Next ... I am so not getting any younger and there is SO MUCH I want to do with my life and I feel like it's getting away from me. But so much of it revolves around money. How do I change that? First, I want to own a house. That requires a SUBSTANTIAL amount of money. And I have none. And I have shitty credit. And the credit thing is such a HUGE mountain I just generally run from it rather than even try to start heading up it... Second, I want to travel. And I want to travel like crazy. But that requires money but is easier before we have kids. Kids need to come soon and so does owning a house, but then where does the travel come in? And where does the money from from to fund it? Not only do I want these big things but there's just very little things even that I don't have the money for right now ... like rabies shots for my dogs, preventatives for my dogs, little music things josh needs...ugh I need to make a list so if I do stumble upon money I know where to spend it. I just see people spend money all the time on things to treat themselves and I just don't have it. I've been traveling for 2 months now and I'd love a nice massage. I don't even have $40 to spare on a massage. But even so, I think I'd forgo the massage and save the $40 toward that awesome cruise from Europe to Galveston in October that I'm dying to take. Geezus we sure do not have enough money. 


And alright haters ... I watched the Royal Wedding yesterday and I cried. I'm crying right now thinking about it. A lot of people are raggin on the people who wanted to watch it or cried at it. They don't seem to see what the big deal is. I think for a lot of girls it's what we always dreamed of growing up. We watched, read and believed in fairy tales. We believed that someday our prince would come. And not that we don't have princes in our lives, but this guy is an honest to God friggin price. And she just became a princess. Every girl wanted to be a princess growing up. Not only that but not gonna lie ... I had a crush on Prince William growin up. And a small part of me thought there was some distance chance that I could meet him and become a princess. That didn't happen of course and I love my life but it's also party jealousy of the wedding they had. It was broadcast live on EVERY CHANNEL AROUND THE WORLD. Everything she wanted was at her feet because she was marrying into royalty. Everything was so perfect in the wedding and in her life, and she will live her life taken care of because she's a part of the royal family. She never has to work again. I heard someone say yesterday, "I wouldn't want that life." Are you kidding me??? I'd give my right arm to be taken care of financially for the rest of my life. Yes you are in the public eye and have public duties but it's not like you're having to work in a labor intensive industry or threatening your life on a daily basis. You have to make public appearances and be photographed. Oh the horror. 


Alright. At least this stuff is out of my head now. Now what?

I've had quite a few things make me smile in the last week... 


On my flight home from Houston last week I sat next to a guy who engaged me in conversation. Normally, to this I groan, but new-more-positive Lisa didn't groan and did converse with the guy. Once I told him who I worked for, I was getting ready to pull out my shield to protect me from the onslaught he was about to hurl at me. However I was pleasantly surprised when he had nothing but good things to say about AT&T. He told me that he's had our service for a while. Once I told him specifically what I do for the company, he went on to tell me "that is SO cool!" This alone gave me a huge grin, because I agree ... what I do is VERY cool. But then once I explained more about my job and how we train the retail store employees he told me that he's always had good service at our AT&T stores but that he has noticed over the last couple of years that the service has really kicked it up a lot. He said the service has gotten even better than it was. That again gave me a huge grin on my face. I explained to him our focus on the customer's experience and how that means more to us than making the sale. He said he has definitely noticed that with his experience in our stores. He then went on to ask me about more personal stuff and I shared my story of Josh and I, and how we met, our relationship, etc. He told me that he had gone to UT majoring in music and taught music for many years, as well as been parts of many bands. He told me that it was so awesome that I was so supportive of Josh and encouraged him to continue to pursue his dream and not get side tracked by taking other jobs. (Again, big smile). After talking to him about our wedding and plans for the future, the flight was coming to a close (short flight ... man I packed a lot in there!) and he told me that my stories made his night. And it made my night that he thought so much of what I do and how it affects the reps in our stores, as well as the kudos to me in my support of Josh and that he just loved hearing our story ... 


Then, on Wednesday, Josh was out working with Brandon and they were going to go fishing afterward. I was off on Wednesday, but I took it as an opportunity to get some cleaning and organizing done around the house that I'd been wanting to do. Josh called me in the afternoon to see what I was up to and I was in the middle of cleaning up the laundry area. Then after a while as I'm dancing through the house cleaning, Josh shows up. I asked him what he was doing and he said he came home because he thought I was upset when he talked to me on the phone. I told him that I wasn't upset and he didn't have to not go fishing for that anyhow. He said that I was more important than fishing and he didn't think I'd have told him if I was upset. I told him that I promise I would tell him and I probably just sounded irritated cuz I was having to hold the phone on my shoulder while cleaning. I was a little disappointed I didn't get to finish my organizing projects but it made me smiled that he cared that much and also cuz we could go to Mamacita's earlier for dinner. :) Hooray!




A couple of small things yesterday made me smile as well ... I was sitting next to an older lady. She was maybe 60-something. She was really well put together though. Looked very pretty, had on a cute little scarf, trendy little bags, and was reading a book on her iPad in a snazzy red leather case. The flight attendant comes up to get her drink order and she says "I'll take two miller lite beers please." LMAO!!!!!!! 
Wasn't expecting that! Maybe a glass of wine ... or a coffee ... but miller lite?!? WOW! So the flight attendant asks her "you do know this is a short flight right (like less than 10 min to consume your beverages)?" and she said "... yeah." And then just sat there and stared at the flight attendant like so what, I want 2 miller lites lol. So then the flight attendant suggests she start with just 1. So the lady says ok. HA! 


Then when I get to Houston, I get to Hertz and yet again my name isn't on the board. It's not so much that I care about that it's just that when I get in I want to get my car and get to the hotel and there is ALWAYS a long line to get to the rep at the Hertz counter. So I groan a little but then go oh well nothing I can do. So I wait patiently in line and when it's my turn I get to the counter and the lady pulls up my reservation. She gets my info and then says "Would a small SUV be ok Mrs. Peek?" ... and I pause for a second because I'm slightly confused about what is happening at the moment and then I say "yes ... yes it would." She tells me I'll have a Terrain, which eluded me at the moment what that was, gave me my paperwork and told me where to find my car. So I walk outside to stall 86 ... and find this ...


Oh and I got to hit the river on Sunday! I went with Tudy, Josh's bass player's wife. I got try out my new tandem tube. I bought it for the times when I go with friends and we always want to tie up so we can chat but then we get tangled. I thought this would be the perfect solution. 
Well it sounds good but the thing is like driving a bus down the river! But, the boys were going to be recording for a while so we took our time down the river. We enjoyed some beverages, the sun, some good convo, singing along to some songs playing on my phone (which was in it's completely waterproof OtterBox case!) and then finally emerged at the end of the trip 5 hours later! 
LOL.


 All in all it was a good week with lots of things that made me smile!

I learned this weekend that people will surprise you. My latest graduating class from new hire didn't wasn't overly outgoing, participating and didn't seem to be overly excited about me. On our final day in class, they presented me with a gift. There was a card that was personally signed with a little memo from each of them, candy and a $50 Target gift card. Holy crap! Did they really care after all? We also took a funny team photo and had fun and it looked like they were really enjoying themselves!


That same day, I went to Target at lunch to get them some graduation goodies and as I got into the line at the checkout I saw a woman throw her stuff down and rush over to an older man who was now sitting on a chair. Another lady came running around the corner with a bottle of Bayer from the medicine aisle that she'd just opened up to give him. The first lady was a nurse and was tending to the man, so the second lady decided it was okay to leave him with her. She did take the bottle of Bayer to the cashier and offer to pay for it, to which he said no (WOW). The nurse kept asking the man questions about his health and was very kind to him, introducing herself and politely asking if she could check his pulse and other things. He asked about the paramedics and she said they were coming and that she would stay with him until they got there. He told her she surely had somewhere else to be and she said "there is nowhere else I need to be that is more important than being here with you right now." And she stayed with him until the paramedics came. WOW. There really are still good people in the world.


People will surprise you ... 

I decided that I'm going to keep Peek-a-boo a blog about The Peeks and I'm going to keep this one for my personal posts. This can be a place for my personal thoughts, inspirations, and pearls of wisdom. 


As I was sitting at the gig last night, and a girl approached me to introduce herself, I felt myself thinking "oh boy, another one ... another person who I'm going to meet and never remember their name or having met them." I meet a lot of people going to Josh's gigs because first of all he knows a lot of people, but second of all people who like his music will come up and meet him and then he'll introduce me. 


Now on to my usual thought process ... I will never remember them or their name or having met them. Josh asks me all the time if I remember meeting someone and my answer is always no. So I think when it's time to meet someone new, why bother? I'm not going to remember them. Plus I really don't like being social at his gigs. I like going to watch him do what he loves. I don't go to socialize like other people do. In addition to that, I talk ALL DAY LONG for my job. After work I don't feel like talking, I just feel like sitting there!


So last night as I heard my self saying the same thing again inside my head, and slightly groaning inside as she reached out her hand to greet me, I shut those thoughts off for a minute and acted genuinely pleased to meet her. She told me a little about herself, and then told me all about how awesome Josh is and talked so highly of me and when a woman tried to hit on him the night before, he showed her his ring. She wanted me to know what a great guy I had. She then told me she had lost her husband in Iraq 2 years ago and was just now starting to get out of the house. I felt about this big after she said that. I'm a horrible human. Here I am dreading meeting this woman, and she was only meeting me to say nice things about Josh and I, and had suffered a terrible loss herself a couple years earlier. 


So I told myself last night, I'm going to stop being a B ... I'm going to happily meet people, even if I know I won't remember them later on, not only because it's the right thing to do, but because you never know who you're going to meet ... and maybe I will remember them one of these days. I know I'll remember her.

So I've been a little frustrated over the last month to say the least ... It all started almost a month ago on the 24th of August when my car got broken into one morning while I was at work and Josh's brand new $1500 guitar got stolen out of my car. It still hasn't been found ...

Gig night, only drank 2 drinks all night the rest was waters and diet cokes.

Tomorrow will be a bigger test... 2 bachelorette parties... Eeeeeeeeeee