In case you were wondering, The Runaways? Not a good movie. It had no point. And The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was just strange. But Brad Pitt is NICE to look at (when he’s his own age, of course).
Last thing: the color of Cate Blanchett’s hair in that movie is what I was aiming for (and missed by so so much) when I dyed mine three summers ago. If I were to ever try again, I’d go for that. Maybe a tiny bit darker.
I have really enjoyed my few days stuck at home. Really. Except for one field trip on Sunday with John, I haven’t left the house. I’m not saying I want to do this every day (I’d feel much better if I could go to my fun classes at the gym or run), but I kinda like not working. And I was SO productive. I finished one book, read two more, and started a third, spent countless hours cataloging the internet (kind of), watched several movies, including one today…what movie did I watch today? Seriously. I even liked it. Hang on.
The Recently Watched section in Netflix tells me I watched Desk Set today, a movie with Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy that I really liked, except for the dumb ending.
These are from several days ago, but you should watch them anyway.
Adorable ticklish baby penguin (Watch to the end. It’s short.)
And this is beautiful. My favorite part is near the beginning, when the movement of the clouds looks like ocean waves.
The Mountain from Terje Sorgjerd on Vimeo.
Sorry about all the short posts lately. I have the attention span of a gnat. Also, my face hurts. Although not as much as I was afraid it would. This whole procedure sounds more painful than it has turned out to be. Thank the whatever from high atop the thing. Seems like it would have been fairly simple, right?
Not so simple. Fake teeth don’t have roots. They have screws. Screws that have to be longer than the roots because, I don’t know, they just do. And in order for the new fake tooth to be sturdy, the screw has to be completely surrounded by bone. Can’t have the end of it sticking out in space. It wouldn’t be as sturdy. (What space? Right, the space in the sinus cavity above my teeth and behind my cheek.) The solution is to fill in some of the space with bone. I didn’t ask where they got the bone. Maybe I should have. Anyway, that’s what they did. My sinus cavity is not as big as it once was, and I have a screw sticking out of the hole where my molar used to be. Once it heals completely (about four months), I’ll get a nice new fake tooth.
In the meantime, I get several days on the couch. I’ve watched movies (Whale Rider – good, Saint Ralph – good), lots of TV (catching up on Scrubs and The Good Wife), started watching Harry Connick, Jr’s latest concert DVD (In Concert on Broadway – my good buddy Geoff Burke is in it! Very exciting. (I realize that seeing him play from 3 feet away for an hour and than talking to him for a grand total of maybe 15 minutes at the bar does not a best-friendship make (wait – I haven’t told you about that yet), but don’t think I won’t use every connection I can think up to get backstage the next time Harry is in town. Besides, he was cool. And really good.)), and played on the internet. A lot. And I finished my book (The Forever War). It was very good (as expected). I’d been looking for it in used bookstores everywhere I went, but couldn’t find it, so I finally bought it new. I’m glad I did. The latest edition has a foreword by John Scalzi, who has quickly become my favorite contemporary science fiction author. And blogger.
I’m rambling, so I’m going to quit here and soak up some of this sun before it dissolves into more torrential rain (yesterday was CRAZY with the rain) and read my book on the deck.
I don’t think I should be awake more than about 16 hours in a row. Yesterday, we were up for 20 hours, and I’m completely worn out and was pretty much useless today. We got up way too early for a Saturday to meet Jess at a book sale in Annapolis (which was awesome – we came home with over a hundred books for a little over a hundred bucks), came home home in the early afternoon and sorted those books for a couple of hours, and then went into DC to meet John’s mom and sister for dinner. I think it was around 1am when we got home.
I spent about half of today in front of the fire with my book and the dogs. I’m getting better at keeping the fire going; I don’t always have to call for John when it dies down a little. I’m still not that great at it, though. It’s all trial and error – poke this log, turn that one over, move the other one over there. Reminds me of learning to sail. I never could figure out when I was supposed to tighten or loosen lines. I just tried it one way, and if that didn’t work, I tried the other way. I didn’t actually learn anything. I’m surprised I ever managed to bring the boat back to the dock.
I’m done with winter, I think. Much as I enjoy days in front of the fire, I’m really not okay with nights where the low is 7 degrees. 7! I just revised my exercise plan for tomorrow. Inside, inside, inside.
For those of you keeping an eye on what I’ve been watching, we finally finished Firefly (we’d put it on hold because we didn’t want it to be over) and then watched Serenity (which I think wouldn’t have made sense to anyone who hadn’t seen Firefly, but we liked it), the BBC version of Life of Mars is really good (I’ll watch anything if it’s got DCI Hunt in it – we haven’t seen the US version yet), and TRON: Legacy has no plot.
i bought myself a present. I finally own a copy of Holiday Inn, which I am watching right now. Other than that, I’ve got nothing for today.
Well, something. If you like Russell Brand, you will probably like Tim Minchin.
With that, I’m off to finish my book. It’s somewhat entertaining (Connie Willis’s book is MUCH better), but I’m ready for it to be over. I need to finish it so I can read something else. Before Christmas. Ooh, there’s a thought. What books are coming with me on our trip? That’ll be fun to plan out.
Thought of something else. John Scalzi posted his third list of ten things he’s done that you probably haven’t. I can only think of one off the top of my head: I have crossed every single line of longitude on the globe, all by ship (except for the width of the US – I did that twice in a car, a few more times by plane).
And now for some geek humor (thanks to The Daily What (and FoxTrot, of course) for the comic).
After hearing their version of “Let It Snow” on Pandora the other day (last weekend, maybe?), I bought The Four Freshmen album, “Snowfall”. It’s my new favorite Christmas album. I’m listening to it now, relaxing a little before bed. We had a very busy, productive day, starting with a long-overdue visit with Erik and Margaret. We met for lunch and moved on to Barnes and Noble, chatting about their wedding plans, puppies, travel, wedding music, wedding dresses, and Calvin and Hobbes, among other things. John and I bought road maps and travel guides for our trip, and then we went shopping for new weather-proof winter coats. We both ended up with coats with zip-out fleece liners (’cause it just makes more sense), but I fell in love with the new Columbia Kaleidaslope jacket.
Trust me, it’s way more flattering on than in the picture. I tried on the large, and it was perfect. And SO warm. I’m very happy with the coat I got, but can’t I have both? I need this one, too, right? Or, you know, not. I’ll live. The point of today’s shopping, though, was to get us that much closer to ready for our trip. Which we’re very very very excited about.
We got home much later than originally planned and settled in for dinner and our annual viewing of Love Actually. Which got interrupted (but in a good way) when Corey called. We’d been trying to connect all day, so I put the movie on hold (to be continued tomorrow) to talk to Brother of Mine. Also long overdue.
Speaking of Christmas, and thanks to nn.c, here’s a link to a bunch of Christmas-themed photos from around the world. My favorites are the skiing Santas and both of the ones of Santa runners.
Conversation before dinner tonight:
John: “It’s going to be a reboot.”
Me: “Okay. So it’s a reboot…”
John: “A reboot. It’s when they retell the origin story.”
Me: “I know what a reboot is.”
John: “Then why did you ask “what’s a reboot?””
Me: “I didn’t. I said, “It’s a reboot.””
John: “That’s what she said.”
Okay, John didn’t really say that last part. In case you were wondering, we were talking about the new Superman movie. The fact that it’s a reboot is the only thing I know about it. That, and it isn’t out yet. And the guy who played Superman in the last movie isn’t going to be in it. And the guy who directed Watchmen is directing it. (I think.) So I know four things about it. And now you do, too.
You’re welcome.
Reboot looks and sounds ridiculous to me now. Like I can’t spell (or say) robot. Like the Jack In the Box commercial where the scary guy with the giant ping pong ball for a head can’t say chipotle and his mouth turns to a squiggly line. (Chipotoplay always makes me laugh.)
I was afraid to eat there, but I liked the commercial.
We watched Away We Go tonight. LOVED it. If you haven’t seen it, see it. Right now. Drop everything. Go. Watch it. There was one scene that made us cheer.
Anyway, it’s Friday, and we have cheesecake (dulce de leche cheesecake – the Cheesecake Factory is a wonderful place), so, um. Bye.
The Men Who Stare at Goats is a weird, weird movie. I liked it.
Remember that navy blue shirt I love but is such a pain to iron? I bought another one today, in a perfect dark red, kind of a maroon-ish color. Matches my toenails. And I love the way it fits. I knew I needed another one when I was so disappointed to realize I couldn’t wear the one I had yesterday because it was waiting to be washed. I might also have picked it up in black. This is what I do – find something that looks really good and buy it in two or three colors. I guess I’ll just have to iron more often.
I saw a ton of wildlife (well, more than usual. Maybe not a ton. Half a ton.) today. On my way back from the winery, I saw a groundhog hanging out in the middle of the road. He was smart enough to scurry off into the grass before I got too close. A little closer to home, I saw a deer bound six feet into the air to clear a fence and run into the woods. That was really cool. Cleared the fence by two feet, at least. You know, it might have been a fawn. I thought I saw white spots on its back, and if I learned anything from Bambi, it was that adult deer don’t have spots. That, and tell your mother you love her every time you see her ’cause you never know when the hunter is coming. Bambi’s kind of messed up. (The movie and the poor deer.) Anyway, while I was at the winery (Hidden Brook – they have John’s favorite sweet rosé and they’re really nice), another kind of wild animal showed up: the all-too-common-at-wineries-on-weekends bachelorette party. This party had clearly already been to several other wineries. They had a bus with a driver and were taking advantage of it, and when they walked in the door at Hidden Brook, the guitarist (there was a guitarist) had just gotten to the line “lookin’ for my lost shaker of salt” from “Margaritaville”, and the 15 (20? There were a lot of them.) women in the bachelorette party all shouted, “Salt! Salt! Salt!” (There’s usually not a lot of shouting going on during wine tastings. There’s probably not a lot of wine tasting going on during Jimmy Buffet concerts, either.) The two employees behind the counter looked like they wanted to run out the back door. I did. Bachelorette parties + several wineries + driver = not my scene (unless I’m one of them).
Back to the subject, I saw a cute little lamb, too, standing a little ways away from the rest of the sheep, but farm animals don’t really count as wildlife, so never mind.
We watched Pretty People With Problems (that’s St Elmo’s Fire for those of you who haven’t seen most of VH1’s I Love the 80s shows) over the last couple of nights, and I found it really hard to like any of the characters. Emilio Estevez bugged me more than anyone else, but Demi Moore ran a close second. I’d like to take Andrew McCarthy home, though. Sad puppy dog eyes.
I could swear I’ve posted these two videos before (or at least linked to them), but I can’t find where, so here they are again.
First, from yesterday’s comments, a brilliantly edited trailer for Ferris Bueller’s Day Off that puts Cameron in the Ed Norton role from Fight Club. It’s awesome (and thanks to Greg for finding it).
Second, from several years ago, here’s the recut trailer for The Shining that makes the whole thing look like a feel-good movie. I always get nervous watching it, but trust me – there’s nothing scary here.
Third, this recut trailer for Mary Poppins that scares the *&^! out of me every time I see it. So much that I’m not watching it right now. I’ll post it, and I might watch it when the sun is shining, but certainly not now. I keep going back to it, though, ’cause I love how terrifying this guy made Mary Poppins. It’s awesome.
Last, I have to share this link from Spokeit’s post today. The site is called Catalog Living, and the woman who runs it posts pictures from Pottery Barn catalogs and tells the story of the people who live there. The one who live in the catalog. They (the people who live in the catalog) are totally passive-aggressive, and the site is completely hilarious. These two are my favorites (one and two) so far.
Thanks to Dooce’s archives, I have songs and scenes from The Little Mermaid stuck in my head. Speaking of her archives, though, sometime back in late 2007 (maybe early 2008), she pointed her readers to this site, created by a woman who rescued a baby coyote and raised it. More importantly, she posted adorable pictures of the tiny thing. I haven’t looked around that much yet, so I don’t know how she handles the issues that most likely came up as she raised a wild animal, but it must have been interesting.
From Nancy Nall’s post today, I found (and came late to the party, apparently, but that’s not unusual for me) I Write Like, which supposedly compares your writing samples to those of famous authors. I plugged in a blog post from a week ago or so, and found that
Well, that’s pretty cool, but maybe it’s because I just finished reading an Agatha Christie mystery. So I plugged in a different blog post and got
Again, I can live with that. So I plugged in another post. Mario Puzo. Hmm. Another post: Vladimir Nabokov. Um, yeah. So I agree with Nancy – it’s gotta be random. Fun, but not enlightening. I googled it and found this from a NYT blog. End of story, I think.
Zoot alors, I have missed one!
It rained all night last night. A welcome change, and really soothing to fall asleep to (several times, since I woke up a few times last night). We woke up at 7 this morning to find it still pouring, so running was out of the question. We found ourselves breakfasted and in the basement before 9am, and we spent a good hour making some donation and trash decisions. We’re not done getting rid of the crap in the basement, not by a long shot, but we made a sizable dent. (That looks weird. Sizable. Sizeable? Still weird.) Around 10:30, I went to Costco for Roxy’s medicine and then to Target (yeah, I know – again), and I was supposed to be home before noon so we could leave at noon to meet Erik and Margaret for lunch and a movie. Well, you know how Target is. I got sucked in, and it was almost noon when I got in the car to come home and get John. So we were late. I hate being late, but this time I can’t blame anyone by myself (sorry again, guys!). It didn’t help that I got off the toll road going the wrong way on 7 and had to turn around and THEN wade through the normal traffic in the area. Lunch (at Maggiano’s) was good, but it was more about catching up with E&M, who we hadn’t seen since mid-May, and that was much-needed and much fun. After the movie (Knight and Day – the first half was funny and pretty entertaining. The second half was okay, but less fun.), I bought a new wallet (a nice red, big, adult-type wallet to replace my falling-apart, overstuffed, tiny little wallet that gets lost in my purse and was meant to only hold the bare necessities but got drafted into full-time use because I don’t know why), and we came home, checked on the dogs (they’re fine), and did geeky website things together (I updated my Pages section. See?). Tomorrow might not be so productive, but you never know.
We have had the nicest day. We got up a little on the early side, went for a run – that reminds me. I had just started the last mile, I was on my way home, I’d been enjoying my run and the beautiful morning, and then I ran into my old boss. NOT someone I wanted to see. We were fake-polite to each other for a few minutes, but that was long enough to really irritate me and put a damper on the rest of my run. I got over it, though. We took care of the lawn and the weeding, went out to lunch, spent a few minutes browsing in Best Buy, and then we came home and started watching the USA-England World Cup match. We stopped about an hour in to go to the movies (Get Him to the Greek – very funny), and now we’re back and we’re watching the rest of the game. The noise in the stadium is kinda weird. Like it’s a crowd of angry bees, not people. Maybe a swarm of irritated kazoos.
They’re all so cute. Must be a requirement. Part of the tryout. You can run, you can kick, you can do whatever else it is soccer players have to do, and you’re good-looking. You’re in. Have you seen these guys? Particularly Bocanegra (captain of the US team) and Green (goalie for England). Very attractive guys.
I watched City Hall tonight, a political thriller from the mid-90s with Al Pacino and John Cusack. It was…okay. I think it might be better than that, but I couldn’t get past John Cusack’s bad accent. I love John Cusack, I really do, but he can’t do accents. His Louisiana drawl was in and out and when it was in, it sounded ridiculous. Really distracting.
I’m going to bed extremely early tonight (like in half an hour), hoping to sleep well and get up early. Two alarms. And maybe a wake-up call.
“Googley-elmo” totally made watching two hours of John Cusack’s bad accent worth it. (Yes, I know they’re not related.) Can’t. Stop. Laughing.
Doesn’t this make you want to go to Iceland? (I’m being sincere, I promise.)
Inspired by Iceland Video from Inspired By Iceland on Vimeo.
Will it be all sunshine and flowers from now on? Let’s go with yes. Why be realistic when I can be optimistic? Seriously, that weight on my shoulders? Gone. I’m not saying I love my job or anything now, but holy hand grenade of Antioch, do I feel better.
I don’t ever want to go here. I had nightmares after Jurassic Park and I was half-convinced raptors were going to leap through my bedroom window and kill me, so a forest full of dinosaurs and GIANT SNAKES is not the place for me.
Curiosity blames her absence on Nicholas Cage. Lots of things can be blamed on him. I’m just glad she’s back.
One last thing: the last paragraph of this review of the new Robin Hood movie made me laugh. Twice.
Now I’m going to bed. Sorry for the choppy post. (I tried to call it a chippy post. Not sure what that means, exactly, but my spellcheck thinks it’s a word.)
Okay, we finished Lost. The whole thing was worth it for Sun/Jin and Sawyer/Juliet. I cried at both. We also saw the new Robin Hood movie today (stupid, but fun). And we started catching up on Glee. Lots of TV today. But that’s not all we did. We mowed, weeded, mulched, and pruned, and after that, we went to Borders. Busy day.
I gave the dogs a little bit of leftover turkey from my sandwich (Wegman’s sub – SO good), and they’re drooling at (and on) my heels now. They’re not letting me out of their sight in case I have more goodies in my pockets. Smart dogs.
John thinks I should change my tag line from “What did you expect?” to “Because Non Sequitur was taken”. And now that I’ve checked, it’s not taken, and I wonder if I should buy it…
In honor of John, here are a few unrelated items:
As I dragged my suitcases from the baggage carousel to the train for the rental car counters, I followed a woman leading a doggie train across the street. Why didn’t I take a picture? I’m an idiot, that’s why. The woman had a rolling suitcase behind her, and attached to that, she had what looked like an overnight bag on wheels with mesh sides. The top was open and there were two little white dogs (Westies, maybe) checking out the surroundings. One was seated with just its head poking out, but the other was up on its hind legs, leaning on the front of the bag, craning its neck in every direction. One of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. They looked like they were riding on the caboose of a little train.
My last rental car (a Kia Spectra), while economy, had power everything. You know, the normal things (windows, locks, etc.). This one, a Chevy Aveo, has power NOTHING. Can you remember the last time you were in a car without power locks? Without power windows? My first car didn’t have power locks or windows, but it was an ’88 Corolla hatchback, not a 2009 Chevy four-door sedan, and I haven’t been in that car since…1997.
I finished the Lawrence Block book, The Burglar in the Library, last night before I went to sleep. That’s right – I liked it SO much I couldn’t put it down. Started it on the plane, finished it before I went to sleep. And as soon as I can find a used bookstore around here that’s open when I’m able to get there, I plan to buy several more of his books. And there are lots of used bookstores in Atlanta.
I started watching Marilyn Hotchkiss’ Ballroom Dancing and Charm School tonight, a movie I’m pretty sure John isn’t interested in. I am, but I can’t watch it now. It’s about a guy (Robert Carlyle) getting over the death of his wife. WHY would I want to watch a gut-wrenching, soul-twisting, tearjerker of a movie about a guy who’s lost his wife when I can’t be home with John? I wouldn’t, that’s right, so I’m turning it off. I’m going to curl up in bed with the next Dresden Files book ’cause a little light vampire-killing (or whatever monster he’ll go after in this book) is just what I need.
“Zannah, why haven’t you gotten me a Les Paul?”
“Clearly, I don’t love you enough.”
We watch a lot of TV. Not as many movies, but we’ve seen a few lately. We watched Broadcast News last weekend. Both of us confused it with Network (another one we haven’t seen), and we didn’t figure out that we were thinking of an entirely different movie until Broadcast News was over. Where was the rant? Oh, right. Wrong movie. We watched Some Kind of Wonderful tonight, but I was a little disappointed by it. I’m not sure what I was expecting.
List for this weekend:
Roxy (who’s doing well, thanks for asking) just gave me a look that said she wished we’d just go to bed already. Don’t we know we’re keeping her up?
*Edited to add the last two items on my list. I remembered them this morning.
John has a weakness for Cadbury Creme Eggs. Since Easter candy started showing up in stores, I’ve bought a handful every week for him. I figured today would be the last day to get any (and Wegman’s was, for once, a disappointment – no Easter candy in sight!), so after the grocery store, I headed to CVS to add a few more to the stockpile. An employee met me at the door, directed me to the candy aisle, and then helped me find the last Cadbury display. John owes that guy. His stash of creme eggs should last him quite a while.
We watched Up last night. Such a good movie. I don’t know what took us so long to see it. I need to add all Pixar movies to my birthday list. We have a couple (Toy Story, The Incredibles – love The Incredibles), but I’d like to have the others. We’re watching Inkheart right now. Well, we were watching it, but we took a break ’cause John’s mom called. I’d never heard of it, but we noticed it on HBO yesterday, and it has Paul Bettany in it (we like him), so we recorded it. It’s…entertaining. Not good. Kinda dumb brain candy. Paul Bettany’s good in it. 🙂 Huh. I just looked it up at imdb.com and found out that the woman playing Brendan Fraser’s wife was Colin Firth’s girlfriend in Love Actually. The one who cheats on him. Hate her. Who would cheat on Colin Firth? She must be stupid. (And fictional. What’s your point?)
