In my book, anyway. I didn't watch the red carpet coverage, so I'm only basing this from the dresses I saw onstage at the Oscars, but she was stunning from head to toe.
She reminded me of one of my favorite vintage Barbie dolls.
Am I the only one that thought it looked like Halle Berry had sideburns? She was still gorgeous. But I couldn't stop staring at the sideburns when she was onstage.
I don't have a lot to say about the Oscars. It was fairly boring, per usual. The Inception intro was entertaining. I thought Anne Hathaway was charming, while James Franco fell flat. At least my girl Natalie Portman won. I love her career choices.
If you're interested in owning any of the films nominated for Best Picture, you could shop at my store. Just sayin'.
Saturday night I sunk into the blue recliner, tucked myself under the red velor throw blanket, set my bowl of popcorn on my lap and my glass of Strawberry-Banana Fruit Smoothie Splash V8 juice on the side table.
I was set for a long evening in front of the screen watching The Social Network and Winter's Bone with my husband and the fur babies, Oliver and Gizmo, lap kitty and lap dog, respectively.
Just 30 minutes into The Social Network, the disc froze. Aaron tried cleaning into to no avail. Thanks a lot, Netflix! I was disappointed since this meant I wouldn't get a chance to finish the movie before the Oscars, but I wasn't engrossed in the film. It's hard to enjoy a film with such an unlikable main character. Was Mark Zuckerberg a total dick, or what?
Frustrated, we moved onto Winter's Bone. Honestly, I really didn't know much of anything about this film. And, I didn't realize that in the film, Jennifer Lawrence looks so very much like my friend Amanda's little sister, Katie. The three of them could be sisters, with Jennifer and Katie as twins. Uncanny, and a bit distracting at first since the movie begins very slowly.
Lawrence plays Ree, a 17-year-old Ozark Mountain girl from a rough, meth-selling family. Ree takes care of her two younger siblings and depressed, shell of a mother. Her father put their home and land up as bond, but he's missing. If he doesn't show for his court date, her family will lose their home. Ree goes "huntin" for her father, trying to track him down through her extended, lawless family. No one wants her sniffing around, but she's determined to uncover the truth about her father, despite threats of physical harm.
Winter's Bone is raw and bleak. It opens your eyes to the real poverty Americans live through every day in the rural Missouri mountains. Ree teaches her young siblings to shoot squirrel for dinner. They have nothing else. Her family is vicious and hateful. They are like a mob family -- the poorest, trashiest mob family to ever live. The movie will haunt you. It aims to.
I’m behind on my movie-watching and more so on my movie-reviewing. I hope I find the time to watch both The Social Network and Winter’s Bone before the Academy Awards on Sunday, but it’s going to take some real dedication on my part to put other responsibilities aside in favor of this mini resolution…
My brief thoughts on Black Swan and The Kids Are All Right.
Black Swan
Loved it. Even though I haven’t seen all the best actress nominated films, I’m rooting for Portman to take the Oscar for her portrayal of Nina. Portman’s transformation from the sweet, innocent, sheltered white swan to the ruthless, psychotic, sexual black swan was cinematic gold. I got a kick out of Mila Kunis’ rebellious, party-girl ballerina character, but it wasn’t an award-worthy role. The mother-daughter dynamic between Nina and Erica (played brilliantly by Barbara Hershey) adds another layer to the movie. At times, it seems that overbearing Erica, a former ballerina herself, has Nina’s best interests at heart; while other times you wonder if she’s just as screwed up as her daughter. As the film builds, you start to question what is real and what isn’t, but it’s best to just let the movie take you for the ride up to the nail-biting opening night of “Swan Lake.” Black Swan is a wild ride that I plan to take again and again. A twisted, beautiful, wild ride.
Really liked it. I appreciate movies that are part-comedy, part-drama because that’s how real life is. I love me some dramedy. The basic plot goes: What happens when two teenage children of lesbian parents contact their sperm-donor, disrupting the family dynamic the summer before the daughter leaves for college. The moms have been having problems and the sudden addition of donor-dad wedges them further apart. Loved Annette Bening as the more butch, control-freak, doctor mom with a drinking problem. But, she better not steal that Oscar from Portman, not that I’m worried.
I have been under the weather and sleeping 10 million hours a day (OK, more like 12 to 14), so I am really backed up on my paid work with deadlines staring me in the face. I keep staring right back at them and at the blank computer screen in front of me, but no words have magically appeared. I can't justify taking the time to write a blog; however, I can take a few minutes of out my busy screen-staring schedule to post some cute fur baby pics from my very outdated cellphone.
It was a beautiful, sunny day in Sactown, so I made Gizmo one happy doggy and played Frisbee with her in the backyard. She is 1 year old, very smart and crazy active and happy. We think she's a Chi/Jack/unknown mix. We adopted her from the Yolo County Animal Services Shelter in Woodland when she was 2 months old. She has probably played fetch every single day since we brought her home about 11 months ago.
Last night I finished Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk. I previously mentioned how his treatment of sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS, really bothered me. It still does; however, it's not important to the plot.
What is important to the plot is the culling song. In investing crib deaths, reporter Carl Streator discovers that parents are reading the culling song to their babies to help put them to sleep, clueless that the poem kills.
With the help of three eccentric characters, Streator takes off on a cross-country trip to eliminate all copies of the poem, but he can't get the words of the culling song out of his head. When someone pisses him off, it takes everything in his power to stop the culling song from flying through his head. Sometimes, he can't help it.
Each main character has a different view of the culling song and how it should be used or not used at all. Real estate agent Helen Hoover Boyle has been using the poem for years, killing for financial gain.
The book is really a story about the death penalty and the consequences of immense power. Of course, it has a few wild twists at the end, which really aren't that wild if you paid attention to the whole story — paused and thought about the foreshadowing. But, as readers, we don't really pay attention, so Palahniuk gets away with it, just as Helen Hoover Boyle gets away with selling haunted houses. The potential owners never really look before they move in. They see what they want to see and ignore what they don't want to see. As readers, we do the same thing. It's what Palahniuk counts on.
Overall, I liked Lullaby. I didn't love it. I loved Fight Club. After a book like Fight Club, I had certain expectations. They were not met here. Maybe an author just can't repeat that level of excellence over and over. I loved Atonement by Ian McEwan. I think it's one of the best written books I've ever read. But, Enduring Love? It was OK. How to Make an American Quilt is one of my all-time favorite books. Unfortunately, when I checked out another Whitney Otto book at the library, I couldn't get through it. I can't even recall the name.
Maybe I just go into these books with too high of expectations. I don't have a favorite author for this very reason, although I do enjoy Jodi Picoult, but it's not as if she's writing at the level of Ian McEwan ...
Friday is "Follow Friday" on Twitter. I'm bringing the same concept to blogging. I need more interesting people to follow since many of my friends have stopped blogging. Recommend some peeps for me to read, and I'll do the same for you.
I recommend AMORRIS for yummy recipes and local coupon deals, and It's All Happening for fashion and green living tidbits. Check out Reading and Ruminations for book reviews by a girl who is, quite frankly, borderline obsessed with books.
When I get the time, I promise to comment on some of the great films I've watched recently, including Black Swan, Pirate Radio and You Don't Know Jack. The latter, especially, struck a chord with me.
As another mini-resolution, I'm trying to watch all the Best Oscar nominated films before the Oscars on February 27. Of course, since I'm poor, I'll probably end up only seeing the ones already on video. I have The Kids Are All Right, The Social Network and Winter's Bone queued up to come next on Netflix, so I'll at least have seen six of the 10 films by the ceremony, having already seen Black Swan, Inception and Toy Story 3.
Nina is judging you for giggling through her intimate moments.
I don't go to the movies very often. My husband and I just don't have that kind of money. We used to go to the drive-ins every so often, but currently don't have the right kind of fully-functioning vehicle for that. (Long story.)
For Valentine's Day, we went to a matinee of Black Swan, a film I've been dying to see long before its release date.
I know when Black Swan first came out, a lot of people hadn't heard of it and didn't really know that it's a twisted psychological thriller and not some sweet, happy film about Swan Lake. Now that Natalie Portman has picked up just about every best actress award, and the film's been getting all kinds of buzz, including a Best Picture Oscar nom., I think the general public is better informed. At the very least, people sitting their butts down in the theater to watch Black Swan should know it's an adult movie.
Imagine my surprise when I hear a baby start to cry not five minutes into the film. Seriously? You brought a baby to the theater, and to Black Swan, no less? And, on Valentine's Day? Seriously? Bringing a baby to the theater shouldn't be allowed for ANY film (unless it's one of those mommy and me specials), but you had to bring a baby into an intense psycho drama? Seriously?
As if the baby wasn't bad enough, the adults in the theater giggled during the sex scenes and made various noises that implied, "We're too immature to watch these scenes without acting like 13-year-old school kids." Seriously, adults? Seriously? If you had read anything about the movie, you KNEW those scenes were coming, and you still couldn't just shut up and watch? You had to take the rest of us out of the movie with your childish behavior? Seriously?
I need to stop going to the theater, I think. I've had far worse experiences, and I still loved every minute of the movie (even when it made me cringe and literally cover my face with my hands), but I really expected more of the adults who would choose to see the very dark, artsy and unromantic Black Swan on Valentine's Day. I guess by expecting people to behave like adults and have a little common courtesy for others, I just expect far too much.
Woohoo. I lost 1.8 pounds since the last time I weighed myself 12 days ago. Not bad considering I spent a good portion of those last 12 days sick and barely able to get my big booty out of the recliner.
I'd like to lose at least another 4 pounds by my 27th birthday on March 10th, although I really don't want to think about getting that old. I don't feel that old, and I certainly don't look it; although, I guess I look old-enough to get a drinking wristband at a club without showing my I.D. That was a proud moment in my life, despite the fact that I don't even drink. I'm so used to people mistaking me for someone much, much younger than I am.
I hate the thought of getting older. When I tease my 30-year-old husband about his age, he likes to point out that I'm only four years behind him. I like to pretend 30 is very far away, but I know I'm inching up on it. Hopefully, I can inch up on it with fewer inches on my waist.
I danced for 30 minutes on Just Dance 2 today. Hoping for another 30 minutes tomorrow!
I’m currently reading Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk, and while I enjoy the plot, Palahniuk’s twisting of real-word facts bothers me so much I never become fully immersed in his fictional world.
Reporter (and narrator) Carl Streator'sinvestigation into “crib deaths" begins the story. Streator says there’s no medical explanation and cites some 1945 study where doctors say babies can’t suffocate on blankets.
This really pisses me off. I feel very passionately about educating people on sudden infant death syndrome. I’ve written countless articles that relate to SIDS in one way or another.
Doctors believe babies can smother on blankets. They can smother on mattresses, baby bumpers, and they can overheat if you dress them too warmly.
Now, researchers have not conclusively proven why this happens, but the leading theory (based on autopsies of SIDS victims) by the American Academy of Pediatrics goes like this:
“The cause of SIDS is unknown, but the predominant hypothesis about its etiology is that certain infants, for reasons yet to be determined, may have a maldevelopment or delay in maturation of the brainstem neural network that is responsible for arousal. This change affects infants’ physiologic responses to life-threatening situations during sleep.”
In layman’s terms, if you rollover and smash your face against your mattress, shutting off your air supply, your brain alerts you to move so you can breathe. For a baby under 6 months, that signal may not sound and that baby may die.
It’s just a hypothesis, but it’s a pretty darn good one, especially when you consider that since the AAP began the “Put Baby Back to Sleep” campaign in 1992 – as in, your baby should always sleep on his back, not his stomach – the rate of SIDS has decreased by over 50 percent. Additional evidence comes from the sleeping environments of the roughly 2,500 babies who die from SIDS each year. Too often, the infant slept with blankets, crib bumpers, on a soft crib mattress, or wasn’t put to sleep in a crib at all, but on a couch or in bed with her parents.
I don’t see why Palahniuk had to twist the research for his modern story. I’m not halfway through the book, but it seems the plot would work just fine had he acknowledged the real research behind “crib deaths,” and not some embarrassingly outdated study, especially when the narrator is a journalist. Shame, shame.
I’ve never met a cat I didn’t like. I’ve been a cat person all my life. I like most animals, but cats just have a soft spot in my heart. I’ve turned my husband into a cat person, too. Well, I don’t know if it was me so much as it was my childhood kitty.
Felicity was the best cat, ever. Period. She was a total sweetheart and the smartest cat you could ever meet. I’m not just saying that because I was her mommy for 16 years. I could get many people to testify to the fact. She regularly impressed my friends with her intelligence.
Felicity got very sick, very quickly with kidney failure and we had to put her sleep on January 2 of this year. It was the most horrible way to start the New Year, but it was the best thing we could do for our baby girl.
My heart broke into a million pieces when I found out how sick she was. My husband and I curled up into little balls and cried our eyes out. Aaron hyperventilated in the bathroom after the vet called us with the grim prognosis.
It’s been just over a month now, and I find myself spending way too much time online looking at all the kitties (and doggies) who need homes. In the last two-and-a-half years, we’ve adopted one puppy and one kitten*, and I’ve spent a lot of time on Craigslist, Petfinder and the shelter websites. I’ve never seen it this bad before.
I’ve always wanted to foster kitties, but I didn’t want to bring new cats into the home, upsetting Miss Felicity. Now, that she’s gone and we’ve had time to grieve, it’s time to take action.
Tonight, I sent an email to a nearby cat rescue, inquiring about fostering. I hope we can help save some kitties and find them good, forever homes.
You can help, too. Check out Sacramento Animal Coalition to learn about area rescues and other local animal services. It's Felicity-approved.
*Felicity would accept babies into her home -- our Oliver pretty much thought Felicity was his momma -- but we didn’t want to push it by adopting older animals.
While not Chinese, I’m taking this opportunity to restart my first blog. I find it difficult to maintain a blog because I find writing without pay difficult, unless I’m ranting and raving in Livejournal. Heck, a private client even pays me to blog.
But, here I am, blogging again, with new resolutions.
My 2011 resolutions are:
Trust and follow my instincts. Always. When I doubt myself, and go against my gut, I regret it.
Branch out and get more eggs in my freelance writing basket. I’m already doing quite well with this one.
Lose weight – the same resolution I’ve had for a couple years now. I eat moderately well, but I live a very sedentary lifestyle, compounded by health problems that leave me feeling fatigued and sore every day. Plus, I catch every little virus. I’m at the tail-end of a virus right now. It’s really hard to exercise when you have a raging sore throat or feel like vomiting, but I’m putting forth my best efforts with the help of Wii Fit Plus and the Just Dance games.
Blog. Oh, look. I’m doing that one right now.
So here’s to another attempt at blogging. I’ll add new goals throughout the year.
Now, it’s time to enjoy my Chinese New Year dinner:
Pot Stickers, Kung Pao Chicken,Mongolian Beef, Hot & Sour Soup, Sweet and Sour Pork and Steamed Rice.
No fortune cookies. Is that a bad omen? Or a way of the universe telling me I make my own destiny?
I’m behind on my movie-watching and more so on my movie-reviewing. I hope I find the time to watch both 
Last night I finished Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk. I 
