yoga, books, movies, tv and WAY too many crime procedurals – not necesarily in that order
And no, I do NOT mean the Winter Olympics.
Got a notice from Verizon last week that I was due for a phone upgrade. I LOVE my LG ENV2. Love it. This is the phone that, not even two weeks ago, survived three hours in the freezing slush of the work parking lot and possibly being run over by a coworker. LOVE that phone. So I wasn’t really inclined to change when I had a perfectly acceptable and functional phone, right up until a friend mentioned that she kept her really good phone as a backup and upgraded to a new gadgetier phone. That planted the seed. Then I made the trip to the local Verizon dealer to scope out the offerings. The only thing really catching my eye was Droid.
The store didn’t have either droid model in stock (Motorola Droid, HTC Droid Eris) so I went home and checked out gizmodo and cnet and the usual suspects about the two models. I know people love the iPhone and, no lie, it’s a sweet device, but AT&T provides absolute shit service up here – so much that the tourists CONSTANTLY bitch about it. Not only that but it’s not exactly CHEAP.
I got to mess with the display models at the store and while the Droid has some really nice bennies, the slide out keyboard frankly feels cheap. Like plasticky might-break-if-you-drop-the-phone cheap. The Eris doesn’t have the same battery life but it comes with an 8 gig micro card and is upgradeable. It’s also got Google with voice search and sweet market apps and frankly, the keyboard didn’t mean that much to me – especially because it felt like a crap feature. So. Droid Eris.
Dudes, I LOVE THIS PHONE. I spent a ridiculous amount of time finding and discarding apps, customizing the look, and setting up all my contacts with Google so that I can access my rss feed, my twitter account, my gmail, and pretty much everything I love on this phone. I’ve got Pandora, a great calendar (which is shareable) and this AMAZING app called Ringdroid. Ringdroid lets you take any audio file and customize a ringtone from it. It is THE BALLS. I now have a ringtone that says “I swear to god I’m going to PISTOLWHIP the next asshole who says SHENANIGANS!”
LOVE.
So pretty much all my free time has been sucked up with searching for neat shit on my phone and tweaking my apps. It’s sad. I know.
I’m also a good chunk of the way through Middlemarch, thanks to audible.com. I bought the audiobook because I couldn’t bear reading it and it’s turned out to be surprisingly good. I’m leaning toward the test of a good book being it’s ability to show interesting parallels between its time and now ( whenever “its time and now” happen to be). Also (unsurprisingly) it’s full of great social commentary. So there you are. Go classics!
Last night we had a homemade mini-pizza party with post-apocalyptic virus film chaser. It was kind of fantastic.
In TV news:
Mercy knocked it out of THE PARK this week. I’m always surprised by how much I enjoy this show and that they’re willing to be (sometimes) shockingly honest while at the same time (sometimes) screamingly funny. I laugh out loud during every episode and I also see something that makes me think. I love that. One of our friends who was a career nurse ALSO has great things to say about it and that seems to be a rare thing in med-drama circles.
I’ve been working early shifts which generally means going to bed early, but our DVR was otherwise occupied on Thursday and wouldn’t record The Mentalist. I wanted to go to sleep but it was all Cho, all the time and I just couldn’t pass it up. The writers do such a great job on that show – I knew whodunnit as soon as the culprit was introduced but I DIDN’T CARE because they did such awesome character stuff.
Chuck continues to be awesome. Kristin Kreuk is 1000% less annoying than when she was on Smallville and I’m digging the new team dynamic. Having Superman aboard isn’t hurting things one bit.
Castle is consistent and engaging. I found out during the Superbowl that it’s a local-friend fave as well.
I haven’t caught up on all my Thursday and Friday shows yet.
Work is good! It looks like I’ll continue on mornings/days full time. I’ve been enjoying my tasks and team work so I’ve got zero complaints. Life in general is pretty kick ass.
Apple iPad – TERRIBLE name and a surprisingly disappointing device. It’ll prompt Amazon to send out more Kindle updates though, so I’m not complaining.
State of the Union. Yeah, I played WET on my Xbox instead of watching. Frankly, I think the whole point of the internet is to keep me from having to watch the news. I’m largely disappointed that everyone in Washington is too busy trying to keep their jobs to actually DO their jobs. I’m tired of them bitching about something being wrong when THEY ARE THE ONLY ONES WITH THE POWER TO CHANGE IT. That’s not to say that’s what I think Obama was doing but I couldn’t stand to watch all the bi-partisan asshattery.
As an aside, every time I see John Boehner I think “John Boner” and then wonder how someone named “Boner” got elected in Ohio. And then I go OH YEAH.
Listening to MoZella’s album and I LOVE IT. It’s like a cross between Feist and Maroon 5. Also the Glee soundtracks and am continuously creeped out by She’s Having My Baby – to the point where I may need to delete it from my entire collection. P.S. How did we get THAT but not Single Ladies?
Whip It came out in DVD. I was VERY EXCITED. I watched it three times. It will get its own entire post.
Indulged a little today by getting a manicure. I’ve been working with cardboard pretty much nonstop for the last month and have an event Monday and Tuesday. The back room project is over at work (at least this stage) and my hands can (hopefully) return to normal. At the very least, the mani will make me presentable for the event and then I can hopefully maintain.
Sometimes when my husband is looking for something and can’t find it, I want to hit him with a hammer.
Dead writers. I can’t be arsed to care, really.
Haiti. Well, the only time we care about poor countries are when there are natural disasters, not things like DICTATORS AND GENOCIDE. SIGH.
Booked my flight for the Seattle trip. Next up- hotel rooms.
We’re watching Public Enemies right now. I’m currently unimpressed. I did watch I’ve Loved You So Long on Netflix and I thought it was fantastic. The Edge of Love was passable but not great.
Listening to Middlemarch on my afternoon commute. The audiobook is DEFINITELY better than reading the damn thing myself – especially since it’s a practical use of the drive time. Eliot is droll but somewhat heavyhanded in the use of narrator commentary. I am reminded (as with East of Eden) that some topics are just as relevant now as they were in other centuries.
I still love work. I’m enjoying it immensely and have fun with my coworkers. Hard to beat that!
Yeah, yeah, everyone else is watching the Haiti telethon. I’m finishing a BluRay double feature that included Inglourious Basterds and District 9.
Dear Peter Jackson,
I’m sure that combining Kafka, mid-east war policy criticism, robot tech and Bad Boys sounded like a good idea. Hell, when I put it like that, it sounds like a good idea to ME- but REALLY. Couldn’t you have made it SUCK LESS? Because I swear to Brutus that this fucking movie wasted a full hour of my life before your plot even started to happen and then when it happened it was so predictable that it hurt. Seriously. Chock full of suck. I feel like you should pay me for the time I wasted on this movie.
No love,
Me
Dear Quentin Tarantino,
I’m super glad that you’re in love with yourself because you need all the self-esteem you can get after Inglourious Basterds. It was like Moulin Rouge meets The Dirty Dozen but less funny and less good. The best part of the film was Shosanna and she was seriously in all of about 15 minutes of the damn thing. When even MY HUSBAND doesn’t give a shit about your characters an hour in, you’re doing something wrong. Like taking yourself too seriously. Please to be back at the drawingboard and huffing less of your I’m-a-Misunderstood-Genius-Juice. Come back with something more like From Dusk til Dawn and then show it for free to make it up to all of us assholes who rented this crap.
No love,
Me
I honestly never thought anything would make me WANT to watch that Haiti telethon but these films really make me wish I’d watched that instead. Feh.
I started feeling a cold coming on yesterday during work and by the time I left, all my joints were achey. When I got home I had reached full shivers, so I took a full ambien (I usually take half) a couple of advil, and passed out.
Cut to me waking up 10 hours later and, frankly, not better. The fever hasn’t broken, I’m still achey, and my head feels like it’s going to explode. Turns out working a month with 2 days off also wrecks havoc on your immune system. I got off easy the week of Xmas but the cold is having its revenge.
Right now I’m catching up on last night’s TV and eating dry Trix. Awesome.
I’m just waiting until 4 am so I can call out sick and then I’m headed back to the land of the unconscious sickies.
That’s something I’m looking to change very soon. But in looking for a particular yoga place out here, my google search led me to this link. All I really have to say about that is “BULLSHIT.”
As a teacher with more than 200 hours of training and certification, AND as someone who TAUGHT at a gym, the bottom line is that any class is only as good as your confidence in (and comfort with) the teacher. If you are a beginning student, I’ve posted about good ways to begin your practice and find a good class but ultimately every student has different needs.
I’ll break it down in bullets:
1. Call the gym/studio and ask about the classes. They’ll be honest.
2. If you feel uncomfortable in/during a class, tell the instructor.
3. NOTHING SHOULD BE PAINFUL.
4. Ask the teacher about their training/certifications.
5. Ask other students.
So for the first time since I’ve known him, Spouse wanted to see a movie twice while it was STILL in the theater. One of the best things about Avatar is that, while the story is JUST engaging enough to keep everyone involved, it’s just visually STUNNING. Even the second time around. I kept getting stuck in that OMGTHISISAWESOME mode and didn’t really care that it’s Disney’s Pocahontas in space. You know what? The plot of Star Wars is not groundbreaking or especially innovative either. That’s not why people keep going back to it. I think the reason people keep talking about Avatar and seeing it (I know several folks who’ve gone to the theater more than once and/or done the Imax version) is childlike wonder.
Sounds silly, right? But it’s the sense – while you’re watching it – that this is the COOLEST THING YOU’VE EVER SEEN. And you can’t remember the last time you saw something THIS COOL and seeing it again brings you back to that moment where you saw the coolest thing ever for the first time. It’s pretty fantastic.
On top of that, the second time around I got to notice just how incredible the detail in the film is. The first time was almost overload – 3D, the realness of the effects, and the time for your eyes to adjust to both. This time was like seeing a great piece of art after you’ve learned how to appreciate it (notice I didn’t say LOVE it). You get past the big splash of color and start to notice other parts of the composition or technique. That’s totally how I felt about this time around with Avatar – it was just as good and almost better because I got to SEE so much more of it.
As for Spouse: “It’s the sign of a pretty good movie that in three hours, even after already seeing it, it’s still not boring at any point.” We also noticed that the kids behind us were loving the movie, which was cute.
In unrelated news, I’m still pretty excited about Salt.
I feel like I actually have three jobs. After work today, I stopped at the grocery on the way home. Once home, I made chili (for dinner tonight), beef tikka masala (for this weekend) and blueberry muffins (for breakfast). Things not to do after cutting up your hands all day working with cardboard: cut jalepenos. Yeah. Awesome. I ALSO managed to get the kitchen cleaned. I am Supergirl.
The muffins allowed me to test my new silicone muffin pans and they are FANTASTIC. I love them. If I could, I’d replace most of my bakeware with silicone. On the current wishlist: those measuring cups/spoons that flatten, as well as a colander.
My Xbox is wending its way to the house as we speak. I’m very excited about it and picked up some used games from GameStop. Fatima promised we could conference and watch bad movies on Netflix, so I’m looking forward to that.
My hands ARE pretty thrashed from work. I’ve been having issues for the last year/year and a half with dry nails that peel (rather than split or break) and recently discovered that a fix seems to include 1. No nail polish and 2. Lots of lotion. I trimmed my nails tonight and there wasn’t a single peeler. The hands ARE hella dry from all the cardboard though. I might actually have to get out my lotion gloves overnight.
New current playlist is an autolist with Lily Allen, Kelly Clarkson, Britney, Gaga and Katy Perry. I’m REALLY enjoying it.
Other random news. Brit Hume- WTF? Because Christians, especially FAMOUS Christians, NEVER have extramarital affairs? WTF *SouthCarolinaGovernor* cough. I think Brit’s a first class idiot. See also: not everyone subscribes to your idea or need for forgiveness. Jackass.
Tomorrow’s post-work excitement will consist of seeing Avatar again and/or cleaning the basement. Piper was mad that we left today and got into the coffee grounds in the laundry room garbage. Mmmm. Coffee grounds. This would likely be less annoying if I 1. drank coffee and 2. thought coffee smelled good. Damn dog.
I might do some more reading before bed tonight- Middlemarch is even more effective than Ambien.
