Freshly Ground Pepper

December 2008: SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, White Elephants, and Xmas

2009-01-17T19:45:00.000-08:00

December 7th, Sunday - SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE. This year's feel-good movie. It was engaging and emotionally riveting and at the end you just want to dance. It was a very, very good movie about a kid from the slums who get to be on an Indian version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" The child actors were fabulous and the hustle and bustle of the Mumbai was mesmerizing.

December 8th, Monday - White Elephant lunch at work. Seriously, who thought this game up?

December 12th, Friday - Susan's birthday party at Don Cucos. I finally get to see the SoCal TWOP crowd again. They told me all about their trip to England to see David Tennant as Hamlet and how he gave them a good look, in the middle of the performance! Fun! They met up with some of the TWOP crowd in the UK and had a great time. One day, Daryl and I will get to go to England, too. Maybe we will soon, now that we've gotten rid of our credit card debt. Who knows?
Here's the birthday girl. The picture was taken with my iPhone.

Here's Sharon. Also an iPhone photo.

December 13th, Saturday - The Parker/Wheeler Xmas party in the old Victorian house on El Mio. This was a fun party.

There was another White Elephant trade and Daryl and I scored a nerf Clone Wars rifle. Booyah! It was a heavily themed Star Wars party, I have to say. And then we got a lovely tour of the house, which I had never heard before. It was all fascinating and from now on when I go to the house, I will be studying the ornate hinges on the doors. The Parkers really did a lot of work getting the house together and liveable. And they did a great job fixing it up after part of it got burned up. Oh and we also watched the movie, EINSTEIN & EDDINGTON, with Andy Serkis and David Tennant. Good fun. Who knew Einstein was such a loon? and a raunchy one at that?

December 24th, Wednesday - Daryl left for Indiana. Boo.

December 25th, Thursday, Christmas Day - Susan and her mother took me up on my offer of a Christmas dinner and I once again disbelieved my thermometer. At least I could entertain my guests with my brand new DVD of DR HORRIBLE. I brined the turkey this time so the breast remained moist and tender while the rest of the legs cooked. I made the gravy the same way as I usually do and boy was it salty. I guess I didn't think that so much of the salt from the brine would get into the gravy. Whoops. It was nice to entertain someone on Christmas, especially since Daryl was gone. And it gave me something to do, too. Although I had so many leftovers I had to freeze most of it for when Daryl got back. I think I had the same Christmas dinner for breakfast lunch and dinner for three days straight. At least I got to eat pumpkin pie while I was at it.
This time I brined the turkey. It felt weird not chopping it up to cook separately. It had a crusty, salty outside and a moist, tender inside.

Here's most of the other food I cooked. It included Cornbread Sausage Stuffing, Green beans, Candied Yams, Pumpkin Pie, and Giblet Gravy. Look, I actually have place settings and nice napkins!

I just have to add this picture of Daryl's cousin's daughter, Marryn. Isn't she adorable?

December 30th, Tuesday - Daryl is back in LA. Yay!

December 31st, Wednesday, New Year's Eve - Robb and Kellee came to town! They just got back from a wedding in Columbia and were excited to show us their pictures. Columbia looked lovely and it looked like they had a great time. We hung out and celebrated New Years, by writing stuff we wanted for the new year on origami paper and throwing them into the ocean, and then writing stuff we didn't want for the new year on paper and burning it at midnight. We'll see if that worked.
Robb & Kellee in our tiny office.

Robb, Maurissa, Kellee, Me, & Daryl at Swingers for a New Year's Eve dinner.

Goodbye 2008! I shall always remember you as the year we got of credit card debt right when the financial markets went haywire.

November 2008: Elections, Turkeys, and BOLT

2009-01-17T19:26:00.000-08:00

November 4th, Tuesday - Daryl and I left early to vote. There was a long line at our polling place. It took 90 minutes. A woman brought her two kids with her and they would jump up and down saying "O-Ba-Ma! O-Ba-Ma!" It was cute. I also realized that our neighborhood is full of polite, patient people. We were going to Mo's election night party, when we heard the news that Obama won because people in our neighborhood were shouting and screaming. I felt bad because I made Daryl wait while I ate dinner. I knew Mo didn't have any food for me and I knew it would be hours before we could get away and eat. And Daryl wanted to be there at the election party when it was announced. Who knew we would know by 8p? When we finally got there Mo set me to work on an Obama pumpkin and we listened to Obama's speech. There was a pool to see who would guess when McCain would give his concession speech. Once again, who knew it'd be before 11p? Met a cool friend of Mo's named Lolly, a drummer at Acme, or is it Comedy Sportz? I liked the fact that she didn't know you could legally get marijuana in Venice with a doctor's prescription. The only reason I knew is because I read about it in THE NEW YORKER magazine.

November 22nd, Saturday - My first free Saturday after working 7 days a week. I've discovered that I'm pretty cranky when I work that much. It's extra, extra important to get plenty of sleep if you work that much. I think I need at least eight these days. It also helps to not have to cook as much, too. Thank God I have a house cleaner!

November 27th, Thursday - Thanksgiving! I did my usual dinner of cornbread sausage stuffing for a deconstructed turkey. I didn't believe my thermometer so we had to make Christian and Yuri wait for an hour while the turkey got to the point where it was safe to eat. I made giblet gravy and while I was pouring it into the gravy boat, Daryl called it "brown gold." I liked that. I also made candied yams, haricot verts, Yorkshire pudding, and Daryl set out a cheese plate for appetizers. I also baked a pumpkin pie and served it with whipped cream. Yuri brought mashed potatoes and I loved it because she served it on lettuce with little tomatoes around the edges. It was all lovely. It really is the best holiday of the year.

November 28th, Friday - Saw BOLT. In 3D. It was delightful watching this movie. There's a scene early on where Bolt gets chased by helicopters and it was so fun to watch the rotors come out at you and see the dog run by! It's a Disney movie,so you know the ending will be happy, but it was fun hanging around the characters until they got there. And the dog looked so cute. I cannot express how much more fun it was to watch it in 3D. It made up for the children behind us. One of them peed her pants, and another threw her sock at me. IN THE MIDDLE OF THE MOVIE! Maybe next time I go see an animated movie, I'll go to the late show. Maybe all the little kids will be asleep by then.

October 2008: Pigs, work, and Mo's birthday

2009-01-17T19:01:00.000-08:00

October 12th, Sunday - Christian, Yuri, Daryl, and I all went to see a Tractor Parade at Underwood Family Farms in Moorpark. The tractors were largely antique John Deere tractors, kinda like this.

It was fun, but the best part was the pig racing. I kid you not, the little piglets love to run. Probably one of the most adorable things I've ever seen.

There was also a corn maze that you couldn't cheat at because they put netting all around the pathways. We all got out because we followed Daryl and his never-get-lost gene. Here we are victorious.

In the course of the maze, however, I stepped in a divot and twisted up my ankle. It hurt a bit more than it usually does, but I just ignored it. And boy was I wrong to do so. Ouch. We also got to get gluten-free pizza at a place called PizzaSalad. So yummy.

October 19th, Sunday - And thus begins my tale of woe, I begin working 7 days a week. Monday through Friday I'm at Disney, Saturday and Sunday at Christian's. It's a lot of work, but I'm saving up money and we're nearly done with paying off our credit card debt. And one day, I will own my very own car.

October 27th, Monday - Mo's birthday! We all celebrated Mo's birthday at El Coyote, where Mo got drunk on tequila. Daryl and I left, of course, because 1) we don't drink, and 2) we had to go to work the next day. But Josh and Steg were there to make sure she got home ok. She also saw a real live bullfight in Mexico just the day before. (Just doing something new for her birthday.) Welcome to 38, Mo!

October 31st, Friday - Missed the Halloween party. Boo. And I had a rockin' costume, too: I was a hippo ballerina. I wore it to work, but not a lot of people dressed up. I didn't win anything this year in the decorating contest, but I did like my entry. Here's the bag from the back.

Here's the bag from the front.

Daryl didn't finish his costume on time. Boo.

September 2008: TROPIC THUNDER and DEATHBOWL TO DOWNTOWN

2009-01-17T18:50:00.000-08:00

September 1st, Monday - It was Labor Day, so we saw a movie, TROPIC THUNDER. So very, very good. Robert Downey, Jr. is really having a good year. I wasn't that impressed with Ben Stiller, but the rest of the cast was fantastic. And I think I love Jay Baruchel. Also, the bad guy in the movie is a kid and he's terrific. Somebody, Disney, or Nickelodean should give this kid a show.

September 8th, Monday - We went to a screening of a movie called DEATHBOWL TO DOWNTOWN. It was all about skateboarding and skateboarders in NYC. I now know what an "Ollie" is and I feel all the richer for it. They also played a documentary before the movie about people in public spaces that I swear I saw back in high school. We went to the after party, too, networking a bit, and by "a bit", I mean Christian and Daryl talked to people and I just stared at my toes. Yuri was excited to be at her first Hollywood movie party. I just kept thinking that I needed to get home so I could work out in the morning. I am such an old person.

September 21st, Sunday - For our monthly celiac dinner we went to The Pink Pepper. It was very, very yummy. Pink Pepper Spring Rolls, Spicy Green Beans, Green Curry vegetables, Pad Thai. All of it fantastic. Highly recommended restaurant.

August 2008: Knights, Pandas, & Assasins

2008-09-28T19:16:00.000-07:00

August 4th, Monday - I got some bad news about my jaw. "Bubbles in the bone" is not a good sign, right?

August 10th, Sunday - THE DARK KNIGHT. Oh my what a grim, grim movie. There really should be a glimmer of light in this movie, you so hope for it, but the closest you get to it is Michael Caine.

August 17th, Sunday - KUNG-FU PANDA. Talk about lightness. This movie is great. The voice work is great, especially Randall Duk Kim and Dustin Hoffman. Ooh and Ian McShane is perfect as the bad guy. The animation was lovely and this is a film I would love to have on DVD. And lest I give everyone the bad idea that this film is just good guys versus bad guys fighting, it's not. The characters are nuanced and there are hints that not every character is one-note.

We also saw WANTED. Yuck. I thought it would be cool to see bullets fly through the air and curve, and it was, but it really wasn't enough. Wesley seemed pretty stupid. It was cool to see Morgan Freeman swear and be a bad guy, but acting-wise, I really think Angelina Jolie did the best job. And she drove a car using her feet on the steering wheel while she shot people upside down on the roof of the car. And it looked convincing. She was also called upon to act like a real person, and did a very good job. This was a grimy, violent movie and definitely not for kids, so it was a bit surprising to find a small child sitting behind me in the movie theater.

More TAKING OVER THE ASYLUM at the Winchester. Now we take the semi-sad and semi-funny miniseries and really up the ante on the sad part. I'm not giving anything away, but the people in the asylum have real problems that are not easy to overcome and sometimes it's really apparent why they're there. So just take that as a warning. Sad things happen.

August 24th, Sunday - Celiac dinner at Hugo's restaurant. Gluten-free Chocolate Pancakes with Marshmallows and Hazelnuts. That is all that really needs to be said, right?

August 30th, Saturday - In San Francisco, having tea with friends at Lovejoy's. From left to right, Diane, Ancilla, Me, Daryl, Elise, & Toby.

Here's the happy couple!

August 31st, Sunday - Robin and Taska got married in Marin. Daryl and I traveled up to San Francisco to meet up with friends and then to go to Robin and Taska's wedding. They live in Germany now, but wanted to have their wedding in San Francisco/Marin. It was a lovely Quaker wedding and I was glad to be staying in the city instead of in the hostel that they had everyone in because I heard later on that the party lasted well into the morning. When we went back up to Marin to have brunch with them everyone had left the hostel and they were cleaning up. So we cooked up some sausages and helped them out. One day, Daryl and I will visit them in Germany. I hope soon!

July 2008: Fireworks, Lightning, Hellboy, Maniacs, and Gambling

2008-07-27T16:51:00.000-07:00

July 4th, Friday - Fireworks at Val & Matt's. It's the 4th of July and we went to the Winchester and had hot dogs and watermelon and then watched stuff blow up. They got all of the legal fireworks they could and while that was going down, some of the neighbors were setting off the illegal ones. It was like we were in a war zone. I am not much of a pyromaniac, but the legal ones were pretty good. Personally, I just prefer the hot dog portion of the evening.

July 12th, Saturday - Val's Birthday. At the Winchester again. This time, there weren't any fireworks, but we did have a lightning storm. It was alternately pretty and scary. After one too many lightning strikes though, I had to go inside and it was there we were sucked into the Wii. Man, that thing is addictive. Val got DW sound effects, which was especially fun since you could have it say "EXTERMINATE" over and over again.

July 13th, Sunday - HELLBOY: THE GOLDEN ARMY. I love Hellboy. I really do. I also love Abe Sapien. And it looks like other supernatural characters love them too. I am so glad Doug Jones got more opportunity to act in this movie. He was so good in the previous one and then the overdubbed him with David Hyde-Pierce's voice. DHP, was/is such a classy fellow, he didn't even want to take credit for it. Go DHP! I'm not sure this movie is as good as the first one. The solution to the problem seemed absurdly easy to me. But the emotions were spot on and the actors so good, it was worth it. Oh, and the graphics were lovely. Steampunk robots! And Gigantic Tree Monsters! And fighting! Always good stuff.

July 19th, Saturday - TAKING OVER THE ASYLUM at Val & Matt's. We watched the very first show that David Tennant was in on British television. He was a manic-depressive in an asylum. He was really good. Super skinny, too. I think he's aging well. He looks a lot better now than he did back then. The show was about the inmates in the asylum and the radio DJ who's been assigned to help them run their internal radio station. He's got issues of his own and it sometimes seems like the "normal" people on the outside are crazier than the inmates on the inside. It's funny and tragic and I don't want to give anything away, but it all kind of seems like real life even though it isn't. It was very, very good and DT credits this show with starting his career. I have no picture because DT looks horrible in 80's clothes.

July 20th, Sunday - THE FALL. It made me cry people. It made me cry. Plus it was visually stunning. Lee Pace is a stuntman in the hospital after an accident on set and he makes friends with a little girl with a broken arm. He starts telling her a story and the visuals switch to the story he's telling and the hospital scenes. Then they kind of meld together. I don't want to give anything away here, but the friendship with the little girl is a ruse and there's more to his accident than he's telling people. Tarsem Singh also did THE CELL, which was visually frightening, at least to me, but it seemed like a very original piece of work. The man does know how to shoot beautiful pictures and I don't think he used CGI at all in this picture. There's a bit of animation in the movie, but it makes perfect sense, when you think about it. I highly recommend it, but if you do get it, get the widescreen or HD version because you really don't want to miss that.

July 26th, Saturday - Casino Night at the Brant's. Daryl and I went to a friend's Casino Night way out east, nearly half-way to Vegas it seemed. Anyway, each person was given a certain amount of money to gamble with and there were games of roulette, craps, poker, and blackjack set up. I held onto my money in case Daryl lost all of his and in the end we were up $600 of play money. But there was one guy who made over $50,000 so he won for the night. Craps was a complicated game and I couldn't figure it out. Roulette seemed to be the most popular one of the evening, and got even more popular after the fellow won $50,000 on Black 9 or some such. The only games that made sense to me were blackjack and poker, but I'm not very good with cards. With my luck, I try not to bet on anything. Oh, and I got to see a junebug. It was huge! The desert makes very big bugs.

June 2008: Indy, Caspian, Spaced, WALL-E, and Doctor Who

2008-07-27T16:46:00.000-07:00

June 7th, Saturday - INDIANA JONES AND THE CRYSTAL SKULL. I was glad to hear this was coming back, but I did wonder...what's up Shia Lebeouf? He was kinda gross in the movie and I have a hard time believing that's what you get when you cross Marion Ravenwood and Indiana Jones. Was it supposed to be telling that his name was Mutt? Daryl did not like this movie and turned to me in the middle and said, "If this ends with a spaceship taking off with aliens, then I'm done." I did like the chase scene. It had some of the exhilarating action of the previous movies. Daryl thinks that they
were trying to imitate the movies of the 50's instead of the old serials, which makes sense...giant ants, aliens, Communists, etc. All they needed was zombies and they would have tapped every old cliche. Apparently, there's a Frank Darabont script out there they didn't make and the general opinion is that script would have rocked. This one was ok, but it did make me long for the vigor of the first one. Oh, and the refrigerator thing...That's when you knew it was not the same old Indy. And why hasn't Karen Allen gotten more work? She's fantastic in every scene, so delightful! Hollywood is stupid for not casting her more.

June 14th, Saturday - Haircut, finally. And boy did I need it. I'd put up a picture, but I'm too embarrassed to show what I looked like for months.

June 15th, Sunday - THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: PRINCE CASPIAN. Here's another movie that I had high hopes for and was disappointed by. Ben Barnes is pretty, but kinda meh. I didn't get the whole power play with Peter. Edmund fared better and Lucy was stupendous as usual. The story was not my favorite of the series, but they did do a good job of adapting it. Peter Dinklage as the dwarf was fantastic. That man should be James Bond. I am not kidding. Heaps of charisma, that man has, dwarf or no. And it was all fighting, all the time. Isn't it a PG movie? It seemed so violent. There's a war, yes, but it did seem a bit much for what is essentially a children's movie. So we saw the movie and then went to Christian & Yuri's wedding. The wedding was in Rancho Palos Verdes at The Wayfarer's chapel near a cliff next to the beach. A lovely location for a wedding. It was beautiful and the weather was great and everyone had a terrific time.
The Happy Couple.

Me and the Ocean

Daryl and the Ocean

June 21st, Saturday - It's time again for the yearly SPACED marathon at Val & Matt's place. This year they held it at their new home which they call The Winchester. Smaller than the previous venue, but the AC is much better. I got sick that day, but refused to leave until the whole show was over. I can't recommend this series enough and it just come out on DVD for the US, so grab it now while you can. It's totally worth it.

June 28th, Saturday - I had the best birthday ever. I had cake and pie. I had friends over. I got presents! I got to see WALL-E. And I got to shoot Nerf guns at zombies. Speaking of which, I was inspired by the Office Nerf War and asked Daryl to get Nerf guns for the party. He obliged and he also set up targets using zombie pictures from the web. My favorite was the zombie kitten. Seriously, this is fun stuff. Daryl's family called me on the phone and his nephews got all excited to hear we were playing with Nerf guns. We got the Recon rifle that deconstructs down to a pistol with an ammo clip. I want to try the Maverick pistol next. It's got a rotating barrel. Plus, it takes the Nerf darts that whistle through the air when you shoot them. Then we all went to see WALL-E in the theater. It was such a good movie. I cannot recommend it enough. I cannot wait for our Robot Overlords. If they're all as cute and kind and curious and gentle like WALL-E, I'm sure we'll be fine in our enslavement. Go Robots! It was a wonderful end to a great birthday and I thank everyone that showed up and Daryl who indulgently helped plan it all. I also cleaned up! I got a Master's Laser Screwdriver from Doctor Who, a bunch of Doctor Who comics, the Serenity comic book, Those Left Behind, Alba lip balms and a mirror for my purse, and the promise of a iPhone. I love all of my friends. It all makes me forget I'm actually getting older and more decrepit. This is why people have parties.

June 29th, Sunday - Oh my. The Doctor Who group got together to watch the season finale of DW and it was a doozy. It was sad, so very sad. People didn't die, but it's kinda like they did. Once you see it you think, yeah, that's they only way they could have done it, but still. It was brutal. There was weeping. Not from me, because I have a heart of stone, but there was weeping. The forums were chittering away for hours after that one. And now we won't have a new one until Christmas. Now that makes me really sad.

May 2008: Vegas, IRON MAN, SPEED RACER, Babies and Birthdays

2008-07-11T18:19:00.000-07:00

May 1-4, Thursday - Sunday - Las Vegas. This is the hotel where we stayed. It's way at the north end of the strip and the Las Vegas Hilton is behind it. Daryl didn't get into the money finals, but he did play two games more than he thought he would. He was actually playing beautifully but then scratched on the 8-ball. Twice. Arg. Poor D. I checked out the spa at the Hilton and I think I may actually like massages after all. I got a massage, a seaweed scrub, and a facial. The massage was great, the seaweed weird, and the facial was more money than I think I should have spent. Also, I went to town at Sephora. I should really not spend any money anymore. Sigh. I visited the Star Trek store at the Hilton and it was a hoot. I bought a communicator! I really wanted a Tribble, but didn't have the guts to actually get one. We had no idea they vibrated and made noises. Daryl actually touched one and nearly fell back after it "spoke." Later on, we actually ate at Quark's bar. It wasn't that bad, but it did not compare to the buffet at the Wynn. Daryl and I went there three times, it was so good. What other buffet has crab legs? It was super expensive, but totally worth it. We also ate at the Burger Bar in Mandalay Bay (Kobe Beef Burgers!) and at Bouchon at the Venetian. The pastry chef even gave us a tour of the restaurant. Seriously, go to Bouchon. It's the best food and the staff is excellent. The pastry chef told me to call ahead next time I'm in Vegas and he'll make me something special! It is so on. Otherwise, Vegas is like one big obnoxious frat party. I just wanted to see the scenery and I feel like I don't need to go back. Although I've heard that they're shuttering the Star Trek Experience , so we may need to go back just for that. I mean, the casino in there is Star Trek themed. It's like you're on the set of Deep Space Nine. Oh, and I have to mention the smoke. Everyone smokes there. It's weird and smelly. Yuck.

May 10th, Saturday - IRON MAN. Robert Downey, Jr. was perfect as Tony Stark. I really hope they make a sequel. I loved him, I loved his Arabic doctor friend (Did you notice that when he shot the machine gun, he fired in to the ceiling. He didn't want to shoot at anyone!), I loved his suit, and I adored his robots. They really got a fantastic cast for this one. And Jeff Bridges is entirely creepy as a bald guy. Who knew?

May 15th, Thursday - Wedding Anniversary. 8 years! Apparently we have to give each other something bronze. I really don't understand that custom.

May 17th, Saturday - SPEED RACER: IMAX. Visually, this movie was amazing, but I couldn't believe how much people were talking. Really, I just wanted to see racing, with the spikes coming out of the hubcaps and the jumpers making the cars leap over each other. Seriously, I've never heard so much dialogue. They tried to make it interesting, sure, with lots of flashbacks and such, but it didn't help. I also was not entranced by the monkey and the little brother. Susan Sarandon and John Goodman were fantastic as usual. Christina Ricci was cute as well as Trixie. The movie was kind of meh, but any movie that makes John Goodman the winner in a ninja-fight is OK with me. Oh, and if any of you know COUPLING, Patrick's head is huge on the IMAX screen. (Oh, and I didn't get dizzy at all, which was a fear, considering how I reacted to THE BOURNE SUPREMECY.)

May 21st, Wednesday - A dog tried to attack me as I was walking home. It was a German Shepard. A big German Shepard. I am now afraid of all dogs.

May 31st, Saturday - Amy's Baby Shower and Matt's Birthday. Daryl and I went to Amy's baby shower. It was huge. Must have been 100 people there. And the decorations were, well, I never knew they had decorations like that for baby showers. I've only ever been to ones where people just open presents and have cake. But this one had Cuban pork roast in the catering and not one, not two, but three diaper cakes. I am in awe. I also didn't know it would last so long, we had to leave early to go to Matt's birthday party picnic. We missed the message that would have told us the party moved to an entirely different location, but we eventually got there and had a good time. It was a park in what looked like a dam on the outside. You'd never know there was a lake and trees and picnic tables there.

April 2008: Rollerskating, Doctor Who, Kung Fu, and Breaking Up

2008-07-11T17:36:00.000-07:00

(I just found this photo. Daryl took it when I wasn't looking. Cheeky.)

April 1st, Tuesday - Ever since his birthday, Daryl and I have been rollerskating with Christian on Tuesdays. It's loads of fun and quite the workout. Afterwards we always go to my favorite restaurant to eat, so it's really a good evening out.

April 6th, Sunday - Lately, I've been going to a friend's house to watch DOCTOR WHO. It's a really good show featuring an old SciFi character I loved when I was growing up. Back then the effects were cheap, but the writing and acting were so good they made up for it. Now it's like the effects have caught up. I usually go every Sunday to watch the latest showing (and I watch it again when it airs on the SciFi channel.) So I thought I'd mention it here. Here's a nice photo of the latest incarnation of the Doctor.

April 15th, Tuesday - Tax Day. Daryl and I actually had to pay this year. That means we actually made enough to have to pay. I think it's a step forward.

April 19th, Saturday - THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM. I love kung fu movies and it was just a dream to see Jackie Chan and Jet Li in a movie together. That alone was worth the price of admission. They both got two roles, too! The story was so-so, but Michael Angarano does his best with two of the most popular and talented kung fu stars in Hong Kong cinema. There's a great villianess with white hair. She's got so much kung fu, her hair can fight, too! If only my hair could do that. Sigh. (There's badness, too, with a very bad urine joke, but I'm going to ignore that.)

April 20th, Sunday - FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL. I think my eyes have seen enough of Jason Segal's penis. Although, Hawaii looks lovely and you really do want Peter to get the girl at the end. Kristen Bell looks great and Russell Brand is delightfully weird in every scene. Paul Rudd is also good as a surfer dude. I didn't even recognize him. I do love that Bell's character actually is not that bad of a person and that Segal's character did play a part in the deterioration of their relationship. That's rare to see in a break-up/romance movie. Oh, and the Dracula musical with puppets was so impressive that the Henson studios want Segal to work on their next Muppet movie! Seriously, it may be the best part of the movie.

(OK, I have TMJ, which means my jaw is misaligned. Every now and then it'll get "locked" and I kind of have to jar it back into place. But it was never really that painful. Now, though I sometimes have a searing pain in my jaw in the morning and my jaw hurts when I chew for a long time. This is going to make gum a less likely afternoon snack. Ow.)

April 30th, Wednesday - Road Trip to Las Vegas with Billy. Billy, who also qualified to play in the tournament, offered to drive us out to Las Vegas. Fun! He has a gigantic truck, luckily, I'm small enough I can fit in the back, no problem. Daryl and I got a nice suite on the first night, but we had to move to the tournament rooms after that. (They paid for half.) I do like getting fresh towels and maid service every day.

March 2008: Alien Pets, Weddings, and Daryl's Birthday!

2008-07-11T16:44:00.000-07:00

March 9th, Sunday - Saw CJ7. It made me cry people, and I have a heart of stone. It's also hilarious in the way that Stephen Chow's movies are so outrageously absurd. I mean, casting a large man as a elementary school girl? Having a poor kid find an alien that he thinks will give him superpowers? That's the kind of crazy here. But like I said, it'll swing you out towards the crazy funny and then slam you down with some serious weepiness. You have been warned. And I want my own CJ7. Seriously.

March 15th, Saturday - Mike and Margie's Wedding in SF. We went to a lovely low-key wedding in SF. It was also moving out day for Elise and Mike. So sad! We won't ever stay in their loft ever again! Boo. We did have fun catching up with all of our SF friends. And we even got to play a game! Daryl was so happy. But we forgot our camera. Boo.

March 23rd, Sunday - Easter. I made it. Tomorrow I'm having a Snickers.

March 26th, Wednesday - Daryl's Birthday!

March 29th, Saturday - Daryl's Birthday celebration! Mo joined us and Christian after doing a triathalon for dinner at Chulada. Then she went off to bed while the rest of us went rollerskating. Yay! The rink announcer even mentioned Daryl in his happy birthday announcements. It was fun and exhausting trying to navigate around the children falling around us. They'd be in front of us rolling tentatively along and then collapse in a heap like their pockets were full of stones. It was like a video game trying to avoid them.

February 2008: Anniversary, Rats, Parades and Tournaments

2008-07-11T16:07:00.000-07:00

February 3rd, Sunday - Our First Kiss Anniversary! Daryl and I celebrate this anniversary mostly because it was a pretty memorable event for the both of us. It was a useful marker for the years when we weren't married. Now that we are married, we tend to like this anniversary better, just because it seems like much more fun. Anyway, in keeping with longstanding tradition, we went to Crustatcean and had the garlic crab and butterflied prawns. (Crustacean has restaurants in LA and SF, lucky us!) I got a bit tipsy and had to lean on Daryl as we left the restaurant. I really do have the best husband ever.

February 6th, Ash Wednesday - Lent begins. I decide not to have any candy. We'll see how well I do.

February 7th, Thursday - It's the Year of the Rat! (4705) Actually, I like rats. They're smart little guys. I wouldn't want any wild one roaming my apartment, mind you. But you have to admit, that they are clearly out to survive.

February 9th, Saturday - The Chinese New Year Parade. I got some lovely decorations, but it wasn't as much fun this year without Christian and Daryl. And it was unusually hot! I really wanted to get a little gold rat with a gold cake on his belly, but they were all out of them. I did buy a very bad Mickey Mouse imitation cell phone decoration, though. It was pretty funny. I have it up in the room at work. All in all, the decorations for the Year of the Pig were cuter by far, than the ones for the Year of the Rat. I guess lots of people didn't think Remy in Ratatouille was cute enough.

February 10th, Sunday - Daryl qualifies to go to Vegas to the APA Tournament! Yay!

January 2008: Juno & Val & Matt's Housewarming

2008-04-02T22:54:00.000-07:00

January 2nd, Wednesday - Yay! Daryl is back. That is all.

January 5th, Saturday - Sick. Boo.

January 11th, Friday - Dentist. Minty fresh.

January 19th, Saturday - JUNO. Cried my eyes out from when she tells her parents she's pregnant, through the entire rest of the movie. Uncontrollable sobbing and spasms. Somehow my infertility and my poverty combined with watching a movie about an unwanted/wanted pregnancy drove me to inconsolable sorrow. I think if I weren't weeping, I would have probably liked the movie. As it is, I can't really tell. Too many issues!

Picture from thecleaningfairy.biz based in SC.
January 22nd, Tuesday - I've finally decided to hire a maid. Trying to keep up the house just got to be too much for me. And you know what? I LOVE IT. It's like fairies come and clean the house while I'm away. It's fantastic. Thank you, Lucy! I love coming home to my clean, clean house. I wish I could afford to have you come weekly.

January 26th, Saturday - Val & Matt's Housewarming. The TWOP crowd has been meeting at Val's old place and hadn't seen the new house, until now. It's a lovely cottage-like house in Alhambra. The driveway is ridiculously small, but the house is a nice comfortable size. They have a fireplace and a yard and a very large fridge. I can't wait to see what it looks like when they finish painting and remodeling. We got to see Matt's LEGO Indiana Jones setup and play Guitar Hero, so it wasn't all about the house. But it was fun!

I forgot to post this picture, but here's a candy goldfish that I got at the Disney Holiday Party. They had a guy roll the candy right in front of you and he'd do whatever shape you asked for. The lucky people got to ask for dragons but I thought they took too long so I asked for a goldfish. Well, I think it's pretty!

December: Colonoscopy, Collectibles, Cinema, & Christmas

2007-12-09T22:00:00.001-08:00

Picture from jupiterimages.com

December 5th, 6th, & 7th - Prep for a colonoscopy, a colonoscopy, and a day of recovery. Sigh. It makes me sad to know I have had a colonoscopy. It's even sadder that I need to have one every three years. (I cheated, though. Last one I had was 6 years ago.) For those who have never had a colonoscopy, (lucky) let me give you a few hints.

Take three days off from work. Never go to work on the day you do your prep and never go to work on the day of the colonoscopy. And take another day off because you're going to want to, believe me.

Also, schedule your procedure for the early morning, because then you won't have to fast as long. Plus, you'll get to sleep a lot after the procedure. It'll be nice.

If you have the cash, do an endoscopy at the same time if you need it. That way you can get it all done at once and not have to go back for more procedures. (They still charge you, though.)

On the day of your prep, DO NOT GO OUT. You're going to be uncomfortable most of the evening so you might as well do it in the most familiar surroundings. Plus, keep a clear pathway between you and the bathroom AT ALL TIMES.

Get someone to bring you home and put you to bed. I was knocked out completely for my procedure. I almost didn't realize a procedure had been done. But it was an hour later so I got the hospital to call Daryl and he picked me up and put me to bed. It was nice to have him there.

December 8th, Saturday - The Collectibles Warehouse! Daryl and Christian and I went to a warehouse filled to the brim with collectibles of all kinds. I was drawn to the comic books, of course. And Christian was there scoping out possible gifts for soon-to-be Japanese relatives and getting lots of foreign DVDs. There was a stall that was completely devoted to memoribilia from The Nightmare Before Christmas. If you're into Disney pins, a memento that I had no idea existed, this is the place to get them. I cannot even count how many pins there were for Disney. I'm actually surprised that there are so many of them. But I guess if you've been around for 50 plus years, things will tend to build up. Daryl and I were very good and didn't buy anything. (We're trying to save money!) But now we know where to go if we want a Nightmare Before Christmas lamp and old Buffy comics.

Picture from skyandtelescope.com
December 13th, Thursday - The Geminid Meteor shower! I wasn't sure we'd pick up any meteors in our neighborhood. The streetlights throw off so much light pollution it's a wonder we see any stars, let alone meteors. But we did! And I made at least two wishes.

December 15th, Saturday - We saw THE GOLDEN COMPASS and ENCHANTED. I liked ENCHANTED better because it had a sense of humor about itself. The overwrought musical numbers were pitch perfect and who knew Amy Adams and James Marsden could sing? Marsden has a lovely voice, I had no idea. Cyclops can sing! And so can Junebug! Anyhoo, if you like Disney movies, you'll like this one. It very kindly makes fun of them and there's a very funny scene of waterbugs scrubbing out a tub. Why McDreamy's lawyer cannot afford a maid is beyond me, but maybe it's because he spends hours in Central Park with a complete stranger who gets the entire population of NYC to dance and sing with her. I don't think he can bill hourly for that.

I'm disappointed with THE GOLDEN COMPASS, though. For some reason the book seemed more exciting than the movie. The CGI animals were pretty good, though. And is there anything Freddie Highmore can't do? And they cut off the end of the book because they wanted a happy ending. Well, [SPOILER ALERT!] the whole series is not really a happy ending so if that's the reason why they made the films, they're in for a big surprise. Nicole Kidman as the villain was pretty good, but she did seem like she was made of plastic and I have no idea what is up with her and her daemon. She is one messed up character. The one kid who has a daemon lobotomy, though. That was horrible. You felt for him and you admired him for seeing through the BS and then they mess him up so bad...I'm giving too much away. And what's with all of the violence here? It's a kid's movie, right? Why so many grusome deaths? All in all, it left me cold. Didn't help that it was mostly set in a frozen wasteland.

December 16-19, Sunday-Wednesday - Sick. Boo.

December 25-31, Tuesday-Monday - Daryl is out of town. And I am alone. Boo. Not a way to spend the holiday.

November: Mexican Wrestlers and Thanksgiving

2007-12-09T21:56:00.000-08:00

November 1st, Thursday - We went to go see Lucha VaVoom! I love this show so much. It's all about Mexican wrestlers and burlesque dancers. So entertaining. Click on the link and see if it's something you think you'll like.

November 22nd, Thursday - I love Thanksgiving! It was just Daryl and me making a huge amount of food. We didn't do a turkey this year and it was nice. I just heated up a roast (From US Wellness meats! Grass-fed beef only. It's really good. Honest.) and it was delicious. Mo also stopped by before she left town, which was nice. And then we watched a bunch of movies. It was a lot less stressful for me this year, I have to say. I even got a good night's sleep the day before. But, it wasn't to last. I got a phone call at 9p to go into work the next day! I'll spare you the details, but I was grumpy and Daryl was lonely. Boo.

October: Pests, Plants, Birthdays and Halloween, complete with Pumpkins

2007-12-09T20:53:00.000-08:00

Okay, I have had it with aphids. Those little suckers have to die. I'm instituting a scorched earth policy and getting totally new plants. Including a bunch of succulents, which they seem to ignore. I've found that the local ant population have decided that my flowerbeds are the ideal place to build a satellite colony, complete with eggs and infested with aphids. I've tried the organic way and along with the thousands of dead ladybugs, I'm done with it. We're going with pesticides, people. I've tried being good, but it just doesn't get any results. I've also decided not to grow any more edible herbs until I've killed every last aphid. I hope our chemical pesticide companies know what they're doing.

October 13th, Saturday - On a good note, we met some lovely people at Amy's housewarming. I look forward to getting some good avocados and tangerines when they start dropping from the trees she has in the backyard. I got them some star jasmine, which smells so wonderful, it just makes you feel good. If Daryl and I ever get a house here in LA, (Ha!) I want some star jasmine all around my house.
Can you tell who's going to win this one?

October 18-22, Thursday - Monday - Daryl and I took off for SF for pumpkins. I didn't get to eat at any of the restaurants I wanted to go to, but it was nice to hang out with old friends. We played games and caught up with people and generally had a good time. This time we flew up instead of drove and we played video games all the way on Virgin America. It was fun. I almost didn't want to get off the plane. It was certainly less stressful than driving, although since we spent all the money on the flight we didn't rent a car. I was so ready for a vacation. Although, next time we're eating where I want to eat.

October 27th, Saturday - Mo's Birthday! We had a lovely dinner with Mo and Lucy at the Cheesecake factory in Pasadena. I hadn't seen Lucy for a long time. She regaled us with stories of her past history as a restaurant hostess in super fancy places and having a crying fit in the closet on her first day. Yowza! I look forward to seeing that incident in her next screenplay. Mo's the last of the 1970 crowd to have her birthday and she will forever hold it over me that I am older than her by 5 months. Respect your elders, isn't that what they say, Mo? :)

Since it's also really close to Halloween, Daryl and I went to a Halloween party with our friends from TWoP! The theme of the party was "Anything British..." so we went as Fish and Chips. Daryl created these outfits from mattress foam, housepaint, and old towels and bedsheets. Mo was kind enough to lend us her overhead projector so we could make transparencies of the London Times and trace them onto our outfits. We ran out of grey metallic paint so we used the rust and purple to fill out the colors. We won a prize, which I shall treasure, for the Most Humorous Costume. I loved our costumes so much I had Daryl mount them to our bedroom walls. I am not kidding.
Here we are as Fish and Chips.

Can you see the DW references in the headlines?

Rose and The Doctor, of course.

No party is complete without Mary Poppins.

October 31st, Wednesday - Halloween - In the annual pumpkin decorating contest at work, I actually won a prize! I made my pumpkin, Sully, from Monsters, Inc. because we had tons of blue colored copies that came out wrong and I wanted to reuse them, instead of just dumping them. Honestly, I just love decorating pumpkins.
I think this one won the best prize.

I got most colorful.

Of course Jack Skellington won, too!

September, the month that wasn't

2007-12-09T20:50:00.000-08:00

I'm sure all sorts of exciting things happened this month, full of dentist visits and chiropractor adjustments, but it was a bad one for me, so I'm skipping it.

August, a month for the moon and stars. And a killer.

2007-12-09T20:06:00.000-08:00

Well, I've figured out the uploading problem. So let's continue with the belated blogs. The month of August! Hot weather, working two jobs and renting a car to keep up with it all. Okay, let's begin.

August 4th, Saturday - THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM. Everyone was talking about how great this one was. Well, from what I could manage to watch, it seemed ok. But it didn't help that the roving camera kept making me sick. I'm sure I missed out on the cool action since I was out in the lobby trying hard not to throw up. I hate the stupid verite camera effect. I'm sure Paul Greengrass is a fabulous director, but seriously he is not making movies for people like me, who have gotten nauseated on elevators. Stop moving the camera! Please.

Perseid fireball taken by Jimmy Westlake on 8 Aug 2007
August 12th, Sunday - Saw a fantabulous meteor shower and made many wishes. Daryl, Mo and I went out to the beach to see the Perseid Meteor Shower. I cannot even tell you how fantastic is was to catch a glimpse of the meteors streaking across the sky. I gasped at the first one and we weren't the only ones. There were families all camped out on the beach with us and many "ooohs" and "aaahs" were heard. Too bad I had to go to work the next day because the later it got into the evening the better it was supposed to be. I'm definitely taking a day off next year to watch and stay up late.

August 18th, Saturday - STARDUST. A good month for this movie, what with all the skywatching I was doing. It was a lovely fairy tale and a family movie. Michelle Pfeiffer is really enjoying being the main baddie in this one. Even under tons of make-up. It's a little corny, but it's a fairy tale. And a good one. The special effects are very good. I especially liked the ghosts of the dead princes commenting on the action. And Robert DeNiro, in one of the oddest characters I think he's played, is a cross-dressing pirate. He's a nice guy though. You really see why his crew love him. The ending actually made sense and there's a little "awww" in there too. I couldn't help myself. But there's still plenty of action and people are threatened with all sorts of sharp pointy things and some people actually die. So it's not all sentimental.

Here's a nice picture of the eclipse. From mr-mcgeek.blogspot.com

August 27th, Monday - August was a good month for skywatchers. This year had a lunar eclipse that made the moon red. It was magical. I love it when you don't need to bring out the telescopes.

August 31st, Friday - Then we saw the Aurigid meteor showers. These meteors weren't as bright or as varied as the Perseids, but it was still fantastic that I got to see them from my absurdly lit street. I woke Daryl up at 2am and there we were outside hanging out on the driveway searching for meteors in the sky in our jammies. I wasn't sure if we'd get to see any but we did and it exceeded all my expectations. At least this time it was on a weekend. I don't have a good photo here, so here's a website that has some good ones.

Rats, Robots, Indiana, Fetuses, Wizards, Explosions, and Exercise

2007-10-29T20:09:00.001-07:00

Things have gotten away with me a bit, so here's the quick lowdown on the fun stuff for July.

July 3rd, Tuesday-Ratatouille
I cannot begin to tell you how much I loved this movie. I was in tears when the title dish was tasted. Seriously. And I don't usually cry at movies. The story made sense, the characters were well-rounded, and beautifully animated. The colors were warm and rich, Paris never looked so inviting. Rats never looked so intelligent and agile. And what a lovely sentiment, that excellence, that truth, that being what you truly are, that all of these things are important and should be celebrated. How wonderful.

July 4th, Wednesday-Transformers
And then there were robots. Destroying stuff. And fighting each other. I loved the cartoon when I was a kid and was all excited to see the live-action movie ever since I saw the teaser trailer online. Bumblebee was annoying, but the big fights with the robots destroying a city made up for the ridiculous plot which inexplicably involved Shia LeBeouf's antique eyeglasses, if you can believe that. But who cares about plot when you have great special effects? Um, well, you know I do like a good story. But explosions are fun too!

July 6-10, Friday to Tuesday-Indiana and Daryl's Grandfather's Birthday
We went to Indiana to see Daryl's grandfather for his 90th birthday. (Isn't Daryl handsome?)

And then we saw his mom's family and met a new addition to the extended family, Nicky.
July 14th, Saturday-Knocked Up and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
OK, I still cannot believe that Katherine Heigl would end up with Seth Rogen, but for the purposes of this movie I'm gonna give it a pass. (I mean, it's like she's forcing herself to like the guy because she's going to have his baby.) It's nice to see a male comedy that actually wants the man to grow up and make it seem like a good thing. But that happens in the last 15 minutes of the movie and what you have before that, for about an hour and 45 minutes, is men acting like kids. And that's the funny part. I guess growing up isn't funny? And the crazy neurotic women are the funny ones. Why aren't there more funny women in the movies? What's up with that?

And speaking of women in movies, Dolores Umbridge, from the latest Harry Potter movie, is one of the best villains I think I've ever seen in a movie. The actress, Imelda Staunton is fantastic. Umbridge is all pink plaid with hundreds of kitten plates straight from the So Cute it Hurts factory where they pump out adorable little fluffballs to insinuate themselves right into our brains and make us say, "Awww." But Umbridge, is also perfectly fine with torture, and what's most important to her is the accumulation and continuation of that power. Umbridge is also the worst kind of villain, in that, she thinks she's doing the right thing by doing the worst thing, and when she gets her comeuppance, you cheer. Harry's going through a bad time and is isolated, even from his good friends. Evanna Lynch is wonderful and perfect for the role of Luna Lovegood. It may even be said that she makes Luna even better than the books. It's not the greatest Harry Potter movie, but it was pretty good.

July 15th, Sunday-Live Free or Die Hard
OK, remember the statement about explosions? In this movie, it happens in the first five minutes! The movie is a total exercise in the more explosions the better, the more fights the better. And there's some great action and the hero uses a car to hit a helicopter. It's fantastic. Kevin Smith shows up to confirm all conspiracy theories and Justin Long is around to teach us all how to steal a car that has the OnStar system. And Bruce Willis does a great job of making us believe he's too old to be doing this, even though there are plenty of opportunities in the movie where he would most likely be dead. It's not a deep movie, but it's satisfying in the way that watching big explosions are satisfying.

July 21st, Saturday-I bought an elliptical exercise machine. I was so excited about it, I cannot even say.

July 29th, Sunday - And in honor of the Simpsons movie, I visited a local Kwik-E-Mart.

Gluten-free Birthday and Spaced

2007-06-30T20:25:00.000-07:00

June 28th, Thursday-Yay! My birthday! I got a load of DVDs including all of the Office and Arrested Development series and The Incredibles and Pan's Labyrinth. Plus, a gluten free cake for the weekend Spaced Marathon. And Daryl took me out to PF Changs which is one of the few places that actually has a gluten free menu. I love it. Plus, I'm getting more gifts later!

June 30th, Saturday-The Spaced Marathon. Daryl and I had never seen the show before, but now we're both in love with it. Daryl even wants the DVDs. Unfortunately, it's only available in England. If you liked Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, you'll love Spaced. We watched for around 7 hours in Val's hot attic and then afterwards the DW crowd stayed to watch the end of the current season. It was a night of really good TV, even though I was not that happy with how they solved the main conflict in DW. Really, Tinkerbell?

Diane's Wedding

2007-06-17T20:12:00.000-07:00

June 17th, Sunday-Diane got married today at the Legion of Honor. Daryl and I nearly didn't make it. We were headed to the Palace of Fine Arts until we learned from Mary Land that we were going to the wrong place. I'd never been to a Jewish Wedding before and I was very thankful that it didn't last very long since it was freezing in the courtyard. The reception was held inside the museum and the food was wonderful. Who knew the groom could play the saxaphone?

And here's where we sat. Each table had a different artist's name. And the placecards were framed pictures from each artist.

You can see the cake behind Elise here, who was the Maid of Honor. I've been told that it was yummy. (I went to Cafe Mariposa in the East Bay to get treats for myself and I forgot to bring them to the wedding. By the way, they have great muffins.)

Here we are all dressed up.

Soren finds all of this fuss exhausting and takes a nap.

Fun at the DeYoung Museum

2007-06-16T19:25:00.000-07:00

June 16th, Saturday-Here we are at the DeYoung Museum. Doesn't it look like we're a band and we're posing for our CD cover?

Alice

Robb

Daryl

Kellee

Michael

Maurissa

Rik

Here we all are in a corner. Trying to be Irving Penn. (Here's another site.)

This isPamela, the rabbit. She's been on an adventure and is taking in the view.

And then we went for a walk.

Gar

2007-06-15T19:23:00.000-07:00

June 15th, Friday-We drove up to SF for Diane's wedding. Elise is very kindly letting us stay at her place. Here's Gar, getting comfy.

Pirates and Pool Cake

2007-06-05T18:53:00.000-07:00

June 2nd, Saturday-What is it about the third movie in a trilogy? Pirates of the Carribean 3: At World's End was about as long as it's title and made less sense. It did have some lovely special effects, what with people/sea creatures moving about and crabs carrying a ship. After watching for a bit, I decided not to try and make sense of the story as it was and just go with the flow. Keith Richards was just the right casting for Capt. Jack Sparrow's father and the thing with the shrunken head was funny. But it's a tiny part of the movie. I expected more from all the talk about Calypso and the result was a disappointing. This is what they're all afraid of? A 50 ft tall woman? They are so not liberated. I also didn't understand why Elizabeth got to be the King of the Pirates, but I decided to ignore that and just watch how sad it was to see Gov. Swann go and to see Norrington have a lovely redemptive ending. Boy, the men do drop like flies around Elizabeth. Really. Maybe her pirate name should be The Black Widow. There's a beautiful scene near the end where Lord Beckett, the villain of the piece, walks down the steps of his ship while it's being blown apart around him. His inability to command when he really needed to shows on his face and is a huge and somewhat sympathy-evoking. Great for a villain. And the monkey! The monkey was great. Kudos to the animal handler there because that monkey moved the plot along faster than anyone else in the movie. And I loved that Barbossa was back. He really was a great villain. Poor Davy Jones doesn't get much screen time as compared to last time, but he does have a sad little scene where you finally see him without the tentacles. This move has such a wealth of talented British actors, it makes you wonder why aren't more American's being cast. I think Johnny Depp, by way of France, and Lee Arenberg are the only ones I can think of at the moment. The love story wasn't much and frankly I didn't care, I'm much more interested in what Captain Jack is up to, which isn't much until halfway through the movie. He has a grand time ordering himself about, after which I discovered, one Captain Jack is more than enough. They left room for another installment so maybe we'll be back in the water in a few years.

June 5th, Tuesday-Here it is! This is the cake that I stayed up til 3a to make. I yelled at Daryl to frost correctly. And then I went to sleep for a few hours and now look at it. The balls and cue are made from marzipan and the interior frosting is chocolate buttercream. This is my first time working with fondant, but I was pleased to see how well it took to being colored. The bumpers and the holes were the hardest things to manage, but luckily Daryl was around to help me. Even through all the yelling. He really is very nice to not be mad at me. Yay, cake!

And here is the team photo.

Kyle's off to get Soapy

2007-05-30T18:49:00.000-07:00

May 30th, Wednesday-Kyle's going away party! Kyle is leaving the Brand Marketing and Synergy Group to go to Soapnet.

Look how surprised Sean is by the news!

PreFab House Design

2007-05-20T18:31:00.000-07:00

The MOCA has been hosting a pre-fab house design exhibit. Pre-fab has a bad reputation here in the US, but there are architects who are interested in pre-fab design that's beautiful and in some cases ecologically sound. Some of the designs are really modular such as the Wee House which can be built in a variety of configurations, 2 bedrooms, 3 bedrooms, or 4 bedrooms and for each set there are a great variety of ways to combine each set of bedrooms, depending on what kind of look you want. I think the Wee House was my favorite. They had configurations called "The Wedding Cake" which consisted of the two bedroom module below and the third on top, like a wedding cake. They also had the LV house by Rocio Romero. We saw the video for the assembly and they were attaching the frame of the house with steel I-beams. That house is unbelievably sturdy. It was also built from the ground up in a week using a very small crew of people, who weren't all construction workers. Another prefab house I liked was the Sunset Breezehouse, which had a middle section that could be completely open to the outside environment. It was also designed to be extremely energy efficient. You could have solar panel and there was a little garden and outdoor pool for cooling. Even the flooring and cabinetry were all made of bamboo or other kinds of renewable wood. Our good friend Rik recommended this exhibit and it now makes me want to build my own prefab house! (Rik actually met one of the architects and mentioned that it's his dream to one day be able to afford to build one. The architect replied, "Me, too.")

Celiac Conference

2007-05-19T18:01:00.000-07:00

May 19th, Saturday-I went to the Celiac Conference and it was fantastic. They had all sorts of vendors there that were giving out free samples of gluten-free food all day. I stuffed myself on cookies and waffles and I even got to have some chocolate croissants. You'd better believe I brought some of that home with me, along with some lovely dark chocolate, three different kinds of nutritional bars, and tons of free samples of snacks and baked items. Yum. I was stuffed with carbs within the hour. I'm definitely going again next year.

Spiderman 3

2007-05-15T18:09:00.000-07:00

May 15th, Tuesday-Daryl and I went to see Spiderman 3. I liked this movie, but it wasn't nearly as good as the first two. First of all, I started hating MJ. Kirsten Dunst has got to be bored with being the "girl in peril" and screaming at greenscreens these days. But I did like the ending with Harry. I was surprised at the whole Venom storyline as there is a specific reason behind Venom's appearance in the comic, but it appears that the black goo chooses Peter at random. And this is a kid that also randomly got bit by a radioactive spider. Topher Grace was good and I felt that his burning resentment and jealousy makes sense. And while I liked Sandman's sorrowful existence, (The poor guy can't even die, apparently.),I just wish we had one villain at a time. The way Venom and Sandman pair up at the end makes no sense to me at all. And I kind of laughed that Peter's descent into evil was exhibited by him eating lots of cookies, disco dancing on the sidewalk (Seriously, it was so cringeworthy, I really hope Tobey Maguire asked for hazard pay.), and dancing spitefully, but not by him actually doing anything illegal or seriously bad. But I guess Spiderman's journey is always an emotional one and his "evil" side would hurt the person he loved most emotionally rather than physically. It's just funny that Peter is so lame at being evil. He just can't do evil, I suppose. As usual, the effects are spectacular. The opening fight with The New Goblin was very well done and TM has many expressions for being afraid and not wanting to really hurt someone. (Those big eyes can emote!) Poor Bryce Dallas Howard gets a girl in peril role that really doesn't show off her talents, but maybe they'll pick her character up in the next movie. If they make a next movie. Maybe Sam Raimi has more that he wants to say about Spiderman that he hasn't already said. I can only hope he doesn't leave the series on this note. We all know he's better than that.

Mo's House and The Gumski's

2007-05-12T17:53:00.000-07:00

May 6th, Sunday-Our dear friend, Mo, just bought a house and we went to a House Decorating Suggestion Party. Daryl thinks she should redecorate the house so that the living room looks like a Roman palace. I think she should put a wall in the bedroom upstairs that has a bathroom. (She just put in a curtain.) She's been trying to get her garage finished and it's all just a frame right now and the backyard is a bit messed up, but she's got tons of room back there and a four bedroom house. I can't wait to see what it looks like when she's done with it.

May 10th-12th-Our very good friends visited us from Chicago. We call them the Gumski's because they are the combination of Nathan Gumley and Mary Anne Zmaczynski. I call Mary Anne, MAZ sometimes, too. They were lucky enough to try out the guest rooms at Maurissa's new place. We had quite the adventure, too, when we went out to get sushi in Japantown. A 1 hour wait! And I think we were one of the last few people served, too.

Acres of Books

2007-04-29T17:45:00.000-07:00

April 29th, Sunday-Daryl and I accompanied Mo to the Flea Market in Long Beach and then visited Acres of Books, a very large used bookstore. I tried finding some books that were recommended to me but they were out. I was a bit surprised that a bookstore of this size didn't have the books I was idly looking for, but I did get lost in the store trying to find my way out!

Peep Wars!

2007-04-16T18:59:00.000-07:00

Monday, April 16th-Daryl's at NAB and I'm just updating my blog. I'd forgotten to post it here, but Daryl and I did a movie for Easter, starring Easter Peeps. It's on YouTube.

Trip to SF/Elise & Mike get MARRIED!

2007-04-15T17:58:00.001-07:00

Wednesday, April 4th-We bid the family goodbye and then prepped to drive up to SF for a wedding. We didn't initially plan to go to SF, but when we heard that Elise and Mike were looking for witnesses for their WEDDING we decided we had the time. And we heard this about a week ago, so all of this is pretty last minute. For me at least. And we got there just in time for Game Night.

Thursday, April 5th-Elise and Mike got married at City Hall with us as witnesses and their families present. It was a pretty funny process. They give you a number and when your number is called you go get married. Like a deli. Except not. Anyway, they got married in the rotunda of City Hall which was lovely and afterwards Elise's mom treated us all to a meal at Max's.

Friday, April 6th-Daryl and I went to the Conservatory of Flowers and the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park. The Conservatory of Flowers had a special Orchid exhibit and it was lovely. And the cherry blossoms and azaleas were in bloom in the Tea Garden. It was a day of flowers. And games. Michael, Chris, and even Mia, however briefly, joined the regular Game Night crowd and socialized with us.

Saturday, April 7th-We met up with Robb, Kellee, Debbie, & Jill at the Farmer's Market and chatted and caught up with each other. Jill had lost a whopping 95 pounds since the last time I saw her and she looked great. Robb finally told us what super secret game he worked on when he went to Paramount studios last year. Kellee just found out she had to file a self-employed tax (Whoops!), and Debbie was making plans to go to Italy in the fall. We had a nice meal and margaritas at Chevy's at the Embarcadero and then drove Robb, Kellee, & Debbie to tea at Samovar and then to Robb & Kellee's apartment which was in a bit of disarray because Kellee was creating a human-size tulle coccoon in the living room. I loved that their apartment had flashcards in Spanish, too. And Pamela the rabbit was visiting the house so we payed our respects to her. Then we had a quick dinner with my sister at Park Chow after dropping Debbie off at her place. Too bad we had to rush off to see Rik who had only a small window of available time for us. Luckily, we got Robb & Kellee to join us at Michael and Rik's place where Chris and Jeannie were already in attendance. So you know it was a night of much laughter. It also helped that the cats were very entertaining. (Daryl was pretty sick and was coughing pretty badly. His brother most likely gave him this cold when he was visiting last week.)

Sunday, April 8th-Easter. We had a nice brunch with the newlyweds and then we were off to LA to drop into our beds. Little did we know that Easter traffic, while not as bad as the Sunday after Thanksgiving, was definitely more crowded than our trip up. We got home at 10:30p. Poor Daryl drove sick the entire time.

Daryl's Birthday/Family Visit

2007-03-26T22:00:00.000-07:00

Monday, March 26th-Daryl's Birthday. And we went out to eat sushi and that's about it. Daryl didn't want a celebration but I did bake him a cake in the shape of a billiards table, with marzipan balls and cue. When he's done with his billiard team I'm going to make a bigger cake for the whole team of 8 players. Currently, they're #1! And is there anyone who's surprised by that?

Friday, March 30th-Daryl's mother, brother, Joel, and nephews, Joseph and Andrew are in town to visit so we got Christian to take us to Hertz to get a mini-van. Boy howdy, the line there was so long we couldn't even pick them up at the airport; they had to come to Hertz and wait with us. Thankfully, we got out of there with the mini-van we were expecting and we then proceeded to Santa Monica Pier. Unbeknownst to us, a fire had been set in the hills and we saw huge billows of smoke coming from the Hollywood sign. Good thing we were driving away from that. We brought the kids out to the Santa Monica Pier and they immediately decided to change into shorts, which turned out to be a smart move as it was sunny and warm. They had fun on the pier in the Motion in the Ocean and Ferris Wheel and also got a souvenir penny. Then we drove up PCH to Malibu and had a lovely meal at Gladstone's where Andrew, amazingly, ate 1/2 pound of crab legs. You wouldn't think of it to look at him, but that boy can really put it away. We left with our leftovers wrapped in a foil bunny and a foil penguin. The foil artist was very good and the boys were delighted with the foil buddies. Then we drove around for a bit and brought them back to our place and we made arrangements to have one adult and one boy in the foldout bed in the living room and one boy and one adult in the office on the inflatable bed. (Honestly, I wasn't sure we'd be able to handle all of these people in our little apartment.) Surprisingly, this worked out and people seemed to get enough sleep. Daryl and the kids bonded over the Playstation and they gave him hints on how to win Lego Star Wars, while he coached them on Jak & Daxter.

Saturday, March 31st-We went to Chinatown for Dim Sum and while Joseph didn't like it all that much, Andrew got a kick out of it. I wonder how this family eats because Joseph only eats cheeseburgers, fries, and the like, while Andrew doesn't like fast food (He even eats broccoli!) or spicy food, but his dad loves spicy food. It must make dinnertime very interesting. Daryl's mother brought Slim Jims, gummi candies, pistachios, and Easter chocolate just in case the kids got hungry. And boy did they! Then we went to the La Brea Tar Pits and tried to see how strong we were at pulling tar and saw a lot of bones and a cool visual effect of a saber-toothed cat appearing over its skeleton. Joseph got another souvenir penny and told me that "all the cool places have souvenir penny machines." We tried to satisfy the kids with fried mozzarella sticks and quesadillas at our favorite Mexican restaurant, but I think, in the end, chocolate candies won the day.

Sunday, April 1st-We had a bit of a late start so had to eat breakfast at Jack-in-the-box. Andrew was ok with it when he learned he could dunk his French Toast into the maple syrup. Apparently, it was pretty good. Then we went to the Griffith Observatory which was a little confusing, but had some cool exhibits, like the big Foucault's pendulum. They even had a person explaining how it demonstrated that the earth moves. Very informative. We got tickets to the lovely planetarium show which was lovely, at least the part that I was awake for. (I told you we had a late start.) I don't know how it ended but the kids stayed up for the whole thing which I thought meant that it was pretty entertaining. Let me just say that the staff there were not only well informed, but polite and happy. It makes me want to be a member. Now if only we could just drive up there! We also strolled around Hollywood Boulevard and Mann's Chinese Theater, where the family was witness to the aftermath of a violent fight. I missed it because I was in the Sanrio store looking for Hello Kitty stationery and pushed my way through the crowd wondering why people weren't moving. Luckily, the kids did get a chance to look at handprints and footprints and even got a picture with Darth Vader and a Stormtrooper. The kids were so happy! And Joel got a great deal on T-shirts for the kids and for people back home. Andrew and Joseph got to pick out the designs that they liked. It was a lot of fun.

Monday, April 2nd-Ok, today was Disney. We did the Buzz Lightyear Astro-Blasters twice. After Daryl gave us some hints we all got higher scores than the first time, with Daryl's mom getting a whopping 95,000 points. The favorite ride of the day was the Indiana Jones ride which we did twice. The first time, after we were done, Joseph turned around to me and said "That was AWESOME!" Which was exactly the response we were looking for. Everyone should go to Disneyland with kids. Everyone. I should mention that we left at a staggeringly early hour (for us, that is) and eventually had dinner at Swingers where the kids fell asleep in the booth while eating. I got the impression that they had a good time.

Tuesday, April 3rd-Today we went to The Griddle and finally, finally, Joseph got a pancake bigger than his head. Carol got to see Ian Ziering yet again, little did we know he was just on Dancing with the Stars the night before. And then we were off to the Star Wars Exhibit at the California Science Center. Just to make it easier to get in, I got us all tickets to the IMAX show which required 3D glasses. Cool. The dinosaurs did look like they were going to get you and there was a moment at the end where the person sitting next to me gave a little scream as she jumped out of her seat. Fun! And then we were shuttled like cattle into the Star Wars Exhibit which was so crowded it was hard to keep track of the kids, although, with four adults looking after them they didn't get far without one of us tailing them. I had fun creating a lego mag-lev train, although there were some magnets missing from the train propulsion exhibit. And the kids had fun looking at all of the blasters from the movies and robots. We even had them programming a robot. Daryl, Joseph, and I waited a good 40 minutes to get into the mock up of the Millenium Falcon which could only hold 8 people at a time. No wonder why this place was crowded. Andrew decided he wanted to climb the climbing wall while we were in line and he made it all the way to the top! There never was a happier grandma than Daryl's mom when Andrew got to the top. Well done, Drew!

Mo's show-Peanut Butter and a dog.

2007-03-13T00:34:00.001-07:00

Monday, March 12th-Mo had her "mid-term" Groundlings show. Mitchell, very kindly, gave me a ride up to the show and we sat down with a bunch of Maurissa well-wishers. I was a bit dismayed to shout out my suggestion to a silent audience when the audience was asked for a suggestion for a dirty job to start the improv. That'll show me to actually suggest something for an improv. But the cast did a fine job and Maurissa, of course, got the biggest laugh of the show-due to some peanut butter and a dog-and her sketch was very elegantly done. She was just relieved to be done with it for the time being, although she did tell me and Josh, afterwards that she had to write 5 more sketches for next week. It sounds like a pretty grueling process and my hat's off to her for even doing it. I do think she'll be asked to join Sunday Company, but she says that we'll probably see her even less since that means she has to write new sketches every week. (Just like SNL.) I gave her my top 5 list of who I think will make it, but we'll see if I'm right. All in all, they were very talented people and if they don't get Sunday Company, my guess is that they'll do just fine. Bravo!

Mary Land & Marathons

2007-03-13T00:33:00.000-07:00

Saturday, March 3rd & Sunday, March 4th-Mary Land came to visit us in LA! We ridiculously forgot to take pictures but we had a great time with her here. Maurissa picked her up at the airport and then dropped her off at our place. We then played a nice game of Settlers of Catan and Puerto Rico. Daryl, surprisingly, lost. I think Mary took advantage of the fact that we haven't been playing games for a long time. (Oh, how we miss Game Night.) But then he won the second game and it was like we were back in SF.

Sunday was the LA marathon and while we were scrambling to find Maurissa running (we missed her by probably a half hour) we spent a good deal of time in traffic in some not very nice neighborhoods starving because we hadn't eaten yet. After a few hours of this, we cheered a few groups of runners/walkers on and then left to eat at The Griddle. They have the largest pancakes ever. I recommend this place to everyone who visits LA. I, of course, got eggs and bacon. And boy, is their bacon worth it. And then we played more games. We introduced Mary to a game called Shear Panic whose cute ceramic figurine pieces belie a game of complete dastardliness and screw-you moves. Fun.

Jeopardy and their pens

2007-03-02T23:44:00.000-08:00

March 2nd, Friday - I auditioned for Jeopardy yesterday. I wasn't looking forward to it until Daryl told me that they might not pick me. And then I perked up. I forgot that they give you another written test when you get there and I got a question wrong that I should have gotten right. Ugh! I hate that when it happens. But we did get to play with the real buzzers that they use on the show in a few mock games. It was fun. Everyone got asked the same questions and one of the questions was "What will you do with the money if you win?" Almost everyone there said that they'd travel. It was a little sad because it just means that people here in America don't ever get to go anywhere. Although I kept wanting someone to say that they'd try to double their money in Vegas. That would have been hilarious. I'm pretty sure they won't pick me, so I'm relieved and I got a pen out of it!

Chinese New Year Parade

2007-02-19T18:12:00.000-08:00

Saturday, February 24th - Chinese New Year Parade. It's the Year of the Pig. Isn't this cute? Daryl and I bought it in Chinatown after the parade. We forgot the camera, but we got to see Archie Kao and James Hong, along with a number of politicians. The mayor actually used his microphone to complain about the potholes in the road along the parade route. And our friend Christian got a photo of the gigantic gold pig that he was hoping for. I'm happy with this paper representation.

Goodbyes, Pipes, Wrestlers, and Chinese New Year

2007-02-19T00:18:00.000-08:00

Saturday, February 10th - It was a sad day for Doctor Who fans in Southern California, our fellow fan, denara, is moving north ("Lots of places have a North.") So we got together to say goodbye and watch some Torchwood. Goodbye, denara.

(Original image can be found here: http://hermes.hrc.ntu.edu.tw/lctd/asp/theory/theories/right.asp?id=2)

Thursday, February 15th - Today we celebrated Valentine's day and I told Daryl he had to spend the entire day with me and he wasn't allowed to work. I finally, finally got him to go see the Magritte exhibit at the LACMA. It's a fantastic exhibit and I recommend it to everyone. They had clouds on the floor and pictures of the LA freeway on the ceiling. The exhibit included various other pieces of art from people who were inspired by Magritte. There was a Jeff Koons sculpture of a little inflatable rowboat that was completely made of lead. Daryl was delighted when he saw it because he had the exact same kind of little rowboat when he was a kid. We also poked around a lot of the other exhibits including one on Picasso. It included a video of Picasso painting a picture. Oddly enough, it was really funny. He started painting a flower, which turned into a fish, then a human face, ending with a rooster. There's a lot of tension, too, because they keep reminding him that they're going to run out of film and he seems fine while they count down. And he finishes in time!

Then we had a quick dinner and then we carpooled to Lucha VaVoom! Mexican wrestlers and burlesque dancers are perfect entertainment for Valentine's. Here are our friends, Christian, Nanette, (who is very pregnant, by the way) and Aaron.

(Image from http://www.ukstudentlife.com/Ideas/Album/ChineseNewYear2005.htm)

Sunday, February 18th - Happy New Year! It's Chinese New Year today and we got to see an old friend and meet some new ones. I couldn't arrange a meeting that involved any kind of celebration for that, but I did arrange to meet up at a Thai restaurant that had a Thai Elvis impersonator and a Thai folk singer. Hats off to Palms Thai!

Clearing Winter Storm

2007-01-12T21:34:00.000-08:00

January 21st, Sunday - We went to the Gene Autry Museum to see the exhibit on Yosemite and watch my friend's film on Hetch Hetchy Valley. (Sometime after the Great Fire 1906 in San Francisco, the government demanded that Hetch Hetchy Valley be dammed up to be a reservoir to provide water for the city and the surrounding area. John Muir, the great conservationist who had lobbied hard to keep all of Yosemite, including Hetch Hetchy Valley, pristine, was against the dam project. But it went ahead anyway. Now there's a movement to get rid of the dam and restore the valley to it's original state. My friend did the editing for the film and I also worked on it.) We couldn't get in because it was sold out, but we did get to see the exhibit. Our favorite picture was the Ansel Adams photograph above.

Here's the original website: http://www.temple.edu/photo/photographers/adams/photo8.htm .

And here's the Wiki entry on Hetch Hetchy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hetch_Hetchy_Valley .

Xmas food. Because it's all about the food.

2006-12-30T21:00:00.000-08:00

December 30th, Saturday-Well, it's just been a whirlwind of holidays parties and after being well-fed and plyed with chocolates and pears we got to the actual Christmas night dinner and it was just the two of us. I made a standing rib roast with au jus (Oops. Didn't skim off enough of the fat.) and yorkshire pudding (gluten-free, of course), cornbread sausage stuffing (also gf), steam-baked potatoes, haricot verts (overcooked, unfortunately), and pumpkin pie. I mistakenly thought the rib roast was thawed (Big oops!) so even though I wanted sort of a late afternoon start to the dinner it turned out to be more like regular dinner time. I basically made a dinner for six for just me and Daryl. Lots. Of. Leftovers. All of the recipes were from the Julia and Jacques cookbook except for the gf yorkshire pudding. And the yorkshire pudding turned out great even though it was gluten free. It puffed up nicely out of the muffin tins. (See below.) Thank you, internet recipe forums.

And I got a lot of stuff from my Xmas list, a 10" braising pan with lid, shirts from LLBean, a little Flash drive, and a gravy boat featured in the picture above. (Daryl also got a Goth box set, a set of Looney Tunes cartoons, a car duster, and the Scrabble mugs above, along with a gift certificate.) Daryl insists that I ask for "fun" stuff for Xmas. I asked for a mop, some shirts and cooking stuff. He said that it wasn't exactly "fun." Well, ok, but I still wanted them. Microfiber, people! It's the way to clean. And who couldn't use more shirts? Especially when they're pima cotton. And for me cooking is fun. (When I'm not working two jobs at the same time, that is.) Shouldn't you be allowed to want what you want? As much as I love getting stuff, I really do think people go a bit crazy about gifts for Xmas. I think we should make Xmas all about the dinner, much like Thanksgiving. Or maybe we could extend Thanksgiving through to the end of the year? Just a suggestion.

I was pretty stressed about work, since I got a video to work on and then had to work at Disney again. I love Disney, but working when I got home from Disney was a pain. Luckily, I worked the week just before Xmas and then the week after so it was pretty low-key. The three-day weekend for Xmas was also great for de-stressing.

One of the silly things I did before Xmas was clean the windows. It was one of the coldest days of the year! And I nearly fell off the stepstool and pulled a muscle. Arg! My periformis! Bending is now a problem. So one of my resolutions for 2007 is to do more Pilates.

SICK SICK SICK

2006-12-06T22:21:00.000-08:00

December 6th, Wednesday-SICK! This time it's the stomach flu. Oy vey.

If you can imagine vomiting and diarrhea all night long then that would be my night. I actually felt so bad I was lying on the floor because I couldn't get up. And it was COLD on that floor, people. I could feel my entire body tingling in a way that was not fun. Daryl was afraid he'd have to take me to the hospital. Listen people, if you get the stomach flu, drink your fluids. It won't be fun, but at least you won't be dehydrated. Thank God for coconut water.

Daryl got sick two days later and nearly threw up on a friend who was in town visiting. Luckily, he wasn't staying with us. I just hope our brief hugs didn't contaminate him. And poor Daryl was still working the two jobs! Now I understand a deadline is a deadline, but seriously, the stomach flu trumps all work as far as I am concerned.

In my recovery, I discovered a lovely recipe for easy egg-drop soup. It's fantastic if you can't really eat. I had that and corn chips almost exclusively for a week.

Oh Sickness!

2006-11-30T23:40:00.000-08:00

November 30th, Thursday-Sick!!! Again!!!! It's my annual post-Thanksgiving illiness.

Thanksgiving, NACHO, EUROPA, AND EVERYONE WE KNOW

2006-11-28T22:49:00.000-08:00

November 23rd, Thursday-Arg. I do this to myself every year and cook like crazy for Thanksgiving. It takes two days to really do it right without totally draining yourself, but even spreading out the work over two days takes a toll. I made Julia Child's Deconstructed Turkey with Turkey leg medallions stuffed with stuffing, Giblet Gravy, Cornbread Sausage Stuffing, Candied Yams, a Gluten-Free Pumpkin Pie, and Basil Green Beans. My neighbor Julie, brought Roasted Parsnips and Cranberry Sauce and made a Gluten-Free Apple/Rasberry Pie. Mo came by to keep us company as we got the dinner ready. We ate around 3p and I was stuffed after one helping. Kind of a letdown after all that work, after all I really want to eat a lot and frankly I just couldn't. I didn't even eat pie until a few hours later and then that was it for me.

Afterwards we watched NACHO LIBRE, which was only intermittently funny, but I kind of admire the effort. Jack Black is always interesting to watch, but there was a feeling of, "Oh, that's funny because they're so dumb." I don't mind movies like that if they also make me laugh, but here they didn't. We watched the outtakes which, to me anyway, seemed funnier than the movie because they just let Jack Black be Jack Black.

Then we watched EUROPA, EUROPA, which was fascinating. It's the story of a young Jewish boy who pretends to be a Hitler Youth in order to survive. This kid goes through a variety of tension riddled encounters with people who would love to kill him. The amazing thing is that he got away with it. At the end, he's told, "Don't bother telling anyone what happened to you. No one will believe it." I just remember that when I would watch the interviews for the Partisan videos that so many of them did similiar things (although not for such an extended period of time) and they mostly got away with it because they didn't look "Jewish" whatever that was supposed to mean. And it didn't hurt to be attractive either. One guy got away because he looked exactly like a German soldier's son, who had died. So weird that the Holocaust could have happened. I mean, rationally, genocide makes no sense at all. But I guess this was a time when people weren't thinking rationally, but letting their basest instincts take over. Hard to believe you could convince so many people that that was the best thing to do.

And then we saw ME AND YOU AND EVERYONE WE KNOW, which was another movie that had no relationship to either movie we'd seen before. I don't know how to explain it, but it's about a series of relationships that a variety of people made in this unnamed neighborhood. A shoe salesman sells shoes to an elderly man, who's driver thinks of him romantically. The driver is also a video artist trying to get her work into a gallery curated by a woman who's got a problem with intimacy. The shoe salesman is dealing with getting a divorce and taking care of his two boys, one of whom gets involved with a possible online sexual predator. The other boy gets harrassed by some neighborhood girls but is drawn to another girl who's preparing her own dowry. There's more going on than what I just related but it's really about people trying to make a connection with each other. The child actors in the movie are fantastic, by the way. It's not a laugh riot, but it's a nice quiet movie, totally indie.

Today sucks

2006-11-16T20:10:00.000-08:00

November 16th, Thursday-A DOG BIT ME. A little blood and a lot of skin burn. At least he didn't rip my shorts. I couldn't stop crying for an hour afterwards, though. Daryl decided to come home to make me feel better. I can't believe this happened to me! I was just walking down the sidewalk! Stupid dog!

Who gets bit by a dog??!! I have the crappiest luck in the world.

TWoP DW SoCal Con and other abbreviations

2006-11-06T17:56:00.000-08:00

November 6th, Monday-Saturday, the 4th we had another TWoP SoCal Con and we got to see TORCHWOOD! Hmm. Kind of like X-FILES with a Welsh flair. Haven't decided if I like it yet. For those of you who don't know, TWoP=www.TelevisionWithoutPity.com, a website which has recaps of TV shows and forums for viewers. I frequent the DOCTOR WHO forums and the SoCal Con=Southern Callifornia Con, or meeting. So a bunch of us who live in the area got together and had hamburgers and hotdogs and watched TORCHWOOD, the DOCTOR WHO spinoff, starring John Barrowman as Captain Jack Harkness. So when I say "a bunch", I mean three of us who chat on the website and Daryl, who fits right in. (Strangely, it's three women. I keep waiting for SoCal guys to show up on the forums just for gender parity.) We're mostly science fiction fans so we also discussed other shows like HEROES, which is sort of an X-Men ripoff. But we all agreed the best character in that show is Hiro Nakamura, who can bend space and time. Somewhat similiar to the Doctor, actually. I've been a fan of DW since I was a kid and have seen most of the shows from Jon Pertwee's incarnation to a bit of Sylvester McCoy's tenure as the Doctor and even saw the movie that made me gasp as the Doctor actually kissed a woman. I immediately didn't like that, but the Christopher Eccleston Doctor had me wanting him to kiss his companion, Rose. Odd, that. And somehow watching the current incarnation kiss a bunch of people doesn't seem all that weird either. I'm still a big fan of the CE Doctor. There was just something so right about that, but, alas, he decided to do only one season. I do like David Tennant, but it's just not the same for me, I guess. I can't wait to see what happens next season.

THE PRESTIGE and THE ISLAND and HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF BLOOD PRINCE

2006-10-13T16:41:00.000-07:00

October 29th, Sunday-Saw the movie THE PRESTIGE. I wanted to see Wolverine fight Batman, but alas, it was just a movie about jerks who happened to be magicians. Actually, to say I saw the movie is a little bit of an overstatement. When I sat down in the very crowded movie theater, I immediately felt nauseated. I spent the first hour of the movie with my head buried in Daryl's arm. I could barely even look at the screen. Then I just couldn't stand it anymore and left to go to the bathroom. I thought getting a drink would help, but after having a bit of Coke and pacing up and down the aisle, I had to go to the bathroom again. Then, I just decided to watch the rest of the movie from the aisle since getting back to my seat required me to block half a row full of people. And I'd probably just have to get up again. In any case, I sort of figured out the gist of the movie which was kind of fun, until they introduced David Bowie as Nicolas Tesla. Seriously, who is going to believe that? Although he does have a weird quality to him, it just threw me that he was supposed to be a real person. Why couldn't the filmmaker's have used a fictional character, after all, he's the one that introduces a supernatural element into the story that I didn't like at all. Before that, the story was sort of an escalating display of one-upsmanship. There's a whole, here's my diary, oops, no it isn't, it's just a trick, thing that was fun, but neither guy would just let it go and people DIED in the process. Seeing people so divorced from morality like this was just awful and I couldn't really root for one man over the other. If I wanted to root for anyone I would have rooted for Micheal Caine's character (Batman's Alfred!) to completely avoid both guys. Hugh Jackman is all kinds of pretty and he also plays drunk well. I think he got the biggest laugh of the evening.

You know, it's odd, I watch this movie and then a few days later I watch THE ISLAND and I think, Scarlett Johanssen was in both movies? (People keep saying she doesn't care for the Hollywood "thin" look, but who really thinks she's fat?) She played completely different kinds of characters, although in all honesty, I don't remember her scenes in THE PRESTIGE as much because I was in the bathroom being sick. I thought THE ISLAND was a remake of the movie, THE CLONUS HORROR, which was a movie, quite rightly, made fun of on Mystery Science Theater 3000. In fact, I remember watching it when they heckled that movie, so I was a bit curious about THE ISLAND. There are all sorts of ridiculous things in the movie, like why they needed to grow whole human beings instead of just cloning the organs--it's easier, cheaper, and probably entails fewer moral problems. And not only do they clone whole human beings, but they also develop a huge infrastructure to house them and lie to them---and employ thousands of people to consistently lie to them! That I find unbelieveable in the extreme. But then again the whole movie is pretty much unbelieveable. The car chase scenes are fun and make no sense at all because how can they not catch two people that are WALKING in LA? The actors all did a great job being convincing even Sean Bean who had to be the bad guy. Djimon Hounsou was also good as the bounty hunter. And Ewan MacGregor has so much charm that I've loved him in everything I've seen him in, even in all of the Star Wars movies. The movie was beautifully shot and the architecture they developed for the clone's facility and the sets outside the facility looked great. I think the makers of THE CLONUS HORROR are actually suing the makers of THE ISLAND, which I find odd, but hey, I guess they did think of cloned people escaping their cloning facility first. I just hope I don't have to be on that jury.

October 31st, Tuesday, Halloween-Did I mention I got sick? Well, I was sick for quite a while so I read HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF BLOOD PRINCE in three days. Daryl was also working day and night---one night he didn't even come home, he slept on the couch at the studio!---so I didn't have a lot of company. Perfect time to read a good book. This book seemed overly expository, but I guess it had to. I'm thinking the last one will be almost all action. Harry once again goes through a trial, after which someone important to him dies. It's sad and I believe JK Rowling when she says that it was necessary. I can't wait til the last book. I checked out JK Rowling's official website and it's a lot of fun. She really thought about this story for a long time and did a good bit of research, considering that the world is nearly all imaginary. She's got backstory on a lot of people in the book that will probably never see print, and she's also catalogued a lot of the imaginary creatures that she thought of, too. I found out all this when I played around on her website. That was what I did on Halloween because I wasn't feeling well and no one came up to the door trick or treating, although I did hear them in the street! Really cute. I wish Daryl and I had had a chance to make costumes and enjoy in the revelry, but with him working like crazy and me being unwell, it just wasn't meant to be. I did leave out a bag of mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cups on the mailboxes, but we still have a bag of mini-Snickers.

October: Jury Duty! Mo's Birthday Party!

2006-10-01T22:09:00.000-07:00

October 2nd through the 10th, I got to work at Disney, which was great. I felt like a real live contributing member of society there for a while. And then the next week I had to go to jury duty. And that is a long and painful story.

October 16th to the 18th-First of all, why on earth did I have to be there at 7:30am? Daryl had to drive me because it was an ungodly early hour of the day to be going to court. And I was late. We all sat in a large room handed in our questionnaires and watched a video about how great it is to serve on a jury and then waited for our names to be called out. Unfortunately, I got called late in the morning, just before lunchtime. Our group went up to the court and after being sworn in and some people being excused because of "hardship," I got called up to be in the jury box. I'm juror #3 and the case is about land taken by the county sanitation district through "eminent domain" for a water reclamation plant (sewage treatment plant). The land is vacant. By law, the government must pay the owners what they call a "fair market value" for the properties taken. The issue we had to decide was how much money the county sanitation district had to pay. So basically we were there to decide a PRICE, which to me sounded ridiculous. I mean, how could they have not come to a compromise on a price? According to the documents we saw, they had OVER A YEAR to settle the matter without a jury and they didn't, which just tells me that the only people making a profit here are the lawyers. Anyway, we're given two questionnaires to fill out, one for general jury selection and one regarding eminent domain. All of the questions total around 50, stupid questions. The judge called upon us to read OUT LOUD our answers to each and every question, and then, the lawyers would question us on our answers. Let me tell you that it was just as excruciatingly tedious as it sounds. I tried to speed up the process by saying, "Questions 1-5, No. Questions 6-8, No. Question 9, Yes, my cousin is a real estate agent, etc..." So now a good number of complete strangers know that I'm married and work as a film/video editor and I have no kids and have no prejudice against lawyers, real estate appraisers, and real estate agents. But I do have a little problem with eminent domain, since my favorite cooking supply store, Surfas, is currently being taken over by the city through eminent domain. Which is just terrible and makes no sense at all. And I also know quite a bit about other people and how they feel about eminent domain as well. The only entertaining moments occured when an obviously hostile potential juror would read their answers and respond with overwhelming resentment, which happened often, by the way. All of the most confrontational people were excused, some of whom I think were faking it and saying just the right thing to get them off. (And I think the majority of those people were very rich and arrogant. One of them actually said, "Do you know how much money I'm losing by being here?" Like the rest of us weren't losing money? Complete. Ass.) The judge also let people off because they had to make a movie or edit a movie and I thought that was ridiculous, since there were plenty of single mothers who had to go out of their way to get childcare for two weeks and miss out on getting paid for two weeks in the jury who weren't excused. I call that a real hardship. Pushing back your preproduction for a couple of weeks doesn't sound like much of a hardship by comparison. There was one guy who read back his questionnaire in such bad English it was funny in that it was so overdone and inconsistent. They excused him as well, but only after he went through every single question! And then another guy got excused because he fell asleep in the jury box! And then they kept a juror who was a paralegal, who's boyfriend was fired by the plaintiff's lawyer's firm! It made no sense, really. All in all I think we went through about 23 people's questionnaires. It took three days, people. THREE DAYS! And I was never excused so I was juror #3. Juror #1 was an illustrator, juror#2 was the paralegal/legal secretary, juror #4 was a web graphic designer, juror #5 was a college professor, juror #6 was a nurse, juror #7 was a housewife, juror #8 was a housewife, juror #9 was a journalist for the Korea Times (I think if they excused the Iranian man for not understanding English, they should have excused this guy because he had similiar difficulty. I think they kept him because he really didn't put up much of a fight.), juror#10 was an accountant, juror #11 worked in a church, juror #12 worked for UPS, alternate juror #1 was a DNA analyser, a la CSI, and alternate juror #2 was an architect, who just happened to be working on a civil engineering project wherein some properties were taken over through "eminent domain."

October 18th to the 20th-OK, so now we get opening statements, which is fine, but takes a day and a half because the plaintiff's (LA County Sanitation District #14) lawyer keeps getting interrupted with objections from the defendent's lawyers. Basically, most of the plots of land are in the same 2 mile area and in parcels consisting of 5 acres. (There was a small 2.5 acre parcel and a 10 acre parcel, too) All in all it was 24 separate parcels that were in question. The owners were represented by a lawyer for a land company that owned a lot of the parcels and then another lawyer who represented 8 individuals who owned parcels in the same area. The owners wanted more money thant the county sanitation district was willing to give. For example, the county sanitation district wanted to pay $26,000 for a parcel that the owner (land company) wanted $50,000 for. The individual owners and the county had an even larger difference, they wanted, say, $71,000 for a parcel of land the county was only willing to pay $26,000. I mean, really, someone is taking advantage here. We got to hear from the first witness, the civil engineer in charge of the project for the water reclamation plant. Basically, I think we didn't really need to hear from him, since the question of the government taking the land was moot. They were going to take it, we were just there to figure out the price. And it took forever for them to get to the explanation as to how that price was determined.

Just a word on life in a jury. Of course, we couldn't discuss anything about the case outside of court, nor could we discuss it between ourselves, like, say, at lunch. Our hours were, typically, 10a-12noon, then 1:30p-4:30p with a 15 minute break somewhere in the afternoon. I constantly got soy chai lattes (There was a Starbuck's right in their courtyard!) to keep awake because it was staggeringly boring. I totally sympathized with the guy that fell asleep. We were all given pens and notebooks to take notes and I took notes, just as if it were a class I had to be tested on. It kept me awake, anyway. It's kind of like being in the most boring high school class that you have to take to graduate, but you can't chew gum and you can't leave and you have to pay attention. Lunch was difficult for me and for the first week I brought my own sandwiches because it was so hard to find a place I could actually eat that was gluten-free. One of the other jurors suggested the Department of Water and Power, which had a really nice cafeteria. Luckily, they had a burrito bar so I usually got the burrito without the tortilla. The DWP actually is housed in a nice building, the John Ferraro building, which had lovely fountains and a slightly dizzying staircase. (There's also a garden out front which consisted of plants that didn't require a lot of watering. And it looked nice! All of the plants were available in local nurseries so I do wonder why people insist on getting the most water greedy plants to put on their property. You live in an area that used to be a desert! Have some respect for the resources available! Anyway, water-greedy grass has always been a pet peeve of mine. It's annoying to see people watering their lawns every day just so they can have green grass. It's obscene how fresh water is wasted around here.) Also, I didn't have a car, so I had to take public transportation every day. I left at 8:30a to get there at 9:30a and left at 4:30p to get home around 6p. The bus was pretty consistent, but it was usually hot and stuffy and crowded. I'm not sure how many people take public transportation around here, but this bus service was pretty good for me. And I only had to take the one bus, no transfers.

October 21st, Saturday-Mo's Birthday Party #1. It's not actually her birthday, that's next week, but we gathered together to eat, carve pumpkins, and play a serial killer game (I kid you not.) Mo showed off some of her new culinary skills and fed us with some of the food she created in her cooking class for appetizers. We ordered food for dinner, and while everyone else got pizza, I got Thai food. Kristin, one of Mo's fellow improv-er was there with her fellow, Scott, who I vaguely remembered back in the day when I actually took improv classes. And Kim, one of Mo's actors from her LA version of The Magnificent Ass Show was there, too. And we carved pumpkins! Daryl carved a particularly disturbing face into his pumpkin that was really creepy. I followed a template that took forever, a witch on a broomstick flying over some buildings. Kim had never carved pumpkins before and I think she liked the experience. Then, Mo gave us all a game wherein we had to figure out which serial killer was which. Daryl and I got about 4 out of 13, but Scott and Kristin got 9! It was really nice to do something fun and somewhat depressing in that I knew I'd have to go back to court on Monday. Which wasn't fun at all.

October 23rd to the 25th-Ok, back to more witnesses. We heard from the land company's appraiser, the individual owner's appraiser, and the county's appraiser, as well as the tax assessor for the area. Bascially, they all used the same methodology, take the prices for land sales in the area that most resemble the subject area around the date of sale, "comps," weight them appropriately according to how close they were to development, power, paved roads, etc. and then come up with a price. Say you have 4 comps in the area.
Comp 1 was sold for 3,500,
Comp 2 was sold for 5,000,
Comp 3 was sold for 2,500, and
Comp 4 was sold for 3,500.
If Comp 2 had access to power then you'd have to give that the least weight, same thing if the comp was too far away from the subject area, or if it was next to a paved road, or if a well drilling was included in the price, etc. So you use percentages that add up to 100% to weight the price.
Comp 1-3,500 X .30=1,050
Comp 2-5,000 X .20=1,000 (less percentage because it was close to power)
Comp 3-2,500 X .20=500 (less percentage because it had no road access)
Comp 4-3,500 X .30=1,050
Adds up to 100% =3,600
And that would be your appraisal of the price of the property.

And it's all very good, but completely boring to most of us since none of us are involved in the real estate industry, nor do we really care. The best part was when the individual owner's appraiser made a mistake in her calculations which added up to 105% instead of 100%. And she did it right in front of us using a pad of paper and markers! Let's just say we found her appraisal to be the least reliable of the three appraisers. The problem with this is that the percentages are completely arbitrary and subjective. But since none of us were experienced appraisers that methodology was really all we had to go on in our deliberations. The plaintiff also tried to make us believe that Land Company Sales were sales made to buyers who really had no idea what the land was like, so they would buy it up for more than market prices. (Which, who buys a piece of land without checking it out first? Silly people?) Only the individual owner's appraiser used Land Company Sales, so that was another strike against her, but not that bad of a strike because we kind of didn't buy that argument completely.

October 25th to the 27th-Finally! We get to deliberate! And we get to determine our working hours, which turned out to be a lot similiar to the regular hours we'd been accustomed to. We basically decide to take the best comps from all three appraisers, and using more from the appraiser we felt was most qualified and less from the less qualified appraiser. We had maps and boards and various items from the appraiser's reports. It took a while because we were still trying to figure out what comps we liked and what methodology we'd use, but once we'd figured out the system, it went swimmingly on from there. A lot of the parcels were within the same 1 mile area so once we agreed on a price for one of the parcels, we applied it to all of the similiar parcels. So there was a 10 acre parcel, a 2.5 acre parcel, various 5 acre parcels in the same area with access to power and paved roads, and various 5 acre parcels in the same area without access to power and paved roads. So using the best comps from the three appraisers, we came up with $35,000/each for the 5 acre parcels that had no access, and $40,000/each for the parcels next to power and a paved road. When we went to court with our verdict, the clerk had to read every single parcel's price out loud. Then the lawyer's wanted to poll the jury so we had to respond yes or no to whether or not we agreed on the stated price. You can imagine how tedious that got. They didn't know that we were all agreed with the prices while in the jury room. It would have saved us a lot of time if we had just said it at the beginning. All in all it took us about two days total to deliberate and we got out around lunchtime on Friday. So, I'm safe for a year. Oh, and I get $15/day for 9 days (they don't count the first day) for jury duty. I feel sorry for all of those people whose jobs weren't going to pay them for the days they missed, I mean, really, it was two weeks. For some people, that's a whole paycheck!

So that's my really boring saga of jury duty. What a huge waste of time.

We leave Yosemite for Napa, and then, home to LA.

2006-09-26T18:19:00.000-07:00

September 23rd, Saturday-Well, we were both reluctant to leave Yosemite, but we had to go to a wedding reception. We lingered just a bit too long, watching the climbers on El Cap and enjoying the view in the meadows...and ended up an hour late to our lunch date! We had a very nice lunch at the Boonfly Cafe in Napa after a horrendously boring drive out of Yosemite. I filled up with food at lunch because I was pretty sure there would be nothing I could eat at the reception. (It turned out I could eat one of the hors d'oeuvres, but that was it. But they also had a buffet of sorts so I picked at that as well. Petit fours were the wedding cake, so that was out for me. I was glad to have had the creme brulee at lunch.) We stayed at a house rental with our friends, Elise, and her boyfriend Mike. The wedding reception was held at the Frazier Wine Caves and they provided a shuttle bus from the dirt parking lot to the caves. (Imagine ladies in fancy dresses and high-heeled shoes walking on soft, gritty dirt to get on the shuttlebus. I was wearing open-toed shoes with silver nail polish and after the trip in the parking lot, dirt.) The caves were nicer than I imagined and they had tables and chairs and loads, and loads of wine there. (Too bad Daryl and I don't drink. We had sparkling apple cider.) They had also booked two opera singers, a cellist, and a pianist to provide music. (The opera singers were really good, the tenor especially.) The groom met the bride at the opera and he booked the soprano that they both saw the evening they met, so it was part of their history together. The groom also proposed to the bride at the Frazier Wine Caves, which explained the venue. It was a beautiful night so we all sat outside and chatted and got caught up on everything that was going on in our friend's lives in San Francisco. it was so nice to see old friends again and to see two friends getting married.

September 24th, Sunday-The bride and groom decided to have a bbq at their house in Napa, so we all car pooled and got food at the local grocery. I can't believe they decided to have a bbq as they must have been tired from all the wedding preparations. And then we found out the wedding presents hadn't been opened yet, so the bride opened an hour's worth before we all had to quit for lunch. And she still had half a room of presents to go. And they were leaving for Europe the next day! Our friends brought games to play and it was very exciting because we had played Settlers of Catan and Puerto Rico with them in San Francisco for years, and when we moved to LA we hadn't found anyone to play games with. So we were looking forward to playing games. And boy did we! We played a game of Settlers at the bbq and then when we got to the rental home, we played more Settlers, a few Puerto Ricos, and another game called Blokus, which was irritatingly addictive. By the end of the evening Elise, Mike, and I were gamed out. Daryl still wanted to play more. Wow.

September 25th, Monday-Elise, Mike, Daryl and I all went out to breakfast and then parted, they to SF and us to LA. Daryl drove the first leg of the journey and we were still both full from breakfast we didn't get any food on the way back. We just gassed up and I drove the last half back to our place. Traffic was manageable and we got home surprisingly easy. Ah, well, now our vacation is over! The kitty, though, is more than happy we're back. Now she can go back to being evil.

Vacation. Yay! Yosemite. Yay!

2006-09-19T17:10:00.000-07:00

September 21st, Thursday-I actually drove out of Los Angeles and straight on through to Fresno. I couldn't believe I did that. Daryl was quite happy I did the drive because he was dead tired. By the time we got to Fresno, four hours later, he was fresh enough to tackle the rest of the trip to Yosemite. Oh, and driving for four hours? I felt like I was going to go crazy in the last hour, plus, by then I really had to pee and Daryl kept on telling me to go the later exits. When we got to Fresno, we stopped for food and got binoculars. I had read on the website www.yosemitefun.com that binocs are very, very useful for looking at all of the vistas and for watching the rock climbers. And boy was it ever. That was one of the best buys that we've ever shelled out money for. The clarity on that thing was fantastic. Anyway, the rest of the roads up to Yosemite were windy and annoying so I was glad Daryl was in charge because I would have crawled along those roads at a snail's pace---with a long line of angry motorists behind me. We got to the outskirts of Yosemite and stopped by the Mariposa Grove which had all of the sequoias. We walked up a short trail to see the one called the "Grizzly Giant." Note the fact that there are people at the bottom. Very, very tiny people.

It was like the Muir Woods except bigger and a whole lot drier. But they did have some really huge roots, which if you need a reference, Daryl is nearly 6 feet tall. And I couldn't get the top of the roots in the picture.

Then we hopped back into the car and drove to the tunnel entrance to the valley. Once you get past the tunnel, it's such a lovely vista that almost everyone stops to take a picture, including us. From our vantage point we could see El Capitan (left)and Half-Dome (rightish center and way back).

Then we drove past Bridalveil falls (Just a small trickle now that it was fall.) onto Curry Village to our cabin. Our cabin had two queen beds and a private bathroom and shower stall. I was relieved just to find someplace where I knew we'd be able to relax in relative comfort, since I am most definitely not an outdoor person. (The idea of sleeping in an outdoor tent cabin really starts to sound less romantic when you know the bathrooms and showers are communal and a goodly distance away. Plus, there's the threat of bears and there are sign all over the place reminding people to lock up their food and remove all food from their cars. (Way to scare the city girl, folks. I was scared of bears tearing down the cabin all night long. But I completely forgot the fact that mice were more likely to get into our food supply. Which we had in the not-so-secure paper bag from Whole Foods.) We went to get dinner at Curry Village, which I had called earlier to ask if they had any gluten-free items and they all looked at me like a freak when I asked. (Sigh.) I ate really expensive mediocre food, but at least I had pudding, which, believe me, made all the difference. I then suggested to Daryl that we go up to Glacier Point and see the stars at night. It sounded like a good idea, but what I didn't count on, was that it entailed a very long, twisty ride out of the valley and onto Glacier Point Road. It took a good hour to get there. But once we got up there it was well worth it. There are almost no outdoor lights so it's a good idea to bring flashlights with you, btw. We lighted our path up to Glacier Point with our flashlights and while we were working our way up, we saw two deer grazing by the path. So freaking cool! It was like time stopped as we looked at them looking at us. We finally reached the top and sat down to relax and look up at the stars and boy, howdy were they beautiful. I've never seen such a clear sky. We could see the cloudy edge of the Milky Way from our vantage point. There were so many stars I didn't know which ones they were. And if we looked down, we could see the valley lit up with campfires and lights. It was beyond gorgeous. And I have to say it was the highlight of the trip for me. Unfortunately, we couldn't take a picture, but I recommend going there to anyone who's thinking of visiting Yosemite. And, hardly anyone else was up there, so if you want solitude in Yosemite, that was one place for it. And then we had to go back to the road to drive back to the valley, which was another long, twisty trip--in the dark. We went to bed pretty early for us, although Daryl didn't sleep all that much because we were awoked to crinkly-paper noise and discovered mice had found our stash of food and had gotten stuck on our bag. Daryl let them go and then spread out the food on the floor to see what they picked up and they chose a lollipop, which was probably going to be the hardest thing for them to eat. Daryl did take pictures of this, which I thought was hilarious.

September 22nd, Friday-Both of us were not in the mood for an early morning hike, so we ate a very nice breakfast at the cafeteria near the Yosemite Lodge. Daryl had booked a room for us and they wouldn't let us register until after noon, so I made Daryl drive us up back to Glacier Point so that we could go on a 4 mile hike. We parked the car and began our hike to Sentinel Dome and it was a pretty nice hike. We saw some more deer on the way! Daryl got staggeringly close.

And here we are on Sentinel Dome. I believe that is El Capitan in the background.

And here is Daryl with his friend, Half Dome, to the right.

Then we took a roundabout path to get to the trail to Taft Point, which was south and west of us. It took a while but I think it was worth it. Here's Taft Point. There's a rail near the top of the picture on the left.

All in all it was a good trip and we got a nice room at the Yosemite Lodge where we showered up, (Because by the end of our hike, we were covered in dirt. All over. There was even dirt on my feet and I had socks and shoes on! Seriously, the trails were very dusty.) We had a nice dinner at the Mountain Room, the restaurant for the Lodge, where I had a steak and chocolate creme brulee. After which, we took it easy, since we were exhausted from hike. It makes me glad that I had been walking for exercise because it turns out it gave me a lot of stamina to do these hikes and I was afraid I'd be holding Daryl back. (Of course, it would have been great if I had also lost weight, too...)

Not again, please

2006-09-16T17:15:00.000-07:00

September 16th, Saturday-Well, after a few months of really discouraging setbacks in various aspects of my life, I have once again found myself with very little self-confidence. This time it's regarding my work situation (I don't even want to start on the health issues. The list is too long and too depressing to mention. Not terminal, mind you, just hugely irritating.) I have once again been told I am "not good enough," although in the nicest possible way, which I appreciate. In any case, despite the light and delicate slap in the face I've been given, it just threw me into a turmoil and I remembered every past instance of being looked over, not promoted, or even considered for a position I wanted. It took me not just twice as long as anyone else I knew to get the assistant job I wanted, but three times as long. I was an old lady by the time I was hired to be an assistant. Nobody has ever really wanted to hire me in the profession I chose, except for the fact that I was cheap labor. It was another experience I can put on the "here's another thing you want that you're not going to get" board in my mind. I used to think that with hard work I'd be able to accomplish any goal I took on. Well, I don't think that so much, now, since almost every goal I've had has been thwarted not just once, mind you, but multiple times. If I gave up after one setback, then I'd think I wasn't really interested, but it hasn't been just one setback, it's been a lot. It's enough to think that maybe it's not worth the heartbreak. I'm just glad I'm going on a vacation soon, because I really need something really good and nice to happen to me, if only to be reassured that sometimes God will let good things happen to me.

My Worst Nightmare

2006-09-14T21:13:00.000-07:00

September 1st, Friday-I'm currently taking over work for a friend of mine while he's in Bali, which is synonymous with "hard to get ahold of in an emergency." Don't get me wrong. I love editing. And I love earning money. And I'm working out of his apartment, which is normally fine. Friday it was not fine. Raw sewage came up the pipes in the bathroom. Imagine my horror when the stuff in the toilet not only wouldn't go down, but moved up. It was like my worst nightmare had come true. (I'm not kidding. I'm the most germ-phobic person I know.) I called the landlord who said he couldn't do anything since it was a holiday weekend and he had no idea who I was. (I'm his tenant's friend who's looking after his apartment!) The landlord then left a message on my friend's voicemail, which I have access to, and proceeded to tell my friend that I had "done something" to his bathroom. I then called the landlord back to tell him that raw sewage was going to overflow into an apartment he owns. Couldn't he call a plumber to fix it, regardless of who he thinks caused the problem? Well, apparently not. He had a party to attend to and it was a holiday weekend. How nice for you, I've got RAW SEWAGE coming up the pipes!I had to call a plumber from the phone book and get him to unclog the main line, which was flushed out onto the front steps of my friend's apartment and onto the sidewalk. (RAW SEWAGE, people! On the sidewalk!) The landlord refused to pay for the repair and I paid for it myself. I also threw out nearly everything on the floor in my friend's bathroom and scrubbed it down. I later found out that this is the 4th time this has happened and that this landlord has been reprimanded by the city. Keep in mind, I'm working this whole time! Trying to keep myself from telling the clients, really, I can't talk to you right now, because I have to literally deal with crap. And it didn't help at all that I wasn't doing well with the digestion that day either. I'm still leery of using the toilet there. It's betrayed me once and I don't want it to do it again. I spent a good deal of today bleaching the place. And the cleaning lady is coming by Tuesday to sanitize again. Because you can never clean too much when raw sewage is involved. AAAArgh. I still can't get the horror of it out of my mind.

Superman, Ex-Supergirlfriends, Pirates and Monsters

2006-09-14T01:15:00.000-07:00

July 14-31-It's been so hot lately that we've been going out to see the movies, even when we're not that interested in the movies. Lack of AC will do that to you.

Here's the rundown:
SUPERMAN
I like Superman, I really do, but this movie was not exciting. The closest it came to exciting was a scene that didn't even involve Superman, but involved Lois sending a fax. Really. We both thought a good 45 minutes cut out of the movie would have helped things, because after you've seen Superman wrestle a jet to the ground, you don't really need to see him soar much after that. Yeah, we get it, he flies. Big whoop, we saw that in the first reel, show me something better. I was looking forward to seeing Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor and I think he had a ball making the movie, it just that Lex, in this movie, kinda sucked as a villian. I mean, make more real estate? That's your evil plan? Really? Why not world domination? The Presidency of the USA? (At least that's in the comics, and makes sense because Lex is supposed to be evil, power-hungry, and SMART.) I'll give you that Lex tries to kill Superman in a novel way, but he doesn't stop to check that he's well and truly dead. The character of Lois was good, she's a pain in the neck and she's pretty persistent about following up on a lead, but I'm sorry, Kate Bosworth? Why, oh why does Hollywood do this to me? She's way, way too young and she's not even a brunette! That dye job was awful. (Substitute "blond" for "brunette" in that sentence and it's exactly the same complaint I had of THE FANTASTIC FOUR. But at least Jessica Alba's hair looked good in that movie.) And she has a Pulitzer? But I guess it's the same thing as trying to believe that Jessica Alba has a PhD. It is beautifully shot, though and has some lovely photographic moments. But I can't get over various issues I had with not just messing with the comics canon, but completely introducing elements that even the creators decided not to do. They had good reasons, people. Trust me on this. It's a pretty movie, but not very exciting. At one point, Daryl even turned to me and said, "Ok, bored now." Not a good sign.

MY SUPER EX-GIRLFRIEND
This was funnier than I thought and it was nice to see Anna Faris in something other than some iteration of SCARY MOVIE. It also had Eddie Izzard and Rainn Wilson, which alone makes it worth watching. (I love how the villian's lair is his house and how he keeps his secret weapon in his fridge.) Uma Thurman is very good as your typical crazy ex, but she got so tic-y and neurotic that I really couldn't see why anyone would want to date her. But then again, I'm a het girl and she's Uma Thurman. And my understanding of guys is that they'd pretty much date anyone as long as they were pretty. Which explains a lot of the ridiculous pairings I've seen in real life. Some of the best laughs are in the trailer, but the bedroom scenes were hilarious and the variety of ways Uma's character gets back at her former lover are imaginative and visually arresting. The fight scene at the end was fun, too, as was watching Uma's super-character save the world in a variety of fashionable outfits. Not a deep movie, but a fun one.

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST
This movie doesn't really have a plot, per se, just a bunch of fun set pieces where Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow gets to show off his ability to cheat death in Mr. Magoo fashion. One reviewer I read called one of his favorite scenes, "The Hamster Ball of Death" and his other favorite scene, "The Hamster Wheel", which is strangely appropriate. People fence, not just on boats and on land, but on moving water wheels where the wood is rotten enough to walk through and get stuck halfway, but not rotten enough to fell three grown men jumping around on it while it was moving. That stunt alone was elegant and masterfully done, as well as being funny and I applaud the people involved in making it. They repeated a lot of the best stuff from the first movie which didn't do as well here, since we'd seen that already, but at least they made fun of Keira Knightley's character fainting to get attention. The problem now, though, is that everyone's pretty much a pirate in this one since everyone's after the same thing, Davy Jones's Locker, or really, what's in it. Bill Nighy as Davy Jones, like Geoffrey Rush's Barbossa from the first film, is the villain who makes you feel sorry for him. Even though Nighy is hidden behind an octopus head, you can still see the flinty defiance in his eyes when he says, "Life isn't fair, why should the afterlife be any different?!" and then sorrow as he recounts how he lost his heart in the first place. It's not easy to act behind a great mass of tentacles in your face and Nighy does an admirable job. Speaking of which, the special effects people, not content with creating believable moving skeletons in the first movie, went ahead and morphed human and sea creature body parts in various ways in this movie. It's not as ghoulishly fun as the skeletons in the moonlight, but the melding of man and shark, for instance, was fantastically done. There's a brief moment in the movie where a man who's been in servitude to Davy Jones so long that he's lost his body and is only a head, sticking, like a barnacle on the wall of the ship, wakes up and talks. It's sad and arresting, and for some reason, not at all surprising considering what had been going on before. The movie ends, sort of, and you get the feeling that the next movie is going to wrap it all up. POTC3 and this one should probably be watched together in order to get the full story. This movie was fun though. Can't wait til the next one.

MONSTER HOUSE
The animation here was done through motion capture and while it's better than the creepy POLAR EXPRESS, it's still not quite right. There's something wrong about the way some character's move, like when someone sits down on a bed, that motion capture gets only just so, but not completely right. But it's getting better, I suppose, I just don't know what's wrong with actual animation. It seems to me, that sufficiently talented animators do a wonderful job of capturing realistic human movement without motion capture (and had been doing so for many years) so why bother with motion capture at all? The story, on the other hand, seems right in all the ways that kids will appreciate. The kids in the movie seem like real kids, who are just trying to get by and grow up with the least amount of embarrassment and awkwardness. And it's a plus that there's no "message" that the movie is trying to convey. It's got a real story with a beginning, a middle, and an end, with believeable conflict and characters. Except for the fact that there's a house that's not just haunted, but possessed. The house itself is a masterpiece of devouring horror and I love the fact that the voice behind the house is Kathleen Turner. After we saw this movie, we found out that it's also going to come out in 3-D. I think it'll be even better in 3-D because there are some moments where you could feel the danger from the house and I only saw it in 2-D. I can only imagine how startling it'll be when shown in 3-D. Unfurling rugs, broken trees, and a lurching, moving, monster house has got to be an experience in 3-D.

Ahhh! The Sky!

2006-07-06T21:21:00.000-07:00

July 6th, Thursday-I saw the International Space Station today! It's so exciting! It whisked across the sky like a very bright star. I'd been searching the skies since the 2nd and registered at www.heavens-above.com. I put in my latitude and longitude and got charts and times for when the Space Station would be visible in the sky. So cool!

Birthday and Fireworks

2006-06-28T01:16:00.000-07:00

June 28th, Wednesday-Daryl got a job for the day, so he wasn't around, but he did give me a duckie T-shirt for my birthday which I was very excited about. And Maurissa took me out to lunch. After which we all met up with Christian for a lovely walk on the beach at night. Fabulous. I so love my husband.

July 1st, Saturday-Well, today Daryl and I are celebrating my birthday by stuffing ourselves with our favorite food. First off, we have Vietnamese crepe and Vietnamese noodles. Oh my, it's so good. The waitstaff keep going out the back so I walk back and peek out and see that they've got a TV set up and are watching the World Cup. They're very excited about the Brazil match against France. Then it's off to Starbucks for a soy chai latte and a round of Scrabble. Daryl beats me again. Next time, Frame, you're going down. Chulada Grill and their enchiladas are next and my cousin Judy and Maurissa joins us for a nice meal and then we go home to make molten chocolate cupcakes and play games. Judy bought us Cranium and we have a nice round of that and then ice cream with cupcakes. Daryl then got me the rest of my presents, blinky lights to wear when I'm walking so cars don't hit me, and a G-Raid drive, which is so wonderful. Now I can store all of my footage on my very own drive. Daryl even already moved my media over. It's such a lovely present! Daryl walks Judy to her car and afterwards we play Scrabble with Maurissa. We even invite our neighbor Julie who happens to be home. She has two sweet cats one of whom likes to visit Babouschka and our supply of catnip. Kitty is not amused. All in all a very nice birthday. I wish I could have days like this all the time.

July 4th, Tuesday-We went down to San Pedro to see the fireworks and have a little picnic. We picnicked by a large Korean Bell, which was all chained up so you couldn't ring it. Apparently, the bell was made for July 4, 1976 for peace and cooperation between Korea and the US. People were setting off their own fireworks right on the streets before, during, and after the sanctioned fireworks. It was all very exciting even though last year it was all happening on the beach. This year the town took over and policed the people going to beach making sure no one had alcohol or fireworks. So people just did it on the street or in their own backyards. (As is the case with Christian's outings, we had the very best seats. The fireworks barge was directly in front of us.) On the way back to the car, there were a few times when we had to stop walking so the lit fireworks in front of us could go off. It took 2 1/2 hours to get home and poor Christian was driving. We were all exhausted.

This is Daryl on the beach apologizing to me for forgetting the earplugs. (Christian is the figure in the back walking on the beach.)

LUCHA VA VOOM

2006-06-22T00:37:00.000-07:00

I wasn't told where we were going. Christian told me to avert my gaze until we were in the Mayan Theater.

June 22nd, Thursday-Lucha Va Voom! This is the best show ever. How can you go wrong with Mexican wrestlers and burlesque dancers? Words cannot convey. This must be experienced. (www.luchavavoom.com) Also, if you ever go, get ringside seats and be prepared to move when they throw a dwarf at you. Or a ref. This is a great birthday present.

Cassandro is the best! He's the guy (yes, he's a guy) with the red hair and the blue outfit. So much drama! He actually cut his opponent's hair off onstage. Unbelieveable.

Cat-sitting

2006-06-22T00:32:00.000-07:00

June 21st, Wednesday-Look at who I'm cat-sitting! It's Delilah and Samson. These cats are very laid back compared to Babouschka. All they wanted to do was sleep. Babouschka, on the other hand, insists on shredding all of our junk mail...and then puking on it. At least we wish she'd puke on it. Most of the time she pukes in the most hard to clean places. I'm just saying, it's a good thing she's cute....

SCRABBLE!

2006-06-21T01:13:00.001-07:00

June 8th, Thursday-I finally win at Scrabble against Daryl. Woohoo!

What's on Hollywood Blvd.?

2006-06-21T01:13:00.000-07:00

June 16th, Friday-I take 2 buses to go to work in Burbank, the 717 and then the 163. At the bus stop to wait for the 163, I see this:

It's a bus stop! Get it?.....Well, I found it funny.

I got this job at Disney at just the right time. I needed something to fill up my week and put money in my bank account and it really was a godsend. (Or is it Godsend if you believe in God, like I do?) I love Disney.

X-Men are among us!

2006-06-06T01:16:00.000-07:00

June 5th, Monday-I finally got around to seeing the latest X-MEN movie. Now, I'm a huge fan of the comic books so I see the movies with a little more of a critical eye when it comes to the characters, so when they completely change a character's mutant superpower or give it to some other nameless mutant I get a little annoyed. But I got over it, because they die fairly quickly. In fact, so many mutants die you can't even keep track of who they are, let alone what kind of crazy superpower they possess. And as a movie fan as well, I also thought, yes, a flaming car being thrown at people and exploding is really fantastic to look at but do you have to repeat it FIVE times? After the second shot of a flaming car hurtling towards unarmed soldiers, I thought, ok, that's nice, what else can you do? The filmmaker's also move the Golden Gate Bridge and place it so that it connects to Alcatraz. The first thing I thought was, that's really gonna put a damper on the ferry tours. Plus, traffic is going to be hell. Daryl's reaction was, why even bother? Just commandeer a boat and ferry all of the mutants over, or better yet, use the helicopters that are already enroute. The plot revolves around the manufacture of a "mutant cure" and there's the question as to whether or not being a mutant necessarily needs to be cured. Those mutants afraid of involuntary "curing" by a government afraid of what they don't know, are not unreasonable in their assumption, especially when the government starts putting them in guns to control the "bad" ones. But the plot is really not that important here, or at least to this director. It's all about the fighting and explosions. There's a fight between Pyro and Iceman or, to get elemental, fire vs ice. As they shot bolts of fire and ice at each other the only thing I thought was shouldn't there be some rain as a result, maybe, at least a little mist? I mean, this is Alcatraz, why not fog? But then, that's the responsibility of Storm, who's so powerful she controls the weather, but gets too preoccupied fighting one mutant, to really have any effect. I did like the appearance of Angel, a mutant who has wings and can fly, but this poor actor was given way too little to do. The effect of him flying was poetic and lovely and kudos to the effects people. Plus, his hair was hairsprayed to the hilt and given frosted highlights, just to emphasize the angelic head. In fact, the hair on these mutants made me think that maybe the mutant gene also comes with a phalanx of serious hairdressers because everyone looked terrific even when they were supposed to look tortured and beaten up. Nearly all of the "hero" mutant ladies had long shiny hair, and the "bad" lady mutants had hair that made me think they were all the members of some punk band. It helped that they all wore black and were tatooed. There's a huge buildup to the terrific powers of Jean Grey, telepath/telekinetic extraordinaire, but when the fighting starts she just stands there like a statue. Wolverine, a man with claws of adamatium, supernatural agility, an almost feral ability to sense danger and smell fakers, and quick healing powers, has a moment where the special effects really shine as bits and pieces of his body repeatedly get torn off and then heal. What I wouldn't do to have an immune system like that. Ellen Page does a great job as Kitty Pryde, a girl who can walk through walls, and you really believe that she's smarter than Juggernaut, played wonderfully by Vinnie Jones. It's a summer movie so it's too much to hope for subtlety and character development, but if you like pretty people flying around in skin tight suits with explosions and gunfire going off around them, then this is the movie for you. (A side note: Beast, a blue, agile mutant who happens to be extraordinarily smart (no one is ever ordinary in these movies), was one of my favorites in the comics and I did not like the casting of Kelsey Grammar in the role, but he did better than I thought. Thank goodness his stunt double was the one flying around and pouncing on people because I can't see Kelsey Grammar doing that.)

Allergies!

2006-05-26T22:59:00.000-07:00

May 26th, Friday-Allergies! Sniff. I am under the influence of Sudafed. Sniff. Pay me no mind. Kachoo! I can barely breathe through my nose and I'm giving off turbo sized sneezes. Sniff. Or sonic boom sneezes if Daryl is to be believed. Sniff. Sniff. KACHOO! I do not wish this on anyone, not even my worst enemy. Aaaargh.

Snail!

2006-05-25T21:14:00.000-07:00

May 25th, Thursday-Saw this on my walk from Starbucks. How does the snail do it? He's walking across the tops of the blades of grass.

Landscaping and Out of Control Catnip

2006-05-25T21:12:00.000-07:00

May 23rd, Tuesday-People in LA really like their landscaping. On every single day, and I mean, EVERY SINGLE DAY, you can hear someone using a lawnmower, hedgetrimmer, weedwacker, or, my most hated modern landscaping invention, the leaf blower. And when I write "hear," I mean you can't hear anything else. And the gas emissions from these things are not only bad for the environment, they're also unbelievably stinky. So, even though it's too hot to close the windows, we have to if somebody is using the leafblower to gather up the 2 leaves that have fallen on the ground. Where I grew up, people mowed their lawns on Saturdays and since I lived in a place that had an actual winter, left it mostly dormant for a good 4 months of the year. Maybe it's the LA weather, it's makes plants grow like crazy so they have to be kept in check more often. For instance, here's my catnip.

I can't kill this stuff and believe me, I've tried. I keep plucking off the leaves and throwing them to the various neighborhood cats, who love the nip so much I feel like their drug dealer. (One of the cats actually knocked the planter down. That's how much she wanted it. Addiction is ugly, people.) I've neglected this to the point of not watering it for weeks and it keeps on flourishing. In fact, it's so happy it's blooming. I think it may need a bigger pot soon. I was hoping this plant would die since I can't really cook with it, but instead my cilantro died.

I had noticed that the cilantro looked a little limp, like it wasn't getting enough water. But I was watering it plenty. I was just going to make a bowl of salsa with some lovely tomatoes from the store when I looked at this plant and saw a very large colony of aphids. I was so oogged out. I removed them by hand (Oh, yuck, you do not want to know.) when I could see them and then sprayed them with a homemade non-poisonous aphid killer. It was too late though, it went brown and died. Sniff.

The mint simply refuses to die, much like the catnip. At least I can cook with this. I've made many mint meatballs with this plant and will make some nice mint syrup next week for tea, but other than that I don't think I'm going to make a dent in this. It's already growing little mint shoots on the bottom. I'm a little afraid that aphids will attack this one next, so I sprayed it with a food/vegetable spray. I hope I got it in time. Let's hope it's stronger than the cilantro.

This is my basil. When I first got it, I was afraid it was going to die. A good bit of it simply went brown and never came back. But now that the sun has been beating down on it and I've been watering it a lot less it seems to be thriving. Go figure. This I use in cool mozzarella salads and in tomato sauces. I can't seem to get rid of the leaves fast enough.

BTW, all of these herbs (plus a rosemary plant that boringly, seems impervious to my neglect) were brought to me courtesy of Maurissa Afanador, who also supplied the pots and planter. Yay, Mo!

More Games and Gamers and Scrabble at Starbucks

2006-05-24T01:22:00.000-07:00

May 21st, Sunday-Today, Daryl and I met another couple that likes to play board games, Toh Hean and Julia. We played a game called Ingenious, which I failed to take a picture of, and then a game called Guillotine, which I also failed to take a picture of. We spent a nice few hours playing and then when Julia and Toh Hean left to go see a movie, Daryl and I played two games of Scrabble. I beat him in a very close game and I failed to take a picture of that one as well. Then, Daryl wins the second game and that's the game I take a picture of. If I win a game of Scrabble, but don't take a picture of it, does it mean I really won? Yes. But next time I'm getting photographic proof.

One half of an EARTH SANDWICH...

2006-05-24T01:03:00.000-07:00

May 19th, Friday-For anyone who keeps track of the goings-on at www.zefrank.com, you would know that he's got a project going on called "If the Earth were a Sandwich" The website (http://www.zefrank.com/sandwich/) states:

"Never before have two pieces of bread been simultaneously placed on the ground directly opposite each other on the globe, thus making an EARTH SANDWICH."

The picture above is our contribution to the project. (Los Angeles, 34.0511°, -118.3577°, to be accurate.) You can tell that it really is Los Angeles due to the very tiny palm trees and the enormous grass. Our gigantic slice of bread is unlikely to find a partner in the Indian Ocean, which is where our opposite side of the earth is found, but it will provide sustenance for those Los Angeles birds, that are not celiacs, for a very long time.

6 years feel like 10 1/2

2006-05-19T00:48:00.000-07:00

May 15th, Monday-Daryl and I have been married for 6 years. But we actually feel like we've been together for 10 1/2, because we met in January 1996. I am a lucky woman, people. After all these years, Daryl and I can still sit on the couch together and joke and laugh with each other. I miss him when we're not together and I feel like seeing him every day is simply not enough. He thinks I'm wonderful and I think I've got him conned. I love the guy and it amazes me that he loves me.

You know what people do on their anniversaries? You go out to have an expensive meal and give each other diamonds, etc.? (According to TV, anyway.) Well, Daryl and I went to our favorite Vietnamese place where the meal was less than $25 (and that's with the tip), and then walked to the local Starbucks and played Scrabble. Now that's a great way to celebrate.

Starbucks addiction

2006-05-19T00:26:00.000-07:00

May 7th, Sunday-Recently, I've become addicted to Starbuck's iced soy chai latte. I haven't found anyone else who makes it as good as they do. Man, that is some good chai. Plus, they have a great iced herbal passion tea. And it's portable! Going to Starbuck's gets me out of the house so I've been going there for a drink and then I read a bit, and then walk home. Boring? Yes, but it gets me out of the house. And then on the weekends, Daryl and I play Scrabble in the afternoon. (One day, Frame, you are going to lose this game to me, Mr. Scrabble on the third turn.) In fact, I go there so often they all know me now. I even bought one of their steel thermos cups. Grande sized. I am such a naughty consumer.

You may be wondering if this is all I am doing. It isn't, but I'm still not working. Sigh.

LA Metro Buses 717 and 163

2006-05-18T23:59:00.000-07:00

May 4, Thursday-Today I worked at Disney again. Since it was only a one day job, I decided to take the bus. Now, the last time I took the bus I had to catch the bus at 7:30a and then got to Burbank at 9:45a and it was horrible. I had to take three buses and one of the stops was on a scary corner. (Look, I'm a short Asian lady. Anyone could take me. I'm soft and small, like a marshmallow. That you can crush. So almost all strangers are scary.) Anyway, it was with not a little bit of trepidation, that I went on www.mta.net to check out a different route. I've been walking around the neighborhood recently and I've discovered that the walk to the local Starbucks takes only ten minutes and it's right on a corner for a bus stop, Fairfax Av/Olympic Blvd (and San Vincente. That's where the two roads meet up.) I enter that corner into the Trip Planner and put in the Disney Channel building as the destination. They give me a route that has only two buses and it gets me to Burbank faster. Still skeptical, I take the Metro Rapid 717 at 8:24a to Hollywood/Highland and then take the Metro Bus 163 to Burbank and I get there at 9:11a. Perfect. I am amazed that this worked. I get to sleep in a little more and I get there a lot sooner. And today the bus is only 10 minutes late, not 45 minutes late like last time. And it only cost $3-for the entire day. Of course the return trip was not was problem free as they had re-routed traffic due to some kind of shindig at Mann's Chinese Theater. It annoyed me greatly as there was no sign as to where the bus would pick up people. I had to wait and then when I discovered the new bus stop I couldn't cross the street in time and I missed it. Grrr. I hate shindigs. But now I don't hate the buses here. I just dislike them a little. Unless it's a Rapid and then I only have like for it.

Oh, and I finished my 12 week weight training/yoga program (4 days/week), which actually took more like 17 weeks since I lost 2 to illness and added more to make up for it. Did I lose any weight? I don't think so. In fact, I think I may have actually gained weight. And now my lower back is giving me issues. I thought exercise was supposed to be good for you. All those exercisers are total liars. But it's nice to finish something. I think my biceps are bigger, which was not the goal I had in mind. I mean, my arms are big enough as it is. And I still can't tip my wok with one arm. (That was the goal, btw.) Of course, next week I start the 12 week program over again. That wok isn't going to tip itself.

Protest! En Espanol!

2006-05-03T00:38:00.000-07:00

May 1st, Monday-Hey, hey, hey, it's protest day! Is there anyone around to

cut your lawn?
pick your fruit?
clean your house?
wash your dishes?
help you move?

No? Well, maybe it's because they're all out protesting in the hopes that they'll get to continue to do all the work you'd rather not do. Let's support that, people, because we all know what a pain it is to wash your own dishes. Or at least, we will after today.

After figuring out an alternate route for Daryl to get to Burbank, I walk to my friend Christian's. He's planning to take some pictures of the protest. The protestors walked from Wilshire and Alvarado (downtown) to Wilshire and LaBrea, which is near where Christian lives (Wilshire and Fairfax). We walk out, since driving would be insane, all the way to LaBrea and immediately see huge crowds of people, almost all in white tops, walking down the road. You cannot even see the end of the line of people, they just keep coming and coming. Some Fox News Reports stated that the crowd consisted of about 75,000 people, but I think it was around a million. (Fox News strangely also seemed to concentrate on whether or not the protestors were going to be violent. Very weird. Everyone was very well-behaved, I mean, people brought their babies! No one was going to cause any problems.) It was very surreal, to be walking on Wilshire like this. I even saw Martin Sheen. Christian even got a picture. (I forgot I had a phone that could take pictures.) We kept walking east trying to avoid getting caught up in the waves of people pushing in the other direction towards La Brea where there were a bunch of speakers, including the mayor. Christian also kept pointing out the hotdogs with bacon wrapped around them that the hotdog sellers were selling. It smelled great, btw. And the lines were huge. Christian told me that a bunch of them had run out earlier, which almost never happens. Anyway, the protest was fun, we should encourage the government to allow these immigrants to stay, because, I mean, really, it was A MILLION PEOPLE. We'd be stupid not to. Speaking of stupid, I finally realized I had a cameraphone and started taking pictures. Christian and I knew it was time to leave when a lady started singing, and it seems that a lot of other people felt the same way. (Although it could have been the cold from the sudden fog and the sunset and the late hour, but I don't know. I think it was the singer.)

Something to think about, eh?

Games!

2006-05-02T23:45:00.000-07:00

April 30th, Sunday-Daryl found a group on the internet that gets together and plays boardgames. Today is a day of games at The Moose Lodge in Burbank. We get there and it's like Daryl has discovered Nirvana. (The ineffable ultimate in which one has attained disinterested wisdom and compassion, not the band.) There are boxes of games on tables that line the side of the room. There are many games and some of them we've never even heard of. There are snacks at the door and a large number of people playing the games. There's a fee, but it's nominal and we're happy to pay it. This group also does book clubs, walking workouts, bowling, you name it. Daryl's just happy to play with other people. He even gets to play Robo Rally with, I think, eight other people. It's a fun crowd and we meet Jen, who runs the group with her husband Brian. Jen plays a game called Wooly Buly, with us and it's like Carcassone lite, and it's fun. And cute. It's got little cartoon sheep on the tiles. Daryl wins. I then play Europe in 10 Days with Rosemary, Erin, and Jen, while Daryl plays Robo Rally. I then play Taboo, with the same crowd and Christy, Newton, Lynn, and Mary. It was electronic Taboo where it was all in a little computer that could keep track of correct answers, buzzes, and passes. We played a few games of this while Daryl plaed Robo Rally. Then I played, with the same crowd, another game called Squint, wherein you had to use cards with various shapes drawn on them to describe a word on a stack of cards. It was difficult. I think I got one point. The winner got 8. Yikes. Daryl and I then took a break to get dinner and then came right back to play another game called Privateer. By this time it was around 9p, so we had to take off. But fun! They do this every month! Daryl was so happy. He didn't even want to leave.

Gladstone's and Lunch with the Cousins

2006-05-02T23:22:00.000-07:00

April 23rd, Sunday-Daryl and I get to Gladstone's, a seafood restaurant in Malibu, to meet up with David, a cousin, and Stella, another cousin, and Diego, Stella's boyfriend. Daryl and I arrive way too early and while we are waiting we see David ride up to us on a skateboard. I'm surprised to see him not driving up in a car. I think, hey look, it's a kid on a skateboard....kids these days....hey, wait a minute, that's my cousin...boy am I old. He's going to take his finals next week and the LSATs later this summer. Man, this kid has got it together. And he tells me that his little brother, Christopher, is really into film and has done a bunch of short movies that are really good. I wonder where he's going to go to school? Hmmmm. Diego is in a bit of a pickle because he hates seafood. We are all glad to find burgers and a chicken sandwich on the menu. Daryl and I brought our laptop so that Stella could see The Easter Bunny's Revenge. She couldn't get her computer to download it so we brought her a DVD copy and played it on our laptop. Our waiter even stayed to watch. Afterwards, we gave all of the leftovers to David. If food is going to disappear, it's going to disappear fastest in a frat house. Stella and Diego had some time to kill so we took them to the 3rd Street Promenade where I hope to see the Psychic Cats. (Yes. They are cats and they are advertised as being psychic. I swear it is true.) Alas, it is not to be. But it's not all disappointing because I stop at one of the FOUR coffee shops, TWO of which are Starbucks, within a three block strip. Soy chai latte, you are so tasty, you are like crack to someone like me. I cannot resist. Diego and Stella now have to catch their plane after waiting for me to get my drink. Seriously, the line at the second Starbucks was insane. That place must be making money like crazy. We all say goodbye and hug and hope that they don't get lost after we gave them directions. We follow them for a bit just to make sure. Sigh. I miss Stella.

Stella! And Shogun Sushi!

2006-05-02T22:56:00.000-07:00

April 22nd, Saturday-Today we meet up with my cousin Stella, who is here visiting from Chicago. She tells me that we have another cousin in the area who owns a sushi restaurant near Anaheim called Shogun Sushi. Now, I have to explain something. I have many, many cousins. Both my mother's family and my father's family have more than 4 siblings and my father's mother was the second wife. The first wife had a number of children too, and most of the relatives from her I have never met. I also have cousins on my mother's side, who, while I met them when I was an infant, haven't met them since. And they have kids, who I also haven't met. Watch out people, you never know when you might run into one of my many relatives. Actually, neither do I. Daryl and I get to Shogun Sushi impossibly quickly. We estimated 45 minutes. We got there in 20. Very, very odd. Stella was running late because they were driving back from a short stay in Las Vegas and missed an exit. Daryl and I wiled away the time with shopping. We stopped by the local Staples and bought a shredder and a digital camera. This is what happens when we're left on our own for an hour in a mini-mall. We spend our time learning how to use the camera. It's terrific! Here is the first photo.

Stella and her boyfriend, Diego show up in a Ford Mustang right after Daryl mentions that this town must be a Mustang haven, because he'd seen five in the last half hour of waiting. Diego had to leave to meet up with his mother's best friend, so it was just us three. We had a great meal although I coudn't finish the spicy tuna roll. Man that was seriously spicy! Love the burn! Love the burn! And then our cousin shows up. I don't know Korean so she mostly speaks to Stella, and talks about....exercise? Is it LA? What's with the exercise talk anyway? She eventually moves on to other topics, her two sons, her husband who is working behind the sushi bar. By the way, the both of them look terrific. Maybe that explains the exercise talk? Anyway, they want to comp us the meal, but we surreptitiously leave money behind a glass on the table as we leave. We then drive Stella back to her hotel where we relax and chat about her horoscope and what the 50 best jobs are according to Money magazine. Stella is trying to get her real estate license and eventually hopes to get a house with another one of my cousins, Hoon, who likes to be called Jack. I love that she's such a go-getter! Atta girl! Eventually, Diego arrives and when I can see him nodding off when we are talking to him we finally decide we should let the boy get some sleep.

Tomorrow is brunch with Stella, Diego, and another cousin, David, who is going to Pepperdine and wants to be a lawyer. Seriously, I've got a lot of cousins.

Anyone know a good tax accountant?

2006-05-02T22:52:00.000-07:00

April 18th, Tuesday-Daryl and I have left two messages with our accountant who still has not called us with any questions about our taxes, nor did she even tell us if she filed an extension. I'm not going to be a nag, but I'm going to leave another message later in the week and try another accountant next year. Do you all agree with me on this?

Happy taxes!

And we return to our favorite rental car place...

2006-05-02T22:42:00.000-07:00

April 14th, Friday-This time we return the rental car and there are no comically annoying incidents. And then we go to The Griddle where we see Ian Ziering again. I guess he loves this place as much as we do. He rises in my estimation of him.

I just want to point out, taxes are due soon. Daryl got his last W-2 last Thursday. We sped the info to our accountant and she said she was going to be working on our taxes Thursday, the 13th. We've gotten no phone calls, no emails, nothing. Taxes are due Monday and we have nothing and all of our information is with our accountant. We don't even have any idea if we owe anything. Well, all you can really do is relax and maybe have some delicious soy chai latte.

Kenny's House Party

2006-05-02T22:30:00.000-07:00

April 8th, Saturday-Disney has called again and I am working. But not today. Today we went to our friend, Kenny's, brand new house and we met his new wife as well. The house is in Pasadena in a lovely little neighborhood. We are awed by the lovely little waterfall and pond in the back, along with a lot of tastefully landscaped flowers and trees. They had to do a lot of renovation, but it all worked out and the place looked great. And their cats, annoyed by the group of strangers clomping around in their house, hid themselves in the upstairs bedroom. Daryl and I tried to pet them, but we decided they were too freaked out. Onwards. Daryl drives us all the way from Pasadena to Culver City and then practically to LAX to get some Mexican food. It was worth it, because we also got to spend time with Maurissa. And it really is true. LA has terrific Mexican food. And it's cheap, too.

Fifth Day of Bunny

2006-05-02T22:09:00.000-07:00

April 2nd, Sunday-Another day with a caffinated start. We get to a park to film a scene wherein Bunny ruins an Easter party. We wait for children and their parents. It takes a while, but eventually everything is set up---Christian has a plethora of Easter paraphanalia---and everyone arrives. It's basically a playdate with a large group of kids, some of whom take on the character of misbehaving children seriously. They are so Method. One of the children was in love, love, love with Bunny, so much so that he practically needs to be restrained so that he can't get into the shot. The little girls had a hard time with Bunny. First, they were all fine with him, and then one started crying, and then another, and then another. It was like watching dominos fall. We kept on rearranging the picnic table to make sure there were still kids sitting there. Daryl, as usual, performed admirably and even apologized to a traumatized young girl, without the Bunny head. Afterwards we all sat down to enjoy the refreshments Nanette, the producer, kindly provided and relaxed in the sun. The parents and even Christian's brother get into the movie. It's the last day of the shoot and Daryl gives up the Bunny costume. But we'll have lots of Bunny memories! And a movie!

Here it is!

http://www.christianwhite.com/EASTER/

Fourth Day of Bunny

2006-04-03T01:17:00.000-07:00

April 1st, Saturday-More Bunny. We began with the now traditional intake of caffeine. This time we came prepared with towels so that Daryl could change without getting his feet wet, rubbing alcohol to clean the inside of the latex mask, walkie talkies, and gaffer's tape. This morning it was threatening to be cloudy and rainy, but it ended up beautiful. The first actor we had was an adult, and a comedian, so it went extremely well and extremely fast. He brought his friend along and he got into the act too. Then Christian made Bunny walk all around the block prancing and dancing. By the time he'd made it around he was hot and exhausted. But because the actors were so good, we were running way ahead of time so when we reached our next location we were an hour early. Nanette, our producer, took a nap in the car while we scoped out a little square. It had little stores, a mah johng parlor, a pretty skeevy wishing well, and paper lanterns everywhere. We were accosted by an older lady who told us that a Dr. Shapiro comes regularly on Saturdays and hands out $200 to everyone in the square. She also said that she was a little bit psychic and that she could tell that Daryl was going to be wealthy, not from a palm reading or a face reading, but from his aura. Well, that's nice. Let's hope it happens. Anyway, the talent showed up, who turned out to be Christian's neighbor and her son, Mac, who's six, but really I think he's more like ten because he's so smart. Mac's dad was also there because we were all going to go out for Dim Sum afterwards. Christian had Mac learn a Chinese phrase which he wanted him to say after his encounter with Bunny. I just find it amusing that Mac actually knows Japanese and Korean, but Christian wanted him to say something in a language he didn't know. The first take was hilarious because as Daryl was approaching Mac, a slew of children ran after Bunny, yelling "Bunny! Bunny! Bunny!" Afterwards Christian got Akiko, Mac's mom to get into the movie as well. And then we had lunch at Empress Pavilion, where I was once again let down by the language barrier. For some reason most people think "meat" when I ask if any of their food has wheat in it. I know it's not going to go well when they refer me to the vegetarian section of the menu. But I can eat sesame balls so I had three and a bowl of rice and steamed vegetables. Mac was so sweet he whispered to me when the last sesame ball was on the table. He wanted to be sure I knew it was still available. Now that is some kid. And then we moved on to Broadway downtown, which was full of people. Christian had Bunny walk up and down the escalator from the subway and then up and down the crowded street. It was fun. I think he walked up and down two city blocks and then Christian asked him to dance around the park. It would have been nice if I could have figured out how to turn on the walkie talkies. On the other hand, it all went very well. Luckily afterwards he let Daryl take the Bunny head off so he could get shots of the feet moving. Daryl was so tired. Afterwards, he said his legs and arms were weak, as if he'd been exercising all day. It's tough being Bunny.

Returning the Rental Car

2006-04-03T00:50:00.000-07:00

March 30th, Thursday-Today I have to return the rental car, my little breath of freedom, before 9:30a completely gassed up by Hollywood and Highland. I am late. I try to get gas at the nearest place to us, which is in the wrong direction. The station is full of people. I pick pump #6 and get out of my car only to find that the tank is not on the driver's side. I then move the car to turn it around and someone else pulls up. So I have to pull in front of someone else. This person is not happy with me at all. I try to explain but she just throws her hands up at me. I get out and use my debit card and select pump #6 three times and finally realize that the gas isn't flowing because I'm at pump #2 now. I run into the station and tell the guy who has already deleted it and I start again from the beginning. This time I pick pump #2. It takes me forever to unscrew the tank cap because the previous person who used the car screwed it on abnormally tight, perhaps thinking that they would never need to gas the car up again, because after all, it's just a rental. I put the nozzle in and push the start button and nothing happens. I do this three or four times until I realize that I'm pushing the wrong start button. I finally find the correct start button and put the clip on so that it warns me when it's full. It takes way too long and when it finally clicks off I am relieved. I go to collect my receipt from the machine and can't seem to get it to give me my receipt until I go through the process three times (which seems to be the number of times I need to do something in order to get it done correctly). I finally get my receipt only to have it fly out of my hand from the wind ( I kid you not. At this point I'm thinking, am I being punked? By God?). I chase after it and get it and drive through really slow traffic to the rental place a good twenty minutes past 9:30a. I return the car and wait in line and after they check the car out they tell me that the car is only three-quarters full. (What? Seriously, God, is this a joke?) I'm shocked. I tell them I just came from the gas station and the tank read full the entire time I was driving. There is no way it was only three-quarters full. God was kind to me though, after punking me, and they didn't charge me for it, but I was late, so they charged me for that. I was so angry about the whole thing and when I told Daryl about it he said that's how he feels when he drives. I told him it wasn't about the driving, it was about trying to return the car and get gas! Daryl brought me to The Griddle to cheer me up and it did because they have a fabulous soy chai latte and the best bacon in town. You can't leave that place unhappy, I tell you. Oh, and we saw Ian Ziering there too with his lady friend. They weren't nearly as interesting as the Gunslinger chili which ranked an 8 on the 0 to 10 hotness scale. Daryl had had it before but we are still waiting to see a chili above that number. We especially want to see the 10. It's called the Demon.

Hydroplaning

2006-04-03T00:49:00.000-07:00

March 27th, Monday-OK. It's raining in LA. It's raining in LA and I can barely see the middle line on the road at night. On the road from Burbank to Los Angeles which goes through a WINDING PATH ON THE EDGE OF A MOUNTAIN. That also DIPS at various places. And you know how it rains, and then you're driving and then you try to brake and NOTHING REALLY HAPPENS and your MOMENTUM CONTINUES to move you SPEEDING down a hill TOWARDS A RED LIGHT and then you feel the car moving left into ONCOMING TRAFFIC and you use all of your arm strength to wheel yourself over into the correct lane and then while your heart is beating a mile a minute you all of a sudden STOP just past the line at the red light and in two lanes at the same time. Lucky for me no one else was around. I didn't drive past 35mph the rest of the way home which I'm sure the driver behind me loved. But it freaked me out!

Third Day of Bunny

2006-04-03T00:08:00.000-07:00

March 26th, Sunday-Today was the bunny shoot. 8:30a! We got caffeine before we began because, well, who wouldn't? Christian says I'm the photographer and hands me his camera. We tell him that I'm bad with a camera and basically I'm doing it because I'm available and I'm going to be around. So we're off and before we know it, Daryl's undressing in public in Pershing Square in downtown LA. We have a lovely bow tie for him now and he looks great. We shoot lovely little girls fighting over Easter goodies and they are adorable. They love the Bunny. There are some protesters that walk by and they ask us to take pictures of them with the Bunny. Complete strangers seeing us with cameras walk into the shots and ask Bunny to take a picture with them. I have to shoo them out of the way. I'm hidden in the shot behind a walkway wall and guarding the bags. Then there's another set of kids that fight near a fountain and Daryl dances towards them in the outfit. The various people in the park watch with interest. These kids are cute too and in between takes they pretend they are explorers. Christian makes Daryl prance around the park, peek behind trees, hop around, and dance around the fountain. He does a fantastic job. And he's also suffocating in the Bunny head. He asks me to take a picture of him in the Bunny suit with the Sidekick so that he can post it on his blog. (Check it out!) Then we go off to another location and this time we need mikes. The mom and kid actors appear and meanwhile we realize that we're in the middle of a real estate push and there are tons of people walking around taking tours of lofts in the area. Christian is nearly beside himself what with the noise and the passersby. Luckily for us the real estate people don't mind us moving their signs around a bit and are nice enough to get out of the shot when we need them to. In between shots, Daryl gets a small break so we take a tour of one of the lofts which was nearly $3500/month of for a 2-bedroom loft with a tiny kitchen and what seemed to me to be a tiny layout for the price. But then again I'm not going to live right across the street from the Staples Center. We leave the tour early, giggling at how not worth it the apartments were. Then we shoot some more footage of Daryl walking down the streets and then we're off to yet another location where Bunny will be walking with a pinata. Seriously. Here the street is full of children and while the majority of them just want a hug there are a few who just feel like it's ok to take anything out of the Easter Basket. Unfortunately, one of the little children in the movie got really frightened of Bunny, but the rest of the kids were great. One of them loved Bunny so much we had to tear him away so we could get more shots done. Spectators were funny too and many of them asked to take pictures with Bunny, to which he obliged, but at one point Daryl was ready to suffocate and was dying in the suit and this guy unloaded two vans full of children to take a picture. It took forever. Poor Daryl. (More pictures can be found at: http://www.christianwhite.com/BUNNYPICS/)

Daryl's Birthday/Dessert Party

2006-04-02T23:46:00.000-07:00

March 25th, Saturday-We thought we were going to go downtown and shoot more of the Bunny, but instead we got a call from Christian saying that half a million people were protesting downtown and that there was no way we'd be able to get through the traffic. I knew that there was a protest, but I had no idea it was going to be half a million people. Christian was mired in traffic for hours. But it was good for me, because I had to prepare desserts for Daryl's birthday. So, of course, me being me, I put Daryl to work cleaning the house while I made the food. I made creme brulee, molten chocolate cupcakes, chocolate souffle, and cream puffs. (All the food was gluten-free.) The big winner was the cupcakes. I am so totally making that dessert again. (And it was so worth the trip to the culinary store to get a cupcake pan and paper liners.) Everyone tried all of the desserts but they all reached sugar overload too soon and I had tons of leftovers. (I hadn't eaten dinner so I made pasta while everyone was enjoying dessert. Because I am crazy.)

I had been a bit tired since I was temping at Disney Channel again. The drive alone is exhausting. But it's really, really nice to be able to visit Daryl when he's at work and have dinner with him. Tomorrow is Daryl's actual birthday, but we will be shooting the video of the Bunny and I don't think we'd have time to really celebrate properly. So, after we cleaned up the party. I asked Daryl if he made anklets for the Bunny suit. He forgot. So we stayed up late cutting fur fabric, safety pinning anklets, adding fabric to the back, and velcroing the head piece to fit more securely on Daryl's head. Collapsed at 2a.

Second Day of Bunny

2006-04-02T23:32:00.000-07:00

Marth 19th, Sunday-We went out and took more stills of the Bunny. We discovered that the suit was just a tad short in the legs and you could almost see Daryl's socks underneath the fur. It's almost impossible to breathe through the mask and it's hard to see. Plus, we think he needs a big festive bow tie. We didn't find any at the costume store, nor did we find the extra fabric for the ankles. Luckily today there were no mobs of children trying to steal his basket of Easter goodness. Even though, this time we came prepared with candy.

First Day of Bunny

2006-04-02T23:26:00.000-07:00

March 18th, Saturday-Today Daryl was a bunny. Really. Our friend is making a movie about the Easter Bunny and Daryl is the Bunny, complete with fur suit and full-on latex Bunny head. He was nearly mobbed on the street when a bunch of kids spotted him in the outfit. I saw one of them spanking his behind! Cheeky! On the previous weekends when Christian was scouting locations the weather was sunny with beautiful blue skies, but when we were shooting the skies were overcast. Isn't that always the way?

OSCARS!

2006-03-07T17:37:00.000-08:00

Oscar Sunday! Daryl and I went to Maurissa's to watch the Oscars. She TIVOed it so we got to see it all speeding thru the commercials and boringness. We had a small pool of 4 when Josh came by and let me tell you it was very, very close. I won! So for the past two months I've actually made $3. Yay me! While I liked CRASH, I didn't think it was all that great but, whatever. I never saw BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN, GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK, and SYRIANA, so I can't really say which was best. I did see PRETTY PERSUASION and JUNEBUG. PRETTY PERSUASION is good and it's a little scary that Evan Rachel Wood is so evil in it because I think she's like 17! She plays a girl called Kimberly Joyce who convinces two other teenage girls in accusing their literature professor/drama coach of racism and sexual impropriety. A TV reporter gets into the mix and after various sexual manipulations and silly courtroom behavior--the truth comes out. And then it gets even worse. It's a fun movie in the HEATHERS, and MEAN GIRLS trend but it might be a bit too heartless in the end. Kimberly says, "It's like the world is this orchestra and I'm the conductor." And she's completely right. And then we saw JUNEBUG which was really slow but very, very good. Amy Adams was soooo good she definitely deserved the nomination. I urge everyone to go see it just for her performance alone. I even voted for her to win in my Oscar ballot. JUNEBUG is the story of a Southern family and what happens when one of the sons comes back to his family home with his new wife--after not having visited for three years. There are some seriously funny moments and seriously sad ones and it was just a really, really good movie. No one explodes or gets shot or gymnastically fights off evildoers, but it just so well acted, you feel as if you could go down there and meet these people. Beware. It's slow in the beginning, but it'll pick up.

February, the month of sickness and DVD rentals

2006-02-28T22:22:00.000-08:00

Ok, so Daryl and I got sick. So I rented a bunch of movies. After Daryl got sick, I got sick. After two weeks, I am still sick. But here are my impressions of the movies. Hey, I was wrong about THE ARISTOCRATS. They did have it at Blockbuster. It was a really good movie about comedy and comedians. I recommend it to anyone who likes comedians. MARCH OF THE PENGUINS was a little overrated. I had seen a documentary on penguins much like this on the Discovery Channel a while ago and knew the crazy behavior that ensues when, like most species, they have kids. The parents stuff themselves, then go on a marathon to a remote part of Antartica to mate and then spend months sitting around taking care of their offspring while alternating the marathon, stuff food into belly, marathon, aaaand, switch off until they feel they can leave the kids alone. Like all species that decide to procreate, the kids drive the parents to do crazy things for their welfare and what do the parents get out of it? Only some of the kids make it. That's how it goes in the coldest place in the world. The problem with the movie is that they liken a lot of animal instincts to human behavior, which, come on, they're penguins. But hey, the babies are cute, and the cinematography is great, so enjoy. Just don't buy into the sentimentality. Nature is harsh. No less for humans than for penguins. Moving on, JUST LIKE HEAVEN was a nice romantic comedy. If you like romantic comedies, then this is a well done version of the boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love with each other, but girl is a ghost, and so on... I cannot hate anything that Reese Witherspoon is in, not even LITTLE NICKY, so this is no exception. And I've found that I really like Mark Ruffalo. I am waiting to see more of his work where he's not crazy or depressed, but it may take a while since that seems to be the only kind of role he gets. Way to go Hollywood. But I guess I should just be glad that they even hired a guy like Mark Ruffalo, because he can actually act. THE BROTHER'S GRIMM was a feast for the eyes, as is typical of a Terry Gilliam movie. The forest is hideously beautiful and the special effects are marvelous. They story was not as great as THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN, but it was well done and it was a great take on fairy tales. There's a little red riding hood, a wolf, a woodsman, an evil witch in a tower, hair that's used as a rope to get up to the tower, an enchanted mirror, oh, all sorts of crazy fairy tale stuff, even a nice take on Cinderella with Matt Damon and Heath Ledger wearing bonnets and aprons. Heath Ledger is great as a bespectacled lovesick geek. He makes you believe that he's a nerd, when, seriously, even with glasses, he's gorgeous. There is no way a guy that looks like that is ever going to have a hard time finding a girl. Or a guy since he swings that way in BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN, which I haven't seen yet. Look people, I know the Oscars are Sunday, but I'm still trying to get out of the house without coughing up a lung. WAR OF THE WORLDS was a typical Speilberg movie, although I did like the rather narrow vision that he had in concentrating on a single family's struggle to survive. Tom Cruise is typically annoying, but I didn't feel the Tom-hate I usually feel when I see him onscreen-as much. Dakota Fanning is alarmingly good. And the special effects are so good I watched a bunch of scenes over and over again. One scene, of them driving down the road, was one long continuous take that was fantastically done. I watched the original on TV many years ago and while there are a few moments that I remember, I mostly only remember the end. It's a really good ending. But this movie's ending wasn't nearly as good because Tom Cruise was in it. And really, does everyone have to use Morgan Freeman to narrate their movies? Can't they find someone else? Although, he does have a great voice. It's just that he seems to be narrating everything. I had read a review of DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN so I got it and I did like it. It wasn't terrific, but it had a good story about forgiveness and an unbelievably sappy love story. And it had a few really funny moments that I appreciated. A lot of Christian movies are really awful, mostly because the filmmaker's get more concerned about their "message" than about making something entertaining. Not that I mind their message, it's just that if it were entertaining as well, I would actually watch it. This movie has a great message, but it's also somewhat entertaining, so I was glad to see that. We also saw the movie KONTROLL which is a movie about the subway, and the subway workers in Hungary. Apparently the whole idea of paying to use the subway there is on sort of a honor system, so you get a lot of people who simply don't buy a ticket. So they have subway workers whose job it is to collect tickets from people and try to get money out of people who don't have a ticket. And most of the time those people are scary. Plus, the subway workers are sort of like gangs and have rivalries. And they do stuff like race the trains. Crazy. The movie follows one group of subway ticket takers, who seem to be the losers of the group. There's a mysterious person shoving people onto train tracks, a cute girl in a bear suit, and a regular ticket scoffer who's faster than the subway workers and shows them up--way too many times. Some of the stuff that happens is beautiful and some of the stuff that happens is fun and some of the stuff is hide-your-face scary. The actors are all very good and it's a good film from a young director and a country you don't hear about that much here. And we finally got to see GRIZZLY MAN on the Discovery Channel. It's a very good documentary about a guy who filmed grizzly bears. He and his girlfriend got mauled by one and they had a tape of the actual mauling. You don't want to hear it and they don't play it and I think it's a good thing. Remember the thing about anthropomorphi-sizing animals? Well this guy goes a little too far. It sort of an amazing picture of human nature vs. real nature. Real nature wins. We still have a bunch of movies to get through, but I guess that's just going to have to wait until March.

Murderball, Sky High, Fantastic Four, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

2006-02-05T14:42:00.000-08:00

Sunday, the 5th-First of all, I just want to say that I've had a lovely anniversary weekend. I'm thinking of extending it to the rest of the month. (It's a short month after all.) Today, we had my favorite, Vietnamese food, and then got a bunch of DVDs from Blockbuster. I really wanted to see THE ARISTOCRATS but there is no way that's going to be available at a Blockbuster. So we got MURDERBALL, which was fabulous. It's a documentary about a bunch of guys who play quad rugby, or as they like to call it, "murderball". All of the players have some sort of impairment of all four limbs and it's basically "get the guy who has the ball" and don't let him roll over the goal line. Pretty simple, but what happens is that you get rammed from your opponents and lots of times you fall on the floor. It's a story about the game and the guys who play it. And the guys who play it are inspiring. You really do start to think, hey, look at them, they had a horrible thing happen to them, but look what they've done since. The extras on the DVD are fun too, such as the time three of the guys from the movie hang out with the crowd from JACKASS. Now, that was hilarious. The next movie we saw was, SKY HIGH. Yes, I know it was a Disney movie, but it was written by the same guys who write for KIM POSSIBLE, which is the best show on the Disney Channel. Kurt Russell was pretty funny as The Commander, the dad who thinks it's the worst thing in the world that his son has no superpowers, but tries not to show it. And the effects were great, lots of practical effects, which means no CGI and, yes, the tables were thrown across the room and the guy really did get thrown in to the column. Stuff like that. The little teenage love triangle was ok, but the whole division of the school into "superheros", i.e., the "cool" kids, and "sidekicks", i.e., the "not-cool" kids, or as they like to say, "hero support" was a good idea. Plus, they had Dave Foley and Kevin MacDonald in the movie as well. Can't go wrong with that. I'm hoping this gets turned into a TV series. Are you listening, Disney? The kids were fantastic here. Give them a show. Oh, and Kurt Russell too maybe. Moving on. The FANTASTIC FOUR was the usual CGI fest, but it did have some good humor bits. For those who watch it, the best part is the the part with the shaving cream. Really. The fire effects for the Human Torch was very well done and I heard that the race with the missle took 4 months to create---for what amounts to about 3 minutes of film. This is why movies cost so much. Well, that and the fact that actors and producers get 10 million for doing a movie. It's definitely not the make-up dude that get's the huge paycheck. It's not nearly as good as SPIDERMAN so don't expect too much, but it's got a few good moments. And even though Jessica Alba is waaaaay too young to be Sue Storm, she does an okay job here. The best actors, I think are Julian MacMahon and Michael Chiklis, playing Victor Von Doom and The Thing, or Ben Grimm, respectively. Michael Chiklis, in particular does a fantastic job under an entire Thing suit. Next, we saw the latest version of CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY. Now, I'm a big fan of the 1971 version with Gene Wilder. This version is definitely not as good as that one so I recommend that everyone see the 1971 version. Now, Johnny Depp is, as usual, completely original and daring in his portrayal and since this is a Tim Burton movie, the art direction on this is fanciful with a little bit of menace. The oompa loompas are all played by one man, who, by the way, deserved every bit of money he got. Oh, and the compositors earned their keep too. But they gave Willy Wonka a really odd backstory, which wasn't the least bit necessary and sucked the mystery out of the character. As a result, this movie is a lot flatter and less interesting than the diabolical 1971 version. Thems are my reviews! We got a coupon for Blockbuster so maybe there'll be more reviews later.

Flower-daddy

2006-02-04T15:21:00.000-08:00

Saturday, the 4th-The Flower Market. In honor of our anniversary weekend, Daryl tells me that today he's my flower-daddy. So we go to the flower market (Eeeearly in the morning, really early.) with Christian and he gets me two large bouquets of roses. Then we go to the Korean market and get rice bun treats. Christian finds a box of honey, so fine, they sell them in laquered boxes. He says he's buying that the next time he goes to Burning Man. Then, when we get home we take a nap. This IS the perfect day. Mo invites us out for dinner at her place. She got a bag of Carson's Ribs sent by her mom and she wanted to share. Daryl and I bought ice cream to eat for dessert and then when we arrived, Mo was still in the process of cooking and so Daryl and I made rice pasta and vegetables. We had a nice dinner, although I found out later that the sauce is definitely not gluten-free. (Thanks, Daryl.) Then we went to Manhattan Beach to play pool at a place called Mr. Pockets where we met up with her friends from the plant nursery. I got a Shirley Temple and Daryl got a Roy Rogers. Daryl, as usual, does a fantastic job running out the table. I'm dying by 10p-ready to go to bed. I must be getting old.

First kiss!

2006-02-03T15:17:00.000-08:00

Friday, the 3rd-It's the anniversary of our first kiss. Ten years ago Daryl and I had our very first kiss, thus confirming for Daryl that I was, indeed, interested in him. Daryl and I don't really celebrate our wedding anniversary, but we do celebrate our first kiss. Daryl is unfortunately at work so we just had an afternoon with each other. So, I think we should have an anniversary weekend.

No work today...Try again tomorrow...No work today...

2006-02-02T19:36:00.000-08:00

Thursday, the 2nd-Just to explain the past month. I haven't had any work since the new year. It's depressing and then I find out that Christian lost a big job and therefore, I did too. So Daryl's my sugar daddy for the time being. Although I've been working out (yoga twice a week and 30 minutes of cardio and weightlifting twice a week) and getting acupuncture. Plus, I finished up a Defensive Driving Course ONLINE. Isn't that odd? You'd expect a driving course to actually involve driving, but, no. OK, I'm not the one who makes the rules here. So, I clean the house, surf the web, work on EFT (www.emofree.com), read my magazines and try to work on arranging the photographs that I haven't organized since 2001. I really miss Daryl at night. Now I make dinner just for me. It's a little odd.

Ben and John and India Sweets and Spices

2006-01-27T19:20:00.000-08:00

Friday, the 27th-Today we met up with Ben and his boyfriend John at a place called India Sweets and Spices. Ben's moved to Philly to go to rabbinical school, but John is in Brooklyn. Poor Ben. I got two vegetarian dishes that I assume had no wheat in it. I asked the proprietor if it had wheat in it. She said, "It's all vegetarian." I asked again, a little louder, this time, maybe she didn't hear me? She gave me the same answer. I asked again, in the vain hope that she would know what i was talking about. Alas, it was not to be. Sigh. I just ate what I hoped was wheat free and avoided the rest. Almost the same thing happened when I tried to order dessert. This time I POINTED to the item I wanted and it took THREE tries before she gave me what I wanted. Sighing, I paid for all three desserts and shared it with the gang. But, seriously, I POINTED! How could a pointed finger be miscontrued? Or maybe the lady was pulling a fast one on me. In any case, the desserts were great. Then, we hung out with Mo at her place. The three guys got together and mounted a gigantic mirror for Maurissa in her entry. It looked great. She's going to put a pink feather boa around it. Daryl left to go to work, Ben and John left to see Brokeback Mountain, and Mo asked to be left alone so that she could prep for her show later that evening. So I hung out with Megan, Maurissa's roommate, and her crowd. It was a fun group and there was an incredibly happy baby there, easily entertained by a little stuffed monkey. The baby's father made some guacamole that was lovely, since, by that time, I was starving, not having had anything wheat-free to eat for a long time. In retrospect, I should have gotten six desserts instead of three. Mo finished her prep and while we chatted with Megan's friends, we ate tons of corn chips and guacamole and drank water out of cups that reminded me of Weeble-Wobbles. They looked like they'd fall over, but they never did. Nice. Then, Mo gave me a ride home and I finally had something to eat.

Jill and Matt

2006-01-15T19:13:00.000-08:00

Sunday, the 15th-Today our good friends Jill and Matt came by from the East Bay. They're both looking to move here and frankly I'd love it if they did. Jill is a former co-worker and she's a great writer. Unfortunately, these days, writer don't really make that much so she's still trying to get the cash to move down here. She just bought a car and unfortunately it's not working and she got into huge debt buying it in the first place. So it's going to take her a bit. She wants to go back to school down here and I really hope she gets a job soon because she's really cool and it'd be fun to have her around. So if anyone knows anyone who needs a good worker in LA, let me know and I'll pass it on to her.

Try some Yak!

2006-01-14T19:04:00.000-08:00

Saturday, the 14th-Daryl and I went out to dinner with Mo and Josh, her old friend from Indiana. We went to the Kathmandu Cafe on Venice and it was terrific. You can get yak there. And they had the best tea. I'm definitely going there again, so if people come and visit and are interested in yak, let me know. (Yes, yes, they also have vegetarian alternatives, but seriously people how cool is it to find out what a yak tastes like? In North America of all places. This is the meat that gets people up Everest. I so totally want to know what it tastes like.) Josh told us about his travels. He did the vagabond thing when he was younger and went to all sorts of places including India where he had to share a room and a bed with a guy and a rat! He and the guy were freezing and they both thought about cuddling for warmth, but both were afraid of being thought of as gay. (Although, as soon as the rat appeared I have a feeling that they didn't get much sleep later that night.) They had a good laugh over that the next morning. But I'm telling you it doesn't really sell India to me. Although I hear you can get silk there for really cheap.

KING KONG and ANNE sittin' in a tree.....

2006-01-08T18:44:00.000-08:00

Sunday, the 8th-We finally went to see KING KONG. It was a feast for all of the people who like spectacle. How does Naomi Watts make me believe that she's in love with a huge ape? With her gigantic blue eyes, that's how. I cannot tell you how many close-ups this lady has had where her eyes are welling up with tears, but, no-not yet, haven't let one of them drop. When Carl Denham says that she's the saddest girl he knows, he's not kidding, and it's not just that she's just lost her job and all of her friends and is starving, just you wait until you see what happens to her after she gets on that ship to Skull Island, brilliantly rendered in CG, complete with beautiful CG fog. It's not for nothing that this movie cost so much. They had to create an ISLAND in a computer, folks. Once you get over the ridiculousness of the story, you get a series of thrills from seeing the natives of Skull Island, ruthlessly killing the film crew, for no apparent reason. And if that's not enough, the survivors from the first attack go BACK to the island to rescue Anne (Naomi Watts) who has been strung up to, er, "entertain" Kong, the giant ape. It's like watching a horror film starlet back into a room with an axe-wielding maniac looming up behind her, but in this case it's A HERD OF DINOSAURS. And, not to be outdone, there's a fight between Kong and not just one, T-Rex, but THREE, all trying to snap poor Anne up into their jaws. There are some really cool silent moments when Anne and Kong's eyes lovingly meet. And we're there with them, enjoying the quiet, when all of a sudden we get an aural whiplash, which smashes us into the next attack begins from dinosaurs or machine guns. It's a strange movie which is made all the stranger having Jack Black NOT acting like he's on crack. That's one of the reasons I watch a Jack Black movie. I want to see him go crazy. Instead, I get to see Naomi Watts do all sorts of vaudevillian dance moves---for her very life. I am not kidding. She does a good job, don't get me wrong, I'm just saying it's odd to see someone literally dancing to survive. My favorite moment in the movie is when Kong gives her a little laugh when she does something she likes and a huffy sigh when she doesn't. Everyone's a critic. But I guess when you're an ape as big as a house you're allowed to have an opinion.

Oh, and did anyone notice that Colin Hanks and Jack Black had previously been in ORANGE COUNTY? Was anyone else waiting for Jack Black to run around that ship in his underwear? And did anyone notice that the guy who played the captain of the ship had previously been in the movie THE PIANIST with Adrian Brody, as the Nazi who hid him. But this time he just stuck him in a cage. Oh, but he did save his life, again.

Disneyland 2006

2006-01-01T17:53:00.000-08:00

Sunday, the 1st-Today Daryl and I went to Disneyland with Mike and Sonia and Maurissa. Sonia had never been to Disneyland before yesterday when she and Mike went together. It rained pretty hard right when they were in the middle of a roller coaster ride. They said it was like being in a washing machine. Today, on the other hand, was a nice day to begin with but then it got rainy around 2p, right when we were having lunch. It wasn't a huge downpour, just an annoying drip, so it was much more bearable than the previous day, when the all of the shops ran out of rain ponchos. In fact, we did just fine with our water resistant clothes and umbrellas. It was nice to just go to all of our favorite rides and not have to bother with the ones that bored us, especially the ones that had huge lines. Space Mountain was the first choice for many and I got a lovely picture to prove it. (They did this ride twice, it was so good.) We also loved the Haunted Mansion with the decorations from the Nightmare Before Christmas. While you're waiting in line, they have signs with the lyrics for Christmas songs changed to fit the macabre theme. Jack Skellington welcomes you in through the gates and Oogy Boogy appears as a topiary in the garden. And it's even better on the inside. I recommend seeing this display if you can. I believe they set it up around the holiday season and it's well worth the wait in line. (Daryl has better pictures of the decorations on his blog, so check over there if you'd like to see them.) We also found the It's a Small World Ride to be a lot more bearable around the holidays because instead of singing just one song they sing two songs over and over again, It's a Small World After All and Jingle Bells (although apparently the mermaids sing a slightly different version-yes, this ride has MERMAIDS.) It's a little bit surprising to see the veiled harem girls singing and dancing to a Christmas song, but the holiday decorations are so vast and lavish it goes by too quickly to really stick in your brain. While we waited for Maurissa to get her raincoat, we explored the candy store at Pooh Corner and boy, do they have some serious candy there. I got a caramel apple with almonds and I couldn't finish it. My first bite was all caramel and nuts. It served as my dinner. Maurissa took a while and when she finally arrived she told us she couldn't find the car and after walking up and down the parking lot a few times decided to chuck it and come back to us. Too bad she didn't take her phone with her because both Daryl and Sonia remembered exactly where the car was. Mike and Sonia took the opportunity to take pictures with Pooh and his friends. We actually saw Piglet this time! He was so cute! He even gave directions to a lady who asked where the bathrooms were. It was adorable. No, really. We went on the Indiana Jones ride and this time I closed my eyes when the blowdarts shot out so I could enjoy the ride fully since the last time I was on this ride something got in my eye from the air shooting out and I missed the majority of the sights after that. This time I looked around for Hidden Mickeys but didn't find a one-or at least not one I'm convinced was really a Hidden Mickey. Although we did show the others the obscenity (if you look at just the right angle) of one of the statues in the park. Then everyone stopped for ice cream, except for me and I got my quarter eaten by a fortune teller. Gypped! We drove back home in a sensory daze and collapsed into bed.

The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe

2005-12-31T23:58:00.000-08:00

Saturday, the 31st-I returned the car today in the middle of a downpour. Daryl and I then went to see The Chronices of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe because that's what you do in LA when it rains--and then also when it doesn't rain. Daryl didn't like it as much as he liked the Lord of the Rings series, but I was a big fan of the books and really liked what they did with the backstory here. Although I do have to say that I really liked the BBC miniseries version, even though the effects were terrible. Here the effects were better, but not seamless. They did fill out some of the backstory, which I thought was good and the casting was really well done. Tilda Swinton has said that she's "prepared for a lifetime of small children slowly backing away from her." and I think that's an accurate prediction based on her performance as the White Witch. And the kids all did a fine job of acting. I didn't quite get the awe that I had when I read the books, but they did a great job making you believe that beavers can talk. The movie also brought up a bit of oddness that I never noticed when I read the book, like, what is Father Christmas doing in this story? It really is a hodgepodge of myths. Beware of Turkish Delight!

I'd like to mention, also, that our window is leaking and the apartment is freezing. We have no insulation and at night it can get down to 40 degrees, which is cold, I don't care what you say. I bought slippers and I walk around with a blanket wrapped around me. Oh, and the heater, while it may work, when we turn it on, the smoke alarm goes off. Incessantly. Apparently, you've got to "burn off" the gunk that's on the heater and then it won't set off the alarm, but in the meantime, the alarm will go off and it will also stink up the apartment something awful. Yeeeuuuuck. So we just don't turn it on.

Early out

2005-12-30T23:54:00.000-08:00

Friday, the 30th-Disney let us out early today, so I visited Daryl at work. Did I mention I love working at Disney? Because I've had my own car I've been able to visit him at work and it's nice, even though I don't stay very long. Today, he got to work during the day because people are on vacation, so we got to spend a little time together and we ate at a place called Poquito Mas. Pretty good Mexican food.

Whoops, someone had quite the morning drive

2005-12-29T23:48:00.000-08:00

Thursday, the 29th-I was driving the usual route to work today, until I saw an accident at La Brea and Beverly. One car was smashed up in the front, with the hood open in the middle of the NE side of the intersection. Behind it was a car that was sitting completely on it's driver's side. I thought, ok, so I guess I'm not taking Beverly today. And later on that day there were 3 other accidents with cars landing on their sides. Weird. Had a very nice lunch with David and Robb (from Disney) at a place called Mo's. Way too much food for me, but yum. And the work this week has been very relaxed and easy and did I mention that I love working here? It's a good job and the people are nice and they pay me. Disney is nice.

Flying out on Christmas Day

2005-12-25T23:36:00.000-08:00

Sunday, the 25th-Our flight was scheduled to leave at 1p. So we drove off, but we went to get gas before we returned our rental car, (Which was a lovely Subaru Legacy Outback, with HEATED SEATS. I am now a big fan of heated seats. We used them plenty while in the Midwest.) so that we wouldn't be charged the gas penalty. We picked the gas station closest to the rental car return, which just happened to be reasonably close to my mother's house. And after we gassed up, we turned out of the gas station and drove down the street---next to my mother in the next lane over. She was on her way to church and was just driving by when we were passing by. It was so funny. We waved and then turned off to return the car.

The flight itself was uneventful, which is how I hope all of my flights will be. I finally got to see The Polar Express, but they were also having problems with the audio. It took them three tries to get it to play correctly. But it was a nice flight and I think Daryl finally got some sleep on this one.

After a loooooong, long wait for our luggage, we finally got back home. And then we went out to Swingers, and got some food because our cupboards were bare. It was nice driving around on Christmas day. There was hardly any traffic.

And can you believe it? The cat LET SOMEONE PET HER while we were away! I always knew she was a kitty-whore.

Tracy and the Chois, Kwaks, and Yoons

2005-12-24T23:25:00.000-08:00

Saturday, the 24th-I got to see my friend Tracy before I met up with my family. She's had some serious health problems recently, but I think things are turning around for her. When we met, it was like we hadn't left at all, we talked just as we had done for years. It was great. I'm definitely calling her more often.

Then it was off to my mom's place. She had cooked a lot of food and so did my aunt. My cousin Esther, my cousin, Michelle, her baby, Benjy, and husband, Brian, and my brother, Simmon and my mother were all there. We had a lot of Korean food, which Daryl was so happy about. And we all watched Benjy toddle all over the house. Michelle actually gave me my favorite hand cream, which I loved because the sores on my hand were not happy, which, by the way, has only gotten worse, no matter how many creams I put on or how well I keep it moisturized. And I have been really careful. But I'm guessing that it won't get better until after I get home in LA. A lot of people think it's stress related. I also think that it could also be something in the water.

Daryl and I left to meet up with another one of my cousins, Stella, who just got a new apartment downtown. We ate Vietnamese Pho with her and her 79 year-old boss at a place called Tank Noodle. Stella refers to her boss as "her dorm buddy", which I would imagine is an enviable position to be in. Stella's boss is friends with the owner of what he considers the best Vietnamese Pho place, 777, just down the street. It was really fun and great to have nice, hot soup in the middle of winter.

Grandpa Frame

2005-12-23T23:16:00.000-08:00

Friday, the 23rd-Today, we all drove up to Ligonier to see Daryl's grandfather. He was making us all lunch. It was a lovely meal and then he had pecan pie and cookies for everyone. ( I did not partake, but it smelled great.) Apparently, he's been doing quite a bit of baking for the holidays. I think I heard the phrase, "30 dozen" bandied about that evening. He's been keeping himself busy and after Daryl's father and stepmother left, Daryl and I stayed behind to spend more time with him. I can't tell you how happy that made Daryl. He had been wanting to see his Grandpa for so long. The man is fascinating and has worked on many projects that have affected the course of history, like the Apollo program. He recently lost his wife and I think he's been holding up pretty well considering. The Frame men, they live long and love hard. I hope that our visit gave him some respite from his grief.

We drove back to Chicago and went on the Skyway, which was supposed to be the fast way, but ended up being really slow due to an accident, of course, just before our turn off. And once again, we stayed at the Gumski Bed and Breakfast. And this time we had dinner there, too. Wish me luck, tomorrow I see my family.

Ball State and Frames in Indy

2005-12-22T23:06:00.000-08:00

Thursday, the 22nd-Muncie. We got to take a tour of the new Music Engineering Building at Ball State University. It's really beautiful and apparently the acoustics are terrific. The new facility is state of the art and has the very latest technology. It's almost too beautiful. I feel like the students are never going to work anyplace that good again. Daryl had a great time checking out all of the new technology and loved the whole building. I have to say, if I had a kid that was interested in music or audio engineering, I'd totally send them there. It's a great deal for the money, especially if you're a resident. We had to leave after eating at the new Thai restaurant in Muncie, which I was really happy to hear about. I love having food I can eat. We drove to Indianapolis to see Daryl's dad and his stepmother, Sherie. We all went out to a steakhouse called Sahns, which had some good steaks and a great dish made of mashed cauliflower and cheese. It was really good. And they gave us Christmas cards that were handmade by Sherie. Wow. Someone's keeping themselves busy.

Muncie

2005-12-21T22:58:00.000-08:00

Wednesday, the 21st-Muncie. We went to see Daryl's old friend, Jeff Seitz and his wife Cassie. And she's pregnant, too. And their house has recently been renovated. The kitchen was totallly remodelled, by them, no less. I am really impressed by the level of woodworking that had to be done. It's really beautiful. And most of the drawers are dovetailed! And they're not done, they're going to turn their in-law into a master bedroom and bath. Oh, and turn the office into a nursery, too. Hopefully all done before the baby comes. We went to Outback Steakhouse to eat dinner and apparently, even though they have a gluten-free menu, the food handlers don't really know what that means because my salad came back with croutons, and then came back again without croutons, but still with the crumbs from the croutons. So annoying. They tried to make it up to us by giving us a coupon for a free appetizer, a bloomin onion, which, I also cannot eat. Sigh. Whatever. Not going back to that Outback Steakhouse again. But then the Seitzs played Catan with us and in the second game Cassie won! Guess who won the first game. Daryl, of course.