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December 21, 2002
see ya'll in a week
this was me three christmases ago. could i be so lucky to give makeovers to unsuspecting horrendously hung-over relatives again on christmas morning? we can always hope.
merry christmas everybody!
Posted by michele at 11:15 PM | Comments (26)
December 20, 2002
e @ technical jargon iv loss, fear of
things are shaping up for the drive up to oregon. i've got me some snow tire chains. i have no presents for my family members other than a wine cozy for my aunt mary. i'm not packed. i'm not prepared. i'm skeptical about getting a room with a door, even if i'm willing to share with my mom and mary. and most horrific of all i will not have internet access for a whole week. i might shrivel up. maybe i'll drop a pound or two based on the jitters. (no big loss.) maybe i'll start chattering my teeth uncontrollably. maybe i'll spasm and froth and be all in all a pitiful sight to behold. maybe they'll give me my own room out of horrified sympathy. here's to hoping. i love my family. i do. i love going to oregon for christmas. but more than three--three? i mean two--days trapped in the same house and i start to go a little crazy. the cabin fever pressure is going to boil up. the lack of weblog outlet is going to stifle me. i'm scared. i'm anticipatorily nervous for my sanity.
i wonder if anyone will miss me. i mean...have you gotten used to my millions of posts a week/day/morning? do you even care? will my absence make a difference? i guess we shall see. but i imagine everybody will be so busy with their own holidays affairs that no one will be on CH that much. and besides, i'm sure i'll be sending postcards from SunRiver.
Posted by michele at 11:03 AM | Comments (11)
she is so amazing.
Posted by michele at 09:01 AM | Comments (3)
RAWR!!!
secret shhh...
Posted by michele at 08:31 AM
December 19, 2002
lunch-date
i just posse-ed myself over to lunch with tracy, ian, marc, shannon, and janie (jamie?). it was fun! i was too broke to buy myself lunch and they kept trying to force me to take their money and ian rolled food over the table at me and then made me laugh while i was trying to surreptiously eat it without being noticed by the waiter.
and then i came back to work and katie (crate) was asking me what i'd eaten for lunch. ahem.
"so what'd you eat for lunch."
"um i didn't...i don't have any money."
"oh...but...uh...who did you go with?"
"my friend tracy who works over in the french dept and her husband and our friend marc and two of thier friends from where they work."
"so you couldn't charge the food?"
"nah. i ate too much chocolate anyway. whatevs yo. they're all over 30 too and like to toss thier money around and kept offering to pay but i was like 'no no is all right."
"you hang out with 30 year olds?"
(this from a 28 year old.)
"um...yeah."
"huh."*
"yeah."
it's funny how people are always a little shocked when i mention knowing 30 year olds. i wonder if the 30 year olds have issues with people when they mention hanging out with 20 year olds. is that not the same thing i wonder? i don't think it is really. but i wait to hear from my 30 year olds. who are not mine a'tall mind, but wholly their own.
holy crap. so then katie was like, "i'm hungry let's get chinese!" and i was like, "uhhhh...all right. i could charge it i guess."** and then our boss was having these 2 people from santa cruz up for a meeting and they were kind of feeling peckish and so now i have this HUGE FUCKING PLATE OF FOOD for FREE! yeah lunch meeting! mmmmm orange beef and pot stickers.....so freeeeee.......i am a lucky goose. goooooossse......
*implicit in the "huh." is the layered question, "what for?"
**which should not be any kind of indication on me not eating with youse guys at the other place. i really wasn't too hungry then and i didn't want you to have to pay. and using credit cards is a hassle. and....um...yeah. but i was so so happy to come and sit. and with the laughing and snorting of rice.
Posted by michele at 03:00 AM | Comments (11)
December 18, 2002
beanie poll
so last night at midnite premiere kristen and i had a communal revelation about the seriousness draw power of the boy in a beanie. kristen judged this to be because boy hair is normally bad and beanie's hide that from us. i think it has something to do with making thier heads all round and fuzzy and smooth. or something. hmm...that is pretty sexually telling. it also frames thier faces really nicely if they have nice faces. cute boys in cute beanies of the indie rock persuasion are hot. that's all i'm saying. and i was bored. and tired. and wonder if you agree.
Posted by michele at 01:26 PM | Comments (3)
the two towers
midnight premiere. super-fiend fanatics all around. it's the best way to see these things. now then what can i say?... seriously do not continue reading this if you don't want spoilers, ok?
#1 bad things. (to get them out of the way.)
tedious fight scenes.
lots of walking
it was just like the boring-ness which is reading the middle book. well really all of the books. isn't that fucking sad? i mean...maybe this is a good point to the die-hard fans who will be pissed at all the other liberties taken by this second movie. but maybe they would just be bored too. but maybe al the fighting scenes will call to mind things like world war II and freedom and liberty and things that tolkein was actually concerned about at the time. or maybe they'll just be lots of headless things and ladders being flung and urukhai being all groany and hollery and really kind of funny in a hackneyed embarrassing sort of attempt at horror on what looked like a low budget at times. cheese dood. cheese.
it was like....the first one was GOOD, right? like...it was serious and magical and real and true. and this second one is more....cheese. like....serious cheese. as if they couldn't quite hold together their subject matter and they became too interested in playing up certain characters to the detriment of others (ie unintentional humor employed by golum, intentional though...sometimes misplaced humor by sam, aragorn, gimli) as opposed to the seriousness of the quest and the battle for middle-earth. (don't get me wrong i fucking enjoyed the humor, i'm just saying it didn't quite fit in.) mainly what it did was bring the movie down to being a...parody sort of. a parody of tolkien's work. like they thought, "now we have established ourselves with FOTR, now we can putz around a little and enjoy ourselves and have choppy editing and make some crude jokes and have some laughs at the expense of following up a really good movie with a not so good movie." a damn shame is what it was.
the ents were too physically short (kristen pointed this one out as a flaw. but maybe it's more of a personal vision flaw than a real flaw, because otherwise the ents were pretty great. well...ok i thought they would be fatter too. and maybe speak slower. and...have more screen time. but they were pretty boring when not stepping on evil minions so whatever.)
frodo and the ring (the main fucking character here people--the ring, not frodo. fuck frodo, cute though he may be. fucking hobbit. practically a midget.) was in the movie about maybe a total of 30 minutes. that's kind of unacceptable. following the plot of the horse-lords, all well and good. the fucking touchy-feely bullshit with those 2 kids and their mom? totally unnecessary. i mean, they wanted me to be all in touch with their spirit or her maternal instinct or something but really i was just like, "who the fuck cares!? get off the screen!" maybe those ones were HIS (peter jackson) kids? i know they were both in there somewhere. their fighting tactics in the helm's deep battle sequence? equally shitty. i mean, maybe that was in the books too and maybe i've forgotten how horribly they fought, but still. did they need to wait that long to shoot arrows? no. did they need to be such wussies about pushing the ladders off? no. did they need to have only like 15 people left at the very end out of the hundreds they started out with? no. it was silly. and the lack of what's her name fighting? what's up with that? she was supposed to fight some i thought. although i don't think she did in the book....not yet at any rate.
not that i can pinpoint all that many examples but it seemed as if the liberties taken in this movie was far more gross than anything done in the first one. they cut out tons of shit, which fine, they had to make it shorter. and they added the stuff with arwen, which yeah is culled from the appendix/short story tolkien wrote about their doomed love, so fine whatever. but there was a lot of ent stuff cut out. and a lot of faramir stuff cut out. and some of the things they did with aragorn (fell off the cliff? did that really happen?) seemed faked.
but let's be the honest the spirit of the books is still primarily maintained. and on to the good things.
fucking schizophrenic golum was BRILLIANT. at first i was like, "ah man. stupid cg effects. shitty face with those big eyeballs all gross and the comb over and ew butt crack." but then later on when he does the first major scene by himself where he talks to the evil golum and says, "goes away and never comes back!" and the little face saying, "no." and the bad face saying, "kills them! tricksy!" "master is our friends." oh man. shit he was awesome. and it's sad, as kristen commented, that the cg character stole the fucking show. but you know what, he was just GOOD. the acting was seamless. and the facial expressions grow on you like a foot disease blanket. splendid.
the boys were in fine form with their little jokes and their battle counts and legolas got all the good special effect moves, the jumping on the horse while it was running, the sliding down a stairway on a shield while shooting like 10 urukhai. he was amazing. now if only he didn't have that hair.... aragorn's sly smile was a sight to see after the aloof unapproachable he played in the first one. apparently the human love interest is good to him. though i still like arwen a damn lot.
gandalf seemed sadly lacking in the screen time, but acquitted himself well whenever he was there.
watching ents squish people and bang their heads together and kick them like footballs was fun.
elijah wood's acting, i thought, was GREAT. but i know not everybody thinks that.
the sweeping vista scenes are still gorgeous, though getting a little old at this point and tiresome like the walking. oh man i slipped back into bad. so i think it's time to conclude.
the two towers is not as good, in my opinion, as the fellowship. i have high hopes though that the return of the king will out surpass them both. since really let's be honest the only actually good part about reading the books is the last 15 pages of the third one and you know what that means...the third movie will have the best last hour out of all three. i am impatient to see more of gondor, more of frodo, more of mordor, more of legolas, more of golum, and more of osgiliath. i think that the two towers is GOOD. technically it doesn't seem as proficient, the propensity for battle scenes in place of more story was disappointing, but overall it's good. the humor moments offset the darkness well. the acting is superb on all parts, (although gimli was a little overplayed at times.) i will probably see it at least one more time while it's in the theatres. and i am soooo happy that i went and saw it at midnight because it's always so much fun to see it first. and it made me all happy and now we shall see how long that happiness last. i give myself till about 7pm before i pass out. =)
andy serkis' (who plays golum) webpage.
picture of merry and pippin at the premiere. ha ha!
ho-ho-oh. hello mr orlando bloom/legolas.
Posted by michele at 12:45 PM | Comments (4)
December 16, 2002
and with a name like nolan...
frantic shrieking! this is totally absurd but i am nervous over the fact that this guy named nolan from this hotel that i have to keep using for conferences is coming over this afternoon to give us christmas cookies for being such great customers. nolan! bwah! it's absurd. who's named that? it's so great! and i'm visibly agitated. on the phone when he was asking if we would be around today and if he could drop some off while he is out and about dropping others off, my voice kept going up and up in kind of a questioning disbelief that someone was actually going to deliver cookies TO me. that's never happened before. and i got off the phone and sat here for a minute before standing up to discuss over the cubicle wall (speak thru my cranny chink) the fact that cookies were en route with katie, who was equally surprised though very suspicious about how many cookies we would get. greedy. (no, not really).
see the thing is. i am easily fascinated by things sometimes. before going to college i was completely intrigued by the name sam macintosh. but thank god i got over that damn quick. (jab erica. [sorry].) and now. nolan treadway. plagued by curiosity. but i don't think i am prepared to MEET object of said fantasy. it's always a disappointment. always. then again at least it will be a disappointment tempered by cookies. maybe they'll even come in a pretty box. bright side.
updates on the hour as to how he hasn't come yet will be forthcoming.
why didn't i dress better today? at least i brushed my hair. why am i such a spaz? spazity spaz.
in other news. i got tickets to the midnight premiere of LOTR. i am sooo excited! and so pre-spaz as i am spazzy in all aspects of my life.
and you know what's a treat? forcing the birthday girl (jolie) to take to the stage of a drag queen christmas show, put on a wig and feather boa, and lip-sync to 'ru paul the red nosed reindeer." sadly she did not win the plastic tiara. but a damn fine show it was all the same. now if only the cable for my digital camera would work (yes gene, it was right there the whole time. but you know what? erica-shaped pipe cleaners are still going to float).
Posted by michele at 12:42 PM | Comments (20)
fruits basket
this weekend...,well just sunday, i watched an entire anime series called fruits basket. yes. fruits basket. not sure why. well i know why it's called that (and trust me the reason is perhaps dumber than the name itself), i am not, however, sure why i watched 26 episodes in one fucking day. or why near the end i started talking to myself, the cat, the television. exhaustion. lack of food. lack of sleep. it wasn't pretty. what WAS pretty were the anime boys. ha! you knew i was going to get to them and my new fervent crushes on each one of the little emotionally scarred 2-d cuties. cutiiieesss....
it was all in all a relatively good show actually. i mean. the plot was well thought out. oh god. i just said that. let me explain something here. the plot was based around this household of three men who, when they are hugged by a girl, turn into one of the 12 animals of the zodiac calender. you can imagine the amount of times the girl had to accidentally trip in order to provide some humorous gag moments. because of course it was a secret from other people. and they would have to cover up really quickly the fact that there was a pile of clothes on the floor and a mouse running across the parquet.
the girl was kind of dim really but always had these holy moments where she would impart some sage wisdom and the males would begin to accept themselves instead of loathing their demon zodiac curse. there were girls cursed too and they had to hug boys to turn. there was a moment with the mailman... anyway. but basically it was a semi-love triangle (undeclared and undecisive) between the main (non-cursed) girl and two of the cursed boys. it was cute. it was sweet. sometimes sappily. but still. and i enjoyed it, i did.
the artwork was standard, though they did some interpsersions of rough sketches which were interesting along with some tv wave patterns every so often to give mystical height or notice. and once there was a scene where there was a train with real people getting off and 4 anime characters in their midst which looked cool. and althogh i know this makes me a dork. in a couple of episodes there were moments when the animation continuity was imterrupted by a misplaced cell. so there would be a fraction of a second where a different image would flash by and with the technological wonder of dvd i could pause fast forward to check and look at how the image was moved slightly to the left so that part of the previous cell was included on one side and the new one on the majority of the screen creating a juxtaposition that lurked at the corners of the eye if you were watching normal speed very closely. in one of these. the characters switched sides entirely and there was this fucking scary shadow figure in the trees on the right side. i stopped pause ffwarding after that.
the reason i found this wacky series in the first place was because i was searching on news of the licensing of 'one piece' (jacob). they are both distributed by the same company (funimation. cause it's so fun.) and although one piece isn't out yet, soon maybe. i know you wanted to see more of it. wacky stretchy pirates. i also got all of FLCL which maybe i will watch today. (it's only 6 episodes.) but i am so fucking excited. it's by GAINAX who did neon genesis evangelion and also kare kano. both exceptional artwork and story. and FLCL is fucking brilliant and frenetic. (or at least the first 4 episodes which i have seen are.)
Posted by michele at 11:03 AM | Comments (49)
December 13, 2002
warren, nj
after half an hour spent online researching warren, nj with jason, my thrill at being able to go there in april for a whole week to visit him is even more intense. ah warren, nj, could you be any more splendid? let me enumerate the reasons for my high esteem.
#1:
doesn't it look delightful?
#2
that is a carefully constructed model if ever i saw one. i'm going to be the size of an ANT while i'm there.
#-2000
spooky doll house cemetary. (bastards! it doesn't retain the integrity of the link. so you have to go to articles and then it's linked in fall 1997)
let me illustrate a few passages for your reading pleasure, though i do recommend reading the whole article. (ok i have pretty much now included the whole article, so really you don't have to go read it at all.)
"Times change, they say, but little Lizzie Eckel's grave in the Coontown Congregational Church cemetery looks as it did 66 years ago when her parents buried her there at the age of 12.
"Coontown, a part of Warren Township, took its name from the family of early settlers named Coon. In early times it was a flourishing community in its own right and boasted a distillery, blacksmith shop, general store and a coat factory."
you don't say.
"Lizzie's mother was the daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Finger"
choked laughter gasp.
"High on a hillside in a Warren Township churchyard cemetery sits a small green and white doll house containing the cherished toys of a little girl. Thanks to Mrs. William Seiler of Plainfield, the house and its contents look as bright and new as they did on Jan. 27, 1882
"That was the day when heartbroken Mr. & Mrs. Emmanuel Eckel buried their lovely little daughter, 12-year-old Lizzie. On the grave they placed Lizzie's playthings -- the doll house containing a pink-cheeked china doll, a tea set of English Davenport china and a doll-sized hutch table."
ok. creepy.
"Mr. Freiday, whose property adjoins the cemetery, repaired and painted the sides of the doll house which are made of window sash. He also cleaned the inside, Several years later he again repaired and painted the house.
"About three years ago Clarence Scheurman of Green Brook Township renovated and painted the house taking particular pains to use all original materials.
"Sixty-six years ago, as now, little Lizzie's favorite doll dressed in Victorian style presided over a tea table with a complete miniature tea set. Time took its toll of the doll's dress until three years ago it was in tatters.
"The Mrs. Edith Conklin of Middlesex Boro and a member of the ...church, took the doll from its house to find that it also needed a new covering for its body. Mrs. Conklin used the original straw stuffing and the China head and hands. She used the old dress for a pattern and, after several months, matched the original material and made a replica of the original dress - a blue and white dotted chambray with lace at the neck and sleeves. She also made new white lawn pantaloons."
are these people not seeking GAINFUL employment?
"I took the house to a carpenter and the doll to a doll hospital." ..... "said the handsome widow"
oh yeah? handsome is as handsome does, you know.
"In the spring the little house gets a cleaning and Little Lizzie gets dolled up for Memorial Day. Mrs. Seiler dresses the doll in a white embroidered Swiss organdy dress of the fashion of the Victorian era. That's the doll's summer outfit.
"When winter cleaning time comes around, usually in the beginning of December, Mrs. Seiler dresses Little Lizzie in a white woolen Little Red Riding Hood outfit."
the *handsome widow* also gets a sick pleasure out of undressing the doll and fondling her weather-worsened visage.
"Last year...Mrs. Prud'homme sent Mrs. Seiler a tinted miniature picture of Lizzie Eckel. Looking out from the frame is a grave-faced little girl with chestnut ringlets cascading over her shoulders. She wears a blue silk dress and high button shoes."
spooky! spooky!
"Members of the congregation and others continued to care for Lizzie Eckel's doll house until 1973 when a cretin took the doll house and its contents from the cemetery. Several days later the house and some of the dishes turned up in a field in Martinsville, obviously tossed there by whoever stole them. The doll and most of the furniture were missing. The remains of the doll house and its contents were never returned to the grave."
the end. the fucking freak-ass small town doll house cemetary cretin destruction end. notice how the cretin does not get an adjective such as "handsome" this is because he is the BAD guy.
#5
on the bright side. there are the wittmans. unless they're dead now. (articles: spring 94 about "everybody knew everybody in the good old days.)
#26
most exciting tourist attraction: THE EGG-O-MAT. i can hardly wait! (articles: fall 1990, "One of a number of Jewish egg producers in postwar Warren, the Epsteins sold eggs from a stand in front of their house, then installed the Egg-O-Mat in the early l950s to accommodate their many customers who needed eggs on weekends and evenings when the stand was closed and no stores were open." egg-o-mat! eggs whenever you want them and you don't own chickens of your own and from jews no less!)
#70billion
weio-weio-weio! whee!! choo-choo!!
Posted by michele at 11:00 AM | Comments (8)
December 11, 2002
gay! wet dream!
(to continue the gayness discussion....)
a certain miss jenny nessel sent me this test to take:
i am only 45% gay. sigh. i expected to be gayer. this is the picture i got when i reached my percentage score:
so apparently i am also a gay cripple.
erica: question to look forward to equals #62. SQUISHY BOOBS!
i put my fuk_o email address in, so if you want to compare at the end that's what it is and you can see how likely at that point it is that i've had a wet dream about you. jenny has a 12% probability of having had a wet dream about ME. i am pleased by this and am curious as to what my %age is for having had one about her. mainly due to the suspicious fact that i HAVE had a dream about jenny with illicit sexual behaviors going on. sick i know (not because of the gayness but because of the friendness). but what can you do? she's a pretty girl. hmm who else have i had sex fantasies about...? don't say erica. because even though there is the porn, i've never actually wanted to sleep with erica. sorry erica. mash the mammaries, yes. have sex with, no. but i think i will refrain from naming any more names because this is just wrong. oh so wrong. but take the test. i will compare my wet dream probabilities. it'll be fun for all.
Posted by michele at 07:40 PM | Comments (34)
December 10, 2002
two towers
i know this is a long shot, but is anybody interested in seeing the midnight premiere of the two towers in phill on tuesday night? whomever can crash at my house if necessary. there's beds. there's my bed. leer leer. i could prostitute myself out for willing fellows to join me in seeing what is bound to be a fucking fantastic film. there might be some vaguely illegal activities to participate in before or afterhand with me as well....(it's a secret or i would tell you more. shush nuala.)
lemme know.
Posted by michele at 04:35 PM | Comments (7)
December 09, 2002
cherry
some time later while michele and long-hai were browsing crate and barrel (crate? or barrel? crate? barrel? table leg?)......
"ahhhhh!!! i have to buy that for nuala!"
"wHy?!" (in tones of rampant disgust)
"well...cause her nickname is ducky. and will you LOOK at that thing?"
a pause for studied reflection.
"well considering that this tag here actually proclaims the many uses of filbur the duck clock and one of them is, 'filbur can be used as a storage shelf too!' maybe you SHOULD buy it."
"hwee! shelf-bill! shelf-bill!"
"and it's only $19.95. a small price to pay for nuala's joy, right?"
"oh god what are you saying? she'd kill me if i got her that."
"what? you were the one who wanted to buy it."
"well but....she'd HATE it. she'd never put it up and she would think it's hideous. it IS hideous. besides there's none here to buy. they're just on display. oo look make-up in a paint can!"
"you could ask someone where some are."
"mmm complete makeover in a paint can."
"all right i'm asking."
"goddammit."
even later (after buying the duckling filbur clock idea had been completely run roughshod over and dropped at the wayside.)
"that isn't very PC."
"ey what?" me rubbernecking furiously to see what the hell he's talking about.
"black waiter's corkscrew."
"oh man...."
Posted by michele at 12:33 PM | Comments (8)
long-hai sundae
"dood! this place is sweet!" (that is obviously me, right? ok.)
"yeah. girls love this place. i've learned that it's best to buy them gift from here because they love it before they even see it if it comes in a pottery barn box."
"hmm interesting...i don't think i would love something just because it came in a p-barn box." pause while i look around for a minute. "well, ok that was the me who'd never been inside of pottery barn talking. now though, now i would go all ga-ga over the damn box."
"my theory is proven! girls are suckers."
"hey!"
sounds of scuffling and breaking p-barn artifacts fill the air. sirens. handcuffs. jail doors slamming.
"dood! this place is sweet!"
"yeah! look at my new jumpsuit!"
Posted by michele at 10:18 AM | Comments (1)
8:11am
PUDDLE! SPLASH! WHEEEEEEEE!!!
Posted by michele at 08:57 AM | Comments (7)
December 08, 2002
swank soiree
so last night i journeyed to the pants party. and this is what i have to show for it:
seriously though, it was a lot of fun. and i really meant it when i told pants that it was good to see him again. which i was thinking about later see and it struck me as kind of odd that i actually missed someone who i haven't know for 1/4 to 1/2 of my entire life. and it wasn't just the lack of internet presence which i NEED to get me thru the day, i missed the pants. which ok maybe you don't understand why i find so odd. for one: i do not make new friends easily. for two: i sometimes wonder if pants really considers us his friends. one plus two is: pants is even more pantsarific when he's drunk.
furthermore i think i like the peach with longer hair, (for those of you who saw the peach shrine in the bedroom you will understand the 2 different hair lengths i am speaking of), but she is still incredibly gorgeous. i can say this without shame because pants told her that she has a fan club in the states, and i am just fulfilling my groupie status here.
addendum: never, NEVER again should you people let me wear the french tickler. i cannot agree to its being a good thing that i licked the majority of my friends last night. playing with my tongue piercing when nervous is bad enough.
add to my nervousness:
one tickler of exciting dimensions
plus lots of people with bare flesh exposed
-------------------------------
result is biblical tongue knowledge in catastropic proportions.
holy crap i really have to shower. i've got to meet long-hai and jason (different jason) at 2pm for my movie montage fashion show in broadway plaza. hwee. those boys had better dress up real good ("you got a real purty mouth") for my viewing pleasure.
p.s though. what is it with me and the math today?
Posted by michele at 01:16 PM | Comments (3)
December 06, 2002
december
today is my mom's birthday. so first things first: happy birthday to my wonderful mother! big smiles and lots of love.
and now onto me being horribly depressing.
last december when we were going out for my mom's bday dinner was the first time my dad fell down in a serious way. we went to tiki tom's and were meeting my brother there and we dropped my dad off at the base of the ramp to the parking garage so he would just have to walk across the alley to the restaurant. and my mom and i went up to park the car. when we were walking back down the ramp we could see a whole bunch of people clustered around someone lying on the ground and i knew then. even so far away that we couldn't really see. i knew. and i knew it was the beginning of the end. there was blood creeping down the street thru the crevices of the uneven paving job coming directly from the large gash in his head. we couldn't move him till the ambulance came because they were worried about head trauma and damage. i had to run into the restaurant and pull my brother out. we went to the hospital and it was horrible. and the month just got worse.
i used to try to go over to my mom's house every day if i could just to be there, even though there was generally nothing i could do. and every day driving over there i would be crying in preparation, hurriedly scrubbing my face once i arrive and taking deep breaths so i could go in and see my family and attempt to behave as if things were fine. as soon as i would get back in the car though i would be sobbing all the way home. and once i got there the composing of self would begin all over again so i could go in and pretend to erica and jacob that everything was fine. as the days went on the pressure on my chest to hold back tears all the time got worse and worse. and on the day that he died, kristen called on my parent's line and i, not expecting it to be someone i really knew, answered it. and as soon as she said my name i started crying so violently that i had to hang up on her. and all the boys in the other room who had come over to reminisce, get drunk, and be supportive were very worried about me.
last month i was trying really hard, subconsciously i guess, to convince myself and everyone around me how excited i was about christmas and going to oregon and seeing the big family. but now that it's dec 6, everything seems to be hitting me again. and although for the most part i've managed to move past the hazy fog of tears i lived in last december, it's hard to convince myself not to be melancholic. so if progressively this month i seem more and more depressed and/or if sushi writing doesn't have its usually panache-e flair, now you know why that might be.
i'm trying really hard for her birthday though. i've galvanized the troops. i'm picking up CPK for dinner. i have the present wrapped and ready. i'm taking her to see harry potter tomorrow. and everything is going to be fine. and i'm going to make it thru this month. and next year i'll make it thru again. and you are not to be worried. or overly solicitious. because i hate that. although hearing kristen call herself my "postman of fun," was pretty endearing.
Posted by michele at 01:17 PM
a little sugar, honey?
the latest addition to my sugar shoes obsession. thanks to that girl who commented on the sugar shoes post with the far out foot wear website.
Posted by michele at 12:07 PM | Comments (19)
December 05, 2002
solaris
what can i say? has anybody else seen it? do you want to explain the end to me? why were there suddenly multiples of her? did the drugs kill him? why did the very end have to be so incredily hokey patokey? was he dead all along? how fucking cool was snow (jeremy davies again)? why would she want to stay with him? he was kind of an asshole. what the hell kind of visitor was the black woman having? was it even human? i know no one will have any hard evidence on that, because we never saw it, but guesses?
technically i liked it. i liked the cinematography of it. i disliked the dialogue for the most part unless it was snow that was chatting. because his flippancy and gesturing were creepy fantastic. but other than his ass george clooney was irrelevant to me. and natasha mcelhone has really nice hair but... well and nice eyes. they take up her whole face almost! it's pretty sweet.
the website is pretty cool. i learned for example that it's based on a previous movie, solyaris and here i thought steven soderburgh had more indie film integrity than to copy. apparently i was way wrong.
Posted by michele at 12:01 PM | Comments (9)
lovely and amazing
was not all that good. i just didn't care about the characters that much. they were all way too neurotic. and the youngest daughter was just irritating.
if only the movie could have been cut down to being ONLY jake gyllenhaal and catherine keener it would have been better. admittedly it also would have then been "the good girl" they practically had the same conversation in the car about going to a hotel in both movies even. wierd typecasting of gyllenhaal, i have to say. well not wierd per se, because i bet women of all ages will want to have sex with him all the time, but maybe more wierd on his part to play the same thing twice.
emily mortimer other than being freakishly shallow was really good. and other than being bitchy catherine keener was really good. and other than playing the same part, albeit less darkly brooding, jake gyllenhaal was really good.
heh. and that is my take on neurotic and controlling.
Posted by michele at 11:39 AM | Comments (0)
CQ
so i just watched CQ, roman coppola's directorial debut. it's really good. the thing that is the most amazing about it, is the combination of two different movies that are being made within the fim itself. there's the dragonfly movie, and there's paul's movie 69/70. the methodology of 60's camp sci-fi and new wave french cinema in order to illustrate the complexities of film-making in general is well done. the editing is flawless, and the multiple storylines are well orchestrated in order to produce a seamless whole.
you know how you can rave about the beauty and stylistic purity of the virgin suicides by sofia? well in a different way you can say the same kinds of things about her brother's movie. it amazes me how a brother and sister can make movies that are so obviously drawing from the same kind of background in film appreciation while at the same time produce two completely disparate movies.
jeremy davies ability to look introspective and act quietly is the perfect foil to the over the top allure of angela lindvall as dragonfly and billy zane as mr. e. not to mention depardieu, schwartzman, massimo ghini, and giancarlo giannini. angela lindvall's transformations from dragonfly the seductress to valentine the earthy sweet hippie is also impressive for a model turned actress in her first movie. although if you watch the dragonfly alternate version of paul's with her commentary she is so godawful juvenile. but apparently she had a baby boy last february. how scary is that? i don't think 22/23 year olds should be having babies when they themselves still speak like 2nd graders.
the special features on the dvd are wide-ranging. there's video documentaries by sofia, his mom, and some other filmmakers. there's a commentary, there's a live music concert of mellow (speaking of which air is WAY better than mellow, but they're both kind of the same thing. another point in the sibling connection i think.) there's like 5 featurettes too which were fun to watch.
i put it on my amazon wishlist, yes i liked it that much. =)
Posted by michele at 11:25 AM | Comments (0)
December 04, 2002
burnt ramen
this is where kristen is inviting us to go on friday. i have to admit to being a little scared. and also disgusted.
direct quote: "Since that time, there have been a lot of shows here, with improvents to the stage and PA. Many bands who have been on tour all over the country have said that this is the most fun place to play. Why? I don't know, it's dirty, it' dark and it's in a scary neighborhood."
-burnt ramen
Posted by michele at 10:05 AM | Comments (16)
astroturf and stalking
jolie asked if i could put this on my page. it is apparently to stand as proof that she is indeed dating astroturf. i don't know if it counts for hard evidence so much...what with the lacking of romantic candlelight or silk sheets and the addition of erica to the little ménage a trois action or whatever is going down kind of crimps up the bit. but you know what. look at that girl! she used to be a freshman. (this was really the only time i ever met her otherwise. when she was puny and young...and actually had less of a strong jaw line. and longer hair. and less make-up.) grown up good that astroturf. that's all i'm saying. not that she wasn't cute as a freshman. so young after all. and what with the cuteness of freshman brien standing next to me when i was introduced to her i think maybe i was overwhelmed by the youngness of it all. mmm freshman brien....so cute....
what is it with me and freshman? i mean there was brien. and then there was the one who i stalked for TWO FULL YEARS. well you have to hand to me the fact that he stopped being a freshman after that first year. although he did remain a strange dwarf throughout. did my weird midget fetish also escalate from that period, i wonder? i also wonder if i looked really hard if i could find the copy i made of SDK's UPS college application (minus the essay, which always pissed me off. why didn't they start saving those earlier? bastards.) that is hardcore my friends. stealing private documents even after i signed that skimpy piece of paper promising not to divulge any secrets nor to indulge my power trips. when will people learn not to trust my work ethic? when but only when?
once i was walking along to class from the SUB up past whatever that hall was called (holy crap i've forgotten some of the names. i worked in that building for like 2.5 years and now i can't even remember what it was called. moan, i miss college) anyway. walking. and he was walking in front of me to somewhere else and i totally followed him. even though he was not going where i wanted to go. i hung back. i paused. i pretended to be searching for things in my bag. whatever. i almost followed him right into the library. but i stopped myself at that point and turned around to go back to my building.
then another time, marina and i were leaving the library and walking around the back to her car and he was sitting at those new desks they had installed in the front windows. and he was totally watching us (i think by this point my stalkerish behavior had been noted), and marina and i were giggling while i attempted to convince her that we should most definitely not walk back in there and say hi. but she escaped my confining grasps all the same and waved at him big and cheerily from right there outside. i was mortified. he waved back. i drug marina away and roundly berated her all the way home. and then some more.
things got better. we were sort of one a first name basis. even though i could never call him by his real name so avoided the subject altogether generally. there was even a point where hugging became ok. he came to my house in california once over spring break when we were all down here visiting. i gave him some of my bookcases when i moved out and left tacoma, i even inscribed the undersides of the shelves with slogans such as "SDK all the way!" and "the FAK is back!" and then he went and had a "religious experience" with johnny's girlfriend for which i still haven't forgiven him. even though it was the summer after i had left. maybe he was sad. but most likely it had nothing to do with me whatsoever. whatsoever.
so. here today you get a picture of erica, astroturf, and jolie. and a long complex, and possibly boring, story about my favorite stalkee.
Posted by michele at 09:06 AM | Comments (5)
December 02, 2002
*blush*
once upon a time i had a different webpage. this was before gene got cementhorizon to work and we were all making do the best way we could. and on that page one day i decided to have a haiku contest. the amount of boredom that i was suffering in my job at that point knew no bounds. so haiku contest, ok? and for the contest aspect of it i thought that we should have some sort of a prize for whoever we judged the winner to be. and i made two polls, one for best haiku and one for the prize so people could vote fairly. it ended up being less than fair admittedly when i gave myself 10,000 votes and laughed in the face of everybody's outrage. but whatever. you know what?--honestly the old page has nothing to do with this post because not only did erica not even submit a haiku, she didn't win the poll either since i did by dint of copious cheating. and the prize was tied between the big ass trampline from sam's club and a porn story to follow up ninjaporn. (holy crap. 95 people have voted on the ninjaporn poll. who the fuck has been reading that i wonder?) i was just SUPPOSED to make sure personal porn and erica won because i had already written a little something something and didn't want it to go to waste.
the real point here is that erica asked for a porn story of her own involving michael rosensomething who plays lex luthor on the stupid superman smallville wb show. and i wrote one. possibly she did not mean for me to post it here. umm...possibly i shouldn't post it here. CERTAINLY NONE OF YOU SHOULD READ IT. oh dood. it makes me seriously uncomfortable. 1)what was i thinking? 2)did i actually just give literary scope to erica's breasts? 3)is that line about the sperm floodgates really necessary, (kristen)? but for whatever reason you like, possibly we should blame my need to have all literary efforts, even excessively personal ones, appreciated, i give you: PORN.
(click on the picture to download the word document.)
note. i put this up. i then took it down 2 hours later out of sheer embarresment. i am now putting it back up. i am still however horrified at myself. we shall see if it stays up longer than 2 hours this time. i don't think anyone saw it last time. people are probably going to see it this time. moan. this is soooo not a good idea. don't be offended. DON'T BE REPULSED. it's ok. everything is going to be ok. note 2. erica totally said i could put it up. she really really did.
Posted by michele at 01:00 PM | Comments (14)
December 01, 2002
san diego crew, the
so marina just, JUST, sent me these pictures, and already i am displaying them for the world to see. this is only going to matter to like 4 people who know marina, jenny, and scott bailey, but whatever. the pictures are from halloween 2002.
katie, (marina's housemate), mark (marina's housemate), marina, and scott bailey.
scott bailey and his girlfriend, nicole.
someone named mike, marina, and jenny.
Posted by michele at 05:28 PM | Comments (16)