Archive | June, 2012

5 Movies You’ve Probably Never Watched (But You Totally Should!)

28 Jun

I’ve done quite a bit of movie-watching this past week. It started with Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows at Brian’s place. It was good, but I didn’t care for it as much as I did for the first film. Robert Downey, Jr. was in it, so that was honestly enough for me. On Sunday, I met up with my mother and sister to see The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which was ok. I guess I would describe it as a coming of age-type story, but a different age. It had the best combination of British actors since the last Harry Potter movie (Dame Judi Dench! Dame Maggie Smith! Bill Nighy!), and featured the mesmerizing colors and breathtaking architecture of Jaipur, India. However, I didn’t care so much for the cinematography. I mean, I get that it was probably jumpy and quick to mimic the pace of life in the city, juxtaposed to the dull and slow portrayal of England, but I just wasn’t into it. Still, I appreciated that Bill Nighy plays the same character that he plays in just about all of his movies. The next day, Brian and I went to see Brave, which I have been bugging him to see since the previews came out. I feel like I’ve finally found my Disney hair twin, and Disney princess personality. (Well, mixed with Belle, of course.) The movie tells the story of Merida, a 10th century Scottish princess determined to choose her own fate. Every wish has its consequences, and she must discover how to reverse a witch’s curse before it’s too late. Like the other great Pixar films, such as Up, WALL-E, and the Toy Story series, Brave is a story about a relationship, a bond. I don’t want to give away any more of the plot, but I will say that this is a mom and daughter movie.

Now that I find myself with a surplus of spare time, I feel like I’ll be able to catch up on some of the movie- and TV-watching that I missed out on during grad school. (Although, I’m getting a bit stir-crazy, and will probably start giving myself projects or homework to keep busy while job searching.) Although classes and work continue, it’s summer, and you’re likely finding yourself with a bit of time to kill, too. While you could head to the theater and shill out $9.50 to see Magic Mike, in which case, call me, because I totally want to see that, too — you could also check out one or two of the following. I feel like I’m sharing a cinematic secret with you, reader… I bet you’ve never heard of a few, if not, all of these movies. They’re all pretty much off the radar, but each is worth a watch and available through Netflix.

1. Waking Ned Devine

I don’t remember when my family first discovered this movie… maybe when I was in high school. My mom picked it up at the library, thinking it might be decent. Being a pretty good judge of character and whatnot, she nailed it with this one. Released in 1998, Waking Ned Devine is set in Tulaigh Mhór (Tully More), Ireland, population: 52. The Irish National Lottery has reached a record high, and it’s confirmed that the winner is from the small village. However, Ned Devine has died from the shock of winning. The townsfolk come together and decide that they’re going to try to claim the winnings anyhow, but they have a few obstacles in their way. I loved the music and the sweeping landscapes, but it’s a hilarious film. Yep, there’s an old naked guy riding a motorcycle, but the story of a lifelong friendship is honest and heartwarming.

2. Undertaking Betty

Ok, so obviously, my family is into black comedies set in the United Kingdom, and this was another library find. From 2002, this movie starts with your typical love triangle-quagmire: Man loves woman who is married to another man, who is cheating on her with his secretary. Did I mention Man #1 is an undertaker? After confessing his love for Betty, Boris Plots and the object of his affection hatch a plan to take her out of her joke of a marriage to the town’s mayor… there’s just that whole “till death do us part” technicality. If anything, watch it for Christopher Walken, who plays the town’s other undertaker, staging flamboyant “fun-erals” that feature showgirls and Spock ears.

3. Pirate Radio

This is another one where I can’t quite remember how I discovered it, but I’m glad I did. Released in 2009 in the UK as The Boat That Rocked, it is based on the true story of a “pirate radio” crew, anchored in the international waters of the North Sea. In the 60s, BBC radio wouldn’t play rock and pop music, depriving the masses of The Beatles, The Kinks, Martha and the Vandellas, and other artists of the time. A certain government minister (played by Kenneth Branagh) decides to put an end to this attack on British sensibilities, and puts his deputy (Jack Davenport, known better as Admiral James Norrington of Pirates of the Carribean) to the task. The rogue gang of DJs, led by The Count (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), refuse to let their hope, and love of the music, sink. I love this movie, and here’s why: 1. The soundtrack is incredible. I was raised on classic rock and pop of the 60s, and the soundtrack of this movie just makes me smile. 2. I’m kind of a sucker for “fight the power” movies. 3. This was my introduction to Chris O’Dowd — the adorable police officer from last summer’s Bridesmaids. Nick Frost (of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz) and Bill Nighy also star. If you get this movie through Netflix, I must tell you to watch the extra and deleted scenes. At a full 45 minutes of bonus scenes, some of the best material can be found here.

4. The Secret of Kells

I had this film in my Netflix instant queue for a while before I got around to it, but after watching it, I regretted putting it off for so long. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this film from 2009 for small children, since some parts could be a little frightening for them, but I think older kids and certainly adults will be able to appreciate the beautiful, hand drawn animation. Set a couple of centuries before Brave, this is the fictionalized story of the creation of The Book of Kells, an ancient Irish text that contains the four Gospels of the New Testament. This movie weaves Irish mythology with the real history of brutal Viking invasions, told through imagery based on traditional Irish art. Young Brendan is living in a monastery outpost, serving as an apprentice to the master illuminator who is finishing the book. In order to finish it, Brendan must overcome his fears and journey into the enchanted forest. There, he meets a young forest spirit named Aisling, who helps him along the way. The movie takes some very dark turns, but if you’re into either Ireland or mythology, this one’s for you.

5. Midnight in Paris

I’ve never been crazy about Woody Allen… his style is kind of an acquired taste, but his love letter to Paris is a good place to start. It was released just last year, and I do remember seeing it playing a few theaters, but I was always heading there to see something else. This rom-com fantasy stars Owen Wilson as Gil, a successful Hollywood screenwriter who wants to start writing serious novels, but he is just one of the many big names in this film. Gil is visiting Paris on a business trip with his dream-crushing fiance (Rachel McAdams) and her skeptical parents, and they run into friends from home, a know-it-all husband and his naive wife, who insist on spending time together. In need of some alone time to explore the city he adores, Gil takes off on a midnight stroll, only to be transported to Paris of the Roaring Twenties. Here, we’re introduced to the celebrities of the age, including F. Scott Fitzgerald (Tom Hiddleston) and his wife, Zelda; Ernest Hemingway; Gertrude Stein (Kathy Bates); Pablo Picasso; Salvadore Dali (Adrien Brody); T.S. Eliot, and a handful of other famous artists. While I’ve never been big into time travel films (especially the other one starring McAdams), this is not one to be missed.

I hope you’ve found these recommendations interesting. Let me know if you watch one of them. Right now, I’m highly anticipating the nationwide release of Moonrise Kingdom. (Watch more Wes Anderson films if you don’t already, please. Bill Murray in madras!)

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Pinterest, the Pandemic

8 Jun

What was the last thing you pinned? Are you pinning? If you’re an 18-45 year old woman, of course you are… at least according to my extremely scientific research. For those still not hip to this new-ish social media outlet, Pinterest is basically a way to create “inspiration” or idea boards, linking each pin back to the original source (although there seems to be some possible legal issues about this). I joined in August 2011 after exploring the various boards for a while and deciding that creating my boards could be rather useful. Little did I know that I would make it my third most visited site, right after Facebook and my Gmail inbox.

When I joined Pinterest, I thought it was great — don’t get me wrong, I still think it’s great, but it’s just… different now. Last summer, I was one of around 1.8 million users, which means I was cool before pinning a photo and simply captioning it “This.” was cool. The latest info I can find counts about 11 million users for the site, and that’s from January, so it’s more likely to be around 14 million now. That infographic backs up my super scientific research that most Pinterest users are women, but I was slightly off on the ages: while only6% of the Pinners are between the ages of 18-24, most users are between 25 and 54 years old… which actually surprises me a little bit… While exploring the boards and clicking around, I was introduced to products, useful tips, and design ideas I never would have come across otherwise. Unfortunately, this pandemic-style growth of Pinterest has given me a few pin-related pet peeves.

1. You have to wade through a lot of lame pins to find something cool because you can’t narrow your interests.

You just have to face it, Sam. Our group is Frodo-centric. If it were a town, it would be Frodoville. If it were an Islamic nation — Frodostan.

I cringe every time I see the pins with wedding attire featuring camouflage and hunting orange details. Same goes for the “hillbilly wineglasses” made of Mason jars and short glass candle sticks. While those are probably fantastic for some bride-to-be, that’s all just… no. No, thank you. I wish it was easier to limit the types of pins you see by your interests. I love arts and crafts/DIY, but I’m so tired of seeing crochet and quilting pins. Nice for someone else, absolutely useless to me. I think it’s fantastic that Pinterest can be such a great resource to my friends who teach elementary education, but to be quite honest, I’ve had to unfollow all of the boards with different learning or activity centers and the like. Not my thing, either.  But, being able to pick and choose particular boards of a single user instead of having to follow everything works for me.

2. Anyone can follow you, and people treat it like Facebook. 

Here are some penguins. Ladies love penguins.

I’m flattered that people are interested in what I’m pinning, or like what I’ve pinned/repinned enough that they post it on their own boards. Still, I kind of wish I could block people. Pinterest is not Facebook,  and unless you’re one of those Facebook friend padders who adds random people you see, there’s an even greater chance that you don’t actually know the people with whom you’re connected. However, I don’t feel the need to connect with every person I know across every social media outlet I utilize. You follow someone because you tend to like the things they’re posting, not because you had 7th period English together in high school. It’s not about who has the most followers, unless there is a really sad “most followers on Pinterest” contest of which I’m not aware. Then you get into the Pinterest flame wars, fights between users started about the content or image of the pin that usually stray away from the original topic within 10 comments. Has no one ever told them that when you fight about something online, no one wins?

3. Just like Facebook, there are the spammers, and then there are people who just don’t get it.

via Apartment Therapy

There’s a difference, and while they’re both just little annoyances, the second is something that can be fixed. On Facebook and Twitter, you get friend or follow requests from fake accounts all the time. Looks like those fakers have overflowed into Pinterest, since you have to have an account with one or the other site to become a Pinner. The spammers can be identified by comments that read something like this: “hey- great pin, come check out my boards” or “wow-great photo, follow my boards.” Annoying. But the second category is a two parter: those who have several (upwards of 100) boards with only one thing on each one, or those who have one or two boards, but pin everything to one of those two. Turns out that the users with tons of boards and 1-2 pins on each are spammers, too.

While I do check the boards and categories I’m interested in just about every day (mainly “Everything” and “DIY and Crafts”), I’m moving outward to the blogs, sites, and other sources that have caught my attention. I end up bringing those ideas or items into my curated collections, which all of my 160 or so followers can see. I’ve made or bought some of the cool things I’ve found or pinned on Pinterest, like these, this, and these guys. Here are a few tips for successful pinning:

  • Make sure the image you’re using goes to the original source. It sucks having to track down the directions for a project or a delicious recipe.
  • Always give your pin a relevant caption that provides a little more of a description than “awesome, doing this.” I’m guilty of it, but I’m getting better about it.
  • Categorize your boards so other pinners can have an easier time browsing for ideas.
  • Take your pinning beyond the boards! When you find something interesting on another site, pin it so others can discover it, expanding the ever-growing pool of, well, stuff that is there to look through.

This summer, take some time to do one of those DIY art projects you found while on your lunch break, or whip up some of those cookies from the recipe you found waiting for another site to load. Although it seems like I have a lot of complaints about Pinterest, the only pet peeve that really bothers me is that I don’t have the time to make all of the awesome ideas I’ve found!

What about you? Anything you particularly love about Pinterest? Anything that bugs you? If you need some “pinspiration,” feel free to check out my boards, but please, don’t feel obligated to follow me. :)

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“Learning Not to Hope For What I Can’t Control”: Some Novel Melodrama

7 Jun

Jeannette’s most recent post is very fitting for my own life right now. The calm that came after graduation quickly devolved into a kind of chaos that is coming from all directions and exists at the middle of feelings of great happiness and great sadness. Happy or sad, life throws us for a loop sometimes and we end up scrambling to keep our feet planted firmly on the ground and keep our minds level. The bottom line is that when you’re stressed, or things aren’t going your way, or you are upset over something, you need to remember what is truly important and how to prioritize. You also need to put your problems into perspective.

There’s a quote floating around on Pinterest about the problems we all have:

Sometimes, our problems seem insurmountable. And sometimes they are almost more than we can bear. But humans are amazingly resilient and strong — we are capable of great things and can overcome that which seems to be impossible. Difficulties are often not as bad as they originally seem, because once we move away from our singular and narrow perspectives, we often see that our problems are not as bad when compared to those faced by others. Placing our problems in perspective doesn’t solve them, but it makes them easier to deal with.

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Hopefully, in reading my blog posts, you’ve learned some things about me. One of the things that I think carries through my musings is that I have a great appreciation for the world around me and everything it can teach me. I take great inspiration from the movies I watch, the music I listen to, the trips I take, the speakers I hear, the photos I view, and most importantly, the books I read.

I’m a book lover, but not what I would call a book snob. I see the value in every book, whether it is a profoundly moving or groundbreaking classic or a fun, easy read. Books convey human emotions and interactions to us, and even if the story itself isn’t the most original or creative, we can still learn things from them. Books are also cathartic and, sometimes, the simple act of reading a story can allow us to center our own thoughts and feelings on an issue going on in our own lives.

I recently read a novel published a few years ago that was just this kind of book. I purchased it last year when Borders was going out of business and thought it would be a simple, quick read. And it was, but at the same time it wasn’t. The events and relationships within gave me great pause, and made me very glad for the life that I have — even if it is sometimes boring, frustrating, or not exactly as I want it to be.

“Roses” by Leila Meachem is billed as a modern “Gone With the Wind, ” tracing the triumphs and tragedies of a wealthy Texas family over the course of the twentieth century. It is a love story, but not just one between two characters. In this case, it is also a love story between families, and between people and their heritage. “Roses,” however, is also a story of hate, jealousy, and stubbornness — and what can happen when those feelings define relationships and family structures.

“Roses” is a frame story, beginning in the present and repeatedly reflecting on past events. The novel revolves around the character of Mary Toliver who, at more than 80 years old is re-evaluating her life and choices. Widowed and with no children, Mary is herself facing the end of her life. With little time left, she wants to correct the mistakes she feels she has made and she sets out to do so, changing her will to reflect her new interpretation of the past. Since childhood, Mary’s life has been completely invested in her family’s 100 year old cotton plantation, Somerset. She has sacrificed over and over for Somerset’s success, which has paid off as Somerset proper is now only one small part of a larger corporation, Toliver Farms.

Without warning, Mary abruptly decides to sell Toliver Farms and Somerset instead of leaving the company and plantation under the care of her niece Rachel, who has been learning the family business since childhood. Before Mary can explain her reasoning, however, something occurs that throws everything  into a state of chaos that leaves all who know Mary confused and shocked.

It quickly becomes apparent that the story of Mary Toliver is not solely her own. It is also the story of Mary’s oldest friend Percy Warwick, the story of her late husband Ollie Du Mont, and the story of her brother Miles Toliver (Rachel’s grandfather). It is the story of another will and its consequences, the story of curses and superstitions, the story of how our choices can affect everything.

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I really enjoyed “Roses.” But it is not for the faint of heart. It is a roller coaster ride of human emotion that will simultaneously make you want to stay up all night reading and make you want to throw the book across the room. It’s happy in its own way, but it is not a happily ever after kind of happy.

I makes you think about what is really important in life, about how life is different today than it was 75 – 100 years. It also horrified me in terms of how some people treated each other, and made me feel very lucky that my family is not that way.

Have you ever read a book that made you think this way? What are you planning on reading this summer?

Let me know, and, happy reading!

 

 

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“Take care of the golf balls first–the things that really matter.”

5 Jun

For awhile, I’ve been wanting to share a story with all of you, but I just didn’t know how. Many of you may have heard this before, but even so, it always makes me feel a little better. So, here it is.  

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A Jar of Mayo and Two Cups of Coffee

When things in your lives seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and the 2 cups of coffee.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full.  They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with an unanimous “yes.”

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

“Now,” said the professor as the laughter subsided, “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things–your family, your children, your health, your friends and your favorite passions–and if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house and your car.

The sand is everything else–the small stuff. “If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, “there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

“Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your  spouse out to dinner. Play another 18. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal. Take care of the golf balls first–the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.”

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented. The professor smiled. “I’m glad you asked.

It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend.”

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Have I really not posted in over a month?

That’s embarrassing and unacceptable, but I promise I haven’t just been sitting around twiddling my thumbs.

I wanted to share this story for awhile, but I also couldn’t decide if I wanted to add my two cents to the story. What could I see that hadn’t already been said, and  how could I say eloquently?

I don’t know if I’ve figured out the eloquent part, but I do have things to say.

I think it’s really easy to get caught up in the superficial things in our life-’what am I going to do on my day off? ”I wish I could buy concerts tickets’.’ How should I get my hair done for the summer?’ You may laugh, but it’s probably because you’ve had some of these very same thoughts. When you think about it, we waste an incredible amount of our time worrying about the sand-the trivial things.

We worry about our job, our education, our homes. But even without these things, we would still be fine if we knew we still had our family, friends, passions, and health.

On March 2nd, our 8-year old golden retriever, Minnie Mouse, passed away. It was completely unexpected and we had next to no time to say good-bye. I was devastated. I cried, I sulked, I wallowed. I think it’s a natural response when you love someone (yes, I know she wasn’t a human) you love. Within a month, we’d gotten another golden retriever in our home-Luna Love-of-my-life-Good.

Going away to grad school, I feel like I’ve missed a lot. I knew I’d miss out on the last few years of our dogs’  lives, but I never expected it would come so soon. Now that we’ve lost one dog, and have gotten another, I feel like I’m sometimes missing out on our new puppy growing up.

If you haven’t guessed this already, I’m a worrier. I’m also very driven and perfectionistic in many aspects of my life. I want to do and get what’s best for me. I want to embrace every opportunity in my path, which often means I worry about the little things. I concern myself with the sand, when I should be worried about the golf balls.

When I found out about our dog, I was still at school. I had a class that evening and I actually contemplated staying for class because I couldn’t miss class in graduate school.  And that’s when it hit me-what’s one class going to matter in the scheme of things, when I could be home saying goodbye and being with my family?

So, I went home.

I forgot about the sand.

I took care of the golf balls first.

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