Well, almost, but close enough. :) I think I'll start the holiday nails tomorrow...I've got a really nice dark burgundy creme on right now and a good red/green glitter topper I might put on over it. We'll see...Need to look at what I have. At any rate, I'm trying to get into the Christmas spirit. This year seems to be harder than most and I think it's because Halloween wore me out. I've only NOW started thinking of Christmas presents and normally I've got it all planned out before Thanksgiving even arrives. *sigh* It probably also doesn't help that Christmas started Nov 1st so I'm a little desensitized already. At least the music hasn't started, yet!
Last night our power went for 4 hours (went out at 9pm). It forced an early bed, which I then proceeded to read an entire book instead of sleeping. Oh well. It was a good book! I might make it to 50 books for the year! It means I'll need to read 4 books in December, but it's possible...The book I read, though, reminded me why I enjoy YA novels so much. I've read some good ones this year, but this one was probably one of my favorites recently. Luckily, I don't have too much longer to wait for the 2nd one. :)
At any rate, movies...Still haven't seen Twilight (turned it down twice now), but maybe sometime between now and The Hobbit (Dec 14th!!). So...My one movie this week.
Lawless (Tom Hardy, Shia LaBeouf, Guy Pearce) - Uhm. Well. What to even say...It's definitely one of my least favorite movies I've seen this year. I knew it was going to be bad based on the reviews, but I didn't think it'd be THAT bad. The acting was good and the cinematography was good, but the story was not good. The end ended up being on the cheesy end and there is a lot of blood. Blood doesn't really bother me, but some of the scenes just made me cringe (the tar and feathering, for example). You have to admit that the 20's in the U.S. was an...interesting...time period, but this one looked at the prohibition and the lawlessness that came with it. You'd think this would set-up to be a good mobster movie or something, but it didn't really hit anything. At least the cast can act, but there's nothing else really redeeming about the film. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone and kind of wish I can scrub it out of my mind. I will say, Forrest (Tom Hardy) is one seriously resilient man! He just would not die...I still like LaBeouf as an actor (I practically grew-up with him), but his personal life does cloud my enjoyment of seeing him in movies. It makes me a little sad and hope that he doesn't go down the path he seems to be just barely skirting. With that...Skip the movie! Grade: D
With that...I think I'll spend this rainy day in bed reading some more. :)
Friday, November 30, 2012
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
Happy Thanksgiving!
I hope everyone has a good Thanksgiving Day and feast with family and/or friends! I will be having some ham instead of turkey (Chris doesn't prefer turkey) and a few sides. It should be good eatin'! I also have the day off from work (we're closed) and it's a paid holiday! In fact, Friday is also a paid holiday, but we are open. We had a few customers who said they wished we were open on Thanksgiving Day and I just had to ignore the comment because there is no way I want to be at work on Thanksgiving! I will be working a full 40-hours this week so I get, basically, 16 extra hours of pay. The pay is nice, but the days off would have been nicer. I am perpetually tired this week and I think it's because of my 7-day week last week. I was good that week, but I'm just tired this week. Almost everyone else got 3 days off this week. I was one of two who didn't (the other person had all last week off, so it hardly counts!), but I guess that's what I get for being Assistant Manager and also us being short. Oh well. Maybe I'll take extra time off around Christmas. We'll see.
Anyway, I painted my nails for Thanksgiving. I used China Glaze Champagne Kisses (a little more pink in person and less gold), mostly, but did accent nails with SpaRitual Liquid Gold for the base. I haven't done nail art in a while and was going to do the turkeys on both hands, but decided doing the turkey on my right hand wasn't going to work out well (I'm right-handed) so I opted for the Pilgrim hat instead. (The nail art was done with various nubar nail art pens.) It was easier to do, but I still messed it up a little too. Oh well! I still like it for Thanksgiving! I think this weekend (next day off on Sat) I'll try a water marble...
On to movies...
Skyfall (Daniel Craig, Judi Dench) - It wasn't too bad. It showed the "softer" side of Bond with Dench's M, which I really liked. It showed their loyalty to each other. This was probably the best of the 3 Craig Bond films. It kind of had everything: emotion, action, nicely cinematic scenes, a crazy villain, etc. I liked the villain too since he was always just a little ahead of Bond/MI6. The Bond Girl had a sort of "rough" go in this movie, though...My one thing about the film is that Craig has 2 more Bond films to do and I'm kind of finished with him as Bond. It's not so much that I don't like him as Bond, but Craig is getting a little old to play Bond. So I hope they do the films sooner rather than later and I hope they play more along Skyfall's lines. They acknowledged his age in Skyfall and I appreciated that. It would be nice to see Bond back to his normal kick-butt/suave manner too, but to keep to the storytelling like Skyfall, which had depth. Grade: B+
Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (Steve Carell, Kiera Knightley) - Let me first say that I liked this film. It had a vulnerability to it, but when you sat down and thought about the film, you started to wonder about its rhythm or something. I don't know. There's just something slightly off about the film and, let's be honest, it does have a kind of depressing-happy end. I did like it overall, though, and it was an interesting movie about what do you do when the world is going to end and you know when it'll end. Seeing Carell and Knightley together was sort of weird, but it somehow worked for both their characters. Knightley's Penny is sort of the care-free one and Carell's Dodge was the one who wanted "the life," but somehow fell short in every way. They end up together on the road together to achieve their final goals before the world ends. I liked it, but it does sort of go from one thing to another, but also somehow worked for me. I don't know. I liked it, but it's not fantastic either. It was a good rental. Grade: B/B- (B, if you don't think about it too much...)
The Expendables 2 (Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Chuck Norris, etc) - After recently watching the first one, I wanted to watch the 2nd one. I have to say, I'm glad I did. I actually liked the 2nd one more than the 1st one! There's actual laughs (intentional laughs) and the girl just wasn't a maiden in distress (she was smart and held her own). The story was a little more far-fetched and silly than the first movie (first one made a little more sense to their band of guys), but it's not like you expected Shakespeare or something in this either so I feel like the actual storyline is moot as long as the rest of it supports it and it does. There was still a lot of guns, explosions, knives, blood, etc, but it was much better this time and the story helped those explosions, knives, blood, etc along a little better. You also saw the "softer" side of the guys when "Billy the Kid" ends up dying. Chuck Norris in the film cracked me up, though. They definitely made his role to fit his enigma and they even got in a Chuck Norris joke, which really made me laugh (actually, almost every scene with Norris was my favorite). I could have lived without Schwarzenegger (*gag*), but I liked Bruce Willis. So, yeah, better than the first one, in my opinion, but it's still silly too. Grade: C+ (maybe a B- just because I really liked the Chuck Norris joke!)
With that...I'm off to read. Once again, a Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I have a lot to be thankful for and it's always good to remember the good in our lives.
Anyway, I painted my nails for Thanksgiving. I used China Glaze Champagne Kisses (a little more pink in person and less gold), mostly, but did accent nails with SpaRitual Liquid Gold for the base. I haven't done nail art in a while and was going to do the turkeys on both hands, but decided doing the turkey on my right hand wasn't going to work out well (I'm right-handed) so I opted for the Pilgrim hat instead. (The nail art was done with various nubar nail art pens.) It was easier to do, but I still messed it up a little too. Oh well! I still like it for Thanksgiving! I think this weekend (next day off on Sat) I'll try a water marble...
On to movies...
Skyfall (Daniel Craig, Judi Dench) - It wasn't too bad. It showed the "softer" side of Bond with Dench's M, which I really liked. It showed their loyalty to each other. This was probably the best of the 3 Craig Bond films. It kind of had everything: emotion, action, nicely cinematic scenes, a crazy villain, etc. I liked the villain too since he was always just a little ahead of Bond/MI6. The Bond Girl had a sort of "rough" go in this movie, though...My one thing about the film is that Craig has 2 more Bond films to do and I'm kind of finished with him as Bond. It's not so much that I don't like him as Bond, but Craig is getting a little old to play Bond. So I hope they do the films sooner rather than later and I hope they play more along Skyfall's lines. They acknowledged his age in Skyfall and I appreciated that. It would be nice to see Bond back to his normal kick-butt/suave manner too, but to keep to the storytelling like Skyfall, which had depth. Grade: B+
Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (Steve Carell, Kiera Knightley) - Let me first say that I liked this film. It had a vulnerability to it, but when you sat down and thought about the film, you started to wonder about its rhythm or something. I don't know. There's just something slightly off about the film and, let's be honest, it does have a kind of depressing-happy end. I did like it overall, though, and it was an interesting movie about what do you do when the world is going to end and you know when it'll end. Seeing Carell and Knightley together was sort of weird, but it somehow worked for both their characters. Knightley's Penny is sort of the care-free one and Carell's Dodge was the one who wanted "the life," but somehow fell short in every way. They end up together on the road together to achieve their final goals before the world ends. I liked it, but it does sort of go from one thing to another, but also somehow worked for me. I don't know. I liked it, but it's not fantastic either. It was a good rental. Grade: B/B- (B, if you don't think about it too much...)
The Expendables 2 (Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Chuck Norris, etc) - After recently watching the first one, I wanted to watch the 2nd one. I have to say, I'm glad I did. I actually liked the 2nd one more than the 1st one! There's actual laughs (intentional laughs) and the girl just wasn't a maiden in distress (she was smart and held her own). The story was a little more far-fetched and silly than the first movie (first one made a little more sense to their band of guys), but it's not like you expected Shakespeare or something in this either so I feel like the actual storyline is moot as long as the rest of it supports it and it does. There was still a lot of guns, explosions, knives, blood, etc, but it was much better this time and the story helped those explosions, knives, blood, etc along a little better. You also saw the "softer" side of the guys when "Billy the Kid" ends up dying. Chuck Norris in the film cracked me up, though. They definitely made his role to fit his enigma and they even got in a Chuck Norris joke, which really made me laugh (actually, almost every scene with Norris was my favorite). I could have lived without Schwarzenegger (*gag*), but I liked Bruce Willis. So, yeah, better than the first one, in my opinion, but it's still silly too. Grade: C+ (maybe a B- just because I really liked the Chuck Norris joke!)
With that...I'm off to read. Once again, a Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I have a lot to be thankful for and it's always good to remember the good in our lives.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
I survived!
*Pinches self* Did I really make it through a 7-day work week?! Really?! I seem to be here and not in a zombie state. I didn't maim, kill, throttle, or yell at anyone either. Huzzah! Granted, that doesn't mean *I* wasn't yelled at during the week, but at least I wasn't maimed, killed, or throttled.
I must say that working 7 days really isn't as bad as it sounds. Sure, no one in their right mind would work more than 5 if they could help it and, yes, I would rather work 6 over 7, but, mentally, by the time you get to 7-days, it sort of like "Eh. Okay." I find working 6, sometimes, is far worse mentally because it's just one extra day of work and you start to wind down on your 5th, as you normally would, so the 6th day is horrible to get through. When you work 7 (according to myself), you keep yourself going and never let yourself wind down because you know you have TWO extra days to get through. It's why I think I'm here blogging instead of passing out on my bed. Course, I may not be passing out because my body is really messed up with all the open/close repetition I had all week. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, but it still wasn't enjoyable and I feel a little off in my sleep/normal pattern.
Anyway, work itself wasn't too bad. I did feel like I was in the office a lot my last 2 days, but it wasn't all bad. The help that came in was very helpful, but one of our problem customers did cause us problems and I got yelled at in Farsi. That was fun. I had to threatened to call the cops too. Yeah. That was my Wednesday night and my Thursday (day 7) morning was involved with trying to come up with ways to communicate with her. I feel like we had some major breakthroughs, though. Then, on top of all that, today we had furniture after furniture donation and that means I have to price and put them out and we had a call out almost everyday and...*sigh* I'm glad it's finished! My only worry is that I had to deal with today like I was leaving the kids alone for 2 days. Only one Lead is left for the next two days and a Lead from another store. I had to make sure our Lead knew what to do for different situations and how to do some other things. Not to mention I had to show where phone numbers were in case something happened. Crazy, I tell you, crazy! Anyway, glad that's over with...I think. I still have that feeling of leaving the kids alone for 2 days...!
Life goes on...And what do I do to unwind? Catch up on my nail stuff! The indie polishes are making some awfully cute holiday polishes. Going to have to be careful what I want to buy and really recheck what I buy so I don't buy everything! I will say, though, that there are two things that nail polish has really made me aware of this past year: New York Fashion Week and Colors/Causes-Awareness Days. NYFW is especially popular with all the nail brands as they tend to do polishes for them. Zoya, in particular, tends to work with a fashion designer to make custom polishes. Some other brands lend their polishes for the runway and others bring new collections to showcase. Nail polish is a part of the make-up/fashion world! The bloggers really like to do blogger challenges and so on awareness/cause days, they all blog about the issue and do nail art or pick colors that coordinate. November 14th is World Diabetes Day (color for that is blue). November 8th was No H8 (anti-bullying and tolerance and tended towards purple). Of course Oct was Breast Cancer Awareness (lots of pink!). There's also Autism awareness (is that gray?) and lots of others. Who'd of thought nail polish would teach me about these different causes and their days to bring awareness of them.
With that...Movie!
Watched Moonrise Kingdom. It has an interesting adult cast (Bruce Willis, Billy Murray, Tilda Swinton, etc), but it's really about the two young stars. I'm still sort of baffled by the point of the movie, but I'm sure it has something to do about love and innocence...The two young stars end up running away with each other and are in love with each other. The town ends up running around trying to find them (they're 12 years old) and you find out they each have a sort of misunderstood persona about them. Their families and friends don't truly get them and they sometimes tend towards violence. They actually have a lot in common. I liked the feel of the film (set in the 1960's) and I enjoyed the acting. It's definitely a quirky independent film, but I liked it. I don't think it would be for everyone, though. There's something touching to see these two young people eloping (basically) and trying to be together while all these adults around them find it irrational and unaccepting. The kids don't see what's the problem since they're in love and simply want to be together. It's an unassuming film with its quirkiness, sometimes dry-quirky humor, and excellent pacing. I enjoyed it, but it's definitely not for everyone. Grade: B
And now...I think I'll get back to reading. I've finished 2 books this week! I'm on to my 3rd. This does mean my TV shows have taken quite a hit, especially when I was gone in SoCal for 5 days. I have so many episodes to watch, I think I'll just wait till the winter break to catch up or something...
I must say that working 7 days really isn't as bad as it sounds. Sure, no one in their right mind would work more than 5 if they could help it and, yes, I would rather work 6 over 7, but, mentally, by the time you get to 7-days, it sort of like "Eh. Okay." I find working 6, sometimes, is far worse mentally because it's just one extra day of work and you start to wind down on your 5th, as you normally would, so the 6th day is horrible to get through. When you work 7 (according to myself), you keep yourself going and never let yourself wind down because you know you have TWO extra days to get through. It's why I think I'm here blogging instead of passing out on my bed. Course, I may not be passing out because my body is really messed up with all the open/close repetition I had all week. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, but it still wasn't enjoyable and I feel a little off in my sleep/normal pattern.
Anyway, work itself wasn't too bad. I did feel like I was in the office a lot my last 2 days, but it wasn't all bad. The help that came in was very helpful, but one of our problem customers did cause us problems and I got yelled at in Farsi. That was fun. I had to threatened to call the cops too. Yeah. That was my Wednesday night and my Thursday (day 7) morning was involved with trying to come up with ways to communicate with her. I feel like we had some major breakthroughs, though. Then, on top of all that, today we had furniture after furniture donation and that means I have to price and put them out and we had a call out almost everyday and...*sigh* I'm glad it's finished! My only worry is that I had to deal with today like I was leaving the kids alone for 2 days. Only one Lead is left for the next two days and a Lead from another store. I had to make sure our Lead knew what to do for different situations and how to do some other things. Not to mention I had to show where phone numbers were in case something happened. Crazy, I tell you, crazy! Anyway, glad that's over with...I think. I still have that feeling of leaving the kids alone for 2 days...!
Life goes on...And what do I do to unwind? Catch up on my nail stuff! The indie polishes are making some awfully cute holiday polishes. Going to have to be careful what I want to buy and really recheck what I buy so I don't buy everything! I will say, though, that there are two things that nail polish has really made me aware of this past year: New York Fashion Week and Colors/Causes-Awareness Days. NYFW is especially popular with all the nail brands as they tend to do polishes for them. Zoya, in particular, tends to work with a fashion designer to make custom polishes. Some other brands lend their polishes for the runway and others bring new collections to showcase. Nail polish is a part of the make-up/fashion world! The bloggers really like to do blogger challenges and so on awareness/cause days, they all blog about the issue and do nail art or pick colors that coordinate. November 14th is World Diabetes Day (color for that is blue). November 8th was No H8 (anti-bullying and tolerance and tended towards purple). Of course Oct was Breast Cancer Awareness (lots of pink!). There's also Autism awareness (is that gray?) and lots of others. Who'd of thought nail polish would teach me about these different causes and their days to bring awareness of them.
With that...Movie!
Watched Moonrise Kingdom. It has an interesting adult cast (Bruce Willis, Billy Murray, Tilda Swinton, etc), but it's really about the two young stars. I'm still sort of baffled by the point of the movie, but I'm sure it has something to do about love and innocence...The two young stars end up running away with each other and are in love with each other. The town ends up running around trying to find them (they're 12 years old) and you find out they each have a sort of misunderstood persona about them. Their families and friends don't truly get them and they sometimes tend towards violence. They actually have a lot in common. I liked the feel of the film (set in the 1960's) and I enjoyed the acting. It's definitely a quirky independent film, but I liked it. I don't think it would be for everyone, though. There's something touching to see these two young people eloping (basically) and trying to be together while all these adults around them find it irrational and unaccepting. The kids don't see what's the problem since they're in love and simply want to be together. It's an unassuming film with its quirkiness, sometimes dry-quirky humor, and excellent pacing. I enjoyed it, but it's definitely not for everyone. Grade: B
And now...I think I'll get back to reading. I've finished 2 books this week! I'm on to my 3rd. This does mean my TV shows have taken quite a hit, especially when I was gone in SoCal for 5 days. I have so many episodes to watch, I think I'll just wait till the winter break to catch up or something...
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Welcome back to life...
...Ugh. Not to say that my week back to life has been horrible, but I'm day 2 into my 7-day streak of work and I realized yesterday that those 7-days go: open, close, open, close, open, close, open. NOT fun...Open to close is great, but close to open is not fun. I get 12 hours before I have to be back at work. On top of it, my manager is gone for, basically, 2 weeks so I get to man the store and people are being brought in to help cover open/close shifts and general help since the manager will be gone and one of our leads is gone. So leadership team? We're down half. *sigh* I have since warned all my fellow co-workers that if I'm cranky come Wednesday/Thursday, I have every reason to be! :)
I did forget to mention (not sure how that happened!) that I got an iPad mini! My dear parents (especially my dad) got me the iPad mini and it was decided it's an early Christmas present. Fine with me! I love it. I'm not sure if it's more because I went from an iPad 1 to the iPad mini or if I sincerely just love the size and capabilities of the mini. At any rate, I adore it. I still use my iPad 1 and will probably keep it for now, but I really like my iPad mini. It's especially fantastic how light it is. It doesn't fit in my hand (I've got girly hands...?), but it's easy to read with because it's so light and I love the retina display on it. Granted, those two latter things are probably due to my iPad 1 being, well, old, but I like my iPad too! I didn't ever realize it was slow till I got the mini...I actually might enjoy reading on my iPad instead of my iPhone for once...I can't tell you how many books I have read on my iPhone. I've read quite a few on my iPad (iPad is especially good for PDFs over the iPhone), but I probably read 5xs more books on my iPhone than my iPad for all sorts of reasons. The mini might just be the perfect compromise...
At any rate, I am reading a new book and I stopped reading for a while. I'm not going to reach my book goal I set. I just stopped reading and couldn't get into anything. Actually, before I left on my trip, I had another "didn't want to watch or read anything" week. I seem to have gotten out of that. I also stopped in at a B&N (I miss Borders...) and did a quick run around and wrote down book titles, so we'll see.
With that...On to movies! Two movies that are going to be deemed as "adult" movies, 1 family friendly and 1 sci-fi film. Eclectic week...
Rock of Ages (Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, etc) - It was okay. The music was interesting. The acting was okay. It kind of reminded me of a happier ending version and a little more silly version of Country Strong with Gwyneth Paltrow. I guess Hough wasn't really a protegee type, but it's still the young, cute couple who both want to sing and they adore some big star and, yaddy, yaddy. Boneta's character was probably more the protegee type. It's just a little sillier and a happier ending than Country Strong. I liked it, but it didn't "wow" me or anything. Grade: C
Arthur Christmas (voices: James McAvoy, Hugh Laurie, Bill Nighy, etc) - Technically, this is a 2011 movie. I adore McAvoy. I have seen him in a good portion of his latest films (from Narnia to present) and I've liked him in everything he's been in (even if it's an animation film!). This is his 2nd animation film he voiced and I liked it! I enjoyed the voice cast (I adore Hugh Laurie too) and I liked the film. It was a pleasant film to watch and it touched me. It's fun, exciting, and also speaks to the excitement of Christmas for children. Sure, the kids believe in Santa (Arthur is the current Santa's youngest son), but it was more about remembering the magic of Christmas and not letting the presents and "process" we get into for Christmas ruin the magic of Christmas. The entire story revolves around them trying to deliver a present to a kid before she woke up. I liked it. It was also funny because it spoke about changing traditions. So the letter to Santa in the beginning is all scientific and how presents are now delivered is heavily based on technology (reindeer? Who needs reindeer?). I liked it. I might watch it again in December. I will say that the animation is excellent too. It's not the "realistic animation," but I thought it was good. Grade: A-
Prometheus (Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender) - Going to be up front and say I have not watched any of the Alien movies; therefore, I can't accurately say one way or another how good it is in comparison of the Alien movies. In addition, I feel at a slight disadvantage because I watched it (it's not that scary...I actually found it more "gross" at points and, even then, not that often) and then went, "It wasn't so bad, but what's the fuss?" It felt a little disjointed to me. I wonder if that's how people feel if they watched Star Wars Episodes 1-3 first before 4-6. I mean, after you've watched 4-6, you kind of have a "point" to have 1-3 and you look out for those tidbits of canon to help fill in the gaps. This one felt like it might have been better to have watched Alien first and THEN Prometheus because it was kind of like "Really? That's it. I watched all that for the last 5 minutes to figure out where Alien came from?". So, I feel like I'm missing some canon significance for the movie that I would have been like "Ooh!" if I had watched Alien first. Oh well. At any rate, the movie wasn't bad or anything. The acting was good. I liked Fassbender and Rapace. I knew going in that the team was doomed, but not sure how. I just didn't get the fuss, I guess... Grade: C
Magic Mike (Channing Tatum, Matthew McConaughey, etc) - Okay, you're thinking, "Why in the world did she watch that?" I was curious! To be honest, other than the gyrating and a couple of scenes in thongs, there's not a whole lot to fuss about. You probably see just as much male skin in any other movie. There are a few scenes of bare female breasts, but, really, not as much as people sometimes think. I will say that after watching the dance scenes all I could think was, "Really? There are women and men who like watching the opposite dance like this? It's so boring..." To say the least, I was only "half" watching it as I was nail polish browsing...The story was kind of interesting. Sure, the kid is brought in, but it's really about Tatum and the kid's sister's relationship and how she, ultimately, gets him out of the gig and encourages him to reach his goals another way. The kid, unfortunately, is more-or-less lost to the life. So, yeah. It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, overall. Would I recommend it? Not really. Grade: C
With that...80 movies! Yay! Feasibly...I think the rest of the year's movies will be Skyfall, Hobbit, and Les Mis in theater; I might surprise myself and see Twilight in theater, but Anna Karenina for sure is a rental next year. Seeking a Friend for the End of the World, Moonrise Kingdom, Expendables 2, and Lawless will be rentals. Might be more, but I can't see the movie rentals past the first week of December. Might watch Hope Springs and, if I'm desperate, maybe Stolen (Nicolas Cage...Why do I want to torture myself?!). So that's 7 films for sure. I'm pretty sure I can push it to 10 given I can't see the last 3 weeks of December movie rentals and Twilight might sneak in. I actually think I might watch this Twilight on DVD, which will be the first one I haven't seen in theater and it's kind of fitting since, pretty much, this part of the movie is also the part of the book I never finished (I skimmed, read reviews, etc, so I know what happens). We'll see. :) So...Maybe 90 movies for the year! Not bad, but it also makes me want to try to reach 100 next year and that's just...scary...to think about!
With that...Should go to bed since I have to open tomorrow. Ugh.
I did forget to mention (not sure how that happened!) that I got an iPad mini! My dear parents (especially my dad) got me the iPad mini and it was decided it's an early Christmas present. Fine with me! I love it. I'm not sure if it's more because I went from an iPad 1 to the iPad mini or if I sincerely just love the size and capabilities of the mini. At any rate, I adore it. I still use my iPad 1 and will probably keep it for now, but I really like my iPad mini. It's especially fantastic how light it is. It doesn't fit in my hand (I've got girly hands...?), but it's easy to read with because it's so light and I love the retina display on it. Granted, those two latter things are probably due to my iPad 1 being, well, old, but I like my iPad too! I didn't ever realize it was slow till I got the mini...I actually might enjoy reading on my iPad instead of my iPhone for once...I can't tell you how many books I have read on my iPhone. I've read quite a few on my iPad (iPad is especially good for PDFs over the iPhone), but I probably read 5xs more books on my iPhone than my iPad for all sorts of reasons. The mini might just be the perfect compromise...
At any rate, I am reading a new book and I stopped reading for a while. I'm not going to reach my book goal I set. I just stopped reading and couldn't get into anything. Actually, before I left on my trip, I had another "didn't want to watch or read anything" week. I seem to have gotten out of that. I also stopped in at a B&N (I miss Borders...) and did a quick run around and wrote down book titles, so we'll see.
With that...On to movies! Two movies that are going to be deemed as "adult" movies, 1 family friendly and 1 sci-fi film. Eclectic week...
Rock of Ages (Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, etc) - It was okay. The music was interesting. The acting was okay. It kind of reminded me of a happier ending version and a little more silly version of Country Strong with Gwyneth Paltrow. I guess Hough wasn't really a protegee type, but it's still the young, cute couple who both want to sing and they adore some big star and, yaddy, yaddy. Boneta's character was probably more the protegee type. It's just a little sillier and a happier ending than Country Strong. I liked it, but it didn't "wow" me or anything. Grade: C
Arthur Christmas (voices: James McAvoy, Hugh Laurie, Bill Nighy, etc) - Technically, this is a 2011 movie. I adore McAvoy. I have seen him in a good portion of his latest films (from Narnia to present) and I've liked him in everything he's been in (even if it's an animation film!). This is his 2nd animation film he voiced and I liked it! I enjoyed the voice cast (I adore Hugh Laurie too) and I liked the film. It was a pleasant film to watch and it touched me. It's fun, exciting, and also speaks to the excitement of Christmas for children. Sure, the kids believe in Santa (Arthur is the current Santa's youngest son), but it was more about remembering the magic of Christmas and not letting the presents and "process" we get into for Christmas ruin the magic of Christmas. The entire story revolves around them trying to deliver a present to a kid before she woke up. I liked it. It was also funny because it spoke about changing traditions. So the letter to Santa in the beginning is all scientific and how presents are now delivered is heavily based on technology (reindeer? Who needs reindeer?). I liked it. I might watch it again in December. I will say that the animation is excellent too. It's not the "realistic animation," but I thought it was good. Grade: A-
Prometheus (Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender) - Going to be up front and say I have not watched any of the Alien movies; therefore, I can't accurately say one way or another how good it is in comparison of the Alien movies. In addition, I feel at a slight disadvantage because I watched it (it's not that scary...I actually found it more "gross" at points and, even then, not that often) and then went, "It wasn't so bad, but what's the fuss?" It felt a little disjointed to me. I wonder if that's how people feel if they watched Star Wars Episodes 1-3 first before 4-6. I mean, after you've watched 4-6, you kind of have a "point" to have 1-3 and you look out for those tidbits of canon to help fill in the gaps. This one felt like it might have been better to have watched Alien first and THEN Prometheus because it was kind of like "Really? That's it. I watched all that for the last 5 minutes to figure out where Alien came from?". So, I feel like I'm missing some canon significance for the movie that I would have been like "Ooh!" if I had watched Alien first. Oh well. At any rate, the movie wasn't bad or anything. The acting was good. I liked Fassbender and Rapace. I knew going in that the team was doomed, but not sure how. I just didn't get the fuss, I guess... Grade: C
Magic Mike (Channing Tatum, Matthew McConaughey, etc) - Okay, you're thinking, "Why in the world did she watch that?" I was curious! To be honest, other than the gyrating and a couple of scenes in thongs, there's not a whole lot to fuss about. You probably see just as much male skin in any other movie. There are a few scenes of bare female breasts, but, really, not as much as people sometimes think. I will say that after watching the dance scenes all I could think was, "Really? There are women and men who like watching the opposite dance like this? It's so boring..." To say the least, I was only "half" watching it as I was nail polish browsing...The story was kind of interesting. Sure, the kid is brought in, but it's really about Tatum and the kid's sister's relationship and how she, ultimately, gets him out of the gig and encourages him to reach his goals another way. The kid, unfortunately, is more-or-less lost to the life. So, yeah. It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, overall. Would I recommend it? Not really. Grade: C
With that...80 movies! Yay! Feasibly...I think the rest of the year's movies will be Skyfall, Hobbit, and Les Mis in theater; I might surprise myself and see Twilight in theater, but Anna Karenina for sure is a rental next year. Seeking a Friend for the End of the World, Moonrise Kingdom, Expendables 2, and Lawless will be rentals. Might be more, but I can't see the movie rentals past the first week of December. Might watch Hope Springs and, if I'm desperate, maybe Stolen (Nicolas Cage...Why do I want to torture myself?!). So that's 7 films for sure. I'm pretty sure I can push it to 10 given I can't see the last 3 weeks of December movie rentals and Twilight might sneak in. I actually think I might watch this Twilight on DVD, which will be the first one I haven't seen in theater and it's kind of fitting since, pretty much, this part of the movie is also the part of the book I never finished (I skimmed, read reviews, etc, so I know what happens). We'll see. :) So...Maybe 90 movies for the year! Not bad, but it also makes me want to try to reach 100 next year and that's just...scary...to think about!
With that...Should go to bed since I have to open tomorrow. Ugh.
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
2012 Breeders' Cup
What a fun 5-days off from work! It has been well worth all the money spent to come down and I really enjoyed my 5 days away from work. Do I have to go back?
I'm not even sure where to start. It was great to see the family in San Clemente and see the new house. Seeing family is always good. The weekend highlight (no offense to anyone) was the Breeders' Cup, though. It was excellent weather. I don't think anyone could have asked for better. It was sunny, small breeze, and low 80's. I went with Tori and we got there about an hour later than we wanted because we went to the San Gabriel Nail Supply store that was about 15 minutes away from the track. It was like a time warp in there! It did not feel like we were in there for an hour. Yes, we bought some polish, but we won't discuss how much. I will say that their polishes are cheaper than buying them retail. OPI go for about $8 and they sold them for $5.25. China Glaze were about 50% off (around $3) and some were only $2 (Misa, which are really hard to find). It was a lot of fun. They didn't have all the new collections, but they had a fair amount. It was fun! I've been to one other nail supply place in San Jose and they are fun to shop in! I will say the fumes started getting to me towards the end, but it wasn't too bad. Huge store in San Gabriel!
Arriving at the track that "late" (3 hours after the gate opened at 8am) meant we parked in the boondocks, but it wasn't too bad. We walked in and it was crazy! I didn't realize they had brought in some of the food trucks of LA in (Tastes of LA). They also had some of the horse rescues there and tents of merchandise and a Zenyatta merchandise tent. Not to me to mention 55,123 people were there that day. We didn't buy seat tickets, but it wasn't too bad and there were seats around if we were inclined to sit. It took a little adjusting to figure out where things were and where we were allowed to go. The paddock was closed off, which is a little bit of a bummer, but with all the family members of everyone wanting in to see the horse in the paddock and all the people, I can see why it was blocked off. The paddock was FULL of people. It was PACKED. I usually like watching the horses get saddled and then walking around the paddock, but it was too crazy. So we went to the track to watch the races and try to find a spot while everyone was at the paddock. One nice thing is there's a kind of migration in horse racing of people going to the paddock to see the horses and then walking to the track to watch the race and then back again. It's basically what kills the time between races (about 30 min). Before the race ends, the next horses are entering the saddling area to get saddled. So sometimes you sometimes have to sacrifice what good views or something to get to somewhere else (or just be quick to leave and enter).
Anyway, we missed the 4th race, which was the first BC race, to get orientated, but we did see the National Anthem get sung. I say "see" because the PA system had issues so we didn't get to hear it all. Really? Big event like this and the PA malfunctions...oh well. I found the Zenyatta merchandise tent. So many things I wanted and held back! I got the new t-shirt and a tote bag, but I wanted the new poster (actually 2 new posters), the mini pewter that was sold out online, and the black tote bag, but they were expensive and I knew I wanted some BC souvenirs too. I ended up with 2 BC shirts. I found a really cute one after I found the typical venue one (location, logo, year). I wanted a sweatshirt, but the sweatshirt I wanted they either sold out of or didn't bring to the location. It's available on-line (I was stalking the on-line store before I went), but I don't know if I want to spend the cost for shipping so now I'm debating whether to get it or wait to see if it'll still be available when they do the discount. I think discounts tend to be the final, final stuff and that is usually the really expensive stuff left. We'll see!
After that, we went and watched the 5th race. We watched a few them. We had a good spot near the finish line. Nice thing about Santa Anita is the grandstand blocks the sun so the grandstand and apron are all in the shade, which was nice. The races were good. It's amazing to see that many good horses compete against each other. I've only see one Grade 1 race up to that point and these races were all top notch with top notch horses. It was crazy and especially hard to figure out who you wanted to win. Normally I can pick horses based on pedigree, odds, jockey, owner, and trainer, but these required some studying because they all were accomplished horses so you needed to look at works and past races. Past races isn't just looking to see if they won, but where they placed, by how much, the race distance, who placed or won, the race fractions, etc. It's time consuming! It's also not what I'm used to either. It made me feel like a real handicapper. I didn't so much do any predictions on Sat, but I tried before the day and it was definitely time consuming. I can see why the Daily Racing Form is important to have.
After a few races, we wandered around and then decided to go to the infield. I've never been in an infield of a racetrack before. It's huge! I knew you could bring lawn chairs for the infield, but figured they'd fill up quickly. Not quite the case! There's this huge area in the back of it that looks like the size of a soccer field. It's lower than the rest. Looks like they might have dug it out to be a lake (lots of tracks have lakes in the center), but grassed it in instead. Outside of that, there were areas to sit on the "rim". There was also the main area that had a big playground for kids, 2 fountains, bathroom, betting windows, mini-BC stores, food, and the jumbo screens too. I know some days they even have a petting zoo back there. It's a really nice area! It was like being at a park, but it's in the center of a racetrack. People had blankets, small coolers, chairs, and one had a radio. We wandered far out away from everyone and decided to watch the races from the back. It was hard to hear the PA system, but it wasn't a big deal since I could read/watch the races at home afterwards. We also couldn't see the start for some races or the finishes for any of them, but it was okay. I could see the horses with only the fence and the inside dirt track between me and them. It also was a really nice day so between races we laid in the grass and enjoyed the weather. When a race started, we got up and went to the fence. I really enjoyed it and it was a nice little reprieve from the nuttiness at the grandstand (so many smokers, downside of the the racetrack). You could also hear the horses hooves hitting the ground it was that quiet out there. I tried getting video of it, but the dumb plane and helicopters kept coming by right then. So I heard it the first time and not the 2 next times. Grrrr.
After that, we went back to watch the Classic from the grandstand. Mostly, I wanted to get photos of the buglers, which I hadn't done, yet. That took a little work because I wasn't sure exactly where they'd be so I asked the guy at the head of the Clubhouse entrance. He was nice and said he'd let me go across to see if I could get a photo (I didn't get told I was in the wrong place for once! Yay!). Turns out, as I was waiting over there, I couldn't get actually to the spot I wanted because there was another person to bypass, that they were on the other side to do the call to post so I had to run back around and try to find a spot. Unfortunately, that was around the time Tony Bennett arrived to sing "Best is Yet to Come." So it was PACKED where I was. I missed the very first few seconds of the call to post, but not too much. Usually, the buglers do some other song piece afterwards, but Bennett sang in lieu of that. The song was sort of the "theme song" for this year's Breeders' Cup (it was in all the advertisements and the "slogan"). I watched the last race from my spot (the $5 million Classic) and that's when my camera was running low on battery and I got fuzzy photos. Oh well. I got to see it in person at least!
We left the track afterwards and headed to the mall to get dinner and see a friend while the parking lot cleared out. It was sort of like playing human frogger...Luckily the parking lot was pretty packed with cars trying to leave, but cars were packing out, merging, etc. It was a little scary sometimes! We also had to find a hole in the fence because the parking lots for the mall and the track boarder each other, but there's a fence to delineate between the two (also probably to keep track people from parking at the mall). We found a hole and grabbed dinner with one of my Leaky Cauldron friends. It was fun to chit chat and nice to eat and relax. I got a root beer float, which was nice! After that, we headed back down to San Diego for shopping fun and relaxation!
I took lots of photos, but had certain things I wanted photos of. I got them all! Some are better photos than others, though. LoL My camera died at the very last race and I was rushing to get photos so I wasn't making sure they were focused. Oops. Oh well. I did get my normal stuff: Paddock, track view, bugler(s), horses running (start, finish), carriage horses, and heading to the track/parading. For this day...In particular, I got the Zenyatta statue! Yay! Also got the Breeders Cup statue too.
Tori and I want to go again next year! We want to buy seats, dress up, and wear fun hats. There's also the possibility if we wanted, that we could just go to the infield with lawn chairs (bring some snacks/drinks too!). I tell you, it was really relaxing being out there. It's a whole other experience and just as fun. The apron, I didn't realize, also was allowed chairs, which are probably some of the better seats to have. You can bring a chair and sit there and you're super close to the track. For some reason I thought the apron wasn't allowed chairs. It would require you to arrive as early as possible to get an apron seat, but the infield has lots of space. I definitely would sit near the back, though, because the hedges for the home stretch sort of block the view. There are no hedges in the back stretch to block the view.
At any rate, it was a lot of fun!
Here are all my photos: 2012 Breeders' Cup Photos/Videos
There are just a couple of videos. My nails for the BC are also there at the end.
I'll update with a few movies later in the week. Returning to work today (Tues) was okay. I had to clean-up a few places, but apparently it was far worse while I was gone and it really wasn't too bad. We were also short staffed a lot the past week. One of my co-workers has pneumonia and another got sick. Ugh! Oh well. I work 2 days, take a day off, and then work 7 days and start back on a normal week (2 days off and then 5 days). My vacation will well make-up for the 7 days and also temporary manager status while my manager is off at another store for a week and a lead gone AND temp leads helping out. Oh yeah, I need to remember my happy vacation to get me through the next 2 weeks!
With that...I'm off!
I'm not even sure where to start. It was great to see the family in San Clemente and see the new house. Seeing family is always good. The weekend highlight (no offense to anyone) was the Breeders' Cup, though. It was excellent weather. I don't think anyone could have asked for better. It was sunny, small breeze, and low 80's. I went with Tori and we got there about an hour later than we wanted because we went to the San Gabriel Nail Supply store that was about 15 minutes away from the track. It was like a time warp in there! It did not feel like we were in there for an hour. Yes, we bought some polish, but we won't discuss how much. I will say that their polishes are cheaper than buying them retail. OPI go for about $8 and they sold them for $5.25. China Glaze were about 50% off (around $3) and some were only $2 (Misa, which are really hard to find). It was a lot of fun. They didn't have all the new collections, but they had a fair amount. It was fun! I've been to one other nail supply place in San Jose and they are fun to shop in! I will say the fumes started getting to me towards the end, but it wasn't too bad. Huge store in San Gabriel!
Arriving at the track that "late" (3 hours after the gate opened at 8am) meant we parked in the boondocks, but it wasn't too bad. We walked in and it was crazy! I didn't realize they had brought in some of the food trucks of LA in (Tastes of LA). They also had some of the horse rescues there and tents of merchandise and a Zenyatta merchandise tent. Not to me to mention 55,123 people were there that day. We didn't buy seat tickets, but it wasn't too bad and there were seats around if we were inclined to sit. It took a little adjusting to figure out where things were and where we were allowed to go. The paddock was closed off, which is a little bit of a bummer, but with all the family members of everyone wanting in to see the horse in the paddock and all the people, I can see why it was blocked off. The paddock was FULL of people. It was PACKED. I usually like watching the horses get saddled and then walking around the paddock, but it was too crazy. So we went to the track to watch the races and try to find a spot while everyone was at the paddock. One nice thing is there's a kind of migration in horse racing of people going to the paddock to see the horses and then walking to the track to watch the race and then back again. It's basically what kills the time between races (about 30 min). Before the race ends, the next horses are entering the saddling area to get saddled. So sometimes you sometimes have to sacrifice what good views or something to get to somewhere else (or just be quick to leave and enter).
Anyway, we missed the 4th race, which was the first BC race, to get orientated, but we did see the National Anthem get sung. I say "see" because the PA system had issues so we didn't get to hear it all. Really? Big event like this and the PA malfunctions...oh well. I found the Zenyatta merchandise tent. So many things I wanted and held back! I got the new t-shirt and a tote bag, but I wanted the new poster (actually 2 new posters), the mini pewter that was sold out online, and the black tote bag, but they were expensive and I knew I wanted some BC souvenirs too. I ended up with 2 BC shirts. I found a really cute one after I found the typical venue one (location, logo, year). I wanted a sweatshirt, but the sweatshirt I wanted they either sold out of or didn't bring to the location. It's available on-line (I was stalking the on-line store before I went), but I don't know if I want to spend the cost for shipping so now I'm debating whether to get it or wait to see if it'll still be available when they do the discount. I think discounts tend to be the final, final stuff and that is usually the really expensive stuff left. We'll see!
After that, we went and watched the 5th race. We watched a few them. We had a good spot near the finish line. Nice thing about Santa Anita is the grandstand blocks the sun so the grandstand and apron are all in the shade, which was nice. The races were good. It's amazing to see that many good horses compete against each other. I've only see one Grade 1 race up to that point and these races were all top notch with top notch horses. It was crazy and especially hard to figure out who you wanted to win. Normally I can pick horses based on pedigree, odds, jockey, owner, and trainer, but these required some studying because they all were accomplished horses so you needed to look at works and past races. Past races isn't just looking to see if they won, but where they placed, by how much, the race distance, who placed or won, the race fractions, etc. It's time consuming! It's also not what I'm used to either. It made me feel like a real handicapper. I didn't so much do any predictions on Sat, but I tried before the day and it was definitely time consuming. I can see why the Daily Racing Form is important to have.
After a few races, we wandered around and then decided to go to the infield. I've never been in an infield of a racetrack before. It's huge! I knew you could bring lawn chairs for the infield, but figured they'd fill up quickly. Not quite the case! There's this huge area in the back of it that looks like the size of a soccer field. It's lower than the rest. Looks like they might have dug it out to be a lake (lots of tracks have lakes in the center), but grassed it in instead. Outside of that, there were areas to sit on the "rim". There was also the main area that had a big playground for kids, 2 fountains, bathroom, betting windows, mini-BC stores, food, and the jumbo screens too. I know some days they even have a petting zoo back there. It's a really nice area! It was like being at a park, but it's in the center of a racetrack. People had blankets, small coolers, chairs, and one had a radio. We wandered far out away from everyone and decided to watch the races from the back. It was hard to hear the PA system, but it wasn't a big deal since I could read/watch the races at home afterwards. We also couldn't see the start for some races or the finishes for any of them, but it was okay. I could see the horses with only the fence and the inside dirt track between me and them. It also was a really nice day so between races we laid in the grass and enjoyed the weather. When a race started, we got up and went to the fence. I really enjoyed it and it was a nice little reprieve from the nuttiness at the grandstand (so many smokers, downside of the the racetrack). You could also hear the horses hooves hitting the ground it was that quiet out there. I tried getting video of it, but the dumb plane and helicopters kept coming by right then. So I heard it the first time and not the 2 next times. Grrrr.
After that, we went back to watch the Classic from the grandstand. Mostly, I wanted to get photos of the buglers, which I hadn't done, yet. That took a little work because I wasn't sure exactly where they'd be so I asked the guy at the head of the Clubhouse entrance. He was nice and said he'd let me go across to see if I could get a photo (I didn't get told I was in the wrong place for once! Yay!). Turns out, as I was waiting over there, I couldn't get actually to the spot I wanted because there was another person to bypass, that they were on the other side to do the call to post so I had to run back around and try to find a spot. Unfortunately, that was around the time Tony Bennett arrived to sing "Best is Yet to Come." So it was PACKED where I was. I missed the very first few seconds of the call to post, but not too much. Usually, the buglers do some other song piece afterwards, but Bennett sang in lieu of that. The song was sort of the "theme song" for this year's Breeders' Cup (it was in all the advertisements and the "slogan"). I watched the last race from my spot (the $5 million Classic) and that's when my camera was running low on battery and I got fuzzy photos. Oh well. I got to see it in person at least!
We left the track afterwards and headed to the mall to get dinner and see a friend while the parking lot cleared out. It was sort of like playing human frogger...Luckily the parking lot was pretty packed with cars trying to leave, but cars were packing out, merging, etc. It was a little scary sometimes! We also had to find a hole in the fence because the parking lots for the mall and the track boarder each other, but there's a fence to delineate between the two (also probably to keep track people from parking at the mall). We found a hole and grabbed dinner with one of my Leaky Cauldron friends. It was fun to chit chat and nice to eat and relax. I got a root beer float, which was nice! After that, we headed back down to San Diego for shopping fun and relaxation!
I took lots of photos, but had certain things I wanted photos of. I got them all! Some are better photos than others, though. LoL My camera died at the very last race and I was rushing to get photos so I wasn't making sure they were focused. Oops. Oh well. I did get my normal stuff: Paddock, track view, bugler(s), horses running (start, finish), carriage horses, and heading to the track/parading. For this day...In particular, I got the Zenyatta statue! Yay! Also got the Breeders Cup statue too.
Tori and I want to go again next year! We want to buy seats, dress up, and wear fun hats. There's also the possibility if we wanted, that we could just go to the infield with lawn chairs (bring some snacks/drinks too!). I tell you, it was really relaxing being out there. It's a whole other experience and just as fun. The apron, I didn't realize, also was allowed chairs, which are probably some of the better seats to have. You can bring a chair and sit there and you're super close to the track. For some reason I thought the apron wasn't allowed chairs. It would require you to arrive as early as possible to get an apron seat, but the infield has lots of space. I definitely would sit near the back, though, because the hedges for the home stretch sort of block the view. There are no hedges in the back stretch to block the view.
At any rate, it was a lot of fun!
Here are all my photos: 2012 Breeders' Cup Photos/Videos
There are just a couple of videos. My nails for the BC are also there at the end.
I'll update with a few movies later in the week. Returning to work today (Tues) was okay. I had to clean-up a few places, but apparently it was far worse while I was gone and it really wasn't too bad. We were also short staffed a lot the past week. One of my co-workers has pneumonia and another got sick. Ugh! Oh well. I work 2 days, take a day off, and then work 7 days and start back on a normal week (2 days off and then 5 days). My vacation will well make-up for the 7 days and also temporary manager status while my manager is off at another store for a week and a lead gone AND temp leads helping out. Oh yeah, I need to remember my happy vacation to get me through the next 2 weeks!
With that...I'm off!
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