Plateaus: You don't always want them flat

The joys of weight plateaus! I'm apparently going to chronicle my weight loss... :P Mini-update at the end.

I've been steadily losing around 2 lbs a week since I started calorie counting. I knew it would get harder to lose weight as I started to lose weight because there's less, well, mass, to help fuel the effort. Luckily, I had lost 25 lbs without any plateaus or any problems. 25 lbs in 3 months isn't bad!

Now fast forward to the past 2 weeks. Two weeks of not losing weight does not always signify a plateau, but after one has been steadily losing weight, not losing any for a week is a little weird. Of course, then starts the constant weigh-ins and the semi-doubt that something is wrong. Unfortunately for me, it was even more baffling because I've been maintaining my calorie count (1,200 calories) and I was still exercising to get to that calorie count. I wasn't snacking and I was eating pretty well. WHY WASN'T I LOSING WEIGHT?! It's not like my calorie count could be any less!

For a while, Chris always scolds at me, "It's better to eat more and exercise than to eat less." I know the reasoning behind that because you don't want your body to go into starvation mode, which means your body won't lose weight well because it's trying to store it. It can also be harmful for you as your body will start to break down muscles and lower bodily functions to preserve energy. But I'm careful to not eat less than 1,150 calories. It's about 50 calories less than what I should be at, but if you're not hungry, why eat? I usually end up eating candy instead to make up calories and it was pretty rare I was below 1,200.

I will say, with my FitBit, it says I'm walking and moving several HUNDRED more calories than I'm even adding in when I exercise. Because I had been losing weight before the FitBit and I'm not sure how "accurate" the FitBit is, I've mostly ignored the extra exercise calories burned the FitBit gives me. It also varies depending on how active I've been in a day. So, it's not something I use reliably and it's not something I count into my daily calories intake or outtake.

So, anyway, I was eating less and I wasn't as hungry. I was actually doing that "on my own" and wasn't because of an eating pattern or anything. I had gotten to the point where it was hard to eat more than 1,300 calories because I wasn't used to it and it felt "hard" to eat! I was eating, but eating when your body is saying it's not hungry is seriously hard to do. I was also eating breakfast regularly, which makes a difference in how full I feel the rest of the day. I still can't eat right away, but I try to eat within an hour to an hour-and-a-half of waking up.

Where does this leave me with my plateau? Here are the possibilities of why I plateaued:

1) I had gone into starvation mode.
2) I was building muscle more than I was losing fat.
3) I was retaining water (high sodium foods (i.e., beef sticks...yummy...), that-time-of-month, not drinking enough fluids, etc)

What's my conclusion on why? Maybe a little of all 3? I will say, the best thing out of the plateau, that I broke the past few days (phew!), is my starvation mode possibility. I never took into account the FitBit calories and I'm still not, but to help myself, semi-account for the FitBit, and make my bodily functions feel more "secure" that it IS getting food, I've decided my minimum calorie intake is 1,400 calories. This does 2 things by making me eat and exercise more. I'm also trying to stop my calorie count between 1,200 and 1,250. This will try and make it so I don't go below 1,200 anymore. Past few days, it's been more like 1,200-1,230. I was also getting lazy exercising when I was eating so close to 1,200 calories. I was walking on the elliptical a lot and kind of half moving, which isn't helpful. So I'm back to actually jogging and trying to "put" myself into my exercise now. Plus, I'm pretty sure holding my cell phone in my hand while on the elliptical has caused poor posture and is why the spot between my shoulder blades is SERIOUSLY messed up (never good when your chiropractor thinks you really did mess it up and he has to adjust the same spot 3 times in one visit...).

So, I'm thinking it was a combination of things for my plateau, but I'm proud I didn't lose all hope. Losing weight isn't easy for me. I was really bummed and frustrated for a week. More exercise doesn't make me happy (it's such a pain!), but it'll be good for me. I have noticed with eating more that my stomach must have shrunk because it feels super "full" now than it did before by the time dinner comes around. 

There was another way I could get my body jump started again. I could do an alternating schedule of 2-3 days of the minimum calories (1,200) and one day of something high like 1,600 calories. It shocks your system and lets it know it's getting food so it'll start dropping the weight. In other words, every few days of a high count makes it so it doesn't get into a pattern that it'll always receive less. It's something I might consider if I plateau again, but the roller coaster is something that's harder for me to follow since this still doesn't come instinctively. Mostly, I'm learning that losing weight is about NOT getting into a pattern! You get lazy and your body starts to anticipate it. Who'd of thunk?

Anyway, personal update! Well, sort of. As I've posted before (several times), I've been cooking more. My biggest problem has been breakfasts. I function better with a breakfast I've found. Who'd of thought? The person who is STILL not a morning person and never ate breakfast, now almost depends on a breakfast in the morning? Yeah. Me neither. Starting the calorie counting, I did the flavored yogurt (I did plain fat free Greek with a tablespoon or 2 of jelly mixed in) and granola. It kept me full for a while, but I got tired of it pretty quickly. Round 2 was no breakfast at all. Round 3 was homemade breakfast casseroles that were not particularly healthy, but they were tasty! Round 4 were green smoothies (of all sorts of varieties: kale, spinach, pineapple, banana, strawberry, cucumber, zucchini, almond butter, almond milk, apple, etc). Now, Round 5 is oatmeal!

Not just any oatmeal. I did do a warm apple cinnamon oatmeal in the crockpot and would reheat it in the morning, but...I got into overnight oats! Seriously, I thought it would be gross because it looks like cold oat mush and everyone eats oatmeal warm, right? Well, I took a chance and made a banana peanut butter one and it was delicious! Now I want to eat it all the time. Figures. :) It's easy to make and tastes good. Best thing? I can make it the night before and throw it into my lunch bag for work. Actually, every breakfast thing I ate/made has always been something I can pack for work the night before (that hating mornings thing and all :P ). It also stores in the refrigerator for a couple of days so I make 2-3 servings (~1 cup) at once. Hopefully I can get a few weeks out of this regimen and then I think I'll go back to the smoothies again.

Here's the recipe I started with...

Peanut Butter and Banana Overnight Oats from Domesticate Me (link here)

Yield: 2 servings

Ingredients

• 1 large ripe banana, mashed (about ½ cup)
• ¼ cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 cup gluten-free rolled oats
• 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
• 1 tablespoon chia seeds (optional)
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon light agave or honey (You may use more if you like sweeter oatmeal. Duh.)
Optional Toppings:
• Sliced Bananas
• Drizzle of Agave, Maple Syrup or Honey
• Cinnamon
• Dark chocolate shavings or chips
• Coconut shavings

Instructions

1. In a medium bowl, mash your banana with a fork.
2. Add the remaining ingredients to the bowl and mix until well combined.
3. Pour the mixture into two airtight containers and refrigerate for at least 3 hours or overnight.
4. When ready to eat, give the oats a good stir, add toppings of your choice, and dig in! 

I omit the chia seeds, use honey, and don't put any toppings on. I just mix it, leave it, stir it, eat it. So yummy! Making a new one that's almond butter, banana, diced apples, and QUICK cooking oats instead of rolled oats. Just want to see what the texture and taste difference between the quick cooking and rolled oats will be like. They're interchangeable (read all about the differences between steel, rolled, and quick cooking oats), but they will end up with a different texture. So, I'm going to experiment and see. I have a TON of quick cooking oats right now and ran out of rolled oats. Not that oats really go bad if stored properly, but it would be nice to use them. So, hoping it tastes fine or I'm going to start making a lot of oatmeal cookies and granola bars. :P

Now, a REAL personal update. The Breeders' Cup is in 1.5 months! Yes! It should be a really good one this year. It's unfortunate the Breeders' Cup Classic winner from last year isn't going to be there (he was injured), but there should be a lot of other great horses. Should be a great day! So, I'm excited. I got my dress from Goodwill that goes with my green and purple California Chrome hat and I've got shoes and a sweater that already go with it. So, I'm set on the outfit department. I just need to figure out my hair. I cut it and that hat is different than my last one so I need to look at hair styles. I might be lazy and just do a half-up and half-down look. It's quick, easy, will fit with the hat, etc.

Work has been okay. Some changes have been happening. I don't think I mentioned this, but we have a new boss for our area. So there has been that change and then we also have new trainees that work with us through a County program. So, it's been interesting, but nothing bad. On top of it all, Halloween! We've already set everything up for Halloween. It's been crazy, but the best Halloween set-up we've had since we've opened so that's been nice. The anxiety it induced the last 2 years is definitely not around this time so it's been more enjoyable.

Movies, I'm still watching them. At this rate, I might as well just do a massive recap at the end of the year that encompasses everything. :P I've been so bad this year! Then again, I feel like I have less time to actually blog too. Working, cooking dinner, prepping dinners, exercising, taking care of the pets, painting my nails...they all take up most of my evenings! I get my days off and they're planned solidly. Recent favorite...I surprisingly really liked Divergent. I was surprised. Perhaps it's because my expectations were low for it since I didn't like the book (never read past #1), but I liked the movie. I'd watch the 2nd one...on DVD... :P My resounding endorsement there! It's a solid movie, though. It's not as good as Hunger Games, but it pleasantly passed the time. Four is way too old compared to the book. The end is changed a bit too, but they always do that. So, it has its issues, but it wasn't terrible. Haven't seen a movie in theater in a while now. I think Guardians of the Galaxy was the last one I saw and I liked it. It was good. Not the best Marvel, but I'm really happy it's done as well as it has and I might buy it on DVD (it was that good). Plus...BABY GROOT! :P Noah is shaping up to be the worst movie of the year...

With that, I can't think of anything else going on so I think I'll leave it here and say hopefully I'll post again and it won't be about weight, exercise, or cooking. ;)

My "Healthy" Year, Thus Far

A little bit of a recap of a previous post, but some updates too on my home cooking and calorie counting.

Funny how I originally said I had no "goals" for this year, except maybe get my license. Yeah, it's August and nothing has progressed on the license front; however, I HAVE gotten myself "healthy" this year. Not sure what really spurred me on. For a month or so end of last year I had started to cook and I enjoyed it (mostly to somewhat), but then I injured my back trying to exercise (yay!) so then I stopped on all fronts.

Then my sis-in-law started to do Once a Month Meals earlier this year, which got the idea into my head that I could do something like that once a week. I have a spreadsheet that I use to get myself organized (I don't pay for OAMM) for menus and ingredients and 26 weeks later (started end of February), I am still doing the once-a-week meals thing!

Making meals once a week helps on three fronts: Space, eating out, and being healthy. I don't have a lot of space, so doing it once a week allows me to be able to freeze meals, but also not completely eliminate my entire freezer space. I do sometimes still struggle with space (if I start freezing more than 8 days worth of meals, space gets tight), but I can do 5 meals a week with no problems. It's also helped me cut down on eating out. Not only were we eating out for dinner, but I was also eating out for lunch. That's a lot of wasted money on fast food or restaurants. In addition, eating out that often isn't good for you and I don't control my portions well when I eat out. I hadn't gained a lot of weight eating out because I was walking to work and I'm fairly active at work, but it definitely wasn't helping me lose any either.

Not that cooking has really made me lose weight, but it has made me healthier and helped my digestive track. I don't make EVERYTHING from scratch (still use a lot of pre-made chicken stock, tomatoes, and cream-of soup), but it's definitely better than buying frozen meals (also a prior staple of dinners) or can processed foods (mm...Dinty Moore stews...so unhealthy, but so tasty). I enjoy the tastes of homemade meals more and I don't get TIRED of eating the same frozen meals or the same fast food. It has been a work in progress to make sure I don't overwhelm my cooking time. I basically spend half a day that I'm off to cook, which isn't always something I want to do, but it's a necessity like doing my laundry. Not fun, but I need to do it. So I've learned to try and balance my time off because I find making the home meals I have enough leftovers for the next day and I always take leftovers for lunch (I'll occasionally still eat a frozen thing for lunch if we've run out) and we're feeding 3 people nightly and still having leftovers. My digestive track is SO much happier with me and since I'm lactose intolerant, that's saying something. I take a supplement to help me when I eat dairy, but sometimes, if I was really off kilter, the pills wouldn't help as they should. Now, I can eat small amounts of dairy without the supplement and not have a problem at all because my digestive track is happy with me.

Not sure what spurred it on, but almost 3 months ago I decided to download MyFitness Pal (friend recommended it) and start calorie counting. The first week was a bit of a struggle, but I quickly adapted to it. It's been amazing for me. It got me to exercise regularly, cut down my sugar intake (a constant struggle of mine since I've got a sweet tooth) and snacking, and...*drum roll*...I've lost 22 lbs in 80 days! I can't say it's always easy calorie counting, but it hasn't been as hard as I thought either.

Cutting the sugar down was really hard in the beginning and I go up and down in my urges to eat it, but not eating a lot of sugar has helped my teeth and myself. I was noticing for a bit that my teeth were starting to hurt from eating all the sour stuff I was eating. Eating that much candy isn't good for you in general too. I would sit down and eat a packet of Skittles in one night. Now, I won't open a packet of Skittles unless I know I can eat a portion of it and save the rest. I'll eat it in quarters or halves. Rips, one of my favorite candy, I can now eat in small portions (those bags used to be gone in 2 days).

The other struggle I've been trying to iron out is the snacking. I used to eat a lot of candy, but the snacking was pretty bad too. I mean, I was making home made meals, which you think would have made me lose weight on my own, but it wasn't. It's because of the candy and I was snacking a lot on junk food. The calorie counting has helped me cut down on junk food a LOT. I now think if I REALLY want to eat those chips or not. Most times I don't bother buying chips now because I know it'll take me too long to eat them before they go stale. :P

Calorie counting has also made me drink more water. I have never been a big soda drinker, but I am a fruit juice drinker. There are a lot of calories in fruit drinks! For the most part, I treat them like empty calories. I'm thirsty? Go drink water. No calories. :) I still don't like the taste of water (ugh), but I almost don't drink anything else now (maybe once a week I'll drink a fruit juice now). I will say, I haven't gotten out of the habit of ordering a drink at restaurants. I'll still instinctively order a soda or fruit juice at a restaurant. It's really the only time I used to regularly get soda was at a restaurant. I'm still trying to break that habit and getting better, but I don't eat out a lot anymore so it's harder to break.

The nice thing about calorie counting is it's not "dieting." I'm not telling myself I can't eat something or I have to eat LESS of something, it's simply giving me a choice of "Do I really want to consume those calories so I have less left to eat something else?" A lot of dieting and weight loss is psychological and calorie counting has allowed me to keep my "freedom" in what I eat, but also lose weight. It's also allowed me to see how much exercising I need to do. I don't exercise the same amount each day. I try to always exercise enough to get me to or below my calorie goal, but some days I had a better calorie intake day so I don't need to exercise as much or I feel like exercising so I'll exercise more. My FitBit Flex has also helped me exercise. Chris has been a dear by supporting my exercising in the ways he can (buying me new workout clothes, the FitBit, a yoga mat, etc). I thought the FitBit was overpriced and we both do, but we're techie people and he wanted to get it for me to help me out. I don't always try to make the 10,000 step goal that's defaulted, but I will exercise more if I'm close. So it's helped with that too.

I will say, breakfast has been my biggest hurdle with calorie counting and going on my vacation and coming back was also extremely difficult. I'm not a breakfast morning person. When I initially started this, I was doing the Greek yogurt with jam and granola mixed in. It was working, but I eventually got tired of eating it and got to a point where I didn't need breakfast anymore. I was used to the lower calorie intake and could skip breakfast and go to a morning snack (okay, practically pre-lunch since my snack would be at 11:30pm and lunch would be at 2:30pm - let's not discuss that I take my lunch later than I'm legally supposed to).

Then I went on my trip, didn't go crazy on my eating, but wasn't watching it as closely as I normally do (I was calorie counting, but not overly concerned). I was also eating when I wanted to and got out of my rhythm. I gained less than a pound on my trip, which wasn't too bad. Coming back home, though, and trying to get back into a rhythm was HARD. I felt like I was nonstop hungry. It also didn't help that I came back to close twice in a row and worked 8 days in a row. It's been 3 weeks since I got back and I was gone for 6 days. It took me over 2 weeks to get back to a schedule of eating where I don't feel like I'm starving all day all the time. I also lost that pound and got back onto my losing 2 pounds a week schedule. It took time and effort, but I'm proud of myself I did it!

As for breakfast, coming back from my trip, I learned to start eating something for breakfast again. I just couldn't do it and it was making me want to snack badly at work. I started with eggs in the morning and then made a yummy breakfast casserole. The casserole wasn't necessarily healthy, but it was tasty! Recently, though, the past week, I decided to start making smoothies and turned them green. I'm still not into the whole extra-green smoothie thing so I only add spinach or kale to mine, but it helps. So the smoothie is what I'm drinking for breakfast. Mine comprise of a green (kale or spinach), a handful or less of pineapple chunks (helps with Vitamin C to counteract the oxalic acid in spinach and kale), tablespoon or two of almond butter, a banana, and vanilla almond milk. Seriously, 20oz or so of the stuff and it keeps me going almost all day. It's keeps me fuller much better than anything else I was eating for breakfast, which means anything else I eat all day satisfies me more. It's also nice because it's liquid and I'm more easily able to consume it in the morning. Sometimes trying to eat in the morning wasn't appetizing to me. I'm hoping to increase my greens in it, but it's something I'll have to build up to. I also need to figure out a better way to get the kale in. Kale doesn't shred as nicely as spinach does so it tends to stay a little "chunkier," which is kind of gross after you drink it because I feel like I get kale stuck in my teeth. I might start cooking it a little first, letting it cool, and then blending it. Cooked kale and spinach are much healthier for you than having it raw. One of the few vegetables that eating it cooked is better.

My next goal is to try and get back into my FitnessBlender workout. I used to do it every other day, but then I started to read more and now I read on my elliptical or watch a movie on the elliptical. I can't do either if I do the FitnessBlender workout! I do want to start again, though, because it gets me more flexible and gives me a better full body workout. The elliptical is mostly the legs and some arm. I also got out of the habit of regularly stretching. I used to do it and it helped my back out a lot, but then I got lazy when it got better. Now that I'm not doing it and went back in to the chiropractor, my back is hurting again and I'm not as flexible. So, those are my two immediate goals other than getting to my weight goal. 

At any rate, it's definitely the year of "healthy" for me. I need to lose another 38 lbs to reach my ideal weight. Once I hit it or get within 5 lbs, I'll switch to strength training and maintenance instead of all the cardio I've been doing. It also means I'll be able to increase my calorie in take. Should be interesting...I know for a fact I'll need to calorie count for a long, long while to make sure I don't slip into bad habits, but, at the rate I'm going, I should make my goal by the end of January next year! Not too bad. I do think I'll throw myself a "party" of sorts for when I break losing 30 pounds. :) I need to reward myself somehow, right?! Might be a nail polish buy instead of food...LoL

Anyway, I'll do a general update and movie update later. I know I've been saying I'll update on my movies, but with the cooking and exercising, my time hasn't been spent on the computer much lately. Also, I'm back to regularly reading so I'm definitely not on my computer much. I guess it's better for me!

Sugar...I want sugar!

Wow, where does the time go? I didn't realize two months had passed since my last blog.

I suffered the loss of California Chrome's bid for the Triple Crown this year. I've now seen 6 TC near misses in 12 years. SIX! Actually, it's more than six...Those 6 are the ones who completed the Kentucky/Derby duo...There have been a few Preakness/Belmont duos (e.g., Afleet Alex). So, in actuality, it's more than 6, but you get the point...it's been a lot! Of all those, California Chrome has been the only horse that I seriously got excited to win. Not to say I wasn't excited for any of the previous 5 horses to win, but it wasn't the same emotional level and excitement. I think a lot of it had to do with the fact he's a Cal-bred horse and Cal-breds aren't the cream of the crop. To be fair, there's a whole "stigma" sometimes from the East Coast towards the West Coast. So, I get overly excited when West Coast horses make a huge impact. Not to say that the West Coast never produces good horses, there have been a lot of them, but you know...rivalry? At any rate, it was hard seeing him lose, but it's time to move on! They're resting him for about 2 weeks for his foot injury he sustained in the race and then will send him to the ranch he was born at to run in a pasture for 6-ish weeks. It'll be a nice rest for him.

I was sort of hoping he'd be able run in the Travers at the end of August, but if they're resting him for 2 months, he won't be ready for the Travers. The Travers is a major 3YO race in the summer. At this point, I'm just hoping Chrome wins 3YO Honors at the end of the year. If Tonalist has a good rest of the year and Chrome doesn't regain form, it's possible he'll lose 3YO Honors to Tonalist. On the flipside, if they both meet in the Breeders' Cup Classic, and one prevails over the other...whoever is ahead might win 3YO Honors too. So...we'll see! I'm excited to go to the Breeders' Cup November 1st because Chrome might be there! I need to figure out what I'm wearing still and if he does go, I might need to make a sign! I'm really glad we have Clubhouse seats now because I can stand right at the rail (along with the masses of other people) when the horses walk out to the track and see him. So, yup, those seat prices will be worth it. :)

In other TC news...There are grumblings about moving the spacing of the Triple Crown races. To be fair, they haven't been the 2 weeks between Kentucky Derby and Preakness and 3 weeks between Preakness and Belmont for all of time. This recent set-up has been the case since the late 60's, I think, but it's NEVER been as far spaced as what some people want it to be (4 weeks in between each race). This is a LONG time. It's been interesting to read the news article comments because people come up with interesting ideas, responses, and facts. I'm in the camp not to respace the races, but I can see the other arguments too. It's supposed to be hard, but our modern day horses and races are not set-up to what they were back in the 70's. At the same time, I think spacing them out longer might make it a little easier, but the UK proves that point wrong since they have a month in between each of their Triple Crown races and haven't seen a TC winner since 1970...? 1969...? Just a little longer than us, but none-the-less longer. So...I don't know. Personally, I think it's silly to think the other races will move their races (well, mostly, that the Belmont will move its race; the Kentucky Derby can stay where it is with no impact on the others). The race set-up is the best for them. If they move them, also, the Haskell at the end of July will be bumping into only 3 weeks away from the Belmont. So, who knows. We'll see if things change. Personally, the point is for it to be hard and we have history to compare. If you change it, then it just gets confusing and I think we'll see a TC winner soon.

So, few days before the Belmont, I decided to calorie count and exercise daily. I've been off-and-on exercising for the past few years, but nothing regularly. I'd get on a kick for about a month or few weeks and then stop. My last kick was when I injured my back. Since getting my back mostly figured out, I think I've been gun-shy to start up again. Let's face it, injury to the same part of my back during two major exercise stints? Yeah, I'm going to be hesitant about trying again. For the record, I was doing two different exercise routines when I hurt my back. Anyway, my Manager has been on a diet since February (restrictive diet) to help his liver and has lost a good amount of weight since then. On top of it, since I'm not eating fast food often (maybe once every few weeks) and cooking at home, I haven't been really losing weight. Mostly, I think it's because my sugar consumption hasn't decreased at all. Sure, I've stopped eating bagels and donuts the end of last year, but still. I had dropped like a couple of pounds, but I'd fluctuate around my weight. So, in actuality, I wasn't losing anything. I wasn't gaining anything either, but...it's time.

So, I downloaded MyFitnessPal onto my phone to count my calories. The nice thing about it is it gives me a a calorie count to aim for on a daily basis to help loose weight. It's not perfect calorie counting, but at least it's a ballpark and it makes me think about what I'm eating. I'm not dieting because I'm not restricting what I eat or how much I eat, but I am conscious of WHAT I eat and  how much of it I eat. Honestly, that's what I really needed. It's amazing how much I would forget I had eaten and, to top it off, most of the things I would forget would be "empty calories." So, calorie counting it is and it's helping.

Wednesday, I ate a donut. Oh man, it was glorious. I haven't eaten a donut in months. So, I ate the donut, but didn't eat other things instead. Unfortunately, the thing I gave up (happened to be the same calorie count) was something that was substantial I normally ate on my break. The difference in food choices was amazing. I was STARVING by the end of work (even with lunch), whereas most times I'm fine. The donut was glorious to eat, but it was empty calories, which made me hungry by the end of my day. Normally, I'd have eaten both items and not been hungry, but also not "noticed" the donut calories at all. With the calorie counting, I noticed the empty calories, which was one of the first times I really went, "Ohh...now I know what everyone means by "empty calories.""

Calorie counting has also gotten my sugar consumption down. I used to eat a lot of candy, but now I'm restricting myself to a fruit roll up here-and-there. They're only 50 calories, but they're fruity and semi-chewy. Since they're also in a single package, I can consume an entire package and not feel guilty! Seriously, there's no "portion control" when it comes to a package of Starburst or Skittles... :) I know I'll get to a point that I can portion control or have a splurge day, but it's good that I don't do it now. If anything, it's like an addiction to candy and it's best I go cold turkey. So, other than the candy, I really haven't craved anything I've cut out because it's not that I'm telling myself I CAN'T eat it. I'm weighing the pros and cons of it so it's my choice. Thankfully, I've never been a big soda drinker so I don't miss that at all. I've also been, on a fluke, weaning myself off fruit drinks so the transition to more water a day hasn't been too bad. I drink fruit juice like once a day now instead of all day.

Calorie counting is also helping me exercise on a regular basis because the cardio helps take calories off and it's good for my back. I'm stretching nightly now. I've known for a month or two now that my back has been mostly okay, but the problem was my back muscles had weakened during my injury. During my injury, I wasn't bending or doing much with my back muscles because it hurt. Now that it's better, the stretching and cardio has helped to strengthen my back (don't take it for granted you can bend over and hold yourself up without leaning on your counter to wash your face or brush your teeth). I still sometimes wake up in pain and stiff in the mornings, but once I stretch it out, I'm feeling pretty good. I still need to be careful with my back, but at least I don't feel like I'm going to fall onto the oven door when I'm putting food into it anymore. :P

Anyway, other than that, things are about the norm. :) I finally watched Her so I'll get a long movie review up and then an post-Oscars piece up.

Epic Movie Post!

i.e., All the movies I've watched in 2014, so far

Mini update on life...The Days of WoW have finally come to a conclusion...it's nit-picking now to get more reputation and better gear.  It's a lot of grinding most of us don't want to do so we've all cancelled our subscriptions. So long, WoW! It's been a good 3-4 months of playing. Maybe when the next expansion comes out we'll go back to playing you. So, I suspect I'll be blogging more? Good time to look for more recipes too...Though, I've found I'm just looking at more nail polish. LoL I saved some the last few months and I went a little nuts this month on the polish because I did manage to save and have some "slush fund." I am buying more this month than the last 4 months combined, but far fewer at the rate I did last year. So...who knows, but it's great to do something "fun" with my money for once. I need to button down the hatches the next two months, though. And...look for a new job. Yes, I must do that.

Work is...interesting...So many things and nothing I can really say publicly. It's just been interesting, frustrating, and interesting. Most of it is completely out of my hands and I just go about my day-to-day work as best as I can without getting too frustrated or thinking too much on things.

I signed up for Covered California (aka, thanks Obamacare!). That was an interesting experience and continues to be an interesting experience...Signing up was easy once I found my Certification of Naturalization...(Really? I have a SSN. You need that?!) In the middle of signing up, though, I got this weird message about them not being able to confirm my citizen status AND whether I have insurance through an employer and having to send verification. I PDF'd the page and just finished my registration. Then I waited 2 weeks for stuff to show in the mail. It took Anthem Blue Cross 2 weeks to have a letter arrive to me! It was printed on the 5th and arrived the 14th. I signed up the 28th of March! Covered CA sent me a letter quicker than they did (arrived 5 business days earlier than Blue Cross). Since the letters...I have paid my initial payment to Blue Cross and scanned and electronically submitted my passport (Chris keeps telling me it's all a scam and they're trying to steal my identity and all my money...LoL). I *think* I don't have to call to tell them I don't have insurance through my employer (as the letter says to do) since I sent my passport, but I'm not 100% sure and will keep an eye out. I have the 90 day sign-up right now till I get all the paperwork settled. So, we'll see! It's been an experience. I've, so far, been the easiest sign-up of everyone I know, though. So...I guess I'm lucky? Random aside, when I submitted my passport, it said my case number was past 1,700,000...Isn't there like 8 million sign-ups total and I'm only on Covered CA...has almost every person had to submit verification? LoL

Anyway...Movies! Lots and lots and lots...35, to be exact. Oscar recap and last year recap when I finish watching all the Best Picture nominations (only 1 more - Her).

Fast & Furious 6 (Diesel, Walker, Johnson, etc) - Honestly, I've never watched a Fast & Furious film till this one...Don't know why, just haven't. Anyway, it was a good action film. It's pretty much what you would expect with a slight sad ending...We'll see what 7 brings with that ending. I will say it was kind of weird watching it given Walker had passed away just a little before I watched it. Grade: C+/B-

Thanks for Sharing (Ruffalo, Robbins, Paltrow) - Uhm...Hm. This is what I get for renting movies I have no idea what they're about. LoL Interesting film about addictions and how you deal with your addictions. It was also about the different TYPE of addictions. Sure, the "obvious" addictions were easy to see and easy to judge, but there are also different types of addictions that can have similar consequences even if they are less judged (e.g., Paltrow had an obsession with weight loss; another one had one with always being "available" at any time for his sponsors). Other than that, it's a little sad with an optimistic ending, but it's a little shallow on touching on the subject of addictions. Good acting, though. Grade: C-

The Family (De Niro, Pfeiffer, Agron, D'Leo) - Silly film from start to finish, which I assumed. I did like the message that family sticks together no matter what and they come first even if you all drive each other nuts. Mostly, it was nutty. Grade: C-

Lee Daniel's The Butler (Whitaker, Winfrey) - I think I expected it to be better. It wasn't bad or anything and I liked the history walk, but I didn't think it was amazing. I can kind of see why it was skipped for Best Picture or any Oscar nods. Compared to 12 Years a Slave or any of the others, the production value wasn't as crisp as you'd expect a Best Picture. Then again, the Oscars aren't always right, but still. It was also such a LONG span of time that it was really only highlighting certain things and the one it mostly focused on was the Civil Rights Movement and ends with Obama being elected. It was a little choppy in the storytelling because of the long span. It was well acted, though, and I liked it. I kind of liked the history walk and the emotional value of the movie, but it misses the fine-tuning to make it great. Grade: B

Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (Lerman, Daddario, Jackson, etc) - I was REALLY disappointed in the first one. I expected more from it, especially since Chris Columbus was directing it and Percy is so similar to Harry Potter. He, in my opinion, killed the movie franchise with the terrible rendition of the movie compared to the book series. Sure, you'll never make something true to it, but you can at least OWN your differences or make it faithful as possible. I felt like it was sloppy. Anyway, I was both hesitant and happy the 2nd one was being made. Fortunately, I felt it was better than the first just by a HAIR. Unfortunately, it was still terrible. Disappointing because the series is so good... Grade: D

Prisoners (Jackman, Gyllenhaal) - Funny enough, I actually couldn't remember the end of the film at first. I had to read a synopsis to remember! I remembered everything till the last 40 minutes. At any rate, it's a well acted film and really gets into the emotional turmoil of losing your child. It's like it's a psycho-thriller, but more like a suspense-thriller without the gore or action. It's all emotional based while Jackman is trying to find his child and, in the process, they uncover a mystery. I enjoyed the film and the acting. It also brought up an interesting morale point about the things you'd do to get your child back. Grade: B

Captain Phillips (Hanks, Abdi) - Enjoyable. It's intense almost the entire way through, though. I thought I was going to pass out from the tension! With that said, I thought the acting was good and for a biopic, it was good. I don't think I enjoyed it as much as the wide populace, but I'm glad I watched it. Grade: B+

Blue Jasmine (Blanchett, Baldwin, Hawkins) - Another movie I rented on a whim before I really knew what it was about. Not my favorite Woody Allen film, but I think it's fantastically acted in by Blanchett. I think everyone else did a good job too, but Blanchett did a really good job. Her character was absolutely nuts, though. LoL I think that's partly what made Blanchett's acting job even better. It's a little depressing of a film, but somehow works given it's Woody Allen and the story. With that said, because it is a little heavy and depressing, it's definitely not a film I agree with from a critic standpoint of adoring it. I liked it well enough and watching Blanchett was worth the watch alone, but the story is just a little sad (in the pitiful kind of way). Grade: C+

Don Jon (Gordon-Levitt, Johansson) - Well, it definitely deserves its rating, but I like Gordon-Levitt and Johansson was in it so I was curious. My co-worker had seen it before me and had warned me it was a movie you didn't watch loud so I was prepared for that. Really, it's not a movie you'd watch loud at all and most people I know wouldn't want to watch it either, but I thought Gordon-Levitt did a pretty good directing job! With that said, the story was a little weird with Julianne Moore and the twist it took with her, Gordon-Levitt, and Johansson. I didn't see that initially and the way it ended was both kind of sweet and weird. LoL Glad I saw it, don't need to ever see it again. Grade: C

Rush (Hemsworth, Bruhl) - The car scenes in the movie are really good. Not sure what I was expecting, but the car race scenes are good. I thought the acting was good. I thought Hemsworth and Bruhl fit Hunt and Lauda right for their roles. Makes you feel bad about Lauda and doesn't really endear you to Hunt, but...that's the way the film painted the picture. As I said, if nothing else, you watch this film for the car races because they were excellently done. Grade: B

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 - Eh. I was "eh" on the first one and I'm "eh" on the 2nd one. The first one was better than the 2nd. The 2nd didn't have the same emotional tone to it with Flint to make it into a morale story in the end. I don't know, I didn't like it as much. Though, the cute food animals are really fun to see! Grade: C

Runner Runner (Affleck, Timberlake) - Honestly, I watched this to see if Affleck could do well in a film he didn't direct. Yeah, this basically confirmed to me I hope he directs Batman vs Superman or his acting job is going to be TERRIBLE. I didn't even like Timberlake in this...He was too "green" in the film for me and coupled with Affleck, it just turned into a bad movie. The plot was terrible too. Course, maybe it was the plot that made them so terrible? I don't know, but I didn't enjoy the film, which is a shame since it had an interesting premise and a decent (well, if you consider Affleck's directed and acted in films). Grade: D

Closed Circuit (Bana, Hall) - Doesn't bode well for my opinion of this film if I only vaguely remember it...Something about a conspiracy and someone is trying to kill off everyone who knows about it. Eh. I do remember the movie itself was put together well, but the plot was not thrilling at all and you need a thrilling film for a conspiracy film! Grade: D

Riddick (Diesel) - I really liked Riddick. I've seen the last Riddick film, but I don't remember it well. This one had some really interesting stages. It started off as a survival film, then went to a horror, and then went to an action film. Unfortunately, for me, the end was probably the lamest of the entire movie. I liked the survival part because it was interesting (even if I knew the jackal was going to die and I told myself from the minute he gets the pup to not get attached). I liked the "horror" part because it was suspenseful and fun to see Riddick toy with the bounty hunters who were trying to capture/kill him and Riddick was ghosting in and out to take them out and try to get off the planet alive. The end was the action scene where they all needed to work together to get away and it was just...meh. It wasn't terrible, but nothing new. Grade: C+/B-

All is Lost (Redford) - I knew Redford was the only person in the entire film, but I had no idea there was almost NO talking in the film at all! With that said, it made me think of Castaway with the minimal talking, but the powerful acting kept you enthralled despite it. I will say, Redford had a TERRIBLE boating trip and made me never want to get onto a boat that's smaller than a really, really big yacht and, given recent events, cruise ships aren't even a done deal! Anyway, it was a superb acting job by Redford and everything that went wrong pretty much went wrong for him (kind of like Gravity, but at sea?). Not a film for everyone to watch because it is rather plodding and not a lot happens except him getting thrashed by mother nature, but it's amazing acting by him. Grade: B

Ender's Game (Butterfield, Ford) - I will preface this with saying I did NOT read the book, though the movie makes me want to read it. I had no idea about the end either. How in the world have I never known the ending to Ender's Game after all the books I sold and all the people I know who like it? At any rate, that surprised me and completely spun the entire movie into a different perspective, which is why I think I need to read it. With that said, it's an okay film. It's, again, one of those movies where you can tell they're trying to make a good based-on-a-book movie, but don't quite get there. I can't say how bad it is compared to the book and I can't compare it to other based-on-a-book movies either since I can't do that initial comparison. As a sci-fi movie on its own, it's only okay. It has its moments (I liked the adult cast) and the end was interesting, but it was only okay. Grade: C

Nebraska (Dern, Forte, Squibb) - At first, I wasn't enjoying the film. I thought it was slow and I didn't like Forte's acting. Then, you get towards the middle of it and you start to understand Forte's character and the acting was spot on. It's just Forte's character has such a dull life that he's, in ways, unlikeable because there's no "life" there. Dern is amazing and so is Squibb, though. The simplicity of the entire film is actually quite amazing and the end is touching. There's something endearing about it that I enjoyed.  Grade: B

Dallas Buyers Club (McConaughey, Garner) - Having watched parts of And the Band Played On and watching this, it's an interesting perspective on AIDS. I enjoyed it with its ups and downs and I think McConaughey did an excellent job in the film. I thought all the acting was good with Leto being my 2nd favorite. The movie wasn't just about AIDS, but mostly about our resilience and will to live. Grade: A

About Time (Gleeson, McAdams, Nighy) - I don't think a "time" related movie ever has a non-sad scene in it...I think it's because that's one thing we always want if we can time travel is to have a completely happy life and that's just not possible. Not to say About Time was overly depressing or had a really unexpected sad scene, but the "sad scenes" are always emotional in time movies because you can never change them. With that said, I liked the film. I thought it was cute. It's basic and, of course, has issues, but it was kind of cute how in the begging Gleeson is trying to get McAdams to notice him and all the changes he does from there. I liked the end message about living life each day to the fullest and appreciating the struggles with the happy times and, even though he technically could repeat days, he finally lived each day as if he couldn't repeat it. Grade: C+

Inside Llewyn Davis (Isaac, Mulligan, Timberlake) - Hard to describe this film...It's a Coen Brothers film, but it's kind of sad (in a poking fun manner) and also poking fun and also...I don't know. It's just different than anything I've watched recently. I'm not sure I fully appreciated it, to be honest. It's just not my type of film and it sort of meanders around this plot and Llewyn Davis isn't exactly likeable, but, at the same time, it's because he is so "lost" and stuck inside his issues? Hard to describe...I kind of felt like it was a waste to watch, but it was also different to watch. Confusing, but because it was so weird for me...it's going to get a low score. Grade: D

The Counselor (Fassbender, Cruz, Diaz, Bardem) - So, honestly, Diaz's supposedly really terrible scene wasn't "as" terrible as I expected it to be considering who her character was, but it was still kind of weird. At the same time, that's her character and Bardem's character makes a point that the action WAS weird. As an actress, though, I'd feel kind of bad for her having to do the scene, but it wasn't as bad as some reviews, in my opinion. With that said, this was a depressing film at the end, but I liked the cast. Unfortunately, for it being an action-thriller or whatever, it was lacking ALL around in the plot, which is a huge shame given the cast. It wasn't an exciting plot given what was happening... Grade: D

The Lego Movie - What a cute film. I liked the older jokes for the older audience. I liked the animation. I liked the message. I liked it all around, BUT...the end bothered me, for whatever reason. I liked the message, don't get me wrong, but something didn't jive with me... Grade: A-

300: Rise of an Empire (Stapleton, Green) - Perfect example of a sex scene that is totally not needed. I mean, it was needed to a point, but it went longer than needed. Then again, it didn't really go anywhere too...It did make for all the "jokes" in the movie later on too, which was kind of funny, but...Eh. Sadly for me, I watched 300 AFTER Rise of an Empire so I lost some nuances in the film, but I thought it was okay even if it was gory. I do think the story was lacking some, though... Grade: C

300 (Butler) - 300 is a lot better than Rise of an Empire, even if it's probably gorier than Rise of an Empire. Butler is perfect in this role. Grade: B

The Wolf of Wall Street (DiCaprio, Hill) - So glad I didn't watch this in theater...was going to until I found out how long it was (3 hours!) and any movie longer than The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug does not deserve to watched in theater, especially as it's not an action film. Sex, drugs, profanity, and money...that's the movie in 4 words. :P I didn't particularly like DiCaprio's acting job in this, but I think it's because I felt like it was the playboy version of Gatsby. Hill wasn't bad, but it felt more like his adult-comedy films, which kind of baffles me on his Oscar nod. Granted, the films are WILDLY different, but still. Granted, Wolf of Wall Street is to never take itself seriously at any point...With that said...The quaaludes scene was HILARIOUS. Oh my gosh...Now that was definitely something you don't see DiCaprio do and Hill was just as hilarious. It was seriously funny and completely ridiculous, but I think it saved the film for me. Grade: C+

12 Years a Slave (Ejiofor, Fassbender, Nyong'o) - What a well acted, directed, and produced film. It's quality all the way through. It's not always fun to watch (whipping scenes make me cringe just remembering them), but it's an excellent film. Ejiofor and Nyong'o were great, but it was also great seeing Fassbender, Pitt, and Cumberbatch excel also. It does show a truly atrocious time in our history, but it's done so well. Grade: A

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (Ferrell) - Didn't see the first one, decided to watch the 2nd. Silly, but that's what you expect. Had an unexpectantly nice ending about family that I wasn't prepared for. Of course, it's buried underneath a lot of silliness (the end epic scene is...random LoL), but it's there. It was okay as an adult comedy movie, though. I've seen better. Grade: C-

August: Osage County (Streep, Roberts) - Riveting acting performances by Streep and Roberts. I mean, for the most part, the movie doesn't take place many places and there's nothing to really watch other than the actors so the performances had to be even stronger and they were. My only real problem with the movie is it's rather heavy and MAN they are a HIGHLY dysfunctional group, let alone family! So, the story kind of brought down the entire experience because I kept going, "Are they nuts?" Or "Is she nuts?" "They're nuts!" throughout the movie, but the acting is really good. I suppose if the story was a little happier or had more to it, the movie would have been better. Grade: C/B (C overall; B for the sheer acting power)

Out of the Furnace (Bale, Affleck) - This would be Casey Affleck, younger brother to Ben Affleck and not Ben, who acted in this film. I wished this film had more to it, is what I left feeling. The acting is great, but I felt like most of the cast was wasted. The story was heavy and sad too. I don't know. It didn't jive with me. Grade: C-

The Book Thief (Nelisse, Rush, Watson) - Emily Watson, not Emma Watson. Another based-on-a-book movie I need to read the book. To be fair, The Book Thief has been on my radar to read since it was originally released in 2005 (I had been working at Borders by the time it was released). It's always been well received for all the years I worked there and it was one of those books I would even recommend to people, even though I hadn't read it. I always heard it was sad, though, and now I can understand why! I knew it wasn't going to be happy (Germany during WWII), but I didn't know the ending either. With that said, I enjoyed it. It is a little long and it does plod along, but I liked all the actors and the story it told. It is a little weak in the telling of WWII, but it's also supposed to be based on a YA novel. I liked it Grade: B

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (Evans, Jackson, Johansson, Redford) - What a good movie...I saw it twice in its opening weekend and would actually see it a 3rd time in theater. There are problems with the film, but, for the most part, it was a solid film. Chris didn't like it as much as the first one and I'm still skeptical (even after all this time) whether I liked it better than the first one or not. It's got a lot of good action scenes, which I appreciated. The conspiracy angle was kind of interesting too. I think the 3rd CA will be interesting and it'll be really interesting to see if they, er, follow the comics through Avengers 3 and beyond (sorry, no spoilers!). The movie also gets you excited for Avengers 2. So, I liked it! Can't wait to buy it on DVD. LoL I like CA more than the Thor franchise and I think they're going more places with CA than Thor right now. Considering the lack of summer movies I want to see, this might be my favorite action film all year... Grade: A

Veronica Mars (Bell, Dohring) - Thank goodness they simultaneously released it on iTunes and Amazon! It wasn't showing anywhere near us and I wanted to see it so I rented it on Amazon. :) Would have rented it on iTunes, but I can't watch it on my TV. So...Amazon it was. Funny aside...Amazon actually refunded me the cost of the rental a day later. We have a 2nd router set up in the living room because the PlayStation gets a really weak signal without it next to it, especially if the Internet is being used by everyone on their computers. So, in the daytime, I watched it with no one around so it streamed fine. Later, I decided to rewatch it after Chris was home because I had a 24-hour limit, but it kept failing on the stream so I gave up. Turns out, the router in the living room came unplugged and that's why it was dropping out. Well, Amazon emailed the refund saying we had "poor playback" and they were sorry for the bad service and refunded the money...LoL Wasn't their fault and I had already watched it all the way through once, but apparently they didn't know it failed on the 2nd watch. :P Anyway, I liked the movie. Unfortunately, I think anyone who was NOT a fan of the TV show would be confused...It tries to make up all the references and leave some in for the fans, but I think it would just be confusing for someone who hadn't watch the TV show. With that said, I'm glad they did it and I hope they do another one! Grade: A (probably more like a B-/C+ if I was realistic)

The Grand Budapest Hotel (Fiennes, Revolori) - I enjoyed it! I think it's my favorite from Wes Anderson that I've seen (only the 3rd one so Moonrise Kingdom or Fantastic Mr. Fox). It's a cute film that is stylized in a special way to convey the message it wants to. There's something in the film that is both innocent and complex. Perhaps it's because you have the age gap between Zero and Gustave, but it works. I also liked the mystery that was woven through it. The movie is also silly in its ways, but it's well done. It is kind of funny how the story is a story without a story...I really like it, though. Grade: A

Philomenia (Dench, Coogan) - Wow...this does not paint the Irish Catholic nuns back in the 50's in a good light...With that said, I thought Dench and Coogan did an excellent acting job. I thought the story was well told too and Dench's character was a hoot. It is a sad story, but a story that is important to tell. I had idea about it! Makes you want to look it up in further details. Good movie. Grade: A

Homefront (Statham, Franco) - Somehow I seem to watch a movie and never realize Franco is in it! I think the last movie I watched knowing he was in it before I started watching it was Oz the Great and Powerful (unless I watched Spring Breakers after it...). Anyway, your typical action film. It wasn't terrible, but wasn't fantastic either. It had a lot of shooting, blowing up, chases, etc. Kind of the typical film you'd expect with Statham starring in it and Stallone writing (based on a book). Grade: C

With that...I am all caught up with my movie reviews! Woohoo!

Uhm...Hello "Delete" Button...

So I had this VERY, VERY long post about all the recent happenings of life (not even padded with movie reviews!) and I accidentally deleted the entire thing...*bangs head on desk* Yeah...I think it took me like an hour to write too...LoL

Here's the short highlights because I can't bring myself to rewrite it now and I haven't blogged in a long time (after I told myself I'd blog MORE this year...):

1) I'm spending a lot of time playing World of Warcraft (WoW) with Chris, my manager at work, and my housemate. It's easier to level than LotRo so we're almost at level cap. :P Though, I like the story in LotRo better, but that might be because I know the story better. The story has gotten better as each expansion has come out, though. I'm really enjoying Mists of Pandaria.

2) I'll do a massive movie post later because I need to do my 2013 recap (truncated version), Oscars opinion, and movie review update (24 movies!). It might be two posts...

3) I haven't been spending a lot of money lately on polish because 1) I'm trying to be better about money and 2) my nails are short...3 nails decided to break at the very base of my nail recently. Not having long nails takes the fun out of doing fun designs for me...Not buying polish kills me some days, but I'm proud of myself!

4) I've been trying to save money with my student loans going up and having to pay for healthcare...I need to be better about it, especially since I'm going down south end of July for my cousin's wedding. At this point, I don't even know if I'll be able to afford the Breeders' Cup this year...If I keep on my money saving plan, save my entire extra paycheck in July, and lower my expenditures from last year (no new hat!), I MIGHT be able to go...To say the least, I'm very thankful Chris has a full-time job! LoL

5) Chris's car woes...his new car is amazing (Scion FR-S), but it's a pain he even needed to get a new car. He saw his Tiburon getting hit (along with all his co-workers) too. Still no news on that and we don't plan to ever hear anything...The Tiburon went to a co-worker as his first car and his parents and him are going to get it the body work it needs to get it fixed. Other than that, the car is driveable. The FR-S is a great keyless car too. Door handle sensors with the key fob just close to it and it'll unlock the door and/or trunk and it's a push start engine. Don't even need  the key fob out to push the button to unlock OR lock the car. It doesn't auto-unlock it either. You have to be touching the car to unlock it, so that's cool. He did long-term lease the car, which is cheaper than buying a new car! His payments really don't affect anything on my end either, which is good.

6) Doing a week version of the Once-a-Month-Meals. I do a week version because I don't have the freezer space or manpower for anything more than a week. LoL I've got it down to a fine art now...My recent days off are on Thurs/Fri so on Tuesday I get my grocery shopping list ready. On Wednesday, after work, I do all the shopping, which is made easier because I organize my shopping list to things that are near each other. On Thursday (first day off), I spend the day cooking and prepping. Friday or Saturday tends to be some sort of casserole because I don't have the freezer space to freeze it. I have learned two things: 1) I can't do a week's worth of cooking that has meals that all need something cooked. I did that last week and almost died. It took me ALL day (at least 8 hours of cooking and no clean-up time). Chris just looked at me and went, "It's not just the money you have to consider. You need to consider your time too." I've now learned to spread out the cooking and non-cooking preps through my week. 2) With leftovers and only 3 of us, I really only need to cook 4-5 meals a week instead of 7! I do think this is saving us money, though. If it was just the dinners, eating out at fast food would be cheaper, but if you include the lunches and leftovers, we're getting really good value out of the meals. My system is much happier for the home cooked meals too. So, saving money in the food department for both lunches AND dinners. Chris and Rob tend to still eat lunches out at work, but will leftovers before or right after work.

7) Work hasn't been enjoyable. Two co-workers have been out for almost 4 weeks. One of them I can't publicly talk about for different reasons, but it was a worker's comp issue. The other is she's out with pneumonia and has taken a long time to heal. There were a few days we thought a lot of overtime was going to be needed because a different co-worker had jury duty, but after 3 days of calling he was excused. Yay! So overtime wasn't needed.

8) In a nutshell, still job hunting. Not as proactive as I should, but I still am putting apps in for various things. Chris is thinking of getting a new job that pays better too. He's also studying for his CPA exams. 

Uhm...I think that was it. LoL Even the shortened version was long, but my original post was REALLY long with more anecdotes and opinions or details, but whatever. :P

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2014!

Welcome to the New Year! It's fresh. It's sparkly. There are 364 days of "unknown" about what will transpire and how your year will look at the end. :) There is something "nice" about starting a new year...Not sure why my birthday doesn't give me the same feeling, except minor excitement for my birthday along with minor-gloom that I'm getting older, but a new year always seems more invigorating. Maybe it's the fact most people on the planet are excited it's a new year and it's a big "thing" and individual birthdays are what you make of them each year. Not sure, but the new year is exciting! This Chinese New Year (Jan 31st) will also be The Year of the Horse. I am partial to this year, even if I am Year of the Ox and, before anyone asks or says it, despite the fact I'm not even Chinese. :P So, here's hoping 2014 is a terrific year for everyone!

Ending with 2013, I watched ONE more movie to make it a solid 110 movies I watched in 2013. I'll do the movie "year in recap" post later, but I wanted to review my final movie and say...I read 68 books! Made my 2 books goal in 4 days. I forgot I was halfway through one book and started and finished a whole other book. Phew. I also did, from my FB posting of pictures, 86 different manicures through 2013 (there might be a couple I never posted, but close enough). That makes it about every 4 days (4.2 to be exact) I changed my nails. That seems to be about right. I'd have said twice a week or every 3-5 days. Wasn't quite twice a week, but close and the middle of 3-5 is 4.

Also, quickly, back update. Second chiropractor visit was a good thing. I had a pretty big adjustment and my spine feels better now. I have another one tomorrow (Thurs) after work. I have less pain and feel less like my spine and bones are rubbing against each other and my movement is smoother. Unfortunately, I think I'm to the point where I think the tissue or ligaments or tendons or whatever AROUND the spine has been damaged. Now it's just waiting for that to all heal and build up my lower back muscle again. I also need to be careful not to overdo the bending. Yesterday, I had a relatively pain free day with minimal bending. Came home from work and started to bend a lot to attend to the rabbits and do other things. By the end of the night, the pain had come back and now, with me sitting, my back hurts. *sigh* I definitely overdid it yesterday, which is good to know what is going on, but bad that I'm still suffering through this. I'm going on week 4 now.

Last movie...and a short review...

We're the Millers (Jason Sudeikis, Jennifer Aniston, Emma Roberts, Will Poulter) - Funny how Sudeikis is the main start of this movie and, yet, most people refer to this as an Aniston film...This wasn't a terrible movie, surprisingly. It was funny in that typical adult-comedy way you'd expect from a film like this, but it also wasn't potty-humor either. I thought everyone did a pretty good job. It's a predictable film, but had some funny lines and some funny scenes. It, of course, has that happy ending and it was predictable, but still happy. Grade: C/C+

With that...110 movies! Yay! And, I'm off to go read or eat or something else that will relax my back... :P

Happy New Year!

Happy End of 2013!

Where has the year gone?! I can't believe it's already the end of 2013. In fact, where'd the last 1.5 months go since my last post? December FLEW by and then, to cap it, I was all confused when Christmas was and kept thinking things were a week closer than they were. No clue why. At any rate, I can't believe this year has flown by. I went to the chiropractor yesterday and he said it's been 11 months since he last saw me. My first thought was, "I was here in January!" and then went, "Oh, wait, January is next month...Yeah, that was 11 months ago. What...?" I can't believe it's 2014 in a few days! In fact, I must be really excited for 2014 because I keep wanting to write it instead of 2013. I can't say 2013 was a terrible year, but it was certainly an uneventful one for me. Not to say that's a bad thing because, goodness knows, it could have been "bad" eventful and there was none of that. So, I'm thankful for my year just to be able to say I made it another year and I've got a home, have a good standard of living, a job (albeit, I wanted to quit it several times the past year), and my family and friends are doing well. As a friend posted on FB when it was my birthday, "Congratulations on existing another year!" Made me laugh. Might be a little dire, but it's true too.

At any rate, looking forward to 2014. My middle brother and his family will be back in the States so I get to see them and a nephew I've never met! I, hopefully, will be able to attend the Breeders' Cup at Santa Anita on November 1st. Get to see the rest of the family and friends through the year and hope them all the best in health and happiness. I've got several (and I do mean SEVERAL) friends who are having kids in 2014 so that'll be fun to see. Some are also getting married. Chris, hopefully, will be bought out from the tempt agency he's with and hired full-time at his company (if not, he'll be looking for a new job). I, hopefully, will be getting a new job (where ever that may be). I might even work on getting my driver's license! Don't hold me to that because it has been 28 years in the making, but it's time. We'll see how that goes, though (i.e., the family members who read this, don't even mention to me I wrote this LoL). I've got some new books coming out next year I'm looking forward to and, of course, new movies to watch. I'd mention new nail polish, but I think that's a given. In addition, I plan to go on a super limited nail polish buy for 3-6 months (not a no buy because there are a few things I want, but super limited). I won't say the specific AMOUNT of polish I have acquired (gifts or personal purchases) the last 2 months, but I think it amounted to more polish than I bought the 10 months preceding it combined...To say the least, I need to clean out my polishes to make room for next year and limit my purchasing...Haven't figured out the clean out method yet, but I do plan to try and make it through a chunk of my "untrieds" next year. I also plan to save more next year. I don't have a contract with the Aquarium next year so I need to be more diligent about saving next year, especially at my salary and if I plan to go to the Breeders' Cup next year. I'm not buying a new hat next year (or very unlikely buying a new one, I do really like mine), but will get a new dress. And, lastly, I am also going to try to be better about exercising. I start and stop far too much...Granted, I stopped this last time because I injured my back. I actually worked out through the pain for 1.5 weeks and then finally it got too bad. Probably didn't help my back... :P At any rate, I'm looking forward to 2014! I do like how this started with what I was looking forward to and then dissolved to quasi-resolutions. I don't really do resolutions at the start of a new year because any time of the year should be the time to do a resolution or a change, but the new year definitely makes it nice and "neat."

The past 1.5 months has been pretty uneventful on the grand scheme of things. I did injure my back from exercising. I tell you, my back on the right side (hip bone area) does not like me and exercising. It's twice now that I've injured the same area by way of shifting something really far out of alignment. This time it was a slow move and continual pain for weeks (almost 3 weeks before I went in and only because I overdid it last week and the pain got really severe). The other time it was a sharp movement (I couldn't move or sit for a few days), but my body adjusted to it fairly quickly and was pain free (I did immediately stop exercising, though...). The chiropractic adjustment was really painful (my worst one ever), but I was pretty much okay right after it. This adjustment was painful, but I must have aggravated the tissue and ligamanets around the area much worse because I still have pretty uncomfortable pain. Two different type of exercises and different results/pain, but in the same area. Gosh dang it. I have to be more careful! I am glad I don't have the same pain level, though, and I'm off for 4-days so hopefully I'll give my back a rest. I've been working through the pain and just limiting my movements. Other than my back, my co-worker fell off a ladder trying to get his cat off his roof and fractured his foot. And then another co-worker had a family emergency for two days and then another one wasn't feeling well. I tell you, it's not been a good December for our store. Other than that, I guess it's been semi-okay (small flare-ups here-and-there) from the work angle. Personal life is pretty uneventful, except that Chris's Christmas present STILL hasn't arrived. I ordered it 20 days ago...*sigh* It didn't ship out till the 15th and it's coming from Canada...Still waiting! This Christmas, in fact, was a terrible on-line shopping experience. Not all of it to do with shipping (I do feel a little sorry for UPS/FedEx, but they should have increased hours (overtime?) if they saw the volume increased the week before Christmas), but it was crazy.

Chris and I have been watching Game of Thrones (season 1 and 2) since my boss owns the first two seasons on DVD. I've read a great deal of information about the books and know a lot of people who have read them so I knew, generally, what to expect. They've also been on my "to read" pile and actually own the first 3 or 4 (got them from a friend - haven't read them, but Chris has read at least the first one), but haven't gotten to them. So, to say the least, I knew what to expect, but I just didn't know the details. I only have 2 episodes of season 2 left to watch and I'm not sure about it...My two biggest complaints about the TV show:

1) Where is this all going? What's the purpose of everything? I'm not opposed to the meandering paths where you don't have a clear objective (e.g., Harry vanquishing Voldemort; Frodo destroying the ring; following someone's life as it unfolds; etc), but this one is a real big "what's my objective?!" In other words, what will my payoff be after I finish this series? Reading about someone's life or the people around them (e.g., Les Miserables) I can read, but there's usually a payoff at the end. This one I can't see where it's going at all and makes me sort of want to quit.

2) There's no clear protagonist or antagonist. Again, I can deal with ensemble books with lots of characters, but this one gives everyone such a flaw that you dislike them or kills off anyone remotely likeable that it makes me want to give up because I'm either scared to like someone because they might get killed or they're so stupid or mean that I just can't like them. I'm actually dreading to watch season 3 because I know 2 of the characters I like now die in season 3. I'm actually reading character synopsizes to try and find someone I can "grab hold" of for the series to keep me going. I'm sorry, but I am one of those people who DOES need a protagonist to keep me going or, again, what's my payoff at the end?

For me, those two issues are pretty big. I will say that the shows are pretty violent, but I can't say they're really any more violent then some other movies or TV shows I've watched. The nudity in the shows, though, are pretty unnecessary. They could give the impression or angle it or whatever. On the other hand, there are several prostitutes that are major characters and one character owns a brothel. Also, apparently, the books do have an abundance of sex in them so, one could say they're being "faithful" to the series. At this point, I've gotten used to the nudity. I also think HBO is doing a pretty amazing job with the sets, costumes, production, etc. They're magnificent to watch. They did not spare a penny on the show. I think the casting is pretty good too. It's hard to really say if someone is really bad given I haven't read the series, though. I do think, though, Peter Dinklage has the best character of them all. He's the only one that I can really say I like in the series and he's, technically, on the protagonist side (sort of). See, there's the problem with the characters! Chris and I have started a saying with the show, "Honor gets you killed." Because, truly, that's what happens to a lot of the characters. It may not be an immediate death, but eventually it does. Also, there are a lot of stupid characters...At any rate, I at first went, "Oh, I really need to read the series now to get more out of the characters," but now I don't know if I even want to...If there's no payoff and I go through all that reading for nothing, I will be angry. So, I might wait. We'll see. I am curious to read the first book, but I may stop after the 3rd or something (which I've been told is a good place to stop even though there are 5 books and more to come (yes, George R. R. Martin hasn't finished the series, yet)). Any way, it's definitely a perplexing series for me...I sort of want to give up because of my issues, but it's well-done....

Lots of movies since my last movie update 2 months ago -- 22 to be exact. These will mostly be short opinions because it's been a while for some and there's just a lot of them! I'll elaborate on a few that I have strong opinions about or saw recently (Lone Ranger I saw today so it's, clearly, got the longest review).

Thor: The Dark World (Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman) - Not a bad film, but not great. I don't think I liked this one as much as the first, but it's pretty on par. There's really only one scene that I REALLY liked and it involved Loki. It's a hilarious scene and everyone that I know who has seen it has also liked it too. The credit scenes at the end were okay. The first one was better and supposedly leads up to the Guardians of the Galaxy, but the 2nd and last one was just…mostly stupid. I just don't like Thor as much as Captain America. Grade: B-

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth) - This one was FAR better than the first. Much, much better. I liked the whole movie and liked it enough that I knew I wanted to own it on DVD; therefore, I went out and bought, on Black Friday, the first one. LoL You can't own the 2nd one and not the first! At any rate, it was much better. Peeta is pretty much continuously weak in the films (not the actor, the character), but whatever. The extra money for this film, I suppose, worked for the film rather than making it "over-the-top" and gratuitous. Or maybe everyone was just better situated in their roles…? Who knows. It's much better. Grade: A

The Colony (Kevin Zegers, Laurence Fishburne) - What a terribly depressing film! Definitely not what I expected. I thought it would be more about the colony trying to find others or surviving. It is about surviving, but it's much more of a survival movie from a neighboring colony. On top of it, it's a little more gruesome than I expected and it's got a rather depressing, open-ended ending! Don't recommend it… Grade: D

The Croods (Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds, etc) - Not a bad 20th Century Fox animation. Not that they've had a real dud. It's cute. It's a cute film about family and the craziness that can be family. It has good animation too. Not entirely memorable as an "Animation of the Year" film, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's up for the category this year. My prediction: Monster University, The Croods, Turbo, Frozen, and a foreign animation film. Solid family film, but maybe for an older younger age. Grade: B-/C+

White House Down (Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx) - What are the odds that two similar-ish movies would come out in the same year with the White House has been taken by force? At any rate, between the two (Olympus Has Fallen) and this one, I liked this one better. It was less "serious" and pure action. Olympus Has Fallen is a little more serious and has a stricter plot line. This one is a little tongue-and-cheek so it's a little more fun to watch. Plus, it's purely about the White House and not the surrounding DC area so you don't get any "accidental" funny scenes of people running from guns…Still, not great. Grade: C 

The Hangover Part III (Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, Justin Bartha, Ed Helms, etc) - You always go into these knowing they're going to be over-the-top and silly. This was definitely silly. This one revolves more around Galifianakis's character (each one kind of revolves around one of them and the rest get dragged into it). I didn't like it as much as the first two, to be honest. I felt like this one was just overly silly…? I don't prefer Galifianakis's character in any of the films and since he's highlighted in this one, it just made it worse for me. Wouldn't recommend this. Grade: D

The Heat (Sandra Bullock, Melissa McCarthy) - Take Miss Congeniality and smash it with McCarthy's character (or feel) from Bridesmaids and what you get is The Heat. I described this to someone who hadn't seen it yet and it makes you go, "Wha…?" at first, but then she watched it and totally agreed with me afterwards. It's an okay film. Wasn't bad. It had some funny moments, but I don't necessarily think it was better than the individual films I had just described. It's okay. Grade: C+

The Internship (Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson) - Surprisingly better than I thought it was going to be. It's not as silly or crude as you'd expect from a Vaughn/Wilson film. There's actually kind of a "nice" moment in the film and a kind of nice message about not giving up, misfits, and so forth. Still wasn't fantastic, but wasn't bad either. Grade: C

R.I.P.D. (Jeff Bridges, Ryan Reynolds) - Just about on the edge of being a terrible movie. No wonder I had no desire to watch it in theaters and definitely no wonder it didn't do well. It was an interesting idea, but was poorly executed. Doesn't help that I'm not a huge fan of Reynolds either, but Bridges couldn't even salvage the movie. Definitely near the bottom of my least favorite films of the year. Grade: D/D-

Red 2 (Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Mary-Louise Parker, Helen Mirren) - I liked the first RED movie enough that I wanted to watch the 2nd one. I liked this one too. It's about the same. It's kind of funny seeing all the characters in their "older" stages going out and kicking butt and wrecking havoc. Can't say it's really better or worse than the first since I don't remember the first all that well, but I enjoyed this enough. Grade: C

The Way, Way Back (Steve Carell, Liam James) - This is another coming of age movie and it's a decent one. I thought the acting was really good and, honestly, the poor kid! His mother seriously needs a brain and I'm glad she gets it at the end. It's a cute film. I don't think it's as good as The Kings of Summer, but it's also a little different. It's kind of weird seeing Carell as the non-family man and being a jerk. Grade: B-

2 Guns (Denzel Washington, Mark Wahlberg) - Not a bad film, but also predictable and kind of "crazy." I thought Wahlberg and Washington were well paired and the script worked for the both of them well. It's a little violent, but nothing too much that you wouldn't expect from an action film like this. The mystery of where the money was interesting. I will say, I refuse to watch any film Paula Patton is in anymore because I have seen her nude twice this year and that's 2 times too many! Can't she keep her clothes on?! Also explains why the Miley Cyrus/Rob Thicke thing didn't really make her comment too… Grade: C

Planes (Dane Cook, Stacy Keach, etc) - Cute. Can't say it was great, but it was cute. I enjoyed it. Decent animation. Not to the Cars standards of Pixar, but Disney did an okay job with it. Good, solid family film for almost any age. Grade: C+

Turbo (Ryan Reynolds, Paul Giamatti, Michael Peña, Samuel L. Jackson, etc) - Another good, decent animation. I thought it was cute. I can't say it was great and whole snail thing was different, but it worked the way it was. My only complaint is I didn't like Reynolds voicing the movie…It was distracting for me for whatever reason. Kind of funny given he didn't bother me in The Croods…It's a cute family film. Not as good as Monster University (I think that or Frozen will win Best Animation), but not bad. Grade: C+/B-

The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (Lily Collins, Jamie Campbell Bower, etc) - I was REALLY torn about seeing this as I've heard the stories about the author and plagiarism and such. I haven't read the books because of it, but the movie got the best of me. Not a great movie. I was rather bored through most of it, but you do see the main character grow through the film. It's maybe too long as a movie, though…I don't know. There was something "off" about the movie. Movies like this and Divergent and such, which are based off of Young Adult novels, aren't doing well this year even though they were popular in book sales. I guess not everything can be a Hunger Games and Harry Potter. Grade: D+/C-

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen, Richard Armitage, etc) - Honestly, I was disappointed in 'Smaug. There were many scenes in it that weren't in the book (not a big deal), but they, unfortunately, felt like fillers to me. With that said, though I did actually think through the movie, "Filler, filler, filler…" the movie was really well-paced. For a 2:40 hour long movie, you didn't feel like you'd been sitting there that long. So, it was kind of weird to both think "filler" and, yet, enjoy the movie enough that the fillers didn't make me feel like the movie was long. With that said, this one isn't as good as the first, which isn't surprising. Also, this film made me definitely think 3 films is too much for such a short book and I haven't even seen the third movie. I'll own this and I'll watch it again, but it could have been either shorter or the series made into 2 movies. Also, for whatever reason, the special effects in this movie bothered me. They didn't feel as crisp as you'd come to expect from Peter Jackson. There were a lot of obvious green screens too. I'm not sure if it's because I saw it in 2D instead of 3D or whatever, but that was also disappointing. Grade: B

The World's End (Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Martin Freeman, etc) - I watched 97% of Sean of the Dead, but I didn't watch Hot Fuzz. So, in some way, I may have missed some nuances and inside jokes, but I liked this enough. I did feel, unfortunately, that it was Stepford Wives…That was disappointing. It was funny at times and the end was kind of weird/funny, but it was okay. I'm glad I watched it and it was fun seeing the boys reminiscence about the past. Grade: B

Elysium (Matt Damon) - Kind of a depressing end, but I guess its was one of those "for the greater good" stories. Special effects weren't bad. The story was pretty predictable, but not bad. It was okay. Grade: C+/C

Paranoia (Liam Hemsworth, Gary Oldman, Harrison Ford, Amber Heard) - Uh. What? I actually spent more time trying to identify the cars in the movie than actually watching the movie, I think. What could have been really interesting, it was severely bland. Oldman and Ford did decent acting, but I didn't really like Hemsworth character. And it was a fight between wealthy men and one of them trying to be a wealthy man. I don't know…it was pretty stupid. Grade: D

American Hustle (Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Bradley Cooper, Jeremy Renner, Jennifer Lawrence) - I really enjoyed American Hustle. I liked the script, acting, story, and direction. It was all well-done and pulled a fast one on you at the end if you weren't paying attention. I liked that. At its core, it is a con movie through-and-through and not just a movie about cons being caught and used to catch corrupt politicians. I also liked watching Renner's character devolve and the depths of the rest come to light. At first, everyone seems like "bad" people and you're glad they get caught, but, as the movie goes on, you get to know the reasons why and you figure out truly who is the "bad" guy and who isn't. It's got a similar flavor to Silver Linings Playbook so you could tell this was a Russell film. I'd probably own this on DVD eventually. If anything, needs a rewatch to see if you can pick up any clues for the end. Grade: A/A-

Frozen (Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, Josh Gad, etc) - I liked Frozen! It might have been my favorite animation of the year. Disney has definitely gotten back its animation movie mojo or whatever. It was another solid effort by them. The musical numbers, I must admit, felt a little weird to me. It felt a little less like the characters singing and more like I was watching a live theater play…? I don't know. The singing in animations just feels weird to me in the recent Disney films (the love song in Tangled took me 2 or 3 views for me to feel "solid" about it), but maybe I just need to see it again. With that said, I did like most of the musical numbers. I liked the two princesses and I liked Olaf. The end was rather sappy and predictable. I kind of felt like you went on this grand adventure and then the end wrapped up SO neatly, cleanly, and quickly that it was a little bit jarring. Still like the film, though. Grade: A

Lone Ranger (Johnny Depp, Armie Hammer) - On its own, the movie isn't too bad, but as a remake, it's absolutely terrible. I will say, the trailer portrayed a cheesier movie, in my opinion. The movie actually wasn't too bad on its own if you removed yourself from every perspective of The Lone Ranger you have in your head (kind of hard to do). There were some things I really didn't like (the slaughtering (and that's what it really was in a "family movie" appropriate manner) of the Comanche, for one), but the fight scenes were okay. The acting wasn't too bad. The comedy wasn't too bad and actually made me chuckle. Unfortunately, the script was rather bad. Hammer wasn't a terrible John Reid, but he came off more "silly" and "green" than Tonto. And the movie is quasi from Tonto's perspective, but, truly, he's just the story-teller. My BIGGEST complaint, there was NOT enough Silver in the movie! And where Silver was doing cool stuff, it was CG (not surprising). It needed more Silver...My other complaint is you could 100% tell this was an attempt to gain the Pirates of the Caribbean glory days. Gore Verbinski directed PotC and he directed this. Not to mention Jerry Bruckheimer (PotC producer) and Hans Zimmer (composer for PotC 2 and 3) were also involved. In fact, one song in Lone Ranger reminded me a little of PotC and there are two characters that rob the civilians and are caught in women dresses or with umbrellas (remind you of a certain pair from PotC? Though, not same actors). So, that was a little weird. I will say, I really like the soundtrack. It's not what you'd expect from Zimmer or for the movie, but it all works. The Finale song based on William Tell's overture is amazing. I don't think it's purely William Tell. I do think Zimmer adds his own into it to work better with the movie, but it's great and a lot of the classic. Besides the "Finale," "Silver" is my favorite song. The end of the song is so beautiful and emotional. In all, if you ignore the fact it's a remake and don't mind the terrible script, it's an okay movie (i.e., thank you action scenes for saving it!). If you factor in the remake, it's absolutely terrible. Grade: C (I liked the action scenes and soundtrack or C-/D+ for remake)

With those 22 movies, I have watched 109 movies this year! I might see one more this weekend given I've got Sat/Sun off with Chris, but we'll see. I will say it was kind of a dud movie year, but I'll go through everything on my movie recap of 2013.

With 4 days left of the year, I'm going to try and read 2 more books. I'm 2 books away from matching last year's 68 count. Granted, I count rereads, but only rereads if I read the ENTIRE book again. Still, for whatever reason, I've been sluggish the end of this year (especially December). I've got books I want to read, but I just can't get myself to actually READ them. Ugh. I have been watching a lot of stuff, but I always take time to read and...I don't know. Weird. Hoping next year is better for the reading, but I should get going to trying to finish 2 books in 4 days. :)

Hope everyone has a good start to the new year!

Lots of randomness, but Gravity in 3D is a must

Well, there is just a little less than 2 weeks till I head south to see family, friends, and races! It'll be fun and a well deserved break from work. I need the break. I've had 4-days off here-and-there the past year, but I haven't had a VACATION in almost a year! I do still need to figure out jewelry and nails for my outfit...I might just wait till I'm south to figure out jewelry, but I do need to figure out my nails since I'll either need to bring my stuff south or do them before I go down. I also need to buy heal gel inserts for my shoes. I could put my orthotics in, but I'm afraid they'll super stretch the shoe so I'm going to buy cheap heal inserts to help my heal spurs for the day.

In other news, I'm officially finished with my Aquarium contract. I've been paid and everything. It feels kind of nice not having it on my mind. I've been able to read more lately, which has been nice.

I recently got into a few authors on Facebook. I've read their books for a while, but recently thought to check for them on FB. One of the authors suggested a new author and the new author is doing a review blitz where if you review her book on Amazon, she'll send you swag. I'm such a sucker for swag. LoL So I've spent the last week solidly reading her series to get to the book that needs to be reviewed to count. Luckily, she's only got 3 books out! I'll finish the 3rd book and the one that needs to be reviewed by Friday, which means I'll have read 3 books in 8 days. First one took the least and the 2nd the longest. Now, do I pick the autographed book or the cool reusable bag?! I'm thinking bag because I can get a signed book another time and the bags are a "while supplies last" thing.

I do still have my class, but it's pretty easy. I am learning a great deal from class. I've got all sorts of forms and stuff to help with grant writing. I'd like to volunteer with some organization and get some hands on experience in grant writing with someone who's done it before. Be good job training and good experience in general. Haven't really looked into any organizations around here, yet, but I think I'll look after I complete the class. Seriously, though, you have to be ORGANIZED for grant writing. Wow. I do find sometimes the class is a little hard to get into because I don't have an organization to "practice" with for writing out letters of inquiry and letters of request. Also, the more you know of your own organization, I think the easier it'd be to do the grant writing. Finding the appropriate funders and getting the proper materials in at the right time and making contact will be the hardest things once all the program/organization materials are mostly completed. I can imagine it'd take a month to get that all ready before contacting any funders, though. Crazy stuff, but I'm enjoying the learning.

In the political scene, this November's election for Monterey County will have interesting impacts on the former Fort Ord. Do we reject Monterey Downs or accept it? I need to read the working of Measures K and M VERY carefully since one rejects it and the other accepts it (or something like that, it's kind of confusing). I'm sort of torn about it the more I read about it because I absolutely think the Peninsula could benefit from a state-of-the-art equestrian facility, which the Downs would create (think Olympic host standard), but I don't like the rest of it. They'd add in hotels, housing, a sports complex, a RACETRACK (a horse-like one), and some sort of "throwback town". Not to mention a dog barn is even going in so your dog can rest after a long hike while you go eat or watch a movie (what?!). I adore my horses and, honestly, it'd be kind of cool if TB racing came to the Peninsula (though, that'd be absolutely ridiculous given the current racing economy), but this is far too big of a development. It'd butt right up against CSUMB (in its backyard, practically) and FORHA and BLM lands. I know one argument is there is already a great deal of land already preserved and we can't preserve it all, but...why is it so big?! CSUMB would benefit from the center a lot too (it's mentioned "indoor graduations" and the future CSUMB equestrian team). In some ways, they make Monterey Downs sound like it'd be the new Fairgrounds, but in a town-like atmosphere since a movie theater would also go in the Downs. I'd like to see a smaller plan, personally. There is an awful lot of housing in the plan. Sure, if you're making a world class equestrian center, you'll need hotels and offices, but what's with the housing? I don't know. It'll be interesting. There's a lot of heat on the issue. I think it'd be interesting, but I don't really like how BIG it is and will probably vote no on it. If it does pass, it's going to be a LONG time before it's finished. We'll see! Must read more into it all...I've only just started and everyone at work is confused about it. LoL

Movies...Not a whole lot right now, but I'm liking a lot in theater, but I'm adverse to watching dramas in theater because of the expense. We'll see. Long reviews for 2/3 movies because there's a lot to be said. :)

Much Ado About Nothing (Amy Acker, Alexis Denisof) - Whedon had always wanted to do Much Ado About Nothing and he ended up filming it at his house in California. The cast was fun to see because a lot of them had worked with him previously so it was fun picking them out. I thought it was good, but it was kind of weird seeing it in a modern setting and Shakespearean language. Other than abridging it, he's pretty faithful to the play. I liked the acting and the movie (it's in black and white), but it's not something I would normally watch. I mostly watched it because it's Whedon and I liked the cast ensemble. Not bad, but not terrific either. Grade: B

After Earth (Will Smith, Jaden Smith) - Not having read much about the film prior, I was informed right before I watched it that the movie was based in Scientology. Not really knowing so much about Scientology I sort of pushed the information aside in my head and watched the film. After watching it, I really researched Scientology and I can see why people say that; however, it's a sci-fi film and Scientology was created by a sci-fi author. This means that the movie's themes are not, specifically, Scientology brainwashing. I could probably name a few other films where the same themes play out. I will say that if you DO know Scientology and the Smiths one might NOT be able to ignore the themes, but I had no problems. The main themes are about getting past our fears and moving on from our traumatic pasts, which can be found in several movies. On the other hand, in Scientology, that is called "auditing." I will say it's much more prevalent than in most movies about not being fearful, but it's nothing new either. So, to me, it didn't affect my watching the movie at all. With that said, this was a disappointment of a film. There was no way I was seeing it in theater since it's a Shyamalan film and he totally burned me on Last Airbender (I will NEVER forgive him for that!), but I wanted to see it because of the Smiths. So, my main conclusion: Not a terrible Shyamalan film; a terrible Smiths film. I didn't enjoy the acting from Jaden and I know he isn't a terrible actor given I liked him in Pursuit to Happyness and he didn't do too bad in Karate Kid. Will is up for debate. His character is REALLY stiff and hard to get an emotional attachment to so I'm a little ambivalent about him, which you can either say is good acting or not. The story was also highly predictable and very linear. There wasn't any real exploration or "new" aspects to the story at all, which made it kind of boring. At least the time kind of went by quickly...? Grade: C (maybe C-)

Gravity (Sandra Bullock, George Clooney) - By far the ONE movie EVERYONE has to see in 3D in theaters. Avatar was great in 3D in theaters because the movie was made for it and had great special effects so the 3D was useful and beneficial, which, to me, up till this point made it the best 3D feature film. Unfortunately, Gravity takes that spot for me. This movie HAS to be seen in 3D to get the full effect of being in space. Most films you watch in 3D and it's just a depth perception thing, but Cuaron utilized it so it made you feel like you were in space. It's hard to describe, but the special effects were absolutely amazing and it was terrific when things in space would float out further to you than the actor to give you that great zero gravity feeling. I guess the difference with Avatar is you can enjoy the film in 2D and the 3D just made it more fun, but the 3D in Gravity puts you into space and watching it in 2D will loose an entire aspect of the movie like losing one of our senses. Outside of the 3D, the special effects were really good. If it doesn't win best special effects at the Oscars, I'd be really surprised. I think my favorite effect, which wasn't really a special effect, but cinematography was when the camera was outside Bullock's helmet and then zooms in and then you figure out you're inside her helmet and then it zooms back out. It was really subtle and good. The acting was also really good. I enjoyed Bullock and Clooney. There were a few moments I wanted to strangle Bullock, but it wasn't like I wouldn't probably be doing the same thing she'd be doing. With the acting and special effects excellent, I had issues with the story. Actually, I had major issues with the story. First off, the movie is only 1.5 hours long and I felt EVERY minute of it. It's intense. There is one point where things relax and I actually got bored. I was sitting there trying to figure out how much was left in the movie because I was so bored. Then everything that could possibly go wrong goes wrong. There were people sitting behind me commenting at certain points and normally that would bother me, but I agreed with them on everything! If you watch it, you'll understand what I mean -- especially the very, very end. The end practically became laughable because of the rest of the movie. At any rate, I think it's worth the theater cost to see in 3D and I think the acting and special effects carry the entire movie. The movie wins absolutely nothing in writing, in my opinion, but it could win all sorts of awards for directing, cinematography, special effects, and acting. Would I see it again? Probably not, but one of my favorite films of the year. Grade: A