RIP MJ

"If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and then make a change." - Man in the Mirror, Michael Jackson

25 more things

Does this get us to 100? I don't remember. And it doesn't matter, anyway. I like making lists.

Oh, and before we start: I got the part-time job! Today was my first day and I had no idea what I was doing but I had a good time doing it. Except my feet kind of hurt from standing up the whole time. Overall, a good day, though.

Ok. Here we go:

1. People who treat their pets like their kids annoy the shit out of me.
2. If I'm in a bad mood, buying school supplies will instantly improve it.
3. The two new spiral notebooks I bought two days ago are dedicated to the screenplay writing.
4. I've bought and eaten a watermelon every week for the past month. By myself.
5. I don't mean this the way it's going to sound, but every once in a while it would be nice to be the center of attention.
6. Screw the Lakers.
7. But don't screw L.A., because that's where they make the movies.
8. Screw the Mavericks, while we're at it.
9. I get a 20% discount at my new job. That is dangerous business.
10. (Because everything I want to buy is really expensive. Damn budget.)
11. The first thing I notice about the opposite sex? Height.
12. The second? Teeth.
13. Sometimes, you just want to eat a hot dog.
14. According to my 4-yr-old nephew, "macaroni and cheese and hot dogs is a delicious meal." (He is clearly wise beyond his years.)
15. I am so ready to go to the beach it isn't even funny.
16. Most of the time I do my workout DVDs barefoot. That's probably bad.
17. I've slept with the closet light on ever since I woke up with a roach crawling on my arm two weeks ago.
18. Josh Duhamel is way too hot to be married to that girl from the Black Eyed Peas.
19. It makes me very sad that they've wrapped filming on the last Harry Potter movies.
20. On that same note, I really want to go to the new Potter theme park.
21. I haven't done karakoe in a while. That might have to happen soon.
22. I am awesome at the Kevin Bacon game.
23. I have the best greeting card ever, ready and waiting to be sent to the next person I know who needs to be cheered up.
24. Twenty-minute workouts don't sound like they'd be bad... unless Jillian Michaels is the one working you out. Bitch.
25. And now, I'm off to "shred" with Jillian...

What we've learned from horror movies

We played this game at work where we listed all the ways to not get dead, based solely on the education that horror movies offer. I now bring the game to you.

1. Don't be a minority.
2. Don't be a virgin.
3. Stay away from the docks.
4. The super creepy grounds keeper? He's on your side. And yet, you'll probably get him killed.
5. The sexy guy in a suit? He will kill you.
6. Always wear matching bras and panties, because you will most likely be wearing only those two garments when you're running through the woods.
7. For God's sake, if you have to run through the woods, at least kick off the stilettos first.
8. You know what? Just have sneakers on at all times. Even if you're only wearing a bra and panties.
9. Don't take a drive in rural Texas. There is nothing to see.
10. Don't ask to borrow someone's phone.
11. Don't be the quarterback.
12. Be single. If you're in a relationship, one or the other of you isn't going to make it.
13. Never say "I'll be right back." That's how you end up decapitated by a garage door.
14. Seances are not a good idea. Ever.
15. Superglue your car keys to your hand. None of this fumbling-in-the-dark-and-inevitably-dropping business.
16. Oh, but if you've left your car unattended... it will not start.
17. Don't seek shelter in the barn. Or slaughter house. Or shrimp boat.
18. Screaming makes no difference. Save your energy.
19. Always wear waterproof mascara.

and above all else

20. Whatever you do, do not... REPEAT, DO NOT... open the portals of Hell.

We'll always have Paris.

Worst way to wake up ever

Have I mentioned how much I hate bugs? LOATHE them, actually. And the worst bug that ever lived? The cockroach.

Ugh. Just typing that made me shudder.

And now I will give all of you (the 10 of you who read this) the heeby-jeebies with the story of how I woke up Sunday morning.

At about 4:30 a.m., I felt something on my arm. Something kind of poking my arm. I wiggled my arm, and the pokey thing moved. Still half asleep, I slapped at my arm with my other hand and flung the sheets off me and jumped out of bed. I turned the lamp on, squinted around, and saw nothing. I pulled my sheets back and shook them, but nothing was there.

I started to wonder if I'd dreamt the thing I felt, but I was sure I had not. I took the opportunity to go the bathroom, and when I walked back into my bedroom, something flew past me and landed behind the trash can next to my dresser.

"Alright, motherfucker."

With that announcement, I went into the other room and got my roach spray. As I was walking back into the bedroom, the little bastard ran out from behind the trash can towards me. I sprayed, and it kept running. I spray-chased it into the bathroom, where it finally hit the wall and flipped over.

A brown one. About two inches long. Disgusting.

It writhed for a while and then got still. They do that to psyche you out and make you think they are dead when they are not. No, I have a roach-killing process:

1. Spray it again. Just for good measure.
2. Get a section of newspaper. (Glad to know it's still good for something.)
3. Throw the newspaper on top of the roach.
4. Put on a sneaker.
5. Stomp the shit out of the roach. You must hear a crunch for initial squishing confirmation. You must lift the paper and see guts poking out of its ass (those are actually its brains. I've done research) for second and final squishing confirmation.
6. Use the newspaper to scoop up the squished little bastard and then flush it.

Oh yes, it's dead and gone. But now, of course, I am on high alert. I couldn't go back to sleep after that because I just knew there were more lurking around. I didn't even get back in bed. I propped myself on the coach with the spray and sneaker where I could reach them and managed to doze off eventually.

And I'm afraid to go to sleep tonight, too. I mean, I guess it's a good thing that I'm aware enough in my sleep to know when something is crawling on me... but no. I don't want to wake up like that again. I felt violated.

The apartment office is getting a call first thing Monday morning to have someone come out and spray. Warning to all bugs, but most especially roaches: You come into this house, you are dead.

Book Review: "Belong to Me"

This book is the sequel to "Love Walked In," which my book club read a couple of months ago. I got this one at the library, but I have a feeling I'll end up buying it, especially since Marisa de los Santos is writing a third in the series as we speak.

I love Cornelia Brown Sandoval. I wish she was real so she could be my friend. Because no matter what's going on in the lives of the people around her -- death, adultery, unrequited love, stalking, a child that the father didn't know he had fathered -- she can somehow make it better.

(This is, of course, crap. There is no way any of these things could be resolved so neatly in real life. But that's why this book is in the fiction section.)

A quick summary: Cornelia and Teo got married and moved from NYC to the suburbs of Philly after Cornelia suffered a miscarriage and 9/11 happened the next day. The neighborhood they move into is swarming with mean housewives and miserable husbands, led by the Queen of Mean, Piper. (Yeah. I know. I guess she needed a ridiculous name, though.) Just when Cornelia thinks she's not going to have any kind of friend in this new life, she meets Lake (I know) at the grocery store. They are like kindred spirits, but neither of them is completely honest with the other. Lake's son Dev falls for Cornelia's sort-of-stepdaughter Claire (from the previous book) and the two of them plus Dev's friend Aidan go on a hunt to find Dev's birth father.

Piper's best friend Elizabeth dies from cancer, and then Piper's husband Kyle leaves her, and even though it takes them a long time to get there, Cornelia helps Piper through it. Just by being Cornelia.

Cornelia helps Lake with Dev, plus tries to be a good friend when Lake falls for her next door neighbor.

Oh, and Cornelia's brother surprises everyone by showing up with a pregnant girlfriend. And since Cornelia is Cornelia, she stands firm by her brother until he realizes that he is meant to be a father.

And then, just when things seem to be working out smoothly for Cornelia (who by this time is pregnant to term with hers and Teo's baby) ... the bomb is dropped: Dev figures out that Teo is in fact his birth father, Lake confirms it (she had Teo didn't meet face-to-face until this confrontation, FYI), Teo is gobsmacked and Cornelia freaks the hell out. As a person would.

That was the hardest part of the book to read. Harder than Elizabeth dying of cancer, even. Because my heart just broke for Cornelia. All she wants and has tried to do for these two books is make sure everyone around her is ok. Even when she doesn't like them very much... she wants them to be ok. And she does whatever she can to help it happen. And not to say that this Dev bombshell is hers alone to bear... but, damn. Poor Cornelia.

(Also... I had a feeling something was going to throw us for a loop. Cover art can make for a good clue. Why are there four pairs of boots? Teo, Cornelia, the baby. 1, 2, 3. The fourth belonged to someone...).

In the end, things seem to strike a balance so that everyone is ok. Which makes Cornelia feel ok, which is supposed to make the reader feel ok. But I did not. I wanted all the other characters in this book to physically get down on their knees and kiss the ground Cornelia walks on. (They love her, of course... but I want to see her loved like nobody has ever been loved before. She deserves it.)

I really liked this book, and more than 50% of why is because of Marisa de los Santos. The woman is a linguistic artist. Her writing is so melodic, her turns of phrase are so well crafted. She is inspiring. She loves to write, and it radiates in every paragraph. I love when writers play with words. I picture her smiling when she thinks up some catchy bit of alliteration or a funny description (my favorite in this book: "a wildly fruitless squat thrust") and that makes me happy. I can't wait to read the next one.

Movie review: "Letters to Juliet"

I am turning into such a girl.

Normally when I see chic flicks, it's because my girlier friends are pouting and begging me to go. And I usually end up wanting to gouge my eyes out with my Twizzlers and cursing that Kate Hudson was ever born.

For the past several weeks, though, my estrogen levels have been at an all time high or something. I was the one who invited my friends to come with me to see this movie.

I defend this with these reasons:

1. The movie takes place in Italy. Who doesn't want to spend 2 hours looking at Italian scenery?

2. The male love interest has an accent. I loooooooooooove guys with accents.

3. Amanda Seyfried is a cool lady. Check out some of her interviews on YouTube to confirm.

4. Vanessa Redgrave is amazing. Period.

So I went into the theater, armed with Twizzlers, fully expecting to be annoyed just like I am every other time I see a movie that has Taylor Swift on the soundtrack. But guess what?

I freakin' loved this movie.

Amanda Seyfried plays Sophie, a wannabe writer who goes to Verona with her chef fiance Victor, who is too preoccupied with his own agenda to pay any attention to her. One of the many times she's left to her own devices, she comes across a group of women who serve as "Juliet's secretaries," meaning they answer the letters that people leave for Juliet on the wall of her house. Sophie finds one from 1957, replies to it, and is surprised a few days later with the arrival of the woman who wrote it, Claire, and her grandson Charlie (accent).

Charlie is a total ass, but because he has abandonment issues and fears for his grandmother's feelings. Claire, however, is determined to find Lorenzo, the long-lost love she wrote the letter about all those years ago. Sophie tags along and documents everything for a story she's planning to write and hopes it's what will finally get her published.

Over the course of the search for Lorenzo, Sophie realized what love really is and that she and Victor do not have it. And, of course, she and Charlie fall for each other. Alas, she goes back to New York and he to London. She gets published, breaks up with Victor and goes back to Italy for Lorenzo and Claire's wedding. She sees Charlie there, confesses her love, he confesses his, big dramatic kiss scene, that's a wrap, cut and print.

Like all chic flicks, this is predictable. Of course Charlie and Sophie would find their way back to each other. Of course it would be at the very last second when the audience is supposed to think it's never going to happen. Of course Taylor Swift is singing over the scene.

But for some reason, this time it was ok with me. Maybe because the movie poked fun at itself and the cheesiness of romantic comedies in general. Charlie's snark served well there. Maybe because of the four reasons I mentioned above. But mostly... mostly it's because I've been super girlie these days and seeing love on a screen makes me ache for love in real life. In Italy. With a guy who has an accent.

Book Review: "The Host"

This month's book club selection was Stephenie Meyer's "The Host." She also wrote the "Twilight" saga, so let's just get that out there and out of the way right off the bat... because this book is nothing like that series.

Well, except for some things.

But first, the things that are different. This book is about a post-apocalyptic Earth where human bodies have been taken over by alien "souls." They've invaded the planet because when they first came to check it out, they saw that we'd made a real mess of things. So now, all these human hosts get to live in an idyllic society where everything is free, there is no crime and nobody stirs the pot. The trade? The humans themselves don't get to appreciate this new world because their minds are taken over by the souls. At least, that's what's supposed to happen.

This story is told from a soul's point of view. Wanderer is placed inside Melanie's body. The problem? Melanie didn't actually go away like she should have. She's still in her own head, there with Wanderer (who they annoyingly call Wanda for short).

Over some time, Wanda absorbs Melanie's memories and feelings and sets out to find the secret hideout of unpossessed humans where Melanie's boyfriend and little brother are supposed to be. She finds them. They see that she's got Melanie's body, but she's clearly a soul. (Their eyes are reflective, that's how you can tell.) So they hate her. And keep her prisoner. And beat the crap out of her on multiple occasions.

Then, finally, they begin to trust her. And then they believe her when she says Melanie is still in there. And after like 300 more pages of this, Wanda decides Melanie deserves to have her life and body and boyfriend and brother back, so she gives away the aliens' most guarded secret -- the way to detach themselves from their host without killing either being.

Of course Jared, Mel's boyfriend, is all for this plan. Ian, however, has fallen in love with Wanda. That gets sticky, but they resolve it by removing Wanda from Mel's body and putting her in someone else's. And they all lived happily ever after. (No. They did not. Stephenie Meyer left it open for a sequel by having the humans come across another group of free humans, who tell them they know of even more free humans! Will they rise up and take their planet back?? If the author gets to writing, they just might).

I liked this book. It's better than "Twilight" in that it touches on actual social issues rather than just ridiculous teenage supernatural love. And while it bored me after a while, I can appreciate Stephenie's creativity in inventing the alien culture and history for this book. It's obvious that much more thought went into it than into the vampire culture she invented for "Twilight."

I did not like this book for the same reasons I do not like "Twilight." The heroine (I mean Wanda, not Melanie) is pathetic. Stephenie Meyer's anti-feminist bullshit really pisses me off. Yeah, I know, she's a Mormon. But guess what? If it was the end of the world, and you and your boyfriend thought you were the only two humans left on the planet (which they did at the time of this point I'm about to make) you would not stop yourselves from having sex because you had not yet turned 18. Are you joking? And speaking of no sex, I'm really pissed that Stephenie didn't give us even a smidge of some good stuff after Melanie was herself again. Because the first thing you'd do is say hello to everyone, give your family a hug and kiss and then lock yourself in your room with your boyfriend for, like, days. COME ON! I'm not saying I needed graphic details, but having one little sentence merely alluding to Melanie and Jared's reunion was just a damn tease.

If Stephenie does write more in this series, I hope she gives us the story from both Wanda's and Melanie's points of view. We saw this world through the both of them for a very long time. I would feel cheated if I didn't get to continue that.

And hey, how about a little sex, too? I mean... aren't Mormons the ones who have 13 million kids each? Come on, Steph. I know you've got it in you. (Um... no pun intended.) ;)