Star Wars: In Concert

So for those of you who like Star Wars, this is for you...

About a month ago I discovered that there was going to be something called "Star Wars: In Concert" at the Honda Center (formerly known as The Pond) and I simply had to check this out for two reasons.

1. My boyfriend is a Star Wars geek and God bless him he's adorable when he geeks out on me.

2. I love John William's music, period.

As it turns out, this was my perfect version of heaven. A full orchestra playing Star Wars music.

I got tickets almost within the first hour they were on sale.

Man, it was beautiful. If there's one thing I love, its music. And this orchestra was amazing. Being in a stadium surrounded by hardcore fans of the movies, and having a pair of great seats was wonderful. There was a enormous HD screen over the orchestra itself and some nice laser, fog and fire effects were wonderful touches, as well at the crystal clear surround sound. 

The event was hosted by Anthony Daniels....C-3PO himself.....

The whole thing opened with the opening score that begins all of the movies, and as the lights suddenly went out in the theater, 20 thousand people gasped, then screamed. That opening score was so beautifully performed, so flawlessly delivered. The next pieces were played just as well and with a passion and dedication only true artists can execute. when the last notes were finally played, the orchestra got a full ten minutes of a standing ovation and a whole stadium of people who were babbling excitedly.

It was a fabulous night, and guess what? if you're a Star Wars fan this was only the second night of its American Tour.  Check ticketmaster for show dates.

it was worth it. plus they had some very nice exhibits as well and some interesting displays, including a lot of storm troopers, some model blaster rifles, a few light sabers and various costumes from the movies. Over all, on a scale of one to ten...it was twenty.

it's worth seeing.  I just can't say enough good things about it....

Go see it. You won't regret it. 

Why Starbucks and Vapid Chicks amuse me.....

So....yeah.....yesterday I was at Starbucks at the Block, getting some water cause it was so flippin' hot late at night even.

anyway.....the line was like twenty five people long and I was in back of all of it....and these two girls come in behind me. I'm not trying to generalize, but I'm going to right now cause there's no other words to describe them except 'valley girls" like 16 years old maybe with enough makeup to cover an entire Broadway show......

twice over....

Anyway...they're talking loudly. I mean really loudly. Enough to drown out the chatter coming from the combined efforts of roughly fourty five to fifty people in that small Starbucks.

here's what I heard....not word for word...but near enough:

Girl1"yeah...so David says he didn't want to hang out with me because he was tired."
Girl2"sure he was tired. You kow you need to ditch the loser and get another guy.'
Girl1"I don't get why he doesn't want to see me. We spent all last week together....and the last few days and he seemed fine then.'
Girl2"if he thinks he can just blow you off..."
Girl1"yeah totally. Like he's gonna find another girl as hot as me who will date him..."
Girl2"Put him in line."
Girl1"Well, his pal Drew likes me. I've seen him checking me out. You know those two are best friends....it'll probably hurt if I sleep with Drew wouldn't it?"
Girl2"Well then maybe David will learn to spend time with you..."
Girl1"Seriously. Fucking loser. I bet I call him right now and he's just lying around the house."
Girl2 Well...I bet Drew's home. Call him up and maybe you can...."

At this point everyone in Starbucks is now looking at tese two, either blantently staring, or shooting them side looks. Now...I'm directly in front of these two girls.....my back turned to them...and slowly but surely my blood pressure is rising. 

Now we enter my mind:

It's Hot!
I'm the last person in line of like a zillion people, half of whom have no idea what they want to drink!!!
in fact I'm pretty sure those morons ordering right now have changed their order like twelve times.
GET OFF YOUR CEL PHONE AND ORDER YOU TWIT! just because you have your thumb up your butt doesn't mean the rest of us do!!! 
All I want is TWO BOTTLES OF WATER....how hard is that?! There needs to be a line for people who just want bottles of water. Simple no effort order. Each bottle is 1.80$ and you just have to pay for it and pick it up out of the cooler...
Jesus Christ what are these two idiots talking about behind me?!?!?!

As you may have gathered, I'm not a patient person when it comes to waiting in line....at least not while it's hot and I'm tired....

Well...that part of the conversation I listen in on and I have to tell you this....girls like these girls really piss me off.....like really really piss me off. Right up there with Animal Abusers and Racist People

I don't know what came over me. I turned around and shouted:

"Oh Shut your Damn Mouth!! The Reason your poor boyfriend who has got to have the patience of a SAINT wants to stay home is probably because HE'S TIRED OF YOUR FUCKING RETARDED ASS MOUTH! It's girls like you who end up on talk shows not knowing which of the NINE guys she slept with is the father of her baby!!! YOU GIVE ALL GIRLS A BAD NAME YOU SPOILED, STUPID BITCH!!!"

I swear to you that's what I said. I'm not joking. 

You could have heard a pin drop. Not joking. Really not joking. Then like a few people clapped and a few people laughed, and a few more people cheered a little. The girl didn't say anything...just looked really really really surprised.

I got to the front of the line and very calmly asked for two bottles of water. The guy got them for me and just GAVE them to me. I held out the $3.60 for him but he just waved it away and told me it was on them. I left and like three people patted me on the back as I left. 

All in all...I'm kinda sorry I did it...but damnit someone had to say something. it was like a Eric Cartman meltdown moment. not joking. I'm still a bit shocked about it.  My buddy Ryan said it was sort of my "slaying a dragon." thing...I'm not sure what he means by that, but woot for me....I think?

(this was a repost and re edit on my part, so if you read it sorry....but the grammar and general flow of the post was bugging me...)

I finally watched Ponyo....

For those of you who aren't really into animated films, Ponyo is a animated movie by Hayao Miyazaki the man who pretty much is Studio Ghibli....think like Japan's own living version of Walt Disney....

Anyway, going into this movie I was told by one of my friends that it's "pretty much Miyazaki's take on The Little Mermaid."  Alrighty then...doesn't sound too hard to understand, right?  Mermaid meets Prince, they fall in love, yada yada yada.....

Not really.

This plot involves some weird, mad scientist guy who lives under water in some magical bubbley type thing who HATES humans, and keeps his fish daughters in a bubble tank in his ship. Yes, his daughters pretty much resemble fish with faces. I'm not making this up, by the way....

One of his daughters wanders away, and makes it to the human populated world and thru a series of random events meets a little boy, who takes her in and names her "Ponyo."  It's important to note at one point, Ponyo gets a taste of his blood....yep, she drinks his blood. 

Not going there with this one....it was odd and made me a tiny bit nervous.....

Anyway, eventually Ponyo's dad comes looking for his daughter, and brings his rather creepy water minions along to help him find her. Ponyo, still a fish type creature manages to get washed back out to sea, and her dad takes her home.  The little boy is very sad and depressed about this, but Ponyo is at this point, one fish in an entire ocean.  not much he can do...

oh, but Ponyo isn't having any of this....

She wants to go back and find him and decides it's time to evolve. Once her dad leaves she breaks out again and goes and gets all hyped up on what is essence magical energy and goes to the surface. What she doesn't realize is that by doing this, basically becoming the Dark Phoenix herself in mermaid mode it's throwing off the balance of the ocean. Ships are being tossed around in huge waves, tidal waves like hundreds of feet high are seen, huge fish start appearing...sorta like a all around "end of the world" scenario by water instead of a zombie take over or a giant rock falling from the sky. 

Ponyo doesn't really realize all of this and simply rides the waves to land to find her boy. His name is Sosuke by the way. There is this really cool sequence of her literally running over the waves. Really cool animation done right there.  She ends up finding him and using magic she turns herself into a little girl. She ends up spending the night with Sosuke and his mom, enjoying being human. She likes human food and is very amused by a lot of the things on land. Then she goes to sleep.

Ponyo's dad shows up, and sees she's turned herself into a human. Worried, he asks Ponyo's mom for help. As it turns out, Ponyo's mom is a sea goddess and very powerful as well as very kind and loving. She asks Ponyo's dad why not let Ponyo be a human? she's happier that way. So they decide to test her and Sosuke and see if it's worth it....

Well...I won't explain the ending....it's worth watching it in theaters...

Now...let me give you some side notes on this movie....

for the first ten minutes I was pretty sure I had dropped acid and was now watching a fish tank. Not kidding. The animation is just...weird as all hell and very colorful. The plot half the time makes me want to scream at the parents in this film being so utterly brain dead. At one point Sosuke's mom leaves her son and some weird, clearly magical girl ALONE in the house while the world is coming to a end to go help some people at the senior center several miles away. THE KIDS ARE ONLY FIVE YEARS OLD!!!!!

I MEAN HOLY SHIT! SERIOUSLY?!?!

ugh. 

But beyond that, it was a enjoyable movie, very cute and entertaining.

I think if you want to watch it you just have to let your mind go as soon as you start watching. If any of you watched Spirited Away, another of Miyazaki's films you started off in a normal area, a car trip and moving day for a young girl and her family. This one you're dropped straight into Ponyo's world and it took me a few minutes to adjust. 

overall, on a scale of one to ten, with one being a: "omg, why was this movie even made?!" to ten being a: "THIS HAD BETTER WIN A OSCAR!" this was about a eight.....

it was really cute, once you realized this was a film purely for children......and it was just going to be weird. You just had to accept the weirdness. I recommend it if you wanna watch something relaxing, somewhat funny and sweet. 

it's about a hour and forty five minutes long too, so no real risk of getting a sore butt from it either. Have fun!

laters. 

The day I will Remember....Always.....

I was only in High School when this happened.

September 11th, 2001.

Doesn't seem like so long ago.

I can even recall exactly what I was wearing....

It was a navy blue shirt, my new pair of stone wash jeans, white and silver Nikes, and my hair was in a ponytail....I was getting ready for school.....

My mom got a call from my neighbor who said that something was happening in New York, and we needed to turn on the news....I flipped on channel 4 and saw the 2nd plane hit not three minutes later. I screamed for my mom, who was outside on the phone.

I don't know how I got to school that day, but all of our classes were cut short. Teachers dismissed us if we asked to leave and our parents were called to come get us. My friend Linny lived nearby and I went to her house after calling my mom to tell her I was safe and with all of my friends. We stayed in her house all day.

we cried and cried and cried.

I'd never felt so afraid and so unsure of what to do.

I prayed for all the people who we saw jump from the WTC before it collapsed. I prayed for all the families I knew would be crying that night. I prayed that the firemen and the police that day would find the strength they needed to keep going.

I'm not sure how I got home. I think my friend's mom took me home where my parents were waiting. We watched the news all night. The next day, I didn't go to school. I felt sick.  I remember curling up on my bed and crying so hard. 

The next day, I went to donate blood with four of my friends. I went to church and prayed. 

but most of all, I remember watching the news, always listening to the radio and praying....and hoping that I would be able to find some outlet for the pain I felt. and it never really came....I wanted to, with all my heart to get in a plane and go to New York. I wanted to help so badly. I felt that the only way I could let the anger and pain out was to dig in that rubble left behind. To move the chunks of debris myself and clear the mess away. I remember around September 19th, 2001 asking my mom if she would send me to New York. She was scared. She didn't want her little girl to go. So I contented myself as best as I could with organizing blood drives and raising money to help the families who survived that day....

It was awful feeling so helpless....sitting on an entirely different coast line. Wishing, wishing with all my heart that I was closer. I wanted to hand those poor firemen a bottle of water with my own hands or tell the men and women working on the site just how much we cared. How much I cared....

Before I knew it the year anniversary arrived.

I know what I was wearing then. A simple red shirt and dark jeans. I watched the memorial service, and cried. I cried until I felt sick. 

Each year after that day people seem to forget more. Or seem to forget just what happened. I read some comments on youtube showing footage of that day and people making snide comments. The most horrible one I've seen was someone simply writing the word "Splat" regarding some footage showing the people jumping from the WTC.

What makes people feel that this day is something to laugh about?  Every single one of those people who died left a family behind. Someone loved each and every one of those people. They were mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, cousins, friends, husbands, wives, children, grandchildren.....they were people.  People who died for no reason, who were going about their every day lives and found themselves in a horrible situation.

I would never want to be faced with that choice. face a burning death or throw myself into the air and fall.  I wonder, when I see this footage, if the firemen and the police that day see that day in their minds. If they see the people they couldn't save from that day behind their eyes or in their dreams....

I pray for the families of the ones who are left behind to deal with knowing there was no way they could have said goodbye....

and I pray for the City of New York itself, to heal. Because pain like that is something that becomes etched in the stones of the buildings and the gravel of the streets. 

I pray we never forget that day. I know that many will argue over the outcome of it all....war, the president the polices we put into place in that time....but let us never, never forget the lives of the innocent people lost that day. of families who lost loved ones and of children whose parents never came home.

Never forget...

IRON MAN: FINALLY, A COMIC BASED MOVIE THAT DOESN'T SUCK!!!

so, I admit, this is a shameless Iron Man fan letter written in a Nyquil induced love fest with all that is comic book based, but oh well. I love this movie.  Here's why.  

Enjoy

I love comic books. 

I love super heroes. 

I love a good action/ comedy movie

and by all that is holy, I love Iron Man.

Why?

cause he's a bad ass.

Tony Stark is basically a playboy genius, multi billionaire with enough money to wipe his butt with hundred dollar bills and not give a rat's ass. 

He also has the amazing Pepper Potts to watch his butt, so that's good too.

Stark is what I'm sure every single man in the world WANTS to be, but can't be.

He's rich, smart, charismatic, savvy, sexy, has a wicked sense of humor and somehow, manages to not take himself seriously. (I bet you could look up a want ad, for a woman seeking a man and find all of those things listed, in that order) And damnit, if he isn't good at just being awesome.

now, back to the movie.

This is one of those movie that makes you believe it's possible to believe that the superhero can actually live in this world. Like, it somehow manages to take the idea seriously. Let's look at the Fantastic Four movies. Yes, yes...I know, it hurts, but bear with me. 

Who for one minute looked at those movies and felt they were in any way at all, real? Not me.

Iron man is different. You can kinda look at Stark and think: "well, hell. I bet if you got someone smart enough, you could have one of those suits  in no time." 

and speaking of suits...holy crap, isn't that the coolest damn suit you've ever seen in your life? 

I WANT ONE!

no, seriously. I want a damn suit.

Now.

I'm serious. 

I've pondering trying to bribe my genius of a boyfriend into making me one. 

of course then if he could make one, he'd probably keep it.....

*GLARE*

Okay, I'm getting off topic. It's the medicine, sorry.

The acting and humor in this film are perfect. They don't overdue the explosions like you'd expect in a Michael Bay film. (Michael Bay is the 3rd largest exporter of explosions, Iran and Iraq being numbers 1 and 2 respectively.) 

It's just wonderfully done. I can't explain perfectly in words what makes this movie great. And if you haven't watched it (WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN HIDING, A FUCKING CAVE? ATLANTIS? UWE BOLL'S TALENT SUPPLY BOX?- HA! fucking horrible director....) then go watch it now!

This movie kicks off pretty damn fast and in a rather unexpected way, and it doesn't slow down. I love movies that can keep a good pace going. I enjoyed watching the trails and errors of building the suit itself. And the fight scenes were wonderfully rendered. 

There's nothing I can say about this movie that's a negative, expect the fact that it ends! damn! I wanted to keep it going for another few hours. i was ready for Iron Man 2 before I even left the theater for the first one. All I wanted was a small potty break and I was good to go for another five or six hours!

on a related note...why are the drink sizes at movie theaters getting bigger? no, really.

You look at the cup sizes at AMC lately?

Small = Milk Jug

Medium = about one and a half kiddie pools of liquid.

Large = full size Olympic Swimming pool, complete with your own lifeguard.

Extra Large = JESUS TAP DANCING CHRIST, YOU CAN FIT A POD OF KILLER WHALES IN THIS CUP!

and the assholes have the audacity to suggest "Free Refills" for any large drink purchased. 

I think my bladder was screaming and cursing me all at once when I had ingested enough cherry coke to drown a city block.  

Now, this was a movie I saw with a few of my friends and boyfriend and I was a retard and ordered myself a Olympic Swimming Pool of Cherry Coke. I hauled it into the theater....and to prove how awesome this movie is...I tell you this....

I finished the drink half way into the movie and refused to leave until the credits were rolling.

My eyes had turned yellow from the sheer amount of pee being held into of me and I wouldn't not leave until I was sure the movie was over. Life, 100% positive.

Maybe this just says I'm stubborn....or stupid...not sure...

either way....as I sat at home, stuffing my nose with kleenex and taking cold medicine, I remembered how cool this movie was and decided to write a nice little review. It could be better....but I have snot dripping from my left nostril. 

and with that image, I leave you.

go watch Iron Man.

Later!

I'm sick! GROSS!!

alrighty, so.....it was SUPPOSED to be a nice 3 day weekend for me...I had such wonderful plans....relax, hang out with some friends, go to the movies, basically enjoy some R & R that I never get during my busy ass week...

Nope.

My plans got ruined.

By some asshat evil cold germs....

I hate working for the public sometimes....

well, no that's not fair. 

I hate when the public brings their disease ridden, coughing, vomiting, sneezing, snot nosed little kids into my Park and expose me to their filth and plague. 

Leave the poor sick kids at home! 

My entire vacation got ruined because some kid sneezed and coughed in my face two days ago.

Yup. Totally pissed off.

I've drank enough orange juice, eaten enough soup and green tea to effectively cure one city block of Japan of SARS.

so that's like...what?  14,093 people, right?

What? Too soon?

too bad. I'm annoyed.

I've spent an entire three days in bed, coughing, hacking and stuffing tissue tampon rolls up my nose to prevent the dripping nose...

OMG! THE DRIPPY GROSS NOSE!!!

It won't STOP!  

WHY?!?! Why does it have to keep leaking snot everywhere?!

ugh.

The only plus side?

I'm calling in sick tomorrow and I'm catching up on my movie watching........

Yay for Dark Knight and Ironman!

Nothing says movie night like superhero night!

Woot!

Alrighty, I'm gonna go cough up a lung or my spleen...not sure which one yet.

Anyone got any good cold remedies? I'm all ears. 

*cough*

R.I.P my dear Jeans....

today marks a sad day in history for me...

today is the day my favorite pair of jeans has gone to join it's brethren in that big Denim Heaven in the Sky.

My dark washed, Boot Cut, low waist, size 4 jeans have finally worn out beyond repair. 

Oh they were GREAT jeans. Soft, and kinda worn out looking from the constant wear. you know that pair of jeans you have that just fell so good putting them on? They fit like a glove and  make you look damn hot in them? yeah. These were those jeans. My worn out, soft as silk, sexy jeans that I've had for nearly 3 years.....oh yeah, I loved these jeans. 

But today, most sadly, they've worn out and received a rip too big to repair. 

*sniffles*

I shall miss you, my trusty jeans of making me feel super sexy. 

I almost cried when I got off my bike after riding to the beach and snagged one of the pockets on a nail at the pier and ripped them.  

Call me attached to my clothing but it really did make me sad. 

I swear I'm going to have a Viking funeral for these jeans. 

You think I'm joking?  

I just finished a phone call with two of my best friends, they're buying firewood and lighter fluid and we're gonna burn them in honor of the 3 years of loyal service they've given me.

Not kidding.

Anyone know any appropriate funeral songs to sing around the funeral pyre?