As you all know, I've been exercising a lot recently. I've been looking for ways to keep it interesting since I get bored fairly easily. When I was younger, I adored horseback riding. I thought about picking it up again, but I'm not sure when I'd find time to do it. I do spend a lot of time drooling over riding boots and outfits. Now if only there were another 24 hours each day for me to do the stuff I want to do instead of the stuff I have to do. More riding and less working!
Favorite Friday
My daughter was sick today so she stayed home from school. I spent most of the day watching the "We Are SMAP" 2010 concert with her. This is the dance Nakai performed in honor of Michael Jackson. Unfortunately, the dance was not included in its appropriate spot on the DVD. He uses some of Michael's songs and the copyright holders wouldn't give permission to include it. If you have the DVD, you can see the dance with different music in the bonus features. But it's just not the same.
My innate gifting ability
Why is it that I find the best gifts for people after the holidays? First there were some rare NASCAR collectibles at the farmer's market that my father would love. Then I found some christmas gifts at Personal Creations that my mother or my aunt would adore. (They totally need the snowman water glasses.) Needless to say, I purchased a few of these goodies already. They will sit in my attic until next year. Maybe I'll be lucky and I'll have my Christmas shopping done by February!
JMovie review: Rookies: Sotsugyō
I was really hoping for some real closure with this movie. The boys would make it to Koshien and we'd see them kick everyone's butts in the tournament. Alas, we don't get to see that. We see the boys make it to Koshien but then the movie skips to their graduation. We never really find out how they performed.
That doesn't mean it was a bad movie. The two new characters, Akahoshi Shoji and Hamanaka Taiyo, are great additions to the cast. Without them, I think the movie would have felt repetitive since the team pretty much does the same thing over and over. I also enjoyed the actual graduation of the senior players. It was extremely heartwarming. There was more than one tear that came to my eye.
If you watched the drama, then you should watch this. It won't give you a ton of closure, but you will get some. However, if the drama wasn't your cup of tea, then you should be fine skipping this entirely.
Thank you!
Now that the holidays are officially over, it's time to write those thank you cards. I prefer personal thank yous like phone calls, but sometimes a card is required. Most of the time, I only use cards when the thank you is from my daughter. She's old enough to write by herself but not quite old enough to force her to talk to distant family members on the phone. There's only so much torture one kid can take :)
Movie review: Easy A
The movie opens with Olive trying to avoid going on vacation with her best friend, Rhiannon, and Rhiannon's hippy parents. She lies about having a date with a college boy, which leads Rhiannon to believe that Olive will lose her virginity. When Monday morning arrives, Rhiannon grills Olive for details. Initially, Olive says nothing happened on her date. After attempting to endure Rhiannon's antics, Olive lies about having sex. The rumor quickly spreads around the entire school and Olive finds herself slightly more popular as a result.
In class, where they are learning about "The Scarlet Letter," Olive is harassed by one of her classmates. She uses a vulgar retort and ends up in the principal's office, receiving detention as a punishment. In detention, she meets Brandon (Dan Byrd), a gay classmate with bully problems. The two become quick friends.
Brandon convinces Olive to pretend to have sex with him a party so the other guys will think he is straight and stop bullying him. Olive goes along with the plan, believing that more fake sex will raise her popularity even more. When she receives a gift from Brandon afterward, she realizes that there is a financial gain as well.
Soon, word gets out among the unpopular kids at school. Olive will have fake sex with people for gift cards. Unfortunately, this leads Marianne (Amanda Bynes), the leader of the school's religious group, to try to reform Olive's evil ways. The two strangely become friends. Until Marianne's boyfriend, Micah (Cam Gigandet), lies about contracting a sexually transmitted disease from Olive. An enraged Marianne tries to get Olive expelled.
With her reputation in the trash, Olive realizes that this type of popularity isn't what she actually wanted. As she tries to figure a way back to normality, she finds out that her old friend, Todd (Penn Badgley), has been in love with her the entire time. He never believed any of the rumors about her sex life. Together, they crash the school pep rally, telling everyone to watch a webcast. Of course, everyone believes the webcast will be of Olive having sex with Todd. Instead, it is Olive telling the truth about everything.
This is one of those movies I wanted to see as soon as I saw the first trailer. Unfortunately, I ended up having to wait until it hit the RedBox. I'm sad that I waited so long because this was an awesome movie. I had a little bit of difficulty believing Amanda Bynes as a Bible Thumper, but that didn't detract from its enjoyability. Emma Stone was absolutely perfect as Olive. She has managed to perfect the sarcastic wittiness that the character needed. I'm sure many people will write this off as a terrible teen flick. Don't. Go see it!
A New Microphone
Way back in November, I bought a new microphone for my birthday. Specifically, a Blue Snowball. Due to an illness, I wasn't able to use it for a few weeks. However, I got a chance to try it out recently and I love it. It not only looks cool but it makes my voice sound awesome. (Which is a feat since I usually hate my voice.) I can't wait to hear the final versions of the songs I recorded. (I have to hand my parts off to someone else who mixes my parts with everyone else's parts and the background music. It can take awhile.) If it sounds decent, maybe I'll share the file here!
Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol
We join Amy (Karen Gillian) and Rory (Arthur Darvill), the Doctor's companions from the previous season, on their honeymoon. Unfortunately, the passenger ship they are on is about to crash into a planet covered in strange clouds that screws up their controls. Of course, Amy calls the Doctor (Matt Smith) to save them. He can't use the TARDIS to save them so he lands on a building that seems to control the clouds. Sadly, he finds a bitter old man, Kazran Sardick (Michael Gambon), unwilling to help anyone.
This is where the Christmas Carol story begins. The Doctor goes back in time to Sardick's childhood to figure out where the man went wrong in life. He finds a boy who has had his curiosity and love stomped out by a demanding father. Luckily, the Doctor steps in to help foster the boy's curiosity about the fish that swim in the strange clouds. But where there are fish, there are predators too. After dodging a shark attack (and losing half of his sonic screwdriver in the process), young Sardick is crushed to find that the shark is dying. Unless they can get it back to the clouds, it won't survive. The only way to save the shark is to use an "icebox", a life support chamber that Sardick's father uses to control people, to transport it.
Young Sardick chooses the chamber of a young woman, Abigail Pettigrew (Katharine Jenkins), because she loves the fish. Just after releasing her, the shark attacks again. It is Abigail's singing that soothes the shark into submission. Once they save the shark, the boy decides that this has been a grand adventure. As Abigail returns to her chamber, young Sardick promises that the Doctor will return every year to celebrate Christmas Eve with them.
Years pass and the Doctor makes good on the promise. Every Christmas Eve, they release Abigail and travel around time with her. On the seventh year, Abigail confesses to a now teenaged Sardick that she was terminally ill when she was locked in the chamber. She only has one more day to live. Devestated, the lovestruck Sardick locks her back in the chamber without telling the Doctor about her condition. Realizing that life isn't fair, he still continues on the path to becoming a bitter old man.
Amy appears as a hologram to old Sardick in order to show him how to passengers of the doomed ship are coping. Since they know that singing can have an effect on the clouds, all of the passengers attempt to sing carols to stop the ship from crashing. The sound of the singing begins to break through to Sardick, but he just waves it away stubbornly.
As a last resort, the Doctor appears again telling old Sardick that he has shown him the past and the present. Now it is time for the future. He brings the boy to see what a crotchety old man he has become. This has a monumental effect on old Sardick, who vow to use his machine to save the ship. However, the Doctor has changed Sardick so much that the machine no longer recognizes him. Their only option is to use Abigail's voice to control the clouds again.
Knowing that this will be her final day, old Sardick opens her chamber one last time. She sings into the sonic screwdriver and the clouds stabilize, saving the ship and her 4000 passengers. Amy and Rory reunite with the Doctor, while Sardick and Abigail spend their last moments riding around the clouds in a shark-drawn carriage.
I usually like the Christmas specials. The Runaway Bride being the one episode I hated. This time around, I absolutely loved the episode. The interaction between the Doctor and the various incarnations of Sardick were wonderful. My favorite parts were when teenaged Sardick asked the Doctor for love advice. While I enjoyed CChristopher Eccleson and David Tennant as their respective Doctor, I really enjoy Matt Smith's version. He has the ability to be completely fun-loving yet deadly serious at the same time. If you haven't watched Doctor Who recently, this may be the one to latch onto.
New Year, New Look!
Welcome to 2011! The Geek is starting the new year with a new wintry look. It's almost too bad that I'll have to change it when winter ends! I do have quite a few reviews to post. I'm planning on starting those either this afternoon or tomorrow, depending on how busy I get. Please let me know if any of the new things aren't working for you. I'll do my best to fix any problems as soon as possible.
Let's get this new year started!