Accomplishing Escapism

DAMN but this was a GREAT year for film.  I saw a whole bunch of really enjoyable, well-put together movies, and I thought that in general, there weren't very many poor showings.  That said, here's what I thought truly blew me away.

10. Adventureland
9. The Soloist
8. Up in the Air
7. Taken
6. Up
5. District 9
4. Where the Wild Things Are
3. Coraline
2. Fantastic Mr. Fox
1. Star Trek

I stand by putting Star Trek in my number one slot, and I'll tell you why.  Not only did I enjoy watching it more than any other film this year (and more than most films in a long time), but I thought the acting was fabulous, the story was fun, and it looked great.  Re-view-ability is pretty important to me, and Star Trek has it in spades.  But I also thought it went beyond the normal summer popcorn fair - it not only revived a classic canon, but breathed new life into it.  The pacing was excellent and the script was fun (also pretty witty).  It wasn't perfect, but hardly any film really is.

 On Friday I skipped work to have a mole removed from my foot.  The mole was not cancerous, but my dermatologist said it was definitely a "high risk" blemish - words that made me nervous enough to have the whole thing cut out.  So now I have four stitches in the really thin skin right about my heel on the inside of my right foot.  It hurts to walk, so I've been moving in this kind of twisted club foot-esque fashion.  When strangers ask me why I'm limping, I've been telling them mysteriously that I have a congenital birth defect.

But seriously, if I don't know you, why would you care about my foot?  Or expect me to share?

Before I got my parrot, I did a lot of reading on them - what they eat, what their habits are, that kind of thing.  Because I am a responsible pet owner.  Almost everything I read said that conures like to have hidey holes, things to poke their heads in, and things to sleep in.  So when I set up Dizzy's sleeping cage I included a fuzzy sleeping tent.  I had no idea if he was actually using it or not, because he always wakes up before I do; but Monday morning, I slept all the way through to my alarm and realized Dizzy wasn't making noise in his cage, waiting to be let out.  I pulled the sheet off and had a split second panic attack because I couldn't see him in the cage at all - until I noticed the long red tail feathers poking out the end of the fuzzy tent.  He didn't move or make a sound until I tugged on his tail feathers, wherein he immediately poked his head out the other end all "What?  A guy can't get five more minutes?"

And it was pretty much the cutest thing ever.

There are three firms that work on the floor that my dad's firm is on.  One is a two-man team that just broke off of my dad's firm.  They're very used to using the assistants in the office to do their filing and such, but one of them is such an asshole that as soon as they formed their own firm all of us were like "Oh good, we don't have to deal with them anymore."  But since they do still need administrative help, I've been hired to do part time work for them (about 5-7 hours a week) at an additional income of $20 an hour (which is slightly more than my normal hourly rate).  As a consequence, I will end up staying later or coming in earlier more often so as not to affect my salary, but hey, extra cash is extra cash.  I will gladly come in an hour early to the tune of an extra $100 a week.

I got my shipping notice for my copy of Star Trek.  While I'm slightly annoyed that I don't have it NOW THIS INSTANT, I'm willing to wait for the sake of the discounted price I paid for it.

My mom has decided she wants to see more movies in theaters, a result of which is that I get to see more movies in theaters.  We saw Coco Before Chanel on Sunday, which was pretty much brilliant, and tonight we're going to see An Education.  I've also been holding weekly movie nights, the goal of which is to bring films most people haven't seen before, and so far it's a resounding success.  Our roster so far:
Sunshine
The Slipper and the Rose
A Boy and His Dog
Frailty
Night of the Hunter (which I'd seen!  Did Seth show me this?  I don't remember!)
I've got Saving Face on the backburner, and my mom gave me a pamphlet with cult films on it from the library, so undoubtedly movie nights will only get more interesting.

I had a dream the other night in which Zachary Quinto and I were hanging out.  Just chilling, no nudity or anything (much to my waking dismay...).  We were sitting at a table somewhere, and he was doing a crossword puzzle, and I was laughing about how much better he was at it than I was.  He was really a groovy dude, very laid back and fun to hang out with.  I hope in reality he's as cool as he was in my dream.

At one point, I was like "where's Chris Pine?"  And ZQ was all, "he was gonna come but I guess he couldn't."  Which is only notable because of the two I am definitely more attracted to Chris Pine, so if he HAD been there I can only assume it would have been a very different sort of dream.