Potterpalooza Countdown Day 9

Yes, that is a lightning bolt scar. And my huge schnoz.


I wish I had a robe or an awesome denim jacket to put this on.


Professor Quirrell impersonation. My turban is FABULOUS


CANDY.

A Gross Anniversary

Seven years ago today, I woke up at 6:30 am to get ready for work. I went out to the living room of the apartment that my best friend and I were living in Louisville, and I turned on the TV, as I always did. I noticed that there were messages on the answering machine, and when I hit the button, I heard my mother yelling like a maniac on the machine. I called her and she told me that something had happened at my apartment building, and she was calling to make sure I was okay. I told her I was fine, that she was crazy, and hung up.

That is when I went back in the living room and started to watch the news. On the news, one of the local news girls was standing in front of a building that had very distinctive shrubbery. This shrubbery looked very familiar. I leaned over to the window beside me and pulled the blinds down.

That news girl was standing just below my window.

This is when the police came and knocked on the door. I went and woke Eleisha up because the cops wanted to talk to us. The man that had been living upstairs had murdered his girlfriend. After months of abuse, he had snapped during an argument. He had stabbed her several times, then he took the woman's four year old daughter to her grandmother's and called the police to turn himself in.

It was the most insane, shocking day of my entire life.

Long story short, Eleisha had heard some things that night that turned out to be evidence, and she ended up having to go testify against this guy twice. I cannot express to you the absolute horror of having to sleep in that apartment that night. We pulled my futon mattress into the living room and slept on it together because we were so scared. Scared of what, I don't know. He had turned himself in, but in that moment, we knew that we were not safe. The world is not a safe place.

We had moved into that apartment in February of that year, and then in July this had happened. We had never been away from home before, and this is what we have to deal with when we finally do get away. It is a day that I will never forget as long as I live.

I will also never forget the looks on the faces of that woman's family when we went to court. I will never forget seeing her little girl playing outside. I will never forget how we screamed and hit the ceiling with a broom because they were too loud all the time. I will never forget feeling like we could have saved her life if we had realized what we were hearing instead of just being annoyed that we couldn't hear the TV.

Seven years later, and I still woke up with a sick feeling in my stomach.

Potterpalooza extra!

I changed the masthead to reflect my current state of Potter-Mania, though I really hate how it doesn't go over that whole box thing that is there. I need to look into finding a different layout to fix that. Hrm..

Anyway, happy 1 week until Potter!

POTTERPALOOZA COUNTDOWN

Day 1--Potter rings on fingers, dig out Slytherin messenger bag

Day 3--90% Potter outfit

Day 5--watch and listen to random Harry Potter media online



With 8 days left to go, I still have SO much to do.

--get hair cut and colored, find flat-iron, perfect Snape-hair before the big day
--decide on outfit, HOPEFULLY find a black pleated skirt if nothing else
--FIND SLYTHERIN TOE SOCKS
--watch all five movies
--hold Harry Potter Scene It tournament
--find some way to display Harry Potter tattoos...though not sure how possible that will be
--buy HBP video game for the Wii
--get this series of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Bean, removing all Booger, Vomit, and Ear Wax ones


OMFG POTTER IN 8 FREAKING DAYS. *THUD*

The Joys of My Job

Dispatcher: 911, where is your emergency?
Woman: Yeah...last night, a raccoon came into my house, and it crawled up into my roll-top desk. So, I closed the top and put the desk out on my porch. Now, the raccoon crawled up into the part where it rolls, and I can't get it out. I need help.
Dispatcher: ........


This is just a typical day, though holidays are usually more insane than most. Luckily, I got to leave at 5, so I missed out on most of the craziness, I hope.

My First-Born Child Will Be Named Starscream

This movie really could have been called two things other than "Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen."

It could have been called "Transformers: Megatron Pwnz0rs All," or "Transformers: Revenge of Megan Fox's Boobs," because that is what this movie is-- Megatron owning everybody and Megan Fox running around with Megan Fox's boobs in Megan Fox's incredibly tight white pants. I am good with both of those things.

The first thing you should know about this movie is that it is an action movie. That's it. Remember that going in, and you will love it. If you expect it to be anything more, you will leave the theater disappointed. If you go in thinking it will be better than the first one, you will be disappointed. If you go in thinking you will not stare at Megan Fox's boobs, you will be disappointed.

1--THIS IS AN ACTION MOVIE
2--IT IS NOT BETTER THAN THE FIRST ONE.
3--YOU WILL STARE AT MEGAN FOX'S BOOBS.

Accept these three things and you will have a great time!

Yes, the movie has problems. It's a given that it would have problems. But none of the problems it has are so bad that I can't overlook them. That being said...


THE GOOD

Megatron--or more specifically, Hugo Weaving as Megatron. He's great! The voice is just amazing, and finally, in this one, I heard Hugo Weaving whereas in the first one, if you didn't know, you probably wouldn't know it was him. This movie was a Megatronpalooza, and that is win.

The Sound Effects and Music--You know how at the beginning of Dreamworks movies they have the little guy sitting on the moon fishing and his little bobber thing plops into the water? Ha, not in a Transformers movie. Instead, during the studio credits, we get the roboty sounds. It's a great way to get you sucked right into the movie. It's like OMFG YES TRANSFORMERS!!1!1 The sounds they make when they transform and the cool sound it makes when they shoot their weapons...it's so just awesome! Plus, when the Decepticons talk to each other in their weird language it totally shook the seats in the theater. WIN! Plus, incorporating the sound of Linkin Park's song from the first movie was genius. The new single for this one isn't as good as "What I've Done," but since "The New Divide" was written especially for the movie, I think they did a damn good job. The score is fantastic, too.

The Parents--Sam's parents are hilarious. His mom actually gets stoned and acts insane, and it is magic. There's a scene between Sam and his parents that will absolutely choke you up. It's a strange poignant moment in the middle of insane robot death matches. They're a great comic relief in the mess of murder and destruction.

Shia LeBeouf--I don't care what ANYBODY says. I can NEVER have enough LeBeouf.

Starscream--I maintain that Starscream is the coolest of all the Transformers, but he is always third behind the nostalgic favorite Optimus Prime and Megatron, who is my favorite. You really get to see just how abused Starscream is in this movie. He is very obviously Megatron's bitch, and they are gay robot boyfriends. He has new Decepticon tattoos, and there's just something scary about the times when they see him coming. In the audience, people were going OMG NOOOOO! IT'S STARSCREAM! Starscream will be the name of my first-born child.

The Decepticons--in general, they are awesome. Soundwave, Devastator (even though Devastator was a typo in the first movie for one that was named Brawl), and ESPECIALLY Ravage. An asteroid crashes into the ocean and a robot jaguar jumps out? WHAT IS MORE AWESOME THAN THAT?

Characterization--I was very happy to see that they gave the Transformers personalities. We got to see more than just them transforming and fighting. We got to see the dynamic between Megatron and Starscream. We got to see that they have lives behind just being robots that cause mayhem, and that is awesome.

The Way You Feel When You See Optimus Prime--nevermind the fact that he turned into a fire truck originally. Every time you see that blue Peterbuilt truck with the flames, I think the six year old inside all of us screams and dances. At least mine does. It reminds me of a different time, a happier time when I was little and didn't know what I know now.

Megan Fox's Boobs--they're fantastic.


THE BAD

The Fallen--I'm not sure why they decided to go with this storyline, but it's not what I would have chosen if it was my choice. After the insanity of the first one, it makes more sense that the Decepticons would rescue Megatron, and it would be HIS revenge for his defeat. Instead, The Fallen just sort of appears, and Megatron goes to serve him. Unless we're suppose to forget everything that happened in the first movie, and in that case, hey! It makes perfect sense. Sorry, no. They said Megatron crash landed on Earth thousands of years before the events of the movie, and what? The Fallen was just hanging out waiting for him to thaw? I don't think so.

The Story--I will admit, it gets a little convoluted. It's a lot to follow if you're not in the know about Transformers. I don't know everything, but I know a little, and even I was like, "WHAT?" They get a bit deeper into the mythology than really needs to be done, but in the end, it's a movie about alien robots. What am I expecting?

The Dialogue--the whole first thirty minutes of the movie, everyone is talking so fast you can barely understand them. I found myself wishing for closed captioning just so I could follow along. I know Sam is neurotic, but whoa.

The Twins, Mudflap and Skids--there were accusations of racism about these two. Usually, I don't buy into the stupid claims of such things since IT IS A MOVIE ABOUT ALIEN ROBOTS, but I'm going to have to agree. They have gold teeth! GOLD TEETH. It wasn't enough to outrage me, but it was enough that I saw what they were talking about and agreed. Bad move on the producer's part. I could have done without them in the movie alltogether, honestly.

Dead Optimus Prime--I swear, I almost cried. Why would they do that to us? It's just wrong in so many ways. On the upside, his death scene, which is an all out brawl between him and Megatron, is made of win.

Dead Sam--RESURRECTION? FROM BEING TOLD 'I LOVE YOU'? So over-played and annoying. Some angelic Autobots tell Sam to go back and not die? REALLY? REALLY!?!


THE RANDOM

--There were so many damn robots in this movie that it was almost hard to keep up. It's especially difficult once you get the Constructicons involved. Who is a good guy? Who's a bad guy? I don't know how the army guys knew who to shoot.

--Why is it that the first time we see them transform it takes twelve hours, but after that it's like BOOM TRANSFORMED?

--The opening scene takes place in China where this special team of humans and Autobots have some kind of partnership to go around and catch lingering Decepticons who are hiding on Earth. They practically destroy the entire town they are in. So all of that property damage and death to civilians is worth catching one Decepticon who was hanging out as a bulldozer and not hurting anybody?

--Be warned. This movie has much harsher language than the first. They even use the "P-word," which is a no-no for me. I could see uncomfortable parents with their six year olds going o.O Hey, it's a PG-13 movie. Get over it.

--I'm pretty ambivalent about the new guy, Leo. I don't like or dislike him. He's sort of just there.

--I really think they could have left Jetfire out of it, but the scenes where they go to find him are pretty funny.


Overall, I pretty much loved this movie. I thought it was great. I'm not sure what the critics found so wrong about it because I found it every kind of right.

Especially Megan Fox's boobs.

Attack of the Killer Sushi

Three things happened because we decided to eat at the Chinese buffet for dinner tonight.

1. My sister's baby's daddy proved that he is an unimaginable asshole.
2. I finally conquered my fear and tried a piece of sushi.
3. The waitress asked if my mother was a senior citizen. She's 48.

I have gone into that buffet at least ten times in the past six months, and every time I go, I go over to the place where they have the sushi, and I stare at it. I stare at the weird little rice and seaweed monsters. I stare, and I stare, and I stare, and then I always chicken out and go back to my seat sushi-less. It's the idea of biting into that mess in the middle that bothers me. I have a thing about texture. I pick up the sushi, and it feels so weird and spongy, and the idea of putting that into my mouth is just too much. The idea of my front teeth biting into that mess is just too big a hurdle to jump over. I reasoned that if I could get the whole thing into my extraordinarily huge gob all at once, I might be able to manage, but since I have never found a piece small enough for that, I was safe.

This time, I went up to that little sushi tray, and I stared at the seaweed wrapped kind, and it stared back at me with it's weird green and yellow stuff in the middle, mocking me with it's perfectly round shape, and I said, "Today is the day, seaweed thing!" I picked that spongy thing up and put it on my plate, and then I practically RAN back to the table. I announced my triumph. I had never successfully gotten a piece onto my plate, and there it was! VICTORY!

The only problem now that it was on my plate was that it was obviously too big to be eaten in one bite. I managed to get rid of some of the rice and seaweed to mold it into a more bite-sized piece, trying so hard not to look at what was in the middle of this monstrosity. The seaweed and rice didn't really taste so bad. It really didn't taste like anything. So far, so good. That was until I put that thing into my mouth and started to chew.

It crunched, and my mouth was instantly on fire.

I have no idea what was in it, but I chewed and swallowed what I could, but it was just too much. I had to spit out what I couldn't choke down. The taste really wasn't so bad. It really didn't have a taste except, of course, of the taste of the volcanic, nuclear, lava from the bowels of Hell THING that crunched in the middle. The problem was that as soon as I crunched on that little piece of the things nightmares are made of, it felt like somebody had put a bullet into my forehead.

Then my lips started to go numb.

Then I was deliriously giddy for all of ten minutes.

Then my face, every freaking INCH OF MY FACE, started to feel like it was melting off like the Nazis at the end of "Raiders of the Lost Ark."

Thank heavens I fell asleep in the back of the car on the way home.

I now feel like I have been run over several times by a bulldozer.

People who tell you to try new things are idiots. Don't listen to them.