A Little Bit of Everything

I'm pretty sure that these posts are supposed to have some sort of point.  At the very least they should be entertaining. Speaking of entertaining posts...

Check out Jen Lancaster at http://www.jennslyvania.com if you're searching for something that will make you laugh hard enough to not breath.  I absolutely love that she's as incapable of doing math as I am. And if her blog doesn't make you laugh, well I dare you to read any of her books and not be as smitten as I am.  If the story (in Bright Lights, Big Ass) involving a stapler and a paper examination gown doesn't crack your stony faced facade, I'm afraid that we can no longer be friends.

And if you'd prefer to have what feels like a one-on-one with a delightful baker, then by all means immediately proceed to http://www.joythebaker.com where every post is filled with LA sunshine and nuggets of wisdom.

On to other forms of entertainment. I watched a couple movies in the last week.  The first of which was Date Night with Steve Carell and Tina Fey.  Maybe it was the company I watched it in, the heat stroke from the 110 degree temps, or the excellent chocolate. But it was funny. Laugh out loud, tears running down my face, snorting instead of breathing laughing. That was followed up with Waitress, which always makes me want to bake a pie or ten. The supporting characters are as intriguing as Jenna, which is a rarity in movies. Let me amend that...at least a rarity in the movies I watch. When I popped in When In Rome last night, I assumed it would be an easy watch. I could do laundry and ice some cookies while it was in. It's the kind of typical romantic comedy fare that I simultaneously love and hate.  Life is just not that simple or compact and I tend to like a realistic ending over the fairy tale any day. Maybe it was the fact that I was exhausted or mentally drained. Whatever the reason, I wanted to be dancing in that fountain with Kristin Bell. And it's totally a conservative mom-approved movie.

The finale in this list is Remember Me.  If you haven't seen it and plan on seeing it, you may want to stop reading now. This "gem" of a movie totally did not hold my interest for the majority of the time. I kept itching to turn it off and get to the gym.  Lena Olin and Ruby Jerins were the shining gems, as far as I could tell.  This doesn't bode well for Water for Elephants.  I have yet to see Rob Pattinson in anything that makes me want to pay attention - maybe Twilight and Remember Me aren't the crowning glory in his movie making diadem? I'm hoping that Reese Witherspoon and Cristoph Waltz (who's entire imdb biography is in GERMAN) will help bring him to life.  Anyway, I digress.  Remember Me was almost unforgettable to me, except for the end. I don't know how I hadn't heard that the movie ends on September 11, 2001.  And while I was watching it, as I realized where Tyler Hawkins was, there was a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. I knew someone died in the end prior to watching it since a friend described it as "Nicholas Sparks kind of, you know, with the twist". For a minute there, I was wondering which character it would be due to some foreshadowing fake-out that occurred earlier in the story line. Back to my sinking stomach. Was I dreading the inevitable outcome related to someone who was in midtown Manhattan on the 89th floor of the World Trade Towers on that day? Was it that the family who had seemed so two dimensional for the previous hour and half suddenly seemed more tangible? Was it because this was the first movie I've seen that referenced that day? It boiled down to me wondering if the shock value of the ending negated any subtle nuances that had managed to be built throughout the movie. Was it a crass move to so neatly tie this family's story together by using that day? I'm still not sure.

In other news, I hit the gym today. I have heard of the mythical runner's high.  It's even possible I caught a glimpse of it the day I ran the half marathon a couple months ago. What I know for sure is that I have not seen it since.  I've had more bad runs that good. I've struggled and wheezed and wondered what the heck I was trying to accomplish. Then I remember the 4 donuts I ate and suddenly remember what the heck I'm trying to accomplish. In case that's not clear enough, I'm trying to avoid having a backside that rivals New Jersey in size. I'm already enough of a guidette due to my heritage alone, I don't need to physically embody Jersey as well. I tried a new method today of running 4 miles then stopping to do some strength training for 20 minutes then running another 1-2 miles. I was hoping that the break in the middle would help me run further overall. It's possible that it would if I do this enough over time, but I am impatient. Impatient. IMPATIENT. I like to see progress now, not a month from now. So we'll see how long I keep this up.

There it is. A little bit of everything.