What the heck is moderation?

Mandy Moore Music Post

2007-06-19T18:47:00.001-04:00

I never write here. I never have anything interesting to say. I put all of my "this is what happened today, good times," crap in my GreatestJournal, and I wanted to save this one for interesting things I think about. But my brain has turned to mush and I don't think about interesting things and instead I tend to ponder Lindsay Lohan's rehab and Paris Hilton's jail sentence.

Okay, not entirely, but that has been a large portion of my time as of late. Not to mention that I've joined this role playing game and it's sort of taken over my life. /nerd.

Anyone, the point of this is to direct anyone who happens to read this blog to check out Mandy Moore's new record Wild Hope because it is incredible. It's the best she's done so far and I've been listening to it on repeat for a week now. She collaborated with a fantastic band called The Weepies, and this one sounds much more... folk, and much more... The Weepies. I've always thought she had an incredibly rich voice, and she really just doesn't let me down. I feel like I'm getting to know her, too, because she largely penned this album herself (with help, of course, but she still at least co-wrote all of the songs as far as I understand).

As stupid as it sounds, I just feel like I've grown up with her. I was probably about twelve when "Candy" and the record So Real came out, and from there she's just been growing with each new release, and I've loved each new release more than the last, like my musical tastes are growing with hers or something like that as we both mature. She's only three years older than I am, so I guess it makes sense.

Anyway. Go check it out.

She likes chocolate in the morning. She drinks her coffee late at night. You can sense that she is guarded, but that's alright. She'll fall asleep while you're still talking with unfinished books beside her bed. She'll cancel all of her appointments and go shopping instead.

Can't you just adore her?

She loves to watch the sunset, but she is partial to the rain. With those tears and that umbrella her allure goes unexplained. You make dinner in your apartment-- you both assume that she'll be late. She always has the best intentions because her goodness is innate.

Me and T.S.

2007-05-07T11:43:00.000-04:00

I love the Internet because of all the cool people. There are some shitty people, of course, but there are some really great ones, too. I met T.S. when I was like 15, so that was about five years ago. Every time I go to New York I meet up with him (mostly at Chipotle). I'm going to live in his bathtub sometime in the near future. I love meeting people from online...!

Tribeca Film Festival

2007-05-04T14:59:00.000-04:00

There's nothing cooler than proving to terrorists that they can't bring us down. There's no person cooler than Robert De Niro. There's no place cooler to have Robert De Niro proving that terrorists can't bring us down than New York City. Three parts cool, one part travel. Mix until it's all blended together. Your result will look like the Tribeca Film Festival.

One of these days I'm going to go and spend the entire two weeks in New York City traveling between cinemas and talking to directors and actors and all of the people behind the scenes of the Tribeca Film Festival. For this trip, though, I got just barely got a taste before being ushered back home.

My fandom(s) carries me to places all over the world. So far I've been to Toronto and London and New York in pursuit of films and premieres and meeting people, and so far it's all worked out. But one of the coolest things I've done is go to the Tribeca Film Festival.

Granted, it was only the second time I've ever been to a film festival in my life, and yes, it was less organized that the Toronto International Film Festival, and no, Cillian didn't attend this one-- but this time it was on my turf. I've been to New York before, so I knew my way around better than in Toronto. I was way closer to the cinema from my hotel, and I could take a nice little stroll to the theater. Not to mention that I was meeting three of the coolest people ever once I got there-- not counting the people who worked on the film.

Watching the Detectives had its world premiere on Tuesday, and I was there to witness it. That's saying something. There are very few people in the world who can say they did that, and I was one of them. It wasn't glamorous and no one was dressed horribly fancy (although Lucy Liu looked very gorgeous in her dress), and everyone hung around on the red carpet for a long time, just chatting.

The film was wonderful. I laughed the whole way through, and I loved every minute of it. It was clever and witty and intelligent, which is a shiny gold star on Paul Soter's report card. The film itself was worth the trip, but the people definitely added to the experience.

Several of the actors, as well as Soter, who wrote and directed the film, were present for a Q&A after the film, and they took to it, laughing and having fun with each other and the audience during the time they were up front. And then even afterwards, when the auditorium was clearing out, a few of them stood around to talk to fans-- namely Lucy Liu and Paul Soter.

Before you ask-- no, I didn't talk to Lucy Liu (although I stood beside her and she's probably only about five feet tall-- very tiny). Everyone seems to be so interested in that. More importantly to me was having a chat with Paul Soter.

Now, I don't clam up when I get nervous-- and I am always nervous when I meet new people, whether "famous" or not-- but I get chatty. I thought it was important to tell him how much I appreciated the film, so I went to talk to him. I waited patiently until he was done talking to the people in front of me, and then I shook his hand and told him it was a great film. I told him everyone I could hear laughed through the whole thing and the audience really seemed to take to it nicely. I told him I was glad I made the trip. He was very nice and responded to everything I said very humbly and even asked a couple of questions in response.

I am glad I made the trip. It would have been a wonderful trip and a wonderful first visit to the [slightly disorganized and chaotic, but only sixth annual] Tribeca Film Festival even if I hadn't met my awesome Internet fans or gotten to speak to Paul, but the best part about film festivals is how cool everyone is.

So scratch that first part. It's not three parts cool and one part travel. It's four parts cool and one part self-motivation. Final result is still something greatly akin to the Tribeca Film Festival.

The Invisible

2007-04-30T01:24:00.000-04:00

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

Why do movies almost always suck?

Here's hoping Watching the Detectives is at least decent. Although, from the clips I've seen so far it looks really funny. Plus, I mean, I'm obviously a little bit biased... I'm thinking about watching In the Land of Merry Misfits on Wednesday evening at the Tribeca Film Festival. It sounds funny, anyway.

Blah. It's so difficult to find good movies. =/ I hope The Dead Girl is good, too. I'm going to drive to Charleston and watch it at the West Virginia International Film Festival (yes, really) on May 12th.

The Condemned

2007-04-27T03:35:00.000-04:00

Why do I waste my time on shit movies? More importantly, why do I waste my time on shit movies that are obviously shit? I mean, there are some films that look like they have a chance at being good, but then there are the ones that when you watch the trailer you think to yourself, "Oh my god, that is going to be absolutely horrible."

Case in point: The Condemned. I saw the trailer at some point in the recent past, and thought, "Wow, that's going to be pointless and a waste of time." And yet I still watched it tonight.

Basically it's about a group of ten people who are on death row, and some Guy takes it upon himself to send them all to a deserted island and pit them against one another. He tells them that the last one alive will be a free man and get a ton of cash. So it's about people killing each other in order to be free. Ironic. Plus, there's a lot of attempted sentimentality that falls flat in a hurry.

It is absolutely pointless. But I already knew it would be. So I just confirmed my own suspicions. Hypothesis proven correct. Good times.

Masa Yamaguchi, however, is awesome.

I guess you're just what I needed.

2007-04-22T15:13:00.000-04:00

So I was just minding my own business checking my e-mail, and for those of you who have a Gmail account, you know that you can choose what sorts of news feeds and things are displayed at the top of your e-mail inbox. Well, one of my choices is "Entertainment," and when I see something interesting I always open it in a new window and go on checking my e-mail and then I get around to it and have a good time reading whatever it is that's sparked my interest in the first place.

There was one today that said something about a "We Will Rock You" musical, and I thought to myself, I though, "Holy crap! A Queen musical?!" so I clicked on it and then started to read the article and found out that yes, indeed, there is a QUEEN MUSICAL!! Now, apparently this has been around since 2002 (in England), but I've only just heard of it and I have a really deep, desperate, yearning to just fly to Toronto and watch it and then fly home. My heart aches to see it! That article even says that some reviews were "practically favorable." Sounds like GOLD to me!

I've been getting really into music lately anyway. Like, good music. I'm not sure if Queen qualifies as good music, but it's musical anyway, so there you are. I've been listening to a lot of stuff by The Cars, and Supertramp, and The Pixies and Van Morrison and Bob Dylan and Yoko Ono and I just wish I had been born sooner. I don't know that I really belong in this time period. Boo! Well, there are some really great bands from this time, too, I won't lie. I'm currently madly in love with Broken Social Scene, and I adore Snow Patrol and The Fray and Belle and Sebastian and The Weepies. But anyway, I added my Last.fm "latest tracks" audio scrobbler to the sidebar last night. I'm figuring out how to use this place! Slowly, but surely, my friends.

Does anyone even read this blog? If you do, comment here and tell me some of your most recent favorite artists or songs or albums or something. I'm really curious to see what everyone likes these days. I mean, I still listen to gimmicky corporate crap, and I love it all, but I'm just glad I'm starting to get more into the good artists. I wish my old computer hadn't died. I had hecka Beatles albums on there.

Alex Garland

2007-04-16T11:57:00.000-04:00

I wish I'd gotten to meet Alex Garland when I was in London. I received my Sunshine script book from Amazon.co.uk today (yay-- 100%!), and I've just sort of been leafing through it in order to get a feel for what it's going to be like when I can actually sit down and read it. The script book for The Wind That Shakes the Barley was a bit more difficult for me to get through, mostly because I'm awful at history. There are very few things that hold my interest regarding History or non-fiction, and the whole beginning of that one was just people talking about the history of Ireland and Britain, and although the story is interesting and important, it was just hard to read through everyone talking about the same thing for however many pages.

However, even though I haven't read much of anything in this script book for Sunshine, I did read Alex Garland's introduction. He's like so many "famous" people in that I want to sort of sit him down and just pick his brain for a while. I think it's so interesting the way he talks about the film and the "crew member" at the end... It's the same thing I've thought about over and over. Straight from the horse's mouth, eh?

Here's the introduction... it's copyright to him. I didn't write it.

Sunshine was created out of a love of science, and of science fiction. In the same way that 28 Days Later attempted to look back towards older post-apocalyptic stories, such as Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Triffids, Sunshine looked back to films such as 2001, Alien, Dark Star and the original Solaris. This was slow-paced, outer-space science fiction. Hallucinatory sci fi about star travel and feeling claustrophobic while gazing into the void. A sub-genre, linked by a common theme: that what man finds in deep space is his unconscious.
Aside from being a love letter to its antecedents, I wrote Sunshine as a film about atheism. A crew is en route to a God-like entity: the Sun. The Sun is larger and more powerful than we can imagine. The Sun gave us life, and can take it away. It is nurturing, in that it provides the means of our survival, but also terrifying and hostile, in that it will blind us if we look directly upon it, and its surface is as lethal to man as an environment can get.
As the crew travel nearer to the Sun, the majesty of the burning star fries their minds. The crew are hypnotised by it, or baffled by it, or driven mad by it. Ultimately, even the most rational crew member is overwhelmed by his sense of wonder and, as he falls into the star, he believes he is touching the face of God.
But he isn't. The Sun is God-like, but not God. Not a conscious being. Not a divine architect. And the crew member is only doing what man has always done: making an awestruck category error when confronted with our small place within the vast and neutral scheme of things.
The director, Danny Boyle, who is not atheistic in the way that I am, felt differently. He believed that the crew actually were meeting God. I didn't see this as a major problem, because the difference in our approach wasn't in conflict with the way in which the story would be told. The two interpretations that could be made from the narrative were the same two interpretations that could be made from the world around us. In that respect, perhaps the difference was even appropriate.

Betel nuts

2007-04-15T00:30:00.000-04:00

I ordered betel nuts for someone from online the other day, and I'm really curious to see what they do to a person. I've never done any sort of drug in my life. I've never smoked a cigarette, either, nor do I plan to do so. I've been drunk before, but I don't do it often, and most times I turn down a drink when it's offered to me. I didn't have anything to drink in Canada or England when I was there and legal, and even though it's not a big deal to have a drink with dinner or when I go out, I just generally don't.

However, I want to try the betel nuts. It's common practice to chew betel nuts, or roll them in leaves, or combine them with tobacco (etc.) in a lot of Asian countries. The ones I ordered for my friend are dried, so I don't think they can actually be chewed... but I could be wrong. Anyway, I want to try them. There are some serious long-term effects that come along with chewing them, but they aren't readily available around here or anything, and I don't plan on using them for a long time. I'm just curious.

Here are some of the effects listed:

mild euphoria and a sense of well-being
feelings of general arousal and increased alertness
palpitations and increased heart rate
increased blood pressure
sweating
facial flushing and a warm sensation in the body
tremors, dizziness, diarrhoea, upset stomach, vomiting, acute psychosis

ACUTE PSYCHOSIS? Really?! I think it's exciting to think about it. Once won't hurt. Not like it's crack, am I right? And, hey, it's common practice in Asia, so it can't be that bad. xP

Cutter.

2007-04-13T21:36:00.000-04:00

I hate the stigma that's attached to people who "cut." I think it's a very common misconception that the people who resort to self-harm are seeking attention. I think more often than not, the people who hurt themselves work very hard to hide it.

I remember thinking in high school (ninth grade-era) when I knew someone who cut that it seemed so idiotic. That there was absolutely no reason for anyone to hurt themselves at all. It just seemed like any intelligent person would be able to find a different way to deal with things. I realize now how terribly wrong I was. Well, I mean, I realized it before, but still. "Now" as in "relatively recently," as in... within about the past nine or ten months.

I don't think it's something a weak person does, or something a stupid person does. Yes, there are those people-- the ones who really do things like that for attention-- but I think that the vast majority of the people who hurt themselves are doing it as an outlet. It doesn't matter what kind of outlet, but it hurts to think that someone might not have any other way to get what is going on in their head out.

I've never written about it anywhere except in private to myself, and I told Lindsey about it, but I've "cut" before. I hate calling it that... it has such negative connotations. And, really, I guess it is a "negative" action, because it certainly isn't positive, but... whatever. Anyway. I've done it before, and I stopped before Christmas this past year in 2006. Every time I looked at my wrist, though, I could see the faint red area where it was scarred, just not very deeply.

Anyway, I haven't done it in a long time until... today. And it really scares me that I lost control. I think I'm being brave by writing about it here. I'm hoping that by telling people it'll help. I won't tell anyone in person (unless they read this, in which case, I probably deserve it)-- at least not unless it gets bad again. The scariest part is that I keep finding ways to justify it.

I don't like this part of myself. I knew it was going to happen, too, as stupid as that sounds. I wrote about it someplace else. I think growing up and being a human being is scary in itself. I don't think it's helping that I don't fit in where I live in this tiny, rural town in Bible-Belt-Virginia. I'm trying to get away, and my dad especially doesn't understand...

I told him on AIM tonight something that I think fits really well. It's just too hard. I hope I change my mind about that.

Photo

2007-04-13T03:16:00.000-04:00

Holy new photo, Batman. Click it to make it bigger. I've never done my hair like that before. =o Instead of straightening it while blow-drying, I scrunched. Good times, good times.

Caffeine.

2007-04-10T11:26:00.000-04:00

I think I might just write the same thing here as I do in my GJ, except here I'll make it less personal. Hmm. Whatever, I'm just procrastinating.

Caffeine is a xanthine alkaloid compound that acts as a stimulant in humans; stimulants are drugs that temporarily increase alertness and wakefulness. Therefore, caffeine temporarily increases alertness and wakefulness. Therefore, caffeine must be ingested in regular intervals in order to transition the aforementioned alertness and wakefulness from temporary to permanent, or at the very least, semi-permanent.

Roasted coffee beans are the world's primary source of caffeine; coffee is Amanda's primary source of caffeine. Therefore, roasted coffee beans are Amanda's primary source of caffeine and must be ingested in regular intervals in order to equate consciousness on Amanda's part, particularly when Amanda has slept for fewer than five hours and must be functional for an American Literature lecture followed by a full day of housework and errands, and then immediately followed by eight hours of work at a movie theater.

I love coffee. I love coffee in my shiny steel Toronto mug. I especially love coffee on days that end in "Y."

Oui. C'est fini.

I don't fit in.

2007-04-09T02:47:00.000-04:00

When I was a child everybody smiled. Nobody knows me at all.
Very late at night and in the morning light, nobody knows me at all.

Now I've got lots of friends. Yes-- but then again, nobody knows me at all.

Nobody knows me. Nobody knows me. Nobody knows me at all.

--

Everybody says "You can't. You can't. You can't. Don't try."
Still... everybody says that if they had the chance they'd fly like we do.

--

The Weepies are my heart right now. The lyrics above are just two examples of how incredible they are. They are absolutely wonderful... I keep listening to "Nobody Knows Me At All" on repeat. Even when I take it off repeat I listen to them anyway. Mandy Moore introduced me to them. I love her for it.

Growing up

2007-04-08T00:11:00.000-04:00

     Al, the handsomest man, looks bewildered and groggy over his first cup of coffee. His mustache is sprung and wild to match his sleep-jagged eyebrows as he peers around the table at us, asking, "What's this I hear about high jinks on the Mouse Rack with the wheelchair? Eh, dreamlets?"
     We all grin dutifully and Elly does her "Oh, Papa!" routine to disarm him while Mama blearily hands around filled breakfast plates, and drags her kimono sleeves through the butter every time she reaches across the table.
     I cut Arty's meat slowly while my chest fills with a yearning that would like to spill out through my eyes and nose. It is, I suppose, the common grief of children at having to protect their parents from reality. It is bitter for the young to see what awful innocence adults grow into, that terrible vulnerability that must be sheltered from the rodent mire of childhood.
     Can we blame the child for resenting the fantasy of largeness? Big, soft arms and deep voices in the dark saying, "Tell Papa, tell Mama, and we'll make it right." The child, screaming for refuge, senses how feeble a shelter the twig hut of grown-up awareness is. They claim strength, these parents, and complete sanctuary. The weeping earth itself knows how desperate is the child's need for exactly that sanctuary. How deep and sticky is the darkness of childhood, how rigid the blades of infant evil, which is unadulterated, unrestrained by the convenient cushions of age and its civilizing anesthesia.
     Grownups can deal with scraped knees, dropped ice-cream cones, and lost dollies, but if they suspected the real reasons we cry they would fling us out of their arms in horrified revulsion. Yet we are small and as terrified as we are terrifying in our ferocious appetites.
     We need that warm adult stupidity. Even knowing the illusion, we cry and hide in their laps, speaking only of defiled lollipops or lost bears, and getting a lollipop or a toy bear's worth of comfort. We make do with it rather than face alone the cavernous reaches of our skulls for which there is no remedy, no safety, no comfort at all. We survive until, by sheer stamina, we escape into the dim innocence of our own adulthood and its forgetfulness.

From Geek Love by Katherine Dunn.

I like her.

2007-04-07T14:44:00.001-04:00

I have incredibly strong feelings about this. FOUND Magazine is amazing.

The Reaping

2007-04-06T02:49:00.000-04:00

Disclaimer: It's 2:48am. I'm tired. So the following may or may not be coherent.

I just got back from the theater. I hadn't planned on staying late and watching anything after we closed tonight (most everyone who stayed is watching Grindhouse, whose only even vaguely alluring point is Rose McGowan [I love her!], and possibly Bruce Willis, depending on the role he's playing), but Lee called, and he wanted to watch The Reaping and suggested staying tonight to watch it. I figured I'd go ahead and do that in order to not have to make a special trip to see it.

So, I'm going through this phase. There's a lot about religion that confuses me, and a lot about it that is just generally not appealing, but then there's a lot that's definitely drawing me in. It's interesting, to say the least, and I'd like to learn a lot more about it than I actually know now. That being said, I'm not sure I want to know any more about Christianity at all. Christianity just generally doesn't make sense to me, so I tend to be blasphemous a bit more than occasionally. As soon as I saw the trailer for this film (which came out wayyyy back-- I remember us having to take it off of An American Haunting when that first came out), I wanted to see it. As much as I dislike Christianity, I still like to watch films that take a sort of analytical approach to it. I like to see films that are brave. Nothing like The Nativity Story, and I didn't even think about watching The Passion of the Christ (funny that it's abbreviated POTC like Pirates of the Caribbean...), but more like things such as The Exorcism of Emily Rose (which scared the crap out of me), The Omen and, of course, The Reaping (not to mention that Stephen Rea from Breakfast on Pluto and On the Edge was in it...). I like the films that have a dark religious side.

So, I was pretty intrigued when I read a synopsis of this film and saw that Hilary Swank's character (Katherine) was actually a former missionary who had lost her faith due to an accident (ahem) with her family. I just wanted to see the type of journey the character would make. It's obvious (at least to me) in watching the trailers that this woman, very devout in her lack of faith, was going to switch sides about three quarters of the way through the film, but I wanted to see how she got there. I don't like scary movies, but religious ones scare me the worst, probably because I've just been raised so Christian that anything blasphemous in regards to mortality freaks me out because I get a wicked case of "what if"s.

Anyway, Katherine has turned from a missionary to a specialist who investigates religious "miracles" and disproves them to be anything but scientific. She's so firm in her scientific beliefs that she goes to this town called Haven (nice and ironic, guys... good try) to try and tell the townspeople why their river had turned to "blood." Plague after plague start to happen, and she speaks on the phone to Michael (Stephen Rea), a priest who was in Africa with her on one of her missionary trips. She learns about a cult and about the way they go about creating the "perfect child" to carry out Satan's duties and how an angel will be sent to stop them.

I had it figured out about halfway through the film. So the rest of the time I was crouched behind my Harry Potter pillow and just wishing for it to end so I could get home and go to sleep. But then I started to think about the psychological effects this type of film would have on someone.

For example, if I were Hilary Swank (hah!) and I had worked on this film, what sort of impact would it have had on my faith? It's like Sunshine (oh, shut up!). Going to the sun would have a massive impact on my faith. If I started out where I am right now and going toward the sun, I would probably switch sides halfway there-- or at least when I thought I wasn't coming back. And then I started to think about the origin of religion, and came to my conclusion.

Religion was created by man. It does not exist. It is there to bring us comfort.

So I'm going to stick to my agnostic label, I think. Even if there's no God (I don't believe that there is), or gods, or whatever people believe in in regards to their religion, I believe in the higher power that is Imagination. Imagination, I think, will always be capitalized from now on. It took someone awfully Imaginative and creative to come up with a religion.

Does this make sense? Or is it just another Ramble?

My Sunshine Film

2007-04-05T01:31:00.000-04:00

Project 365

2007-04-04T14:11:00.000-04:00

So, since I made that post about being a better person and whatnot, I've started to try and learn things. I bought a book a while back that was on the clearance shelf at Border's and it's supposed to teach me to draw. I haven't been signing onto AIM very much because I'd rather just not be on the computer. That in itself is a feat. I want to work on the computer as my job, though, I've decided. It would just be ideal, and I'm a really fast learner, especially when it comes to computers. Not to mention taking three years of computer classes in high school. Easy As. I finished the work in there like two weeks ahead of time every six weeks so I just read books and played online for the rest of the time.

ANYWAY.

I've also joined this community called the Project 365 Challenge. You're supposed to take a photo a day and then write something about it and keep it as a memory of that day. And then do it all year long and then have a record of it. I'm taking it very seriously right now. I hope it doesn't fizzle out. My Project 365 journal is Bright Red Boots at GJ. Here's the photo I took yesterday. It's my favorite of the three I've done so far.

The head projectionist of the theater resigned on Saturday. We got two movies in ("Firehouse Dog" and "Are We Done Yet?") and I had to make them up. It was the first time I've made up a film in about four months because usually I do other things on days we get prints in. This is me rewinding the Spiderman 3 trailer.

Sunshine

2007-04-02T14:18:00.000-04:00

I am so in-fucking-love with this movie.

I can't STOP. GAH.

In other news, I get way too wrapped up in other people's drama.

Starting Fresh

2007-04-01T00:27:00.000-04:00

It's 12:26am, and that means that it's 01 April. I've been thinking a lot lately, and reading a lot lately has helped push my brain along to think more. I've watched Sunshine (and I feel a little ridiculous for being so obsessed with it, but I'm kind of intrigued by how I don't just dabble in things-- I get completely wrapped up in them) twice now, and I feel compelled to do more than just take it at face value.

I feel like I'm growing up.

It's scary for something like this to happen so suddenly. I felt grown up when I went to stay in New York City by myself when I was 18. I felt grown up when I took a week's vacation to Canada by myself when I was 19. I felt pretty grown up in February when I went to London alone and was 20-- and being 20 is pretty grown up as well. But now things are very different. It's odd. The first time I was in London, I felt the same. Since I've been back from the second trip-- maybe it was even while I was around those few days-- I've just had a sort of epiphany. It's not the type of epiphany I can even put into words, because I'm definitely not eloquent enough to explain it, but it's something that's changing, for sure.

I think it dawned on me the most when I was reading something that Gia sent to me. It was a couple of days after the second time I'd seen Sunshine. I cried during the film, but because I'm an emotional mess when it comes to these characters anyway, and in a way, the ending of the film moved me enough to at least make that spot in the middle of my chest ache for a second, but as I was reading what she wrote and thinking about what it meant and how it related to the film, and then about how it related to me I just started crying. I was crying over a film I had seen two days earlier. That has never happened to me. It was a moment of clarity.

And now there's all sorts of high school drama at the theater where I work. One of the members of management (not me, clearly) says he does not like the drama and the way the employees interact with one another, but at the same time, if he's angry at one of the teenagers who works there, if they try to get his attention, he turns away and won't speak to them. How is that helping the situation? He's acting exactly like them-- only it's worse because he's supposed to be setting an example.

I just don't have tolerance for it anymore. It's arrogant of me to even think things like this, but I feel like I've been too many places and seen too much of the world (which is silly, since I've seen hardly anything at all) to be bothered by something so petty as a grown man's interaction with the teenagers he employs and how he has absolutely no skills necessary in working with them. I want to get out of it all and grow to be a better person instead of just accepting my life and the people in it who drag me down into their narrow-minded and ignorant ways and means. It's sickening for me to realize that I've been doing it my whole life. I always knew I wanted out of Wytheville, but I never knew exactly how much until recently. This place has absolutely nothing that I want or need in order to become a functional member of society.

So, since this is technically the first day of the month, it seems like a wonderful time to make myself into more of the person I want to be. I want to write down my goals, and I want to actually work toward them. I'm going to start taking a picture every day to represent my life and keep as a record of how I grow. I want to mature as a human being. I want to learn more about everything. I'm going to stop wasting my time as much. I'm going to become healthier. I'm going to be a better version of myself.

And I will do it. I'll be a better person by Monday, and even better than that on Tuesday. I won't be recognizable this time next year. I can't wait to meet myself.

Ironic that it's all on April Fool's Day, though.

EDIT at 1:57am: It's funny that the first thing I'm actually doing during the beginning of my new phase is planning a one-night stay in New York City to go to the Tribeca Film Festival to see Watching the Detectives. It's only about $350 for airfare and hotel, so that's less than $500 for everything... Isn't that silly? I'm planning on paying $500 to see a movie. I think it's worth it. That's the silliest part.

EDIT again at 3:06am: Gia, if you happen to read this for some reason, I just finished Flowers for Algernon. Gah. Gahhhh. It was incredible. I'll have to buy it so I can read it again instead of just borrowing it from the library. It was beautiful...

The Day of the Triffids

2007-03-28T13:03:00.000-04:00

I want to write a movie script.

These are quotes from The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham:

"You know, one of the most shocking things about it is to realize how easily we have lost a world that seemed so safe and certain."

She was quite right. It was that simplicity that seemed somehow to be the nucleus of the shock. From very familiairity one forgets all the forces which keep the balance, and thinks of security as normal. It is not. I don't think it had ever before occurred to me that man's supremacy is not primarily due to his brain, as most of the books would have one think. It is due to the brain's capacity to make use of the information conveyed to it by a narrow band of visible light rays. His civilization, all that he had achieved or might achieve, hung upon his ability to perceive that range of vibrations from red to violet. Without that, he was lost. I saw for a moment the true tenuousness of his hold on his power, the miracles that he had wrought with such a fragile instrument...

---

Until then I had always thought of loneliness as something negative-- an absence of company, and, of course, something temporary.... That day I had learned that it was much more. It was something which could press and oppress, could distort the ordinary and play tricks with the mind. Something which lurked inimically all around, stretching the nerves and twanging them with alarms, never letting one forget that there was no one to help, no one to care. It showed one as an atom adrift in vastness, and it waited all the time its chance to frighten and frighten horribly-- that was what loneliness was really trying to do; and that was what one must never let it do....

Attentionwhoreism

2007-03-28T02:48:00.000-04:00

I suffer from attentionwhoreism (definition two).

"The act of trying to receive as much attention as possible via egotistical means." An attention whore is defined as follows: "A person or animal who won't leave you alone and comes up to you when you are trying to work."

Wait, wrong definition.

Okay, basically, I am just needy for attention. I don't really act out in comparison to most attention whores, but I certainly do enjoy being in the center of everyone's attention. I get it from being in Drama classes, I guess.

Anyway, I've been thinking a lot about how much I need attention lately.

I've got this ex. I don't like her at all. I would be perfectly fine if I never spoke to her or saw her again in my life. But she sent me a message and I had to reply. And I want to keep getting replies from her after I answer hers. And she hasn't sent a reply in a few days. And it's making me crazy.

And then there's that other girl who has a crush on me (that sounds so juvenile). Well, she did. For a long time. And I couldn't tell if I returned the feelings or if I was just friends with her. I realize now that I was just friends with her (but relationships are very complicated when they start out as friendships, especially girl/girl relationships). But then tonight she blogged something about she felt something for so long and then all of a sudden it wasn't there anymore. And it bummed me out. Because I really want that attention.

I'm also a bit of a drama queen. I'm definitely an "overly dramatic person." That's probably a good reason why I'm blogging about this in the first place.

So if you've learned anything from this post, it's that UrbanDictionary.com is an amazing site.

Also, I finished reading The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham today. It was wonderful. Even better than the book on tape. Reading things is so much better than hearing them or watching them in a film. It was quite scary, though... I think everyone should read it. It's a classic!

Amazon.com

2007-03-25T12:41:00.000-04:00

WHAT is the deal with Amazon.com right now?

Okay, normally I have absolutely no problem with having anything I order delivered as soon as it becomes available. I completely understand that sometimes things aren't in stock and it takes a while to receive them, and then a while longer to ship them out to the people who have paid for them.

Does that mean I should still be waiting on a DVD six months later? I think not.

I ordered Disco Pigs on 25 September 2006. Today is 25 March 2007. I still haven't received it. Amazon.com says that my [new! again!] delivery date for said DVD is between 21 March and 06 April.

Should I e-mail them and let them know that I've been waiting on this particular item for six months? Maybe. Lindsey says I should wait until 06 April and if I still haven't received it to e-mail them then.

I fancy myself at least marginally patient, but goddammit, if you're going to make me wait for seventeen years to get a lousy (I'm sure it's not lousy, but you know what I mean) DVD, then you'd better be sending me something with it. Like your soul.

I have had much better experiences with Amazon.co.uk. My The Wind That Shakes the Barley script book came just when it was supposed to. It even said it wouldn't arrive before Christmas and it did. I've got the Sunshine book on order, too. I hope my satisfaction with Amazon.co.uk remains at 100%. If they screw up it brings it down to 50%. Ouch.

Okay, rant done. I really want to see that film, though...

Sunshine.

2007-03-23T10:47:00.000-04:00

I am not a sci-fi fan. I've seen a few sci-fi films, but I don't flock to the nearest cinema to check them out. The only one I own on DVD is Alien vs. Predator, and that's only because it was three bucks at the video store and I needed a fifth one. I haven't seen 2001 or Event Horizon, and I don't remember anything about Alien. I saw Armageddon in 1998, when I was eleven years old, and I just remember being embarrassed at that scene with the animal crackers.

That being said, this film may have turned me into one of the sci-fi fans. If nothing else—if seeing a film that explores more than just "action" on screen isn't your kind of thing—the film is gorgeous. The shots of the sun are some of the most fascinating bits of effects I have ever seen in any sort of film, not only sci-fi. The film is set only fifty years into the future, and therefore the technological aspects of the set are relatable rather than hard to imagine.

The characters are well developed, and the actors are top-notch. Every single performance is phenomenal, and I was even a bit taken aback by how much I enjoyed Chris Evans's portrayal of Mace. Everyone seems to have taken the time to learn about the science and about the psychological factors of being with the same people for so long (most likely due to the fact that Danny Boyle sort of forced them to), and it shows on screen. The characters are all real, and although none of us know what it would be like to be in space and alone for sixteen months, there are aspects of them all that are immediately relatable.

The plot is secondary. That doesn't mean that it isn't well thought or anything like that, but the human drama and psychological journey of the characters is the primary concern in the film, and the fact that they are going to re-ignite the sun is merely the background story that puts them all together in the first place. There are far more triggers that ask the audience to think about their life and the life of mankind and of the universe itself than there are for the audience to question, "Well, how did that just happen?" The film asks us to have a brain and be willing to use it.

Sunshine is a religious experience. It is very personal and is a very unique experience to each member of the audience. It is incredible, awe-inspiring, intense, and one of the most beautiful pieces of film I have ever seen. Danny Boyle, Alex Garland and Andrew Macdonald have done it again. A+.

Sunshine = Obsession

2007-03-22T01:03:00.000-04:00

ob·ses·sion /əbˈsɛʃən/ [uhb-sesh-uhn]
–noun
1. the domination of one's thoughts or feelings by a persistent idea, image, desire, etc.

- Dictionary.com

Sunshine.

Dominating my thoughts and feelings? Check.

Review of the film soon.

I just got back from London tonight. I saw two screenings and met several people involved with the film. It was incredible. The film was magnificent. The performances were top-notch and everything about it was wonderful. I'll need to see it a few more times. A few thousand more times, perhaps.

Insomnia

2007-03-14T04:41:00.000-04:00

"Insomnia is characterized by an inability to sleep and/or inability to remain asleep for a reasonable period," says Wikipedia. By God, Wikipedia might have a point.

As I read through that Wikipedia article I learned that I am currently suffering from "transient insomnia," which only lasts from about one day to a week, and is commonly caused by jet lag or short-term anxiety. And probably a bit of nerves and/or excitedness, too, am I right? Because I think that's what's going on in my case.

Although-- is it insomnia when I just can't sleep until nearly daybreak, but then I sleep until noon or later? Or is it just a case of my sleep schedule being completely skewed? And how exactly does my schedule mess itself up like this? Probably something about the fact that I stay up until 5am trying to finish editing my latest video instead of going to bed like I should've.

By the way, who ever heard of "fatal familial insomnia"? Apparently it's a disease of the brain and is very rare. NO. WAY! Yes, way! But, I mean, an insomnia that's fatal? That sounds like something out of a bad horror flick. "SLEEP OR DIE" could be the tagline. I'd take one look at it and run screaming. Scary movies are awful. I have nightmares for weeks. Although a tagline like, "SLEEP AND DIE" would scare me a lot more.

Anyway, this isn't really anything substantial, but, hey, I'll bet you learned a little bit about fatal familial insomnia, didn't you?

Hello, new blog.

2007-03-09T02:09:00.000-05:00

Well, I guess it is actually a new blog, isn't it? That's nice. I've never had a Blogger blog before, so I'm just learning how to use it. I doubt anyone will read it, and that's okay, but I want to learn how to use all of the cool things on this site because of the whole blog revolution. I don't think I realized exactly how popular they were until recently, so here I am.

My blog is titled "What the heck is moderation?" or something to that effect, and I chose that name because I never really know what moderation is. If I become interested in something, it's damn near obsessive, and if I find something I want to update a blog about, it's usually a pretty passionate update. I don't really have moderate feelings for anything. I generally am very, very passionate about it, or I'm not at all.

Anyway, I'll probably keep all of my personal updates at my GreatestJournal account, but this one will be for "important" things. We'll see how it works out.