Movie: Casino Royale

Starring Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Mads Mikkelsen, and Eva Green.

001. I've seen it twice and I'll see it again.

002. Daniel Craig is SO Bond it's ridiculous, he was made for this movie. Also, he's hot.

003. Villain with an inhaler? Questionable, and kind of funny, but at least he has a physical deformity to make up for that weird detail. Plus he's also hot in real life, not so much in the movie though.

004. Bond girl--I've seen better.

005. Definitely flawed, and a bit too drawn out at the end but awesome all the same. This was close, but the next one should be Bond at its best.

006. A card game has never been so thrilling.

007. The best moment is the very last shot in the movie, and the torture scene is my favourite torture scene of all time. It's fantastic.

Movie: Happy Feet

Starring the voices of- Robin Williams, Elijah Wood, Hugo Weaving, Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman, and Britney Murphy.

Oh-so-cute baby penguins. Dancing and singing penquins at that.
The movie is full of wonderful messages that we must teach with animals since we don't accept humans as they are. Humans, it seems, are not cute enough to provoke an emotional response from other humans. Nor is the planet.

I saw the movie twice and I'd see it again. The kids love it, the sounds of little tapping feet could be heard throughout the theatre during half of the movie.
It gets very sad and dark in the middle--that's where we learn our lesson. Go see the movie and learn about love, friendship, acceptance, and being environmentally friendly.

Penguins sing Queen. If you won't go see it for that, then I don't know what else I could possibly tell you.

I'm not hot, but....hello? Hello? Anyone there?

You mean you can be fat AND happy? Hmm...weird. I just assumed that you should be ashamed of yourself for being unworthy of skinny respect. Well, way to go! You just keep your head up fatty. You're so brave. ("Fat" of course means anyone that looks like they've ever eaten bread. Most people would call it "normal", but that's a bit of a stretch I'm afraid.)

Tonight's episode of Cold Case was about a suave (hot) guy who scams undesirable women. He finds fat women, charms them because they are desperate, and then he steals all their money. Later on he starts marrying them and killing them, he makes more money that way.
This show brought to mind the fact that skinny girls and fat girls are from completely alternate universes. Though us fat girls are superior to skinny girls in several ways, we will always be generally defective. There are fat girls that are just as pretty as skinny girls, but skinny is still skinny; it's what society prefers.
There's this emphasis on "real beauty" and whatnot lately. That's lovely and all but they're just frosting the cake to feed to the over-eaters. It doesn't actually mean anything. It just makes people feel better. It's like when they put minority, handicapped children in catalogs. It looks nice. Have a look around...I don't see any fat, hispanic, wheelchair bound, women on TV. I see girls with shiny hair, flawless skin, and pointy shoes, wearing a size 4. None of my friends look like that.
I suggest a girl who is maybe a giant size 12, with uncooperative hair, tennis shoes, and jeans. What's wrong with normal? There are a few TV females with personality, but they go overboard. If she doesn't look like the pointy-shoed types then she's a nut case. But hey she's quirky!
I will say this--the quirky ones and the pointy-shoes with all their lip gloss tend to be somewhat smart. So, we are women, we are judged on our looks but at least the men and television show writers now achnowledge that we do have brains. Isn't that sweet of them.

Movie: Stranger Than Fiction

Starring- Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Queen Latifah.

Well, it's funny. I saw it last night at 7:05 and I'm still thinking about it. It's not rolling-in-the-isles funny, it's more like huh... funny. All the characters are ACTUAL characters. They are all bizarre people, who live in their own little worlds.
Will Ferrell is not Will Ferrell in this movie if that is of concern to anyone.
While watching this movie I was sort of wondering what the point was but once you get to the end--you smile. I gave it a B+ (Memorable) rating on Yahoo, but I think it could even get an A for sheer creative amusement. I definitely want to see it again--it's one of those that I really feel I need to see again to properly understand.
If you don't want to pay for the theatre, then at least rent it when it comes out. It has a very interesting after-taste.
I almost forgot to mention the fun song at the end of the credits. I believe it's called "Love You", and it's a little bit terrific.

Academic Rant

So here's the thing...all* of my English teachers are so pompous and arrogant it makes me kind of want to kick them.
Do they not realize how utterly ridiculous they sound? Not just English profs of course, I'd say a majority of professors are like this. At least the men are. The women tend to be much better about not sounding like complete fools.
Professor A: If something is not academic then it automatically has less value than something that is academic. If he thinks it's a good idea then it's a good idea. If he thinks it's a bad idea then it's a bad idea. So out of touch with anything non-academic that I think he might actually be crazy.
Professor B: So-called grammatical errors can be "bad form". Grammar is life, it matters so much to the harmony of life. Does he realize how ridiculous this sounds?? Because I do! Decent grammar is nice, but when you think the placement of a comma is of the highest importance then you are an idiot. (I do realize what you do for a living by the way. :) But I'm speaking of the academic side of this crap. Totally overdone.)
One prof likes things one way and another likes them different. These guys cannot actually keep themselves from saying some haughty remark, or huffing in a disapproving way to illustrate that they think that other prof is silly.
Question: Who the fuck cares?
The whole point of any of this is to be able to successfully communicate something (thought, idea, whatever) to someone else and have them understand. I am perfectly capable of doing that without all my commas accounted for.
I can articulte and explain a good many things to more people than many of my "lettered" professors. You may know big words, and you may know when to use who and whom but no one wants to listen to someone who thinks they are smarter than everyone else.

(* By all, I mean most.)

Update: The Book

The Book is updated. Lots of new and exciting stuff!
Check it out.

http://www.geocities.com/kathayj/TheBook.html

Happy Guy Fawkes Day! Give a penny for the Guy.

"The only verdict is vengeance, a vendetta, held as a votive not in vain."
~V~

Remember, remember the fifth of November, gunpowder treason and plot.

I know of no reason why the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot.

And the rest of the poem:
Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes,'Twas his intent.

To blow up the King and the Parliament.

Three score barrels of powder below.

Poor old England to overthrow.

By God's providence he was catch'd,

With a dark lantern and burning match
Holloa boys, Holloa boys, let the bells ring

Holloa boys, Holloa boys, God save the King!
Hip hip Hoorah !Hip hip Hoorah !

A penny loaf to feed ol'Pope,

A farthing cheese to choke him.

A pint of beer to rinse it down,

A faggot of sticks to burn him.

Burn him in a tub of tar,

'Burn him like a blazing star.

Burn his body from his head,

Then we'll say: ol'Pope is dead.

"People should not be afraid of their governments. Goverments should be afraid of their people."
~V~

Halloween

Happy November!
I thought I would update you on my Halloween festivities.

On Monday night I went to the English halloween party (it was in my old neighborhood, very weird). I was dressed as Miss Piggy and I won a prize for Best Cultural Critique-tied with Uma Thurman from Pulp Fiction, post-overdose.

From there I went to Morbid Meditations Upon Dark Spirits-Ghouls Gone Wild, the annual Halloween theatrics from Dr. Luehrs, a former History professor.
On Halloween night we went and had pancakes, watched a dumb movie and I attempted to do some homework. The boys came to visit at least, so that was the excitement of the day. Tanner was Dash from the Incredibles, and Jordan was Syndrome (the bad guy).

I don't get trick-or-treaters here in the alley so the boys were the only visitors. I also had a sign on my door that said "Trick-or-treaters will be fed to the cave troll", that might have had something to do with it.

To see more pictures you can try here but I'm not sure if it'll work. Let me know!http://new.photos.yahoo.com/kathayj/albums/

Movies: The Prestige and lots more.

Starring Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine, and David Bowie. (Seriously.)
Good Friday night fun I thought. It has lots of twists and crazy stuff going on. I found myself figuring out the secrets just moments before they told me.
I hear it's similar to The Illusionist, however I don't recall Hugh, Christian or Michael in The Illusionist. I'd certainly recommend at least renting this if you don't get to see it in the theatre. I was pleasantly surprised that I got to.

What else have I been watching lately?
-The Wolf Man (1941) Starring Lon Cheney Jr. A fun classic! I really liked this, and Lon Cheney is just super.
- The Howling, starring Dee Wallace Stone (aka- Mom from E.T.) Very 80's but surprisingly entertaining. Very creepy in a um...ok sort of way sometimes, but I still liked it. Probably don't want to watch it if you don't like good old 80's horror.
- Silver Bullet, starring Gary Busey and a tiny Corey Haim. Even lamer 80's fun. Totally Saturday afternoon movie. Same advice as above.
- Wolf, starring Jack Nicholson, James Spader and Michelle Pfeifer. How Michelle got hired after this I do not know. I hope whoever wrote the script got fired. "You think I can't get bacon?" That shouldn't be said. Spader is quite hillarious, Jack is ok. Keep your eyes open for David Schwimmer....bet you didn't know he was in this.
- Van Helsing, starring Hugh Jackman, David Wenham, Richard Roxburgh. Had potential. They should have killed the woman in the first (maybe second) scene and just had Van Helsing and Dracula have it out. Then it would have been much better. I had a good time watching it because the monsters are excellent (with the exception of the Harpies, soooo anoying). This contains my favourite werewolf next to Remus Lupin. (I did a speech on werewolves if you were wondering what the deal is.)

- Where the Truth Lies, starring Kevin Bacon and Colin Firth. Terrible. A few moments of entertainment surrounded in crap.
- The Snapper, Irish movie that Colm Meaney and Brendan Gleeson can't make good enough to watch again. Very annoying.
- The Muppets Show, Season 1. It's a bit slow in places and you can ALMOST get Muppet overload (thought I did watch it for days at a time) but it's just terrific.
- I'm still making my way through the Bond collection. I'm on Diamonds are Forever now. (Plenty O'Toole HAHAHA, who writes this crap?) I skipped Goldeneye because my DVD didn't work but I'll fit it in somewhere. The last few have not been very impressive.

Reply to Mary's Moment of the Day Re: Fire Safety

Mary's Moment of the Day:
Entry for October 16, 2006
In class the fire alarms started blaring. Apparently I was the only one concerned. As I slid my coat on I realized no one else was moving, the instructor informed us that it was probably a drill, but he didn't know. As he explained that we were on the third floor and the stairs were way away there was nothing we could do. "We could get out" I chimed in. Everyone sat calmly listening in class while the bright fire alarm light flashed like a strobe for the next 20 minutes. Finally I asked him to see what other class rooms were doing. Some had left and some had not. "What's wrong with these people?" I thought to myself as I pictured tonight's news featuring our burned up bodies and the reporter claiming we would have lived if we just would have left! Finally it stopped, I'm guessing the bulb burned out. If it's not obvious by now, we lived.

My Response:
So I'm sitting in Publications class listening to a guest speaker. The fire alarm starts going off, and we just sit there. Everyone looks at the flashing light and contemplates for a minute I guess. I'm sitting there assuming we'll get up and go outside, you know, like we learned to do in kindergarten. Nope. We just sit there and continue on with class. Finally someone gets up to see if anyone else is leaving. Once she comes back and says the best idea would be to go outside, THEN we all get up to go outside. (After gathering all of our stuff, of course.) Once we get outside, after our slow stroll through the hallways, we wade through all the smokers who are standing right next to the building, blocking the door. If they were testing us for fire safety we all failed miserably and would be dead if the building was in fact on fire. Did NO ONE else go to elementary school and have a fire drill every month or so? Geez. (We too lived through the ordeal Mary, but I feel that I lost a couple IQ points by witnessing the spectacle.)--Kath

Movie: Man of the Year

Starring: Robin Williams, Laura Linney, Christopher Walken, Lewis Black, and Jeff Goldblum.

I was so enthused with the beginning of this movie. It creates an illusion of how politics should be. It's so much fun. You're thinking--I want to go vote right now! Yes! John Stewart for President!....I mean.....Tom Dobbs. It's just a movie of course.

Sadly, like the 2000 elections, not everything turns out how it should. Laura Linney, as usual, plays an infuriating character with awkward lines that should have been but out right from the beginning. (I like her but her characters are always twitchy and crap.)

Robin Williams was funny. He really did take on his role I thought. However, the movie wasn't meant to be stand-up and Christopher Walken can only do so much. I think perhaps the writers should have decided what kind of movie they were going to make before they started filming and the editing crew could have hacked up about 20 minutes of boredom.

I'm not terribly angered that I paid to see it, but I was expecting much more than a few clever moments. If you have the opportunity, just watch the first 20 minutes or so. It'll make you long for the kind of politicians that we deserve to have.

The Departed

Starring: Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Wahlberg, Martin Sheen, and Alec Baldwin.
Ok, so the cast is good, but can you have too many stars in one film?
No. Or at least Scorsese is immune to over-celebritizing.

It's a relatively bloody, South Boston, Irish-American cop movie. Has a bit of a Boondock Saints flare to it with the whole Irish/Boston thing and there's not a clear line between good guy and bad guy. It's not as cool as Boondock Saints of course, but it serves you with several well-placed plot twists and very intriguing, ocassionally psychotic characters.

While we watched the credits some guy sitting behind us kept muttering something about Scorsese and Oscar (to himself). It was a good movie, maybe not THAT good, but apparently people are saying stuff about this Oscar guy. Just because a movie didn't suck doesn't mean it should win something. That's like putting a kid on the honor roll for getting a D+.

PS- No need to stay for the credits if you're wondering.
Oh! And the music was fantastic.

Let me know what you think:
Should I start writing my reviews on my blog, or should I leave them on my webpage?
If I blog them, then you can leave me comments. Or yell at me if you hated a movie I said was good.

What in Pagan hell makes you think I agree with you??

If one more person in one more lit. class says anything is a "christian allegory" I am going to personally create a voodoo doll of them.

If one more professor makes a comment indicating that everyone in his or her class in a Christian, I am going to throw a hissy fit.
I am not a Christian and not everyone in every class is a Christian--even here in the Catholic capitol of the universe.

Not every story is meant to be an allogory of some sort. Some fairy tales are just fairy tales; sometimes people manage to be creative on their own without using the Bible as a reference.
I have not read the Bible cover to cover, nor do I wish to. Do not assume that I know all the stories from the Bible and can recite them in class. When others are reciting, do not assume that I have any clue as to what they are talking about.

If you want to talk about fiction we can talk about Harry Potter. At least it's a bit more modern. I can come up with Harry Potter allegories if you MUST compare literature to something other than itself; even if that goes against everything I think it should be.
I've paid for these classes with the intention of learning something, and moreso just to graduate, but I didn't think it was going to be Sunday school for grown-ups.

Crisis in Hays.

I lost the Stewie button off my backpack and it saddens me.
However, I have some nice music to make me happy- Disney's Greatest Hits Vol. 2, and the Jarhead soundtrack. Awesome.
Thankfully I didn't lose my "I heart Lucius Malfoy" button.

It would take more than Disney to soothe me after that.

It pays to buckle your seat belt...

Seriously. I got a dollar today because I was wearing my seatbelt.

While Lindsay and I were coming back from lunch today we tried to wave at the big State Farm teddy bear, and he totally ignored us--but some cheery woman did come up at the light and give us money.

I guess it's some promotional thing they were doing. Everyone they saw wearing a seatbelt got a dollar. We considered going around the block again, but we didn't. Don't want to abuse the system and all.

Here are some Buckle Up, Kansas! Fast Facts that we got with our dollar:

• In 2005, there were 428 fatalities in Kansas. 70% of those killed were found to be unbelted. (KDOT)
• Safety belts are the single most effective way to protect people in crashes. In 2005, it is estimated that 27 Kansans were saved by wearing their seat belt. (KDOT)
• Kids follow your lead. Studies show that when the driver is buckled up, 85% of children are also restrained. In a car, the safest way to transport your child is buckled up in the back seat.
• The force of impact from a 30 mph crash is like falling head first from a three-story building.

Click it. Or ticket. It's Kansas Law.

So there.

New email rules

To avoid further annoyances, please consult the following guidelines when sending me an email:


1. If it says you are going to win money, don't send it. You're not going to win anything.

2. If it is 47 pages long with some nice moral at the end of the story, don't send it. I won't read all of it and therefore won't get the message.

3. If it has anything to do with Jesus loving me and/or my country, don't send it. I've seen it and I don't want to see it again.

4. If they would be at all reluctant to say it on Family Guy, American Dad, or South Park, don't send it. If it's too offensive for them then I'm not going to find it amusing.

5. If you send me anything at all, just do this: imagine that I am the subject of the email and then decide if you would still send it to me if that were true.