Blue Tulips

Update on The Musical

2012-02-05T21:47:00.002-06:00

So apparently, DramaFever is a legal site, and has all the episodes on it. Total Win! Too bad I'm completely buried in homework right now. But still. You can go watch it. You'll be glad you did.

The Musical: A Smash Alternative

2012-02-01T21:11:00.000-06:00

As I have a slight propensity to watch Korean shows ~~occasionally~~ a LOT, I stumbled upon this gem on Hulu.

Unfortunately, they only have one episode up. And it's the second episode. But, you get a quick recap of all the important stuff at the beginning. At least, I understood what was going on. Here's hoping they post more soon!

The basic premise of the show is the same as Smash: a girl has a dream of making it to the big stage. She starts out in med-school, but drops out (or puts in a leave-of-absence) for a year to try to make her dream come true.

I completely fell in love with it. Then again, I like silly shows like I Love You and Playful Kiss. What can I say? Korean dramas are awesome.

P.S. It is completely possible for school to swallow you whole.

Old T-Shirts, Take Two

2012-01-27T23:19:00.000-06:00

Remember this?

Maybe you read my post a couple of days ago and said, "Well, that's great. A rug is wonderful and all, but what am I supposed to do? I don't need a rug. But I do have old t-shirts. And I actually want to save them."

Yes. It's not fair of me to ignore your needs just because I don't have any good memories associated with my t-shirts. You probably do. That's probably why you kept yours, instead of being like me and saving them just because. I think you're smarter than I am.

But I have a couple of solutions for you. In fact, I have a couple of t-shirts that I know I'll eventually stop wearing, but will want to keep around. Because they're cool. Because they're Doctor Who shirts. And because fedoras are cool. Even though David Tennant is my Doctor.

So here's a couple of ideas:

Source: craftingagreenworld.com via Holly on Pinterest

Make a scarf!

Source: jezebel.com via Holly on Pinterest

Make a couple of throw pillows!

Source: craftingagreenworld.com via Holly on Pinterest

Wall art, anyone?

Or, you could always go the classic route and make a quilt.

But, just in case you DO actually want to make a rug, but don't want to whip-stitch it together like I did, here's an easy pattern that you could use. I suppose I could have used it if I had spent a little time planning. Quick note: if you want to do an oval rug like I did (even though it didn't end up quite as oval as I had hoped), you would only need to increase around the rounded sections of the rug.

Good luck turning those old t-shirts into something that's useful again! They really don't like being stuck in a cold, dark box, never to be seen or used. I promise.

P.S. A good reason to have a rug around: http://pinterest.com/pin/264586546827816185/

Smash: More like a fist bump

2012-01-25T21:39:00.000-06:00

When I first saw the commercials for this a couple of months ago, I was pretty excited. A show about theatre? With a Glee-like feel? No ridiculous teenage angst and unnecessary drama that made me stop watching Glee (after about the second episode)? I'm there.

Oh, but I have to wait until February. Sad day.

Ah, but they're doing that thing they did with Once Upon a Time and releasing the pilot online a couple of weeks early. Score!

There were some shining moments. Really great moments. There were also some not so good moments and some really terrible moments. But that's pretty standard. And, you always have to consider that the pilot of almost any show is usually not very good. They need a little time to settle into the world, and the audience should give them that chance. Usually.

Things I loved:
The dialogue was pretty good. The writers had some opportunities to take the cliché road, but chose not to. They also had the opportunity to completely ignore environmental action. Again, they chose not to. It was refreshing.
I thought the pacing was done well. It didn't waste too much time getting into the story, but also sufficiently oriented you to the world. You knew who everyone was and what their motivations were. Not many people do that in the first episode.
Debra Messing. I never watched Will and Grace, and I never had much of an opinion on her from the couple of movies I have seen her in. I know she's not supposed to be the main character, but I feel like she is kind of holding the show together right now. And I'm okay with that. Also, I'm okay with the totally great (and human) moment a few minutes in when she goes off on a critic, and then does a complete 180 two seconds later.

Things I thought needed work:
Costuming choices. I'm not a costume designer, and don't usually care too much about what characters are wearing, as long as the clothes themselves look good. This time, I noticed. I thought the clothes were pretty good most of the time. But I wondered, more than once, "Why did they pick that dress?"
Anjelica Huston. Okay, maybe she was fine. Maybe she wasn't. All I know is, sometimes she bothers me, and sometimes she doesn't. This time, she bothered me.
The motivations. Having said I appreciated knowing what everyone's motivations were, I didn't appreciate everyone having 50 different personal problems to deal with. Waaaay too much all at once. Pace yourselves, people.
Marilyn. There's a scene at the beginning where they debate the merits of doing a Marilyn show. They have some very valid reasons why not too. And they should have listened to themselves. Yeah, sure, everyone loves Marilyn. Yeah, sure, everyone loves a show that gets swept away with itself because they over sex-ify everything. Because it's Marilyn. Because they can. Because they want to fall down the same rabbit-hole Glee did.

Final word:
I'll give it a week or maybe two more. However, if it goes where I think it's going, I'm done.

That said, I think it'll do well. It is Glee-ish (from my limited knowledge), and Marilyn is usually a big draw, no matter what. Also, my tastes don't usually align too well with the rest of the country. I think it has potential to be really good. And I really hope I'm wrong, because I'd really love to watch it.

Go see what you think. You'll probably like it.

P.S. Gene Pitney's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, vs. Cher's Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves. Discuss.

Why did I keep so many t-shirts?

2012-01-24T23:00:00.002-06:00

Shortly before school began, I decided to spend some time going through my boxes and figuring out how to catalog it all. It wasn't long before a found a BUNCH of t-shirts. Yep, I know what these are, I said to myself. But wait, why am I actually keeping these?

Because they're shirts from events and school and sports teams and all kinds of stuff that has a ton of memory-potential.

Only problem? No memories. Nope, zilch. Okay, maybe a few, like with my volleyball jerseys. Well, those memories aren't all that good. Most of what I remember about volleyball was how my teammates REALLY didn't like me and seemed to try to make my life miserable. Yeah, not really something I be reminded of. This stuff is supposed to be about GOOD memories and make me happy when I look through it.

So throw them out.
But wait, I could save them and use them for scraps when I'm experimenting. Yeah, that's a great idea.
Well, do I really want them taking up space somewhere else? How likely am I actually going to use them for something?

My friends, I actually used them for something. And something totally useful, too!

Tiny mat from IKEA for about a buck.

We had been talking about how our dinky little rug in front of our door wasn't really cutting it. It's snowy and wet and muddy sometimes, and that's not something you want to have to clean off of the carpets all the time. Solution? A rug thick enough to absorb wetness. Bonus points? Completely washer and dryer safe.

Win.

But there were problems. Problems? What problems.

Oh, my execution planning skills need work. I was so excited to get started, I found a quick tutorial on how to cut the shirts up to make "yarn", and we got to work. Cutting up 20 shirts only took about 3 hours. Seriously. You wouldn't think so, but it's time consuming.

P.S. Cutting up lots of shirts makes lots of little fabric fuzzies that go EVERYWHERE. Just saying.

So we got the yarn all ready. Sweet! I'm ready to go. But wait, planning. Planning? I hate planning.

I started in anyway. I decided to crochet, 'cuz I didn't want to have to sew it all together later (hahahaha -- joke was totally on me).

A couple of rounds in, I realize, wait, I'm making a bowl! That's no good! So I pull it out.

And start again.

ARRRRRGGHHH!
I'm making a bowl again!
But I increased as I went around the curve. And why is it all wavy around the edges, like a modern artsy bowl or something?
Ugh. My head hurts.

So I pull it out again. Let's make this easy. I'll just crochet a chain of single crochets (so it has the thickness and weight I want) and I'll just get some cheap (washable) canvas and sew it on as a base. It'll be perfect!

Yeah, not so much. I kinda don't own a sewing machine that can feed that much fabric through at once. So, hand sewing it is.

I hate hand sewing (probably stemming from a mother who demanded perfection when she taught me how), so I definitely wasn't going to put a backing on it. Stitching it together took forever anyway (again, remember I strongly detest it), and I still ended up with a little bit of curling through the first few rows.

The key, if you were going to do this, is work with it on a flat surface. If surface = flat, then rug=flat. Pretty simple equation. Pity I didn't think of it sooner.

Regardless, it gets pretty close to flat, and it's hard to tell when shoes are on it.

And now we have a new rug!

P.P.S. All the shirt really were in about three colors. I never noticed it until I started thinking about the rug design (I didn't want it looking completely hodge-podge). I guess I'm just lucky that there was very little imagination when the color of the shirts were picked. Either that, or they all had my best interests in mind and knew I would someday be doing this project.

Putting my schooling to good use

2012-01-18T18:06:00.001-06:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about what to do with all that stuff I've kept from school and whatever else in my childhood. What's the good of it sitting in a box, but never to see the light of day again?

I don't want to get rid of it all. Obviously some of it could probably go. But most of it I really do want to keep.

So what to do?

My cataloging/organizing/librarian self says to organize and label it all and go completely crazy. But then I thought, would it really be all that crazy? Isn't part of the point of keeping all this stuff so that I have something to show my kids when they want to learn about my childhood?

And what about when I die? All this stuff will have to be sorted through, and if I don't do something with it now, no one will know what any of it meant to me.

So, I'm going to do a series describing how to sort, organize, and make sure that all those meaningful things never lose their meaning. Even when you're so old, you can't remember your own name.

Coming soon (aka once I finally finish the silly thing): a post about all those old t-shirts I've been keeping for who knows why.

Creating Rainbows

2011-07-25T11:00:00.000-05:00

Life has been kind of crazy, so the other day, I decided to take a break and do some sewing. The only problem was that things had gotten piled all over my sewing table, so I had to clean up before I could do anything.

I've always struggled with a good way to keep my knitting needles organized, and today was especially bad, since they were rolling free, resistant to being contained. So, I decided to finally make myself a roll-up to keep them in. I found a tutuorial here that I decided to base mine on, and got to work.

I had some fabric scraps that I figured would be big enough, but they were folded or rolled, and I had no idea what size they actually were. So I unfolded, and unrolled, and wound up with a bigger mess because most of what I looked at was NOT big enough. BUMMER.

But I found some fabric that would work, pressed through, and wound up with this

Yay! So much better!

But now I still had a bunch of fabric hanging around and being very much disorganized. So I searched for a little longer, and came up with this and this and this. Now, I have a new and improved sewing area.

The fabric:

Compact, neat and visible storage. My favorite.

The swatches:

I really love this idea because I'm terrible at buying matching thread when I buy fabric, so now, I don't have to remember to cut a swatch and bring it with me to the store! Also, it will be nice if I'm looking for coordinating fabrics to go with something I already have. So excited for this!

And the fabric remnants:

Now I can see exactly how big each piece is before opening it out and making a mess of it. Also, now I realize that I might have kept too many scraps. There's a lot of small pieces in there...

eReaders

2010-02-24T10:19:00.007-06:00

http://www.apple.com/ipad/specs/http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/features/techspecs/?cds2Pid=30195http://www.apple.com/ipad/specs/I had promised myself that I wouldn't get myself excited about eReaders and such again, because frankly, I just don't have the time or money to spend on such toys at the moment. BUT. I was reading my scriptures on my iPod touch last night and I was thinking, "You know, this isn't all that bad. If only the screen was just a little bigger." Lo and behold, I find the Barnes & Noble nook this morning.

Amazing!

It removes the issues I see with the Kindle (at least the cosmetic ones anyway). With the current version of Kindle, my main issue is with all the buttons. It has a full keyboard at the bottom of the device, and the question begs to be asked, "Why? In a world of touchscreens, why stay with conventional buttons? Apple doesn't own the technology, so why not take advantage of it?"

The nook, on the other hand, geniusly, in my opinion, separates the screen into TWO. The top half is the standard 'eInk' where you read your books. The bottom part is a touchscreen where you can search through books, either as covers as seen in the picture, or with a keyboard. COOL! I like this separation because there is a certain charm to flipping through the pages of even an eBook, rather than endlessly scrolling down through the text.

Of course, I don't have one so I don't know really how well it works, but I think with proper guidance and good programmers, Barnes & Noble could be onto something. I have officially decided that the time for an eReader is not quite yet, but I'd give it about a year or so and see how things are developing. I do have reservations based on the specificity of function for these devices, but they are cool.

Now, if Apple were to sell an eReader, I would probably buy that, mainly because their model would likely not have as many initial bugs with the software as models like Kindle and nook do simply because Apple is more experienced in the ways of creating software or at least finding people who can create good software.

That said, Apple has released the iPad, but my main issue with this, besides not introducing any radically new features as we have come to expect from Apple, but the proportion is all wrong.

I understand where they were going with it, but it just looks short and fat. I'm not saying it's bad, but I think they could have changed the dimensions just a little bit to be more visually pleasing. Also, I do understand that they were going for the multi-function purpose so that changes things as well.

Regardless, the iPad isn't for me, at least not now when I'm not sure exactly what it can offer me that I absolutely must have, but the nook and Kindle aren't for me either, since for the moment anyway, I'm happy with print copies of books while the industry navigates it's way through the new digital-age, trying to decide how they're going to handle it.

One plus for a dedicated eReader like nook or Kindle, however, is that they both provide free 3G for ease of downloading books wherever you are. That, is cool. That, is definitely something the iPad, nor Apple, will ever offer. But, the sad reality of it is that it is only available because the nook and the Kindle are so specific. There isn't much room on those devices to manipulate them to make phone calls or use the internet or whatever else the cellphone companies are afraid of you doing that would eat up their bandwidth. But still, it's a cool feature to be able to download wherever you are, without having to pay just to get the ability to download.

The eReader is definitely a niche product, but unlike other people, I'm not going to declare it dead just yet. I think it's worth waiting just a little while longer to see what happens.

New Favorite Movie

2009-11-12T14:46:00.002-06:00

Okay, so here's the deal. My movie watching has been severely abbreviated since I've been working on my full-length play for school. It's coming along, which is good, but it's taken time away from some of my favorite things in life. Well, maybe it's not the play that has done that but rather school and homework. Anyway, I have had the opportunity to watch a few movies lately and I've recently found a new favorite. Thanks to my friend Lyvia, I was introduced to Phoebe in Wonderland. This movie blew me away, and it actually made me cry a little bit. I wasn't sobbing, but still; very few movies are able to make me cry. Anyway, it's plugged and I might go into more detail a little later about why I love it so much. Watch it. I know you'll love it.

Macbeth

2009-04-23T14:50:00.003-05:00

While I didn't actually see the production myself because I was busy working backstage. However, I can tell you that I thought the cast and crew did a great job with the production. I know some people weren't thrilled with the choice to set it in Ancient Meso-America, but I thought it was a good idea. I loved the costumes and the set, and the subtle integration of Book of Mormon names and places into the dialogue. It may not have been the most amazing production of the play ever, but I really think the director's concept was well executed and is something that is cause for consideration. The director wanted to draw parallels between the story of Macbeth and the Gadianton Robbers. Thinking about just how similar the two stories are, and how easy it can be to fall into the same traps, I have found a new respect for Shakespeare. Even if he didn't come up with his own plot lines, he had a talent for weaving a story of almost universal appication.

Doubt -- the movie

2009-04-23T14:25:00.003-05:00

I have to admit I had high hopes for this film, considering both Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman were starring in it, and considering it was nominated for five Academy Awards. I was disappointed when it didn't win any, but that was before I had even seen the movie. Adding to my high expectations was the fact that I had read the play about two weeks before watching the movie. It seems no matter how hard I try, I always forget on first blush that the film adaptation is hardly ever going to be as good as the original book, or play, as it is in this case. It isn't until a little while after that I remember that replicating the book exactly is not only boring, but also uninventive and not taking advantage of the possibilities that each medium offers.
However, I couldn't really like this movie because it was boring, and extremely uninventive. The playwright adapted the play for the screen as well as directed it, and it shows. Sometimes this is okay and the writer pulls it off really well. This time, it really was as though I was watching a filmed stage play. The cinematography was boring and very straightforward, the acting, as amazing as Meryl and Philip are, was just largely uninspiring. As I look back at it now, I am glad that the film didn't win any Oscars, partly because it just wasn't worthy of that kind of honor and recognition. This film had great potential, and it could have benefited greatly from the unique opportunities that the medium of film has to offer, but after watching it, I felt as though John Patrick Shanley was afraid of using them, lest his message didn't come across as clearly and perfectly as it did with the play.

Good Intentions

2009-02-07T21:53:00.000-06:00

I promise I had good intentions to review some of the movies that I saw over Christmas Break. However, school got in the way of all those good intentions (as it usually does) and disallowed me to do as I wish with my time. Thus, reviews of previously said movies will be postponed until further notice.

More Reviews...Coming Soon

2008-12-30T15:31:00.002-06:00

After having spent a good deal of time over Christmas break watching movies, I have some reviews to catch up on. I'll try to get started on those soon, as well as post reviews for the movies I will inevitably be watching over the next week before school starts again. Cheers!

Just a teaser of what some of those reviews will include:
We are Marshall
Incident in a Small Town
Cars
Her Alibi

Little Shop of Horrors

2008-11-17T12:14:00.003-06:00

I'm a slow bloomer with some movies. Little Shop seems to be such a classic that most theatre majors would probably be surprised that I hadn't seen it until yesterday. I must admit, I was missing out on something fantastic.

As a movie, it's a little corny. BUT, it's hilarious. The music is amazingly catchy. I had heard some of the songs before, so they weren't a surprise, but the visuals that accompany the songs are inexplicable. Seriously.
I probably wouldn't ever watch this movie again, and I definitely wouldn't own it, but it was worth watching. I was amazed at how many references are made to this movie and I never even realized it. Things like, "Suddenly Seymore" and a comment made by the director of 'Houseboat' about the dentist became so much clearer to me. It was such a huge "Ah-ha" moment that could almost be described as spiritual. Okay, maybe I'm being a little sarcastic here, but come on, that's what the entire movie is all about.
I'd definitely recommend this movie if you feel like watching something fun and silly. Even if you don't and you've never seen it, please do. I can't say I promise you won't regret it, but I don't think you will.
I will so however that if I ever have the chance to see this performed on stage, I'll go in a heartbeat. Sometimes there are fine differences between the mediums of film and theatre that really can ruin or make a show depending on which medium it is in. For this script, it was originally done Off-Off Broadway and I believe it would be an incredible piece to seen done on the stage.

Houseboat Honeymoon

2008-11-09T13:19:00.003-06:00

I have been involved a little bit with this play, so I have seen it all week at tech rehearsals. Let me preface this post by saying that I do not like comedy in a play, or story, or movie or whatever, just for comedy's sake. So saying, this play is a comedy. I'm not trying to say that it isn't funny, because it is. There are some hilarious parts of this play that I absolutely love. However, none of them actually contribute to the story. In fact, most of the play has nothing to do with the story. They are more for entertainment and comedy's sake and to further display just how crazy the family is.
I went through the whole range of emotions while watching this play five nights in a row. At first I hated it, then I loved it, then I hated it again. Perhaps that just came of watching it too much. However, I really don't think this was a very well written play. The idea is spectacular, but from watching it I got the feeling that it became a brainstorm of how many things they could throw into it so it would be funnier. There are people that get thrown overboard several times. There is a character that is the slapstick comedian because he is always getting hurt. Yes, those things are funny at times, but how funny is it when it happens over and over and over again. Like I said before, I am not one to appreciate comedy purely for comedy's sake. How funny are the Three Stooges really? To me, not at all.
To be fair though, I must reiterate that it is a funny show. There are funny parts that I laugh at all the time. I just think it would be better suited for a comedy routine than as a play put up on the stage.

Dial 'M' for Murder

2008-11-09T13:17:00.002-06:00

(Note: this is a copy of a post I had previously posted on my other blog.)

I was pleasantly surprised with this play. I had never seen the movie, still haven't in fact, but I didn't feel extremely strong ties to the film.
I knew that the directors would look at what tactics the film used, but I was a little concerned that the film's influence would overpower the creative beauty of putting a piece of work on the stage. There were a few things about the performance that bothered me, but they were fairly minor. For example, during the first two acts, when the action is basically pure conversation between two characters, the actors would walk around the set quite a bit. This wouldn't normally bother me, if they had something legit to do, but most of the time it seemed like movement for the sake of movement. I'm sure the directors had a concept for the movement outside of that reasoning, but I didn't pick up on it. Not that I'm the expert either, but I was a part of the audience, and it was more distracting to me than anything else. It was still a very fun production to go to, and I'm glad I did.
I would post some of the production pictures, but I don't really like any of them. Production pictures aren't always stiff and obviously staged for the single purpose, but these ones just don't really do the actors' performances justice.

Edward Scissorhands

2008-11-09T12:57:00.003-06:00

This is a movie that I was always interested in watching, but never really got around to until recently. Honestly I was a little disappointed. The story line was weak and not very interesting. The artistic factor of the film though was fantastic. In typical Tim Burton style everything was very purpose driven and held some sort of meaning to the film. It was an interesting film to watch, but I'm not sure that I'd ever own it. I might watch a few more times in my lifetime, but even that is not for sure. It was an inspirational film if you want to create your own movies, but as far as being a good movie in and of itself, I just don't think it cut it.

Amazing Grace

2008-10-09T09:37:00.003-05:00

This movie absolutely blew my mind away. I had heard that it was a good movie, I knew it was based on a true story. Normally, these two things are enough to convince me a movie is worth watching. However, I was still skeptical right up until I finally watched it. I'm not entirely sure why, but the fact remains that this was a movie I was not looking forward to watching.
It still took me about 15-20 minutes to really get into it, but once I did, I was captivated. I had planned on doing homework while I watched this movie, something I can't normally do anyway, but I thought I'd be able to look away from the screen enough to do my reading for my class the next day. I was so entirely wrong. I could hardly look down, let alone read anything.
Part of the reason why I was taken by surprise by this movie was because I thought I already knew most of what anybody could tell me about the slave trade and the fight against it. I was still deeply touched by the accounts given and the visual demonstrations in the movie. It made me extremely sick to see Wilberforce go into the gallows of a slave ship and see so exactly the living conditions the people were forced to suffer through. It reminded me of Schindler's List in the fact that some parts were so disgusting I almost couldn't watch, but it was true to life and therefore worthy of my attention. The suffering of fellow human beings, no matter how long ago, is not something that we can just avert our eyes from. These are situations for the mature viewer, but still quite necessary for us to see if we want to truly be able to say that we understand the sufferings of these people.
Aside from my spiel on human suffering and our understanding of it, I really loved this movie. The cinematography was incredible. Every element that goes into making a film fit together so seamlessly and beautifully. The crew that worked on this film were truly artists.
If you haven't seen it, SEE IT! It's well worth your time. Here's the link to the official site. The trailer is right on their home page.
http://www.amazinggracemovie.com/

Brisingr

2008-10-05T17:40:00.003-05:00

I have been reading this book over the course of the past couple of weeks. It doesn’t usually take me this long to finish a book, but I have been so busy I have hardly had time to do anything for fun. I am almost done however, and I am excited to finish. I have liked the storyline thus far, but one of the things that bothers me most about Paolini is that for these last two books, the title he gives them doesn’t actually come into play in the book until the last hundred pages or so.

For example, in Eldest, we didn’t learn that Murtagh was Eragon’s elder brother until the very end of the book, when we also learned that the second dragon egg had hatched for Murtagh. The picture on the cover of the book depicted this happening, only that the dragon would hatch, but it took the whole book for the action to actually discuss the dragon or the issue of who or what was “eldest.” I can only assume that the same thing is going to happen in this book as well.

Being about two-thirds of the way through the book and not having any evidence of the answer to how the third dragon is going to hatch, or even any discussion about the third dragon at all, I can be fairly certain I am correct. This approach leaves the reader (or perhaps just me) irritated and frustrated that at the end of the book, you only have twice as many questions as you did before and only a few answers addressing your questions from the book before.

---------------------------------UPDATE------------------------------

Okay, so I was wrong. Somehow I missed in the second book that the other surviving dragon was gold, and that was the dragon depicted on the cover. However, I still have to say that the book frustrated me because nothing was really resolved. It's just like The Two Towers in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. It is necessary to get to the rest of the action, but nothing really happens in it. Not to say I didn't like the book, I just want Paolini to get to the main action a little bit faster.

Wait Until Dark

2008-10-05T17:11:00.002-05:00

I had not seen this movie let alone heard of it until this summer. Last night I finally watched it with some friends. I must confess I was pleasantly surprised. I usually consider old horror movies to be somewhat of a joke. This film, however, was quite intriguing and had me going at the end. In the moments before the lights came back on, I wasn’t sure if Susy had survived or not.
I was very much impressed by Audrey Hepburn’s performance as well. I have been thinking a lot lately about how difficult it would be to play a blind person, especially on film. Personally, my eyes dart around rooms quite a bit, so it would be very difficult for me to pretend like I really couldn’t see. I’m not much of an actor, so that doesn’t say much, but I do understand some of what actors go through while trying to portray some of these characters.
My one big problem with the film, similar to my friend, was the ending. Sam continued to make Susy do things herself when he did not go to her, instead waiting for her to go to him. I didn’t really like the character of Sam anyway, but even still, that ending scene made me hate him more. What kind of a decent husband, or any one for that matter, makes a blind person come to them after they went through such a huge ordeal? What kind of person who really loves someone, doesn’t run to them immediately after discovering something like that had just happened? Perhaps this was an underlying issue that the screenwriter and/or director were trying to discuss, but I didn’t feel like it was discussed enough in the film to really make that a valid defense for that choice.
I still have not quite decided whether or not I actually liked the movie or not though. I was impressed by some of the acting and the plot was very simple, but yet complicated enough to keep my interest and keep me wondering what was going to happen. I think I’ll probably have to watch it again a little later in order to really decide how I feel about it.
Here's the trailer from IMDB
http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi3019571481/

Artistic Classes

2008-10-02T15:59:00.002-05:00

I just realized why most teachers won't let the creator comment on their own work. I have always had the impulse to defend my choices when I present a piece of work that I have done, but the last few years I have learned how to restrain myself for the most part. However, I still felt like it was kind of an unfair request of teachers/moderators for the artist themselves to remain quiet.
For the first time today I experienced first hand why that request is so often made. If left unbridled, the artist will explain what they were thinking or going for, far beyond the bounds of what the audience needs or wants to know. While these discussions can often stimulate great creativity, something for which I am grateful, it can also too easily lead the artist to thinking out loud, which is usually not the most interesting discussion for the spectator. I felt as though my head were about to burst from boredom and frustration. Perhaps also I experienced this because I was slightly miffed that the piece of work that was being discussed was on a topic somewhat similar to my own piece. This coincidence immediately frightened me into thinking that perhaps when shared, my own work would not be as greatly appreciated or have the desired effect, because it had already been discussed in the recent past.

My Personality

2008-10-02T13:42:00.003-05:00

Some things have caused me pause lately that made me realize just how odd of a personality that I have. At work, which I love, I am somewhat of a computer geek. I love learning about the programs and systems that we use, and I am always pushing myself to learn them better so that I can take more initiative.
At school, I am a theatre major, which in and of itself signifies that I might be a little crazy. I'm not quite as weird as some of the people that I know, but perhaps that is not because I am completely immersed in it. I love it as well, but obviously, I have other things that I like to concentrate more of my time on.
At home, I am kind of a compilation of both of these, plus a little more. I love watching football. I love reading, knitting, writing, as well as watching movies. I LOVE watching movies. Probably too many sometimes, but I've gotten over my childhood guilt for that. Yet somehow, I often find I don't know many of the movies that are discussed in my theatre classes. And, being the type of personality that I am, I immediately want to go out and remedy that. And then I realize that I don't have any time to do that.
I know that so many interests make me a well rounded person and that most people probably have wide varieties of interests as well. At the same time though, I can't help but wonder if perhaps I truly am more unique than some, simply by virtue of the odd combinations of my interests. I didn't even realize until today how strangely they fit together.
On a similar note, the other day I took this personality test based on colors. At the time, I thought it was kind of an interesting way to evaluate a person. Now, though, while I am still a little curious to know exactly how they decided what colors mean one sort of a personality. After I took the test though, I was completely shocked simply because it turned out to be so accurate. It gave me my primary personality and my secondary personality, both of which were totally me. The first said that I was creative. The second was that I was an organizer.
When I first saw this, I didn't think that it could be right. How can creativity and organization really fit together? I still don't know the answer, but somehow, it does work.