We went to the movies...

Novel huh? We kept talking about how often we'd go to the movies this summer as the kid is not here and we can see grown up movies without sending her to my mom's house (she's a freak, I try to limit my kid's exposure). So far the count is at 1 and it wasn't really a movie on my short list. It was on the hubby's though and I didn't want to bother being picky with him (his hours changed at work, he's been kinda tired) so we went to see Clash of the Titans. Do you guys remember the old version way back in....1981? Good gawd that's old. My fav was Bubo (pictured above) and he had a short cameo in the new one. They pulled him out of a box and threw him back in, it was cute.

The rendition itself had a ton of changes, or as my husband put it they 'took liberties'. That sort of thing doesn't bother me at all as long as they make it work, which they did. I am all about being entertained at the movies, make up whatever story you want, take all the liberties in the world, just make it entertaining. I like that they were able to do a lot of much better special effects, ah the upside of modern technology! The actor playing Perseus, Sam Worthington, did a great job but his accent (they may or may not have been trying to hide it) kinda faded in and out lightly. Oddly I find it somewhat distracting. I love accents (like what American woman doesn't?) but I want it either there or not. The fading is annoying. Liam Neeson (EXCELLENT actor) played Zeus who, in this rendition, is not really a good guy.

I used to LOVE Greek Mythology. Starting when I was about 8 I had several books on it. Yes, I was that kid in elementary school who spent her recess in the library. And here you wondered what happened to that weirdo kid, here's your answer! I have, unfortunately, not kept up that particular fondness and have become woefully remiss in my study of Greek Mythos. So through the whole movie when they'd be describing a god or creature I couldn't for the life of me remember if that particular version is the one that is most often recounted or if they just made it that way to fit in the movie. It did, however, remind me of how very wrong the Greek gods were. The Greeks back in the day must have been some very strange people is all I have to say.

There was a part (if you remember the story) where they have to go to Medusa and cut off her head so they can use it to turn the Kracken to stone. They repeat the story of Medusa being a snake with snake hair whose eyes turn anything living to stone. OK, that's about on par with what everyone knows. They went into how she was cursed to that life though and I couldn't remember if it was on par with the common stories. As per this movie Posiden wanted her (as a mortal woman I'm guessing) but she didn't want to be with him so she ran to Athena. Athena didn't care that she wasn't interested in Posiden so he (and I love this phrase) took her on the floor at Athena's temple and then cursed her to a life as a snake with the hair and whatnot and no woman was allowed in her dwelling, only men. Now here is where I love what the Greeks came up with. So this chick didn't want to bang a god (supposedly one of the good guys they are supposed to worship?!), ran away to one of the other gods (another good guy?) who didn't care and so she was raped and punished forever? Yeah, love that style of justice! Makes me want to worship that awesome group of gods, how about you? Who comes up with this shit? I mean it's great when you can make movies about it but in real life? Could you imagine? Yeah, sign me up for that time period! Hell even the dark ages were better than that, give me the black plague any day!

So all in all, I totally recommend this movie. Does it have to be on big screen? No, it's not Transformers or anything that spectacular but it does have some great big screen fight scenes. They made it so that Andromeda (the sacrificial princess) was not Perseus' love interest. And it worked well because instead they gave him the love interest of an absolutely beautiful, just gorgeous actress (Gemma Arterton) playing Io, a woman who, again, refused to be seduced by a god, and was cursed to never age. Not the worst of curses, just as Medusa....

New vivarium

Look, a post with pictures! I've been doing most of my computing (i.e. web surfing) from the iPad and you can't download pics on it from the camera so for the most part pictures are being taken and stored on the flash card. I know, what's the point huh? I finally took some and downloaded them. Novel! My minion at work (the plant guy) needed more room to work in his garage space so he finished his biggest project (my mossy frog terrarium) and brought it over today. It's sitting sideways on my kitchen bar (we have yet to decide on a stand for it) so it was super awkward to get a picture of it.

In the pictures it looks totally narrow but it's not really. The dimensions are 18" wide x 18" deep x 24" tall. It has a waterfall starting about midway up and enough water can be kept in the bottom to house fish (it's connected to a filter that feeds the waterfall) that the mossy frogs will most likely eat.



No, I don't have the frogs yet. I want to make sure the tank is fully functional with no issues before having the frogs shipped out. The plants inside the tank will grow in and fill it quite a bit more given time. I will be taking pictures in the coming months to show the growth and we'll see what survives and what doesn't. I love some of the plants and others are just there because that's what my minion thought would do well or work as variation in texture and color. Really it's kind of like making a painting, monochromatic isn't what you are looking for and nature doesn't like patterns. There are a few flowering plants in there too, even an orchid. I wan anxious to see if I can't get the orchid to bloom. I have like 10 orchids but none of mine bloom, my house is probably too dry. I take them outside a lot and water them more often than recommended because they dry out really quick inside but I suspect the one in the vivarium will bloom faster. I'm a plant freak, did you know that? I may have majored in chemistry but it could have just as easily been botany. If it weren't for the fact that I kill plants more often than not. I try though! And I do love plants so. This vivarium thing is rad for people like me, it's kind of a gimmie as far as keeping plants alive.



By the way, those big gray rocks you see? Those are all fake. My minion has newly perfected rock casting (it's a really involved process, you would not believe the effort and money involved) and all those rocks are barely a few pounds. Of course the gravel and water weigh a ton but hopefully I'll decide on a permanent shelf for this lovely structure and will only have to move it once. Or so the husband hopes!

The Eagle has landed...

This morning was the morning. It was the morning that we sent off our 8 year old daughter to San Diego to spend the entire summer at my mother in law's house (we call her Nanni, pronounced nonni, don't ask me why she spells it with and 'a' because it annoys me to no end). This was not, by any means, the first time she's been on a plane. It was, however, the first time she went unaccompanied. Nervous parental breakdown much? Why yes, yes it is time for that. My hubby and Nanni thought she was perfectly capable of doing this and I agreed. I do not, however, trust other people. I just don't. I don't know the people who will sit next to my child on a (3 hour 9 nonstop of course) flight to the west coast. I therefor do not trust them to be near my child.

The bonus of this was that she was given incentive to do this flight on her own. The bribe? The cell phone of course. She got it last week (see previous post) and has spent the past few days becoming acquainted with it. It's not as easy to use as the iPod that she's been making documentaries with (how scary is that) but she got the hang of it. I was not going to get her an iPhone so don't even get me started. Her daddy is just tickled that he can text his child and I think the phone was worth it just for his entertainment alone. She's been very good with it, texting mostly which is what we want her to do. It helps with her spelling (yes, she spells out her words on the phone, none of that short hand crap) and her reading. Plus we can always get a hold of Nanni who doesn't like using a cell phone herself. Again, one of those old dog new trick that isn't going to happen things.

So the hubby gets the kid on the plane this morning. He gets there early since you have to do a bunch of paperwork with an unaccompanied minor. Could not have worked out better. 3 people sit in a row on Southwest flights to San Diego. There are 3 unaccompanied minors to her flight this morning. The hubby spends the wait chatting with the mom of one of the other minors. The plane boards and the kid is happily making new friends with the other 2 kids she's sitting next to and so they all go and board together, just an off handed wave to the dotting parents. I think she'll be in her own apartment before she hits high school at this rate. Really, why does she even bother keeping us around? Cash? Maybe but only just.

To add to the 'perfect' flight scenario the plane lands early (gotta love those SW Airline pilots, they haul ass) and she calls us as soon as her Nanni meets her at the gate. She's a smart girl, she knows who pays her phone bill. But wait, there's more! She's going on a ton of camps this summer. San Diego Zoo, Museum of Natural History (bug camp, once again, jealous), swimming, gymnastics, constantly going to the beaches. Oh and BTW, during this phone call Nanni mentioned that they are going to drive up to San Francisco this weekend. Going to hit up the Monterey Bay Aquarium on the way. Have any of you ever been there? It's a fav of mine. Like if I had the opportunity I'd move there just so I could go every single day. The place is amazing. I have a thing for aquariums ya know. Seriously, a thing. So I mention this on Facebook (my instrument gacked up a hairball last night, my work day is hosed and I consequently have nothing to do, HELLO Facebook) and our old neighbor lets me know that HEY, she's on that drive and we should have the kid meet up with them while she's up there. This neighbor has 4 kids and my kid has been missing them something awful. They are a super sweet family. Except the ex-husband (hence their move away from us), my dog didn't even like him.

So I gave the friend the kid's new cell phone number with instructions to txt my child. She's going to vacation in San Diego all summer starting with a drive to Nor Cal and maybe even a visit to some old friends of ours. Isn't this right out of the book of vacations you should have as an adult? WTF? I'm having coronaries just telling people to txt my child to have lunch or some yuppie shit.

How does one come to terms with the fact that their kid is now all that and we are so not that anymore? Sooo beyond my prime, swear to gawd.

The up side? The hubby and I have all summer to ourselves. To , you know, make another kid. Hell, maybe this one Nanni will vacation to Hawaii with or some such. Hey, wouldn't it be nice if she took us along to like, babysit or something?

Twitter, and those who follow....

I'm on a couple of these 'social' (a 4 letter word in my vocab) sites. 2 actually and I actively participate in 1 forum. I think that's a new social max, I just don't need anymore. Add this poor neglected blog to it and yeah, I may have to hole myself every once in awhile just to recover to my normal level of bitch. I'm pretty uptight about these sites though, my comments on this blog are moderated. Some freaks followed me back from commenting on P Dub and told me not to be so negative. I told them to get of my piece of the net. Specifically, IT'S MY PIECE GO FIND YOUR OWN FUNDY. Short and to the point. Then I moderated the comments. Facebook, yeah I don't actually 'friend' everyone who asks and then I block all the updates from you losers who need brown cows in farmville. Ya, I don't need to know about it. See? Social, it's all relative. Mind you these jobbers are all accessible via iPhone so it constantly updates. That and my email. No, I don't need to do this but there it is. I pay enough for the damn phone plan, might as well squeeze it for all it's worth.

Twitter is one of those things I started and would probably not have it at all if it weren't for my friends Alison and Jason in San Diego. Alison is kinda insane about it and about 15 times a day it updates her status to where ever she is standing in the city. Because you know, we all need to know where Alison is. It's important right? I follow 16 people. Only 4 of which who regularly post. Which is a good number. Probably too much if they all posted but they don't so I continue to have it as a kind of back ground. Plus it does help me keep in touch with Jas and Ali and any disasters they have going on. Don't make fun, we can help from halfway across the country too. Really!

Now what I don't get, seriously, are these people following me. I have 25 followers. Dude I don't think I have 25 friends, wtf are these people? I mean I have a few fellow bloggers who follow me (Hi Steph & Lisa!) and I know who they are. And a few (yes few) friends that are up there but the rest. I dunno where they came from. I even found that I have a 'list' that's following me. A list? WTF is that? And why do they give a hoot what I tweet? My tweets are mostly a back and forth conversations with someone (Alison 99% of the time) that I could just as easily do texting. It's one sided for those that aren't friends with the both of us too so it must look...odd?

So yeah, Twitter. I think it would have worked better if Facebook hadn't come along. And with all the security issues with Facebook have you noticed it's not like we stop using it. People just put up a note that bitches about it? We're all a bunch of semi-social losers.....

P.S. if you are just that nosey my sign on name to just about any site (including Twitter but not Facebook, you need my full last name for that) is MichelleSG. Not saying I won't block you but there it is, in all it's antisocial glory.

*Note that within 3 hours of writing this post I had 3 more complete strangers follow me. I'm not sure if they were individuals or businesses of some sort. Curiuos to see if there are more by days end.