I’ve Had 2 ½ Hours of Sleep.

And that’s not all! I saw Harry Potter 7, Part 1, of 2, at midnight in an Imax.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted. School happened. I’ve done two film projects since last time. The lesson? Directing is stressful. I much prefer editing. Probably because I’m OCD and editing lets you be as freakin’ OCD as you want. (There is no such thing as overediting. Riiiight.) And my Internet was still having issues, though today we were told it was fixed for good. Until it breaks again, of course.

Also…I have seen…movies. LIKE:

• Red – nice little comic bit on old CIA retirees being chased by a new, younger squad of CIA employees. I was delightfully surprised at Brian Cox’s appearance and character, and seem to only remember there being a BA scene of Bruce Willis exiting a moving car and one John Malkovitch being obsessed with a pink pig. Kind of off the wall humor, which probably was a factor in why it didn’t pull in a ginormous amount of money. It wasn’t spectacular persay, but I still enjoyed it.
• Megamind – the recent animated flick by Dreamworks. Once again, not the greatest thing in existence, but I still laughed my tail off and enjoyed it. Megamind is a humorous, adorable character. Metroman I found questionable, I thought the plot might have been a bit difficult for really little kids to follow, and for some reason I vaguely remember thinking it would make a good live action movie. If the villain didn’t have a bulbous blue head, of course.
• …and that’s probably it, really.
• OH NO WAIT. Green Lantern trailer. – my reaction? Disappointment. This article goes on about how it looks as though the movie will be breaking the trend of superhero movies employing a sense of “realism.” Eh. Fantastic Four was a bit of stretch in my opinion, but I can still stomach it without flinching too terribly. This? I’d be concerned people won’t buy it. I’m thinking it might get slammed by critics for not having that realism audiences are used to. I personally feel let down because the posters look so damn serious and stoic. (It’s almost like Green Lantern observed The Dark Knight and ran in the opposite direction.) We will see this summer how it will fare, but based on that single trailer, I no longer am so excited to see it.

Yes I did reread and finish Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince and do intend to have a discussion on the book and movie. Soon. I swear. Before my opinions leak out my ears due to my brain being overstuffed with stuff for finals.

Now, for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows P1… I will say upfront I intend to see this more than once. From the first viewing last night, I was not impressed. But then again, I was initially not pleased with the Half Blood Prince movie either, but it has since become practically my favorite of the bunch. My main complaint with this movie is that they had so much time by splitting the book in two and yet they still make everything extremely fast paced and stretch out silly or unimportant moments (when compared to the book and the overall story). I need to see it again in a not Imax theater to properly judge the visual elements, as we were so close I had to crane my neck a bit up to see the whole screen and it looked as though all the characters were leaning away from me they were so huge.

In short, I am still being forced to wait for the second half, which I knew would be the better of the two. I knew, and some how I tricked myself into thinking this movie would be fantastically the best thing to grace the earth ever.

I gotta quit getting excited for movies.

Hopefully over November and December there will be more posts, although I cannot say that they will come on any sort of schedule. Happy Friday, and go see the Deathly Hallows!

The Internet Has Eaten My Braaain

My inability to keep a schedule with this blog frustrates me. When I was keeping a weekly post, it made me realize how quickly time was going by. I find myself in a conundrum.

Right, so once again the Internet went out, this time it died Friday night and didn’t come back until late Monday afternoon. Time and time again I was left grumbling and snarling about the shit connection in the apartment, and once again multiple people reminded me that I should have actually spoke to people who lived in my apartment before I moved in. But according to the managers, this problem didn't start happening until this year. The same managers that told me that their negotiations with the cable company shut out only Mac computers. Not sure who to trust. But the manager's nice. So it's hard to be mad to their faces. But then again it's not hard, because I'm taking an online class that is...online. And it can't be accessed when offline. Every two weeks we have about two papers and a project due in this class, that mostly take the form of webpages. It's not a big deal to me, I did the last project in maybe three hours, I'm used to coding pages, but still. The Internet we were guaranteed with rent needs to work. Especially given this is an apartment that caters to university students.

So this is nearly six days now in the past month that I've been without Internet, and on the one hand, I feel really really pathetic I can hardly make it a day without griping and getting upset that I can't get on the Internet. It's gotten to the point where I'm starting to disdainfully think a computer is worthless if it doesn't have an Internet connection (especially since I don't know where my Sims 3 disc is). I know this isn't right at all--computers have that inherent quality to compute things and they've got these nifty things that help write papers called 'word processors.' I've got photoshop and artistic ability, I could blow some time with art. But no, when the Internet dies I'm suddenly paralyzed and feel entirely cut off from the world. I'm left to check Facebook updates on my terribly slow connection on my phone (not a smart phone, so yes the connection there is bad) and run the battery down. For the past several days I've had to cart my laptop to campus and check email and do little bits of homework here and there, but when I know in the back of my mind the Internet doesn't work at home, there's such a finality to everything I do on the computer that I begin panicking that I won't get it all done between classes and then I'll be left in the dark when I go home.

It's terrible. I'm so paranoid it's just sad.

But on the other hand, knowing that I really can't go more than a day or two without Internet, I'm comfortable enough to admit this fact because I know a lot of people in my generation can't. Freaking digital age infiltration, and all. It doesn't bother me so much to say that because it's more accepted now. I've been hooked on the computer since I was a kid, and got into the Internet in my late elementary school years. I've always been a tech person.

And it just frustrates me to no end when I can't fix the problem. I think that--the fact that I had to call tech support over the weekend and they couldn't find the problem and couldn't send a technician until Monday--was comparable to twisting a knife in a wound. If I had access to the modem I could fix it. If I was at home, I could fix it, and then if I couldn't, I would be fine being mad at myself for not being knowledgeable enough about the hardware. Here? No. I'm left floundering in the darkness that is a broken Internet connection, having to wait for other people to come to the rescue when I know I'm perfectly capable.

On an unrelated note, I've started getting Nintendo Power magazines in the mail again after about a two year break. Huzzah! I'm excited and they're helping me expand my Christmas list. Also the latest Entertainment Weekly has The Social Network crew on the front, and I fully intend to see that movie soon and would be willing to do a little review. Then there's this upcoming assignment where we film students are going to be able to analyze any film we want in accordance to the Motion Picture Code developed in the '30s. I'm doing Iron Man 2 because it came in the mail last week and yes. Then I'm intending to shoot my second film project for the other film class tomorrow.

Fun times? Eh, sure. Stress? Hell yes.

So...be on the lookout for a possible post on the film shoot, and another on the wonderfulness that is Harry Potter (I've wanted to share my thoughts on it for a while, but figured I should wait until I refreshed my memory...and I started book 6 again this morning).

Happy Monday, everyone.

Decorating

Seeing as I’m a fan of movies, it should come as a surprise that I often consider movie memorabilia to fall under the category of “décor” and that I often times see movie posters as art.

I moved into my first apartment back in August and still haven’t done much as far as decorating goes. The kitchen and living room area are done in red and black, and my room is white and turquoise. Thus far my room has a painting I did several years ago of a V for Vendetta poster. I’m torn between keeping things minimalistic and going all out.

But what really concerns me are the actual living spaces…where the walls are a flat white and have…nothing on them at all. Last year I picked up a beautiful poster from The Spirit that I intend to hang, but because of how much space is available and the location of the light switches on this one wall, I’m thinking of getting another poster to go with it to space across the wall next to the dining table.

Now, The Spirit wasn’t a particularly great movie as far as story goes, but I enjoyed the warped humor and the stylization. It did poorly for a comic book adaptation; it didn’t make money at the box office two years ago, but I still saw it the day after Christmas 2008 or some where in the vicinity there. Then we bought the DVD and I’ve probably watched it three times since it came out. (I think I just wait long enough to fool myself into thinking that it wasn’t nearly as bad as everyone says.) But forget the story—the art and the stylization was what drew me in.

Again, the living areas are done in red and black. Now I just need another poster to go with the one I’ve got. I’ve looked at the other Spirit posters (actually I’ve posted half of them here) but I’m not certain about having multiple posters for a movie I didn’t really like. Then I’m not sure if these are too busy or aren’t strong enough next to the “my city screams” image. I took a step back and googled black and white posters for an hour or two over the weekend, and the best ones I could come up with are below:

Now these three are all from movies I really like. Chicago was probably the first musical with real live people that I saw (both the movie and some months later I saw the theater performance). The music’s good and the story’s (corruption in criminal justice) great. I haven’t seen it in years because we lost the DVD, but I do remember enjoying it. Good Night and Good Luck I saw two years ago I believe, when I was trying to get into watching the award-winning movies. I’m a little fuzzy on how the story goes (it involves the government and early television broadcast medium), but I remember that the final speech by David Strathairn was incredibly powerful and moving. I intend to buy the movie as soon as I come into some extra money. Then there’s Sweeney Todd, a dark musical about a murderous barber featuring Johnny Depp and Alan Rickman—two of my favorites.

I think the Sweeney Todd image fits well as far as style goes, but I don’t like the blue in it and I’m not so certain on having a poster about a bloody musical next to the dinner table. It could unnerve guests. Chicago’s poster is a bit more yellow than The Spirit, but there’s some yellow elements in the kitchen as well. I personally like Good Night and Good Luck the best of the three movies, I think simply because of the message in it, but I don’t think the poster is stylized enough.

Anyone have any opinions on the matter? I’m happy to listen to suggestions, or other black/white/red posters I may have over looked.

Nine Years of Neopets

If you’ve used the Internet for a significant amount of time, especially in the early 2000’s, if you have a child or a young relative, there’s a good chance you’ve heard of it. Neopets is the virtual pet site that’s been up and running since November 1999.

As of September 14^th, 2010, I’ve been on the site for nine years.

...Rachel. You’re a college student. Why on earth are you playing that game…still?

The short answer is simply that it’s addicting. Is/was. I certainly don’t play it like I used to in elementary/middle school, when I easily blow hours at a time on the site. Nowadays, I couldn’t tell you last time I spent an entire hour in one day with it.

It is a virtual pet site yes, but it’s also a game arcade and a social medium as well. The site has over 180 million accounts today. It’s coming close to having one trillion page views. It’s fantastically popular. The creators were heavily involved, they had accounts of their own and were known to interact with regular users. Many, many "plots" have been spawned since it's inception, some as hunt-and-gather type of things where clues are spread out for you to unlock some secret. Others (my favorites actually), were actual wars where you got to pick a side and fight against baddies to see whose side could get more points. But the site's gone through some massive changes in the last few years. Not all I’ve particularly agreed with or even appreciated, but the general public claims it’s been for the better overall. I don’t keep up with the politics so much anymore, now that I’m in college and I have other stuff to keep myself busy. But I was very active in the day of the sale—when Viacom bought Neopets in 2005. This led to a plethora of changes and a huge spike in users as well as an eventual site-makeover.

One of the biggest changes involved a ton of redraws of pets and the ability to 'customize' them, or dress them with clothes and...stuff. The pets pictured overhead are called "Lupes." The first pet I ever made was a blue Lupe and originally looked like the top one.

I know I’ve taken a couple hiatuses, but somehow, I’ve managed to come back, and I’ve kept the same 2-3 accounts the whole time. (Those unfamiliar with the site, the Neopets Team…the rule makers, essentially, have said that one human being is allowed to have 5 accounts to accommodate all the Neopets you make or adopt.) My first account was made September 14^th, 2001, and my second about six months later. I use the second the most.

Originally, when I was still a little kid, I played the site daily. I made and adopted pets. I opened a shop and sold spare items, I explored far and wide, I played their arcade games so much that I made enough money to buy “paintbrushes” to change the color of my Neopets. When I painted all of the pets on my first account and had 300,000 Neopoints (their currency) I thought I was hot stuff. I might have been in 6^th grade by the time this occurred.

But then...I actually learned some stuff. In the first two years for sure, I taught myself HTML on the free “pet pages” each pet came with. I made up back-stories for my pets. I joined “guilds,” which were essentially just clubs of people, and in my first few years, it was essential to me to be a part of a worthy guild and to socialize with its members. When I turned 13 I played around with their chat boards, which were really more like forums. There, I learned about role-playing for the first time.

In a way, Neopets taught me a lot. So the long answer here is that I keep coming back to the site because I have a nostalgic spot for it. It’s taught me a lot about Internet politics, about business, about how people fuction, about websites, about storytelling. It gave me so much practice in writing and drawing that I’m grateful to have found the place. It is just a game, the pets are just pixels, but when you invest so much time into it all, it becomes more than that. It may just be a website that only exists in the invisible space that is the Internet, but it’s become something of an actual place to me. Of course it’s changed and I’ve not kept up with the news or the politics of it lately, but back in the day, it was like sliced bread. Not only could you play games and be imaginative, but you could meet (presumably) real people who liked it as much as you did.

Again, even though I’m pessimistic and old-fashioned and prefer the old site with its real sidebar (and not this top bar that I still don’t like the organization on), I’m glad its still around. It’s been a pretty great nine years, and I’m perfectly content to keep coming back, even if it’s only to play the arcade games between classes.

Now wait for it...old school ad time!

Um, hi?

Holy crud. I just wanted to say I've not fallen off a cliff or jumped off the face of the earth or anything like that. My internet, since I returned to the apartment on Sunday, has been completely out. It just came back today about 20 minutes ago.

And here's the thing: the internet for the past two weeks has gone down nearly everyday for about 2-3 hours in the evening. But nope, mine just went kaput entirely. (But now its baaaack yaaay! It really makes me rethink and almost take back everything I said about wanting to live in the 80's. If I was born today and was somehow time-travelled back, I wouldn't make it for more than a couple days. I'm terrible.) The manager said our provider was renegotiating stuff, and when they did that it knocked a few of the Mac computers completely offline.

Greaat. I said.

So I went and bought two routers and fought with them, had a horrible day yesterday, so horrible in fact I thought it was Murphey's Law day (anything that can go wrong, will most definitely do so in epic proportions). It was just the most frustrating thing--knowing that I'm a tech-savvy person and that if I was at the house, I could have fixed this...but here I was helpless without access to the apartment's hardware. I finally called the Internet provider myself today and they said they'd send someone, when my roommate called after a measly one day of no service and they reset the modem and everything came back.

I promise a more meaningful post will come tomorrow. Until then, I have to work my tail off on dinner (fish tacos!) and writing this film paper I have due in 2 days (but couldn't even attempt because of the downed Internet).

Happy Tuesday!

Zany, Zealous, Zootime Merriment

Surely there’s a verb that starts with Z that could describe my zoo-going.

My black and white photos were developed! I had a fun time paroosing the zoo even though it was very, very hot out. A lot of the animals, especially the bigger ones, were more interesting in lounging than putting on a good show and posing for me. And since I grew up near a huge city, we had this big nice zoo all through childhood and I visited it frequently. This one in my little college town wasn’t nearly as big, although it was out on some back-road area so it looked way more natural.

As I walked around the zoo, knowing I needed to take over half a roll of pictures and upset that it was so hot and the most fantastic beasts refused to move, I began to wonder. Did these animals enjoy their habitats? Would they rather be in the wild? Do they even know the difference? I’ve never been a huge rally person on rights or anything, but I do care about animals. I had been told these animals were rescued creatures, and this very well may have been true since one of the llamas we saw did have an injury on its face—perhaps it was a newcomer.

I’d like to think that these animals have it good with scheduled meals and certainly here they have employees that care about the creatures. Many of the enclosures had more than enough playthings versus the zoo back home. They’ve also got little rooms here that they can escape to during the most extreme weather. But you’ve always got to wonder, even though the enclosures are often massive, they can easily look like cages versus their natural habitat of the whole, wild wilderness.

Though I say all of this, my friends can attest to me saying “I’ll take you home, I want a tiger as a pet!” when obviously this would be a terrible idea—not only do I have no idea how to take care of a jungle cat, an apartment is no place to keep one.

Memory, My Memory, I Need You to Inspire Me

I survived the first day of classes! And I came home and baked cupcakes for a friend’s birthday on top of that! If only I’d gotten off my duff and gone to the gym this morning, then I’d feel on top of the world. Oh well.

I promise this post won’t be a boring recollection of my hourly adventures on campus. Instead I've got an assignment to share. I’ve come to learn that for one of my film classes (the particularly long one that runs from 5:00-6:30 in the evening), it’s required that the students keep a journal of their ideas. Just any ideas that come to us that pertain to projects. I’ve been told that only a few will be really reviewed and turned in, so I though to myself, why not post the thoughts here? By posting my thoughts here, it’s following the spirit of my professor who would rather see the whole class go paperless (although I really couldn’t function if I were told I couldn’t handwrite my lecture notes).

So here’s the project. Using less than 15 black and white still photographs—taken with a 35mm camera, mind you—we are to tell a story. Oh, but not just any old story. This story has to have some certain special importance to the author. The story must derive from a memory.

The first thing that comes to mind: my life is boring. I have no story from my memory to tell.

But then as lecture goes on and I’m gawking at all the supplies we’re going to have to buy for the projects for this class, a few things come to me. As a kid I fell off a horse. One of my cats died recently. I’ve shot more deer than I can remember when hunting with my dad. It took a good thirty seconds for me to realize that none of these will prove good stories, seeing as I have no access to livestock, I have no desire to attempt to train my remaining felines to lie still and play dead, and it is not deer season.

So I mull it over. I lean over and ask one of my friends why on earth we should pay $100 for a script-writing program that we’ll use once for this class. I think to myself, “You want to be a screenwriter, you’ll use it.” I still question why we have to spend $100. It isn’t until nearly an hour later that I remind myself that this is technically an art class, and they were always expensive in high school.

I think of the drama I encountered in high school and decide against it, knowing many of my fellow high school students followed me to my college. I go further back. I think of how I was in Science Olympiad for 5 years, and all the crazy-sciencey things I did. For fun. (For those who don’t know, Science Olympiad is basically science club, but instead of partaking in a science fair, we compete in certain events that encompass some math or science skill against other schools.) There were countless times when we spent hours practicing only to go to competition and fail. Tears and heartbreak. Oh what little nerds we were…but I loved it and miss it now.

I think that the Science Olympiad idea may require too much building (reconstructing old projects) or too much explanation to squeeze into 15 pictures. I go home, check the mail, my roommate cooks for me (for the first time and I’m estatic!), and I bake cupcakes. I think some more.

I think of things that scared me as a child. I remember being afraid to lock bathroom doors—really any doors—because I thought I’d get trapped inside. This happened to me in a paint-your-own-pottery place when I was in elementary. I was banging on the door and nearly in tears by the time the handle jiggled free, only to find everyone staring at me when I escaped. I think this could be an interesting story if I tweaked it and heightened the dramatics a bit.

Stuff evidently has happened in my life, I just fail to remember any of it. Perhaps it’s because I’ve got a difficulty opening up and sharing my life with others—complete strangers, really. I love art and I take pride in my work, but to rip myself open like that and lay it all out on a table for potentially a whole auditorium of strangers to see, it’s hard! Alas, this just means I'll have to spend a lot of time lying around eating the remaining cupcakes and being inspired by life. So difficult, but some how I'll manage it, just you wait and see.