Oscar Fever Ramble

Yes the above picture does have something to do w/ today's post. Plus it makes me grin like a big 'ol doof to look @ it. Before I forget to tell you, the reason the pic is relevant is that when they weren't busy making Ocean's Thirteen, George & Brad found time to make a couple of little gems entitled Michael Clayton and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Have you heard of them? If not check your Oscar nominee list.

Today should be a national holiday as far as I'm concerned. It is Oscar day and preparing for tonight's telecast has been a labor of love for movies. Below is the list of nominated films I have seen in anticipation of the festivities that are Oscar:

3:10 to Yuma
American Gangster
Atonement
Charlie Wilson's War
Gone Baby Gone
Juno
La Vie En Rose
3/4 of Michael Clayton
No Country for Old Men
Once
Sweeney Todd
There Will be Blood

I wish I had seen The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, The Savages, Into the Wild, I'm Not There, Lars & the Real Girl, Bourne Ultimatum and In the Valley of Elah. To the best of my knowledge Jesse never came to Bozeman or Livingston and even though it has been released on DVD, it is not at Movie Gallery & is a "long wait" at the top of my Blockbuster.com queue. I don't understand this predicament as it is a western and this is Montana? Blockbuster sent me Elah, but it was the blu-ray version and it won't play in a regular DVD player, so I learned something new, but didn't see the movie!

I watched a smattering of Ratatouille w/ my beloved nephews Sullivan and Maxwell at Christmas, but really as a cat person, should a rat be ANYWHERE near a kitchen? I had given the film to brother Ira so he could remember the first movie he took Sullivan to the theater to see. I figure after they've watched it 100 times or so he won't forget hehe.

After watching the Independent Spirit Awards yesterday on IFC, there was a glaring omission to films that should have been nominated. I haven't seen Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (although I did try, but I got too hungry), but from the clips I've seen and what I've read how could it not have found a place on the same ballot that found a slot for Norbit. If you don't believe me about Norbit get your own ballot at http://www.oscar.com/

So you are probably dying to know what I would be tickled my favorite shade of pink to see win tonight:

Original Song: Falling Slowly from the little gem Once;
Original Score: The Atonement score by Dario Marianelli for inventive use of a typewriter as an instrument;
Makeup: La Vie En Rose's makeup because those Edith Piaf eyebrows kept me mesmerized throughout Marianne Cotillard's entire performance. I could NOT stop looking at them;
Cinematography: No Country for Old Men's bleak modern west photography, although I sure wish I'd seen the old west landscape of Assassination of Jesse James to compare. [Film geek note: Roger Deakins was the cinematographer on both movies as well as In the Valley of Elah, so he really deserves to win];
Adapted Screenplay: No Country for Old Men as I have heard the original book by Oprah darling Cormac McCarthy was as cheerful as watching baby seals being clubbed!;
Supporting Actress: Saoirse Ronan since she was by far the most interesting person in all of Atonement;
Supporting Actor: Philip Seymour Hoffman for Charlie Wilson's War. Javier Bardem was excellent in No Country, but Phil single-handedly stole the movie from always overrated Tom Hanks, was a sheer joy to watch in the talkety-talk, political movie, and was probably robbed of nominations for his performances in The Savages and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead;
Actor: George Clooney for Michael Clayton because he rocked as the off-his-game corporate fixer and will lose to histrionic Daniel Day-Lewis;
Director: The Coen Bros for their much deserved turn as directors of No Country for Old Men. I watched Fargo the other night since No Country isn't on video to watch again yet. They have been preparing for No Country since their first film Blood Simple, honed their craft in Miller's Crossing and darn near got it right in Fargo. Note to the brothers: The only lame movie you were ever accused of making had Tom Hanks in it;
Picture: Hands down for me the film of the year was No Country for Old Men. If it doesn't win it will be for the same reason one of my favorites Pulp Fiction lost 14 years ago to CGI filled overhyped Forrest Gump - violence. If it can't win my preferred order is: 1. No Country, 2. Juno, 3. Michael Clayton, 4. Atonement (at least it was pretty) & 5. There Will Be Blood (so "great" Mom and I had the whole theater to ourselves last Sunday).

I'm off for now for a pre-event nap, bath & accessory pick. We are scheduled to have potstickers & frozen pizza for our Oscar party at Chez Sháron (aka Mom's house). I'll check back very soon w/ a pic of my Oscar ensemble and reaction to the actual award winners.

With all that said, let the pre-awards show fashion trashin' begin.

G'Day Heath

Maybe I should call this the three day weekend blog, since I don't seem to be able to update it unless I have an extra day off. As a result today's topic is a bit belated, but very important to me nonetheless.

You may remember last time I mentioned that I have a weakness for high school movies and television. Because of this predilection, I was in severe shock the whole week surrounding Heath Ledger's untimely, tragic and supposedly accidental death. It took me until Saturday to watch my favorite film of his again. Yes, he packed a brief wallop in Monster's Ball, was brave and brilliant in Brokeback Mountain and much anticipated in The Dark Knight. But, my favorite movie of Heath's was his first real American movie. . . . 10 Things I Hate About You.

As a matter of fact 10 Things is on my list of top 3 high school films, along with She's All That and Drives Me Crazy. I literally could watch those three movies nonstop once a week or so.

Thanks to the website http://heathledger.piwko.pl/index.html I can remember Heath as he was above with screenshots of his 10 Things movie scenes. In the press that came out about his career after his passing, toward the end of his life, Heath had pretty much dismissed this movie as the first film someone would cast him in. Knight's Tale notwithstanding, he actively shunned the teen dream image in favor of more serious, artsy fare. However, 10 Things undoubtedly put him on the map and was a great start of a career cut too short.

Watching the film on Saturday, it has stood the test of time in that I still get a kick out of the Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew reworking. Heath was fresh, cute as heck and even sings in the film. Since initially seeing the film I have kept an eye on him as well as several other cast members: Julia Stiles, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Susan May Pratt, David Krumholtz, Gabrielle Union and even Allison Janney. Joseph has also turned into an incredible indy actor with Brick and The Lookout to his impressive credit. Susan was in two out of the three hs movies mentioned above, since she also played a not-so-true friend in Drive Me Crazy. Julia has been in the Bourne trilogy, the first of which made me begin to re-evaluate Matt Damon. Allison was superb in The West Wing and the new recent classic Juno. David is doing Numb3rs on tv, but I remember him more for the memorable bit part he had on ER back in the Dr. Carter days. And finally, Gabrielle was also in She's All That.

So, my point is that 10 Things was a great starting point for several actors, with the brightest star being Heath. He will be missed by me and I'll always wonder what kind of work he would have treated us to in the future. I saw The Dark Knight preview yesterday in the theater and I will be seeing the movie this summer because of Heath. It looks like a creepy end to a career that started with a little big high school movie. I bet its THE blockbuster of the summer.

R.I.P. Patrick Verona

#3 of 3 from previous post

I work at a tanning and hair salon a couple nights a week and on Saturdays for some fun money. I love the job because of the people. The customers and staff are great to visit with, and as you know I love to talk. Don't worry, they don't let me near the scissors.

Recently while working there, I saw this page in a Modern Salon magazine. It said the lady's fine, slightly wavy hair made it perfect for the hairstyle. Since that is my hair type, I thought I just might be able to pull off the look. My stylist Tracy modified it to my lifestyle and the results can almost be seen on the previous post picture. The thing I like the most about it is the short bangs. Quite liberating and easy to care for. The modified 'do fits my new life too as I am out in the wind much more than before, and with a shake its back in place. What do you think?

1 picture 3 topics

Sorry for the long delay. I am having a challenge getting used to a new job, but today was a government holiday so I had a little bit of extra time on my hands.

Regarding the above photo, it was meant to allow me to comment on 3 different interests, but upon looking at it only 2 of the 3 are apparent.

Starting from the top, I'm tickled to death with my birthday present of the first season of the stellar high school drama The O.C. Mike & Chris were so sneaky in providing me with a means to keep satisfying my habit for watching episodes without having to fill up my Blockbuster queue again. Thanks to Blockbuster I have seen every episode, but can make my way through at least the first season at leisure. You avid readers will remember that I had the complete series box on my birthday/Christmas wishlist, but this is an amazingly good start as some afficiandos contend season 1 was the best of the 3.5. It consists of 27 episodes, because the show originally premiered in the summer and then thankfully got picked up for a full season. Why do I like this bit of fluff?

1 I have a weakness for well done high school movies and tv shows because I enjoyed my small town high school experience so much. 2 The music is an indy lovers dream. A little heavy on the emo, but stellar tunes by the likes of Imogen Heap, Sufjan Stevens and LCD Soundsystem were used. The music is so worthy it deserves a post of its own, which I'm sure it will receive at some point. 3 Captain Oats & Princess Sparkle. 4 Adam Brody & Rachel Bilson - possibly the cutest geek/prom queen couple ever.



The second item of note in the above picture is the 14 karat fup shirt I purchased from Powells bookstore in Portland Oregon. No I've never been there, but for years I've received their newsletters, and have frequently ordered from them vs. amazon. The reason I discovered Powells was because their technical bookstore had an amazing store cat named fup. No, I never met her either, but like tons of other newsletter readers I always scrolled to the bottom of the latest issue first to read about fup.'s adventures. Well written, quirky, and almost believable. Fup. was so real to me I was dismayed to read of her passing in late 2007. Her tribute can be read here http://www.powells.com/blog/?p=2568 and is worth a view.

Since her death I have connected with several other fans, including shoutouts to Beth at Powells, Gretchin and Amy. I also purchased the two available t-shirts. The shirts were printed for fup.'s birthday parties for several years. I have requested a memorial t-shirt, but haven't heard back from "Dave" yet. If you like cats you might get on board and contact Powells for 1 last super tee.

#3 0f 3 in the above picture will be in a separate post. Thanks for stopping by.

Before It's Too Late

Before It's too late, please check out one of the most incredible photography sites of 2007 365 Portraits by Bill Wadman has been a highlight of my year. Mr. Wadman is a photographer living in NYC and he has taken a photo of a different person every single day. They haven't all been famous, but he has included photos of such illuminaries as Imogen Heap and Buzz Aldrin. You can still view the photos and see some truly interesting faces. I found the website through the cupcake blog, so you never know where the web will take you. Above is a photo of me kissing a prince, er frog, that I wish Bill had taken. Now check out his photos ya'll!

Did you know that where hot chocolate is concerned ice cubes are the new marshmallows?

Coupla outta sight sites

I love cupcakes! They became all the rage this year. I have a friend who remembers I love cupcakes and he brought some to our group lunch today. Aren't they pretty? There is nothing better than that super sweet buttercream frosting. . . except maybe for good pop culture dish to go along with it. Today's lunch w/ cupcake topic: Jamie Lynn Spears pregnant at 16 of course! There was a brief digression onto the sauna scene in Eastern Promises, but I before I digress way too far way from cupcakes, I have an amazing website to share w/ you.

Cupcakes Take the Cake is tasty blog, also on blogspot, that I ran across this summer while shuffling through random blogs after checking out the latest nephew photos. Now I don't live in a big enough community to have a cupcake club like the bloggers in NYC do, but it sure looks fun. Since then my lunch friend Chris aka Virginia Hamm has treated me to cupcakes twice and we had "Red Velvet Cupcake Day" at the Delux Bakery in Iowa City Iowa. I hope you find the blog as sweet as I do.

My nephews brought me a calendar today. I had seen the website for Stuff on My Cat earlier this year also, but never imagined they'd do a daily calendar. Can't wait for the new year to start so I can see new stuff on a new cat every new day.

Remember you can luv cupcakes and you can luv cats, but if you try to mix the 2 you'll get hair in your frosting or frosting in your hair!

What I tried to post before . . . aka today's news -- today

...so what I got was...
Not one thing off the list; not even the superglue!

I did get:

Cat cards, cat stickers and a dancing cat with candy fish =^..^=
Subscription renewal to Allure magazine
Coffeehouse gift certificate
Pizza place gift certificate
Local movie theater tickets

So many of my passions appeared, even if none of the list items were checked off. The best part of the day though was the brother, sister-in-law, nephews, grandma, mom & dad there to help me celebrate. We had homemade red sauce & meatballs with penne and the annual Waldorf Red Velvet Cake – cooked icing, not cream cheese. As the ad says...PRICELESS