Behold the enchanting and astonishingly expressive gaze of the most unlikely romantic lead imaginable. Yet WALL-E is one of the most convincing romances I have seen in a while. Pixar never ceases to astound me with the expressiveness of inhuman characters. WALL-E is charming, curious and adorable; the cutest thing (and biggest eyes) in space since ET. He proves that love needs no dialogue. And the seemingly ridiculous idea of robots in love becomes a captivating adventure. 

And I had to laugh at this futuristic tale, which shows the re-emergence of life on earth, with people beginning to re-evolve into humans... washing up on earth as gelatinous blobs with rudimentary skeletons and beginning at last to reverse the detriments of 'progress'.

Oh, and the little cockroach is cute too.

Pixar also maintains its standard of brilliance with the latest short. Funny stuff.

Oh gravity!

"When falling from great heights, one must not think of the landing, but look ahead to how one is going to pull oneself back up."

Rosie sent me turf surfing after another bout of jockey training. I'm so annoyed that I fell off after already surviving a half mile gallop with one stirrup. But she hung a sharp right and I stayed left. Oh well, it happens. I was more annoyed that she broke her bridle so I couldn't get back on. But it was kinda my fault. I was cantering around the outside of the pasture and thought it was cute that the other horses were cantering along the fence with us. It didn't occur to me that they might spin and gallop off bucking in the other direction. And that maybe Rosie might follow them. Naughty Rosie-roo.

Dear Santa...

I guess I should start with this: Christmas was wonderful. My mom made an awesome dinner and I never want to see another cookie. So. much. food. Since my grandparents moved to a retirement community, we operated on old folks time, which is a completely different time zone. So really, I ate a little cereal for breakfast, one HUGE dinner at about 2 PM and nothing else. All festivities were done by 5, so it kinda feels like yesterday already. But no worries, it was still quite enjoyable. 

My mom entrusted me to iron the tablecloth and I felt very grown-up and clueless.

Then I watched Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, which was bubbly, predictable and absolutely delightful. Fairy tale ending extraordinaire, but I loved it. And... just when I thought I couldn't possibly adore Lee Pace, aka Ned the Pie Maker, any more, he turns up looking like THIS

and being the gallant, dashing, romantic, perfect man. WITH a British accent. And he can sing pretty well too. 

Too bad Santa already came and went.

Mad bummin', but still delightful...

Going to bed early in the same pajama pants I rolled out of bed in this morning and wore all day. I finished making a mix CD for my dad that I think he will like. I checked out The Builders and The Butchers, who Emily always talks about and I think Dad will be into them. 

I wrapped presents.

I read The Kite Runner before I wrapped it for my mom. I started looking through it and couldn't stop. My resolution to read more really isn't that hard... once I have a book in front of me, I can't put it down. I finished reading Five People You Meet in Heaven yesterday. 

Helped decorate the tree... it's becoming a traditional Christmas Eve activity, since Mike and I outgrew the childhood eagerness we traditionally can't get our shit together before then. 

And watched A Christmas Story!! Another Christmas Eve tradition which is still delightful after at least the 20th viewing. I grew up watching that movie every Christmas and from every perspective I've experienced it's equally excellent. Just a new perspective from which to love it. Everything is just perfect, from the script, to the score, to cast and the acting, the overall silliness and the wonderfully seamless flow of silliness. 

I find it really funny that the actor who played Ralphie actually exists and is affected by the passing of time. Observe...

I also love Randy. His character is basically effective by being as limp and passive as possible. Which makes those small facial expressions all the more funny.

And now I leave you with a few more indelible images.

 

All your diction dripping with disdain...

Not here. I dig this song. 

With all my being...

...I love my Rosie-roo. :)

Saw her today for the first time in 3 weeks and she's even cuter than I remembered. <3

It's a Hamlet reference, so I feel justified...

Yes I was doing work and being productive today.

Mad intrigued

Jenna and Gab both had encounters with the same ghost last night, so I've been having many deep and intriguing conversations on the subject of ghosts and haunting. 

Based on the circumstances, we've hypothesized that the ghost is that of one of the servants who live and worked in the building way back when servants lived and worked here. It all makes sense: Gab and Jenna both live right across from the servant wing, she knocked on Gab's door but left when Gab told her too, then went to check on Jenna. I'm mad creeped out but mad interested too. I want to look up archives and stuff to figure out who used to live here and find out who it is, but I really should be writing some papers instead. Hmm... 

Done is Good

My finals week check list:

1. Study biology - done! 12/14
2. Take biology exam - done!! 12/14
3. Rewrite Csem paper- done! 12/17
4. Final CSEM paper - DONE! 12/17
5. Write Spanish essay 1 - done! 12/14
6. Spanish essay 2 - done. 12/16
7. Spanish essay 3 - done! 12/17
8. Spanish essay 4 - ¡done! 12-19
9. Spanish essay 5 - ¡HECHO! ¡Completamente hecho! 12-19
10. Hand in Csem portfolio - Done! I wash my hands of performativity on 12/18
11. Send in Spanish exam - done done done 12/19
12. Clean - done! 12/18 moving on out
13. Do laundry - done! 12/17
14. Pack - done! 12/18
15. Go home! - DONE! 12/18

All is complete. :)

Magnum opus

I just achieved the hitherto undreamed of level 14 of tetris on my phone. That equals 244 lines. Usually I can just make it to level 12. I'm no tetris-connoisseur, so I don't know how varied my version is from legit tetris, but I feel quite accomplished.

Fair pie-maker...

Let's talk about how much I adore Pushing Daisies. (Deeply, madly, passionately, truly, eternally, etc). Everything about it is so utterly endearing. The morbid romance. The fantastical, fairy-tale setting. The absurd situations, crazy murders and outrageous villains. The endearingly screwball characters. Sweet, adorable, neurotic Ned (he's so cute). Sweet, honest Chuck, always dressed in yellow. Their ridiculously cute and impossible romance. (Remember the very first episode when they each held their own hand behind their back and pretended they were holding each other's hand? My heart melted right then and has never re-solidified.) The Pie Hole, the pie maker, pies in general. Bigby, the undead dog, eternally loyal. Sarcastic, deadpan and ultimately an oversized teddy bear Emerson (with his pop-up books, so cute). Shrill and endearing Olive. The crazy, eccentric aunts: sweet Vivian and abrasive Lily. So absurd and SO lovable. And I like the addition of the cute, awkward, needy twins, I hope they stick around.

I adore it all infinitely. 

Free is good

I am a fan of free iTunes downloads. They are sometimes quite good. I have the bad habit of downloading free songs then not really listening to them, so I've only just discovered that I love Geraldine by Glasvegas. I've been looking them up and apparently they're a band from Glasgow, Scotland and quite popular in the UK. I'm digging their music, and the accent.

So long... farewell...

Tomorrow (well, today if you want to get technical) is my last CSem class EVER!! I'm ever so excited to put that experience behind me. Of course, I have to perform, but it should be easy. Our performance is going to be pretty cool, at least I hope.

Hopefully my collage (the most worthwhile thing I've done in that class) will be returned to me. It consists of lots of pictures of the beautiful man shown below.

 

This will be my last day of classes for the semester! It's hard to believe my first semester as a college student is almost over. I'm ready to be done with these classes, but it's gone way too fast. I was sad leaving my final Spanish class today... Adios doesn't cover it. 

At least the beastly, 10-20 page final will leave a lasting mark by kicking my ass.

My life is a slasher film

I keep imagining my life as a horror film, because my friends are turning into ghosts all over the place and this crazy girl is going to kill me. Ok, well not really, but I know how it would play out. I should write a script. I come in my room, and there's a quote from Wicked painted on my wall in BLOOD! The camera zooms in with ominous piano riffs. Bom Bom BOM! Cut to my face as the horrible realization hits me and then pan up to psycho killer on the ceiling, who jumps down with a hiss onto the camera. Cut to black. 

This no facebook thing is making me a very prolific blogger.

Mr. Bean is a funny dude

It's true.

With pages and everything!

Since I have joined the hall-wide Facebook boycott, I was thinking of maybe wasting my time on a different kind of book-- you know, one of the literature variety. So I went to Canaday and got a real, honest-to-goodness book with which I will distract myself from my work. (No faces except for the two on the cover.)

I have always intended to read some Jane Austen, since I find it odd that I have not. (Unless you count three pages of Persuasion last summer before my busy life swallowed me.) So , after going back and forth between the well-known titles, I decided on Emma for no particular reason. 

Let it begin.

Well that was ridiculous

These words will appear on my tombstone.