Books

In addition to watching a lot of movies, I have read a couple of books recently too:

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Yes indeed, that is all 7 books of the Harry Potter Series. I began this adventure after I graduated and finished just before we moved. In my previous attempts at the books, I had read Harry Potter and Sorcerer's Stone 2 times but failed to get farther than chapter 2 in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. But I was determined this time and thanks to the Provo City Library and their book and DVD collections I was able to read all 7 AND watch all of the movies currently out. My least favorite book was 5, my favorite was 6. Second favorite was 3. Third favorite 4. 1,2 and 7 tie for my "most medium favorite". However, I like movie #3 the best. And yes, I am very excited to see HP7/8. During this adventure I had at least 2 dreams about Voldemort and constantly made references to the books while playing games, watching movies, or in every day life. I am definitely a fan.

Since moving to Texas I have read one book: Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. I decided to read this book when I saw the preview for the new movie based on this book. And I remembered a few girlfriends telling me that I should read it. I liked it a lot actually.

I have now started reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss. It is a book about punctuation. Paul tried to convince me that it was going to be really boring (and it might be, I'm only on page xx) but I have a feeling that I will enjoy reading it.

I have no idea what I will read next.

Movies

I've loved watching movies for a long time. I still love watching movies. I remember my friend Allison asking me what movies I haven't seen. I also have been told that I am a picky movie-watcher. Now that is not entirely true. I'll pretty much watch anything (ask Paul) but I definitely won't always like it. If it bores me, I'll do something else while the movie is on in the background. If I really don't like it I'll turn it off and find something else to do. Usually I'll stick with it just to say that I watched it (and so I can give a real opinion on it. I just realized I don't do that with books. I don't mind just stopping in the middle of a book and never reading it again). Anyways, I've been watching a lot of movies lately since we finally have internet at our place (yay!), we finally sent back our Netflix movie since we have a new address (yay!), and the library (provo and goodfellow) is full of awesome FREE movies. (also I am unemployed and not going to school). So I thought I'd do a little review of the movies I've seen lately.

Invictus. Netflix DVD. I watched this with Paul this afternoon. I didn't really like it. I'd give it 2 stars (the "I didn't like it" rating) ... but if there were half stars for Netflix ratings, I would give it 2.5, which would be half-way between "I didn't like it" and "I liked it". Voila, the "I didn't really like it" rating. (this is out of 5 if you are unfamiliar with Netflix). I started playing bejeweled on Paul's phone during the final game of the world cup. Yeah, it was boring. I spent more time being a dork looking up South Africa, Nelson Mandela, William Ernest Henley and Rugby on Wikipedia than watching the movie (all of those topics are actually quite interesting. look them up). I especially liked the poem ... "I am the captain of my soul". What did you think about it?

Inception. Theaters. I went to this on Tuesday ($6.00 day, yay!) with Paul. and I loved it. Loved it. Usually I get bored with movies that are longer than 2 hours. Longer than 1.5 hours actually. But this was so good. SO good. What can I say? The plot was wicked sweet awesome. Trippy. Really trippy. Okay. I'm liking this one-word description thing. It's about dreams people. The subconscious. Reality. Truth. Perception. The mind. After the movie Paul and I talked about all of these topics for hours. Also, the cinematography was awesome. Anti-gravity fighting scene was COOL. My favorite part though (spoiler alert) is that the whole movie could have just been Leo's dream. Also, technically, since it was just a movie, it was someone's dream. Someone's mind created that movie. and it was really good.

The Aviator. Library. Go Leonardo DiCaprio. I liked this movie well enough. Yes, Martin Scorsese is unique and kind of disturbing, but you need that element in a movie about a guy who has obsessive-compulsive disorder. I thought it was well acted. I did get a little distracted with Wikipedia again (Katherine Hepburn, OCD, Howard Hughes etc). All-in-all I thought it was good. I probably liked it more than I would have normally because I saw Inception right after it and it fueled our discussion about reality.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Library. I watched this the other day with Paul. It was amusing. One of those movies that I wouldn't mind watching again, but really wouldn't mind if someone knocked on my door and I never got around to finishing it. One of those movies that I watched just to say that I've seen it. It's classic ... (so what? I say.)

Baby Mama. Library. Seen it before, but think it's hilarious. Hilarious. Just watch it.

Ladyhawke. Library. I can't believe I watched this. 1985 fantasy film. The music made me laugh. The plot was ridiculous.

(sidenote: Paul's actually introduced me to a lot of 80's films: Better Off Dead, One Crazy Summer, So I Married and Axe Murderer, Never Ending Story, Clue, Top Gun, E.T. ... wow, at first I was going to say that all 80's movies are weird (which, yeah, okay, true statement) but now I realize that they really do have endearing qualities. maybe I kind of like 80's fantasy films!)

Other awesome movies I have recently seen: Live Free or Die Hard, Casablanca, Miss Potter

And for your TV entertainment delight, please take my advice and watch ABC's Modern Family. You won't regret it.

I think I love Texas

Well at least I like San Angelo. I like that you can drive from one side of the city to the other in 20 minutes, which means, that if you have been driving for more than 20 minutes you are either lost or going to San Antonio.
I like Dairy Queen. Did you know that the state with the most Dairy Queens is Texas? And that they even have their own website? And that the pecan pie blizzard is divine?
I am comforted that the groceries are not any more expensive than Macey's. H.E.B. is a little big, but nice to my wallet (or Paul's cuz he usually does the actual purchasing).
I really like the ward here. We are in the San Angelo 2nd ward (I think) and the people are so nice. SO nice. I mean really nice. There are all kinds of new kids to watch and oh! there is a family of Weasleys! I'm serious ... all red heads and one of them looks like Ron. No joke. It's great. And to top that off, we are next door neighbors with the bishop. Score. I know where to run if something explodes while Paul's gone.
Speaking of Paul, I think he likes Goodfellow Air Force Base. As do I. The hotel we stayed in was ice cold with AC. They have a sweet little library with even more good movies than the Provo library. I love libraries I've decided. There is also a gym (free), tennis courts (free), and an arts and crafts building. All of these places have AC. Sometimes I do get confused with all of the acronyms. I have mastered a few (DITY, TDY, BAH) but I still have no idea was DBIDS are, even though I asked to have them put on my ID card. I have a military ID now. oooooh. My name is in the system. eeeeee. Cool.
And I'm sure y'all er wondrin bout thuh accint? yeeeah. It's fiiine. My faverit is when people say y'all guys or y'all too. We've been to a few restaurants (all but one of them have been delicious ... another reason I like it here) and our waitresses say "what can I get y'all" or "y'all doin ok?" I've decided to adopt "y'all" while I'm here. Seems appropriate.
Our house is very nice too. We're renting a house just north of the base. It was built in the 50s but has new floors, a new kitchen, and a new bathroom. I think we might have spoiled ourselves. But it was too good of a location to pass up.
What I don't like about Texas right now is the weather. It is too hot and too humid. It is only 9:30 and it is already 85 degrees outside. However, I know that it will be just as hot in Utah. And I will probably change my mind about disliking the weather when it is still 65 degrees in December. And the moisture has already healed my heals and dry legs. So, I can't really complain. Except that it is so hot.

I think I do love Texas.

Summer Revised

Moab, UT

New York City, NY
Cheyenne, WY
Denver, CO
Kansas City, MO
St. Louis, MO
Memphis, TN
Birmingham, AL
Montgomery, AL
Atlanta, GA
New Orleans, LA
Houston, TX
Dallas, TX

Albuquerque, NM

And finally
San Angelo, TX
to stay. ... ?

Our original plan for after graduation was to drive to Montgomery Alabama to go to basic training for 6 weeks (stopping at various cities along the way, as in a mega road trip). After that we would drive to San Angelo Texas where Paul would go through about 8 months of intelligence training. Nope. Wrong.

We are leaving to drive to San Angelo in less than two weeks. We might be moved by the Air Force, we might have to move ourselves. Should we start packing? We have no idea when we'll have to go to Alabama. We still don't have official orders. In about 5 weeks, Paul is going to Ukraine for a month (same exact air force program he did last summer) and leaving me alone at our new place (which might be a hotel or might be a four bedroom two bathroom house with a pool ... who knows). We don't know when he'll start intelligence training when he gets back. Let's just say it is hard to know what to say when people ask us what we're going to be doing.

Despite all of the not knowing, I feel surprisingly calm. I know eventually we'll get it all worked out. and as long as we can work it out together, I know it'll turn out great.

#1 New York City, NY

Paul and I arrived in New York City on Tuesday April 27th. We took a taxi to our hotel, which ended up costing us the same amount as a week-long metro pass ($25). We followed our urge to explore and went downtown to times square. It took us about 45 minutes to get there.

On Wednesday we went downtown again to walk around and see what we could see. We wandered into the Empire State Building, but we decided that we didn't want to wait in line or pay the money to go to the top. But here's a picture that proves we were there.

We accidentally waited in line to get tickets for West Side Story that night, until we realized that the tickets we were waiting for were for the matinee. And we had a baseball game to get to. We bought me a Mets hat and took the metro up to Citi Field.


The game was fun, and we had nice seat in left field. However, it was incredibly chilly because of the wind. We enjoyed NY hot dogs and nachos as we watched the Mets beat the Dodgers.

After the game we walked around a nearby park and tried to get a better glimpse of the US Open stadium but didn't have much luck. We eventually made it back downtown and had a cupcake in Grand Central Station. Then we wandered some more and came across Rockefeller Plaza.


We went in early that night to rest up for our 8:30 ferry to the Statue of Liberty. We both thought the statue was cool, and of course you have to see it if you're in New York, but it was just a statue.


The Ferry took us to Ellis Island next. I really enjoyed it there. But I like museums. It was cool to read up on immigration and read some stories. We ate lunch at their cafe and it was delicious.


We were tired that afternoon but spent most of it walking around Wall Street. We saw the bull, bowling green, federal hall, the actual wall street, and even some protesters.




Then for fun we decided to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. The views were cool and it was fun to people watch. I liked looking at everyone's shoes. We actually got lost in Brooklyn trying to find our way to a Metro and we were exhausted from walking all day.


On Thursday night we went to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. It was so good. One of the best that I've seen. Paul even liked it too.

On Friday morning we went to the UN Building for a tour. We go to go into the general assembly and listened to an audio tour. I liked it a lot.



After our tour we walked some more. We saw Park Avenue and then went back to Rockefeller Center for our tour of NBC studios. The tour wasn't as exciting as I thought it would be since we didn't meet Tina Fey or Tracey Morgan, but it was still neat. Then we did the "Top of the Rock" thing and went up on the roof. That's the Empire State Building.


Some old ladies asked us if this was Central Park. duh ...


On Friday night we went to eat at Carnegie Deli, a suggestion from Paul's Aunt, and it turned out to be delicious. We shared a sandwich that was about a foot high. And of course ate cheesecake too. Then we went to Carnegie Hall to hear the Yale Philharmonic Orchestra. The hall was really pretty and we spent some time in the museum. But the concert was painful. The orchestra was doing a tribute to some modernist composer. I don't remember his name, but we were giggling at the beginning and then clapping with relief at the end.

On Saturday we went to central park and walked around. Then we went to the Museum of Natural History and spent all day there. I don't know why I didn't take my camera out, but we both really liked it there. Then we went downtown again and hit the Toys R Us and relaxed and people watched.

We saw Marry Poppins that night. It was delightful.

On Sunday we hit central park again. We were a little out of sorts because our internet at the hotel hadn't been working and we didn't have a reliable map to work with. The park was fun though and we got yummy popsicles.


We went to NYU in the afternoon, and saw China Town and Little Italy. China town was funny because it really was so much like China. Paul got pushed as we got off the metro and the guy mumbled in his ear "whatchu want? bags? gucci?" and on and on. We watched some performers at NYU who were very unimpressive. We ended up hopping on the Staten Island Ferry that night to rest our feet.


On Monday morning we took the metro all the way down to coney island only to find this:

The place was deserted and foggy and creepy. The bums asked us for money and we couldn't even see the beach. We walked along the boardwalk imagining what it was like when the place was up and running.
We still didn't have internet so we went towards where we thought the temple was and eventually found it. Cool.

We hung out at Rockefeller Plaza that afternoon waiting to get into the Late Show with Jimmy Fallon. We ended up being able to watch him practice his monologue which was coooool. And then we watched the show and I met Sarah Silverman afterwards.



We left for home on Tuesday afternoon and made it home safely. Our only souvenirs were 2 t-shirts that we bought at the NBC studios shop, and my mets hat. And about 300 pictures.

#0 Moab, UT

Unfortunately, my summer city hit list has been postponed because of postponed active duty dates from the Air Force. We did hit up New York City last week (city #1), which I will post about later. But I wanted to post about our trip to Moab, which, since it wasn't on the hit list, I called city #0.

Since we didn't have that many finals during finals week Paul and I decided to go to Moab to camp and to go biking. It was busy and we were lucky to find a campground.

We rented a bike for me, since I didn't have one (see above). It's valued at about $2800, if I remember right, and was a pretty sweet ride. We rode about 3 miles of a loop that was supposed to take us around the whole park, but ended up opting out of doing the whole loop since the first 3 miles had been all uphill!

We decided then to ride the Bar M trail just up the road. Here's a shot of the trail we went on. If you look closely you can see the white lines that mark it on the right. It was pretty easy to ride, but also very fun. Near the end, the trail practically turned into a roller coaster.

Neither of us fell off or got scuffed up really, and we had good sun-screen so we didn't really get tan either even though the sun was out and the weather was perfect! We had such a good time that we decided to get me a mountain bike as an early birthday present (thought it was a good idea since I told Paul about his present early -- which, in case you didn't hear, are 2 tickets to see U2 in concert on June 3rd -- exciting).

Paul's birthday was on Monday. We went to see Sherlock Holmes (good but need to watch it again to figure it out), and we went out to Sizzler (his choice). Then we played tennis for about 2 hours and got very tired.

In other news, neither of us have jobs, since we lost our student jobs when we graduated, so we pretty much just play tennis, watch movies, and go to the library and read all day long. If it ever stops raining we're going to start mountain biking in the canyons.

That's all. I love summer.

A little thing called "graduating"

Thursday April 22nd 2010: done, done and done.

Summer 2010 City Hitlist

New York City, NY
Cheyenne, WY
Denver, CO
Kansas City, MO
St. Louis, MO
Memphis, TN
Birmingham, AL
Montgomery, AL
Atlanta, GA
New Orleans, LA
Houston, TX
Dallas, TX

And finally
San Angelo, TX
to stay.