Another weekend goes by too fast.
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[reading] I finished re-reading The Sandman series. A lot of people say that Volume 2: The Dolls House is their favorite but I have to say Volume 9: The Kindly Ones is mine. It's the climax of the whole series. By the very end of Volume 8, you know what's coming. That thing happens in Volume 9. Volume 10, the last trade paperback, is sort of like a come-down off everything that has happened- it's an epilogue that ties up a few loose ends and answers a few remaining questions. But really, Volume 9 is where the shit hits the fan.
I started Lucifer again and am on Volume 3. So far I've really enjoyed re-reading it.
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[watching] I finally got around to watching Brokeback Mountain. I can understand how calling it "a gay cowboy movie" is grossly oversimplifying what the movie is about. It's a love story. Ang Lee is one of my favorite directors and I've really enjoyed all his movies. His films are beautiful to look at and the stories always pull me in (and make me cry). I'm glad he won the Oscar for Best Director but I'm a little put off that Heath Ledger didn't win for Best Actor. I'm going to have rent Capote and see what's so great about Philip Seymour Hoffman's performance (besides that fact that, okay, he IS an amazingly talented dramatic actor). I give it 4/5 stars.
Syriana made me feel stupid. I'd have to watch it over and over to understand who's double-crossing who, who's working for who, and who's who. I know I'm not stupid but I had to ask Dollar to pause the movie so I could ask, "Wait- So who's that guy? What's he doing? Is Matt Damon working for him now? Who's that guy? Who is Chris Cooper? What's going on?!?!?!?!" I told him that
this is why movies like this don't get made all the time. Most people can only handle a "cookie-cutter boy-meet-girl, misunderstandings keep them apart, all is resolved in the end" type of movie. Which isn't to say that that's what I want, but Syriana was so complicated. Dollar said that that's because it's real life. The movie was based on a true story. OOOOooohhh. That explains everything. Anyway, 3/5 stars. It was a good movie and my rating might go up if I watch it again and understand more.
In TV land, we want a new show to watch so I got Showtime's Weeds. I had high hopes (pun intended) for this show after hearing what it was about: Single mother (Nancy) of two living in suburbia starts selling pot to stay financially afloat. Interesting, no? Dollar and I watched the pilot episode last night. I have to tell you, there is so much wrong with this show it's frightening.
1. The writers try to have the rapid-paced dialogue that all the HBO shows (and Gilmore Girls) are known for. Here, though, it falls flat because none of it is really believable. It's kind of forced and hokey. The main character gets her drugs from a family of black people who say things like, "Ooo, white girl, you be trippin'" or whatever. Is the show trying to perpetuate the stereotype that black people sell drugs and can't speak a clean sentence?
2. Nancy appears to be high all the time. Understandable, that, but the first rule of drug dealing is that you can't be a user yourself. She appears to be high at her son's soccer game (where she sells bags out of her purse- nice) and at home and sitting on her roof. She thinks one teenager she sold to might be selling to 10-year-olds and shoves the teenager against her minivan. I thought pot wasn't supposed to make you aggressive?
3. Nancy pretty much has no idea what's going on with her kids and is a bad influence on them. Her son falls through a skylight when she's not around and when he tells her about it, she kind of blinks like, "Whoa, that must have been... wow." Her older son and his girlfriend fairly walk all over her. When she can't take it anymore, where does she go running? TO THE BLACK FAMILY OF DRUG DEALERS. Honey, I think you need to lay off the smoke for a while- until you set some rules for your kids at least.
4. Nancy isn't a sympathetic character. She trips a boy (granted, the boy was being a jerk to her son, but come on) and later called that boy something like a fucktard. Later still, her youngest son refers to the bully as a fucktard. Gee, I wonder where he heard that. She's baked all the time.
5. None of the characters are sympathetic. The teenagers have no respect (or a healthy fear) of their parents. Everyone's cheating on their spouses. One woman see's her teenage girl giving her the finger and calls her daughter the "c" word and says, "I should have gotten an abortion." I mean, come on! Why would I want to watch anymore of this show?!
Jeeze, those are just my thoughts from the pilot episode. I've got both disks of season 1, so I might as well watch them, but I have LOW expectations for the rest of it.
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[playing] Had another gaming day at my place on Saturday. We played a round of Bang! and then Shadows Over Camelot. During SoC, everyone thought I was the traitor because of some "selfish" things I was doing. I'd get a card that said "You gain 3 life or all other knights gain 1 life." Since we're all working together to defeat the game, the selfless thing to do would have been to give everyone else one more life point (in fact, the card is called "Piety").
Instead, I chose to use it on myself and max out my life. "Traitor!" they all screamed at me. I told them I wasn't. When I played a "You may draw 4 cards or all other knights draw 1 card" and I took 4 cards, they were SURE I was the traitor. I swore up and down that I wasn't- I just needed to do these things to be effective in the game. AND, get this, I'm a stickler for the rules (duh). Someone re-shuffed the white (good) deck and I said, "Hey! You have to re-shuffle the black (bad) deck at the same time you re-shuffle the white, regardless of whether or not it's been exhausted."
That's when everyone threw the table over, pinned me against the wall with my hands behind my back and looked at my hidden loyalty card.
"Huh. Loyal," they said. "I guess you just aren't a team player."
It should be browner with a part in the middle. So my suggestion would be to still knit it in the round, but put a purl (or two) into the front middle and back middle, running the whole way up.
