Because I can.

Yay for animal hats! And soft fluffy kitties.

Black Swan International Trailer: Yeesh!

I squirmed during the last 3 seconds because of those faint music box notes. Who knew psychosis was so endearing when dressed in a tutu and put to Swan Lake?

This is all kinds of wrong.

I'm pretty sure we're all thinking the same thing here: Fuck this shit.

I'm an HSP (clearly).

Oh my, it's been so long. Oh, and I'm an HSP. It's quite relieving to read the article I just read in Marie Claire about HSP's. HSP stands for Highly Sensitive Person. It makes complete sense.
      "Researchers from Stony Brook University in China recently published in their journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, that HSP subjects undergoing an MRI have greater activity in areas of the brain concerned with high-order visual processing, with participants spending longer examining photographs given to the while they underwent the test, and in general paying closer attention to detail than non-HSPs.... Once upon a time, HSP's might have been written off as shy or even neurotic, but Aron believes these labels are demeaning and inaccurate. Shyness, she says, is a learned response; HSPs are born with a heightened sensitivity meter and 15 percent of the population are HSPs.... Typically an HSP demonstrates greater caution and reluctance than the non-HSP population with things such as taking risks, trying new experiences, meeting new people, even venturing to unfamiliar places." 
I mean, my blog is called My Rabbit Roar, c'mon. That's obviously a clear first sign. I also took this True/False quiz, which I basically dominated.

I seem to be aware of subtleties in my environment. T
Other people's moods affect me. T
I tend to be very sensitive to pain. T
I find myself needing to withdraw during busy days, into bed or into a darkened room or any place where I can have some privacy and relief from stimulation. T
I am particularly sensitive to the effects of caffeine. F
I am easy overwhelmed by things like bright lights, strong smells, coarse fabrics, or sirens close by. F (I'll get overwhelmed at some point but not too easily)
I have a rich, complex inner life. T
I am made uncomfortable by loud noises. T
I am deeply moved by the arts or music. T
I am conscientious. T
I startle easily. F
I get rattled when I have a lot to do in a short amount of time. T
When people are uncomfortable in a physical environment, I tend to know what needs to be done to make it more comfortable. T
I am annoyed when people try to get to do too many things at once. T
I try hard to avoid making mistakes or forgetting things. T
I make a point to avoid violent movies and TV shows. F
I become unpleasantly aroused when a lot is going on around me. F
Being very hungry creates a strong reaction in me, disrupting my concentration or mood. T
Changes in my life shake me up. T
I notice and enjoy delicate or fine scents, tastes, sounds, works of art. T
I make it a high priority to arrange my life to avoid upsetting or overwhelming situations. T (only if something is obviously dangerous or overwhelming)
When I must compete or be observe while performing a task, I become so nervous or shaky that I do much worse that I would otherwise. F (it depends on the situation, but not that often)
When I was a child, my parents or teachers seemed to see me as sensitive or shy. T

Finally I can post this!

Before today, this video was unable to embed. But I've been wanting to post this for like four days.
This is a video of Graeme Taylor. He's 14 and gay. Watch as he eloquently stands up for his high school teacher who was disciplined for throwing a kid out of class that made an offensive anti-gay comment. Run for office, Graham. Do it.

Movie poster of the day: Jane Eyre

Hurry up, March.

This cat. I want him.

Why I kicked and screamed through last night night's episode of Glee.

I must say, Chris Colfer has quite a job playing the only gay glee club member, Kurt Hummel. Aside from it showing more truth than glamour, it's the truth part that makes last night's episode more ballsy than any other episode.
Kurt is not your average, loud impersonation of who a gay teenager is, and I'm pretty sure that has to do with Chris being gay himself. Under those bright cardigans and animal print shoes, he's subtle and introverted, almost never wanting to be the center of attention, and most of all, he doesn't let people take advantage of what they assume him to be. For example, the previous episode featured Mr. Schu predictably wanting Kurt to play the alien transvestite Frank-N-Furter for the Rocky Horror piece. Yet Kurt unpredictably declined on the spot, leaving images of Kurt in a corset, lipstick, and high heels still imaginary. High five, Glee writers.
This episode was one of the most painful to watch considering the literal amount of pain brought on Kurt by a hefty, ignorant football player, Dave, who regularly shoves Kurt into the lockers in his most fragile state. Football-Ass-Dude not only pushes him face-first, but with a considerable amount of force that makes it shocking to believe Kurt isn't left with a broken arm or nose. Rather bravely, Kurt gathers every ounce of scared courage he has to chase after him screaming, "What is your problem?!" to which Dave responds with more threats of his "fury" fist. Dave is clearly angry for reasons other than Kurt's choice of interest.
Kurt does do the smart and thing and go to his Glee Club teacher for help rather than mustering up some scheme involving a pail of beans and a pulley. But Mr. Shue can only sympathize.
Giggle-scream #1: The prep school boys. Kurt decides to go outside his school for some encouragement and winds up at a prestigious, uniformed, all-boys school. Lo and behold, the first boy he meets is Blaine, a member of the Glee Club, and also intelligently gay. Blaine excuses himself to sing Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream" with the other members, addressed almost entirely to Kurt. Insert dreamy halo and godly music. At last, Kurt has found The One.
Scream #2: When the second confrontation with Dave comes around, Blaine has taught Kurt that Dave's actions are out of ignorance and Kurt's best option is to educate him so all the presumptions that seem to be pissing off Dave are gone.
This is what went down: Dave propels Kurt against the lockers so hard it's amazing he's still conscious. Kurt does the same thing as last time: screams after him, trying to get answers. They both wind up in the locker room. Then,
K: "HEY! I am talking to you!"
D: "Girl's locker room's next door."
K: "What is your problem?!"
D: "Excuse me?"
K: "What are you so scared of?"
D: "Besides you sneaking in here to sneak a peak at my junk?"
K: "Oh, yeah, it's every straight guy's nightmare--all us gays are secretly out to molest and convert you. Well guess what, Ham Hock? You're not my type!"
D: "That right?"
K: "Yeah. I don't dig on chubby boys who sweat too much and are gonna be bald by the time they're thirty."
D: [up goes the fist] "Do not push me, Hummel."
K: "You gonna hit me? Do it."
D: "Don't. Push me."
K: "Hit me 'cause it's not gonna change who I am. You can't punch the gay out of me any more than I can punch the ignoramus out of you."
D: "Get out of my face!"
K: "You are nothing but a scared little boy who can't handle how extraordinarily ordinary you are!"
Dave grabs his face and kisses him. My eyes even blurred a little, that's how quickly they saucered. What's even more amazing, he goes in for more and Kurt shoves him away in horror. It was his first kiss that "counted." Well, he got his questions answered, and so did we.
Scream #4: To deviate from the Kurt Chronicles for a moment, Coach Beiste ("beast") has her own love issues as well, which is just as apparent as her great football coaching skills. Beiste sits down with Mr. Schu to talk about why she quit and how sensitive she is regardless of her muscles and teaching methods. She's never been kissed despite being 40. She feels ugly and no one understands her. She's straight. So Mr. Schu takes it upon himself to help her take the next baby step and kisses her. Not only did I scream with arm motions, I protested due to morality of the scene. Since when was it okay for a teacher to kiss another teacher under those circumstances? TV-wise it does seem plausible, but that's it. It's a push-pull. You feel sorry for Coach Beiste, but you also wish Mr. Schu worked his wisdom without taking that extra step.
Scream #5 was internal: Dave shoulders Kurt into the lockers and he falls to the floor. Someone get that boy a punching bag and Enya CD ASAP.

I think my appetite just grew an appetite.

So there's this blog I just discovered thanks to Gwenyth Paltrow. It's by a woman visiting her hometown of Bilbao, Spain, a very ethereal, simple countryside of magic, wishes, and food so amazing I can't look away. It's called "Cannelle et Vanille" and the writer, Aran, takes some fantastic photographs of her worldly food creations.

 I'm moving to there.

This is a conversation/movie about a very important sandwich.

The Sandwich Movie from Sean Christensen on Vimeo.


Totally worth the animation and stuff.

Willow Smith on Ellen. 10 out of 10.

The actual song doesn't do much justice to her voice. Girl has pipes (and no budget).

My Halloween involved no candy and lots of beer pong.

(I know what you're thinking, What? No candy?! but honestly I didn't even notice.)
I don't want this article to be very long but I have a feeling there's no avoiding it.
I wasn't gonna go to the new party when Crystal told me the original party was canceled a few hours before. But I figured I would regret it if I didn't go since I've been very antisocial these past few weeks and I had to do Something or I'd just be doing nothing.
My costume was definitely half-assed. I don't like Halloween. I will never like Halloween just because it's Halloween. And I'll never like being forced to dress up as something nonhuman against my will. Except for last night. After much pondering at Alli's place with whiskers drawn on my face, a black nose, sparkly white and purple eyes, and black booties, I was definitely a last-minute polar bear with the help of a fuzzy white ear hat and white bandage dress (not mine).
Iris, Crystal's sister-in-law, dressed as a dead sexy soldier. Iris' best friend, Kelsey, who showed up last-minute, is a very pretty lesbian, and wore her regular boyish clothes and beanie with an added drawn mustache on her upper lip. Alli wasn't quite sure what was she was but she wore black angel wings, a masquerade mask, and black lace slip. Crystal was the Mad Hatter, which was mostly deadly make up and a little top hat and super-short black dress.
After a 45-minute drive to Redondo Beach, the first person we met amongst the haunted house decorations was Jessica, a pretty, impish looking girl with green tulle around her waist and green stockings and green hair spray and pine tree earrings. She was a car freshener and dead-set on memorizing our names. "Crystal, Alli, Juno, Iris, and Kelsey!" after five minutes of hit-and-miss. She offered us a drink and Iris and Kelsey practically shook with anticipation since they'd been waiting all night for one (or seven).
We entered the garage, which was set up for two beer pong games at a time, and discovered we actually knew quite a few people in the crowd. After mingling with the girls for a few minutes and sharing costume explanations (Madonna, Taylor Swift, gay offspring, Alice, etc.), we were in the kitchen again joined by some Indians getting our pictures taken with a thousand-dollar camera.
I met this Nacho Libre guy from Mexico (who sounds European) who became rather attached to me throughout the middle of the party, maybe because I was nice and we could carry conversation. But after a while he wouldn't stop asking questions and touching my hand in the midst of me feeling very sleepy and not caring (beer does that). I adored him; he was very nice, but he didn't have to be around me so much. There were other people to mingle with who were not slutty polar bears. So I left the balcony and went downstairs to join familiars on the couch in the dark. Nacho showed up again so ten minutes later I went back up to the balcony because I was so tired of answering the same questions, "Are you ok? You just tired?" Fuck. Yes, I'm fine.
On the cold balcony, my friend, Dark, gave me his jacket and analyzed what it looked like on a girl in amazement. Our friend Andrew was laughing at Dark's attempts to hit on me and Dark said, "How can you not hit on Juno? She's a polar bear." I said Andrew was the only one who's been resistant to my bandage dress powers, which is either true or a sign of denial on his part. Dark asked me to dance with him and I said he should've asked me an hour ago when my feet didn't hurt. "I don't give a fuck how much you don't wanna dance," he told me. "I don't give a fuck how much you want to dance with me," I told him. He came up close to me and asked again nicely to dance. "No," I said, completely high from people's need to do "stuff" with me and take pictures of me and ask questions I didn't care about.
We left around 2:30. It was freezing out. While standing at the doorway, Andrew and Dark were on the couch. Andrew said Dark was drunk and that's why he hit on me. Dark said, "Don't listen to that." I told Andrew this was a routine of his for every party so I was used to it.
On our way to the car, I heard a guy calling from the balcony and knew it was for me since he said, "Hey, cat! Nice legs! I like your legs!" I said thank you. My polar bear powers.

This is really, really...funny.

Funny counterpoint.
Before going to the link, read the article below this first.
This is from the blog Jennslyvania, written by NY Times best-selling author, Jen Lancaster. Tagline: "Land of the free, home of the bitter." (fuck yeah) It's a rebuttal to that "misunderstood" Marie Claire bitch straight from a "jiggly" lady herself. And, oddly enough,  the narration sounds like Carmen Electra in my head.
For the record, my friend refused to read Maura's article because it was too mean. And she's not even obese or anything.
As for Maura, I'm sure she's crying at her computer right now hoping to not be assassinated. Poorly played, honey. Very poorly played.

Marie Claire blogger Maura Kelly has something to say...

When I woke up this morning, I did my usual round of websites: People, Gmail, TheFrisky, Hulu, EW, TheDailyWhat, and so on. On TheFrisky, however, journalist Jessica Wakeman has uprooted a rather startling discovery from the blog page of MarieClaire.com, for which Maura Kelly is getting some serious, insulting, and personal flack for her article entitled, "Should Fatties Get a Room?" to which she immediately replied, "Yes!" In the article, Maura addresses a TV show, "Mike and Molly", that follows two obese characters in love and how their weight effects their lifestyle and relationship and what not. What seems like a fairly harmless show just trying to shed light on a stereotype not typically romanticized, Maura finds "disgusting."
Posted on the 25th, there are now over 1,200 comments found on the page addressing how horrid Maura's statements are, especially from the readers who actually are obese, which Maura did not seem to take into account. As if only thin people would read it and the others would somehow bypass the word "Fatty" in the title. Just to quote a few sentences: "So anyway, yes, I think I'd be grossed out if I had to watch two characters with rolls of fat kissing each other...because I'd be grossed out if I had to watch them doing anything." "...I find it aesthetically displeasing to watch a very, very fat person simply walk across a room." Then she has an entire paragraph in parentheses claiming she'd be "happy to give nutritional information" and a rather two-faced-sounding "YOU CAN DO IT!"that comes across as incredibly ignorant.
Also surfacing with Maura's childish article is her own body image issues. Editor-in-chief, Joanna Coles, who OK'd the article, is admitting these words of hatred are really addressing Maura's own self hate towards her body. Having dealt with anorexia almost her whole life, it is imperative that Joanna take Maura's issues into account when dealing with such a sensitive subject as for both readers and the writer herself. The whole fiasco is based on very poor judgement, which does not represent what Marie Claire stands for at all. Last fall they made headlines by hiring a plus-sized stylist for the magazine spreads. Indian Plus-sized model, Crystal Renn, is more popular than ever after a ten-year hiatus. Yet Maura decides to write as if all obese people should all feel ashamed and constantly try to fix their bodies, which are "mistakes to be corrected," completely forgetting that not everyone needs to be ten pounds underweight be satisfied with their bodies.
In the comments--there's a new testimonial posted about every 2 minutes--are women telling Maura she should be fired, that this shows how she was raised, that she should be ashamed of herself, that she's a terrible writer who wrote about nothing important except how she felt, some even say they'll never purchase another Marie Claire magazine again (uh-oh). All very well thought out and not a trace of profanity to be found. Despite the fact that under the article is a long apology from Maura, no one is taking her seriously. Hopefully Maura's next article (if she can get passed this) is more people-friendly and not something sprung from a one-sided opinion.
To read Maura's article, go here.
For Jessica Wakeman's response, go here.

Movie: Away We Go.

Being in a relationship is like being in your car. No one else knows what it's like to be in that particular space, and when you're on the road amongst hundreds of other drivers, you know your car is unique in some way. It's the center of the universe, if you will. Just like no one knows what it's like to be in your particular relationship, with the other half that makes you a couple, and the feelings can never really be explained--they're just meant to be felt.
I wasn't compelled to see this movie when it first came out, mainly because of the contradictory reviews. It's depressing; it's a stoner movie; Sam Mendes is amazing; Sam drops the ball. Regardless, I'm glad I saw it so my mind could be made up.
It's one of the very few films that makes you forget the two actors acting like a couple, who probably met just two months before filming, are not really a couple in real life. Especially not John Krasinski and Maya Roudolph. She's too wise for someone like John, who's a joker.
John plays Burt. Maya plays Verona. They're not married. Verona is six months pregnant with a girl. One day they're comfortably in love, the next, one or the other needs reassurance that one isn't going to wake up the next morning feeling differently. Burt is very much committed to Verona. He proposes almost every day, even casually repeating himself at dinner with friends: "Verona, you are the love of my life." "Thanks, babe." "Will you marry me?" "Nope." They smile. It's not personal that Verona won't marry Burt. It's not him, who says he can't wait to see her as a mother, and hopes the baby has her smile. It's Verona.
Burt and Verona decide, three months before the baby's arrival, to leave their home due to Burt's parents absence. They're moving to Europe (the bastards). Burt and Verona feel desperate for familiarity and structure for their baby, so they go searching for a new home, one with friends and neighbors to help their new lives. They drive hundreds of miles in their little orange car visiting old friends with kids and Verona's younger sister, all exaggerations of textbook examples of the various families that differ in the world.
First stop is a near-neglectful family. The wife (Alison Janney) talks loudly about obscene subjects in front of her two chubby kids, claiming they don't hear her. It's "jibberish" to them, even screaming about her young daughter's dykish ways and her son's trophy-handle ears. The husband is just as dumb and passive as his kids.
Then is Verona's younger sister, who is single and curious to know what Verona remembers about their deceased parents.
After that, Maggie Gyllenhaal gets the hippie mom spot-on, banishing strollers from the house, claiming, "I LOVE my babies. Why would I want to push them away from me?!" when two minutes ago, Burt bought her an expensive stroller. She tells him to put it on the porch. Outside. Almost in tears due to quiet frustration.
And then is the Montreal family. Lovely parents. Five adopted children, all different ages and ethnicities. Verona loves this family most. In an amateur strip club, the father tells Burt about his wife's four miscarriages, and one a few days before, while his wife sways and twirls unhappily on a stripper pole. She's not in lingerie, just average clothes, as if she's done it a hundred times.
Towards the end, Burt learns his brother's wife has left he and his daughter down in Miami. And thus comes a fantastical scene, a screenwriter's wet dream, of Burt and Verona alone on a trampoline at night. Just talking about what they've seen and how it's affected them. Burt proposes again, in the midst of a tantrum directed at his betraying sister-in-law. And Verona says, "No one loves each other like us," and she tells Burt what to do and what not to do with their daughter and he listens like non of the previous husbands did. They're the best example.

Ne pas faire ce qu'il fait...

J'ai un ami. Je veux le garder mon ami. Recemment, il n'a fait rien mais m'ennuie avec ses singeries. Il pense qu'il est me gagnera plus d'avec ses voies mignonnes et avec du charme. Quand reellement, il me repousse. Je suis sur que n'est pas ce ce qu'il veut pour se produire. Tellement voici quelques choses qu'il devrait eviter tout en feignant pour ne pas avoir des sentiments pour moi.
Quand je me dis n'aimez pas quelque chose, je la signifient. Au lieu de me corriger comme je badine, notez lui. Feignant je suis dans le dementi n'est totalement pas mignon.
N'essayez pas d'etre avec du charme si ce n'est pas comment vous pensez a vous-meme. Il semble force. Ce n'est certainement pas mignon.
NE MENANT PAS. Vous ressemblerez a une Ass. Vous semblerez faible. Les seules person autorisees a se trouver sont des agents secrets, celebrites, et Chuck Bass de Gossip Girl. Pas quand vous essayez de courtiser une fille.
Ne pas repeter les meme questions. Il sera probablement la meme reponse. Et la reponse est non, je n'ai pas  besoin que vous pour rien avez a poser. "Je peux faire quelque chose?", "Desole je me suis endormi la nuit derniere [la messagiere text]", "Ce que vous faites?" Si vous devez forcer une reponse de notre part, vous etes deja hors de nos espirts.
Plus il est facile d'obtenir des informations des notre part, plus nous vous le souhaitez. Et vice-versa.
Il ya une ligne fine entre la parole et souvent harceler. Parlant souvent a un but. Pestering n'a d'autre but de que de vous garder dans notre espirt, meme si nous ne voulons pas de vous la-bas.
Il vous en avez, garcons et filles. Ne soyez pas pester. Soyez Chuck Bass.

How to turn your kitchen into a bubbly wonderland in 4 easy steps.

Step 1: Open dishwasher, mix two dish soaps into the door container.
Step 2: Close dishwasher and turn to "heavy wash."
Step 3: Leave the washer running and don't go into the kitchen until it is finished.
Step 4: Walk into kitchen. There should be a large puddle of suds on the floor, crackling away. Enjoy!

Bubbles--a lot less appealing when you least expect them.

Dear Cat: thanks for the suicide scratches ya brat.

There are four lovely scratches going down my left wrist, the "down the valley, not across the street" ones.... I hate you.

Juno has much more respect for Elmo.

"Elmo likes wasabi!" Hahaha

I'm sorry, Willow Smith, but you're still 9 years old.

She's such a pipsqueak! Watching this makes me think her tiny neck will break off from all that "whipping".

What European techies do for fun: be awesome.

I'm not sure what language that is, but come on. Does it matter?

Drop everything and watch this.

The 600 Years from the macula on Vimeo.


To mark the 600th anniversary of Prague’s preposterously complex Astronomical Clock, video mapping specialists The Macula, aided by Lukáš Duběda and Michal Kotek, projected a stunning 10-minute-long animation against the clock’s facade. - The Daily What

I believe it's called paranoia...

I would write this article in French, but sometimes it's hard to get the right sense of humor across in a different language. So I'm sticking with American.
I didn't think last night would actually happen after moving into this apartment, but it did. I was tossing and turning, burning up but reluctant to remove the covers, and looking around every time I opened my eyes. I was afraid. But why? At one point, it was about 2AM and I was drifting to sleep, and I opened my eyes when I felt the bed shake. Tucker was moving next to me, but did he really cause that shake? Or did I  do it, I just wasn't aware? Neither of those made much sense. Tucker's a 6 month-old cat. And on my left side, I don't know if it was just my body relaxing or if it really did feel like something pushing the covers under my ribs, as if to tuck me in or whatever.
I even had a dream that I woke up one morning to find my CD player close shut and play music on its own, at which point I went next door to my mom's apartment (we were in a boarding house-type place) so  she could grab a Bible and take it into my room. The Bible shook terribly in her hands, like a radar, and that confirmed my worst fears.
I've always had a terrible phobia like this. It goes up and down. For the passed few months it's been a pretty quiet whisper, but ever since Halloween has flashed commercials for horror movies in my face during Glee, it's shot back up to a dull roar. Especially the Paranormal Activity 2 trailer that I can't seem to get away from even on Hulu.com. The grotesque thing is that I tend to apply those scenarios to my own life for some reason. I can't help it. They just play out with no Stop button. All it takes is one little commercial and the idea spreads like wildfire. Then I have to wait at least five or six days to convince myself that nothing is wrong, nothing will happen.
I have a friend who says she loves scary movies. She just thinks it's fun to feel scared, like it's some form of entertainment and enjoyment. I'd rather have that attitude towards horror flicks to save myself from the night sweats because it sucks not wanting to even glance at my mirrors for fear I'd see something I don't want to see. The feeling just sits in my body and rots, digging holes, drying me up inside. I can't wait till I'm 25 and won't give a damn no matter what I see.

Congratulations, RiRi, I (kind of) like you again.

How effing charming.

Movie: It's Kind of a Funny Story

I saw this last night on the verge of getting over a cold, which has drained me of my usual long attention span. Being not so patient, I sat through the hour and forty minutes of quirkiness, hearing the audience react in a way I couldn't. So I sat there, criticizing, trying to enjoy what moments seemed enjoyable. And I did enjoy it for the most part.
Based on the book by Ned Vizzini, the movie is about introverted Craig. Craig (Keir Gilchrist), 16, is not quite a severe case of depression. When we first meet him, he's about to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge--actually, he does it. It's confusing whether or not his parents showing up to stop him is real or if he's dreaming, nor is it explained. And I don't care much for the dialogue there. Me=1, Movie=0. So that morning, he checks himself into the psychiatric ward of a hospital. He tells the front desk, "I want to kill myself." She hands him a chart and says, "Fill this out." Me=1, Movie=1.
He sees a doctor, an Indian one (because this is a movie and it needs diversity so in with the Indian doctor). The doctor is about to send him back home when Craig makes a desperately bold speech about how he absolutely cannot go home, fearing "I might...do something." The doctor reluctantly checks "admitted" on the chart. Thus opens the doors to a windowless, bottom-floor world of psychosis in its different forms. Me=1, Movie= still 1.
Craig is shown the room he'll be staying in for five days minimum, and his roommate, an old Egyptian man who "hasn't left the room in weeks." Me=1, Movie=2.
Bobby is played by Zach Galifinaikis, and rightfully so. Bobby is comfortably insane, wearing his pudgy body and scruffy beard and sad eyes like a walking teddy bear. Craig likes him because Bobby gives him more attention he's received in weeks. The diagnosis doesn't matter. What matters is that they're there, alive, interacting like two new friends at school. The pacing tends to remain a bit slow even though Craig is now at the hospital. Me=2, Movie=3.
Noelle (Emma Roberts) is another specimen of the ward. Also 16 and donning three scars on her left cheek, she takes an interest in Craig after watching him offer Bobby one of his dad's shirts for an interview. Noelle, playing the ultimate teen, thus too shy for direct verbal contact, drops a note at Craig's feet telling him to meet her that night.
They play the Question Game, where she asks him a question and he must answer with a question. This is point where I stopped seeing Craig as imaginary and started appreciating Keir's abilities to pretend like he was a depressed adolescent attempting to flirt with a pretty girl in a mental hospital. The cool shyness is mastered with a few raised eyebrows and seemingly coy teasing that made me wish I was Noelle just so he could ask me questions. Me=2, Movie=4.
As Bobby puts it, their chemistry is like his vocalized air missiles followed by an explosion.
Truth be told, my favorite part of this movie has to be during "music time" when half the patients gather round in a circle with various instruments and attempt to recreate "Under Pressure" by Queen. Noelle has a tambourine while Craig is just fine empty handed so he can watch peacefully. But then, the instructor insists he must do something, so "you're on vocals." The last thing anyone wants to hear at a hospital. After much encouragement, Craig stands at the mic. Then begins a dream sequence of rock n' roll where Craig has a mohawk and skinny jeans, Bobby is on keyboard, Noelle is on guitar, and they're all in 80's David Bowie attire. I much enjoyed watching Keir's abs through his open leather jacket. Me=2, Movie=5.
As you can see, IKFS won by a few points.

Mirror's aren't really mirrors....

This is just something I've noticed... with a slight pang of what-the-fuckery.
Having two mirrors opposite each other in my apartment, I've noticed that reflections play tricks on you. For example, my lamp in front of the mirror is on. My closet mirror, parallel to the other mirror, is reflecting a wall with light switches, an intercom, and an alarm panel. In the mirror there seems to be a boxy, orange light on the wall. But when I look at the wall, there's no light on it at all. There also seems to be a difference in shadows in the mirror. Some objects have darker shadows or even an extra one I can't see without the mirror. What the heck, science?!

I'm not sure why I like this...but I do.

I think it's the accents and fantastic nerdiness....

Old crush reignited: Jack White.

There's something oddly sophisticated about him, don't ya think?

Movie: The Social Network.

Not your average, run-of-the-mill biography, that's for damn sure. First, I couldn't believe the amount of creativity that went into emulating the birth of Facebook and the simultaneous (somewhat) intimate relationship roller coasters. But, of course, I wasn't expecting anything less from director David Fincher either.
Mark Zuckerberg is definitely not a common character, especially one commonly pulled off by actors. This is why God invented Jesse Eisenberg. If Jesse's portrayal of Mark was any more believable you'd think Jesse really was a total asshole compared to his typecast soft-yet-brave roles. Mark is introduced as a fast-talking Harvard student with a dangerous anger and way of speaking that makes you think he enjoys talking to himself more than others. He is smart because he is both inside and outside every situation. He is fascinating to watch because of his unpredictability, and likable because he makes mistakes just like everyone else. My favorite line of his: "I can't stand here staring at that loop of Niagra Falls, which has nothing to do with the Caribbean."
His best and only friend, Eduardo Saverin, played with fragility by the British Andrew Garfield, is sweet, sensitive, and caring. Also smart, has his own funding from oil futures, and is never not in a button-down silk shirt. My favorite line of his?: "You better lawyer-up, asshole, because this time, I'm coming back for everything." Ahh, revenge.
Sean Parker, acted by Justin Timberlake, is somewhat of a lost cause on the inside. Paranoid, desperate for emotional connection lasting more than two hours, and devilishly likable, Sean weasels his way into the Mark-Eduardo relationship better than James Bond ever could. Having founded Napster at 19, he has his own history, and Mark can't help but be drawn to his consistent coolness. But Eduardo can see right through those tight blonde curls of his. Favorite line: "Amy, come quick! There's a snake in here! Okay, there's not a snake, but I have a question."
Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss. The Abercrombie & Fitch twins. Only better. Who knew someone as mathematically good looking as Armie Hammer could pull of such a complex role--times 2? Armie plays both Harvard students with body doubling by a real A&F model, Josh Pence. The brothers are rowing machines and always have their wits about them, never acting too quickly without thinking long and hard about the consequences. They're the ones who claim Mark stole their idea for Facebook and take him to court. Favorite line from Tyler: "I'm 6'5", 220 [lbs] and there's two of me." Cameron: "Oops, broke your 335 year-old doorknob."
Moving on to the man behind it all: David Fincher, who has a reputation for pewter tints in all his grim movies. This is the first one I've seen with a rather smooth, warm palette, it's almost fantastical. This review would not be complete without the mention of the rowing scene when the Winklevoss twins race and lose by less than a second (not really a spoiler). Why is this pivotal? The fucking camera lens has such a shallow depth of field, causing everything to look ridiculously 2D, you'd swear you were staring at a painting and not actual people. With the sharp-blurred focus, it's perhaps the trippiest scene in the entire movie. And no Fincher movie is complete without at least one scene giving off a that's-not-normal feel.

Movie: The Town.

(I saw this a week ago so bare with me.)
First, I loved it.
Second, The Town is one of Those movies: the cheap-looking expensive film. The picture is grainy, no fancy suits to be seen, dirty neighborhoods, low-maintenance hairdos, no make up.... Enter various bullet-proof trucks, tons of police man/cars, explosives, ridiculous guns, bank robberies with elaborate vaults, etc.
It's also a movie with much passion involved. Ben Affleck seems to have a knack for producing likable, vulnerable characters and dropping them in a pot of trouble to stew. Perfect.
Sir Affleck plays Doug MacRay, a native to Charleston in Boston. In Charleston is a one-square-mile neighborhood of bank robbers who are damn good at their jobs of driving up to a bank in costume, demanding money, getting the money, and leaving with nary a fingerprint. Doug is one of the good ones.
Lovely Rebecca Hall plays Claire Keesey, a victim of one of Doug & Co.'s many bank jobs. Left completely traumatized by the experience, Doug discovers Claire is practically his neighbor; she lives across the street in a town home. Naturally, Doug decides to follow her to make sure she doesn't go to the FBI.
He watches her at the laundromat, silently folding clothes, even asking him if he has quarters for the dryer. He doesn't. Claire freezes at the sight of dried blood on the collar of her work shirt and Doug is immediately guilty as Claire starts to cry. Sitting just a few feet away, Doug feels obligated to charm a smile back onto her face.
And thus begins the secretive, complex, and most enticing romance to watch on screen.
I'd say more but I'd rather just see the thing again.
Fine, one more thing. Blake Lively can most definitely pull off a lost Boston hoochy, and Jon Hamm can beat the shit out of criminals as an FBI agent.

Once again, meanwhile in Japan world...

Oh ho it gets better.

YES ad of the day: don't mess with pandas.

Kid: Dad, can we get Panda Cheese?
Dad: No, we have enough.
Cue pissed off panda. :D

Kitty tantrums: living with a cuddly-soft 5 year old.

This week in particular, Tucker Care has been like going through the rebellious, "mine!" phase that comes with toddlers. I've had him since he was two months old; feeble, no full coat of white and grey bunny hair, and barely enough teeth to eat with. Now, three months later, his tail is puffy and long and he's addicted to wet food like it's crack. I've never seen a cat that whined loudly at me for no reason till him. It's pretty funny.
Today, for example, I got kind of a late start on my day and finally stuffed my laundry in a bag to take downstairs. At the elevators (close to my apartment), I realized I forgot soap and hurried to get it. When I opened the door, Tucker zoomed out into the hall and I yelled after him, dropped my things and caught him at the elevators where he stopped. He'd never done that before. He's tried but stopped immediately outside the door because he got scared.
And what's become a nightly routine--almost every night--are my Tucker Sleepy Holds. When it's very late and I'm exhausted, Tucker is usually at his most hyper. If he's making too much racket, I grab him and hold him on my bed till he calms down (kitty tantrums) and gets tired. He definitely resembles a little kid screaming, "Nooo! I don't wanna gotta bed!" when I have to hold him in one spot.
Although I must say, even though it sounds like I'm complaining, I really, really love taking care of him. He's mine. My kitty who sleeps next to me every single night with his head on the pillow and sometimes I'll wake up with his arm around my neck, who skids onto the counter when I make his food, and who absolutely depends on me for everything. And no one would put up with him as much as I do.

WANT of the day.

SEIL bag by Lee Myung Su design lab from Ben on Vimeo.


Oh, asian people. You tickle my futuristic bone.

If I had enough money, I would...

I've been indulging my money fantasies lately via the Internet. It's like crack, I swear.

1. Invest in every single nail polish color Sephora has to offer.

2. Buy an isolated cottage in the French countryside and then drown it with lavish flowers, plants, and food gardens. 

3. Decorate said cottage with Ashley Croswell Shabby Chic and/or Anthropologie house furnishings and/or authentic antiques. 

4. Get a record player and play all music from vinyls. 

5. Purchase a mass array of plaid/plain button-downs from various places.

6. Seek out every useful appliance (garlic crusher, food processor, stick blender, grapefruit spoon, mini pie   shells, lemon squeezer) and stock up my kitchen with them.

7. Raise two cats and allow their kittens to romp around in the backyard and not give them up for adoption (families are families). 

8. Ride an antique, mint-colored bike on a open trail and really enjoy it.

9. Host massive Christmas and New Years parties for family and friends once every few years.
10. Never, ever eat another processed food again, breathe in toxic air, drink bad water, or become deathly ill.

11. Do a lot of things people want to do but never get the chance to.

Today (Wednesday) was not good...

For a number of seemingly small reasons that had a tendency to build and build like a damn pyramid...
1. Je n'ai pas obtenu de voir mon conseiller, la personne la plus importante au monde en ce moment. J'ai attendu vingt minutes et il n'etait pas n'importe ou.
2. Un ami a voulu me voir mais il etait deja assez tard. Il ne laisserait pas vers le haut ainsi j'ai du continuer a le rejecter a plusieurs reprises. Maintenant il est triste. (Calme vers le blas, mon appartement eset malpropre et j'ai eu une longue journee. Ne la prenez pas personnellement. Et il m'a juste dit que je semble toujours etonnant.)
3. I left sound class around 2 (while editing a Scott Pilgrim trailer) due to a gnarly head/neck ache and went home to eat and hurried back to class to take a final quiz.
4. Car incidents I never take lightly. Anything relating to my dear Honda Civic is taken with all seriousness. So, in the parking garage, when a lady (in her smirking Prius) and I were parked so close I could not open my door, she honked at me and asked, "How will you open your door?" Causing me to back up and repark it. When I started walking to school, I could feel my brain pushing against my skull like it wanted to jump out and stab itself. I was pretty heavy with rage by then so I had to compose myself before I got to class.
5. I kept thinking the garage guards would question me about my fob since I use it to get in yet I park on the visitor level because I don't live in that building anymore. They stared daggers at me just like I thought everyone else did today.
6. I saw He Who Must Not Be Named pulling out of the parking garage, showered and shaven, but immediately looked at my feet. I am in no state to act like everything is fine.
7. Je ne pense toujours pas ma maman comprend que je suis juste comme me suis inquiete d'obtenir un travail pendant qu'elle est. N'est-il pas mon souci du travail a ce sujet? En repetant ces soucis a plusaieurs reprises a moi soyez la pulpart de temps cauchemardesque pour entendre. Vraiment, il y a seulement tant d'heures pendant le jour. Me propres pensees sont assez psychotiques, je ne pensent pas que je peux manipuler beaucoup plus sans se developper en spirales.
8. I can't decide what to wear for graduation.... Yes, I worry about it.
9. Last week I impaled my heel and now my foot has a painful bump.

There you have it.

(Yep, definitely a video week) Oh yah, THIS is why i heart Fanny Pak.

Hey Mickey!

Looks like it's been a video week.

5 Reasons I love Tavi Gevinson.

1

2. She has a fantastic fashion blog.
3. She's been on the cover of Pop magazine.
4. She sits front row at Prada runway shows.
5. We have the same hair.

Lady Gaga PSA: Repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell.

I love how she has a flag behind her and how she waits and waits for the senator to pick up the phone. There are lots of people posting videos of themselves calling their senators asking to repeal don't ask don't tell. I just might do that :)

That's not a road.

It's fish off the Louisiana coast. I hate BP.

I've found it: the place I want to live.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt sings Lady Gaga... Need I repeat myself?

You cannot go wrong, in any way, shape, or form, when combing Joseph and Gaga. Pure magic comes out. The world needs more Josephs. And Gagas.

Oh my God yes moment of the day.

2010 MTV Video Music Awards - More VMA Video

I've loved Florence for quite some time now, but this is the first performance that really blew my mind (in terms of harmony). It's very flowy and oddly peaceful and dancers are so amazing. It's like they're from Planet Ballet.

Watch as Oprah tortures and tortures...and tortures her studio audience.

Oprah's Audience Freaks Out Again
Uploaded by TheDlisted. - Watch feature films and entire TV shows.

I wanna go to Australia, Oprah!
PS Why are people crying before they even know what it is? Calm down! I feel like they all need tranquilizers by the end of this.

Tucker has discovered how to crawl under bed covers...

And it's so cyooot!

I'm not sure why I want to marry this man, but I do.

This man is either French or from the seventies. Either way, I want him.

Let's chronicle how I'll manage without a microwave, shall we?

So I was in Whole Foods today for the first time in about two months doing some long-term grocery shopping (I won't say where I used to shop but it rhymes with "shmader shmoes"), going down each and every aisle tediously, scanning every product and weighing my options like a human calculator. Come the  Asian section and I realized buying those boxed Udons and soups were rather pointless since they were manufactured for microwaves. My new apartment is absent of the device, though. Not that it's a big deal, I'll just have to be patient while my Amy's meal is sitting for a good hour inside the oven. But what if I'm feverishly starved (happens every once in a while)? I'll need something fast, dammit.
I'll just have to make sure that doesn't happen. So no boxed soups or microwaveable egg rolls (ew) or radiation for me.
Isn't food tastier when its molecules are heated naturally anyways and not like its inside a tornado of invisible lava? Ok, that was an exaggeration, but it's not when you don't wait for it to cool down.

By the way: You're welcome.

WANT.

Exes of the world: yeah, what he said.

Catchy, no?

Movie Review: The Cove

First off, I have to say how glad I am that this documentary was made. It starts off a lot like "Man on Wire": with a rather illegal yet groundbreaking mission. There's James Bond night vision, people crammed into a van with cameras, and walkie-takies checking everyone's position asking how many cars are tailing them ("the Japanese mafia?"). All for one cause: to save a throng of dolphins.
The first person we meet is Rick O'Berry. Any time he enters the town of Taiji, Japan, he must be incognito, wearing a face mask like nurses wear and a wide hat. He even hunches over when he drives a car to keep his identity or else "they'd kill me if they could."He's referring to the chief of police in Taiji.
Dear Rick, once a dolphin trainer himself, has a history of getting arrested multiple times a year for attempting to free dolphins in captivity (and succeeding). His actions are rather simple: take a pair of scissors and cut a whole into the damn fence. I burst out laughing the first time I saw footage of him in a scuba suit with sheers snipping into an underwater chain link fence, purely because it was so joyful to see him in such an act of bravery, outsmarting the bad guys. It's a rush.
Rick tells us about why he's devoted his life to saving the dolphins--because surely someone can't just be born with this destiny. There has to be a solid reason for this madness he causes (or rather, tries to put a stop to). And it all boils down to his Hollywood days of training a dolphin named Kathy for the TV series, Flipper. Almost all dolphins in captivity are young females because they look the part. For ten years he helped build up the industry of show casing these animals, whales included. Until a pivotal event happened. "Dolphins breathe consciously," he tells us. "Every breath is a conscious effort. Kathy was severely depressed, I could feel it. Then, one day, she swam up into my arms, took a breath, and didn't take another. She committed suicide." The next morning, Rick went to a seaquariam and freed a dolphin from captivity and got arrested.
That was the minute I decided it was okay to cry. Who'd ever heard of such a thing? A British scientist goes on to explain how a dolphins are capable of doing the things they do. And he says, "The trainers communicate to the dolphins with their hands. In human form, it's Sign Language. But dolphins don't have hands, so it's one-way. This is a plain example of how incredibly intelligent these creatures are. It's extraordinary."
Enter Mandy and Tom. They're a married couple whose passion is freestyle scuba diving, which is essentially scuba diving on one breath of air. Mandy and Tom also have a passion for dolphins and whales because they've swum with them and understand them as animals. They were both recruited to help Rick and his team expose the cove of Taiji during the kill-fest.
Another man on board is an Australian surfer, who is the responsible for Hayden Pennetiare's display at the Taiji cove in 2007. He, Hayden, and five others swam out on surf boards into the cove, held hands, and refused to move from the killing spot--till the fishers started threatening them with the harpoons, jabbing at them, and yelling violently. This is where Hayden earns my respect because the girl, who was about 18 at the time, fought till she couldn't fight anymore, stumbling onto the shore in hysterics because she couldn't save a baby dolphin. All six surfers were arrested and banned from ever returning to Taiji.
Rick talks about the fisherman and their ignorance, and we see it first hand. They taunt the Westerners who venture to the cove to try and take pictures to expose the evil that happens--and so far, a lot of Westerners (photographers, journalists, activists) have battled with them on shore. One time, when Rick was there, one man in particular was so out of line that, "he wanted me to punch him. He was taunting me, and man, I would've socked him over the railing." I have to say, personally, that I was fairly surprised to see such behavior from the Japanese fisherman. I've been to Japan and they're not like that, not at all. Maybe it's a regional thing, but they are not ignorant or aggressive or obnoxious like these men were.
The method of killing is rather interesting yet irritating. It's too easy. I never would've known dolphins were so very sensitive to sound had I not seen this film (I only knew a little about it). Sound is the reason that droves of dolphins died when Sea World first opened. The tanks they were being kept in were so loud and terrible that it stressed them out, made them sick, and they died. It's a similar method at the cove: there's a long metal bar on the side of the boats that are whacked, creating a loud clanging, a wall of sound, and immediately the dolphins flock to the inner cove to be kept in a large net overnight and killed the next morning. It's too easy.
I must say, throughout the documentation of the crew's mission to film up-close what happens at the cove (building cameras in disguise and planting an underwater camera at night), the most satisfying moment comes at the very end. I won't give that part away. You have to check it out yourself. But I will say I was so shell-shocked I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. Thank God I don't have roommates or I would have been pretty embarrassed by the look on my face.
The film itself is not about animal cruelty (MOM), it's about restoring the way dolphins need to be treated. So instead of dismissing the matter just because dolphins died (MOM), watch it because of how much effort is being put into trying to rectify it all.

Hahaha. I laugh.

My favorite is "floppy."
I'm not a cat freak, I swear. 0_0

100 cats let loose in a store. What will Ikea think of next?

So here is the making of an Ikea commercial in Wembley, England. When the store closed, a film crew and the cat's owners huddled inside and set up. Then, well, they let the cats go and filmed the whole things. The video explains it all....
The end made me hug and squeeze my kitty!

Just so you know.

So I was on the Internet looking for the lyrics to an Interpol song, "Summer Well," and I noticed that every site I went to had them all wrong. How dare they. Is it so hard to understand what they're saying? No. It's not. So here are the lyrics in case you were wondering.

The fevered plastics that seal your body
They won't stop this rain
Hey hey
I was your eye in the night
when the profits fell
I said it looks like you summer well

I want to stay magical
I want to stay yearning
I want to feel up on your lie
I miss you
But it looks like you summer well

All the while the protests will shine the same
But you will never notice
It's alright
I rely on the process
Don't mind the frame
They will never take this
dream from me

It's alright
It's alright
It's all the way behind her
It's alright

I miss you babe
I want you back
The signs we gave
But weren't those signs supposed to last
The rainy days
The summer's back
The signs we gave
So what was that
You know we have ways
To make the seasons touch these words
So let me take this
Turn your eyes look away
Until it fades

All the while the protests will shine the same
which you will never notice
It's alright
I rely on the process
Don't mind the frame
They will never take this
dream from me
It's alright
It's alright
You send me

Today was better than I thought it would be.

(Pardon the lazy writing, I wasn't expecting to write this.)
First off, thank you to Interpol for reminding me just how damn cool the location of my school is.
Around 4 PM, my friend and I happened to go up to the roof of the school to see her new car (a Jeep SUV!) when we heard music coming from across the street at Space 15, a small place for any cool Indie people. We went to the edge of the roof and peered over the wall to see a concert set up. It took my friend a few seconds, but she shouted, "It's Interpol!"
We watched them rehearse for their concert and headed back to class five minutes late.
Once class was over, we had plans to go to Kabuki for dinner. Just as we were about to walk into the parking garage, we heard the music again. They were still playing! "We should go watch," Friend said. So we broke into a sprint--literally--and hauled ass down the sidewalk where people from high balconies cheered at us (not kidding). When we finally got to fence of the concert, panting and antsy, we realized the school roof was still a better view. So we hiked up the driveway of the parking garage and went back to the wall to watch the crowd of about 200 scream at the band and someone even managed to climb onto the roof of Urban Outfitters and snap pictures. About 20 kids from the school were balancing on car bumpers to watch and sing every lyric of their songs and scream to get noticed from the band members (I gave an exaggerated wave during their rehearsal from the roof).
We stayed for about 4 songs and then left for Kabuki.
One of the coolest days ever.