"Up in the Air" about Movies

Happy New Year! We had our usual quiet New Year's Eve at home. We're not ones to go out on the road to celebrate this occasion. I stepped out onto our front doorstep with a noisemaker at midnight and hollered Happy New Year to the empty street while hubby laughed at me from inside the house. It was perfect!

We just got home from seeing "Up In the Air" starring George Clooney. He plays a "terminator" who goes around the country firing people for various companies that don't want to do it themselves. He is a more-than-frequent flier who feels like he is providing a valuable service, helping to let these people go in a face-to-face personable way. With all of his traveling, he doesn't have a home life ... or even a home. It was a fascinating movie, especially if you like to ponder the psychology of people and situations. It is very thought-provoking but I am a happy ending kind of girl and this one didn't cut it. I usually gauge how much I liked a movie by whether or not I'd like to see it again as I'm leaving the theater. This one, not so much.

One of my favorites this year was "The Blind Side" with Sandra Bullock. If she doesn't get an award for her role in this, I'll be sorely disappointed. It is the wonderful true story about a well-to-do white family in Texas who takes in a homeless black boy, Michael Oher, and wholeheartedly makes him a part of their family. He goes on to college as an All American football player. This was a heartwarming story of love and encouragement that I am looking forward to seeing again.

If you've read the Twilight books, you know "New Moon" is the second in the series and the movie was terrific. They did a nice job with the supernatural changes, turning people into werewolves on-screen. This ongoing saga of a high school girl who falls in love with a vampire, and whose best friend just happens to be a werewolf, is fairytale great. Looking forward to the third one.

We saw a few animated movies with the Granddaughter, including "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel" and "Up." The Chipmunks movie was just plain fun. There was a lot more to "Up" than just a cartoon, including love, death, mourning, trust and loyalty. Definitely an all-around great cartoon for kids and adults. Carl's voice (the senior citizen in the movie) was done by Ed Asner, who I've always loved. I once stood in a long, long line in Las Vegas to meet him and have a photo signed by him. (Not sure where it is right now, but it's here somewhere!)

And, of course, my favorite, favorite movie of the year was "Julie and Julia." We rented it recently and I fell in love with it all over again. It just makes me smile. I now have my own Blu-ray copy on order from Amazon and when it gets here, I'll happily watch it again.

We saw other movies this year, but those were the standouts.

So, New Year's resolutions anybody? I have a few ...

Continue to get organized. Sometime during 2010, I will have gone through every single drawer and cupboard and closet in this house and cleaned. We keeping using the word minimalist, which means a lot more donating and garage sale-ing, as well as just plain throwing stuff out.

Work on my zen. I will let things go, dismiss those that aggravate and frustrate me, and just be happy ... in the moment.

Eat more salads. And that's as close as I'll get to the word diet.

Take more walks. And that's as close as I'll get to the word exercise.

Happy New Year!

Reading the "Twilight" Series

I love nothing more than reading a series of books, one after another. It enhances my enjoyment and escapism so much longer. It's like taking a mini-vacation or having an extended visit with someone delightful.



In 2008, I finally read the original "Twilight" book by Stephenie Meyer. It came out in 2005, but I waited a few years to buy it for several reasons. The granddaughter just turned 12 last year and I knew she was *sigh* leaving her Junie B. Jones series behind for more grownup reading. She, of course, loves "Twilight" and loved the movie when it came out. And while I am pretty fond of the supernatural genre, vampires have never been at the top of my list. But we're talking about a beloved local author -- Ms. Meyer lives in Arizona -- and I'm all for supporting local talent. (Visit her website at www.stepheniemeyer.com.)

So the granddaughter asked me recently to buy her the second book, "New Moon," which will be out in theaters on November 20th. I think she's already standing in line to see it. :-)  Then all of a sudden, and very surprisingly because she hates anything supernatural, my youngest daughter decided she wanted to read the series. She sends me an urgent text about how she is nearing the end of the second book and will I run out and buy her the third -- "Eclipse" -- so she can just keep reading. Being the absolutely awesome mother that I am, of course I did. Then she decided to finish the series and bought the fourth book, "Breaking Dawn." She really enjoyed them all.

So here I am, with all of the books in my house, a total of 2,444 pages of reading bliss! I picked up "New Moon" and just got lost in it. I read in bed at night and a lot on the weekends (all knitting screeched to a halt). I managed to blast through "New Moon" and "Eclipse" in one week. My eyeballs were literally burning. Had to slow down some on the last one because of our house painting project, but finished "Breaking Dawn" in a week.

They were so great! I enjoyed every second. Escaping to their diverse world of humans and vampires and werewolves was like being on a supernatural vacation for several weeks. Even when I wasn't reading, I was thinking about the books and the characters and wondering what was going to happen next. I swear there were moments when I could smell the woods and hear the crunching of leaves underfoot in Forks, Washington.

So thank you, Stephenie Meyer, for the entertainment and for sharing your wonderful imagination with the world! And, please, keep on doing the amazing thing that you do ...