"Inception" or "How 'The Matrix' forever ruined movies for me."

When I saw "The Matrix" for the first time, I had that "What the...?" moment that I'm sure many of you had. I went home and thought and thought and thought about it.I didn't quite understand what had happened; Keanu's terrible acting and all that heavy metal music had distracted me. Everything became clearer upon second viewing, and by the third time I'd seen it, I felt comfortable discussing it at length with others.

That was the first movie that ever really baffled me. The first movie where I missed sections of dialogue because I was trying to wrap my head around this giant perception shift.

So now, ever since I saw 'The Matrix,' I can no longer just watch a movie - I have to analyze every bit of it from start to finish. And this makes enjoying a movie awfully hard. Within the first ten minutes of a film, I typically have a fully-formed opinion about: which direction the plot will take, who will die (if it's that sort of picture), whether the romantic leads will end up together, and who the double-crossing friend will be (if it's that sort of picture). It's an understatement to say that the brain is a phenomenal multi-tasker; so, obviously, I can still watch the movie while all this opinion-forming is going on... but it's not the same.

You sort of ruin it for yourself when you boil a movie down (even internally) to its most basic points - girl meets boy, boy dies via T-Rex attack, girl meets new boy, new boy double-crosses girl, girl is sad but eventually rides off into sunset with archaeologist - and you have the potential to miss a lot when you do this. The nuanced performances, the stunning visuals - you're not getting your metaphorical money's worth if your distracted by trying to figure everything out before the first handful of popcorn has been munched. And because I know this, I TRY not to extrapolate the plot so much... but it never works.

Enter "Inception," the buzzed-about film from Chrisophr Nolan ("Memento," "The Dark Knight") - I went to see it last week. I knew that this movie was supposed to be a mind-bender and that there was somewhat of a surprise ending, so what do I do? I start plotting it out in my mind five minutes into the show. No spoilers here, but, for me, the movie did not quite live up to the hype.

But is it because the mass media overstated its greatness? Or is it because I just had to be super sleuth and guess the ending shortly after the opening credits rolled?*

*The author is currently undergoing psychiatric treatment for her problem. She is being made to watch films such as "Citizen Kane" and "Unbreakable" where the endings make no sense and are therefore good aversion therapy.

Reviewed!

I read... a lot. I'm getting slower in my old age, but I still bust through about a novel a week. I'm forever being asked (and asking others) for book recommendations, so I thought I would post a few reviews here. Please feel free to comment with recent books you've read which you feel are worth sharing!

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"Pride and Prejudice and Zombies"
by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

I was late to this bandwagon... well, technically, I wouldn't qualify myself as being on the bandwagon; it's more like I'm in the vicinity of the bandwagon. Anyway, I was intrigued by the idea right away (Zombies in the Victorian era? Whatever will they wear?) , but didn't read the book until three weeks ago.

I don't think I'm selling the book short by saying that it is exactly what the title states it is: Pride and Prejudice ... and Zombies. The author - nay, embellisher - takes the original book and sandwiches in this idea that England is overrun with zombies and that the Bennett family has been trained to deal with them. The original story - with all its angsty romance, misunderstandings, anguish over social improprieties - is still there, but now there's this matter of the Undead as well. There are lots of gory fight scenes, a clever backstory about the Bennett girls' martial arts training in China, and some great zombie-centric twists to the plot involving namely Lizzie's confrontation with Lady Catherine and Charlotte's marriage to Mr. Collins.

Other than those two plot developments, in my opinion, the best part of this book is the illustrations; eight black and white drawings accompany the story. The scenes depicted are generally ones of zombie mayhem. (Although there's a great one of a zombie-fied Charlotte in wedding attire. YES, Charlotte's a zombie!)

I don't know that this book will really get people who wouldn't normally read Austen to suddenly flock to her in droves. It may however get them to read the first few chapters out of curiosity's sake, and it has assuredly made existing fans view the original title in a new way.

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 stars (I would have given four save for the fact that Grahame-Smith didn't write most of the book.)

You Will Enjoy This Book if You Like: the original "Pride and Prejudice" (maybe - if you're a little kooky), Bram Stoker's "Dracula," or "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell" by Susanna Clarke.

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"Bloody Awful"

by Georgia Evans

This book is one in a series of murder-mystery tales that take place in southern England during World War II; the main character, Gloria, is a were-fox. Yup - she turns into a red, bushy-tailed little thing in the moonlight and romps around the Surrey hills solving mysteries. As if constantly tripping over dead bodies weren't enough, Evans also populates this world with vampires, pixies, and dragons - oh my! - and all seem hell-bent on making Gloria's life complicated.

I really wanted to like this book; I really, really did. I recently met the author (real name Rosemary Laurey) at a science-fiction/fantasy convention and I thought she was brilliant; erudite, witty, and sarcastic as she was, I thought her books would definitely be to my taste. But this book is dull and disjointed and just... not good. *sigh* Her title was unwittingly appropriate.

Anyway, I will try her other books before making a blanket judgement. She also writes vampire romance under her own name and has some other risque fiction under the name 'Madeleine Oh.' I will update you, intrepid readers, on how those other books fare.

Overall Rating: 1 out of 5 stars

You Will Enjoy This Book if You Like: Ummm... other boring books?

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"Crown of Vengeance"

by Stephen Zimmer

Eleven ordinary people find themselves enveloped in a strange mist and transported to another world. Separated into two groups, with no idea how or why they came to this place, they must fight to survive. And it is evident that war and unrest plague this world, as armies muster and factions strike against each other, often placing the eleven right in the middle of their conflicts. Will these travelers discover untapped reserves of strength and cunning, or ultimately break against the pressures of this strange new world?

Zimmer introduces many races and cultures in this book, the first in the Fires of Eden series. It's obvious that this story is going to play out on a grand scale. (To me, the most interesting group is the Trogens, a proud dog-like race who ride winged feline steeds.) The use of mulitple non-human races, mixed with a major plotline involving religion, reminded me a little of C.S. Lewis' "The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe."

In a nutshell: the story pulled me in, the characters did not. Even by the end of the book, I didn't care about any of these eleven people; in fact, I was more emotionally invested in some of the half-glimpsed villains of the story than I was in the purported main characters. So, I will read the next book (which comes out this November) in the series, but only because I want to know what comes next... not because I care about what happens to these eleven people. Actually, I hope they all get eaten by the dog-people. :)

Overall Review: 3 out of 5 stars (with the caveat that I enjoyed it enough to read the next book in the series)

You Will Enjoy This Book if You Like: "The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe," George R. R. Martin's " A Game of Thrones" series, or any of the Falconfar books by Ed Greenwood.

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I actually have three more books to review (Did I mention I read a lot?), but this post is already enormous, so I will save those for next week. Check me out again, gentle readers, for reviews of: "The Female Brain" by Louann Brizzendine, "A Storm of Swords" by George R. R. Martin, and "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" by Seth Grahame-Smith.

And this is just awesome...

This makes me giggle and clap my hands like a small child:



The following is a message forwarded to me by a friend. The message was written by the C.O.O. of her company (Names have been removed to protect the witless):

"It is with my pleasure to announce the promotion of ****** ****** to the position of ************* responsible for the Texas and Mid-West multifamily portfolio. ****** has proven herself over the last several years with both successful portfolios under her charge as well as the excellent teams she has assembled.She will be establishing continuity with branding ,systems,and marketing /training throughout her regions.Please congratulate her as well as assist her in this transition.I believe our company is in a strong position in these regions and will continue to progress and improve in the future

**** *******
Chief Operating Officer"(sic)

And here is my response:

Dear ******,

You do not possess the grammatical (or editorial, apparently) skills that befit a C.O.O. Furthermore, in my opinion, your blatant disregard for spacing renders you subhuman. Therefore, I am banishing you.

Good day, sir.

Hatefully yours,
The Email Nazi

Friendly Warning

This is worth re-posting because I continue to have this dream.


So I had a dream about the end of the world.
Now, I've had apocalyptic dreams before, but they normally involve staying at a lovely seaside hotel and watching a tidal wave engulf an entire town. This is followed by the stars (literally) falling from the sky. I've had this particular dream so many times that I will never, ever stay anywhere where the ocean is closer than a mile away. The very thought fills me with dread. (Maybe that's what causes the end of the world! Me staying at a seaside hotel! Look out, Nostradamus - I'm awesomer.)

Anyway, this dream involved the sun blacking out and then sailing across the sky like a gigantic baseball. It was horrifying. The only thing that kept it light (and utilimately made me realize it was a dream) was when my friend Joe said, "Uh, yeah... it'll take at least 2-4 weeks for the sun to recover from that."

I firmly believe that dreams are your mind's way of telling you what's going on in the dank and musty recesses of your brain, especially when it comes to stress and worry; your cerebral "Basement of Hand-Wringing," if you will. So, what does that mean for me? Hmmm. Off the top of my head, I would guess I'm worried about something big that's coming up soon; whatever it is, I think it's going to go badly. And that would make perfect sense, given the dream... IF I had something big coming up that I was worried about. But I don't.

Sooooo... I guess that means the world's really coming to an end. Sorry 'boutcha. :)

Ha ha ah ah ha ha ha ha ha ah ahaha ha!

I crack myself up re-reading this post, so I had to bring it over here:


My former employer- who many of you know - seems to be obsessed with me. Part of her obsession manifests itself in her assuming that I am obsessed with her and her stupid company.
Now, some of you might stop me here and say, "But Kelli, you're taking the time to write a blog about her. That could be construed as at least being unable to let the past go, don't you think?" And you may be right, gentle reader. However, I defend myself by saying that... SHE STARTED IT!

I will not name her - since I fully believe her pact with Satan involves her being able to sense the use of her odios moniker - but most of you know her or have heard me speak of her. I'm sure you also know about her melting candle wax face and her wide, expressionless psycho baby doll eyes. And for these things I pity her. All her piles of money can't keep her from having to sleep hanging upside-down from the ceiling each night or stop her cheekbones from sliding into her clavicle.

I can picture her now - eating at MCL in a ballgown or buying her way into another organization - and, I will admit, my mind fills with cold hate. BUT... there's another picture of her that floats through my head: her, shoring up her melting face by gathering folds of skin and stapling them behind her ears, sitting in her white marble office with her princess phone and her fake quill pen from 1985 (the last year she was relevant). She is alone. Utterly alone. THIS picture makes me laugh and laugh.

In the end, how could I (or anyone else) be obsessed with someone so tragic?

I think we all know the answer to this one.

And another post from myspace...


Can people change? Can they really, really change?

If I say 'no,' then that means I can't change either... means I can't evolve, mature, or essentially alter my character in any way. And that's just depressing. Who doesn't believe that they will someday overcome those bad habits, destructive tendencies, idiotic psychoses? That - deep inside - there germinates the seed of a beautiful new tree of life? That maybe they are just sleeping inside a chrysalis of their own making, which will one day crack open and reveal a totally different person?

If, on the other hand, I say 'yes'... I am ignoring years of hard evidence to the contrary. It is foolish to think you can change a person and many times even more foolish to believe someone who says that he/she will change. If you let yourself walk blindly down this road, then I have no advice for you, only the pity of one who's been there and found no end to it. (As someone once said, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice and clearly you've found the right person to fool.")

I think the crux of the matter is this: people can change... but only if they truly want to change. No one can fix your problems for you, just as no one can identify them. I believe that if a person recognizes and understands his/her issues, and wants to do something about it/them, then they can change. The important thing for us, the bystanders with hope beating away in our chests, to recognize is the difference between a person who wants to change and a person who says they want to change.

And while you're trying to decide if someone really wants to change or is just telling you what you want to hear, remember this: people don't always need to change just because we think they should. The world is not our dollhouse; we should never attempt to rearrange lives on a whim. Love is accepting someone for who they are. If you want someone to overlook your faults, be prepared to overlook theirs.

Waxing Poetic

Another blog post from myspace. Really just an excuse to type out my favorite poem.

"Each and All" by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown
Of thee from the hill-top looking down;
The heifer that lows in the upland farm,
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm;
The sexton, tolling his bell at noon,
Deems not that great Napoleon
Stops his horse, and lists with delight,
Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height;
Nor knowest thou what argument
Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent.
All are needed by each one;
Nothing is fair or good alone.
I thought the sparrow's note from heaven,
Singing at dawn on the alder bough;
I brought him home, in his nest, at even;
He sings the song, but it cheers not now,
For I did not bring home the river and sky;
He sang to my ear,—they sang to my eye.
The delicate shells lay on the shore;
The bubbles of the latest wave

Fresh pearls to their enamel gave,
And the bellowing of the savage sea
Greeted their safe escape to me.
I wiped away the weeds and foam,
I fetched my sea-born treasures home;
But the poor, unsightly, noisome things
Had left their beauty on the shore
With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar.
The lover watched his graceful maid,
As mid the virgin train she strayed,
Nor knew her beauty's best attire
Was woven still by the snow-white choir.
At last she came to his hermitage,
Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage;
The gay enchantment was undone,
A gentle wife, but fairy none.
Then I said, "I covet truth;
Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat;
I leave it behind with the games of youth:"
As I spoke, beneath my feet
The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath,
Running over the club-moss burrs;
I inhaled the violet 's breath;
Around me stood the oaks and firs;
Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground;
Over me soared the eternal sky,
Full of light and of deity;
Again I saw, again I heard,
The rolling river, the morning bird;
Beauty through my senses stole;
I yielded myself to the perfect whole.


For centuries, Man has come up with a variety of answers to the questions, "Who are we?" and "Why are we here?" Generally, these answers develop and define our relationship to ourselves, the universe, and our deity/supernatural force of choice. We explain things and derive comfort from it. It is said that realizing how insignificant and infinitesimal you are in relation to the cosmos will drive you mad.

I, on the other hand, find comfort in the fact that I am nothing on my own. That I am but a small drop in a vast ocean of beings and forces. Because, as the poem suggests, 'small' does not have to mean 'unnecessary.'

I'm still here!

I've decided to actually try to maintain this thing once again. I don't know what it is about this blog that makes me neglect writing; I was pretty prolific over at myspace... Anyway, in an effort to become motivated again (and as a way to cheat - hee hee), I'm transferring as many posts as I can from my myspace blog. Here's the first one:


So, last night I watched a special on PBS (Yes, I watch PBS. Buzz off, nimrod.) about the science of attraction...
A group of scientists gathered 20 men and 20 women and put them through a series of tests with the goal of matching each one with at least one other member of the group. They used facial similarity mapping, compatibility tests, body-morphing software, and, finally, actual one-on-one encounters to compile data on each individual.
Facial similarity: this takes your face, maps it, and then compares it to faces of members of the opposite sex. The theory is that people are attracted to other people with similar facial features. Ever seen those couples who they look like they could be sister and brother? This is why.
Compatibility tests: theirs was the "CQ" test and consisted of over 100 questions covering every topic conceivable.
Body-morphing software: they asked the men and women to "create" their ideal body type for the opposite sex. They then put all the different selections together to create an average desired shape for both sexes.
One-on-ones: participants had two types of speed dates. The first was simply for gauging first impressions. A woman would sit down in front of a man, then they would both adjust dials hidden on their respective sides of the table to indicate how attracted they were to that person - no talking allowed - and then move on to the next person. The dials ranged from 1 to 100; 100 being the person to whom you were most attracted. The second date was three minutes long and was the participants' chance to ask questions of each other. The dials were reset to the levels chosen after the first dates, and the men and women could lower or raise them based on how they now felt about the person after the second date.

Well, good effort all the way around, guys. Bravo for trying. What they found is that there were too many variables to accurately predict to whom someone would be attracted. (Maybe they heard me yelling at the television screen.) The people with similar facial features were creeped out by each other. The compatibility tests were not foolproof. And the body-morphing only revealed this chestnut: men are attracted to women with good waist-to-hip ratios. Preferences for other areas were varied, but this quality came up consistently across the board.

The thing I found amusing about the one-on-one encounters was that the women participants were in almost all cases giving the men higher ratings on the attraction dials after the second date, suggesting that they were interested in more than physical appearances. The men's dial ratings, on the other hand, changed very little from the first to the second date. (To be fair, the women could certainly have upped the attraction level on the second date after hearing, "I'm a rich doctor" or something similarly superficial.) Along the same lines, was the fact that the women's body-morphing choices (which averaged out to something like a muscle-bound guy who hadn't gone to the gym in a bit) went right out the window when it came to the actual dates. They did however rate for attraction based on height. Soooo... skip the gym, guys, and just... be tall.

Sadly, ladies, it seems you do need to put your fullblown face and knock-em-dead heels on when going to the grocery store (if you're on the prowl, that is). If his first impression is bad, you probably won't get a chance to make another one...