Tuesday, March 8, 2016

This blog.

My friends, I just realized I still own this blog. (Well, not own. I guess Google or Amazon owns everything.) Since I just thought this morning, "Hey, maybe I should try blogging again," & I couldn't think of a name that was better than "The Topical Life"...I'm back. Look out, world.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Shark Week

Nothing says “morbid fascination” like Shark Week. I love it as much as the next guy, but I don’t understand why I love it. I mean, how many times can you hear the same story: “I was spear-fishing in shark infested waters, and this great white came out of nowhere and tried to take/succeeded in taking my leg off! Unbelievable! No, I'm not angry at the shark. Why would you ask that?” ?? And how does your everyday shark-attack survivor feel about the fact that I find his experience so entertaining that, while I merely “make it through” the other 51 weeks of the year, this 52nd week – Shark Week – makes my life worth living? When I am attacked by a shark and the Discovery channel comes knocking, I’m gonna be like “Mind your own business.”

Madeleine Cookies

If, in about a month, you’ve noticed that I’ve gained 10 pounds, you can say to me, “Hey, looks like someone’s been hitting the madeleines pretty hard”…and you will be right. Someone save me from myself.

Inception

*note: I will not be giving anything away here. If you know me, you’ll be surprised, because I have no problem ruining movies for people. This one, though, is too good to ruin for you.

While Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is the film with which I’ll eventually settle down and have babies, Inception is the film that has loved me so well I’ll never be fully satisfied by another. In truth, I started this blog so I could write about it.

I realize Leo is the star of this film, but my affair with it has almost nothing to do with him. While he will always have a special place in my heart for 1) being talented and 2) having worked with two of the great loves of my life (if you can guess them, I’ll give you a cookie), the way he said “Mal,” his wife’s name, was distracting. It was quite a vomitous sound, and Marion Cotillard deserves better than that. In fact, she deserves an Oscar for being both creepy and sympathetic at one time. I might be biased (I don’t know why – it’s not like Tim Burton made the movie), but I thought all the actors nailed it, even Ken Watanabe, whose words I could only guess from context clues. Some people (*ahem* Trey) only noticed Tom Hardy’s lips, but I thought he was so good as the “forger” (otherwise known as Eames) that I might hire him to live my life for me. And Joseph Gordon-Levitt? Who knew he was some kind of badass, unstoppable by even gravity itself?!

Really, though, this movie had everything good in it – it was creative, thrilling, stimulating, and, most of all, elegant. Also, it wasn’t a remake of something from the ‘80s, didn’t tell the back-story of a superhero, and didn’t have Taylor Lautner in it…or any of those sparkly vampires that I adore on paper and despise in film. It’s an impossible idea, but Christopher Nolan didn’t get bogged down in explaining to me how it was done. And, though the ending was a bit of a mystery, everyone in our theater (both times) chuckled when the screen went to black, instead of screaming at the screen like at the end of “Lost.”

To sum it up, I’d really like Christopher Nolan to remake Twilight. Maybe he and Tim Burton could collaborate. I’m gonna go get my letter-writing campaign started.

Topic #1: The Husband


Does a husband count as a topic? I hope so, because many of my favorite topics are people. Since he helped me create this blog (or sat on the couch and watched me get rejected by the first URL I chose), it seems fitting to name him my #1. Otherwise, #1 would have gone to Zac Efron…and that would have been inappropriate.

A lot of girls out there probably think their husband is the best one. While I understand this tendency, I must respectfully disagree. This one is the best one. He cares about things I care about (eventually – it took him awhile to want to watch anything but Disney movies with me). He cooks for me, because he knows I’d rather clean (or lick) the toilets. He doesn’t cry when I throw things at him. He doesn’t think I’m annoying, even though I punched him in the arm a bunch of times. He even offered to go to Lilith Fair with me this year. (Don’t worry – I didn’t let it happen.) On top of all that, he’s unintentionally funny – nothing gets to me more than a man who makes me laugh by accident.

This husband’s name is Trey, and, in the million years since we got married, I’ve only grown to like him more. So, hats off to me, because my husband’s cool.