56 reasons I actually love Love Actually

On my list of favorite Christmas movies,  I always put Christmas Vacation at the top, but I may have to change it – because I always forget that Love Actually is a Christmas Movie.

The first time I saw this movie, I thought it was cute.  Then I saw it a couple of times on TV, and I thought it was cute.  Then I watched the unedited version again, and I fell in love.  Head over heels.  Why?  Well, since you asked, in chronological order (um…oh yeah – spoiler alert, if you haven’t seen it before):

1. The opening sequence, in the airport, people greeting each other – it chokes me up every time.  Did you know they used real footage from Heathrow?  No actors there.  All real emotion.
2. “If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around.”
3. “Ah, fuck wank bugger shitting arse head and hole.”  (Americans simply can’t curse as well as those Brits.)
4. “Solid gold shit, maestro.”
5. Emma Thompson.  (Please, please, check out Wit, her nearly one-woman show from HBO.  Fabulous.  There are not enough words.)
6. The porn stand-in’s.  Absolutely fabulous.  And entirely cut out of the TV version – big surprise. 
7.   Andrew Lincoln.  Yum-my.  *swoon*
8. The two handed wave the new PM does before entering the residence.  Made me giggle.
9. Natalie’s verbal vomit – “I did have an awful premonition I was going to fuck up on the first day.”
10. The fabulous surprise Mark gives Peter and Juliet – I love the horns popping up from the congregation.  “All you need is love…” (Ba-badadadum!)
11. Again – the porn stand-ins. Absolutely hysterical.  “And massage them, please.”
12. Sam (played by Thomas Sangster) is such a cute little boy!
13. DJ:  “Best shag you ever had?”  Billy:  “Britney Spears.”  DJ:  “Wow!”  Billy:  “No, only kidding. She was rubbish.”
14. (Are you singing yet?  “I can feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes…”)
15. “Who do you have to screw around here to get a cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit?”  I love that the PM can joke about that in a room full of cabinet members.  Americans can be so damn uptight.
16. Stand in porn!!  “…lower the nipples…”
17. Colin’s decision that he can get laid better in…Wisconsin.  “Stateside I am Prince William without the weird family.”
18. When Daniel finds out Sam’s in love:  “I thought it would be something worse!”  Sam:  “Worse than the total agony of being in love?”
19. The PM offering to have Natalie’s boyfriend killed because he called her fat.  And then, upon realizing he has a thing for Natalie, asking the portrait of Margaret Thatcher:  “You ever have this kind of problem?  Yeah, of course you did, you saucy minx.”
20. Daniel talking to 10 year old Sam about the love of his life:  “What does she…he…feel about you?”  And then saying to him:  “Basically you’re fucked, aren’t you.”  Again, Americans are so stuck in the mud.
21. Billy Mack:  “Don’t buy drugs. (pause) Become a pop star and they give you them for free!”
22. Santa hats on nipples.  Art.
23. Colin Firth communicating with a Portuguese woman via Spanish, a miming kick, and Turkish.
24. The PM:  “I’m not sure that politics and dating really go together.”  The Presidents response:  “Really?  I’ve never found that.”
25. The PM’s sudden strong stance against the US President.  “…Britain.  We may be a small country but we’re a great one, too.  The country of Shakespeare, Churchill, The Beatles, Sean Connery, Harry Potter.  David Beckham’s right foot.  David Beckham’s left foot, come to that.” 
26. “Now which doll should be give Daisy’s little friend Emily?  The one that looks like a transvestite or the one that looks like a dominatrix?”
27. HUGH GRANT DANCING.  (I have to rewind this part a couple of times, it’s so funny.)  And then when he gets caught:  “Yeah.  Um, Mary, I’ve been thinking, can we move the Japanese ambassador to four o’clock tomorrow?”  “Certainly, sir.”  I saw an interview around the time the movie was released, and I remember Hugh Grant saying that he realized, watching the movie, that he should never dance again. 
28. Jamie and Aurelia’s one sided conversations in which they’re both talking or saying the same thing.  “It’s my favorite time of day, driving you.”  “It’s the saddest part of my day, leaving you.”
29. *Sigh*  Andrew Lincoln.  See #7
30. Dido!
31. Annie:  “The chubby girl?”  PM:  “Oooo – would we call her chubby?”  Annie:  “I think there’s a pretty sizeable ass there, yes sir.  HUGE thighs.”
32. Sarah’s little Christmas tree – I love it!  (You have to watch really closely for this one!)
33. Karl playing with Sarah’s hair while they’re dancing – SO sexy.
34. LOVE the way Karl looks at Sarah’s face as she’s taking off her dress.  Again, so sexy, that his eyes don’t automatically shift to her breasts.
35. The look on Karl’s face when Sarah picks up the phone and says, “No, no, I’m not busy.”  He’s like, what am I, chopped liver?
36. Rowan Atkinson is so awesome.
37. Porn stand-in!
38. “I’m on Shag Highway, heading west.”  And the followup:  “Here comes Colin Frisell, and he’s got a biiig knooooob.”
39. Rob Thomas’ voice on Smooth is…hot.  (ahem….excuse me.)
40. The three girls in Wisconsin inviting Colin to stay at their place – “But there’s one problem….We just have the little bed…so you would have to share it with all three of us…and on this cold cold night it’s going to be crowded, and sweaty and stuff…and we can’t even afford pajamas, which means, we would be naked…”  Oh, and the fourth girl, “the sexy one,” is going to make it even more crowded.  Poor guy.
41. I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes…  “Oh, Jesus, not that crap again!”
42. *sigh*  “…for now let me say, - without hope or agenda, – just because it’s Christmas – (And at Christmas you tell the truth) - To me, you are perfect – And my wasted heart will love you – Until you look like this -” (picture of shriveled mummy-looking thing)
43. “Enough.  Enough now.”
44. “Ten minutes at Elton John’s, you’re as gay as a maypole.”
45. The Prime Minister going door to door, and then having to sing carols (“Please, sir, please!”), and his bodyguard jumping in to help out with his deep voice and rolling r’s.  And the cute little girls dancing – adorable!
46. “Where the fuck is my fucking coat?”  I would NEVER say that around my family.
47. The kid in the octopus costume – priceless.  And the PM manhandling him out of the car – heehee!
48. The girl Sam is in love with, Joanna, is beautiful, and has an amazing voice.  At least, I’m assuming that’s actually her singing.
49. “Let’s go get the shit kicked out of us by love.”  And so happy about it, too!
50. And…Claudia Schiffer!!
51. Sam is SO DAMN CUTE.
52. Jamie’s grammatically incorrect Portuguese – “I’ve come here with a view to asking you to marriage me.  I know I seems an insane person because I hardly knows you but sometimes things are so transparency they don’t need evidential proof.  And I will inhabit here, or you can inhabit with me in England.  Of course I don’t expecting you to be as foolish as me, and of course I prediction you say ‘no’…”
53. “Jamie’s friends are so good looking…I think maybe now I have made wrong choice, picked wrong Englishman?”  “She doesn’t speak English properly, she doesn’t know what she’s saying.”
54. “We’re going to shag at last.”
55. Natalie FLINGING herself at the PM at the airport.  She’s so cute, and so good for him, you know, him being slightly stodgy and all.
56. Airport scenes again.  Choking up…

 Merry Christmas.

Child survivors of the Holocaust

I found this over on metafilter and wanted to share. 

This website is trying to help more than 70 child survivors of Holocaust find information about their past.   

(sidenote – is it “The Holocaust” or just “Holocaust”?  I guess you don’t say, “It happened in the WWII”…)

Meeting the parents (and all that jazz)

A poll for both guys and gals:

How long into a relationship did you introduce you’re significant other to your family?  And how long into the relationship did your significant other introduce you to his/her parents?  Give me pertinent information (like, well, it was 6 months in, but my parents live in Guam).

Also, how long into the relationship before your first “holiday” together?  This includes weekend getaways as well as week long cruises and trips.

I want comments, people!!

I’m going to make some man very happy one day (aka, I don’t need no stinking diamond)

So, I finally sat down and watched Blood Diamond the other night.

My God.  People never cease to disgust me.

I’ve heard all about boy soldiers and conditions in diamond mines, civil war in African countries and the over-value of diamonds themselves.  I read about half of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, and while it was quite moving, it didn’t really force a change in my attitude.  It was sad, but still “unreal” in the way most atrocities you hear about are.  I sometimes feel like we are so immune to those kinds of things, because we see so much of it, and you get to the point where you think – “What can I do about it?”  And you go on living your life.

But watching Blood Diamond brought it home.  I sat through the first half of the movie nearly in tears, cursing the motherf*ckers who could possibly do things like that to other humans.  And I spent the second half of the movie swearing that I would never buy another diamond ever again.  And while I might wear an heirloom diamond something or other, I don’t want to be given a newly bought diamond, and yes, that includes the dream engagement ring nearly every girl wants.

Yes, yes, you can buy “conflict-free diamonds,” but how about another alternative?

I’m kind of liking this one:

 

Center stone is 1.72ct, side stones are .59ct each, total ct. wt is 3.05.  The cost?  $1998.  (Can be found here.)

“Moissanite has more brilliance and fire than diamonds, and is harder than rubies , sapphires and emeralds.”

“Having a higher refractive index than diamond, moissanite is the most brilliant of the colorless jewels…Moissanite clarity is comparable to that of a VS diamond and its color can vary around I-J-K in the diamond grading scale.

“Moissanite looks so much like diamond that even jewelers have trouble separating them.”

“Diamonds are an incredible rip-off.”  This site offers 7 reasons you should never buy a diamond and 8 reasons why Moissanite is a better choice.

“Beautiful is beautiful (no matter the origin).” 

“What’s better a Diamond or a human life?”

Check out this 20/20 spot (about 2 minutes in).  BTW, it’s a North Carolina company that holds the patent and manufactures the product.  (Small world, eh?)

You’re such a Knurd!!

You know when you have one of those glaring examples of being a complete idiot?

Take, for example, my current realization of idiocy.  The Flying Saucer – their website can be found at www.beerknurd.com.  I have the t-shirt that says Beer Knurd, I got it when I signed up for the UFO club.  I know the term, I’ve heard it for years.

Yesterday, I was reading about the etymology of the term “nerd.”  (I was eating nerds, I wondered if the candy was named for the “nerd” or the “nerd” was named for the candy – yeah, I know, don’t ask.)  I found that the first documented use of the word “nerd” came from Dr. Seuss’s If I Ran the Zoo(1950).  The slang meaning, “square,” dates to 1951.  An alternate spelling, ”nurd”, appeared in the mid-60s or early 70s, ”but its first recorded use appeared in a 1965 student publication at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.  Oral tradition there holds that the word is derived from “knurd” (“drunk” spelled backwards), which was used to describe people who studied rather than partied.”  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerd

Now, I just want to be clear – I’m not feeling like an idiot because I didn’t know the etymology of ”nerd.”

I’m feeling like an idiot because I never realized “knurd” was “drunk” spelled backwards! 

 

Charlotte Dinner Club

When I lived in Denver, I met a group of people through a dinner club that I found on Craigslist.  The idea was you would meet new people and try new restaurants…it was good for me at the time, when I was very alone in a strange city.  The only problem with that dinner club was that you never quite knew what you were getting into, they were complete strangers, and sometimes the size of the crowd got way out of hand (one time there were over 40 of us that showed up at a restaurant).

Lately, a few friends began talking about a similar idea, but I think it was more about trying new restaurants with our current group of friends, more than meeting strangers.  I thought a kind of compromise would work well – starting with a circle of friends, and going out like spokes of a wheel – getting different circles of friends together, so that you may meet someone new, but there’s still a connection there.  Degrees of separation and all that.

The most important thing in doing something like this is that it has to be a firmly scheduled event – none of that “what works with your schedule?” and “I can’t make that, can we change the date?”  So I decided on the Second Wednesday of the month.  Wednesday should be less crowded in restaurants than a weekend night, and making it the second rather than the first of the month should get us away from any holiday conflicts.

The second most important thing is getting the information out to people in a safe, easy way.  Emails and evites would be a little complicated – it would take a lot of coordination, and then you’re sending emails to people you don’t know, etc, etc…  A website would be a great way, people can check it at their leisure, but then what’s to prevent a psycho stranger from showing up at dinner, too?  (A dinner club stalker?  Improbable, but not impossible.)

Then I remembered that on Blogger you have the ability to host an “invite only” blog, so that only the people you invite can see it.  I started there, set up a blog, but then I realized there were a couple of issues there.  Number one, it’s limited to 100 email addresses (I know, I have high hopes thinking this could ever get up to 100 people), and number two, people would have to register, and some people don’t want to do that.  Same thing with setting up a group on Facebook. 

But WordPress has the ability to password protect posts.  So the blog can be checked by anyone, but people would need a password to view the restaurant of the month.  Getting the password out wouldn’t be hard to do, and you don’t need to register to post a comment.  So, I think I found the solution.

If you’re a friend in the Charlotte area, let me know if you’re interested in joining us sometime.  You can find the new blog here:  www.charlottedinnerclub.wordpress.com

I’m laughing so hard I’m sweating!

I think this is still the funniest thing I’ve EVER seen in my entire life.  The Crocodile Hunter meets Ross the Intern.  Pineapple PINEAPPLE!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXbCY_yRWOc

Resolved…

I had an incredibly productive weekend.  Four days off without having to worry about traveling is better than I ever thought it would be.  I hung the last set of blinds in my condo (on a steel door, which is more difficult than just, you know, hanging blinds).  I patched the wall where there was some water damage, and while I was at it I patched all the holes in the wall from the curtain rods that were previously hung in there.  I took the cat condo that’s been sitting in my stairwell for three years to a co-workers house for her cats to use.  I took the recycling to the drop off.  I cleaned out two (2!) boxes of junk that have been sitting, unpacked, for three years.  I caught up on some random stuff.  I put some pictures in a new picture frame and hung it.  I moved a bookshelf. 

I really felt very accomplished on Sunday.

And I finally talked with The Pilot.  Everything is fine.  He logged on to match to show his friend how it worked.  Although, I’m still trying to figure out why he had to un-hide his profile to do that.  But, I’m letting it go, I’m trusting him, and I am no longer getting those damn emails with potential matches. 

I’m taking Thursday and Friday off work, to match The Pilot’s scheduled days off, and I have no idea what we will be doing, but I’m looking forward to it. 

I’m finishing up my vacation time for the year – three days on this week, four days off, four days on, four days off, four days on, two days off, two days on, six days off, two days on, one day off, one day on, two days off.  Seven days off in the month of December, not including the holiday and weekends.  Don’t ask me how I ended up with so much unused time – I was so worried I was going to run out of time, and now I’m stressing to make sure I use it all.

Man, January is going to suck, having to actually work several five day weeks in a row.  I wonder when I’ll use my first “mental health day”…