I am now..

a double-digit runner! Saturday I ran 10.7 miles around Kansas City. And it felt surprisingly good. My favorite part was passing a group of obviously very well-trained (I could tell because their shorts looked more like underwear) runners who yelled "keep it up girl" as they ran past me. My stomach treated me better though my calves were sore to the touch for a few hours. I still get a migraine every time I run long. I owe my life to Imitrex.

a wife of one year. Shea and I celebrated our first anniversary this weekend. The wedding day cupcakes were still amazingly delicious complemented by wine given to us at our engagement by our friends Carolyn and Jim. I made Shea an Adventure Book (from the movie "Up") full of programs, ticket stubs, matchboxes, receipts and cards from our three years of dating, engagement and marriage. He got me Love and Respect, a book I have been wanting to read together for awhile. But the card that went with it was my favorite. They always are.

a big fan of Glee. I have resisted this craze because we have too many other shows via DVD to watch and not nearly enough time. Imagine if we watched real TV. My friend Jo lent us the first season, and this weekend we watched. and watched. and watched.


excited for K-State Football! First game is next Saturday but first we'll be attending Purple Power Play on Poyntz where the entire town comes together for a pep rally and fireworks. Then tailgating and kickoff! I love college football, love the way my hometown turns purple. For the first time since high school, I'll be attending every home game. Bring on the Cats!


officially a graduate student again. We had our first class last week. If someone paid me to be in school for the rest of my life, I'd be content. As long as every class I took didn't deal with research methods and data sets.


learning to dance. We had our first official dance lesson last week, too. I wish there was a bar where I could do the tango because really seems to be my forte. 

i don't care about your rose

In the great money makeover of tears adventure, cable TV got axed. We gained $140/month, and my life has never been better.

We do have a HDTV antenna, which gets us enough of the Today Show that I can find out which cute white kid has now been kidnapped by an overzealous stepmother. Or how dirty the bedspreads in hotel rooms really are. (dirty.) And when hail wakes us up at 3 a.m., we can get enough of the weather to see if we should head to our non-existent basement.

We also have Netflix, which provides enough for me to see my documentaries and shows like Dexter and How I Met Your Mother, one year later. The viewing delay offers a nice restraint so that my life does not become a long conversation of "omg did you see who got the final rose?!"

But best of all, I don't have to watch the Bachelor/Bachelorette. Because if you think Cinderella and Snow White stories are bad for little girls' misconceptions of love, please tell me what we're teaching with this amazing display of true love. That if you act outrageous, show a little leg and a lot of boob, degrade other women and rehearse your "I never thought I could love someone as much as I love you despite the fact you are sleeping with other girls while millions watch me act ridiculous" speech, you'll catch your very own husband. Or even better, turn the tables and make him stand up with 20 other guys while you judge his personality, muscle formation and kissing ability on national television.

Ranting aside, it's great not having to miss out on real life and exploring our city because we might miss an episode of someone pretending to live in unscripted reality. We've done more in the seven months we've lived in Kansas City than the two years we dated in Minnesota.

You could also blame that on the not-so-delightful Minnesota weather but it's 115 heat index today in KC and my face is melting off. But I WILL enjoy it. There's nothing on my TV anyway.

LOST characters + Bruce Willis --> OMG, we're dead.

Obligatory caveat: I know that I am in the minority for saying that I think LOST is a terrible, terrible show. I'm glad most of you find joy in it. Yay for you! The comments in this post are not meant to attack you personally so don't get all defensive and call me an "other."

I am snobby when it comes to TV shows. My favorites are West Wing and Gilmore Girls because of their fast, snappy dialog. I tried LOST. The first season ranked somewhere between my love for Cake Boss and reruns of Boy Meets World. I stopped watching sometime in Season 3, and surprise, did not have any withdrawal effects. I've never felt incomplete not knowing what was up with the jungle whispers, the smoke monster or weirdo Jacob. Nor did I miss the incredibly intelligent dialogue; "I'm going to kill you. How? That's a surprise."

But alas, I love my husband more than I hate LOST so I attended a finale party. (I got a free t-shirt that I am auctioning off. $5 anyone?) We had the displeasure of sitting in front of a family who loved LOST and didn't understand the difference between a private living room TV watching and public viewing.

They were a script writer's dream filling in the dramatic silences with "uh oh!" "Go Jack!" "you go girl" "bottoms up" and "he sure doesn't look happy." 

My favorite, though, being when Jack opens his father's coffin and annoying mother yells, "It's empty!!!" Really? You didn't see that coming? Has Jack's father not appeared in various degrees of aliveness throughout this entire stupid show? Not only is he "OMG alive" but he eventually exits the church through Jesus-like rays of sunshine. Death, resurrection...that's been done.

Speaking of light. As our hero Jack was lying on the side of the mysterious light which is never to be explained  and seems to have little significance because surprise, we all died anyway, I got the incredibly strong urge to yell "DIE, Jack, DIE." So I wrote it in big letters on my napkin. Which as a fan of the show, I am sure Shea really appreciated my support.

Then the dramatic ending with all that hugging, smiling and deadness. Thank goodness the hugging fest only went on for the last 10 minutes of the show because I was getting a bit worried for the lady next to me whose shoulders were convulsing as she was gasping for air through her tears. I hope she hasn't watched The Sixth Sense yet, because (spoiler alert!) Bruce Willis is dead, too.

It's all over. *Tear* I'm so pleased that the island did not fall off into the ocean due to the fact Jack placed the giant pistol back into the hole of light. And I'm extremely relieved that every character realized they are in fact dead, and they are in some parallel reality. Or are they? Is there really a "now?"

Now we can start planning for LOST: The Lost Years!

P.S. I genuinely enjoyed the Target commercials. Props.

Documentaries you should watch. And then make a change.

Right before watching Fantastic Mr. Fox:
Sarah: We never watch MY kind of movie.
Shea: They don't make your kind of movie that often.
Sarah: Hmm, true.


He's right, they don't. I like smart movies, which eliminates pretty much all comedy made in the last decade. I like movies that include some element of reality and truth, especially those that involve politics, social justice, journalism or history. Also I do not like movies that include Tobey Maguire, Nicholas Cage or most singers
turned actresses. And, no cartoons unless they are old-school Disney or Up.

Lately, though, the only movies I stay awake for are documentaries. They challenge our thinking, actually provide some education and make us want to change our behavior for a week. Sometimes longer.

Documentaries we've seen that everyone should see:

1. The Color of Fear.

•   I watched this in class, and it changed my perspective forever. It's just a bunch of men sitting in a room. Some of them are Asian, some Latino, some Black and some White. And they have the conversation all of us are too scared to have but know needs to happen. Racism is real, painful and as White people, we are sheltered from it too often. Unfortunately this movie is not on Netflix, and is pretty hard to find. Check your libraries. But please, watch it and then do something about it.

2. Mirrors of Privilege: Making Whiteness Visible

• Lucky for you, you can watch the whole documentary by following the link above. Consider it Whiteness 101. It's good, not quite as intense as The Color of Fear, but will make you think twice about how you got to where you are in life. If you want more about how we even constructed an idea of race, watch this at PBS: Race: The Power of an Illusion

3. Food, Inc. 

• Great documentary about where your food comes from. We try to buy more organic meat, and get as much from the farmer's market as possible. And when we have the freezer space, we'll buy our meat  from a local farm. And I find I read almost every food label and think, "there is corn in this, too??"

4. God Grew Tired of Us

• Follow the journey of Sudanese Lost Boys who come to the US seeking a new life. They came to the US not knowing how to eat cereal or how to use common appliances. Despite that, they not only thrive in the US, but are able to turn their attention back to their friends and families still living in refugee camps in Africa. 

5. Darfur Now

• Follows the story of six people trying to make a difference in the Darfur region of Sudan. We've all walked past the people handing out flyers on the street trying to "Save Darfur. " This is your chance to really understand the genocide that continues.

6. Who Killed the Electric Car?

• One of those eye-opening documentaries where you can't believe you didn't know about all this. It has the familiar tone of look how much these companies are influencing the government and killing a good thing. But it also blames consumers for not being willing to invest in what's right.

7.  Outfoxed: Murdoch's War on Journalism

• I like this because I dislike Rupert Murdoch. And you should never ever watch Fox News and think you're getting accurate information. CNN and MSNBC are not perfect or unbiased. But Fox News is dirty, and you should turn it off. Period.

You can't care about every issue, and you certainly can't change everything bad about the world. But have an issue, or even a few of them. Make your world bigger.

The Great Compromise

Soon after we found out we were moving to Kansas City, the question came.

"What about the Twins?"

So began the Great Compromise. First we agreed to not get cable TV, and instead went with Internet only. Meaning the only way the Minnesota Twins and Denard Span can be an integral part of our summer is with MLB TV. So $80 and a free trial subscription to Sports Illustrated later, we can watch the 100 + Twins games this year.

And that's not all! That $80 also gets us cravings for Shea's masterpiece "god in a bowl" which really tastes a lot more like processed, sodium-rich flames of hell in a bowl. Also the yelling, distress and general emotional rollercoaster of being a Minnesota sports fan.

Now for the part where the wife whose watching baseball games on TV tolerance level is capped at a more healthy 20 games per season.

We have many weddings to go to this summer. And due to my problem with office supplies and waistbands, I need a new dress or two. I will get a dress to wear for a night or two. He gets over 300 hours of baseball watching. I should work on my negotiation skills.

Red carpet bash

Tonight we went to Oscar Night at the Uptown Theater's Conspiracy Room across the street from our apartment. They did a great job, and it's unfortunate there weren't more people there to enjoy it. We had a blast, and plan to go next year!

We dressed in our Oscar attire, and walked the red carpet. They had candle-lit tables and several screens for the watch party. Free food, too!

Pretty good for a Sunday night in our own neighborhood!

Oscar Predictions 2010

Tonight we're attending Oscar Night at the Uptown Theater, which is just a few blocks from our apartment. The Conspiracy Room will have free food and we'll enter on the red carpet in our Oscar attire.

We didn't get to see all of the Best Picture nominees, especially since they upped the category to 10, but here's what we thought of the eight we did see:

Up in the Air
Good acting (and hot) with a witty plot line. The previews, though, showed all the funny scenes and left out the sad, very depressing theme of the movie. Best watched with a glass of red wine and a bucket of chocolate. Grade: B-

 

The Hurt Locker
Not for the faint of heart. So glad we watched this on DVD rather than in theaters. I wanted a bullet to bite on for most of this movie. Sadly, I am anti-second amendment so I was left to dig my nails into Shea’s arm. Well done movie. And by a woman. Plus 10 bonus points. Grade: A

Avatar
The set design makes it movie of the year especially when you watch it in 3-D. The acting is only satisfactory and dialogue leaves much to be desired. Battle scenes reminded us too much of Lord of the Rings. However, the amount of breath-taking, gasp-inducing beautiful scenes probably makes it movie of the year. Grade: A

District 9
Shea says “Unique, creative and entertaining.” I didn’t watch it because I don’t like paying $9 for a shaky camera induced migraine. The plot was different than a typical alien movie but tough to believe the aliens are controlled by their cat food addiction. (Sarah: “um what?”) District 9 is only good because it’s different. Grade: B

Inglorious Bastards
Most importantly, I loathe Quentin Tarantino’s choice of fonts, embarrassingly showing my priorities in my movie-watching habits. Great dialogue, disgusting effects as usual. The mean guy, Christoph Waltz, should win best supporting actor. Didn’t appreciate the close-up shots of scalping. Grade: B

A Serious Man
We HATED this movie. And if it weren’t nominated for an Oscar I would have shut it off and not wasted two hours of my life. There is no ending. Not the usual, “Hi I am a Coen Brother so I don’t need to follow the rules” ending. But ZERO ending. Hate it. All of it. Every second. Grade: F-

Up
This is the only movie on the list that made me cry. Very timely with the economic landscape today as the main character faces his house being taken away by imminent domain. I H-A-T-E cartoons but loved this movie. It won’t win because the animated old man in this movie was a better actor than George Clooney, and there will be NONE of that on the red carpet. Grade: A

Blind Side
I lied, this one made me cry, too. Sandra Bullock far exceeded her acting skills in Speed. You’ll like it if you enjoyed Remember the Titans. It was good and even better knowing it’s a true story. Still, kind of surprised it’s considered Oscar caliber. Grade: B

An Education and Precious
Didn’t see them, falling short of our goal. Luckily they come to Redbox next week and we’ll watch them for free. Because we are masters at the Internets.

Somebody Get Jack! (Why LOST is not the best show ever)

We’re almost done with the second season of Lost. I admit it’s quite addicting but I also get eye strain from the need to roll them so much.

1.    Punching, poison and torture. There is so much of it. Why the reactive behavior? Those who don’t punch, shoot. There is heroin addiction, prisoner torture, kidnapping, intentional poisoning, cutting off fingers and legs. This is grossly out of proportion for 40 people, even stranded on an island.

2.    Black smoke monster. I don’t even know what to say about this. It’s ridiculous and completely unbelievable. I do not appreciate any part of this show that involves magic.

3.     Jack the doctor. This man has it rough. The punching, poisoning, torturing, kidnapping, shooting, spearing, chopping off body parts. They all end with “SOMEBODY GET JACK.” Luckily he’s the most emotional strong, intelligent, medically proficient, and brave person on the island. Just once, I’d like Jack to get shot in the stomach and see someone else step up and drain their own blood into his veins using a hollow twig while simultaneously pulling the bullet from his intestines with their teeth.

4.    Weak dialogue. SO dramatic. This is no Aaron Sorkin script. “There is a man. A man in the hatch. I beat him. I beat him badly.” Why are you talking in short, short sentences, Zahed? Why does your story end with …” dramatic pause….and you were strung by your neck and left for dead.”  Why are your pupils always so dilated?

5.    Inquisition. Or lack thereof. No one on this island is curious. Someone gets shot, and is bleeding profusely from the neck on a journey to the black rock, which you’ll note is not a rock at all.
               Supposed normal person: “What happened?! You are bleeding profusely from a major artery!”
               Profusely bleeding person: “Everything will be fine now.”
               Supposed normal person: “OK, cool.”
               Trek through jungle continues as normal.

6.    Music.  To keep with the theme of totally unnecessary drama, plunging musical chords strike with every vague comment, capture or discovery of a missing door/hatch/medical lab/stupid countdown clock.

7.    Back stories. Again, how could all 40 people have such dramatic stories? A mediocre rock star with a drug addiction. A torturer straight from Iraq. A man with a mysteriously cured paralysis. A magic 10-year-old. A mother with an ominous fortune reading. A petite murderer/arsonist. A heroin-smuggling priest. A morbidly obese lottery winner.

I will keep watching because I do not have cable. But I hate this ridiculous show more every day, and I hope that 108 minutes pass without notice and the whole island blows itself up.

A Netflix Education

No cable has ironically given us more knowledge of the TV shows all the kids talk about. Except we can’t really talk about it with the cool kids because we are perpetually a year behind. 

Big Bang Theory: Unexpectedly hilarious and a new favorite. The theme song alone is happiness-inducing. 

Curb Your Enthusiasm: Funny in an uncomfortable Larry David way.

Always Sunny in Philadelphia: More like partly cloudy with a huge side of inappropriateness. Sometimes too offensive and other times just really annoying to watch three whole minutes of four people all talking at the exact same time.

30 Rock: LOVE. Potentially better than Gilmore Girls but still undetermined. Unfortunately we finished the three available seasons and now must wait. Tina Fey makes my pajama-wearing, no hair-brushing, spilled-food-on-the-shirt days acceptable.

How I Met Your Mother: More love. This show however has been in a waiting pattern for about six months as we are unable to watch the current season without messing up our order and already finished the DVDs. I NEED to know who the mother is!

LOST: Hated the first five episodes but getting better. Observations:

1.       That island is far too big for it not to be known.

2.       Where is the beauty salon located on the island? These people look more groomed and beautiful than I looked on my wedding day.

3.       Why are they not more injured after crashing in a plane with nothing but a few scratches? You know, except for the dead people.

4.       There seem to be a lot of helpful tools in the checked luggage. Guns? An ax? Medications? Herbal tea? Needles? Bandages? Hunting knives? A hot doctor? Clearly this was a pre-meditated crash.

Jon and Kate Plus 8: I never watched it until unemployment coupled with Instant Netflix forced me to. It has taught me that 1. You can be a really irritating wife but a good mother. 2. Kids, especially eight of them, produce a lot of disgusting bodily functions. 3. Since I know the ending – the lawsuits, the affairs, the ridiculousness, not quite as charming of a show.

Next up: Mad Men, Six Feet Under, Weeds, Chuck and Glee