The Confession

I was laying with Luke to try to get him to go down for a nap. He was being very sweet -- kissing me and saying, "I love you just the way you are."

Then he said, "I tell you a secret."

He got very close to me and whispered, "I. Killed. Mufasa."

1/2

On the second day of the year, we took a picture in some of our new Christmas clothes to send to our new aunt (my brother got engaged! They are both far away and I wanted to show her that the nice gifts she sent fit.)

Later that evening, we turned on some tunes. Luke loves music. He is especially into "pitano"(piano) music as performed by Ben Folds. Just in the past couple of days, he discovered Mumford & Sons. He contemplated their song "I'll be there," which he later sang while playing on the little fisher price piano.

Luke Sings!

Luke is a rock star this week! Yesterday he had a silly hat and a guitar hero guitar at my mom's, and was singing "My Old Kentucky Home." The day before he jumped up on our fireplace, sang a bunch of Alleluias, and finished off with a rousing rendition of "Jesus Loves Me." 

 

Today, I was playing on the computer and randomly sang, "Hey, I just met you, and this is crazy." To my complete surprise, Luke chimed in, "Here number. Call me maybe."

I DO look like Katy Perry

I am proud to report that when Luke saw a snippet of a Katy Perry video, he pointed at the screen and said, "Ma?"

I am now going to have to figure out if he needs glasses. ;)

*******

In other news, I am going to do my best to update my blog more often this year!

Where I'm at this week ....

Of course, it's the last two weeks of the semester before finals, so this is grad student time to SHINE! (Look at how positive I am. SHINE, I tell you. Not fail. Not cry. Not throw rotten tomatoes at professors—SHINE. Now, SHINE, darn it!)

So tomorrow I have a project due and the presentation for the project. I chose to go tomorrow because, obviously, Dec. 2 is Britney Spears' birthday, and I cannot think of a better omen than that! I announced that to my class, of course, when we were discussing the dates on which to present, and they all think I'm crazy. In my defense, one of my dear friends' birthdays is Dec. 2, and so we always teased her in high school about having the same bday as popular-because-she-makes-suggestive-grunting-noises-in-songs Spears. I am half tempted to have Britney narrate my presentation. I also considered making cookies to bring in as a celebration. Alas, my presentation is on a class I have created called First Amendment and the Internet: An Introduction. Although Brit-Brit might have nary a thing to do with this topic, well, I'll make something up.

Sometime between now and next week, I have to watch NINE episodes of The Secret Life of the American Teenager. This seemed like a great idea when I was coming up with my topic for my qualitative class. However, it means I have to WATCH NINE HOURS OF SECRET LIFE. How can life get any better?! I daresay, it cannot. I will CONQUER those episodes. I swear.

I also have various and sundry things to tie up for my health class, including the dread group project. I loathe group projects. My group is pretty good for this project, but I still would rather do the whole darn thing on my own. That's a presentation due next Tuesday. Awesome.

And this weekend, JENNIE (my sister) comes to visit! It will be mayhem. It will be magic. It will be lots and lots of volleyball (her team is playing a tournament here). And pizza. Oh yes, there will be pizza.

What I'm watching...

I got into a discussion about the TV shows I like to watch this week with my friend Joanna. I also talked about TV with my friend Rosemary today. I thought I would let YOU all know what I'm watching, too.

Weekly shows I love to watch (currently on):

1. Flash Forward
It's fun and creepy and Joseph Fiennes is hot. However, the more I look at him, the less hot I think he, objectively, should be (due to the physical dimensions of his face). BUT! This does not let me think that he is less hot than I originally thought he was (I'm not sure that makes any sense). Anyway, I've been looking for a creepy end of the world show since Jericho went off the air. I never got into Lost for whatever reason, but like this a lot. And it's not only because Joseph Fiennes is hot. The story is interesting and I'm enjoying the suspense. I hope people don't get bored with the "not knowing" and the show explodes and gets canceled on a cliffhanger at the end of the first season, resulting in a fan uprising and a reinstatement of the show for a second season, after which it gets canceled again (I am SO still bitter about Jericho).

2. Glee
One of my colleagues says that only women and gay men like Glee. I don't know if this is true, but I am a woman and I love it. It is so. much. fun. I love the musical numbers and I like how silly and campy the whole thing is. Matthew Morrison is adorable and fun to watch sing and dance. Jane Lynch is ridiculously funny -- I loved her in Boston Legal, and I really love her here.

Shows I watch often, but not on a real schedule (alternate title: I like to watch people buy houses):

1. House Hunters
I wish Susan Whang was my friend. That is all.

2. Designers Challenge or Color Splash
I wish I had $50,000 to remodel my kitchen. Or bedroom. Or family room. In fact, I just wish I owned my own kitchen, bedroom, or family room.
Alternatively, I would love David Bromstad to make over a room for me. He seems like so much fun.

3. Property Virgins or My First Place
I wish I hadn't owned a house so I could go on Property Virgins and I could hang out with Sandra Rinomato. This show gets extra points because they filmed several in Cincinnati. More extra points because I felt like we were more informed about house buying than a lot of the people on the show.

4. Gilmore Girls
Obviously.

5. Any number of Food Network shows
I enjoy food. I like the challenges, including Iron Chef and Chopped. I also love Ace of Cakes and anything Alton.

Weekly shows I love to watch (not currently on):
1. Secret Life of the American Teenager
Sigh. You just can't turn away from the train wreck. It also helps that every Monday night, Megan B. and I have a "date" online to chat through the show. Perhaps she and I will try to live blog one when it comes back in January.

2. Greek
Hal and I caught onto this show this season. It's adorable. I really like it a lot. Also, since Boston Legal is now off the air and I can no longer have an inappropriate TV crush on James Spader, I have transferring the inappropriate crush to Cappie (Scott Michael Foster).

In summary, I really need a cable provider who will allow me to pay for only the channels I want. That would be: the basic networks, ABC Fam, HGTV, Food Network, and some channel that plays UK basketball. That's all I ask for.

What are you watching?

The Creek*

On January 20, 1998, my life changed forever.

I turned on the WB and fell completely in love with a floppy haired, cargo short wearing, movie-loving, sappy, sappy, sappy boy named Dawson. He and, more importantly, a little show called Dawson's Creek.

I joke now that I used to watch it every week in high school and cry. Perhaps, and this is confession time, perhaps that isn't so far from the truth. I watched the show faithfully and related WAY. TOO. MUCH. to the characters and outlandish situations in which the characters found themselves. And maybe, just maybe, that resulted in some emoting.

I was a sophomore in high school when the show started -- the characters were sophomores. Like Joey Potter, I had a crush on my good guy friend, and he was clueless (well, he wasn't clueless in my case, just not reciprocating!). Like Dawson, I loved movies and wanted to move to Hollywood and make it big when I grew up. Unlike Pacey, I did not have an affair with my high school English teacher. I knew Andie McPhee was coming -- I had a feeling that the show was going to add a blonde girl into the regular rotation. I was bitter it couldn't have been me.

My friend Brandon and I watched the show week after week, sometimes over the phone and sometimes in person. He often taped the show for me if I couldn't watch it live. On a VHS. I have these VHS's floating around my parents' house; in an era before TiVo and DVR and Internet TV, this was the only way to catch those all-important shows.

This love transcended high school. In college, I remember coming home from watching an intense episode to find my roommate Heather sitting on her bed with a tear-streaked face. Dawson's dad had died in a most tragic way that evening. In what was one of the silliest ways to kill off a character, he had a car accident because, while driving, he reached down to retrieve a scoop of ice cream that fell off his ice cream cone. "Mitch died because of an ice cream cone!" Heather cried. "It's sooooo sad!"

I have met so many guys that have confessed, sometimes shamefully, a secret love for the show. So don't think that this passion is just a girl thing.

Brandon and I watched the series finale together, days before I left for a summer working in Florida.

Joey didn't end up with Dawson, and I was DEVASTATED. I was 20 years old and had lived for five years fostering the hope that my two characters were going to choose each other. We end with Joey picking freaking Pacey, and my dreams were crushed. (But let's be honest, Katie Holmes isn't known for her romantic choices, now, is she?)

I was fully and utterly invested in this series. I liked its silliness, its dirty talk, its movie shout outs -- my favorite occurs in season 1 when Pacey (Josh Jackson, who played Charlie in The Mighty Ducks) said, "No way! Emilio Estavez! He was in those Duck movies, remember? God, those were classics, so funny." (Side note: I have determined that I was so loyal to Dawson because I was still bitter at Josh Jackson for The Mighty Ducks, where I liked Adam Banks better.)

Tomorrow, the complete series comes out on DVD. I currently own each individual season. I watched a huge chunk of them when I first moved to Bloomington and had no cable.

So I have all the seasons.

But who doesn't need the COMPLETE set?!

I started quite a debate about this over on my facebook page the other day. I asked for help in convincing Hal that I needed the complete set. As for why Hal doesn't think I need this, I am unsure. He has seen at least one episode (because I forced him to watch the series finale on DVD with me) and he confessed to even liking it a little bit. On Facebook, I got 13 unique responses (Including one from Hal saying, "No. Call me dream killer."), 11 out of the 13 of them offering support for my buying this set.

In perhaps the best tip, my friend Megan (a different Megan than the skinny jeans opinionista) sent me a gorgeous picture. She said, "Not buying the set will make Dawson cry. Print this out and hang it all over the house to drive the point home with Hal!"

This is the picture she included:



What's a girl to do? I made it my Facebook profile picture.

I even have a call out to James Van Der Beek himself. I, ahem, follow him on Twitter, and I asked him for ideas on how to convince my husband that I needed both the complete set and the individual seasons. Currently, I have not heard back from Van Der Beek, but believe me, if I do, I will keep you all informed.

So what do you think? Does anyone else think fondly upon their days in Capeside? Anyone want to fight about the Joey/Pacey match?

You'll find me in the basement, sniffling and watching some reruns.

*Obviously, the title "The Creek" refers to the show that Dawson ends up making in Hollywood in the series finale. Seriously, I would watch it.

Mushy brain

Tomorrow I have a literature review, intro, and method section due for my qualitative methods class. This has resulted in quite the mushy brain.

I am working on a paper about "The Secret Life of the American Teenager," analyzing the sexual content in the show, especially as it relates to risk, responsibility, and consequences. To do the literature review, I have been working on compiling information about sex on TV. As you can imagine, there is a lot of sex on TV.

Also, and those of you who watch Secret Life will love this, the show won a Gracie Award this year, which (I kid you not) "strives to encourage the realistic and faceted portrayal of women in entertainment, commercials, news, features, and other programs" (gracies.org).Realistic is not the word I would necessarily use (not all the time, for sure).

(As I have been typing this, it came to mind what types of characters will come to this blog through what strange and wonderful google searches. Sex. Teenagers. TV. Oh Dear.)

On a completely different note (kind of), those of you who are interested in chick lit (as well as DAWSON'S CREEK!) and different funny themes (in this case -- college life), check out Sadako's post today. It's excellent and mindful.

6 things that make me happy

I was tagged by Children of the 90s for a meme! (In addition, the Children of the 90s blog is very very funny!)

1. Mention the person who nominated you (above).

2. List six unimportant things that make you happy
3. Tag six blogs, state the rules & notify them with a teeny comment on their blog.

So without further ado, I present to you 6 UNIMPORTANT things that make moi happy:

1. Surprise people in movies or TV shows. For example, Eric Camden from "7th Heaven" played Melissa Joan Hart's bad dad in Drive Me Crazy. I had forgotten this. When we watched it again, I was filled with glee. I immediately sent a text to my sister that said "Eric Camden is in Drive Me Crazy!" She replied, "Is he her dad?!" We apparently think alike. ("7th Heaven" in general also gets kudos because my brother relayed one of his greatest lines about it. The show, if you haven't seen it, follows the train wreck trials and tribulations of a minister and his family. My brother said, "I think the pope watches this show and that's why he won't let priests get married.") Similarly, The Famous Jett Jackson was in Akeelah and the Bee. Extra points for when Dawson Leery appears in anything.

2. Breaking the hard sugar top on a Creme Brulee. I can't imagine how I would embellish this particular entry. I liked this long before Amelie mentioned the same thing.

3. Layla (my dog) doing silly things. Like getting tangled in the blanket on the bed. Or sitting on the window ledge (it's big) and staring out the window like a cat when we leave.

4. Chocolate milkshakes from UDF. I can't help it. They're the best chocolate milkshakes around. (Yes, I realize this is my second food-oriented mention in this short list, meaning that, as of right now, 50% of the things that make me happy are fattening candy-ish substances. And, honestly, if I'm excited about Dawson Leery, it's kind of like being excited by some sugary fluff. Candy for the MIND. So I suppose by that logic, 75% of this list thus far is about junk food. Awesome.)

5. Getting the mail. I was an avid pen pal when I was a kid, and I remember sitting out by our mailbox waiting for the mailman to come. When I was in this phase, my family lived at a house that was on a flag lot, so our driveway was more than 200 feet long. So if the mail wasn't there yet, I often just sat at the end of the driveway rather than make the walk back to the house and, eventually, back to the mailbox. These days, I can check my email about 10,000 times a day, and that is also happy.

6. Fall days that have perfect soccer weather. For either playing or watching. There's something about a crisp fall day -- the feeling of it, the light, even the smell of the day -- to make me think of bundling up in jeans and a sweater and watching high school soccer at (the now demolished) Fox Field. Sitting in the stands with all my classmates, watching our friends, so many dramas. My parents would be down the field a little way with other parents. There's still something about those particular fall days that make me smile and think about those times. (Note for new readers: my high school didn't have a football team, so soccer was the big fall sport when I was in high school.)

Now, I tag 6 people....(of course, please don't do this if you don't want to!)

Hmmmm....

Eliz
Chere
Thomas
Dibbly Fresh
Trixie
Court

Oh, Dear God, this one is AWESOME

In December of 2007, I detailed two of my favorite Full House episodes (the one where DJ gets beer spilled all over her and the one where Stephanie drives the car into the house).

But today. TODAY.

I turned on my TV and caught the end of a fantastic episode. I was able to rewind it to experience the whole brilliant thing, sans commercials.

Gibbler decides to throw herself a surprise birthday party. (This is the exposition)

(Did I mention I used to teach the story narrative arc using an episode of Full House?)

Anyway. Gibbler's surprise party is a POOL PARTY. For all of us who do not look like the models in the magazines (unlike, apparently, Gibbler), these two words engendered fear in the heart of our middle school selves. At least, Full House suggests it does.

DJ decides she need to get as skinny as a model in the two weeks before the party. To do this, she tapes pictures of models to the refrigerator and enjoys ice on a stick while everyone else samples wedding cake. Of course, in the process of sampling cake, Michelle crawls across the table and starts stuffing her face with slices of cake, getting a ton of it on her face, hands, etc. I don't know about you, but I don't really find this charming. Especially if I was supposed to have some of that cake. I imagine that watching these types of scenes were one of the reasons Mary Kate later had a "relationship with food" of her own.

Anyway. Over the course of the half hour, DJ gets more and more focused on weight loss. She decides not to eat for three days, even at one point giving her lunch to both Gibbler and Comet the dog (who might be my favorite character).

Line of brilliance: DJ says to Comet, "You're lucky. Dogs don't have to wear bathing suits."

So DJ goes to the gym with the family. Of course, all the girls in the family minus DJ have workout leotards and leggins on. Poor DJ seems to have an oversized sweatshirt on and then bike shorts on underneath it. (Can I also add, the aerobics instructor has on a thong bikini bottom OVER leggings. This seemed to be a workout style in this time period. I can think of nothing more uncomfortable. And I really hope the girls wearing leggings-as-pants don't watch this show and get ideas.)

Another line of brilliance: Michelle to a very muscular man at the gym, "Hey mister, you are very lumpy." Zing!

DJ works herself into such a ferver that she passes out. This of course causes, rightfully, consternation and gnashing of teeth. Later that night, Stephanie spills the beans and DJ's secret is exposed!

During the inevitable heart to heart where DJ's eating issues and self-confidence issues are completely resolved, DJ does utter another Brilliant Line: "Show me one girl in here [these magazines] with this round face and these Charlie Brown cheeks!"

We know this is a Very Special Episode. And this is a huge concern for parents of girls (and guys, for that matter). So I guess I give them points for trying to tackle an important issue. But, for pete's sake, there has to be a better way to do it than this.

What do you think? Was there a Very Special Episode of a TV show that changed you or touched you in some way?

For me, I think I watched this episode as a kid and was shocked that someone would STOP EATING ON PURPOSE!