Fin

Well, my celebration upon completing the list of reviews I had to write came to a halt when I realized that the last review I had to write, for the horrible movie Salt, was actually written already. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that until after I'd posted the new review and was trying to add it to my review index on my web site, thecinemaphile. Not only that, but my original review was actually better than this one. Oh well, I posted it anyway. A movie so crappy, panning it makes me happy. (I guess)

So now it's full steam ahead with the Oscar push, albeit a couple of weeks late. Chris and I are traveling to Madison this weekend to clean up three movies in one fell swoop at the sublime Sundance theater, and then either before or after we are going to catch the Oscar Live Action and Animated shorts programs at the Rosebud Cinema Drafthouse and Times Cinema, respectively. Fun times ahead - now if I can just get through this work week.

One more wish - warm up a little outside, won't you? It's 2 degrees out and I'm sitting in my office with a long-sleeved turtleneck, but it's so cold I have my space heater going on full whack, which is just making me want to curl up and sleep.

Blog, Interrupted - Packers Edition

On a weekend when I should have been doing nothing but watching Oscar nominated films and catching up on reviews, the Packers had to go ahead and play a Super Bowl game. And I just had to go ahead and watch it since I'm a life-long fan.

No worries. I wrote three reviews, re-watched another movie so I could review that one as well and now have four reviews to catch up on. I'm hoping that I can get some time in on those today and then really push forward and watch more films this week. I kind of need to, since I have to send Inception back to Netflix and want to watch it again before I review it.

I guess my "to do" list could be worse. Not to mention the fact that our house is starting to look like a rat's nest and I/we should be getting some quality cleaning time in.

Zoinks

I woke up with a sour stomach this morning that I can't seem to get rid of, and it's hampering any spark of motivation I may have right now.

This week has been a bizarre one. Like most of the country, we got smacked with some serious precipitation and after the initial hysteria it's basically done nothing more than cause a major slowdown and feeling of malaise. Everything is just so haaaaaard nowwwww..... (whiny voice).

Anyway, the Oscars were announced. I've seen half the movies nominated and probably won't get to see another quarter of them because apparently nominated foreign films are only seen via academy screener copies or in cities larger than Milwaukee. So it's a mad race to see the other quarter that are available. Well, not so much a mad race but a reluctant shuffle. I'm just finding it hard to be a completist this year - I am abjectly opposed to paying money for a film like Harry Potter just to check it off my list, and even though I actually would see Tron, I would only do it if it worked out in a perfect scenario and I didn't have to pay for the 3-D version since my blind eye doesn't allow me to experience that effect anyway. So I guess I'm not seeing Tron.

On top of all of that, I decided that I probably should put an Oscar section up on my web site so therefore, I probably should put some Oscar-related content up. That means reviews and that means ZOINKS! I'm looking at the list of Oscar-nominated films I've seen and therefore should review and I kind of want to drop into a snow bank. So that's why I'm stalling by complaining about my sour stomach and anything else I can think of off the top of my head.

In all seriousness though, I need to get my shit together so I can actually watch some movies without feeling like it's adding to my burden, even if it means working on reviews for nearly an entire day. Ugh. There goes my weekend.

Oh yeah: GO PACK GO! Now I've done my due diligence as a life-long Packer fan. Like every other workplace in Wisconsin (and probably parts of Arizona and Florida) today is "PACKER DAY!" at work. We were encouraged to wear jeans and our Packer gear, but, well I don't really do the group thing. I'm not a renegade, I'm just allergic to forced participation. Especially when I'm in my office and looking at people in their 40's with their hair in pigtails and green and gold hair ribbons who look like a played out Raggedy Ann after she got jumped by a mugger with a fetish for Packer paraphernalia.

So, I'm wearing a brown turtleneck and calling myself a representation of the football used in the game-winning touchdown...with a sour stomach.

A Short Fuse

I refuse to turn this into a bitching blog just because I haven't been able to watch movies lately, but holy crap am I in a crabby mood today!

• Upset stomach
• Annoying co-workers who act like howler monkeys on a daily basis even though this is supposed to be a professional office
• Uninspiring writing projects I'm supposed to be working on
  
• A creepy co-worker across the hall who I'm convinced would turn me into furniture at the drop of a hat
• The unyielding snow that's threatening to kibosh my plans to see finally see True Grit tonight
• It's Monday and I'm just simply tired
• I'm eating a peanut butter sammich for lunch for about the third week in a row

There's more, but I'm going to stop now at the risk of sounding like a complete and total kvetch.

Color Me Confounded

There are a couple of things I don't understand, and I realize that they are all going to make me sound petulant, but I own that.

• How is it that there isn't remotely enough time or motivation for me to the things I want to get done on any given day? I suspect part of it is a generally frenetic day at work where there are a lot of demands put on me from various internal clients, but it really makes me wonder how people with real problems and real lives get it done.

• Why is it that regardless of the fact that we have plenty of food in the kitchen and pantry do I have a mental mindblock when it comes to cooking dinner for Chris and I at night? I think I may have an answer to that one; that I work best on a schedule and we have nothing resembling a schedule because of his erratic work/after work activities, but I still can't get past my stubborness and work around it. (Though I'm still not entirely sure that's my fault.)

• On a day when I finally have a shot at reviving my screwed up web site and doing some much needed updates, why is it that the program keeps "throwing exceptions" and closing everything down? On a good day I'm terrible at all of this, so I don't need crap like this to shake my confidence further.
  

Yowza.

Well, at least my web site is able to be worked on again. Chris clicked a button on the program that I clicked a million times and it worked for him so mazel tov to both of us. Now if I could just actually get in there to do some work on it the world would be just a little brighter.

I guess I'll end this blog post on that night since there's nothing worse than a kvetch with nothing really to say.

TGIF: Think Grumpy. It's Fun!

Day three of web site panic. I seriously have no idea what I'm going to do if I have to start from scratch. Chris said he took a look at it last night but will look at it further this afternoon, which translates into, "I didn't get a chance to look last night because I was playing Batman, or I logged on to technically be able to say I went to your web site, but I'll maybe get to it at some point this evening or tomorrow after yelling at you for asking me about it yet again." It's been 7 years - I know him better than he thinks I do!

Anyway, last night I went home an hour early from work and crashed in my chair, hard. After Chris got home from the mall we just watched a couple of Bones episodes, but I vow to not get out of the weekend without seeing at least 3 movies. Nothing much planned for the weekend, but it's going to be cold as hell so I'm not in a hurry to go galavanting around, so to speak, so it shouldn't be too difficult to fit some flick time in.

Computer Blue: The Sequel

Still no word on my web site. I got a fun pat answer from godaddy that was basically just a cut and paste from their FAQ and didn't help. Apparently, according to Chris, this is not uncommon since most people don't check the FAQs before bugging customer support. Regardless, I still don't have a site and I'm starting to get really worried about having to completely redesign/reconstruct the whole thing. I'm hoping Chris can tear himself away from his computer game tonight to look at it for me. (I'm normally not such a nudge, but he promised me he would look at it last night, so in not doing so, it just prolongs my agony.)

Work hasn't been much better today. I completed a couple of big, non-computer related projects, and just about the time when I was ready to start up again with a new batch of projects, our e-mail server goes down. Yikes. Yesterday it was our donor database being down for a half a day that basically had me with one hand tied behind my back, and now this today. It's pretty unreal how dependent we become on computers, especially at work. And I would imagine that I'm on the extreme low-end of computer dependency; I'm just glad I don't need it for friends and a social life. If anything, I actually would like to spend more time on the computer reading various blogs and writing more. Well, that was part of my resolution for this year, so we'll see how that goes.

So, it's been a dog day afternoon, and I may just watch that very movie tonight; it just popped up on Netflix Instant. I'm so determined to get through the IMDB 250 this year (finally) after years of treading water and rewatching movies while friends catch up, but now that I've been hunkering down to watch some of the movies I'm finding myself backpedaling because I'll watch 1 or 2 movies and cross them off the list, but then it changes and adds 3 more movies I hadn't seen and movies I have seen fall off the list, and I'm back to square one. A week ago I had 30 movies to go, now I have 32. How about them apples?

Regardless of what goes down tonight, I'm gong to kick it out of here an hour early, at 4, go home and relax a bit and then make some kind of yummy pasta bake something or other for dinner. Basically, I have a vat of homemade marinara I made a couple of days ago, various dried pastas and a couple of different cheeses I shredded in the food processor the other day, so I'm sure I can come up with something. Then, depending on what Chris is in the mood for (hopefully not a fight) it will be more Bones catchup or a movie. Either way, it's semi win-win.

Now, if I could just get my damned web site dilemma straightened out...

Computer Blue

Ugh ugh ugh. I finally decided to take a look at my web site (www.thecinemaphile.com) because I've been hating the format of it for a long time; it seems really long, there's a lot of wasted space on the side, etc. Since I'm in no way a computer genius (or even a computer imbecile) I've been working with templates, and I finally got one that looked kind of how I wanted it to look - clean, but wider, with the navigation buttons on top of the screen instead of the side where there would be a bunch of dead space.

Well, lo and behold, moving the content blocks around, I completely screwed it up, so I decided to just let it go and go back to what I have and start from scratch. Unfortunately, the damn thing is now reverting to a project that I started before I put all the work into the current incarnation of my web site, and I can't figure out how to get back to it. My saving grace is that I never published any of the "new" content, but I can't get to my old site anymore to make any changes.

Sigh. After the threat of many tears and frustration I e-mailed godaddy to see if they can help me, and Chris is going to take a look at it later this afternoon. I just have to be able to get through until then because I'm terrified at the thought of having to reconstruct everything again. I don't know that I could at this point.

Hopefully a cheerier update later...

An evolution of resolutions

I try not to make resolutions because I've learned not to kid myself about thinking that I'll actually keep them beyond day #2, but this year I actually am going to make a resolution to do my very best to make time to do the things I should be doing and the things I want to be doing. Sometimes the two end up being the same thing, like keeping in touch with family and friends, and sometimes they don't, like making sure the house is clean and finding the time to watch films and write reviews instead of just plopping down in front of the plasma and letting my brain die with the Real Housewives.

My challenge is to do some of this in conjunction with Chris, and I think we're a world apart in many aspects right now. I'm not sure if a schedule is the answer, (it hasn't seemed to work so far with other things) or what, but I've been trying to be patient while sorting things out. It just doesn't work out as well as I'd like it to most of the time, even though when things come together, either around the house or when we watch a good movie together, we both have to admit the end result is a good one.

So that's my 2011 resolution. It may seem small but it has many facets. It's only January 4th and there have already been some bumps but hopefully things will get smoothed out and I/we can form a routine that is more than a rut full of laziness and procrastination with occasional bursts of productivity or inspiration. Even if my life isn't action-packed (and I don't want it to be) I can still be fulfilled with a happy household, a nice relationship with Chris and engaging in my hobbies.

Great Expectations

Maybe it is sitting in my car vegging out during lunch, or maybe it's watching the crazy people power walking down Prospect Avenue during their lunch hour. Or maybe it's the relief I'm feeling after seeing Matisse acting semi-normal this morning for the first time in days. But I'm feeling inspired to come up with a bucket list of sorts for the winter... Call it a "milk crate list" of things to get accomplished.

Nothing earth-shattering, but something to think about in the coming days.