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Love Actually

A fantastic film. Of course, I coulda’ gone without all the naked people, but that was the only part of the film that I didn’t love. The writing was superb, the acting was fantastic and the story was fun to watch. I guess this would be considered a “chick flick”, but it’s excellent regardless. I feel that it transcends strict genre and represents a creative, well told story about love of different kinds and by and for people in different stages of life. Often, a romantic comedy (which is the single genre that this film most resembles) different types and aspects of love are explored, but all forms are generally portrayed in a shallow way until the payoff when the couple falls in love and lives happily ever after. This film covers platonic love, unrequited love, characters choosing a greater love in lieu of a less personal, less necessary love, and even love that simply must not be expressed due to circumstances and poor timing.

A great, great movie.

Mondays are always so rough…

…because by Sunday night I’m used to being up late, getting up late and sleeping a lot. I don’t need bunches of sleep, but I tend to take advantage of extra sleep time if it comes my way. That kinda’ time comes my way once a week in the form of the weekend and it only takes me those two days to become totally used to the luxuries of sleeping however long I want and napping at any time of the day. Of course, it won’t be long until I’m thrust back into sleepy reality as my alarm clock drags me out of bed and throws me in the shower at 7 tomorrow. I should be getting ready for bed, only I’m not tired. It’s going to be a long, short night.

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You’re 97, huh? Well, you have the right to remain silent…

So, an old lady gets pulled over for speeding or something and then they throw ‘er in the slammer because of an outstanding warrant for her arrest. And of course, people are all huffed up about it because “how can you arrest a 97 year old woman?!” Well, my calloused thinking goes like this: If she’s young and alert enough to drive, she’s young and alert enough to pay fines. The bigger issue, though, is “where do you draw the line?” It’s obvious, but I’ll say it anyway: if 97 is too old, what about 96? 95? 80? 70? 60? And then, whenever you say “well, that’s young enough that they could be arrested…”, then I add one year and we go again. The point is that there’s no objective age (on the books) where people are exempt from paying fines and being arrested on outstanding warrants. In order to allow that woman to make her appointment at the beauty salon, the police would’ve had to make a subjective decision to let her go. That’s not law enforcement, it’s bias, and that’s not their job.

Bottom line: I think it’s pretty crazy that such an old woman was arrested, but that’s just a strange example of a statistical outlier. I don’t think the law–at least in this instance–should be subjective to someone’s age. Also, she’d have never been arrested if she’d paid that fine.

Friends: Jennifer Anniston

I’ve been a fan of the show for a few years now, but I can’t say I’ve ever been really sucked in by the acting. Occasionally, something will catch my eye, but I mostly watch for the comedy and story. Tonight, though, I was really impressed by the scene that Anniston did with Schwimmer near the end of the episode. Her energy was right on from the moment she entered the room, slamming the door behind her. I just thought she nailed the scene: she didn’t go over the top with the emotion, but she seemed really honest about her trepidation and frustration. I suspect a lot of that emotion was real emotion that the cast is experiencing as the final episodes are winding down, and I think it’s fantastic that she did such a great job channeling that emotion into her character in that moment. Kudos to Jennifer.

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Showing improvement

Tonight was my third acting lesson and I was pleasantly surprised at my progress. More specifically, I was pleasantly surprised at my instructor’s evaluation of my progress. We only had time to record and critique the monologue from Good Will Hunting, but he seemed genuinely satisfied with my progress and with the work that I put in since my last session. I wouldn’t say I “nailed” the monologue, but I think I did very well considering how little experience I have–this was my first recorded monologue–and I was pleased to hear my instructor say that I am definitely ahead of where he expected me to be at this point.

I’m excited to continue working and I hope to see more improvement. In fact, I fully expect to see improvement from week to week; if I don’t improve, that would indicate I’m not working hard enough. I don’t think that’ll be a problem, though.

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Slowly assimilating

Well, work wasn’t too bad today, although I hated bein’ there. I hated it so much I left a couple hours early. I was tired and still sort of in vacation mode, so I figured why not dip out a little early. Anyway, I’ll make up the time later this week when I’m back into the routine.

Learning the acting

I finished Acting in Film and started How to get the part without falling apart. I’ve also learned a monologue from Good Will Hunting–the one where Sean tells Will that he’s onto his game–and done some more work on the scene from Swingers. Hopefully tomorrow’s lesson will pick up right where we left off last lesson. I’m beginning to feel more comfortable with the process and I hope it starts to show on camera.

I decided to try and rig up my camera to shoot some video, so I can practice my scenes on “film”. I wasn’t sure how it’d work, but I think it is working really well. The camera can only record about 7 minutes of video with audio, but that’s enough time to run a scene a couple times and play it back so I can give myself notes.

Moving quickly

I’ve said a few times that I’d like to move to L.A. eventually and continue working part-time. Recently, there have been buzzings around work that they need engineers to move out to L.A. and work. I’m finding out that all this moving may be happening soon… sooner than I’d even hoped for. So, now I’m having to think about whether I can adjust my plan to accommodate for a potentially quick move.

I’m already thinking over the financial and logistical aspects of such a move, and I’ll talk to my acting instructor tomorrow night about how different our “plan” would need to be for me to move out there sooner. I’m thinking I probably won’t be moving out there too soon, but I think it would be foolish to completely ignore the possibility.

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Finally setting in?

Not surprisingly, last week’s trip to Gainesville has reminded me of what I’ve left behind and where I’m going. What is surprising is how rough it’s been my first day back. When I first moved here, I wrote how I didn’t take it as hard as I thought I would. It seems like I had somehow delayed the inevitable and my trip to Gainesville seems to have catalyzed those feelings of loss that I anticipated in January. I’m sad to be back here and I miss my family and friends. This week will be rolling starting tomorrow, so I guess I hope I’ll just be caught up in the routine as I have been for a few months now. I’ve said many times how I can’t picture myself being an engineer forever, but even now, the thought of being an actor is difficult to bear. I mean, acting sounds great, but I’ll probably still be just as alone as I am here, only I’ll be alone in California, which could be better or worse.

Anyway, I do take solace in knowing that my situation here is all but permanent. I just hope that, in the next phase of my life, I have friends around me to experience it. Back to the couch.

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Gainesville trip: Day 7

This should be the shortest and least interesting post of all. Basically, I woke up, went and ate lunch at a local Chicago-style pizza joint called Leonardo’s, watched a little of the NFL Draft, packed up my stuff, drove to Jacksonville, hopped on a plane, drove home, ate dinner and watched a bunch of TV. Nothing exciting, nothing extraordinary, just me trying to assimilate myself back into my new reality.

Tomorrow, I’ll relax, try to rest up and do my best to be mentally prepared to return to work at 8 am on Monday. It’s really nice to be home, sleeping in my own bed and surrounded by my things, but I am already missing Gainesville and thinking of the next time I’ll be able to make a trip home. It was a fantastic week and a well-timed vacation and I can’t wait to do it again.

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Gainesville trip: Day 6

Today was pretty good and I got to see a lot of people. First thing, I went and got lunch with a couple friends (yeah, my sleeping hours have slipped to the 4 am to noon window). Then, we played some Spades until we went to play basketball. Basketball was definitely the low-point of my day as I played very badly and didn’t score any points in two games. My assist to turnover ratio was far less than 1 and I missed plenty of wide open 5-foot shots. It was very frustrating.

Later, we went to Hops for dinner and then went to a friend’s place and hung out for a bit. We played croquet for a while (I won the first game in spite of having never played before and playing horribly), but got blasted the second game. It was a good time. Now, I think we’re about to play some more Spades or something, then I’m off to bed. I have a long day of traveling and packing tomorrow.

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Gainesville trip: Day 5

We spent most of the day at the annual End-of-the-year Crusade Picnic. I think this was my sixth such picnic and it was the first time I’ve actually stayed for the whole thing. We had a good time goofin’ off, playin’ frisbee golf (Frolf) and Ultimate Frisbee. It was an all around good time, but it sapped my strength for the rest of the day, so this post is about to get even more uninteresting.

Crusade with old guys emceein’

I emceed the 2002-2003 school year at Crusade, but had only been on stage once since then. Last night, my former co-emcee and I talked to the CRU Planning Team leader (who’s actually our protege) and we all decided to pull an emcee gag. Basically, us old guys got up as though we’d never officially left and declared that we’d been on vacation for a few weeks, but we were glad to be back. From there, we did our regular routine of improving and doing everything unscripted (because that was the way that we got the best response from the audience). Then, this year’s emcee came walking in (intentionally late on his cue because he was trying to rattle us) and asked if we are still playing hide and go seek. We told him yes and did you hear us say ‘one hundred’ yet? He said no and we asked where his bindings were and how he got untied. He said he had opposable thumbs and just reached down and undid the stuff. We said we shoulda’ tied his hands. Anyway, that was the gag, then we turned it over to him and everything when on normally from there.

Jumanji house

After Crusade, a bunch of us went over to this house to celebrate a recent (as in, at the meeting an hour before) engagement and just hang out for the end of the semester. Basically, it was a big, hot house where people were walking around and talking and being sweaty. It was fun and gross.

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Gainesville trip: Day 4

I spent most of the morning sleeping and watching TV. Then, I went to lunch with a couple friends at the Chicken Kitchen and went over to see their new place where they will be living this fall. It’s a pretty nice place, but it reminded me that, for some reason, architecture here in Gainesville is really strange. There was one place in the living room where the previous owners had cut a hole in the carpet in the middle of the floor, so they could run a phone wire up to an end table or something. I guess they were pretty certain they’d never move that end table.

Frisbee golf

Then, we went and played a round of frisbee golf at the old course. My best score there when I was playing a few times a week was 3 over par. I shot a 13 yesterday. Most of that was just general rustiness–I hadn’t played in about 9 months or so–and some bad luck–if there was a tree, even if I made a good throw, I found it. Anyway, it was fun and we all had a good time.

Newberry Backyard BBQ

This place has some of the best baby back ribs I’ve ever had and I’d been looking forward to going there since I started planning this vacation. Of course, they didn’t disappoint and I had a great time with about 7 of my friends. I hope I can make a trip out there every time I visit Gainesville.

Kill Bill Vol. 2

Even better than the first. I don’t want to do an all-out review or analysis, but I’ll say that I’m seriously impressed with Trenton ability to mix various genres of film from different eras into a seamless, solid movie. Also, Uma was spectacular and I was very surprised by her performance. I could see that she took direction very well and that she was a great fit for the role. I can’t wait to see the DVD with special features and “making of…” kinda’ stuff.

Funnier ’cause we were tired

As we were all startin’ to go to bed about 4 am, I was walking through the kitchen when the phone started ringing. I looked at the caller ID and saw that it was one of the other guys in the house calling in on his cell phone. I decided not to answer, but my roommate did and this is what he heard at the other end of the line: “Hey. What’re you doin’?” Then, the same guy called about five other people around the city and did the same thing. That delayed our getting to sleep by about an hour because we were just laughing too hard to realize we were tired.

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Gainesville trip: Day 3

Yesterday’s support appointment went well and I’m not officially on three peoples’ MDPs (I think that’s right and I think it’s “Ministry Development Plan”; it’s a TLA–Three Letter Acronym). I’m excited to be giving to Crusade beginning in July and I think it’s awesome that I can help out three staff people.

Basketball… again

I played some more basketball yesterday and I’m really feelin’ it today. I think I ran seven games in two days. That’s not outrageous except I haven’t played that much basketball in that little time since some time last year. I’m pretty sore, but it’s good to be in good enough shape that I can at least run the games. I hope to play at least once more before the week’s out.

Gators Dockside

Last night was all-you-can-eat (AYCE) wings at Dockside, so about six of us went over there to try and break ’em. Between us, we probably ate over 200 wings, but I can’t say that I contributed too much. I think I only had 20 or so because I’m just not used to eating that much grub in one sitting. At least it wasn’t AYCE pasta or pizza or something; I’m pretty sure I’d feel awful today. It was only wings and they were grilled, not breaded or fried, so I’m good to go for some more eatin’ today.

Kill Bill: Vol. 1

Man, what a strange movie. Of course, if I felt any differently after watching a QT creation, I’d have to check my senses. The guy just knows how to create interesting, strange violent stuff. It’s bizarre how he maintains an irony of violence without believable gore. I mean, there’re people gettin’ limbs lopped off and whatnot, but it looks so fake it’s hardly even so disturbing as odd. I’m not talking about being desensitized, I’m talking about recognizing what parts of the film QT wants the view to feel are real.

Anyway, I think we’re going to see Vol. 2 some time this week, so I wanted to make sure I’d seen the first part, first. Now, I’m off to lunch with some friends, so I’ll have to pause for a bit.