iceblog

Lots of people tell me, "Marisa, you blog so much." This is true. I do blog a lot. But what you don't realize unless you've already had this conversation with me is that I actually post about half of the blog thoughts that I have, and that now, after two months of training myself to blog every day, my brain works like a blog.

This isn't entirely true. My brain likes to work like I'm a character in a novel - it likes to have rational thoughts, it likes to motivate me in rational ways and it likes for all of my brain processes to be explainable to an invisible audience. I think this is because I am actually really weird (for actuals) and because I like to write so I've kind of always thought like this. But now I have a specific name for it - rather than thinking like a writer or thinking like a character, I'm thinking like a blogger.

Anyway, I have lots of half-written posts, in various stages of production, some of which will never ever be published and some of which may be later combined or finished or deleted. This is because I want to produce the best blog possible and also because I have more than one profound thought each day, so sometimes I start a post and then realize that I have a way better one so I'll save the first as a draft and then write the second awesome one but then realize that I actually like the first one better. Or something like that.

So if the posts that you see comprise the tip of the iceberg of my blog (hereafter known as my iceblog), the submerged part looks something like this:

• evolution and why I think that this is a kind of silly debate
• things that I would tweet if I caved and got a twitter
• how I accidentally became a math major (this one will be written if I ever do declare a math major)
• the statistics of my blog
• best non-titular characters of all time, a list
• why I don't like sarcasm
• coffee thoughts (as suggested by Medina)
• my favorite misheard lyrics

So you can see that these are interesting topics in their own right but I can't blog more than once a day or everyone would be convinced that I don't have a life (you should now be starting to get the idea that my summer actually is comprised of tv, books and blogging and I have not been exaggerating about that). I even have a note on my phone so I can jot down blog ideas and not forget them throughout the course of the day.

My (ice)blog is ever growing. Some people wonder if I will continue blogging once summer ends because I will get super busy, and I don't know, because I have terrible follow-through once I remember how much I love procrastinating before studying, but I do know that even if I'm not posting them my brain will be drafting blog topics for years to come. Or in other words I will continue to have extraordinarily weird and interesting and mundane and slightly irrational thoughts for as long as I possibly can.

my computer

As much as I like the technology of computers, I actually hate using them. My first experience with computers was as a child when I "played" a "game" by which I mean that I played with color levels (rgb) to make cool colors. My favorite to make was lavender because it was so tricky to figure out how to make purple (blue + red) but also make it light (I don't remember how I accomplished this). Then I learned how to type without looking at the keyboard then I got my own computer then I got an email address (apparently I have had one of my yahoo accounts in continuous use for 8 years which is a really long time in my short life). Then I started to hate computers.

One of the first things I learned about computers was how to use Windows Task Manager. I am very good at killing processes that are using extraordinary amounts of CPU. I have dealt with more printer drama than most people see in a lifetime. I am proficient at changing the format of word documents from .odt to .doc (changing their readability from OpenOffice to Microsoft Word, because I grew up without Word). I have dealt numerous times with not being able to open spreadsheets because they were in Excel. I was enabled in all of these instances to figure out computer bugginess both by my own curious nature and my dad's good instructions.

My desktop computer now runs Linux and seems to be moderately reasonable in terms of doing what I want, which is mostly using Google when my two-year-old laptop is incapacitated. Back in the day it would shut down while I was using PaintShop because apparently this was too difficult for it. But this is nothing compared to my laptop. Because for my laptop, iTunes is a stressful application.

I don't know why it is, but if I listen to music for more than an hour and don't use my computer (whose name is the Crimson Dell because it's red and a Dell and it's a play on the Crim Dell) for other purposes, once the screensaver starts I know I'm done for. I can't get my screen to come back for like five minutes and then it will, but iTunes will say that the wrong song is playing and no other application on my computer will respond, so literally my only course of action is to press the power button (I was raised to fear such situations and shy away from damaging my computer by not restarting properly, but sometimes it's necessary).

Whatever. On the bright side of owning a laptop, aside from giving it a great name I have also given it great stickers so that everyone knows what to think of me based on the back of my screen! I'm still in the market for lolzy stickers to fill about a quarter of it, but for now I have plenty of pride in Hufflepuff, Sleeperstar, my ability to vote, thinking green, my support of the milk industry (despite my inability to drink it) and, of course, Justin Bieber.

driving challenges

I really like long drives much in the same way that I like long trips to the rec center: I see them as a challenge to cover as much ground in as little time as possible. I don't mean this in an extremely dangerous way, and I have my limits on both driving and running, but I do mean it in a very literal mathematical way. I spend like 90% of a run calculating how fast I'm going and how far I could go if I just pushed for a given distance by a certain time (like, get to 5 miles in one hour, then subtract the amount of time and distance I've already gone and subdivide my distance so that I know exactly what fraction of a mile I need to run in one minute and further how fast I should be at a 30 second mark...I am crazy). But this is good because I hate running and by thinking about this all the time I'm thinking way less about why I'm actually running and I can feel good about something other than the calories I'm burning (because I know I'm getting a smoothie when I'm done).

So when I drive long distances, I do the same thing. I take my arrival time and attempt to shave minutes off of it slowly but surely by driving a little bit faster than the speed limit, but sometimes I also pick an arbitrary goal (like Savannah) and say that I have to be there in 30 minutes which is only possible if I average 70 for the next half hour, and then whenever I get there I calculate what my average actually was (which is kind of difficult because it's not an easy clean number but like 72.83 or something). This will give me math to do for a solid half hour and it's super fun. (Also, I think cruise control is really boring and a cop-out and it would make me way less concentrated on driving and it wouldn't even challenge me to get somewhere at an arbitrary but specific time.)

This summer has given me an intense appreciation of driving by myself for a long time, because I don't have to talk to anyone for several hours and I can entertain myself in a variety of non-reading/watching activities, and thinking about the car in front of me is not very interesting but thinking about my life and identity is what I do when I'm not driving so it can get very tiring to do this all day. As much as I like driving and talking to people, it can get awkward when, after an hour, you've run out of things you want to talk about and then you just listen to music but then you worry that they don't like it or you're really cold but you can tell they're hot or they're distracting you when you need to merge. So for long trips I don't worry about environmental friendliness and I instead think about preserving my sanity. Anyway, thanks to Orlando and Williamsburg, I have some new fun driving habits/games!

• Cloud-gazing. I literally saw like fifteen mice in the clouds as we left Disney World, some of which looked like Mickey and some of which looked like real life mice.
• Counting Waffle House signs. I counted 17 between Florida and Nova but I was asleep for part of the ride. The only light-up sign I saw without burnt-out letters was the one in Fredericksburg.
• Calculating gas mileage. This takes more patience because it's best when you let the tank run all the way down, in my case over 320 miles, but it gives you something fun to do once you stop at the gas station aside from worrying about bathroom cleanliness!
• Listening to CDs. Usually I just listen to the radio, but after hearing The Edge of Glory, TGIF and Rolling in the Deep like fifty thousand times this summer, I have grown grumpy toward all radio stations. I have since discovered that Codes and Keys is perfect for the drive from campus to 295 or vice versa (45 minutes) and that basically any other CD is acceptable for the rest of my drive (though the 500 Days of Summer soundtrack is pretty fun to sing to AND chill to). If I get my timing down to a good science (allowing for some traffic), next time I could figure out a CD of the perfect length for the entirety of 95 or perhaps two CDs with a fun switching point like the James Monroe museum.
• The alphabet game on road signs only, though I gave up after five minutes of looking for a J. Whatever, I'm sure I saw all of the other letters like ten times each.

Also, the drive to Williamsburg is now no longer a long drive. It can still be terrible in traffic, but when I get home it doesn't really feel like I drove all day (since I didn't) so that's a good thing. It's actually really fun to see the same signs and think the same thoughts every time (I counted the number of times I have driven/been driven to the burg and it is now 19). Here is my thought process (shortened for your convenience).

• I have no idea how to get to Williamsburg, what on earth, there are so many highway options, oh no, I'll just take Stringfellow because I don't even count 123 as a highway.
• Fairfax County Parkway connects to 123?! Oh yeah I thought that last time. I still don't know which one is north and which one is south though: I just know that if I turn left I can get to Reston and if I turn right I can get to...the other direction. So I guess I'll skip that shortcut.
• Braddock is always way longer than I remember it being.
• Burke Lake is so pretty, why don't I go there?
• Blu Steel Way...is that the way that Zoolander spells it?
• Lorton...Lorton prison...Lauren Medina lives around here, and she would make a very funny criminal. She would definitely explain her motivations in a monologue if she were a villain.
• Occoquan is so cute, why don't I go there too?
• IKEA - 500 DAYS OF SUMMER - WANT.
• Dumfries is a strange name for a road but I'm ok with it because I've seen it so many times, but Jamie thinks it's really silly. I wonder what else we think is silly just because we're unfamiliar with it (or what we think is normal because we're used to it).
• Quantico...shoot why didn't I start the alphabet game earlier, when else will I see so many choices of Q's?
• THERE'S A JAMES MONROE MUSEUM?
• Carmax - this would be a long way to drive for a car, but it doesn't feel that far away from home.
• Fredericksburg - there is that freaky Waffle House with all of its letters.
• Oh so that's where Lake Anna is!
• Is it Carmel Church, Bowling Green or Carmel Bowling, Church Green?
• I don't know what Stafford is but it seems to be everywhere you could possibly want to exit.
• Bass Pro Shops - this means that I'm getting close to my exit.
• Atlee/Elmont...Clement Attlee much? (British PM nbd)
• Mechanicsville...now I'm picturing Kris Kusnerik conducting a train. I wonder how mechanics advertise there.
• These road signs that say I should drive 65 mph have weird spinny orange things on them...do they move on their own or is it the force of air being moved by a constant stream of cars or what?
• New Kent CH/Providence Forge - this is clearly a sign meant for Kennis Forte, I mean really, they have the first three letters right for both her first and last names!
• Croaker/Norge/Toano - there are too many places with O's in their names.
• Oh my gosh, going 45 is like crawling down the road instead of driving on it.
• Richmond Road has to be safe enough for faster than 35!
• SNO TO GO.
• Nooooo not 25, I'll never be able to drive at a normal speed again!
• WAWA. MONROE. I'M HOME.
• Parking services grump grump grump.

Now my goal is to memorize all of the exits in order and figure out which one is the exact midpoint between my house and my dorm - this should only take a year or so, since I have so many already down. My next goal will be to find someone willing to put in $5 for an investigative tour of this James Monroe Museum.

comic book movies

I love comic book movies because I love superheroes...because I love fantasy. Fantasy allows us to examine society, human nature, love, courage and strength in ways that normal stories just can't do. When I hear the word fantasy I usually immediately jump to an image from Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy or something (I don't really understand these things). But when you think about it, what isn't fantasy? Rotten tomatoes tells us that Toy Story is fantasy, and of course we have Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Batman, and basically everything that is awesome. So when I say that a movie has to have quirky characters to be of any interest to me, I generally mean that a non-fantasy movie MUST have quirky characters but a fantasy movie has to have good characters and an imaginative backdrop for those characters, be they quirky or not.

Anyway, the only comic books I ever read growing up were of Tintin, a Belgian reporter who is pretty awesome - but I literally have no idea if anyone I know has ever heard of him because these were popular European comics and I'm not sure at all how they found their way into my basement/life. This too is becoming a major motion picture, though the adaptation remains to be judged by me as good or not.

So I never read any of the superhero comics, but I really really like them in movie form. Obviously this post was inspired by my viewing of Captain America, a film that I would recommend to anyone else who's similarly enthralled by comic book movies. The thing about these movies is that they're adaptations of comic books, so there's a) a lot of material to work with and b) really weird-looking villains. That sort of comes with the territory. So I was ok with that aspect of Cap Amurika. Whenever I watch one of these movies and subsequently feel like immersing myself in Marvel-land, my immediate recourse is to go to wikipedia and learn as much as I can about their histories and characters and so on without having to do real work. Naturally this included researching The Avengers and the greatest villains of all time and of course the casting choices for The Dark Knight Rises (which will again include a lot of IMAX, score!). Anyway, now I just have to watch Thor to be caught up - which is weird because you'd think that I would have already watched a movie about a Nordic superhero, but unless I catch something the first week it's out I'm much more inclined to wait until I can watch it for free, and I was very busy studying when it came out. Actually I went to a concert and the beach that weekend, but after that I was too busy studying for finals. But actually I only had micro left, so I just spent my free time packing properly, but I would call that a good investment of time despite what others may think.

Whatever. Aside from Thor, then, here's my ranking of the superhero movies based on comic books that I have seen (obviously influenced by major film reviewers, personal movie-going experience, etc. etc.):

1. The Dark Knight - this was not only an epic story and amazing in IMAX, but it also made you feel bad for the millionaire hero who should have everything he could ever want. Also it posed some great ethical dilemmas, and there's nothing that I love better than a good moral debate in my action movies.
2. Spider-Man 2 - all of the Spider-Man movies were well made and Tobey Maguire remains the best casting choice for any superhero (except maybe Hugh Jackman as Wolverine), and it's hard for me to say that this was better than its predecessor but then again it has the best villain, Harry's revenge, MJ's engagement and plenty of reasons for Spider-Man to hang up his spandex and call it a day. But of course that wouldn't make for a good role model.
3. X-Men: First Class - ok, I'll admit that I like all of the X-Men movies and I feel like they're very good for escapism and imagination, but this one blew their oddly-shaped socks off. Excellent casting, actually pretty funny, and even though I knew what had to be coming I was still thrilled to see it.
4. Iron Man - I had pretty low expectations going to see this for the first time, but I was surprised at how funny, smart and kind of cute it was. And it looks super clean and shiny while still being dirty, if that makes sense?
5. Captain America: The First Avenger - I would call this better than any of the second-best in any of these series, but not as good as the best offerings of each. It's kind of like a mash-up of Spider-Man's personality and story and Iron Man's technology, with the only major change being that it's in the 1940s, and along with that comes some nice perks: it feels nice and classic and we get to have Nazis (sort of). Also, though fairly predictable now that I've seen so many of these movies, it was still enjoyable and Steve Rogers is a nice contrast to Tony Stark in that he's actually likable (same goes for Peter Parker, but hey, we haven't seen him on the big screen in four years...good thing that's about to change).
6. X2 - now I'm tired of explaining my rankings.
7. Spider-Man
8. X-Men
9. Batman Begins
10. Iron Man 2
11. X-Men Origins: Wolverine - though there was a significant lack of other characters to care about, Wolverine was still more than enough to keep me interested, and I really enjoyed getting to focus on one character, since the rest of the series is about all the big action/plot sort of things that don't leave room for character analysis or emotions.
12. Spider-Man 3 - lots of people hated this movie, but I thought it was really funny and I wasn't confused by how many villains there were (like, how realistic would it be if only one bad guy tried to attack New York at once?).
13. Watchmen - I actually did like this movie a lot, but its characters didn't have a lot of depth and none of the lines were really memorable which is why it's below these other films. If I had time I would love to read the book/series, which is supposed to be epic.
14. X-Men: The Last Stand - again, I liked this movie more than most people, but I still agree that the others in the series were way better.
15. Fantastic Four - I was entertained but I didn't walk away thinking about anything important (just how inconvenient their superpowers would be).
16. Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer - I didn't really like it?
17. Superman Returns - I really didn't like it.

Aside from Thor and the previews for The Avengers, The Amazing Spider-Man and The Dark Knight Rises, I have really had enough of superhero movies for quite some time. And I expect that it will actually be a long time until they can make a Superman or Hulk movie that looks interesting to me.

quirks

I am the first person to call myself strange (no, not of all time - I mean I am the quickest to admit it regarding me specifically). But I really like to think of myself as quirky, in a Luna Lovegood sort of way. And since I know myself so much better than I know anyone else, I assume that I am the quirkiest person alive. I'm definitely up there on the awkward scale and I would say that I am gathering personality quirks as I age.

So when I watch a movie, I of course think about how I would rate it on both a star and a grading scale given the dialog, performances, music, tone, originality, title, themes, etc. - but the most important part to me is the believable quirks of the characters. If they aren't awkward, lonely and weird then I just don't know what to think of them, because to me those are the most human characteristics there are. The movies that stand out in my mind as the greatest movies ever made aren't necessarily the ones that won Oscars (though they're generally pretty great movies), but are necessarily the ones that introduce memorable characters, people who I can relate to and who get woven into my unconscious mind so that when I meet a person in real life who is similar to them I feel at once an ease of familiarity.

Maybe my standards are high, but I stand by them. I'm sure that not everyone in the world is quirky and some people are quite perfectly normal, but that's pretty boring to me and I don't care to watch movies about boring people. Unless that's the whole point of their quirk (like Harold Crick in Stranger than Fiction). But I really can't stand romantic comedies about boring people, which is why I don't really like Notting Hill (his roommate is ok but a little bit too gross to qualify as truly interesting), Titanic, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (funny but ultimately just a popcorn flick), and basically any other popular romcom. I will, however, defend The Notebook because Noah is incredibly weird (Ryan Gosling gives off really awkward vibes which make me think that he might be a psychopath or he might just be quirky).

Anyway, as quirky as I'm pretty sure that I am, soon that will not be enough: my aspiration is now to become eccentric. This definitely denotes someone who only makes sense to themselves but is awesome in a Dumbledore/Bill the Pokemon Researcher sort of way - an academic with odd collections and a very silly sense of humor. That could easily be me in like thirty years. Hollywood of course tells me I can reach this much sooner through such eccentric characters as Amelie and Holly (Breakfast at Tiffany's), who take opposite approaches to life: one keeps to herself and meddles with people's lives from behind a metaphorical curtain and the other keeps her identity to herself but doesn't seem to care for anyone else, though she's happy to surround herself with perfect strangers.

Ironically, two very talented and classy Audreys.

There's a lot more to their characters to analyze and digging further could tell us a lot about our society, but my brain's already went there and back and I don't really want to walk through all the steps again. Despite their depth, there are many exceptions to the well-crafted character, and most characters who you might immediately think of as "eccentric" are merely caricatures of real human weirdness, exaggerated for comedic effect. I think movies handle quirky much better than they do eccentric. Regardless, I suppose my ambition is to intrigue people as well as the best characters do...and again I'm explaining myself and taking away part of my mystery, but I guess moderately long blog posts about my personality are just one of my many quirks, and this blog hasn't even begun to scratch the surface of my weirdness.

commonly confused

In my mind there are a lot of random associations that I have which are probably really, really silly.

• Lincoln Lawyer and The Conspirator...they both include a Lincoln and are dramatic films recently released in theaters but I'm pretty sure they are about very, very different subjects
• Wind in the Willows and Wuthering Heights...I'm sure that these are completely separate books but I can't hear one without thinking of the other and then thinking, should I be picturing a toad or a Bronte? (insert English major joke here)
• Root beer and gum...ok, I don't confuse these but every time I drink root beer I think of gum and sometimes of gumby simply because I'm thinking of gum, but this only happens when I first drink root beer, I know I'm weird (more like my neural pathways are weird)
• Goldfish and sunday school, or more accurately Goldfish and glitter glue and play-doh
• The name Erin and the color green, though Katie and I discovered this was because of Beanie Babies
• Backstreet Boys and N*Sync, I know one was supposed to be way better but I honestly don't know the difference
• Disney World and Disney Land, it took me years to learn that there was a difference
• Hayes, Garfield, Arthur and Cleveland...I'm pretty sure that I learned nothing about reconstruction except that there were something called carpetbaggers who I imagine as Neville Longbottom's grandmother with a gentleman wearing carpenter pants and carrying around a big, moth-infested bag
• Arnold in Magic School Bus and Kris with a K, oh wait...
• Gregory Peck and Charlie Sheen, but admittedly this was only when I was growing up and now I know the difference (you want to know the real difference between us? I have class and you don't...yes, that's a Parent Trap quote, and yes the difference is GP is infinitely classier than the Sheen)
• Eating slices of bread before bed and Bart Simpson being a brat
• The Fantastic Mr. Fox and half of the guys I know
• Comic Sans and Mr. Demek, my history teacher who required all of our assignments to be turned in with this font (much to my horror)
• Gummy worms and tape worms (it's quite unfortunate)
• Mankey and Machop...like obviously I know the difference but I can't think of one without thinking of the other

There are like hundreds more but these were, for some reason, on the top of my mind. I lead a very thoughtful life, I guess.

the power of free

It is incredible what I will do for free things. Even though I can get free soft serve ice cream in Sadler any day, I am still willing to buy a Colonial Williamsburg mug every year partially because I get free ice cream in it (and also because I get free cider). Even though I have way too many t-shirts, I can be convinced to participate in all kinds of things if I am only promised a free shirt (like pay to do campus golf...and gain a FREE SHIRT!).

Ok, these are things that I have to pay for and actually get a bonus thrown in. But there are some things that you don't have to pay anything for, like free getting free food for your birthday. All you have to do is be born, or have a friend who was born on a given day if that friend is generous and crazy like Isabel, and you're set. Right? Sure. But this can be taken to excess and you might not realize all of the consequences - you can run around all day, have to print out coupons, have to pay for transportation, have to get a ton of annoying emails forever, and probably other things. Oh, you might overeat. Maybe you really don't want a free burrito from Chipotle, but if you don't get it you're passing up on free food and that would obviously be foolish. So maybe you eat more than you should which doesn't really have any impact on the restaurant and is only hurting yourself. The same thing goes at all you can eat buffets - I am always tempted to get another plate, because hey, there's no extra cost so it's really like lowering the marginal cost of each plate...but it's not like eating more at one meal makes me any less hungry for the next meal, it just delays it a little bit.

But sometimes the promise of a free thing actually motivates me to be insane. Katie, Jamie and I wanted to get some Georgetown Cupcakes because they're basically amazing and I'm always up for them, but we ended up not having enough time on Friday to make this happen (we got froyo which was fine by me). So we decided to go to Georgetown Saturday morning - they open at 10, and Katie had to be at Union Station at 11:25, so we figured we would have plenty of time to get cupcakes and get there. Of course, the lines are just as famous as the cupcakes, so when we got to Georgetown at 9:50 there was already a long line. But it was going to be ok - we just needed to get on the Metro which would take us right to Union Station by 10:53, and the line clearly wouldn't take an hour. So we waited in line and were clever enough to look up the free flavor of the day on twitter, which went to the first 100 people who requested it. We each paid for a $3 cupcake and got another one for free and were given our cupcakes by 10:38. Then we had a decision to make. Power walk to the nearest Metro stop (a mile away), drive to the Metro and have to pay for parking twice, or drive all the way to Union Station, though I haven't ever really driven in DC before? We decided to power walk, Katie dragging her suitcase behind her and none of us even having time to look inside our cupcake boxes. After all, we could totally do a 15-minute mile, right?

We followed the walking directions on my phone. We power walked the first 10 or so minutes, saw a bus, considered getting on it, but continued on, not knowing how much the bus cost or how long it would take to get where we needed to go. We picked up our pace, holding our boxes of cupcakes, dripping in sweat, weaving in and out of people, beginning to run when we saw the Metro signs ahead of us, our flip-flops flapping against the pavement - we ran down the escalator and hurried to get Metro tickets, Katie went ahead to the platform and I hastened to give her instructions to switch to the red line, Jamie and I hurried to get $7 each on fare cards which was way more than we needed, we ran down the next escalator, and found Katie standing on the platform having just missed the train we needed. We could wait for the next one but then the next red line would get us to Union Station just after her train was set to depart. So we learned that the next alternative was the bus, the very same one we had passed before. We hurried upstairs and walked another few blocks for the bus, and it turned out to cost like $1, which is less than the Metro for sure. We still got to the train station late (like 11:40), but thankfully, there was another train at 12:25. We dreaded going up to the ticket office because it would cost another $40, and the first train ticket would have been all lost money. But the ladies only charged her $3 and then chastised us (you just had to get those cupcakes, didn't you?), so we sat and ate our cupcakes and contemplated the fact that we had each received a free cupcake of a $3 value, but had spent an extra $3 to each get there (between the Metro charging us just to go through the gate and back and the bus) and then Katie had to spend an extra $3 for the later train. And we had experienced a hot and stressful hour of running around and worrying.

Oh free cupcakes.

People can also manipulate you by giving "free" gifts. It can be unintentional, of course, but companies certainly are intentional in trying to win your favor and make you feel obligated to buy something once you've had a free sample, or make you want to buy more in order to get a free gift. These gifts are usually somewhat appealing but something you wouldn't actually spend money on, like a miniature gift basket, and this is surprisingly similar to the overeating example. At Downtown Disney, if you buy something you can get a better price on a towel or something - but this has hidden costs to it. In addition to having to still pay for the extra good, you also have to transport it, which may or may not be difficult on vacation, and it probably is still a bad deal compared to the price of a similar thing at home, but it seems like a good idea because it's on sale.

While on this subject, I'll talk about smart shopping. I was raised by an expert couponer slash bargain-finder slash yard sale buyer, and I've also studied price bundling (an economic idea of selling more than one product together OR larger products, like how a 12 ounce soda is not exactly half the price of a 24 ounce soda), AND I get very impatient with long shopping excursions so I feel pretty confident on this subject. So, for example, beware of buy one get one free...this really means half off everything, but you have to buy more than one thing, so it's actually a worse (trickier) deal. If you're going to buy something anyway, then sure, it's fine, but you shouldn't be convinced to buy something because of a sale like this. So basically, think about why this particular price or deal is being offered and about how much you would be willing to pay or want to buy without knowing the price.

Speaking of willingness to pay, this is something I am constantly considering. There are some things that I would be willing to spend inordinate amounts of money on, so when I buy them I feel like I just saved myself a bunch of money and also got a great product/experience. The classic example I visit in my head is when I went to Atlanta with my econ challenge team (yes, dorky moment, but free trip to Atlanta and like two days off from school, nbd). After we lost we had some time to kill, and I really wanted to go to the Coca-Cola factory but the rest of my team wanted to go to the aquarium. This turned out to be very expensive so we decided to walk to the Coke factory anyway, and on the way we discussed our willingness to buy, because of course we are all huge econ nerds (but actually). I was pretty much willing to spend all of the money I had with me, though I knew I still needed lunch and a souvenir, but basically I was set to spend up to $50 for this experience. When else would I be in Atlanta? The other guys varied between no amount of money making it worth it up to $10, so when it cost $15 to get in they were all kind of bummed but I felt like I had found quite a bargain (our teacher had said he would be willing to pay exactly $15, so he was actually indifferent about the whole thing). So I guess my advice is, when you know you have to pay for something anyway you might as well convince yourself that it's going to be worth way more than its likely cost.

But when I don't feel this way, I generally just won't buy anything. I shopped for three hours at Disney stores without finding anything that seemed like a good enough deal to me...there were plenty of nice things, but nice doesn't really cut it - I would have been willing to spend about $7 on a picture frame so when all of them were like $15, I couldn't make myself buy them. They just didn't seem awesome enough to warrant being that expensive. And the ones that only cost $6.95 seemed terribly small and cheap and worth at most $4 to me, so I didn't get them. But then panic set in. What if I couldn't find anything I wanted enough to part with my money...what if I left with no souvenirs? Or worse, what if I was forced to buy something terrible and that I didn't like just because I had to get something? I left the shopping trip empty-handed but determined to find something to buy the next day at Magic Kingdom. It took me another couple of hours of scattered shopping and mulling over potential purchases before I found the perfect item and decided that I would have to get it, no matter the price. It was a little bit more than I would have paid on my first day at Disney, but since this was my last chance, I went for it...the whole point of money is to get rid of it, after all, and I decided that I was tired of being controlled by price tags.

And then when I got home I realized that it broke.

Oh what you do Mickey, do Mickey, don't break my heart Mickeyyyy.

Oh well, glue to the rescue, right? So far none of my mom's many craft glues have been any good at repairing my perfect souvenir, but I still think it was a good purchase since it can hold not one but three pictures and commemorates all four Disney parks. Of course, now we have to go buy superglue...but I'm sure there will be a coupon for that.

precocious animals

There are a lot of things that I don't like that make people think that I am inhuman. These include most sports, Power Rangers and, yes, animals. Now, I don't mean that I hate all animals, but I am more than satisfied just by looking at a picture of a cute puppy - I don't need to touch it to know that it's cute. I've never had a dog or cat so when people start talking about missing their pets at home I feel cruel for not empathizing...but whatever. I've recently decided that I'd like to have a dog one day, but this is an idea that will take several years to get used to and might never happen, because let's face it, as responsible of an individual as I am, I hate having to get up to do things. I'll sit and read in the dark rather than stretch to turn on a light, so I'm not sure how the whole walking a dog thing would work out. Maybe I'll just get another fish and call it a day.

I'm usually nonplussed by normal animals like house cats, wild bunnies, horses, etc. I will not pretend that insects don't cause me to retrogress to an eight year old girl, but on the whole I deal with animals pretty well for being a non-animal person. Take Barky the Bat for example - I really liked him and found him incredibly cute, though he had to stay behind glass for safety reasons. But recently I've had some very frightening experiences with animals. I'm totally ok with friendly pets as long as they don't have sharp teeth or claws - I'm talking about wild animals here, and though you'll probably judge me for my fright, at least I'm giving you some interesting stories.

1. I met a deer at American University who was the friendliest deer ever. This was slightly unnerving because it didn't run away from us and was walking around a campus in the middle of a city in the middle of the day, so I would rate the experience as curious on a scale of normal to deathly animal encounters.
2. On our first stop for gas and coffee on the way to Florida, Melanie and I found ourselves at a McDonald's in Benson, North Carolina. First of all, this place was cleaning its specialty coffee machines and wasn't on either a regular or breakfast menu even though it was 4 in the morning. So after being denied a mocha frappe and a cheeseburger, we settled on coffee and got two creamers a piece. Pulling away and sipping our coffee, we realized this would not do. So we went to a convenience store across the road, which was closed for cleaning for the next half hour...but thankfully the man cleaning the floor took pity on us as we stared forlornly through the glass doors. When we asked for coffee creamer, he left for a few seconds then returned to the door with a giant pump, from which he proceeded to pump delicious cream into our cups (I got six pumps which made my coffee sickeningly sweet, but hey, better than black). By this time we were tired from not sleeping and not eating and practically jumping through hoops just to get some caffeine, and we also needed to use a bathroom which we were denied at the gas station, so we went to Waffle House (or WAFLE OU according to the lit-up sign). They were, I kid you not, playing Hillbilly Bone as we walked in and the woman serving us was as stereotypical as they come for waitresses at Waffle House at 4:15 in North Carolina. After drinking more of our coffee and eating decent waffles and finally being allowed to pee, we were ready to go. I went out first, prepared to take over driving for the first time, but I was stopped in shock at the sight of dogs by my feet. They were noisy and ownerless and my first thought was of Fluffy, the three-headed dog in Harry Potter, but there were only two of them and they were, upon closer examination, not actually connected. They just moved together and followed me as I stepped off the curb. The man who had been working inside the Waffle House was taking out the trash at the other side of the parking lot, and I wondered if they were his dogs, but this didn't make much sense. Perhaps they wanted food? I looked back at Melanie for help in getting them to stop following me, for I couldn't move to the car without getting killed by them (though small, they had very wide eyes and big teeth and seemed unafraid of confrontation), but she was safely behind the glass door and looking more terrified than I felt. I told her she had to come out since she had the keys, so she did and immediately the dogs began tracking her instead. I gleefully scurried to the car and waited for her to come and let me in. This was not ok with me, and on my previously mentioned scale, it is just shy of the lethal mark.
3. Though not as dramatic a story, at Animal Kingdom a giant bird swooped right over my head and almost attacked me and I was also not ok with this. I think it just wanted to eat something, as it landed in front of the restaurant I was walking towards, but my hair is pretty off-limits to basically all birds. This was a bit beyond curious and probably most aptly described as gasp-worthy.
4. There was a miniature stink bug (or some other sort of tiny bug) on my laptop last night and I actually didn't freak out about it and let it crawl away, though as a precaution I didn't go to sleep for another three hours, so that it would have time to vacate my pillows. On the regular animal encounter scale this would be considered normal, but for bugs I would call this a positive experience (the only way it could be more positive is if the bug in question were behind glass or possibly on tv).

I am ok with cute animals, friendly animals, even precocious animals - as long as they have owners I can find responsible for their actions. The nerve of some bugs, to come to my room uninvited, is beyond me.

disney love

Going to Disney World for the first time made me think a lot of thoughts. First, it made me excited to have kids and bring them there (in like 17 years, no rush) to experience the magic. Second, it made me want to rewatch every single Disney movie ever made. Yesterday I watched Sleeping Beauty because this was one of the princess movies we didn't own and that I was always enchanted by, kind of like how I loved watching Scooby Doo when I went to my grandma's house because we didn't get Cartoon Network. Anyway, my cousins had it and that's where I saw it for the first and probably only time. It wasn't very cool this time around, though the song is stuck in my head now.

I wouldn't say I'm one of those anti-Disney people, but being a realist I don't like the fact that kisses can wake people up from enchanted sleep. So I looked up the original Grimm version of the story and decided that I was ok with the kiss.

Things that I like about Disney:

• Great songs
• Emphasize dreams and possibilities
• Interested in sustainability
• Great employment opportunities
• Lots of female heroines

Despite common complaints about the depiction of females in Disney movies, I beg to differ. First of all, all of the dead mothers really cared about their kids and if they were alive we wouldn't have much of a movie because then the mothers would be taking care of them. So that semi-negates the women needing saving theme. We still have the trouble of dashing princes being required to save the day in lots of classic princess movies, but I would be much more troubled if the princess always had to save her own back and I think that scenario would be more demeaning to men than the current stereotype is to women. Because don't women want to be saved? As much as I like being independent, if there was someone who I could truly trust I would totally be ok with him saving the day to prove his love for me, because there isn't much else that would prove it to me (take note...I will require someone epic).

Let's look at some examples (by which I mean all of the official princesses) and I'll explain why I'm ok with Disney depictions of romance as long as kids are eventually taught that they aren't reality.

Snow White - I'm not ok with this one at all, actually. She's really cute and likes animals and is kind and not prejudiced, and he can ride a horse. That does not qualify him as her true love, and even then that shouldn't wake her from her poison-induced coma. I do like that he recognizes her from the well and that it isn't merely her beauty that makes him kiss her like in the original tale, but rather her great singing voice and love of animals.

Cinderella - this is more about class distinctions than gender roles, and if the stepfamily were nice they could have saved her but they weren't. So the prince was able to use his resources to pull her out of essential slavery. Where I dislike this movie is in their brief romance and how he falls in love with her based on her beauty and ability to dance, but this is basically true of all Disney movies so I can forgive it. Also, she's brave and resourceful and kind and perfect and she's kind of my favorite classic princess ever. We have again the problem of happily ever after meaning happily paired off with a man and getting married and being rich without working for it, but this is a kid's movie and I'm ok with an idealized view of romance in some cases or else childhood would have been very depressing.

Sleeping Beauty - while I like the idea of a betrothed couple meeting and falling in love without realizing the other's identity, they literally see each other for like two minutes and dance the entire time and then decide they're in love, and Aurora has even less personality than Phillip, who doesn't really have facial expressions. Also, she's sixteen. So I'm not really ok with this one, either. And what a strange way to alter the prophecy/curse. But on the bright side, the fairies save the day in many ways and Aurora is shown to have independent thoughts, so it's definitely a positive take on women (men, as shown by the kings, are not portrayed as very resourceful or nice).

The Little Mermaid - I think Disney basically ruined this story by making it children-friendly, because the original is super interesting and cool. She is supposed to be motivated by a desire for an immortal soul in addition to her love for the prince and her curiosity about the land, and the girl Eric falls for is his betrothed anyway (though tragically he mistakes her for the one who rescued him from the sea). I will defend the movie, though, because she wants the legs not only to meet Eric but also to satisfy her curiosity, making her adventurous and rebellious which is way more than lovesick, as people who bash her story would have you believe. Yes, she trades her voice but she gains the ability to walk, dance, etc. which is clearly an experience she would otherwise never have. Also, in the original she's supposed to experience stabbing pains every time she walks and it ends in tragedy, which of course I am a fan of (but actually it's a way better story). Anyway, she gets to choose her own fate and gets to live happily ever after so I wouldn't say it's entirely a bad moral story.

Beauty and the Beast - this is essentially the best story ever. Ok, some will say that it teaches girls to stick with abusers to change them...but Belle doesn't love him to begin with and only at the end realizes this, so I don't really buy that argument. It teaches all people to love beyond appearances, and in the end she saves him instead of the other way around. Also, she's a nerd and turns down the buff guy. She's awesome. While it still teaches that happily ever after is strictly defined as finding a husband, I'll refer to the Cinderella argument that this is fair because she also gets wealth so this is a fairly good achievement. It's kind of negative in that this means she can't make money for herself, but I would argue that she could live in the village on her own after her dad dies and be fine (like she's on track to do from the beginning by denying Gaston), but she doesn't want that boring life, so choosing the Beast is really about exercising her own free will. It's like the idea of becoming a housewife really being a luxury rather than strict confinement from the workplace, though that's not exactly the implication for the remainder of her life.

Aladdin - I'm not a Jasmine fan, but I suppose she's clever and feisty and holds out for love and someone kind, despite their social ranking, which is a good message. She's not about marrying for money or connections, much like Aurora, which is good though not entirely practical for a princess (but it's ok, I doubt there are many princesses who are taking lessons from her). Her need to marry is about her royal obligation more than monetary necessity so in that sense it doesn't speak to female independence at all except as in line with the social setting, though this could be said of any Disney princess...

Pocahontas - I don't feel qualified to speak on this subject since I haven't seen it in many years, but I would say that if they had stuck to real life events this would be way less kid-friendly. It definitely depicts a strong female character.

Mulan - this is my favorite Disney movie of all time, so I will of course be defending it. Women in Mulan's society are seen as highly superficial with the exception of the tomboyish title character who pretends to be a man not so much motivated by proving herself but rather in order to protect her father from injury and certain death. She has family values and though she realizes that she should be a wife, she doesn't feel cut out for it. In the end, she turns down a man's job so that she can be with her family - which might seem like a blow to feminism, but hey, it's her choice and that's the important part. It says that caring for family is a valid life choice for a woman, even one who isn't really ready to host dinner parties or pour tea. And on a hugely positive note, she doesn't get married at the end, which is great because she hasn't even had a chance to be a woman around Li and so we can imply that they don't have a rushed romance. Though romance and true love is never something she seeks out, we can imagine that she would make a great, courageous wife to a man who is an equal match to her wit. So she wins herself a man - that's kind of an accomplishment and not at all a bad message, because we know she doesn't "need" one, but we also know that defying some gender stereotypes doesn't make her unworthy of finding love.

The Princess and the Frog - I don't think that this was as progressive of a movie as it could have been, but I will say that I don't agree that it is entirely against single working women. I think that a lot of that reflects the society it's set in, and the characters who discourage Tiana from pouring all of herself into her work are trying to encourage her to invest in personal relationships, not necessarily romantic ones, which is a very good message to everyone. Obviously this was going to be a romantic movie, and I think that they did a fine job of displaying an "actual" relationship as opposed to all of the classic princess love stories (granted, this is between frogs and they're only together for a few days, but they got the bickering and flirting right); certainly it's the most like a classic non-animated, non-magical romance movie, yet is still entirely appropriate for kids. Yes, it takes some magic for her dreams to com e true, but we can assume that her hard work would have eventually paid off and that had she quit earlier she never would have achieved her goals.

Tangled - ok, she won't be official until October, but she's in the picture so I'm including her. I would rank her story along with Tiana's (and Mulan's) as being about more than finding love, and the romance being a nice addition to her life. Sure, you wouldn't have much of a movie without it, and it doesn't add much realism to Disney romances, but again we have a strong character who is quite resourceful and delightful on her own. The movie adds a lot more depth to the original story, which pretty much epitomizes damsel in distress being rescued by a dashing prince, so that's a plus. It takes her much longer than the audience to realize her love, and neither of them are motivated by royalty (though of course she is a legit princess), and she actually sacrifices part of her beauty for a good reason (better than Ariel's, at least).

Finally, what these movies overlook:

• Some people are perfectly happy without finding a "true love" or alternatively get married and later realize this was a mistake...or lose a loved one (though this is alluded to by the loss of other family members)
• Real marriages take a lot of hard work...the wedding is never the end of a true life story
• Most people need a lot longer than a few days and songs together to know that they want to spend their lives together
• Some people can love more than one person in their lifetime, and happiness can be found in making a choice to love

But personally, I would not like to be taught these things by singing mermaids or beautiful princesses; from them, I like to learn that courage and kindness pay off and that for some fortunate people there really can exist a happily ever after. Leave the rest of the lessons for the disillusionment of adolescence.

*spoilers*

I have now waited for seven midnight releases, between books and films, and have spent the past seven years feeling like Harry Potter's closest friend, and now there's no denying that he's all grown up. Blah blah blah sentiments...my favorite part of a Harry Potter release, aside from the costumes, is the analysis that follows! Since I read most of the last book in the last 24 hours, I have a lot of critique to give.

• Percy had no apology/reconciliation scene whatsoever which was to be expected, but I was disappointed. He used to be my favorite character (mostly because I like being weird, but also he's a prefect) and I was sad to see that he was present with the Weasleys and Chris Rankin was recast but they didn't even touch that storyline.
• Ok, what on earth, why did Voldemort even make that announcement that they had one hour, and then McGonagall put up the enchantments and then Harry learned about the diadem...this was completely backwards and I did not approve, and then he made the one hour announcement again, so that was pointless. Also, they didn't evacuate the students, this seems really dumb.
• Ollivander was not supposed to believe in the hallows since that indicates that he told Voldemort about them which is contrary to the book - because if he knew about them he'd totally be after them, so I found this a little bit discomforting.
• Voldemort was not supposed to feel when the horcruxes were destroyed, that race against his discovery was half the fun of the end of the book. And Harry wasn't supposed to hear them, I thought that was just dumb.
• Ok, Snape's last memories in the book are tear-jerking every time, Snape's last memories in the movie were ok except for when he goes into the Potter's home. That directly contradicts the part that they even show in the movie when Dumbledore tells Snape that Harry has Lily's eyes (I assume that this was supposed to be after she died, since Dumbledore's talking to him, but then he would have already seen him so it's just dumb). I've always been disappointed at the way they show memories, so this wasn't really surprising, but it was one of the best parts of the entire series so I was sad it wasn't perfect. And then, he's all crying and that makes me uncomfortable because it's Alan Rickman and he can't cry.
• Did I miss the part where they say Teddy was born, because Harry mentions him to Lupin but that was all I saw. So, they completely glossed over the way him being orphaned was supposed to mirror Harry and made Lupin/Tonks' deaths seem pointless and yet not even that sad. Also, I was sad we didn't see Fred die.
• I understood taking out all of Harry's angst about Dumbledore lying to him and uncovering his past, but that was kind of the heart of the book - Harry found himself in lies and secrets and decided not to continue, making him better than Dumbledore, and certainly a good user of the hallows. When he died, he didn't even talk to Dumbledore about the hallows and never got an explanation as to why Dumbledore did what he did and why it was important that he be a willing sacrifice, and they left out how his sacrifice protected everyone else. Whatever. In general, King's Cross disappointed me since I could imagine everything that they showed pretty easily and at least the dialog wasn't all cut short and not well explained in the version in my head from reading the book.
• There was no hallows/horcruxes debate!
• What on earth was going on with giving people other lines...it was Harry's idea to get on the dragon, Hermione was supposed to tell Harry to see where Voldemort was, etc. These just seemed like little things that could easily have been accommodated without any need to change them.
• What was that little boat house supposed to be? Shrieking Shack not good enough?
• Along with the not evacuating students, there was no fight with Ginny about her staying behind and I rather liked that in the book.
• They never explained Harry repairing his wand and that was like the best part ever about him being so noble.
• Inference of Parvati's death seemed weird considering we already have the emotional grief of a twin dying, and she was overage anyway so I don't see why they couldn't have just done Colin Creevey like they were supposed to.
• The Gray Lady bit seemed weird and I feel like they just didn't explain that properly - it was supposed to take some persuasion, which we've learned from HBP that Harry is good at, as he's so like Voldemort (I still would have liked the scene in HBP with Hepzibah, but this is not the place for general movie complaints).

On a more positive note,

• I liked everything about McGonagall, and they added some great quips.
• The beginning scenes were spot on with the book, and everything up through Gringotts was perfect. The fake Bellatrix was awesome. I didn't like that we didn't understand why Griphook wanted the sword and the whole idea of goblin ownership, but I suppose this is one of those deeper philosophical things that just doesn't have space in the movie.
• I'm glad they cut out Travers since he was just unnecessary.
• Good work cutting out Hagrid and giant stuff, but actually.
• I would normally not like Neville and Luna together, but seriously, they are awesome together and I was sad to hear from Jo that they didn't get married. This is movieland and I am perfectly ok with them pairing off evenly.
• I was skeptical of Ron and Hermione telling Harry where they were going to get the fangs, but it worked out and was really cool and didn't ruin anything plotwise.
• Everything about the Malfoys was perfect. I wished they had explained Fiendfyre, but since Crabbe wasn't there it would have been kind of weird I guess...but I didn't like that Harry used a fang on the diadem...but I did like Voldemort's faces in the fire.
• I liked how they aged for the epilogue and the casting was great.
• I was glad that they included Lavendar being attacked by Greyback and Hermione stopping him; she's so mature.
• Though the enchantments were supposed to happen before the Death Eaters approached, all of the visual effects of the castle protections were really cool.

I still don't know how I feel about:

• Aberforth showing up at the battle...and leaving out all of the Grindelwald/Ariana/Elder Wand business. It wasn't entirely entirely necessary, but again this mystery was central to the book and Harry's frustration with Dumbledore and Dumbledore's plans and so on and I don't think it would have really added to the movie much, just as Winky didn't have to be really important in Goblet of Fire as proved by her absence, but I don't like that in the future it will be deemed unimportant just because it wasn't in the movie.
• All that random stuff with Neville during the battle - like the snatcher and him randomly finding the sorting hat (and not being tortured with it) and his speech. They were ok moments, but not really that epic - and I wish that his epicness had been witnessed by everyone.
• How Ron and Hermione are fighting Nagini while Harry fights Voldemort. Actually, I didn't like it. It was dramatic and ok for a movie, but the point was that he didn't want to be separate from her because, you know, he didn't want to die. But, it was good that Harry ran into Ron and Hermione instead of Neville before sacrificing himself. I was mad at first but then they started crying and I decided it was way more emotionally satisfying this way. BUT, Neville was supposed to kill Nagini in front of everyone and Voldemort was supposed to be defeated in front of everyone, and I don't like that this didn't happen.
• Dean being really really tall.
• Snape calling in all the students and asking them to come forward with info about Harry and whatnot...this did not seem to be something that was protecting any student and knowing he was a good guy this didn't make much sense.
• The whole jumping off the cliff together thing was really weird, but the face meld was really cool and almost worth the departure from the book.
• Lack of house-elves...again, expected but still not cool.

And that's about all I have. All told, a good movie!

florida overview

The past two weeks have probably gone by the fastest of any two weeks I've ever known, except for maybe the last two weeks of high school. I've been rushing to finish my reread of Harry Potter (just finished the epilogue, otherwise I wouldn't be blogging right now) between visits from Katie, Isabel and Jamie and, way more time-consuming, my trip to Florida!

I had never before been to the sunshine state, nor in a car for that many hours in a row since I was about two, so it was quite an enlightening experience. I maintain that I love long car rides, even slash especially when I am driving, so if you're planning a road trip for the near future let me know and I'll be in! As long as you're paying for gas. Anyway, Melanie, who's been my friend since seventh grade and is perfectly okay with being a nerd with me, also loves Harry Potter so we went to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal. Or, that was our main motivation in going...it turned into much more than that.

How my blogging is going to work out regarding this trip and my life will be like this:

1. I will post this overview as soon as I finish writing it.
2. I will watch Harry Potter and then blog about it tomorrow.
3. I will have a lot to say about various topics blogged over the next week or so that relate to stories from Florida.

So, most of the fun stuff is not going to be here but I thought I should lay it all out before I forget how it all went down. First, Katie came to visit me two weeks and like four hours ago. We hung out and then went to bible study and Isabel joined us, so we went to DC the next morning and they ran in the morning etc etc, it was a great time. That afternoon Jamie drove up from Williamsburg to join us and we made jewelry boxes and then there was a whole ordeal about Georgetown Cupcakes that I'll get to later. Jamie and I hung out, walked a lot, had a legit fourth of July (I finally got to see Danyah), and this brings me to Tuesday, July 5th, otherwise known as Isabel's birthday. I, for the fourth time in five days, went to DC and got a ton of free food but also walked like five million miles and felt like dying afterwards. I got home around 9:20 pm and started packing for Florida. I felt just like Harry in the beginning of HBP when he doesn't pack a thing until Dumbledore arrives, because some part of him feels like it's too good to be true. My main reason for not packing was busyness, but it was kind of the same...I didn't have time to think about the fact that I would be in Orlando until just before I left. About seventy minutes of packing later we were on our way! Can I just say, I did an expert packing job considering my time constraints, especially compared to Melanie who forgot, among other things, her toothbrush and wallet.

Anyway, we drove overnight and had a lolzy time in North Carolina which I will also revisit in a later post. We got to her uncle's house around 1 pm on Wednesday, after I had about a combined hour of sleep, but I managed to stay awake until around 8 and then slept for fourteen hours. For a while I thought I was doing great and thought, hey Marisa, why do I bother sleeping when I can clearly forgo it and be fine? This is a bad, bad thought because I'm pretty sure I actually lost time in this deal due to overcompensating for my lack of sleep and also I was pretty groggy throughout the day. This is why I don't do all-nighters.

Anyway, then we went to Epcot, Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios with her uncle over the next two days and saw a lot of rain but obviously had a magical time anyway, considering this is Disney we're talking about. And considering I could pretty much never afford to go to this many parks for this many days, it was really a blessing that we got free admission - otherwise it would have been a much shorter trip and a lot more confined to Universal. Anyway, we went to Universal on Saturday and got 2-park tickets so we could see Boys Like Girls in concert that night (and also all the cool non-Harry Potter things are in the second park). Harry Potter was really great and magical and all, but very crowded and we didn't feel like standing in long lines after the main ride, which turned out to be a 90 minute wait, so we did some Dr. Seuss rides and other roller coasters for the majority of the day. We didn't have a lot of time to shop for Harry Potter goods which was sad, but after the concert there was a general Universal store open, and they practically had to kick us out we stayed so long. I bought a chocolate frog, which I've already had before but they're the best Harry Potter themed candy in my opinion, and some playing cards which are oddly larger than normal cards, but whatever, I mostly got them for collecting's sake.

Sunday, we went to Clearwater Beach and I got pretty burned, and then we were planning on coming home on Monday but we still hadn't been to Magic Kingdom and the only reason we had to come home was for Deathly Hallows, so we stayed a while longer. Monday I mostly just read, but we got to go to Downtown Disney that night, and this is really when they started to win me over. I didn't buy anything, but it was pretty awesome shopping for like three hours, and this is coming from me (the only person I know who likes shopping less is Jamie).

Finally, on Tuesday we went to Magic Kingdom. This truly felt like the most magical place on earth, probably because Melanie and I were so excited to meet the princesses after looking at all of their merchandise the night before and thinking about it ever since we had finished our obsession with all things Harry Potter (or at least, paused it). This was basically the best day ever, though by the end of it I really did feel like I was dying (we were there like fifteen hours, as long as we possibly could be). Then came the drive back on Wednesday, which we decided to do during the day, though we got to a late start due to sleeping in. When I got home I unpacked everything and read some Deathly Hallows then passed out, and when I woke up all I did was read.

And now, I'm finally, finally ready for the last installment. I hope.

brb

Going to Florida with Melanie, many more updates to resume in approximately one week. Nbd.

pokemon lessons

Watching seven hours of Pokemon this weekend may seem redundant considering these are all episodes I watched about 18 months ago (and which I also remember from when I watched them on tv like 13 years ago), but I must say that this time around I learned something new. I realized a lot of the lessons that Pokemon teaches children are actually pretty good, though they aren't the explicit ones you would think would come from a kid's anime show. Maybe I'm just stretching here, but I think they're pretty good at subconsciously teaching us to be good people.

1. Being nice to mean people is always the right thing to do, though it's hard (see Ash et al. saving Team Rocket from drowning in the St. Anne).
2. Sass and stubbornness are funny but they don't make you friends (see Pikachu all the time).
3. You should accept people as they are and accept that you don't have the right to change them (consider Ash not making Pikachu evolve to defeat Raichu).
4. In relationships, quality is better than quantity and it's better to surround yourself with people who you care about than people who are powerful (a general metaphor from Ash's encounters with trainers like AJ who are pretty tough on their Pokemon).
5. Having hope and faith distinguishes people of good character from cowards.
6. Street smarts can be more important than book smarts (see all those preps from Pokemon Tech).
7. No one likes to be underestimated because of their age/any other reason.
8. Persistence pays off.
9. There are no bad Pokemon, just bad masters (as we learn from Ekans). This doesn't exactly apply to people...but I guess there is no person worth hating, just their decisions?
10. You should respect animals' natural habitats (Tentacool, Digletts, etc.).
11. Mottos are way better than songs, and you should hold onto your values (Team Rocket does this so it's kind of a negative message, but Ash always cares for his Pokemon).
12. It's ok to admit you made a mistake (Ash trading away Butterfree, Ash not properly defeating Brock, etc.).
13. Some theme songs are so awesome that you can listen to them and sing along to them like 24 times in one day, so if your theme song is not that good you should keep looking for a better one. Seriously.

This is so much Pokemon love.

my workout blog

I do not have a workout blog. If I did, the post for today, as has been suggested by Isabel and Katie, would be commending myself for walking across a crosswalk in 17 seconds.

My friends Katie and Isabel have a pretty intense love for their workout blog. I started reading it for a while but then I got bored because they work out pretty much all the time and it made me tired just hearing about their escapades. I think it's a kind of lulzy idea for a blog and I commend them for a) working out and b) keeping up with a blog about it, but a workout blog is probably the least likely blog you would ever see produced by me.

Blogs that are more likely to be produced by me:

• a music blog (this is already pretty unlikely, but I could talk about how Rolling in the Deep was on two stations at once and how Wet Seal played a whole bunch of MJ but not on the anniversary of his death etc etc)
• a tv blog (this is fairly likely, actually)
  
• a food blog (good for recipes, my thoughts on various bacon-based meals, my baking escapades, my indignation at having to pay so much for froyo, etc.)
• an econ blog (mostly about how everything I see relates to econ or math in some way)
• a harry potter blog
• a political blog
• a design blog
• a photography blog
• a general pokemon/lolcat/internet blog (aka my tumblr)

To be fair, I did a pretty good job of burning calories by walking around DC for forever and a half. I had to research this via google maps so that I couldn't be blamed for overstating this, but just so you know we walked 1.6 miles one way (from the Metro to the Capital to lunch) and 2.1 miles another way for a total of 3.7 miles walking on the streets, which does not account for standing in two massively long lines (ok, one was tonight) and going through a museum and shopping at Michaels. It's fair to say that this is about 10 times as much walking as I do on a normal day of the summer, and maybe 2 times as much as I would do on campus during school, so of course my feet are sore.

Back to workout blogs. Mine would be the least interesting of all. It would mostly consist of excuses...like, "today I did 20 crunches and then I was going to do some more but I got distracted by looking at my drawers while I did them so then I had to reorganize all of my t-shirts, and by the time I was through with that I had to eat dinner." This hasn't happened to me, but it easily could. I do begin the day with motivation, but I generally lose it because I have to take a shower right now or I to eat or something. I don't have the motivation to run - let me be clear, it is only the motivation to do minor stretches and crunches - which is why I slept for an extra hour this morning while my guests ran.

I guess I like to run at the rec center, but I come up with a lot of excuses there, like, I'm feeling kind of sick, I really need to sleep, by the time I walk there I'm already exhausted, I'll just get a smoothie and cancel out my workout. It's not like it doesn't feel good to run, but since I would much rather sleep it doesn't really happen.

Whatever, I can still cross streets fast enough to avoid death and illegality so I assume that my sedentary lifestyle isn't having any major adverse life effects.