Yes, it is indeed Harry Potter's birthday. And yes, I know he's a fictional character, but gosh darnit he's one of my favorites. And I know I'm a little late, as it's already tomorrow in Britain and nearly tomorrow here, but it's the thought that counts, right? Here's a little quickie I whipped up for my favorite boy wizard:

Saw the Bourne Supremacy with Ross last night. It was a fun movie, and the theater was nearly full even though it was the second weekend of release, so yay for Bourne. I thought it was good, probably better than the first, if a little more convoluted. They had you going 'huh?" for quite a bit in the beginning, trying to figure out who's killing whom and why, but the action sequences were great. Two car chases, wow. And I have to say, Karl Urban looked so much better in this one than in Chronicles of Riddick Two LotR alums in BS, actually...Bourne meets up with an assassin buddy of old and lo and behold it's Marton Csokas or however you spell his last name, aka Celeborn-the-elf-of-the-few-words-and-husband-of-Galadriel. Also known as the anarchy-advocating rebel of xXx. and wtf! Marie!?! sigh. either there's not going to be a sequel (which is stupid considering the aforementioned full theater), or they're just going to invent it out of the whole cloth, being as they changed most of the plot of the second book. Oh, I know the first one wasn't really like the book, stripped down, etc, and the books are infinitely better than the movies, but still. I admit I haven't finished the second book and maybe there are more elements that I'm not aware of that they did include in the movie, but it sure seemed like they were veering off on their own tangent. That's ok, I guess. Books are good when they can stand on their own. Ah well.

Ross and I talked...alot. I'm amazed at the breadth of the topics we discussed. Problem is I'm not all that good at discussion, what with not having too many strongly-held beliefs, whereas Ross is going to (Wash U, natch) law school in the fall. But it was interesting nonetheless. It's fun to have conversations ranging from religion to politics to school to weather to old ladies cursing. And I had my first mocha Kalhua freeze (yes, a coffee drink!). I never drink coffee of any type (the smell used to make me sick, really) but it wasn't bad. Mostly the bitterness was covered up by the mocha And I believe Ross when he says he isn't normally a bad driver. He just happened to have some bad directions

And Tim Schneider (my crush from middle school/highschool and the hs salutitorian) and his wife just had twin boys, so congrats to them. Apparently they were nine weeks early so send some prayers and well wishes their way!

Guess I better get this in before midnight, and finish my dinner. Toodles...

Posted by Jen at 11:04 PM | Permalink |

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Well, here it is, finally...my John Mayer concert review...Admittedly yesterday I was busy, but I just really didn't want to sit and type up the whole thing. So I'm doing it today while I have nothing better to do. I could be making a Harry Potter birthday icon, I suppose, but perhaps I'll do that tomorrow...if I'm not at ShowMeCon, which I most likely won't be...ah well, money issues...
Anyway...onto the musicy goodness.

Sooo...while I was on my way home to meet the aunt and cousin, all I heard on traffic was bad bad accidents on all the highways, so I was worried. But we apparently left at the right time, or took the (slightly back-roads) right way, since we didn't hit any snags, just normal rushhour traffic. Yay! So we got there early enough to hit the restrooms and hear some random guy on the second stage (he sounded enough like JM that I was confused for a bit, but he was black, so no relation and he finished just as we managed to get in the gates, so I have no idea who he was) and get a cupful of free stuff, literally. Southwest Airlines was sponsoring the concert so they were giving away big plastic cups with stuff. And there was the obligatory free condom man He gave me two. Not sure what I should think about that. After enjoying a leisurely soft frozen lemonade, we took our seats.

DJ Logic started us off, but either his equipment was faulty or he was just randomly inserting scratching into popular songs I'll never quite know, since I wasn't really listening. It was really nice weather for the evening, suprisingly, but thankfully. The concert did start pretty soon after 7, which was nice...I guess Maroon 5 didn't come on until about 7:45, and they played to sometime after 8:30, so a good set. Will have to check out their cd now, I guess. Yay. more things to spend money on *sarcasm* They have a very clever logo: an M with a V cutout in the middle. Get it? Maroon V? I liked it, and they played pretty well. Didn't play the song from the Spidey2 soundtrack which I wouldn't have minded seeing, but they did play the three hits they've got on the radio right now.

And then came the good stuff...John Mayer came on just about 9 pm. Amazing it was neither humid nor raining like they'd said it might be, so everything was perfect condition wise. Too bad the sound isn't quite as good at outdoor concerts as it is indoors, because while you could hear the words of songs pretty well, whenever anyone was just talking it sounded like a blur of noise. Meh. But yeah, songs pretty. I followed my convention from the Josh Groban concert and made a setlist (with help from the official site and Scotty's road journal):

Bigger than my body
No Such Thing prefaced by some 80s song that I can't recall the title of
"This is playing the blues" A Blues Thing (because he's heard people call some of his songs bluesy and wanted to set the record straight)
Come Back to Bed
New Deep (source of the title of his latest disc, Heavier Things)
Wheel (everyone's favorite singalong)
Why Georgia with a side of Portable
Something's Missing with a side of Home Life
My Stupid Mouth with a side of something I can't remember
Old Love (an eric clapton tribute, I think. DeLa (his best bud/guitarist) had a big solo, and then he and JM did this great duet where DeLa stood behind JM and played JM's guitar while JM played DeLa's. Now that takes talent!)
Your Body is a Wonderland with a side of Signed Sealed Delivered and Maroon 5's She Will Be Loved
Neon with a guitarist from Maroon 5 and JM playing a Macintosh Apple-stickered guitar (yay!)
Clarity
encore
LA Song (acoustic, JM only, a new song he's working on for the next album. good stuff)
Great Indoors (acoustic, JM only)
Only Heart (JM and some of the band)

He ended sometime just before 11...all I know is that we were in the car at 11, so a nice long set. We left just as he was ending his last song, since Aunt Carol didn't want to spend as much time in the car waiting in the parking lot. We still had to wait a long time, but you'll hear about that later.

So, more thoughts:

JM had a really simple set. There were three large folding screens with a vaguely asian tree design, and were backlit or frontlit at certain times to set the mood. And as a backdrop looks like he stole the Counting Crows' backdrop from last year with a huge black sheet studded with lights. Beautiful, especially when they all flickered like a real night sky...

He wore his own tour shirt. They were selling signed concert tour shirts (black, natch. Why are all the good concert tshirts black? Color is good, people!) but they were $80 and that was $10 more than I had brought with me. So I got a raglan tourdate shirt which theoretically is cool since it's longsleeve but is slightly too large so might have to attempt something with the sewing machine I might get from my cousin since she won both the auctions she bidded on. (How's that for a run-on? )

Every so often he would fling his guitar pick into the audience. A silly little thing but man if I wouldn't have minded getting one. Of course we were just slightly too far away for that All in all, good seats, only slightly right of center and just behind the VIP seats. How on EARTH do you get VIP tix? Aside from paying $400, there must be a way...alas I am not that lucky.

Lots of younger guys there. I guess JM attracts them for his playing, which admittedly is very cool, unless you look at his face when he really gets into it. As I mentioned last year he either looks like he's in pain or having an orgasm when he's playing. Maybe he is. Maybe it's both. Guess I'll never know. But it's good for a laugh nonetheless.

Tried to catch his new tatoo on his right arm, but we were on the wrong side of the stage for that. That and he's usually strumming with that hand so we never see the underside. Ah well.

Gripes: No 3x5, but since he played my favorite song of his at both the previous concerts I was at I guess I can't complain too much. Leaving before he walked off the stage, but I guess I didn't really miss much and the song he ended with wasn't my favorite. It's the principle of the thing. And while we were doing the intermiable wait in the parking lot after, this Jeep Liberty (it's official, now I hate Jeep Liberties...that's the car that rear-ended me last year) tried to nose in front of us (quickly and scarily, really) stopping just short of hitting us and Aunt Carol got mad at the driver...she's volatile that way. They kept coming though, even after an application of the finger, and Carol got out to have words. They backed off after that. Ah well. Can't be totally perfect!

And I'm sad/not sad that i didn't get to go to the soundcheck as a perk for being in the fanclub. It would have been nice to see him perform in a slightly more intimate way, but it would have been too much trouble to do, so I'm glad I didn't. Maybe next year. Maybe he'll play at Savvis and the sound will be better. Who knows? I'd love to meet him but it's most likely not going to be at UMB.

I think that's all I've got, and I've got to get home so Ross and I can catch the Bourne Supremacy, so y'all have a good weekend and be sure to wish Harry Potter happy birthday tomorrow, and take a look outside tomorrow night and see the blue moon. Mwah!

Posted by Jen at 5:22 PM | Permalink |

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  Fireworks mix

file under: music

Squee! John Mayer tonight! I love immature that makes me sound. Ah well. Let me put it this way...I'm going to what promises to be a spectacular showcase of stellar singing/songwriting this eve. Better? It should be a good concert. JM always does well live, and Kate said that Maroon 5 is good in concert as well. Here's hoping that it doesn't stay too hot/humid (or conversely, not getting too cold as it's been dipping into the 60s and even 50s in some parts of the city at night) and it doesn't rain!

Re: yesterday's entry...*facepalm* and that's all I'm going to say about that.

Welcome back Alex and Leo Hope you had fun in Detroit.

Kate and I went for Ted Drewes last night...yay st. louis famous custard! I had, for the first time, a Big Apple, which is their concrete custard mixed with apple pie and whipped cream. Fun! And very good. We took a walk around the block while we ate, and so negated some of the calories Talked about politics, mostly. I hate politics. I think it's because I don't have too strongly held opinions on many of the debateable subjects...I always feel a little out of the loop when I try to have a conversation about them. I don't know who I'll vote for in the governor's race if I do decide to vote. I might not. It's a bit of a pain since I'm still registered as living with my parents and have to go to their polling place. I honestly don't really even know what's going on with the ballot. I'll just have to trust the Post-Dispatch to fairly report the issues and ask my dad what he thinks

After the TD stroll we headed home, but Kate wanted to find a park with swings, and fortunately there happens to be a park nearby...so we went and see-sawed and played on the jungle gym and swung, and slid it was fun. Weird being in a park/playground when it's dark. And we talked more. It was a big day for talking, as I'd spent somewhere over an hour on the phone with Ross earlier. Hi Ross! We don't keep in touch nearly enough: he hadn't heard about the apartment, my mugging, my trip to San Diego... But we're going to see a movie on friday so that should be fun.

I don't know what I'm going to do with my family this weekend...tomorrow is softball, so I won't be around till late, and then going out on friday...they're here until sat, but I don't know what time. Hopefully I'll get to spend some time with Corey, especially, as she's my favorite cousin and very shortly she's going to Kent State in Ohio for grad school. Alas. Everyone is going away...at least she'll be close(er than I am) to Cedar Point so maybe finally I'll have a reason for going out that way.

Must remember to leave earlier and get book from library and milk and oj from store! Stupid groceries. sooo much money to be spent today! eek!

Posted by Jen at 10:53 AM | Permalink

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  "Ash And Smoke: The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King soundtrack"

file under: music

Your Intelligence Is Determined By THIS Apparently my mathematical grey matter is close to non-existent...

It's 7-27. What a beautiful number. And incidentally, a month from my 24th birthday...egad I'm gonna be old. Well, I'll still be the youngest person on my softball team

I had a really crazy dream about Ross last night. Like seriously crazy. Like he said he wanted to be my boyfriend. That's how I know it was just wishful thinking. I hate being pushed into actually doing things that are probably good for me, but I do still need to find someone to see the Bourne Supremacy with...watched the first one last night, just to be ready...

Annoyance of the week: I'm still getting hundreds of those emails with 'hi' in the title. The problem is that lots of people send messages with just 'hi' as the subject, some legitimate, so I can't just set it to filter all of them out...and secondly, most of the emails go to a slightly different variation of my email (ie adding a letter at the end or simply making up a first part, since I have a catchall) so I can't just block certain senders. I love it when it says it's from me, as well. yay. Stupid spam.

John Mayer tomorrow! Whee! Spidey 2 and King Arthur scores and Ned Kelly dvd today! But I'm going to exercise extreme self control and try to wait until August 10 when Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix comes out in paperback...maybe if I wait until then I'll get Hidalgo as well...agggh! I'm never going to get a keyboard. Mom wants me to look into selling the piano at home, b-b-b-but I loves the piano! Even if I never use it anymore! Not like it would fit in the apartment, either. Well, I guess it would, but getting it up those stairs would be a horrible task. And then we'd really have to get it tuned. It's held its tuning remarkably well considering we haven't had it tuned since I was taking lessons, oh, ten years ago See why a keyboard is better?

Posted by Jen at 9:54 AM | Permalink

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Title's from the Switchfoot song Beautiful Letdown. Finally sat down and watched the dvd of their live performance this weekend. I've had the dvd for a few months now but never actually got around to watching it. It's pretty cool. They sing AND play instruments! Did I mention how I really like that in a band?

Congrats to Lance Armstrong. He just won his 6th consecutive Tour de France. Live strong indeed. And amazingly enough, for one weekend with a movie premiere I did not see it opening night...hopefully I'll find someone to see the Bourne Supremacy with me later this week. Yay for number one at the box office. Makes me sad I didn't go, even by myself, but I guess it's not like they needed my help. My mom is pushing me to call up this guy from high school who randomly tries to get me to do something with him, and I just don't feel comfortable doing it. He's a nice guy, but there's just...I don't know. I hate it when people try to set me up, even if it's just for friendship. Maybe there's something wrong with me. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I'll see a movie like Spidey 2 three times, once by myself. Ah well. I'd see it again, too...just like I'd see HP3 again. DVDs can't come out soon enough.

In exceedingly annoying news, there were 2000+ messages in my inbox when I came in this morning. Fully 1600 of those were spam that was immediately deleted and the majority for the rest part was also spam that had to be more closely looked at before deletion. This really sucks and I'm not quite sure what I can do about it because most of them are actually to my address and don't have unique subject lines or senders. Sigh. Stupid 'hi.' I think I probably deleted the message from my softball coach last week because of this inundation.

In other news, thanks for voting for this site last week, and feel free to do the same this week. I'll need all the help I can get!

Posted by Jen at 10:05 AM | Permalink

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  "John Mayer: Neon"

file under: muses

Dan Radcliffe...aka Harry Potter, turns 15 today. Ahh, jailbait. Course, he's the second or maybe even most rich kid in England, so I don't think he'll have a bad one. Just browsing MuggleNet.com - The Ultimate Harry Potter Site...need more HP desktops. Silly, I know. It's been a while since I've surfed on my laptop so it's sadly out of date.

Sounds like the Calcium Kid and Troy will both come out on dvd around October sometime.

Am I horrible if I really want to see Spidey 2 and HP 3 again? And again? Egad I need a life. Of course, JK Rowling needs to write quicker so we can have a book 6...and I need to wait until August 10 to actually spend money so I can do that silly thing called 'saving'...

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..but if I ever see one I might just get it, on the principle of the thing...
Barbie Collector Showcase

And in case you've ever wondered...What if Orlando needs a green card?

I've made more icons. Soon there will be a post. But probably over at the LJ. I'll get back to you on that. Wait! There are some up in the Iconic gallery already. Yeah. Go comment.

And you must check out this site for Harry Potter fanart. Wow. artdungeon.net ~ Harry Potter Artwork (Fan Art by Marta) Am inspired.

Want the King Arthur soundtrack, the Spidey 2 score, and the Ned Kelly dvd. Next tuesday there will be a sharp drop in Jen's budget.

Posted by Jen at 12:42 PM | Permalink

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You must click to watch this 4 minute Spidey vs Doc Ock video, with all 'actors' scenes, props etc, made out of Lego blocks! It's well done and quite funny. Yay childhood toys put to good use

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The Onion | Study: Majority Of Americans Out Of Touch With Mainstream

From the John Mayer Road Journal:
"I told the Ticket Fairy that LA Songwas in the encore, then I was all like 'just kidding' then she was all like 'that's mean!' and I was all like 'I know. You know what else is mean? The average of a set of numbers.' " --Scotty, JM's tour manager or something...

Scotty apparently considers himself a bit of a wit. For example:

I share an office with the Much Loved Ticket Fairy. She walked into the office, grinning ear to ear, with a girlish spirit about her. In her hands she held a pine cone, nurturing it like a little pet. "Oh my pretty little pet, I love you." Stroking it and petting it and massaging it. I looked at her quizzically, to which she replied,

"Whaaaat? I LOVE acorns."

Acorns, huh? How do you feel about pine cones?

(in case you're wondering, the ticket fairy is someone who goes around at the shows giving out front row or similar seats to worthy looking souls. Or hot girls to fill out the seats. Too bad I have yet to be in either of those groups. Josh Groban has a ticket fairy too, but I doubt any of them actually make it up to the mezzanine.)

It's really hot today. Like triple digit heat indexes. And I still haven't started my NAFLD isolation. Bah. Guess I better get on that. Maybe I'll go to the zoo tonight for the alumni thing. Maybe not. I'm just great at prevaricating, you know.

Posted by Jen at 11:10 AM | Permalink

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Ahhh, Josh Groban. He's my man right now. And apparently St. Louis is collectively the man, as we gave him the first standing ovation of the second half of his tour. Yay StLGrobanites!

Have to say, the set was really nice. Except for the parts where the lights would sweep up dramatically and blind anyone not sitting on the floor level. And who are those people who can afford to pay upwards of $400 for tickets? Not me. So not me. Not in a million years. I can't even afford to upgrade my laptop or buy a keyboard. Mope.

At least when the lights were blue and teal and azure and shining up through the stairs it made a pretty picture, made better when Josh came out. We had to sit through a half-hour of a jazz lady, Mindy Avair; she was good and multitalented playing sax and clarinet and singing, but that's just not my type of music. Then we had to wait twenty minutes before JG came on, which was terrible because we were sooo ready for him. Ah well.

He had on this really great purple oxford shirt at first. He always looks so natty. Good stylist I guess. Then later he changed into a white shirt with this crosshatched pattern on it...looked really good in the binoculars that the nice couple behind me let me borrow for a few songs. He also changed into Adidas soccer sneaks I thought that was great.

Setlist:
oceano (a favorite! really good, loud, great opener)
per te
to where you are
mi mancherai
mi morena (spanish section, I guess, the guitar is great)
alejate (ok, one more)
canto alla vita (my absolute favorite, even if he sings it solo as opposed to the duet on the cd...started the song off by playing keyboards, which rocked, then at the end he busted out his drum chops...yes, the boy can play percussion, which is wonderful! So much fun )
a solo by Lucia what's-her-name, the violinist who is very very good. must find out her last name and check out her new cd. The solo included parts of Bohemian Rhapsody, which was suprising, being on a violin, but perfect. And hard, a showcase of her talent.
alla luce del sole (another favorite. I love the songs that sound classical then turn into this big loud pop song)
my december (yes, JG likes Linkin Park, and I like Linkin Park more because of this song. His voice is just wonderful on this one.)
caruso
remember when it rained (favorite off the Closer album, JG wrote it himself and plays piano throughout. Really makes me want a keyboard so I can attempt the same thing. Beautiful.)
vincent (aka starry starry night, a song about Vincent van Gogh, and how he killed himself, a favorite of JG's, pretty, but odd.)
remember me (Troy lives! Yes! Hah. even he said he was a little disappointed with the movie. ah well. troy footage showing behind him, but no orlando, alas. just shots of buildings and battles. man, when he belts out a song there is no one to compare.)
you raise me up (the big song for JG right now, unfortunately just at the edge of his range, so sometimes he sounds like he's straining. but pretty nonetheless. And damn me if I wanted to be the bishop dubourg high school choir...they got to sing along during the gospel section. eh. ran against them in high school...no way affton's choir would get picked for something as high profile as this. ah well...)

And for an encore...(you knew there was going to be an encore)

After he got the standing ovation (for a goodly length of time, I might add) he came back out and played his version of simon and garfunkel's america, which I didn't think I knew but turns out that I had at least heard it before. He did it solo on the piano, which just boosts him into the stratosphere in bonus points. anyone who can play and sing at the same time is amazing to me, since I have such a hard time doing it. And his voice never sounded better...just him and the piano, so pure and strong, even after singing for an hour.

Then he left and so did quite a few people, but the band (minus the string section from some orchestra in st. louis but I missed it...could have been the stl symphony but I'm not sure) came back out and they launched into never let go, which is another good song. Kinda suggestive if you listen to the lyrics One of the cool parts of the set was the big video screen just behind the band. most of the time it worked really well, like during RWIR, but there were times when you could tell that the projector wasn't getting turned off before the film ran out, because there would be this bright flash before it went black. Sort of distracting, but when it worked it was great. and if that was all the trouble they had on the first night of the second leg of the tour, after changing sets and songlists etc etc, I think it went quite well.

Met with the StLGrobanites before and after the show, which wasn't quite as weird as I thought it could have been. Before was at the Route 66 Brewery in Union Station, which probably has better food than what they served us, since it was quite a big group, but a little on the dry side. Got a goody bag with stickers and a glowpen (which came late and I forgot to bring to the concert for its specially designated waving times) and cookies which I'll eat tonight and a lyric book and a bookmark and probably other things I forgot.

Afterwards was in the lobby of the Drury hotel, where we waited a while for people to come back from hoping to see JG and his tour bus. The Savvis has a protected area for the busses so it's hard to catch a glimpse. Not like when I caught John Mayer at the Fox There weren't that many of us at first, and I actually left early because I did have to be at work today. Started an experiment late because I took off early on friday. Of course, just as I left saw more grobanites heading towards the hotel. Almost turned around but I was really tired. Glad but sad. Hopefully I'll catch up a little more with the people from the group on the boards later and make some friends...

Jen is a happy camper, and has a shirt and program to prove it.

Bring it on, John Mayer!

Random: I'm so glad the marriage act didn't pass.

Posted by Jen at 7:51 PM | Permalink |

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  Josh Groban: Oceano

file under: music

When I was browsing around the John Mayer fanclub site yesterday (wondering where my membership kit was), I found out that a new benefit for fanclub members was a chance to attend the soundcheck party before the show. Now, this is really cool, and I would love to go. But, problems...of course. See, I'm seeing the concert with my aunt and my cousin, which is wonderful, because I hate going to concerts alone...but guests aren't allowed at the party. Just the fanclub member. And the party starts at 3:15 in the afternoon, which means that I'd have to leave work pretty darn early to get out there. Which poses another problem...I really don't want to have to drive out there myself, because it would mean two cars to deal with. So I'd have to find someone to drive me out there and then have some way to meet up with my aunt and cousin without the use of a cell phone. And, while cameras are allowed at the soundcheck, they're not (I'm pretty sure) allowed at the concert itself. So once we've gotten past all the meeting up in the first place I'd have to have someone tell me where the car is so I can put the camera there. Stupid UMB for not having lockers, or not allowing cameras in the first place. Boo.

So, anyone wanna drive me? Maybe I'll take a day off. Can't take the day off, have work to do. Damn. Nothing in my life is easy.

But hopefully this weekend I'll meet some nice peopleGrobanites at the meet&greet before the Josh Groban concert on sunday. This should be interesting...never actually met up with music fans before...must find a yellow rose because apparently that's what shows you're a fan.

Anyone wanna go to the Hanson concert with me? lol. Don't think there'll be many takers there. But it's at the Pageant, a really cool venue in town (much nicer than UMB, I agree with Alex) and it's pretty cheap, and Hanson is a good band despite their pop image.

I want to see Harry Potter and Spider-man 2 again. I'm so silly

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for some reason the mt software isn't rebuilding the page, so this is just a test to see if the thing is getting written at all.

today was busy and sucky and I was tired and it's after 3 pm and I haven't had lunch yet. working on that soon. I just love it when I have TWO things that no one told me about just sort of plopped in my lap. ahhh, the beauty of a research job.

and I missed leo at the med school, boo.

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Saw King Arthur last night. Saw it alone because once again I've run into the 'need more offline friends' brick wall. Sometimes I hate being a loner. I don't mind that I saw it alone, although it was damn cold in the theater and quite empty for an opening night...thank goodness I brought an extra shirt and a book. Lots of fun imagery, but awkwardly edited. I enjoyed it, but it seemed like there were some parts missing. Had a good score though. Hans Zimmer may be derivitive sometimes but he still writes good music.

Seemed like there were some strange cuts from one scene to another...here's a shot of Woads getting ready for battle, here's a nice domestic scene...or here's the night before battle and then it's dark and suddenly Guenivere is sneaking into Arthur's room...and even though I knew they were separate groups, for quite a while it was hard to figure out who was Saxon and who was native Briton. Guess that's why they went with the super-blue people. Poor Merlin hardly got a mention.

Kiera Knightly is entirely too pretty for words. She looks good even when she's blue. Perhaps not the right accent for her acting region, but at least I was convinced she could be both queen and warrior. sometimes. Clive Owen, now, I could live without him. He's just not my type. Although I did start to like him better towards the end of the movie. He does seem like a Roman officer. I liked most of the knights of the Round Table...Gawain and Galahad were familiar, I knew I'd seen them before, but couldn't place them with all that hair! Gawain's actor also appeared in Ned Kelly (with your favorite and mine, Orlando Bloom) and Galahad was in some period drama that I'm not sure of but I know I've seen.

Ioan Gruffud is a good looking man, and he uses two swords as Launcelot...kinda like Legolas' white knives. Yay! Unfortunately the friendship between Arthur and Launcelot isn't really developed and there is nonexistent romance between Launcelot and Guenivere. I heard that Jerry Bruckheimer (producer) was pushing for an R but this ended up with PG-13, so I bet a lot of the romance got cut so there could be more 'violent' fighting sequences.

Warning: there's a spoiler ahead.

Launcelot dies! Damn them! Stop killing off the cute ones!

Silly reason, I know, but I really wanted to see a movie that opened on 7-7. Being that 7 is my favorite number, how could I refuse? Eh. I guess I should be used to going to work tired after movies by now.

Still wanna be an actor. Medieval costume drama anyone? I need a sewing machine so I can start working on all those patterns I bought last year. Merph.

Found out yesterday that Troy is no longer in theaters around the StL area. How sad! I wonder how long it will take to get to dvd.

Kareoke with Josh Groban I'm amused that I got my (single) ticket to the Josh Groban concert later this month probably about a month ago, but I'm just now getting my John Mayer tickets (for a concert just a few days later). And the greatly frustrating thing is that the JM tix are sent UPS...which means they can't deliver unless someon's home. Damn the inner-lobby mailbox! I really don't want to take off early to try can catch the deliveryman, but I guess I will. I can only hope that he comes around the same time he did yesterday, cause I'm not going to take off a half day the day before I go on vacation! Ah well. I guess it gives me more time to pack.

Softball tonight!

Posted by Jen at 12:27 PM | Permalink |

vote for ATTS: ER | Wishlist: {Amazon} |

  Billy Joel: The Ballad of Billy the Kid

file under: movies

Getting fairly excited here. Going shopping with Kate tonight for the big camping trip this weekend. Although I don't know how much camping we'll actually do...we're sleeping in the state park campgrounds, but we'll probably spend most of the day out of them...yay swimming in the lake! swimming at johnson shut-ins! stupid jen for not telling her mommy she was going camping!

d'oh. I guess I told my dad, but not my mom. Sorry mommy! Do good at Hearts Hands and Voices for me. Sorry I'll miss it. Meh.

Avoiding aikido class tonight because I have to go shopping and I don't want to go alone. Here's hoping they don't mind alternate nights, Alex!

Someone remind me to sign up for Orgo. blah. And I have to check out the Hanson concert at the Pageant later this month. Hmm. Three concerts in two weeks? Yes, yes, I know. Hanson. But they have a new cd out and it's cool! Shut up. I'm allowed my silly music tastes.

King Arthur comes out today. Too bad I'll be busy...unless Kate wants to see a late movie. Most likely not. Sad, so sad. Kiera Knightley is just too pretty, even when she's blue.

Posted by Jen at 5:55 PM | Permalink

vote for ATTS: ER | Wishlist: {Amazon} |

  Counting Crows: Colorblind

file under: getmoving

So the big news today is that John Kerry chose John Edwards for his running mate. Remember when I said that would be a good idea? I think it's a good choice. And obviously I know who I'm voting for come November. Now the Missouri congressional seat...that's a conundrum.

And here's another shoutout to the gotta-love-st-louis-weather...it's been crazy weather the last few days. Alternately hot and torrentially rainy, what a pain to get ready in the morning! And last night it was pretty horrible: in the middle of watching True Lies with the 'rents the power went out. When we called Ameren UE about an hour after the power was out the message said 93,000 people were without power...gaaah. And for those of you keeping watch on papershew.com, my mom's got another show this weekend, the one at St. Mark's, which is always a fun show...but the week leading up to a show, any show, is always horrendously busy for her, and this week even more so because she just got done with the daylily show and has to replenish her stock. So you can see how a power outage is not a good thing to happen this week. It was supposed to come on sometime in the night, but as of around 11 am it still wasn't on, and now they're saying not until 9 tonight! Agggh. Poor Mommy. Thank goodness the power didn't go out at the apartment, but it sure was weird driving down Lindell with no streetlights. All those million-dollar homes along there had no electricity...feel almost really bad for them. Slightly less because of that stupid rich daylily guy who wanted to come by my parents' at 6 am on July 4th. Gaah!

So yay Kerry!Edwards and booo power outage and random rich people who think everyone is up at insane hours on weekends/holidays.

Random question: why does no one visit the aspire exchange? I made it all pretty and then no one came. meh.

Posted by Jen at 2:41 PM | Permalink

vote for ATTS: ER | Wishlist: {Amazon} |

  Dashboard Confessional: Vindicated (Spider-man 2 sdtk)

file under: politics , rants

I can't believe it's July already! And Independence Day is this weekend...seems like the year has gone by awfully fast! All of my Three of my movie premieres have gone by! Here's to King Arthur and I, Robot.

So that entry I posted a few days ago about the title of the 6th Harry Potter book is true. It will be called Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, who is neither Harry nor Voldemort for those of you curious. I can't wait to read it...hopefully, hopefully it will be out soon. Too bad JK Rowling doesn't keep her readers quite as updated as LK Hamilton...

No softball game tonight, in honor of the holiday, I guess. So we're going to the batting cages near my house, which is an odd coincidence. I mean, there've got to be many batting cages around, but they choose Tower Tee Then we'll go to Fortel's Pizza Den, which will mark the, oh, fifth time in a little over a week that I've had pizza for dinner. Maybe I'll just skip the pizza and have toasted ravioli. Yay St. Louis treat!

Have a good one if I forget to blog tomorrow. Celebrate your Independence! And yay holiday on monday

Posted by Jen at 5:12 PM | Permalink

vote for ATTS: ER | Wishlist: {Amazon} |

  Josh Groban: Remember Me (Troy Soundtrack)

file under: books , celebration , getmoving