My Boyfriend's Back

Sigh. My favorite Old Spice manly man is back for more. I want one.

Full 'Deathly Hallows' Trailer!

Okay, so, of course I devoured all of the Harry Potters books and I've seen the movies and very much want to go to the theme park, but I admit that since the book series ended and I have had some frustrations with changes in the last couple of movies and there are so many other things like the Twilight craziness that seem to be taking over the Harry Potter thunder, that I haven't been dying for the new movies. I mean, of course I wanted to see them and have the series concluded, but it was kind of a meh feeling. Until, dun dun duh!... I just watched this full trailer for the new Deathly Hallows movie coming out November 19th and was biting my lip and holding my breath the entire time! Gah! I forgot how great they are and now I want to go back and read them all again! It's like coming home to old friends, like my Amelia's, and those are the best kinds of stories ;)

Sanuk = Love (Well, Actually 'Fun,' But I Love Them)

So I have recently become obsessed with Sanuk footwear. The name is the word for fun in Thai. They have been out for several years and I have heard of them, but they are getting more popular and are starting to be available in more places. I believe the only place that actually carries them around here is REI, but there are only a few options to choose from. What actually led to to investigating them, funnily (and possibly embarrassingly?) enough, is that I was browsing Twitter a few weeks ago and Nina Dobrev, star of the TV show The Vampire Diaries posted a link to the Sanuk website, so I got curious and checked it out. I thought that they were so cute (plus I really only have flip flops and needed a good pair of summer shoes) so I ordered the 'Kitty Hawk' Sidewalk Surfers:

Little did I realize that they are not only visually appealing, but they are ridiculously comfortable as well. The Sidewalk Surfer is a deconstructed shoe upper on a sandal footbed, allowing the foot to bend and flex naturally. With the new construction, the Sidewalk Surfer has been labeled "Not-A-Shoe," creating a new category in footwear. Seriously, soooooo comfortable and breathable and adorable. The perfect summer shoe. 

I loved my pair so much right away, that I jumped on-line and splurged and ordered another pair. I wanted a pair that was a very different pattern from my Kitty Hawk's, so I went with the 'Del Mar' Sidewalk Surfers:

It was kind of a tough call, because I am not normally one for animal print apparel, but I love these 'I'm Game' Surfers as well:

I also love these 'Spring Flings' as well, but I wish they came in some colors besides just black. I could go for a nice, bold red:

Gah! I want them all!


I did, however, also order some Tubeflops. How fun are these!?! They are basically thin leggings built in to your flip flops! Perfect for boating mornings when you've got your swim stuff on but its still chilly out. LOVE:

The Tubeflops are pretty much for the ladies, obviously, but Sanuk has sandals and Sidewalk Surfers for Men, Women and Children too. It's fun in Thai. They are Green. Get a pair. Do it. I'm serious.

"If You're Not in New York, You're Camping Out" -Thomas E. Dewey

Back to the Big Apple! Wasn't I just here? Yes, but I love it! The last several times I have gone it was in Autumn and Winter, so it was kind of nice to be there in the summertime. Also, I typically plan my trips around a specific Broadway show that I am dying to see, and this time the trip was for more personal reasons. Not that we didn't fit a couple of shows in, (please, this is me we're talking about) but the reason for the trip was to attend the reception of my friends Brian & Isa. They actually got married back in the end of December, but had a belated reception. It was in Central Park and was super casual and it was so good to see them so happy!

My friend Adam and I (who are both friends with Brian from our BYU years) took a Thursday night red-eye flight and arrived in NY bright and early (and humidified) on very little sleep, but that hardly mattered. We stayed with our lovely friend Alli (another mutual friend from BYU- she is a nurse and her husband is at Med school at Cornell) and they graciously let us make a wreck of their living room all weekend.

Adam had been to NY before as well, but he had a little bucket list of things he wanted to do and we did a pretty dang good job of covering it considering we only had three days and Brian's reception was the main point of our trip and travel time getting all over takes up a lot. Things on the list we covered were:

1- The Metropolitan Museum (I go every time I'm in NY, but I love it)
2- The Guggenheim Museum (I had never been!)
3- The NY Public Library (I had also never gone here- really glad we did)
4- St. Patrick's Cathedral
5- Cruising out to the Statue of Liberty (Instead of taking the two hour ferry we took a speed boat- I would highly recommend it ;)
6- Top of the Rock (I had never done this either- its a look out at the top of Rockefeller Center. If you have never been to NY then you have to go up the Empire State Building, because, well, its the Empire State Building, but now that the Towers are gone, it doesn't have the best view anymore. Top of the Rock has a great view of the ESB and also of Central Park)
7- Serendipity! I can't go to NY and not go there either, apparently. I'm okay with it
8- Times Square and Broadway shows! We went to two shows, Memphis and Fela! They were both really great, and both won awards at the Tony's this past week. Memphis won the coveted Best Musical
9- Strolling/eating in Greenwich Village
10- Baseball game- the Yankees were sadly out of town, but we went to a Mets game at the new Citi Field
11- Most importantly, got to spend time with Brian and Isa and Alli and got to finally meet Alli's husband Dustin, who is great- it is so awfully thoughtful of my friends to keep marrying people that I like  ;)

Not too shabby for three quick days! Here are some pics!

LOST S6: E17 & E18 FINALE- 'The End'

...For a moment the unearthly stillness of the desert enveloped us...
Then Newman said, "My father once told me a story I always think of, when the going gets rough and things look hopeless. It's about Destiny….
Destiny came down to an island, centuries ago, and summoned three of the inhabitants before him. 'What would you do,' asked Destiny, 'if I told you that tomorrow this island will be completely inundated by an immense tidal wave?'' The first man, who was a cynic, said, 'Why, I would eat, drink, carouse and make love all night long!' The second man, who was a mystic, said, 'I would go to the sacred grove with my loved ones and make sacrifices to the gods and pray without ceasing.' And the third man, who loved reason, thought for a while, confused and troubled, and said, 'Why, I would assemble our wisest men and begin at once to study how to live under water.' "
I, too, never forgot that story. When our cause seems doomed and the future LOST, when despair becomes unbearable and the heart is on the edge of breaking, let men summon hope and honor and high resolve in yet one more stubborn affirmation: Come, let us assemble our wisest men and begin at once to think, to study, to try to learn – even to learn, if we must, how to live under water."
-Leo Rosten, Captain Newman, M.D.

Legen... wait for it... dary. From the music to the aerial shots to the battle in the rain to everything coming full circle with Jack lying down and closing his eyes in the same spot he woke up and opened his eyes in the very first scene of the very first episode... loved it. I suppose I will have to find something new to obsess over and blog about now. Sigh. Or get a life.

Little satisfying acknowledgments and reveals:

-LockeNess referring to Jack as the obvious choice, because that is what we were all thinking
-Kate snickering at the name Christian Shephard-Island Claire saying she is crazy
-Juliet is Jack's baby mama as hoped/confirmed (though I guess the little guy doesn't actually exist, sad.)
-The whole story has been a combination of elements from different mythologies and religions, and I love that it remained generic to the end- like Christian standing in front of a stained glass window with icons from several theologies

Things that choked me up:

Okay, so I pretty much started getting emotional from the moment the show began and the music played, but here are some specific times:

-Every time someone had a flashback sequence and finally remembered
-Charlie's face watching Claire from the stage-Kate helping Claire give birth to Aaron, again
-Sawyer whispering, I've got you, to Juliet

-Jack saying to Desmond I'll see you in another life, brother
-Jack's conversation with Christian in the end

Things that made me smile like a fool:

-All the people who remember smiling like idiots at the people who don't remember yet (Hurley at Charlie, the Kwons at Sawyer, Kate with Jack...)

-The joyous reunions that came with two people remembering at once (Sayid & Shannon, Sun & Jin, Sawyer & Juliet, Kate & Claire...)
-Boone already being in the know and he and Hurley giving Shannon & Sayid a little more time
-Ben's face to Hurley when he finally got to be the chosen one
-Jack & Kate's epic kiss on the cliff
-The symbolism of them protecting the Light on the island and then walking into the Light in the end

Favorite lines:

-Sawyer asking Jack what the Burning Bush had to say for itself (te he)
-Kate to Jack- you didn't ruin anything, nothing is irreversible... Hurley, this would be so sweet if we weren't all about to die
-When Desmond was going down the hole and said he would go where the light was brightest, all I could think was, second star to the right and straight on til morning! (From Peter Pan)
-Miles- I don't believe in a lot of things, but I do believe in duct tape

-Charlie- I was shot by a fat man

From the very first season, fans clamored around the theory that the island was Purgatory, and the writers/producers promptly shot that down. It was very clever that the twist is that its actually the Flash-Sideways world that is, maybe not Purgatory, per se, more like Limbo, or a literal passage to the light, for the dead to move on. It's a very nice idea that you create a perfect world to find those that matter most to you so that you can remember and let go and then move on together. The ending, with them all hugging it out in the church, which Kirsten aptly named, The Titanic Moment (as in the final scene of Titanic when Rose walks up the stairs and everyone (especially Jack- what a great name!) is there) was also wonderful. Everyone there but those who weren't quite ready to move on yet- Ben, Miles, Charlotte, Daniel... (and those spirits who are apparently trapped forever on the island like Michael?)

For several weeks now I have been suspicious of the to-good-to-be-true nature of the sideways world, feeling like it was some kind of Matrix. Then last week Desmond had me confused when he said that he was there to help them, let go. I was so caught up in it all that the realization of what was really happening didn't hit completely hit me until Jack walked into the Church and looked at the casket and I knew Christian wouldn't be in there because they were all dead. I had an eye-popping, jaw-dropping, make-my-friends-pause-so-I-could-get-a-grip-and-explain moment.

At first when it ended, feeling extremely overwhelmed, I felt like there was a lack of continuity with them all being dead since there were a few in the Island time, aka, Real Time, that were still alive. The more I think about it the more perfect it is though. They really did go through all of that and successfully saved the island and fulfilled their destiny. Those that died seem to have sort of, waited for those who lived so they could all move on together. Hurley and Ben had their moment of -you were a good second...you were a good first, so they really must have cared for the island together for a time. For how long? It hardly matters, because as Christian said, this place they created has no place and no time- they created what was familiar and contemporary to them so that they could all find each other and be together. Though they didn't confirm it, and that's okay, its nice to wistfully think that Desmond got back to his Penny, that Kate and Claire stayed friends and lived a full life loving Aaron, and that maybe Sawyer and Miles did become cop partners! So when Kate said to Jack, I've missed you so much, it really must have been a while for her since she lived years longer than him. (And who knows about Richard.) Its also fun to think of Hurley finding his groove as the new Jacob. He would be a friendly face to meet, with Ben-as-the-new-Richard being the intimidating one. What a pair. I wonder who Hurley chose as his replacement...

Genius. Fulfilling yet lingering. I'll miss it and I want more, but I agree that it was time for it to end. The whole episode answered enough, but was still beautifully ambiguous, which is fitting, because all of LOST has been one exquisitely mysterious journey. C'est la vie.

Little Brother is All Growed Up and Graduated!

So this is a couple of weeks belated, because I was lazy about getting the pictures uploaded, but two weekends ago I went to Bozeman, Montana for the college graduation of my (second of four) little brother Parker (fondly nicknamed 'Bug'). My folks are still out of the country, so I was the family representative. He was a film student and it was really a lot of fun having him show me campus and show me his art classrooms and videos they have worked on and what not. It made me sentimental for school and made me think that Film would have been a pretty awesome major since, if this blog is any proof, I kinda like media stuff. Sigh, bygones. Once Bug is on a roll, he is hiring me as his personal assistant, so we're good ;)

Here is a little slide show of my brief but eventful adventures in Bozeman:

Here is a video of Bug actually walking across the podium. You know, for the folks: