Thursday, February 24, 2011

Who You Got?

It's about to be one of my favorite Sunday's of the year. No, not the Super Bowl or anything sports related. This time it's about movies—February 27 is Oscar Sunday, and it's so fun trying to guess which way the Academy will go.

Here are my picks for the "big" stuff:
  • Best Picture: The King's Speech
  • Best Actor: Colin Firth in The King's Speech
  • Best Supporting Actor: Christian Bale in The Fighter (although I am cheering for Geoffrey Rush in The King's Speech
  • Best Actress: Natalie Portman in Black Swan
  • Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Leo in The Fighter (personally, I loved Helena Bonham Carter in The King's Speech
I have not seen all the Best Picture nominees, but at least there is a clear winner this year. Last year I didn't really feel like any of the nominees were a "best" of the year, but this year I fell in love with The King's Speech. If something else wins that I have not yet seen, it had better be amazing, because The King's Speech was the best movie of this awards season. I don't think it will win for Best Director, but I don't really know what will.

Oh, and just for kicks, I'm taking Inception for Film Editing, Sound Mixing and Sound Editing; Toy Story 3 for Animated Feature (it's way too tough to unseat Pixar, but How to Train Your Dragon was great); and Alice in Wonderland for Art Direction and Costume Design.

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Happy Birthday to My Grandma


Today is my Grandma's birthday. She rocks. Some tidbits about her:
  • She taught me how to sew and iron.
  • She also used to pick my sisters and me up everyday from school.
  • When she picked us up from school, my grandma always had some sort of ice cold drink for us. Mostly I remember that it was Tang.
  • She can't sit still!
  • She made dinner every night, packed it up, and sent it home with us when my mom picked us up on the way home.
Happy birthday, Grandma! You are the best person I know in this world, and I hope I can some day be as patient and kind as you.

By the way, the picture above is slightly old (circa 2006 I think), but I love this picture of my grandma and her girls.

Monday, February 21, 2011

Graced Characters. Graced Book?

GracelingGraceling by Kristin Cashore

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


In Kristin Cashore's Graceling, people live in a world where some humans have been graced by a particular skill or ability. It can be as amazing as the ability to read minds to extraordinary fightling capabilities to the perceived useless ability to climb trees or talk backwards. These individuals are marked by their "grace" by their eyes, which are always two different colors.

Interesting, right?

Unfortunately I couldn't get into this book until I reached the halfway point. Finally, there was something about the book that kept my attention. I'm in though, I'll give book two a go.



View all my reviews

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

My Hyundai Headache

Guess what. The hissing noise is back.

I didn't even mess around, and called the Hyundai dealership right away. The car went in the shop today, and of course they could not replicate the noise. But, they did determine that the A/C system had been overcharged and that my car was without a cabin air filter. No cabin air filter? What?!

My response was "Either it was never installed, or it was removed and not replaced at some point last year when the car was with you guys." They installed one. And, they recharged the system properly. We'll see how this goes...