February! Where did you go? G's Birthday and Life...

 I kind of checked out a bit in February. Between the winter blues, health issues, life, ugh...whatever. I just didn't get on here. Anyhoo, G had his 14th birthday last month! What? It is hard to realize how much time has passed and how little there is before he starts making his way in the world in one form or another. 

I just love G and who he is and who he's becoming! We found out about a new conveyer belt sushi place nearby and G said that is where he wanted to go for his birthday dinner. We haven't been to a place like this as a family since we moved back from Japan so it was a real treat! 

The next weekend we took him and a few of his friends to a trampoline place and they went crazy for hours!

The other big stuff is the storms...wow, and we didn't even get hit like other states...we have not had this much snow since 2007?!

I also attended Sundance online and attended one movie with the family at the end of January. I am so happy they allow for the hybrid model since the pandemic.

Also got out of the house to snow shoe with my friends! Gorgeous. 


Movies at Sundance I really liked:

Going Varsity in Mariachi: This was a fantastic documentary on a specific mariachi high school band in Texas. I had no idea this was a thing and it was amazing to watch these extremely talented young adults work hard and love on their mariachi culture. If you get a chance to see it, please do it!

The Amazing Maurice: We saw this one in-person as a family and with my friend and her family. It's based off of one of the Discworld books The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents by Terry Pratchett. 

Onyx the Fortuitous and the Talisman of Souls: Was a weird gem! Kind of a horror-comedy but not scary at all. If you like weird probably soon-to-be cult-classic films this one's for you.
Fancy Dance and The Persian Version are honorable mentions.
Books Finished in February:
G agreed to do Battle of the Books with a group of his friends at school so I've been working through a few of them alongside him.

The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen-
I really liked this simple yet powerful story about Hannah, a modern Jewish girl who is transported back in time during the Passover. What's to remember during the Passover? Turns out a lot. Hannah experiences first-hand what it was like to be captured brutally with her people and thrown into concentration camps. I'm truly amazed how she was able to capture full-fledged characters and the awful history of the Holocaust into such a short book for middle schoolers.

A Divided Nation by Jennifer Nielsen--
Gerta and her family live in East Berlin, controlled by Russia, in the early 60s. Her father and her brother Dominic are in West Berlin during the night that East Berlin began putting up wired fences and then eventually the Berlin Wall.
Nielsen gives us a peak into what life was like for those who were caught on the wrong side of the wall through Gerta and her brother Fitz. Neighbor turning against neighbor as the Stasi listens in and demands obedience.
It's a great introduction for kids into what that time was like and hopefully after reading it will want to learn more!

Conspiracy: Why the Rational Believe the Irrational by Michael Shermer--
I really enjoyed the deep-dive into the psychology of conspiracism, how it works, and which conspiracies actually turned out to be true, like the conspiracy that started World War I. He also gives a pretty detailed analysis of some of the common conspiracies of our time like JFK's assassination and 9/11. He also gives us a lesson on common cognitive biases and how we can think through them as much as possible. It's a great book to have on the reference shelf.

Persuasion by Jane Austen--
This is a reread for me...third time! It's my favorite Austen. It was her last book before she died and it shows. I really feel it's her most mature novel. Harvard Press has released big annotated hardbacks for each of her books over the last few years and I am working my way through them! Pride & Prejudice was last year and this year Persuasion started me off.
Lots of interesting details about archaic English words and phrases. Info on what the different carriages were and looked like. And analysis by various people on why Austen said what she said or what things might mean. A whole new worlds opened up to me about the aristocracy and the Navy. They also talked about her more religious side coming out in particular in this novel...maybe due to her declining health? All stuff I would have had no idea about otherwise.
It's time to re-watch all the Persuasion BBC versions....

Aru Shah and the City of Gold by Roshani Chokshi (Aru Shah #4)--
I read this one aloud to G. We're now on the final book 5!!!!
This is my favorite series. Great character development. Wacky fantasy plots and hijinks. Kids who don't know what they're doing but trying to pretend they do and are so anxious about every choice and action and yet they still get up and try and forgive and laugh and cry. I love it!
Currently Reading:

I'm listening to Don't Fear the Reaper (The Lake Witch Trilogy #2) by Stephen Graham Jones. I didn't realize this was going to be a trilogy after I read the first one My Heart Is a Chainsaw. It was so good. So I am lapping this one up. It's an all-star cast! Different voice for each character. It's a slasher series so not for the faint of heart...
Upstream by Mary Oliver. I read her memoir/essays in the mornings to give me a good boost. Can she write or can she write? I can't even imagine having a brain like hers and absorbing all that information and spitting it back out. Wow. This is my first dive into Oliver and it's not going to be my last!
Fourteen Talks by Fourteen: The Essential Conversations You Need to Have with Your Kids Before They Start High School by Michelle Icard. G isn't out of middle school yet so I have time....
The Nineties: A Book by Chuck Klosterman. I've been wanting to read this one for awhile. The Nineties were my formative years and it's time for the walking of the memory lane...
Lost & Found by Kathryn Schulz. I'm over halfway now and I'm really enjoying her framing of the death of her beloved father and finding the love of her life, and now her wife.
Aru Shah and the Nectar of Immortality (Aruh Shah #5) by Roshani Chokshi. Final book, which is awesome and  also sad...
TV
DH and I have jumped on the bandwagon for The Last of Us. Never played the video game nor DH but everyone says it's pretty true to storyline. I'm loving it!
Picard is in its final season but everybody from TNG is back! Well, except for Wesley...I am loving every second of it. I'm also working my way through TNG. I'm on season six and halfway through the season the first season of DS9 premiered so I've challenged myself to rewatch that series alongside TNG. 

Poker Face (Peacock)--Natasha Lyonne is so good in this. Murder/mystery solve each week. New locales each week. New people she grows to care about...it's so different and yet familiar. I can't rave enough about this one.
Those are the highlights...whew.
March look ahead...
DH's birthday is this month. It's the big 5-0 and he is not looking forward to it but we're celebrating with friends anyway! There's St. Patrick's Day. And let's not forget it's the start of spring!!!! I am so excited to be done with this winter. It'll be miserable and cold for another month or so but still...
Also...we are planning to move in the next few months or so. We're frantically getting our house ready to put on the market. We're moving up in the world. We've been wanting a house for awhile now and even though we should've done it last year for the best bang for our buck with interest rates and all that...it is what it is. A lot of our time is going towards this goal. No crazy out of state move, thank goodness but we are excited to find something a bit closer to DH's work.
Bookwise...I hope to read a book or two by an Irish author like maybe Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan or a murder mystery by Dervla McTiernan...

Sundance Film Festival Favorites

 

I spent the last half of the week of January and the first half of the week in February watching all the movies and all the things at the Sundance Virtual Film Festival! And oh what a treat! I will watch all the things virtually, thank you very much. What a success. They should feel so proud to pull off such a wonderful festival that so many people could participate who couldn't otherwise. There is no possible way even without a pandemic that I could ever watch as many wonderful films as I did without doing it virtually! It's taken me a week to get back to the real world and recover. I stayed up too late and still had work to do the next day along with watching all the things. I truly hope they do some form virtually next year so I can still participate next year and in ensuing years!

Also a big thank you to my family for helping me participate this year. DH enjoyed a couple of movies with me and this was like a mini vacation for me so lots of stuff went neglected...

Here are a few pics I took from home. Corner left is Robin Wright talking about her film Land that she wrote and directed and starred in. Top right is the crew from Passing, and bottom is the crew from Mayday.

For everyone who signed up for at least one movie they offered a free screening of a movie from a previous Sundance premier...Columbus. It was a beautiful film and glad I got to enjoy it for free.

Jan 28th I watched one movie Censor at the 10 pm premiere. It was a trip! I enjoyed it immensely but it's made for the fans of slasher movies from the 80s, especially from the UK and their "Nasties." There was quite a wave of hysteria around those movies apparently at that time.

They also premiered their Shorts series and Shorts documentaries, and Animation Spotlight. I watched two sets of their Shorts, but due to some miscommunication I wasn't able to see the last two short films of the first section, which makes me so mad since the one I wanted to see the most was the last on that section! It figures.

Short series #4: My favorite that I saw was Doublespeak about a woman who reports sexual harassment from her boss but since she can't 'prove' it they say they can't do anything it about it. It's a very powerful little film.

Documentary shorts #1: So many good ones in this set. This Is the Way We Rise stands out for showcasing how words and poetry can instill power and activism. They focus on Indigenous people from Hawaii standing up for their land rights and the young woman who helps bring them together.

Jan 29th I watched the documentary Bring Your Own Brigade. It's a big piece. Full of characters, fires, death, and policy. I think the director put too much in; it's a bit bloated and long. But it's still an important work and I highly recommend it when it gets distributed! It focuses on the fires of 2018 and everything in between, from the causes, how to manage the land, who gets hit the hardest, and what to do for the future. Highly recommended!

The next movie I really enjoyed was Knocking, a Swedish horror that focuses on gaslighting women and how hard it is for women to be believed even when they're right. But it's even harder when they are faced with mental illness. 

Documentary Shorts #2: G was able to watch one of these with me The Field Trip. They film a field trip to a JA Biz Town in Oregon where kids spend the day having "jobs" to do like adults. G did this same thing but where we live a couple of years ago with his grade. They let the documentary speak for itself and it was a bit troubling to see how the kids "lived" up to their expectations whether great or small. "CEOs" talking down to others. Kids getting really stressed out over paperwork. Yikes! 

When We Were Bullies was also a haunting short. A man remembers bullying a kid with his class after school when he was in the fifth grade in New York. He ends up tracking down everyone involved and trying to figure why.

Jan. 30th I watched three movies but the only one I'll mention is Passing adapted and directed by Rebecca Hall and based off a book by Nella Larsen from the 1920s. It stars Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga. Just gorgeous and haunting. I loved it. Definitely a must-see when it comes out!

Jan. 31st I watched 4 movies and all of them were really fantastic. But my favorite was Mayday. It's a retelling of some Greek mythology, specifically the Sirens. There are lots of layers and lots of powerful women. It's different because it crosses so many genres. But it's a powerful film and can't wait to see it again. So definitely look for that one! 

The others I'll mention and that you definitely should see when they come are: Marvelous and the Black Hole, an adorable coming-of-age story that deals with grief. Land, also about grief. And First Date, which I found to be a really fun film.

Shorts #3 section was really great. My favorite, though, was Wiggle Room. A woman in a wheelchair needs to visit the insurance agency in order to get reimbursed for the ramp she built. Red tape ensues and then another disgruntled client causes mayhem. She ends up saving the day. Such a great little film.

Feb. 1st I watched two films. Ma Belle, My Beauty was excellent. It takes place in a quaint Southern French village. The director says to pair the movie with a good red French wine! I definitely will do that next time I see it! There's lots of romance, polyamory, specifically, which was great to see on film. 

Shorts #1 section my favorite was Don't Go Telling Your Momma. The director did an ABCs theme on experiences of being Black in America. Very powerful and touching. BJ's Mobile Gift Shop was also really interesting. A man literally has a suit case full of useful items that he sells to people when in need. 

Shorts #2 section there were a lot of very interesting ones. One man made a short on the urban legend of how Phil Collins made his song In the Air Tonight. LATA we experienced a day-in-the-life of a domestic worker in India. It was really moving.

Feb. 2nd I watched 4 films. Violation was my amazing, but it is not for the feint of heart. A woman seeks revenge and we go on this journey with her. Truly terrifying but so well done! We're All Going to the World's Fair is a homage to the creepy pasta genre. Excellent performances but I wasn't quite the target audience. 

Life in a Day 2020 was offered to Utah locals so I took advantage. Truly touching film. The editing was phenomenal. It's on YouTube now for free. So please check it out. The day was in July of last year and it's truly an amazing film.

Feb. 3rd I watched 6 films! I caught up on the films I couldn't get to before and ones that won the awards at Sundance. I watched stuff back to back and I still could not get them all in!

Summer of Soul (...or, When the Revolution Couldn't Be Televised) was amazing! If you see only one documentary this year, make sure it is this one! Harlem had their own music festival the summer of Woodstock. It was professionally filmed but nobody wanted to buy the rights and air it. So it sat in a basement for 50 years until now. Questlove brought this all together and interviewed people who were in the audience and people who had participated. So many people were there! He takes us through so many of the performances and brings context to the times. Powerful. This was my favorite of the Festival.

CODA (child of deaf adults) was a great one too. Apple just bought it for tons of money to distribute it and it will definitely be a crowd-pleaser.

On the Count of Three was a funny and dark movie that explores what makes life worth living.

Flee is a documentary on a man who had to flee Afghanistan as a child and relocated to Sweden. It's a harrowing journey that is done through animation in order to keep him anonymous. The director explores the trauma that people carry especially as children. Powerful and a must-see.

Writing With Fire focuses on an all-women newspaper in Northern India. It explores the caste system, and the violence and poverty and injustice that these women try to expose and change. They're constantly under threat as well. It's a must-see documentary and look forward to its eventual release.

I am just so grateful I got this opportunity. I don't know if I'll ever get it again. So I ate it up and let it soak in. 

Sundance and Seeing Austenland

Monday night I took my husband to attend a screening as part of the Sundance Film Festival here in Utah. It was so much fun. We headed up through Salt Lake City and grabbed a bite to eat and then another hour up to Ogden.

Ogden seems a bit out of place for the Sundance Film Festival but they have an amazing theater, the Peery's Egyptian Theater. It holds over 800 people and there were more than enough to fill all those seats.

Inside the Egyptian Theater

Stock photo from Austenland

We had to stand in line for a long time to get in but I got our tickets early and so we were one of the first people in line and in the theater. My husband is such a fun person. When he's really excited and feeling good, he's such a people person. So he talked to everyone in line and found out where they were from, how long they had been attending/volunteering. He even found a fellow Portlander where they talked about the old days of organs and bubbles of his youth...

Archie and I chilling before the movie

The theater also hosts one of the few pipe organs left in the country and so we were serenaded by organ music before the movie started. So amazing. The atmosphere is electric with people excited to see everything. I know I was.

Pipe organist!

This showing was not the premiere of Austenland. That happened two nights before down in Park City so I didn't think we'd get any of the actors up in Ogden, but the director and writer (they're locals) were there and after the movie, they answered questions.

Drinking chai tea by the fire before movie

The movie is FUNNY! Jerusha Hess managed to take subpar material and really turn it into something visually as well as do a script upgrade with the actual author. The whole audience just guffawed almost through the whole movie. I was crying! Busting a gut, what have you. Romance didn't work very well, but it didn't in the book either so I wasn't expecting much in that area but if you want a really funny movie, this is it. You can tell the actors and the crew just had a blast. It really does make the movie come alive.

I was soooo excited for this to start!

After the movie there was a Q&A session. It was just fun and exciting to see the director and writer up there just being funny and personable and talking about their experiences. How can I put it? It was just really cool.

Jerusha Hess (director) and Shannon Hale (book author)

They even had a live band next door and a few appetizers to eat and we sat and listened to music and ate a few cucumber sandwiches.

It was an amazing experience and one we look forward to experiencing every year!

Sundance Film Festival 2013

I live in Utah and I have never ever attended the Sundance Film Festival. It's literally less than two hours away from me, and it's really not too expensive if you want to make a day out of it and see 1 or 2 movies and maybe a bite to eat. So....I finally decided this year was the year! My hubby and I are seeing Austenland, a book-to-movie film by Shannon Hale. The film has been written and directed by the same people who did Napoleon Dynamite and Nacho Libre (Jerusha and Jared Hess). While I know those films weren't everyone's favorite, they are two of mine. Napoleon Dynamite reminds me a lot of my own childhood--similar boredom, dresses, paneled walls, 70s green lamps, and crazy creatures in the backyard.

Austenland was not my favorite Austenesque book, but it had its moment,s and since it had a lot of potential, I'm hoping it will turn into a great homage to Austen and her characters, along with some funny romance.

My devoted husband is taking the day off, mom's watching our son, and we're heading up for the whole shpeel next Monday! I don't know if I'll see any celebrities, but I'll keep my eyes peeled. In any case, it's a date without our child. It'll be fun no matter what.

Gabe moment this week: He's potty training....and this is what he came up with while playing with his Tiggers: