Not that it’s anything to brag about, but I saw the new movie Shutter not once, but twice this weekend!  It was pretty good, if you like movies like The Ring and The Grudge.  There are a few other movies people say Shutter is like, but I haven’t seen them.  It did remind me a lot of The Ring – they were both super-natural ghost stories.  I should have known I’d like it, at least that I’d like it better than Doomsday, because the guy who gave Doomsday an “A” rating on movies.com gave Shutter a “D”!  I’m starting to think he’s a moron.  I gave you the quote he made about Doomsday in a previous post of mine; he talked about how great all the violence was, yada, yada, so just to prove his idiocy, here is a snippet of what he thought of Shutter:

“As unfrightening PG-13 horror films go, this unfrightening PG-13 horror film is the most unfrightening of the year. It’s even more unfrightening than The Eye, which featured such unfrightening scenes as Jessica Alba yelling into an oven. This one has unfrightening scenes of Joshua Jackson sitting in a chair. Okay, there is one jumpy moment. That happens when Joshua Jackson turns around really fast in that chair. All the 11 year-olds in the audience went, “AUUGGH!” when that part happened. So if you’re 11, then that part is really going to freak you out.”

So according to the movies.com review guy, a movie is not good or scary if it doesn’t have at least 3 decapitations, exploding animals, and some cannibalism.  Whatever.  He does have a point though – the 11-year-old in the theater with us was scared silly – which brings me to the reason we saw it twice in one day…

Grandma was in town for a visit.  Despite the impending snow storm (again), she was able to travel the 200+ miles to see her grandchildren, thank goodness.  Who would have believed that we’d have to deal with Grandma almost having to cancel her spring break trip to Ohio because of still more SNOW!  Thank you, Grandma, for taking the time and energy it took to come early to ensure the special time you were able to spend with the girls wasn’t ruined by yet another snow storm.  So anyway, with Grandma being in town, that left Hubby and I with a whole afternoon and evening to ourselves!  Snowstorm or not, we were going to make the most of it…  So we saw a matinee of Shutter, which we enjoyed.  It wasn’t scary, comes no where close to the creepiness of The Ring, but it was entertaining, and it saved itself from getting unbearably cheesy several times…  A lot of the reviewers didn’t like it, but I think they’re just sick of the whole PG13-Asian-horror-movie-remake genre.  As a side effect of the PG13 rating, during our matinee, there were obnoxious teenagers in the theater.  Their laughing and running up and down the aisles wasn’t totally obscene, but it did take away from some of the enjoyment of a horror movie.  When they left the movie at the end, they had a younger boy with them who looked scared beyond belief.  I think maybe all the laughing and whatnot was because they were actually really nervous and scared.  So, when we explained their antics to the movie theater manager, they were completely understanding and told us we could go ahead and see it again.  I didn’t really catch anything that I missed the first time (except for one itty bitty scene where I dozed yet again), but it was fun to watch a horror movie again that no one else in the theater had seen yet because it was its first day out in the theaters – you knew when the scary parts were coming and could watch the whole theater jump and gasp.

If you are a fan of the PG13-Asian-horror-movie-remake genre, I think you’ll like Shutter.  If not, it might not be what you’re looking for in a movie, unless you’re between the ages of 14-23.

I just wanted to get that Godtube video up before continuing writing.  I can’t believe it’s been three days since my last post (not counting the first Easter post of course!).  Well, yesterday was a busy day.  Friday was, well, Good Friday.  Like a Good Friday should be, it was a very dreary day outside- snowing for most of the day.  After shoveling (for the last time until next winter I hope!) I headed out to the church.

The service that day was like a tour.  The first stop of this “tour” was worship time.  They basically played a loop of songs.  From the bulletin we were given, it looked like they played the same five or six songs over and over for the five hours (with periodic breaks of just instrumental music).  I hope they switched off bands throughout the night- playing the same songs for five hours straight would be kind of grueling.

Anyway, the songs would prepare our hearts for the next part of the “tour”, which we could skip to at any time.  This part had signs and card packets all around telling us why Christ had to die.  There was even a projected image of this on the wall.  There were many, many reasons along with Bible verses supporting each reason.  I think I read maybe half of them as I walked through.

Next was a meditation area where we would see constant changing images of Christ’s “trial” and execution.  This actually wasn’t working for some reason when I arrived, but they finally got the projectors going before I moved on.  Step four of the our had us write our own sins and nail them to a large wooden cross.  There was a long wait for this as there were I think only two or three hammers.  We could also leave the cards in a basket at the foot of the cross.

The final stage was communion.  We would go in the room, grab our own bread (small cracker) and wine (grape juice) and take some time to reflect, pray, and take in the two elements all on our own time.  All in all it was a very somber mood throughout the evening, befitting of a day like Good Friday.

Saturday I was at the church after 1:30 (supposed to be at 1:30, but as usual I was late) for choir rehearsal.  The worship music the day before had been somber, but the Easter music we had been practicing was anything but.  Where Good Friday was a time of reflection, Easter is a celebration!  We actually did very well according to several people.  It was a lot of singing- not just the four special songs we were doing as a choir, but five worship songs as well.  It was near constant singing from almost the time I got there on Saturday until after 5:30, and again today.  The well-wishers’ critiques must have been spot on as our time to be there this morning was pushed from 7AM to 7:25, but it was still a bit grueling with so much singing- two services plus the rehearsal (similar to what felt like two rehearsals last night plus the service).  I was actually supposed to sing at the end Saturday night (about 6:25ish) but I felt I was needed in the children’s ministry as there was only one leader besides another choir member and myself there, and the other choir member went back down to sing the final song.  I was able to sing this song the two Sunday services however.

So here we are, voice resting for now.  I really should practice singing more often.  My voice held out this time, but there have been times in the past where my endurance didn’t last through all the services.  I remember particularly from when there were four services at one time before the second campus opened and many people went there instead.  That one extra performance turned out to be a killer of my voice.  But I don’t sing in the choir all for me.  It’s about giving back to God.  He gave me this talent, so it’s only right to use it to give some back to Him.

Once again, HAPPY RESURRECTION DAY!!!

Okay, trying to make people say Resurrection Day instead of Easter is just pointless. If you’d like, Happy Resurrection Day! The celebration of Jesus Christ’s victory over death is upon us once again! Hallelujah! No, I wasn’t calling you over, Hallelujah (private joke: there is a boy named Hallelujah in one of the classes I teach). Now that you’re finished cheering, I have a Godtube video to share. Godtube is like Youtube (ya think?) only it’s all about Christ. My pastor showed a video in church a few weeks ago that really shows using dance/drama what God’s love is all about. He loves us so much He went through the humiliation of becoming a man and the pain and suffering of becoming a sacrifice- the sacrifice for us. Anyway, on to the video. Let me see if this works…

<edit> Nope. I guess we can’t embed videos- hey C, any way we can turn this feature on? like embed, target = _blank also gets cut out of the code when trying to make a link open in a new window. Anyway, here’s the link:

[godtube]https://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=ee73e63418003b47d7d5[/godtube]

Last night’s excursion to Too-lee-doo was full of thrills, chills and did I mention I saw The Lion King? Getting there and enjoying the breathtaking splendor of live theatre was great, getting back was another story entirely. I will concentrate on the show and leave the adventure getting home for another time.

As I noted in a previous blog, the stage production of Lion King includes several songs which were not in the movie. Some of these include: Morning Report, Endless Night, and Shadowland. My favorite new song has always been Endless Night. It is sung by Simba in Act II. It is a beautiful soliloquy in which the lion struggles to decide whether or not to return to the Pride Lands and fight for the throne which is rightfully his or stay and remain hidden in his new life of Hakuna Matata.

Aside from the new songs, everything about seeing the masterpiece on stage is brilliant The puppetry used to personify several characters (towering giraffes, leopards, antelope, and countless other animals) must have taken hours to design and be implemented. The choreography is stunning. Perhaps even more spectacular is the use of African-style chant to enhance the atmosphere. My companions and I were curious as to the English translation for the lyrics. Also of interest was the number of African natives who made up members of the cast. Surely some degree of pride must be felt among them as they sing words native to their homeland.

I would HIGHLY recommend taking the entire family to see this excellent production. One or two of the scenes may be a bit intense for the very young; however, if they have ever seen the movie , it is no more intense than what is seen in it. There were several children in the audience (perhaps no younger than 5) with looks of utter awe and wonder. It is a great way to introduce the whole family to the spectacular world of live theatre..

Tonight I had the privilege(?) of watching my brother’s three children (ages 3, 9, & 12). Pretty wild until about 8 o’clock when I stated that it would be silent while we watched “Smallville” after playing the Wii.  I did pretty well but got my brains beat in by a 5th grader playing Super Smash Brothers Brawl.  This is DEFINATELY NOT my Super Mario Brothers game. Speaking of getting beaten by a 5th grader., I allowed the two oldest tykes to stay up and watch “Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?”  This is a very fun show with America’s redneck, Jeff Foxworthy, serving as host.  Tonight’s first contestant was a very pregnant female who seemed to draw inspiration by rubbing her belly.  I hate true or false questions: “Africa is the only continent where elephants exist naturally in the wild.”  Katherine eventually answered enough questions with the help of 3 of the five 5th grade students to win $50,000.The second contestant did not fare as well.  The orange grower needed help on his first three questions.  If not for the assistance of two 11 year olds, Vince would have been one of the poor, unfortunate souls who left the show with zip, zero, nada.  “How many times does the letter z appear in the word (lizard)?” Vince’s answer: 2.  Two other equally challenging questions followed.  The orange man did however manage to go home with $25,000.All in all a comparatively calm night to some I have had with the three little darlings. Since spring break begins tomorrow, I do not think big brother would mind the kids staying up one hour past their bedtime. Who knows when he will return from his poker game?   

Thanks to my awesome husband for finding this…  I haven’t had a chance to try it yet but I am about to, so I will post my best score…  which will probably be at least twice the score of you “experts” out there!  Oh well, they are fun…  let’s see how this one compares: https://www.gigarcade.com/full-960-MiniPutt-3.html

…is the title of an AP article I read the other day about the price of celebrity divorces, inspired by, of course, the McCartney-Mills divorce that’s been dominating the headlines lately.  I took note of this article because I was surprised that the McCartney-Mills settlement was not in the top 5 most expensive divorce settlements.  In fact, the top 5 were surprising to me; just people I would not have guessed that would have had that much money or who would have not been able to protect themselves and their assets any better.  Actually, the McCartney-Mills divorce settlement at $48.6 million equaled a little over half of # 5 on the list.  Here it is:

1.  Michael and Juanita Jordan – possibly more than $150 million settlement pending, 2006.

2.  Neil Diamond and Marcia Murphey – $150 million, 1994.

3.  Steven Spielberg and Amy Irving – $100 million, 1989.

4.  Harrison Ford and Melissa Mathison – $85 million, 2004.

5.  Kevin Costner and Cindy Silva – $80 million, 1994.

I wonder what some of these amounts would be if adjusted for inflation also.  This article would have been a little more interesting if they had included the wedding date or how long the couple was together before the divorce.  I am often amused when I look in the local newspaper and see divorces between couples who were only married a few years, some only a few months!  My dear friends are wedding photographers, and they’ve shared at least one story of a couple who was no longer together by the time their wedding photos were ready to be picked up!  It’s amusing, yet sad at the same time, especially of course any time there are children involved.  I wish people would think a little bit harder about the commitment and sacrifice involved in marriage, and I wish that more people would treat marriage like the institution it was meant to be. 

This was a favorite line of one of my past coworkers. Speaking of coworkers, this isn’t a story about students not getting along- it’s about two middle school teachers! Someone tell these two that they’re supposed to be role models! Click link for story.

Teachers Who Got in Fist-Fight Arrested

And just so I don’t have to write another post, there’s a link on that page about a school staff member dying his hair green for St. Pat’s day. The principal apparently wasn’t a fan of the day…

Udpate: News item scrolled off the links. Here it is:

Educator Sent Home for Dyeing Hair Green

The movie Doomsday is about a virus that wipes out all of Scotland.  I’m not really inspired to write much about it because I didn’t like the movie.  I can’t even think of anyone I know who would.  I wasn’t bored at the theater, but you couldn’t pay me to watch this movie again.  First of all, it wasn’t my type of movie.  It was sci-fi and took place in the future, which is already 2 strikes against it as far as I’m concerned.  And then there was the violence.  The never-ending, non-stop, constantly gruesome and always bloody violence.  People died in any and every way you can imagine and some hopefully you can’t.  I lost count after 5 decapitations, all very graphic, and there were also scenes of people getting squished, burned alive, smashed by cars…  like I said, you name a method of torture, it was in this movie.  I was not expecting this.  I thought the movie was going be more like Outbreak, where people try to combat the virus together – I would classify that as more of a drama from what I can remember.  After seeing Doomsday, I even had a dream involving severed limbs last night…  thank goodness it wasn’t nearly as graphic or bloody as the movie…  I wouldn’t even classify it as a nightmare.  And don’t go thinking I’m some kind of weirdo – if you were exposed to almost 2 hrs. of that kind of violence, you would understand why it came across in my sleep!  But anyway, Doomsday definitely goes on my Worst Movies I’ve Seen list.  So far the list consists of:

1.  The Night Listener

2.  The Producers (2005)

3.  Doomsday

4.  The Devil’s Rejects

5.  Meet the Spartans – I’m actually going to remove this one – it doesn’t really qualify as a movie, plus I didn’t see the whole thing.  I KNEW it was going to be horrible, but my husband wanted to try it for some reason…  we lasted for about 10 mins, if that.

This list is in no particular order.  It’s really difficult to do that because they were all horrible in their own unique ways.  I liked the original Producers (1968), but I never even saw the whole remake with Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick because I couldn’t get past the first scene, which is rare for me, usually I will stick it out.  The Night Listener was horrible because it was predictable and dumb, but I would much rather sit thru that movie again than be subjected to Doomsday and all the violence again…  But when I saw each of them for the first time, I was more entertained by Doomsday than by The Night Listener…  so it just depends on the movie and what you mean by worst.  But they are all worthy of being classified as the worst movies I’ve ever seen, for one reason or another, some more than others.

I was totally surprised that Doomsday ended up being so bad after seeing that movies.com gave it an “A” as a rating!  I used to have this theory that I would go opposite whatever the critics said about a movie, and I think I will have to continue that trend.  If I remember correctly, Ebert and Roeper gave Devil’s Rejects “2 Thumbs Up”.  As I said, movies.com liked Doomsday, but I think the following excerpt of their critic’s review just about says it all – I say, see this movie at your own risk, on a dare, or if for some reason you are getting paid.  Otherwise, don’t bother with it, don’t know why we did!

From movies.com:

 “Name something you want in an ultraviolent action thriller and this movie delivers it. Impalement, decapitation, decapitated heads being affixed back onto bodies only to then take arrows through the skull and fall off again, motorcycles decorated with human skeletons, cannibalism, exploding bunnies, insane car chases, wacky costumes, incomprehensible editing, an indestructible a hot chick heroine (Rhona Mitra, who looks like what would happen if Kate Beckinsale and Victoria Beckham had a baby that was the Terminator) whose hotness grows in tandem with the number of people she mows down in the name of truth. Does it suck? Sorta. Is that awesome? Absolutely. In terms of sheer excitement, it’s the best movie of 2008.”

NOTE FROM ME – Best movie of 2008?  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we’re only in the 3rd month!

I say Resurrection Day because the word Easter is used in reference to the spring celebration with eggs and easter bunnies.  Resurrection Day rather refers to the holiday we Christians celebrate at the same time, the resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ.  He was murdered on a cross by a reluctant Pilate at the insistence of the Jewish leaders who were blinded and could not see that He really was the Messiah they were waiting for as He came in humility rather than in power, to teach rather than to conquer.  There will come a day of course when He does finally come to destroy the ones who reject him and build a new Heaven and Earth for Him and His people, but for now we wait and celebrate what He has done so far in offering a way out of the darkness we call sin.  That He was resurrected shows all that He has victory even over death, what many think of as the final conclusion to ourselves.

First of course we must remember His death- His unfair trial, His suffering, and his being nailed to a cross in the most brutal form of execution know in those days.  Good Friday, as it is known except by school districts that now refer to it as a “non-attendance” day, is the day we remember this horrible death.  I of course have the bonus of it being a day-without-pay so I can really feel the suffering. 😛  Kidding of course, but it is a serious day.  Our church is actually doing something a little bit different this year.  We are still called to attend wearing black, but instead of a drama (I was in it 7 out of the last 8 years!) and a message it is apparently an open-ended service where we can come at any time within a 5-hour window.  More on this after Friday as I really don’t know anything more about it.

We are preparing for Easter with the choir and it is coming along nicely.  Of course tonight we will probably have a train wreck as we’re told to sing from memory- no sheet music for us when we’re up there!  Of course the train wreck will be followed by further improvements as we improve in our confidence of the music and, just as important, will actually be looking at the choir director instead of the music! 😀  And once it’s over, a week of (unpaid) rest follows…