I'm back!!!

Currently: drinking wine

I don't have much to add right now, but I had to comment on my new favorite thing. My new laptop. I currently purchased a Mac Book Pro (not the newest model, but the one just before that). I love love love it.

I haven't been able to play on it too much because I worked 13.5 hours today, but I'm going to try really really hard to accomplish that over the next few days.

October was an extremely busy month for me so it may take me awhile to update this with my recent adventures, but I'll try my hardest.

Until then...

ODD FACT:
No piece of square dry paper can be folded more than 7 times in half!

I'm sad and it's Labor Day Weekend!!

Current Mood: Heartbroken

So my current favorite author Stephenie Meyer was planning on writing the last book of the Twilight universe (everyone hoped there would eventually be more but for now this was the last of it) called Midnight Sun. It was to be Twilight, but from Edward's perspective. I read the first chapter that she had on her website and it was amazing. Twilight is tied with New Moon as my favorite book of the series and this first chapter of Midnight Sun made me think it was going to be better than any of them. So there was no release date for the book, but Stephenie told us she had 12 chapters finished and was planning on getting back to writing it after the Breaking Dawn craziness calmed down. I knew I was going to have to wait for it, but I figured it was going to be amazing and I already knew most of the story from Twilight, so I could wait.

Now it's on hold indefinately! Someone (Stephenie won't tell us because she knows her fans will tear that person apart!!) leaked the unfinished manuscript onto the internet and Stephenie is so upset that she can't continue writing it right now and doesn't know when or if she will.

Here is a link to her website and her statement on the issue. She has posted the partial manuscript so fans don't have to illegally go out and read it and I'm torn. If she does get around to finishing it then I don't want to read this version, but if she doesn't and this is the only thing out there... I have to read it right??

I wonder a bit if this is some type of publicity thing or something for her to put out there so she can work on it in peace, but then I can't see her posting the unfinished product on her site and this is creating even more controversy. I don't know what to think or do. Knowing myself I'm sure I'll read it. I bet I can hold out for about 2 or 3 weeks and then my curiosity (or I guess obsession) will take over and I'll read it.

I've ranted now time for food...

ODD FACT:

If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days, you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee.

I'm trying to stay up-to-date...

Currently watching: The Olympics (only 2 more days left)

Ok, so last weekend Jason come to town from Vegas (he is a mutual friend through my friend Sarah) so we hung out with him all weekend playing the Wii and drinking some beer. Myra came down Saturday night and hung out with us as well. The Wii is really fun, but you get tired from all that moving around. If you haven't tried it yet - you must. It's lots of fun. I love the Tennis (although I'm not very good at it...) and Boxing is fun, but you wear out quickly playing it. Sunday we got together for brunch with the guys before Jason had to head back to Vegas. Then we went back to Sarah's and swam in the pool for several hours. My tan is getting pretty good from all the sun I've seen this year. I've managed to spend more time at the beach and by the pool this year. YAY!! Before Myra left I had to help her with her Myspace page (she is really new to it...) and uploading some music to her computer.

The Outside Sales DVD release party at the House of Blues (on Sunset) this last Wednesday:
So this feature film I worked on about 3 years ago finally went to DVD and they had a fun release party for it. Free bar and a red carpet entrance. It was fun at first and then I talked to all the people I knew (about 6 total) and had a few drinks and then I was bored. Blayne and Brandon (the guys that created it) are great, but they had to make the rounds and talk to everyone and Sarah had to work, so I ended up leaving after about an hour and a half because I got tired of trying to strike up conversations with people I hadn't seen in about 3 years (except the 2 or 3 that I saw at the screening of their 2nd movie - Weather Girl). It was a good experience, but it would have been better if I had a "wingman."

Today's excitement:
It was my friend Dave from work's 40th birthday, so I got him a little chocolate cake and a few of us took him to lunch. It was a fun little afternoon outing... I even got some pictures.
Pavel and Dave (the birthday boy)



Pavel, Dave, Tom, and Kyle (in my sunglasses)



Then I went to the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences building for a great gallery exhibit on set decoration. They had most of the set decorators there from the new Mummy movie, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, The Spiderwick Chronicles, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Get Smart, Iron Man, and a few others. They spoke to us about decorating the sets for the movies and we got to ask questions and talk to them afterwards. It was great! Follow this link to see some more information and some pictures of the sets that were on display.

I'm off to the LA Zoo tomorrow, so I'm sure I'll have pictures from that.

Oh, on a side note...
FACEBOOK - I'm addicted to the flair application. You know the little buttons that say things. I could search on there forever... Just one of my favorites (there are way way too many...): By the way it says "Suck it France" in case it's hard to read.
ODD FACT:
Men are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than women.

More Breaking Dawn event pics

Currently watching: Women's individual gymnastic finals of the Olympics

I've got to say first off - I have become hooked on the Olympics. I didn't ever really watch much of it before, but now I make sure the primetime coverage is recorded to my DVR.

Here are the Breaking Dawn concert/book signing event pictures from Myra.



We had over an hour and a half to kill and cameras in our hands, so this was the result...








One of the better self pictures that we ended up taking.Showing off the back of our fun shirts we made.
THANKS! Cassondra (Caz79) from Twilight Moms for the great quote!


SPOILER WARNING:
Here is what our shirt said:

FRONT:

Wedding planned by Alice Cullen: $500,000 dollars.
Honeymoon on a Private Island: $30,000 dollars.

BACK:

Waking up next to Edward Cullen covered in feathers? : Priceless.

Another pic of us showing off our shirt - again. But how could we not when it was the best one there (I know I'm a little biased...)













Another with us next to the big poster of the book cover.


ODD FACT:
Thomas Edison was afraid of the dark.

I love Blue October!!!

Ok, so I didn't mention it in the previous post, but I love Blue October now. I had heard them before, but I had never really listened to anything more than what was on the radio. Now that I bought the CD at the Breaking Dawn book signing concert and listened to it - I love them!!

Check them out.
Here is their website. You can listen to a handful of their songs from the site.
http://www.blueoctoberfan.com/foiled/index.php

Goodnight!!

Oh, and I forgot:
ODD FACT (this one is a law):
Sarasota Florida: It's illegal to wear swimwear while singing in a public place.

I'm back!! - Sephenie Meyer has taken over my life...

Currently listening to: Muse & Blue October

Ok, so I have several weeks of events to record but I don't have tons of time so I'm just going to write about the amazing Stephenie Meyer and what has kept me busy over the last few weeks...

Re-reading the first 3 books in the Twilight Saga: Twilight, New Moon, and Eclipse

I wanted to make sure I didn't forget anything before the new book came out on Aug 2nd at midnight. I love this book series and I had to be there at midnight to get my copy of Breaking Dawn the 4th and final book of the saga. I started reading at 12:30 a.m. Sat morning and finished at 4:30 p.m. Sat evening. I didn't sleep - in fact I only took an hour and a half break to meet Sarah for breakfast at 7:30 a.m. because she had to work all night and we were both starving.
My initial review: I was disappointed. There was so much I wanted and didn't get. I want to go into more detail, but I don't want to ruin it for anyone, so I will just say that compared to the other 3 books it seemed like Stephenie didn't spend as much time with the characters in this book like she did with the rest. I wish she had written 2 books and had more time and pages to really write the characters like we are used to instead of trying to get the story told in under 800 pages. I have re-read all but the last 100 pages and I must say that I like it better (much, much better) after my second (slower) read through. It isn't what I wanted it to be, but I am ok with that now and after reading and watching some of her interviews and understanding why she did some things the way she did I get it. Also, I'm just sad it is over... No more Bella and Edward's stories.

So, I got 2 tickets to the Aug 7th book signing concert at Royce Hall UCLA. I missed the Host book signing and I wasn't going to miss this one since it was only 1 of 4 events for this book. Myra loves the books too (which I discovered by accident when I went down for Donna's birthday) and it didn't take much to convince her to go with me. We made T-shirts based on a saying that one of my fellow Twilight Moms came up with. Now I know some of you are saying - "wait, Mandy isn't a mom..." and you don't have to be a mom to be a Twilight Mom member. All you need to be is over the age of 25 and be in love with (obsessed) the Twilight books and their
creator Stephenie Meyer. I'm including some pictures in this post and going to put most of the photos I have (I'm waiting on Myra's from the signing) in a slide show on the page that you can click on to see bigger size pictures. DISCLAIMER: Don't zoom in on our shirts if you haven't read the last book. It will give something away...

So we got there early. We weren't missing anything. We finally found our parking (it was a little adventure in itself...) and decided we needed something to eat and since we were there about 3 hrs early we had time. We ate and were on our way out of the restaurant when Myra noticed a woman reading Breaking Dawn in the waiting area who had a Bitten by Breaking Dawn pin. She asked her where she got it and found out that the bookstore in the student union bldg was giving them out for free. We immediately headed that direction. People were reading our shirts all the way back up the street. It was really entertaining because you had the Twilight fans who loved our shirts and then there were the other people who read the back and when we stopped waiting on a light would look over to read the front and then have a confused look when they didn't get it.
We got to the bookstore and they just ran out. The woman had one on her name tag and she gave it to Myra, but I didn't get so lucky. If only we had known earlier - we had stopped in the student union bldg on our way to eat to use the restroom and we had even walked past the Breaking Dawn books... Damn!
So we went back and hung out with the other fans for another hour and a half before the event started. We had tons of time to kill, so we pulled out the cameras and started taking each other's pictures. The goofy ones are on Myra's camera... I'll post them when I get them. We started walking around and there was a camera crew interviewing people and the camera guy came up and wanted to film our shirts. He started out with the back of mine and then went to the front of Myra's. He made a comment about it being on the border of obscene because he was filming her chest. It was really funny. We met up with the Twilight Moms to take a group picture and they all had to take pictures of our shirts, so we stood front to back so they could get both sides - It was like we were in the middle of the paparazzi. Then it was time to get in line to go in even though we all had assigned seats. I ended up getting us pretty good seats. The inside of the hall was pretty great. They had banners up for each of the books. We still had about a half an hour to wait, but there were plenty of things to entertain us. CNN was there interviewing people around us, Catherine Hardwicke the director for the Twilight movie went and sat in the audience and was immediately bombarded with fans wanting autographs so she eventually got up and left until it started. Then Justin Furstenfeld from Blue October came out and performed a couple of songs acoustically. He went back stage to wait and Stephenie came out and answered some questions submitted by fans. She didn't answer too many, but we couldn't expect her to stay there all night. We would have loved it, but she probably wouldn't have. Then Justin came back out to join her and they talked a little about how they ended up getting together for this concert series and then Stephenie would tell us where a certain song fit in with a certain section of one of the books and then Justin would sing the song. It was amazing. To hear the songs and remember the scenes while he was playing was like nothing I have ever been a part of. I loved it!!! Then it was time to get our books signed. They let us out in sections and the balcony was first, so we had some time to kill. There was someone asking trivia questions for t-shirts and she also wanted people with shirts that they made themselves to go down to the stage to share with everyone. I made Myra go with me because we had to share our t-shirts!! After saying the 2 lines in the front - people in the audience got excited and then when I told them what was on the back (... PRICELESS! That's all you get here...) they all erupted in cheers and applause. I made sure I have proper acknowledgment to the Twilight Mom that came up with the phrase because she deserved it. I may be biased, but our shirt was a hit at the concert/signing. We got to then stand in line for about 45 min in a line that looked like the ones you get into at Disneyland (you know the ones that bend around and through 3 or 4 different rooms) to get our books signed. I thought Stephenie was just going to sign her name and move on to the next one - I wouldn't have blamed her she was signing over 1,000 books and I was probably around 300 or so already, but she looked up and smiled at me. Once she noticed my shirt said something she said "I have to read it." and she got a big smile on her face and Myra turned around so she could read the back. After she read it she laughed said "the shirts just keep getting better and better." I regretted not making her one. I'm still hoping I can find a way to get it to her...


So I have been in a Twilight centered universe for the last 3 weeks or so. Between reading the books, watching the interview videos of the movie cast and Stephenie online, and reading articles online I have been a bit preoccupied... Hopefully I can get better about writing in here...
But now Sarah has a Wii and the Olympics are on and I've actually been watching so we'll see.

This last weekend we had a girls night out on Friday at the Red Lion brew house. Dor (someone I work with who I discovered also loves the Twilight books and who helped me design our shirts) Sarah, and Shaina all had dinner, drinks, and "girl" talk. After dropping Dor off we went back to Sarah's to play the Wii and some idiot hit some plastic trash cans (they were just off the street waiting to be picked up the next morning) and they smashed into Shaina's car - skipped mine which was right in front of hers and hit the one in front of mine before ending up half a block down the street. It was an interesting night.
Saturday: Hung out at Sarah's playing the Wii. Then we went to a friends because they were having an outdoor screening of Grease (projected onto a sheet in the backyard) for Wendy's 40th Birthday. They had a popcorn machine and candy and it was lots of fun. If I ever get a house and have a backyard...
Sunday: Hung out at Sarah's again only this time we played Wii then hung out in the pool for most of the day. Our arms already ached from playing the Wii on Sat, but we still managed to hit a beach ball around like it was a volleyball in the pool. 2 people in the deep end (treading water while still managing to hit the ball) and 1 in the shallow end running around after the ball. Marissa and Tabitha (her 6 month old baby) came to hang out with us. We played some more Wii and then watched the USA men's team beat the French in the men's relay. It really got me into watching it and now I'm recording it on my DVR. GO USA!!!

I'm Back...

Currently listening to: Beck - I figure I'm going to see them at the Hollywood Bowl, so I should know them better...

So I'm still a little behind, so I'll try to catch up without writing a novel.
Wednesday (June 18th) - My friend Julie and I had dinner. We've both been pretty busy and haven't seen much of each other, so she met me at work and we walked to California Chicken Cafe to pick up dinner. We hung out on Laser's balcony and ate dinner and caught up. It was great.

Friday (20th) - Met Sarah in Burbank for a movie. We saw Get Smart with Steve Carell. It was really funny. I have heard some people's reviews that said it wasn't good, but I laughed really hard and was entertained the whole time, so in my book it was good. It's not Oscar material, but a good movie.

Saturday (21st) - I worked most of the day and then tried to rent a surf board (for Sunday) and had no luck at Val Surf, so I just had to rent one where we went. I then went to dinner and to the Groundlings comedy show. It was a lot funnier than I thought I was going to be - I highly recommend it. Here is the link check it out if you are in the LA area.
http://www.groundlings.com/start.htm

Sunday (22nd) - Woke up early (for me that's 8am.) and went surfing at El Porto beach with Lynda and Sarah. It was hard work, but I had lots of fun. Sarah and Lynda's goal was to get me standing before we left, but I couldn't seem to get that last stage from my knees to my feet. I did surf some waves kneeling, so it wasn't a total wash. Then I got too tired to try using one of their boards instead of the soft top one I rented. We called it a day, returned the rental board and my rental wet suit, and had lunch at the Shack. Sarah and I hung out for about an hour before I went home and took a shower and then headed back to Sarah's. We had Hollywood Bowl tickets to see Thievery Corporation. It was a great show. Here is a link to their myspace page where you can listen to some songs. http://www.myspace.com/thieverycorporation
We had a little beer and some wine and enjoyed the music and the atmosphere. Friday and Saturday were so hot you could only stand to be outside in the valley (for those of you who don't live here - the valley has the hottest temperature in the LA area) for about 5 min, but Sunday outside at the Hollywood Bowl was great. Perfect temperatures and a great show.

Monday - I left work early and met Sarah and Rod at The Well for happyhour. We had a drink and then went to the LA Film School to see a free screening of The Wackness. It was a great film - highly recommended. Here is the synopsis I found on imdb:

Its the summer of 1994, and the streets of New York are pulsing with hip hop and wafting with the sweet aroma of marijuana. The newly-inaugurated mayor, Rudolph Giuliani, is only beginning to implement his anti-fun initiatives against crimes like noisy portable radio, graffiti and public drunkenness.

The Wackness centers upon a troubled high school student named Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck)a teenage pot dealer who forms a friendship with Dr. Jeffrey Squires (Ben Kingsley), a psychiatrist and kindred lost soul. When the doctor proposes Luke trade him weed for therapy sessions, the two begin to explore both New York City and their own depression.

Propelled by an exuberant hip hop score, The Wackness captures the spell of 1994--a time of pagers, not cell phones; a time when Tupac and Biggie were alive but Kurt Cobain had just died. Funny and moving, The Wackness is an offbeat tale of two lost souls stumbling towards maturity.

That's the update. Until next time....

ODD FACT:
Potato chips were invented when a diner kept complaining that her french fries were "too thick". The cook kept cutting them finer and finer until he shaved them out anger.