A movie review brought to you by Grandma

Sometimes I feel I am equal parts 5-, 25-, and 85-years-old.

Par example:

Early this afternoon as I was getting ready to meet my friend Tom for lunch, my mom asked me if I wanted to join her and Dad for a movie later in the afternoon. Minutes later, she was on the phone and I whispered, "Is that Dad?"

Then she told Dad to hang on and asked if I wanted to ask him something.

I did, in fact.

"Can Tommy come to the movie too?" I asked.

(This was the 5-year-old in me.)

I went to lunch with Tommy, where we complained about job searching, crankiness as a result of break-up withdrawal, Tom's business plan. You know, grown up, twenty-something topics.

Then we went to see a movie with my 'rents, which I suppose is a mature, 25-year-old activity. Seeing an indie British film with your parents, on a Wednesday afternoon? Sure. We'll call that grown up.

I should probably be fully honest in my disclosure here and mention that after some chatty settling into my movie seat, as Tommy and I exited the theater to get popcorn Dad told me to run off some of my energy before returning to the theater.

So I relapsed for a moment into 5-year-old Bailey. See what I mean? Who am I?!

Okay, I will move us along to the 85-year-old portion of this post shortly, but first we will pause for a movie review.

Today we saw The King's Speech, with Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, and Helena Bonham Carter. It is the true story about King George VI and the speech therapist who helped him overcome his struggle with stuttering when he suddenly succeeded his living brother as king during WWII.

Friends, I cannot express enough how much you should go see this film. It was excellent. All four of us loved it. It was a wonderful story of friendship, it was funny, it was touching, terrifically acted. Seriously.

GO. See. It.

And yes, Riley Francis, that was Mr. Desplat's work you heard in the trailer (for those of you who breezed past it without watching the trailer, march your mouse back up to that link and watch it! This is the bossy 5-year-old speaking!). And you would L-O-V-E love the soundtrack as much as you will love the film itself when you

go. See. It.

Okay. Seriously. Go see it. Please. This is coming from a girl who has little patience for movies, and rarely solicits them.

Okay now moving on to the 85-year-old portion of my day.

This evening, while Dad watched TV after dinner, I continued work on my current cross stitch project.

I have been suffering from a mysterious muscle ache in my right hand and it occurred to me just as of late that it could be the result of cross stitching too much.

Last night I also cross stitched in the living room, while Mom and Dad dozed in front of the TV, and BooBoo slept on Mom.

The other day Patrick called and asked what I was doing for the afternoon.

"Well, I just made some tea, I'm gonna cross stitch, and take some ibuprofen because I'm kind of sick."

"That's a grandma afternoon!" he told me. "The highlight of your day is taking some Advil!"

Yes, Patrick, yes.

Well, I quite like my age-confused existence. And why am I not ready to go back to school, aside from the fact that the books and constant reading and writing will soon loom over me again?

Because I'm not done hanging out with my parents, who are my friends. Or our cats.

So there.

Yours truly,

Granny

Dress Up and Find a Place to Go!

My mama bought me 3 delicious dresses today. One is orange, one is blue, and one is cranberry. I love them all.

I was putting them in my closet and realized the number of dresses in my collection is getting a little out of hand. I wonder if I'm up to 27 yet--I'm a little too scared to check.

When the movie 27 Dresses came out, my friend Corie and I went to see it with a group of girls, and we tried to get them all to wear formal dresses to the theater. No one was brave enough but us. That's right. We're awesome like that. And yes, people gave us weird looks, but you know how many other times I had the chance to wear that blue dress? Twice. And then I got rid of it. I'm gonna start wearing prom dresses to the grocery store, just to show them. I would wear them to work, but unfortunately there is a dress code there. Sigh...

Les Tournesols

I just finished watching the movie Calendar Girls. I first saw it this winter, and told my parents they would love it, and just now watched it with Mom (she did love it).

Not only is this movie hilarious, I think it is brilliant, and so sweet. It is based on a true story, which makes it all the more powerful than if it were simply fictional, but even so it is a fine piece of art. Every piece of life that the story touches upon--friendship, beauty in age, death, humor, tensions with those you love the most--touches me so deeply and personally. I L-O-V-E love it. Here is my favorite line (spoken in the movie by character John Clark, who in real life is named John Baker):

"I don't think there's anything on this planet that more trumpets life than the sunflower. For me that's because of the reason behind its name. Not because it looks like the sun but because it follows the sun. During the course of the day, the head tracks the journey of the sun across the sky. A satellite dish for sunshine. Wherever light is, no matter how weak, these flowers will find it. And that's such an admirable thing. And such a lesson in life."

'Cuz now it's time for the Birthday Rap!

Today's my birthday.

Thank you, thank you. :)

Well as you may have (hopefully) noticed, I blundered yesterday and forgot to post. But you will have to excuse me, because I was celebrating Birthday #1, aka Fake Birthday. So far it seems Fake Birthday went better than Real Birthday (although Real Birthday has been fine, honestly, I am blessed and aware of my blessings).

Fake Birthday (to review, Fake Birthday=yesterday) went as follows. Early alarm, sleepy girl, but all this was quickly shrugged off, because I had volunteered to wake up to an alarm to get RILEY FRANCIS, baby bro extraordinaire from the airport, i.e. my birthday present!!!! On the way home from the airport Riley and I had near panic attacks as we stacked more and more miles on the trip odometer and couldn't find a gas station. 310 miles when we pulled up to the pump, usually I refill at 270. Just saying. Then lunch with parents, grocery shopping for party, chores, blah blah blah, then friends and fam at my house for BBQ, cake, and general carrying on. A fine time had by all.

Real birthday (today). Earlier alarm than day before, after late night (see "general carrying on" above), due to early work schedule. Yes, that's right, I had to work, on my birthday, on a Saturday. "Yeah...I'm gonna need you to come in on Saturday..." It honestly wasn't that bad, but there goes the day, ya know? So then I get home and Riley and Mom and I decide to go get pizza and hit up a movie. Well after pizza Ri decides to ditch us (it's okay, he's forgiven), so Mom and I go to the movie, just the two of us.

We went to see Is Anybody There? with Michael Caine. Now, Mom and I both agreed it was a good movie, and Mom said she would recommend it to others, and I wouldn't say it necessarily has a bad ending, but let's just say I was a little unsettled. Now don't worry, I'm not going to ruin the ending for you, but there are just a lot of layers and a lot of emotion throughout the film, and I was very tense during the whole thing because I never knew what was going to happen. So whenever I see a film like that I think, "this better have a good ending or Girlfriend's gonna be mad." (Seven Pounds? Don't even get me started.)

I took an Intro to Theater class my freshman year of college and I remember we learned that Aristotle said that for the theatrical viewer, a play is a form of catharsis. You watch the actors go through a range of emotions, you feel the happiness/sadness/disgust/rage alongside them, and at the end, you are purged. Or something like that--whatever, I didn't write a dissertation on the man. Well Stotty was right tonight. So about ten minutes before the end of the film, there is an obvious scene where you feel, "this is the height, I should grab the tissues now." And you certainly have tears brimming on the lids. But then the scene is over, and ten minutes later the whole movie is over! There's closure (okay so maybe I lied, I realize I am ruining this for you, but I'm only ruining the concept, not the details), but you still feel "I didn't get my chance to cry! You made the scene too short, dammit!"

So then credits roll, Mom starts laughing and apologizing for bringing me to such a depressing movie on my birthday and I say, "that's okay, it was good, but now I need to cry!" And people are wanting to get out of our row, so I am in the aisle, hugging Mom, overwhelmed with unexpected emotion, not quite sobbing, but almost choking because I am so caught offguard by my own tears, arising too quickly for my slower awareness of them.

Anyway. It was a good film. View at your own risk. I wouldn't recommend going on your birthday. But this blog is getting long and I'm not done yet. So THEN, we get home, and somehow I manage to get these tiny tiny but MEGA painful splinters in my hand! Where did those come from??? So whatev, I'm thinking, "work, sad movie, splinters...." But I did have a profound thought as I was picking at my hand with a needle and tweezers, which inspired me to write this, and here it is.

So the difference between splinters and other injuries, bodily nuisances--bruises, scabs, sore muscles--is that you have to deal with a splinter right away. I would say I'm a big fan of instant gratification, but the emphasis there is on gratify. If it's a fun activity, I want to do it right away. If it's not so fun? The word "later" is one I've used probably more than most in my life, right up there with "precious," "holla," "Brad said," "Dibby Wibby," etc. But a splinter? Gotta deal with it. Birthday or no birthday, be it fake or Round Two, you've gotta stop what you're doing, and keep stabbing at the little punk embedded in your skin until it's out. Nothing else comes first. This is a hard concept for me, but one I continue to slowly learn nonetheless. I realize that grass needs to be mowed, bills need to be paid, doctor's appointments need to be made, before I watch America's Next Top Model, or read a whole book, or eat Laffy Taffy and whisper sweet nothings to the cat. Ahh, the first lesson of my twenty-fifth year. Thanks, God. Appreciate it. Thanks for 24 great years, an amazing family, all the people who love me and teach me lessons, kitties, and all your other blessings, day in and day out. All glory truly is to You.