November 24 2008
Thoughts

Turkey Travel

I feel like a turkey. I have to get home for thanksgiving and it’s ending up to be a bigger comotion than usual because this time I have choices.

I can go home Tuesday night after my 6Pm class, or Wednesday anytime. I also get to decide how I go home. The bus or the train.

Over the summer, I’ve become accustomed to traveling on the Chinatown bus to get to New York. The employees are rude, but it’s cheap and quicker than taking the train. It’s also the more direct route.

I don’t know. It could be that I am work, and I’m feeling sluggish after eating an unsatisfying sandwich. Home really is going to be a sweet and welcomed break.

Things I am looking forward to:

1. Home cooked food
2. Napping on a couch
3. Gettin’ my drink on with my mom and her family
4. Clearly, seeing my family
5. Seeing my pets

So whether I take the LIRR to Penn Station (50mins). From Penn Station via the F Train to Chinatown (30mins). To board a bus to Philadelphia (120mins). And then having my dad drive me back to home (30mins.) (Total: 3.8 hours, getting me home around 11pm)

Or the LIRR to Penn Station (50 mins). From Penn Station boarding a NJTransit to Trenton (110mins). And then having my Dad pick me up in Trenton and drive me home (60mins). (Total: , getting me home around 11pm)

If you were me, what would you do?

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November 17 2008
Music

This Weekend In Review (pt. 2)

Pt 1: Friday: I saw Role Models

Pt 2: Saturday: Played Dungeons and Dragons

Pt 3: Sunday: Scrolled through my old xanga. Redskins game and True Blood

My day of D&D:

I woke up, got dressed, ate some breakfast and heading out to Long Island City for a few friends. We got there around 2. Started picking out characters and started the game around 4:30 (after eating some chinese food). The character picking was quite intensive. You had to pick a race and a class, along with supplies, weapons, a mindset and even a diety.

I was a cleric elf with a rapier named Kiki. I also had purple hair, orange skin and green eyes. I was 4 feet tall and weighed 75 pounds. I wore banded armor that took 10 minutes to put on and could turn invisible and heal the shit out of everything. I imagine I may have looked something like that:

Either way, I’ve never played before and I haven’t used my imagination like that in while. The dungeon master was brillant. He had a story line involving robots, mutant wolf-people, mechanical horses, medical testing on children and poor townfolk. There were a few things that made me LOL so hard IRL (laugh out loud in real life). In fact, this took me so far out of things I know. It isn’t URL, it isn’t IRL, it’s…?? Beyond! Fate was decided on lots of different sided dice (D20, D12, D8, D6, D4).

We went on a quest to a place called “Thunderclap” from 4pm until 12:30 in IRL time. But in the land of D&D, it was about a month. I’m glad I brought a shovel and tent with me or my fellow companions (Delorean (a wizzard), Ella and Miguell (half elves)) would have been in big trouble.

And of course, when I returned to real life, I was exhausted and went to bed. And that night I had dreams of Andy the spy robot, and Tien, the town’s folk who had a nervous studder. And in the morning, I continued to use terms and told of situations from the game before. And I don’t care if that means I’ve transformed into a nerd. It was well worth it.

I get why people dress up for the game. It’s very mind intensive. It involves problem solving in a place where consquences only matter if you want them too. Now, I could probably play D&D once a month or less, but, unlike the Dungeon master, there is no way I could handle playing a weekly game.

Thoughts? Are you judging me? Lesson learned:  I won’t be judging D&D players as much anymore

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November 17 2008
General Review

This Weekend In Review (pt. 1)

Pt 1: Friday: I saw Role Models

Pt 2: Saturday: Played Dungeons and Dragons

Pt 3: Sunday: Scrolled through my old xanga. Redskins game and True Blood

Part one: Role Models.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqnvu5QC2fQ]Let me tell you. It was funny. I lol-ed a few times actually. I mean no lines particularly stick out. And there were a few lines that relied on stupid humor (the kind of humor you’d expect from Sean William Scott). You know, the “you’re a stupid face… no, you’re a stupid face” kind of dialogue. But besides the few lines to make the Long Island lame-faces happy, it was really good. There wasn’t much slapstick, there was a storyline that didn’t take away from the humor.

The storyline (briefly) were about these two guys (Scott and Rudd) who are sentenced to community service. They have to work at a program called “Sturdy Hands” which is a mentor program for children.

It reached past my expectations and is now something I am willing to see again. In fact, I like it so much, I’m going to refrain from reading any reviews in fear of it tainting my memory.

While on the surface Scott has cemented himself as the stupid asshole character once again, he breaks through that to show that he is indeed, as asshole on the surface but there is a conscious. It is rare in a comedy to have a character transform without the whole movie being bogged down.

And Paul Rudd. Paul Rudd. I’ve loved him ever since he played Josh in Clueless. Those blues eyes just melt my soul. But he, as it is repeated over and over again on screen, is a dick. He’s miserable, he hates his life. He hate fun. And while, some of you may think I’d relate to him, I actually learned a lesson from this character. No one likes a Debbie Downer.

Now about those kids? One played by McLovin’ aka Christopher Mintz-Plasse (aka no one cares) and another played by a Bobb’e J. Thompson (which it looks like to be a breakout role for this previously unknown little boy). McLovin has nailed himself as a nerd. And he continued this nerd role where he ultimately plays a nerd who realizes he likes being a nerd and people end up embrassing his nerdom… sound familiar? Think Superbad or Revenge of the Nerds. I just wonder if McLovin will ultimately be on the equivalent of Lizzie McGuire when he gets older, like Louis Skolnick. Bobb’e aka Ronnie was killer. It played with racism and ampliphied the same reason why I don’t like children and changed it to an understanding. All little Ronnie needed was some understanding.

Whatever. I don’t want to ruin it. But all the actors killed their roles (in the best way). I felt for the characters and at the climax of the film I thought i might even get choked up. Everyone understood themselves in relation to others and changed and transformed to make their worlds a better place. Director and writer David Wain did it again. Which isn’t at all surprising due to Wain’s impressive resume.

Overall rating: I’d give it a 8 or 9 out of 10

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November 10 2008
Music

How Did I Miss That (pt. 1)

So, I’ve realized that no matter how much music I know about or talk about, I will never know everything single album, artist, song or any other musical relation. So today, I found another artist which I sadly missed out on. I “discovered” Miriam Makeba from a post on Boing Boing.

She just passed away from a heart attack. She has a phenomenal style and attitude that crosses over into her music. She became famous during a turbulent time in South Africa, which resulted in her becoming a rights activist and a songstress. As I watch a few YouTube videos of her, something very earnest came across.

Immediately, I thought of Nina Simone, a favorite jazz artist of mine. But besides time period and some vocal similarities, it’s clear that they both do their own thing. I hope you find yourself a new artist to enjoy.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-VrfadKbco]

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November 7 2008
Thoughts

5 Reasons Why I Love Bears!

1. I decided that a bear was my power animal a few years ago. Cute and cuddly, but claws out and killing too!

2. I was a bear for halloween!

3. They are great characters for books

4. Bear v. Gorilla: It’s a fun game I like to play where you ask people to choose who would win in a fight (bear or a gorilla). It causes quite the debate!

(FACE OFF!)

5. And most recently, Internet Videos:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpwdcmjBgNA&hl=en&fs=1]

another one: They apparently give really great hugs. And especially after this week I could use ‘em!

There is also a Kimya Dawson song called “I like Bears”, but that does not count as a reason to why I like them. I liked them longer than that song has been around. Even though the song aptly describes how I feel about the topic of bears.

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Opinions expressed on this blog are purely and personally those of myself, Sara Knee.
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