The start of another stellar week

After a rip roaring family (and fun) filled weekend, we are off to another stellar start to another work week. I'm hoping you catch the sarcasm there. We had our first two showings of our house on Saturday, one looked promising, but they needed a little more room, and the second one was, well... interesting. It was a mom and dad buying a house for their newly engaged daughter. Apparently their cap was $300k. When our realtor asked if they were pre-qualified for a mortgage, the response was, oh, they will be paying in cash. ??? Wha? Huh? That actually happens? Apparently so. So our meager little house didn't make the cut. Say la vie!

Saturday after a family baby shower, my friend Laura and I grabbed some food and went to a local theater (The Dryden) to see a new movie titled The Missing Person starring Michael Shannon. Most people would know him for his role in Revolutionary Road as the somewhat "crazy" son of the next door neighbor. We wanted to see the movie, but the extra pull was that Michael Shannon was going to be there in person to introduce the movie and do a Q&A after wards. He walked up to the podium in a pair of jeans, hoodie, and big ol' winter coat and thanked everyone for coming, that the movie meant a lot to him, and enjoy. We watched the movie, and it was a great take on past detective noir pictures. Lots of subtlety, great shots, great editing, and great acting. After the movie finished, the assistant curator, Michael Shannon, and the film editor came on stage. Now, I love what The Dryden offers, I love going there. But the curator and some of the other people who work there and introduce some of the movies just... talk out of their asses. They make me cringe with the types of ridiculous questions they ask. While listening to and watching Michael Shannon answer questions, Laura and I were like, is he drunk? High? Then after a little bit I leaned over and said, none of the above, I think he is just one of those mellow, laid back, eccentric kind of guys. He had some great, hilarious stories to tell and was just a really interesting person to listen to. I really love going to events like that, it gives you just a little bit more of a peak behind the curtain of movies.

Last week Laura sent me the link to the absolutely amazing interview in Esquire magazine with Roger Ebert. If you haven't read it, go do so immediately. Here it is: Roger Ebert: The Essential Man. As a regular reader of Ebert's movie reviews, I am a big, big fan. This is such a phenomenal look into what his life has been like since his cancer diagnosis and how he has pushed through. You can read Ebert's response here. Seriously. Take 20 minutes and read them both.

Kicking off '09

Well we have survived the holidays and have started another year. Another year of changes, surprises, and who knows what else. I am in my 15th week of pregnancy and things have improved. I am still sick first thing in the morning, but that is it. I can eat normal food, I just have to eat slower and usually smaller meals. But I will take that any time over what I was dealing with for two straight months. Now that the nausea is passing, I can start to feel a bit more excited about this little stinker. I have lost 10 pounds due to the sickness, usually this is something to be happy about, but not so much when you have a little bean growing in your abdomen. I'm pretty sure that I'm doing a good job of putting the weight back on with countless meals of mac and cheese, bagels and cream cheese, and Ben and Jerry's ice cream. Hey, it all has calcium, right?

This time of year starts my movie geek time of year. As I tell my friend Laura, who is the main person I share this geekdom with, this is our SuperBowl. Award season for movies is a challenging, exciting, aggravating, and everything in between. Over the past couple of years, I have tried my hardest to see all of the pictures nominated. So far I have seen Rachel Getting Married (NOT that impressed with it) and today I have seen The Reader, which was really fantastic. I am waiting for the biggies to open up over the next couple of weeks in our area: The Wrestler and Revolutionary Road. I have heard wonderful things about Slumdog Millionaire, but I am not overly attracted to it, so we'll see. Another one I struggle with is Milk. Not because of the story, which looks extremely interesting, but because of my strong dislike of Sean Penn. Hopefully I can get over that to watch the movie. There are lots of favorites in each category, so we'll see what The Globes bring us tomorrow night. That will be a good telling of what the Oscars will hold. Considering I hold The Dark Knight as my #1 movie of 2008, I'm anxious to see if a comic book movie can make the cut for Best Picture. And I believe Heath to be above and beyond deserving of Best Supporting Actor wins as he did such a phenomenal job with ingratiating himself into The Joker. But I digress, and like I said, it's my big geek time of year.

January brings really cold weather and more snow. We are getting several inches of snow as I type and it is holding in the upper teens, lower 20s. I am officially sick of winter. Would it be possible to be snow birds in our 30s? If only we weren't so attached to our home town, I'd love to relocate, because winter has worn out it's charm for us. Dominick loves to be outside in the snow, as does Logan, so we'll suffer for the next few months and think ahead to the beautiful, green, warmer days of spring.