Egypt - King Tut

Last night I caught the last half of a 2010 documentary called King Tut Unwrapped and it was really interesting.

They discovered that his left foot was deteriorating and would have been extremely painful. (Which then made sense as to why he was buried with so many walking sticks.)

They had his DNA analyzed for known diseases of the time and they discovered he had malaria. I can't remember the type of Malaria but the worse kind there is. (Which then made sense as to why he was buried with a bunch of different seeds - for example one of the types of seeds was a fever reducer.)

Ancient Egypt fascinates me and I've always been drawn to King Tut.


I don't know if it's because the mystery and circumstances that surround him and his discovery... whatever it is I LOVE it!

(image from wikipedia.org)

And I may have gotten teary-eyed when I was in the Cairo Museum looking at King Tutankhamun's gold burial mask. What? I don't judge you.

PS - This also explains why I would plan a trip to Berlin, Germany just to visit a museum to see the beautiful bust of Nefertiti. And oh man, it was beautiful in person!

Dr Who Finale Party

What can I say? I'm a nerd

My friends and I had a Dr. Who finale party. Our invites looked exactly like the invites from the beginning of season 6. My two nieces like Dr. Who so I invited them as well, but discovered a problem with that scenario. They've started watching Dr. Who on Netflix, but are only in the 3rd season, so last weekend we had an impromptu Dr. Who party (for them to watch the 6th season) starting at about 9:00 Saturday evening. I had them up until about 12:30 and they wanted to keep going, but I had to be the responsible one and say "That's enough for tonight, church is early." Never fear we continued it after church. By last Sunday evening they were ready for the finale party :-)

I think it's fun doing nerdy things with nerd friends and having a nerd time = Geek out sessions. Yay geek out sessions! (Just like midnight showings for the Twilight movies)

We played pin the bow-tie on the doctor, we had a trivia game, we had many treats (double heart cookies, jammie dodgers (sp?), mini tardis cakes, etc) I started to create a BINGO game but wasn't able to get that finished in time, so I think we'll be playing that at the premier party. Yep, I smell a season 7 premier party in our future.

It was a fun episode and a fun evening. Sadly I didn't take any photos. Oh well!

PS - It's fun being able to geek out with your nieces and nephews. (Dr Who for the nieces and it was Avatar the Last Airbender for the nephews) I think I need to find something else to geek out with the nephews since Avatar has been over for awhile. Hmmm.... I wonder when the Legend of Korra will start.

Bridezillas

So this past week I've been watching the show Bridezillas. I never did catch it back home, but I've been watching a couple episodes and I must say it kinda annoys me. I want to slap sense into these people that are this self-centered! And it's not just the wedding that makes them like this because when they talk about themselves they say they always get everything their own way. Oh.my.goodness

I do wonder though, do they watch their episode afterwards? And how do they feel when they see themselves in action?

Anyways, the point of this is that I heard the funniest thing - this one couple, which I think were from Georgia, were heading to the church to take photos a half hour before the ceremony, but practically everyone was there already. And the bride of course is freaking out and she says "Why aren't they on black-people time?" Then the maid of honor is talking to the camera and explaining the events and she says, "We had expected everyone to be on black people time, but no, they were on white people time and came early." I was just dying from laughter! it was so funny.

But I can relate because whenever I planned any church activities I would think "Is it important that they show-up on time?" If it was then I would announce 15-mins prior to the actual time. If it wan't important I'd announce the actual time but know that no-one will be there until 15 minutes later. :-)

I can't think of a cool title

So sometimes I catch this new afternoon show called "Ocean Force" and it takes place in Florida during Spring Break. Oh my goodness people do STUPID things when they're drunk. I think I get involved in the show because there were two girls stuck in a riptide and I'm yelling (like it's going to make a difference) "Swim sideways!" They kept trying to swim to shore.

I thought that was common knowledge - when you're getting pulled out and are stuck in a riptide, instead of trying to swim back to the beach you swim sideways to get out of it. And that's why I don't swim in the ocean. (Well and because there could be a giant octopus or squid swimming underneath you and you wouldn't know.) I go up to my waist and that's about it.

Except in Oregon you really can't do that. If you try you'll get hypothermia. But the Oregon coast is SO pretty and relaxing - I love it so! So that's my rule when I'm in Hawaii, Southern California, and when I lived in the south. Maybe I developed that rule when we lived in Monterey, CA because the beach we always went to had bad riptides and we couldn't get into the water.

I'm just rambling now so I'm done. :-)

Happy Valentines Day

Yesterday I went over to Blair's and had a lovely time with her. She made some delicious lunch and then dinner.... well her mom made the dinner. I love hanging out with people!

Our plans may have consisted of us watching this

and this

and this

with some of this

I may have missed the last bus home (darn you Sunday schedule!) so I ended up sleeping over. And we decided since I was already there we should watch more Burn Notice. Sounded like a good plan to me.

You see, Blair is moving to the states about a month after I move back and I figured she'll need a show to watch, so why not introduce her to the greatness of Burn Notice now? See, I was doing a service! LOL

On another note.... I have a massive headache. I now remember why I don't grow my hair out. I made the mistake of putting it in a ponytail yesterday and it caught up with me. I may need to take some more ibuprofen in a few hours. :-(

True Story

Have you seen Finding Nemo? If so, remember the part when Marlin and Dora are about to exit the EAC and Squirt comes and in his cuteness says:

"Good afternoon. We're gonna have a good jump today. Do you have your exit buddy?...." and then he proceeds to explain how they are to exit the EAC.


And during the whole conversation, Marlin has the deer in the headlights look and his eyes go larger and larger as he mumbles "It's like he's trying to speak to me..."

When I first moved here and people would speak to me I felt like Marlin. I had the deer in the headlights look while I tried to process what was being said to me. Sometimes my processing wasn't accurate...

But it's been a couple months and I've gotten better at it! Sometimes I'm still slow in responding since I'm trying to process. People at church I can understand. People on the street, sometimes not so much.

Anyways, I thought I was getting better....

The other day I was at the mall and a lady stopped me and I swear she just said "mwaghaghajgnghaghbnlafhgah." I just stood there staring at her. I couldn't process a single word she just said.

I had no clue.

I didn't want to be rude and just walk away though. I figured she was trying to sell me something because she came from a desk, so I did the "usual foreigner" response. I smiled and said "No thank you" and then walked away. Hahahaha

David Tennant and Family History

I really like the show "Who Do You Think You Are?" (and you need to watch Lisa Kudrow's episode - I balled like a baby!) Anyways, after moving to Scotland I learned that there's been 6 seasons here and one of the episodes was about David Tennant. You should already know about my obsessive trait so needless to say I added this DVD to my queue quickly.

why hello there handsome.... (via google images)

It was a very interesting family history journey and it really made me think about my own journey.

I was really moved with what he said at the end of the episode (and to get the full effect read it with a scottish accent):

"...you're having to deal with your reactions to issues that are still very much alive. And dealing with people that made choices and decisions with their lives and died a long time ago. But they passed a bit of their DNA on to you and you now feel like you have to go back and figure out why they did what they did. You want your family to be people that you admire and be inspired by..."

I think we all want that. I know I do.

As I search through older census reports I always hope that the slave column is empty. I understand it happened and is a part of history but I don't understand how people could think they're better than another human being, make them slaves, and treat them horribly and like trash. I'm very happy to report that so far that column has been empty and I really hope it stays that way. But what if it doesn't? Then I'll keep going.

Our ancestors are people just like us. I think some people put their ancestors on pedestals and forget that they're people who have made choices (and sometimes we may not like those choices). They make decisions based on their circumstances, learned values from the society they're raised in, and the knowledge that they possess.

We're all bound to find something we don't like that our ancestors did. For example, she or he may be a convict.

Does that mean we should hide it? Ignore it? Tell anyone that gets close that they worked at the prison instead of being in the prison? No! (hahaha... seriously no hard feeling here.)

That is part of the ancestor and by learning what led him or her to make that decision provides an opportunity to learn more about him or her.

Personally I don't care that my 2nd great grandpa was a convict. In fact I want to know why he stole such stupid things. Did he steal them for someone who really needed them (like Robin Hood) or was he just a clepto?

You know what? The beauty of having a convict in the family tree is that the prison records are a gold mine complete with a picture! Full of information that you won't find anywhere else.

I don't think my extended family meant harm when they hid that fact that he was in prison (twice) from my sister and I. I think it goes back to what David said, "...You want your family to be people that you admire and be inspired by..."

I think they want to remember who he ended up being not who he was. But we shouldn't hid and ignore who he was because that made him the man they want to remember.

PS - If you like this show (or just like David Tennant) I recommend this episode, I'm not sure if you can get it in the states though.

Dr. Who obsession

A cute little 5 year-old girl told me a joke at Thanksgiving dinner:

Girl "Knock, knock"

Me "Who's there?"

Girl "Doctor"

Me "Doctor who?"

Girl "That's a TV show!"

I didn't say it was a funny joke, but it was hilarious to this cute little girl.

(You have been warned now - this is a geek post)

For years I've had friends discussing this show called Doctor Who, then I moved to Scotland and I saw an episode on the tele and I was hooked.

They were showing reruns and I came in the middle of the series 3 and I loved it! Shortly afterwards Amanda wrote a blog post about the show and I was like "Yay, another Dr. Who fan!"

I'm sure I've mentioned before about my obsessive personality, so I continued to watch it on the tele but I wanted to watch it from the beginning (the new series that is not from the VERY beginning).

• Between the tele, internet, and renting the DVDs I've almost seen it all. Of course it's been a bit backwards. I've seen half of series 1, 2, and 3. All of series 4 except for the 4 specials and all of series 5. But here are my thoughts:
• If you see pictures of the 9th Dr (who is the first of the new series) it looks like he would be a tough guy but then he's not. I found it funny. Maybe it's the leather jacket?
• Early Rose annoys me. Really annoys me.I liked Rose at the end of series 4, but not early Rose because she's annoying. She wasn't as annoying at the beginning of series 2 - so I'm hopeful that she gets less annoying soon. But it reminds me of NCIS - I first started watching it with Zeva and when I watched the early episodes I didn't like Kate because she wasn't Zeva. Early Rose isn't Martha Jones (she was the companion in the episodes I started with).
• Donna Noble is the BEST! (and hilarious!) I really liked how there was no romantic complications between her and the Dr. She's just awesome. Oi, space boy!
• The 10th Dr is adorable. I love his smile and I bet almost all female fans are in love with him.

• I absolutely love the new doctor and series 5. I think it was brilliant and was the best series so far. And I really like the companion, Amy Pond. Hmm, maybe it's the red hair that makes awesome characters because Donna Noble has red hair. Can't wait to watch the Christmas special and the new series.

Ok, I think I'm done geeking out for the moment.

BBC Night

Tonight has been my first night of no American shows. Previously I've been watching Star Trek the Next Generation, Star Trek Voyage, CSI, CSI Miami, CSI New York, NCIS and Family Guy. (When I was at Mary's throw in some America's Next Top Model) but tonight was different.

In fact, I think the only "non-American" show I've seen before tonight was "An Idiot Abroad." (On another note, I'm reading the An Idiot Abroad The Travel Diary of Karl Pilkington and it is HILARIOUS!)

Anyways, I stuck to the British shows tonight. I can't remember what I started my evening with but the second show was Dr. Who (unknown if it was a new episode or a re-run, I'm going to research that). I have many friends who know and love Dr. Who already but I've never seen it. And boy will I be watching this one again!

Then I watched a show about people's weird habits which was entertaining.

And then came Spooks! I've already been introduced to Spooks (which is called MI-5 back home... I don't understand why names of TV shows and movies change) and it was a good one! I think next week is the season finale.... I could be wrong but I don't think I am.

I think I'm going to bed soon :-) How was your Monday?

Funny Video!!

HAHAHAHAHAA!!!!

Extreme Makeover Home Edition

After the coast trip I volunteered on the Extreme Makeover Home Edition set - which was amazing! (I'm not a morning person and I volunteered for the morning shift Sunday morning... now that's love.)

It was my first time wearing a hard hat... :-)

I love the fact that so many people from a community are willing to volunteer their time and talents.

I didn't hear any complaining because people weren't working inside with the TV personalities or that they wanted to work in the haunted house instead of outside. There was none of that. (that I witnessed)

It was, "I need two volunteers!" and like 5 people would step forward because they wanted to help. People went to the place they were needed without questions or grumbling. That's what I found the most amazing from the experience.... people in a community coming together for the community.

The show will air October 31st and it's amazing what they put together!

The Mummy

Saturday evening after The Lion King & dinner I returned to the house & dog that I was sitting. The dog yelled at me for being back later than 5:45 because she's hungry! (she only thought she was hungry because the princess is used to a schedule) Anyways, the place does not have cable, so I was flipping through the basic channels to see if there was anything that Myla and I could watch. I came across The Mummy.

I love The Mummy (I saw it so many times in the theatre) and haven't seen it forEver and I got excited. I quickly noticed the TeleMundo logo in the bottom corner and was hoping for it to be subtitled in Spanish, but once Evie spoke I knew that wasn't the case. That didn't stop me from watching it and I still laughed at the funny parts.

After the ferry catches on fire and Benny is on one side with the horses and yells "O'Connell! Looks to me like I have all the HORSES!!!" And O'Connell yells back "Benny! Looks to me like you're on the wrong side of the RIVER!!!!" (except that conversation was in Spanish) I laughed and then decided I need to watch it in English because I don't know Spanish.

I ran over to Best Buy but they didn't have it! They had the special edition trilogy package for $45 but I just wanted one movie and did not want to spend $45. I called Target across the street and they didn't have it. Then I thought to try the Target at Keizer station and success! When I got there they only had 2 left and it was only $7.50, score!

I noticed in this movie there's a lot of shooting guns with both hands and I couldn't help but to think of the first episode of "The Good Guys". The young cop uses both hands to shoot at the #2 assassin and of course completely misses. The #2 assassin says in a accent, "It's not as easy as it looks, huh?"

Another one

I also think this one looks funny:



I will be seeing this in September.

What movies are you excited for?

I really want to

see this:



Doesn't that look good? But unfortunately we have to ignore the release date of July 30th because it got pushed back to March 18, 2011. I KNOW!!!

Movies and more movies....

Earlier this month I went to Amanda's house to watch Leap Year around 8:30/9:00 PM. I've already seen Leap Year but I've wanted to see it again because it's a cute movie and the guy is super hot. So Amanda, Amy, and I watched it and had a wonderful girls night.


Then afterwards we discussed Northanger Abbey, which I had not seen before. It was concluded that I needed to watch it, so we did. And the verdict is that I LOVED it!!!


And then after that movie was done we were discussing the new Sense and Sensibility which I haven't had a chance to see, but really wanted to. It was concluded that we needed to watch it, so we did.

It was a long and glorious night. Amy didn't last the whole length of Sense and Sensibility, she had to get home and left about half way through. Amanda almost passed out before it was over, but she made it. I'm so proud of her! At least they had already seen it, so they weren't missing out on anything. I really enjoyed the new Sense and Sensibility. (BBC does such a great job.)

I have discovered that I can't get Northanger Abbey out of my head. I keep thinking about it the past couple of weeks and I want to see it again (Know what else I want to see again, the A-Team! Man, that was good. And has no relevance to this post but here's a visual, don't you want to see it? Bradley Cooper and Liam Neeson are in it....)



Now back to Jane Austen.... Are you a Jane Austen fan? If so, which Austen work is your favorite?

Drop Dead Diva

I just love this show!
Have you seen it?

WaHOOO!

I'm back from Alaska, I arrived at 5:22 and I was so tired. I took a nap until 12:30. And the first thing I did was to watch Project Runway. I'm so excited that Seth Aaron won!! yipee!!

Now I'm off to finish working on pictures so I can do my Alaska post :-)

Project Runway - Go Seth Aaron!

Please excuse me, I need to be a fangirl for a moment....

I'm so in Seth Aaron's camp!

I have loved his work all season long (and this has nothing to do with the fact that he's from the Northwest.)

I can't wait to see his collection on the runway next week and I HOPE he wins it! (I may cheat and check online at ny fashion... but I've been trying not to.)

And PS - Emilio, how can you not care what Tim Gunn says? I know you won't listen because you're designing "a line for a woman" and Tim isn't a woman. I'm a woman and so far I can't stand you're line. Tim is right. Matronly and old-fashioned. Not good, not good. And I still say you should have gone home during the "hardware store" challenge. As you can tell, I'm not in the Emilio camp.

Tim Gunn says "Make it work"

And boy did we ever. My sister and I have "sister power" and when our powers combine we make fondant cakes (among other crafty things).
This fondant Coach purse is our latest creation.

Sunday was our Aunt's birthday and we wanted to do her birthday cake. This way we saved Dennis from going to the store to buy an ugly cake. (No offense stores!) Our first thought was a stack of books because Mary loves reading. And then we thought "No, she loves Coach even more." So we decided on a coach purse.

Making this was a comedy of errors. We learned from the oh-so-many mistakes that we will add to our bucket of knowledge for future cakes. There were many times Laura wanted to give up and start over again and I kept repeating Tim Gunn. "We will make it work" It's like artwork, when you make a mistake you don't throw it away, you go with the flow and work with that mistake to turn it into something good. (Hey, like life!) Who knew that making cakes can provide life lessons?

The cake wasn't what we envisioned, but we made it work and I think it turned out adorable.

Roman Holiday

Was playing at the Elsinore Theatre tonight.


I almost didn't go because I was exhausted and the plan was to go to bed early. I spoke to my sister and told her I'll be there if I get a second wind after eating dinner. My sister was there alone, which didn't bother her, but it bothered me. And that was my second wind. There was a long line and the theatre was packed but Kim and I made it just in time with 12 mins to spare.

We lucked out that no one wanted to sit next to Laura, there was an empty seat on both sides of her, which she did not save because she didn't get our texts. She must have stunk or something... LOL just kidding, I will say it had to do with human nature. I do find it funny how when someone sits "next" to you in a theatre there's always an empty seat between you and the stranger. Even I do it... I think everyone does. And when people don't I always think why they're being weird. LOL But anyways, we lucked out on that and had our perfect seats yet again.

This was my first time seeing it and I LOVED the movie. Can I say that again? LOVED it! And it was brilliant on the big screen.