Category: hobbies

My problem with La la Land

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This was the exact moment when La La Land lost me.

This was the moment when I got angry, one exact minute later;

Why you ask?

Oh, I will tell you.  I’m going to use a quote from an interview where Emma Stone said “I liked that (the non-happy ending) too, because in real life…”  The quote continues, but I’mma stop it right there because I don’t even need the rest of the sentence to prove my point.

In real life.  She says.  IN REAL LIFE.  And she’s referring to a movie where people DANCE IN THE FREAKING SKY WITH STARS LIKE FLOATING CLOUDS ARE AROUND THEM.

You make a movie where the protagonists SING AT A VIEW AND TAP DANCE and then insert a freaking REAL LIFE ending?!!!!!!!!!  (And yes, I could use more exclamation points, if you were listening to my voice saying that sentence, the exclamation points would not end.)

What is wrong with you Hollywood?!

If I want to watch a movie with some real freaking life in it?  I watch Fences.  Or Hidden Figures.  Or I don’t know, I watched The Yellow Handkerchief and that was a real life filled script, with real life situations and guess what?!  HAPPY FREAKING ENDING.  Everyone was feeling joyful at the end of that.  The ex-convict who had no hope of building a life?  HAPPY!

La La Land?   No joy.  Just the slap of a good old dose of reality.  And right at the end too.  Just so I could feel like I wanted those two hours back.

And that’s why it’s a NO.  Off of my chest now.

Have a very happy day.

I got feelings: 50 Shades of Grey

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I said I was going to share a bit more about my feelings on what I read during the days at my parent’s and well, I am.  I need to get this out of my system.

I read the Fifty Shades of Grey series.  The porn one, yes.

And I read it because my mom bought all the books.  We are talking about the same woman who does not even say ‘heck’ even though she’s the descendant of Spaniards on both sides.  Cero bad words but a soft side for teenage romance (she has the entire Twilight Saga, both books and movies)  and soft porn apparently.

And what I thought about these acclaimed works?

Mediocre at best.  Entertaining?  HECK YEAH.  I laughed so much.  Though it might have been for cheerful happiness of reading something, anything, because I hadn’t done that in two years.

My indignation comes at how the books are worshipped.  I mean, every bad trick is there, every weak attempt at being clever failed miserably and with the exception of the bad guy being that bad guy it was so weak in plot I could almost feel the pages fainting.

The big reveal about the “fifty shades of Mr Grey”?  Please.  I read fan fiction.  Young writers with too much time in their hands made Harry, Hermione and Ron do things that took the nasty scale to about 8578934759834758.  You can’t expect me to flinch by reading about the desires of a guy with a preference for strong shagging.  And it was more like the three shades of Grey because it seemed to me the colors of his character were so limited he pretty much had two faces the whole time.  Maybe three.

Not to mention that he and his lady friend and protagonist are pretty much the same thing.  In terms of how they were written I mean, you could tell from an airplane that they were written by the same person because they both had the exact same timing and wit in their dialogue – which I HATE in a book.

But I fast read a book a day and finished the saga in three days so I’m not saying they were entirely boring.  Just terribly bad written.

That’s all I think.  If I think of something else I’ll add it to the comments section (because you know that happens all the time, a day after you publish you are like “this is the one sentence I wanted to include there but it didn’t came then, meh”.

 

Have a great day!

 

Working backstage; updates!

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I have been working on a couple of updates backstage that I want to share.

– the about me page has been updated.  It was overdue!  I could tweak it a bit later, but for now I’m pretty satisfied that it’s a bit more fluid than the last version.   Mainly, I just wanted to include pointers to some posts from deserving moments.   I hope it reads well 🙂

– new google + profile.  The google + button has been added to the sharing options and of course, you can add me to your circles, if you so wish.  I also might be participating in a couple (literally, two right now) communities over at google plus (Weekly Photo Challenge and a blogging community) sometimes.

– last and actually not really important, you might have noticed the background changed about a month ago.  I was trying to find something more a la me, and this one felt much better than the last one.

So there you go.  Even the tagline has been updated!  I feel it’s a bit fresher over here, hope you like the little tweaks.  And have a great week!

The battle of the batter

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A couple of weeks ago I tried to make home made doughnuts for the first time.  I basically burned some oil, had a ’till death’ battle with the batter and by the time I finished gave up, there was no spot in the kitchen that wasn’t sprinkled in flour.

I had never been so taken down by a recipe before.  I followed the instructions perfectly and I knew as soon as the batter was done that there was something horribly wrong.  I couldn’t manage the batter well, it wasn’t cooking properly and I had huge issues maintaining the oil temperature.  I burned all the doughnuts and they were still raw inside.  I tried to fix things, but after a while I lost the bit of patience I have.  It was hot, I was frustrated (and hungry) and I just took the batter and threw it in the trash can, along with all the doughnuts.

On the bright side, the kitchen smelled lovely for like, two days.

I pretended that I didn’t care about the doughnut fail, but all I did the next few days was research because I was going to win this, I said I was going to make doughnuts; so help me God.

Today I tried again.  I used a different recipe (turns out the other recipe was missing about half a cup of flour, which explains a lot) and did breathing exercises during the process and I made the doughnuts.  I wouldn’t eat them, unless it will save someone’s life, but everyone else has eaten them and they survived, so they are eatable.  Oh, the icing is yummy.  I licked the bowl.

I’m never making them again, but I won.

Onward!

Reading: We, the Drowned

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Shreve Stockton of Honey Rock Dawn recommended We, the Drowned by Carsten Jensen a few months ago and I ordered it with just that vote of confidence for my yearly reading list.

 

I haven’t even made a big dent on it because it’s kind of massive, but I’m already in love with it.  It’s witty, and beautifully worded and for such a big book, where you expect the author to linger around things, it’s surprisingly and refreshingly straightforward which I love even more.

 

 

So, if you are looking for a substantial read, I highly recommend this one.

 

 

Onward!

Ginger tea and how it can’t be made with something OTHER than ginger

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After the flu I had about 900 years ago, a dry cough has stayed with me.  I downed two bottles of over the counter-maximum strength cough suppressant and it worked wonders for about seven hours.  Then I got to half a bottle of an organic mix that includes agave syrup and eucalyptus and some other ten natural ingredients that make your brain all minty and your stomach to beg for suicide and I felt like new, for two days.

 

Everyone agrees I should see the doctor in case there’s something nasty trying to eat my lungs and I would, if doctors were not vacationing like any other normal person does on holiday time.

 

My friend recommended me ginger tea and a couple of weeks ago I mentioned it to my mother in case she could get some ginger at the supermarket.  I worked through the holidays and had no time to shop for anything.  I hand-made all my holiday cards and people though I did it because I’m thoughtful and crafty when actually I had no time to make a line in a store.

So my mom goes and buys the ginger.  Except when I see this ginger, it’s really weird ginger.  It doesn’t smell like ginger, it’s awfully hard to cut and it’s huge.  When I tell mom that the ginger is weird she apologizes because the quality of all the ginger in the store was bad.  I tell her I don’t want to offend anyone but this ginger has no ginger qualities.  After about an hour of discussion and an additional witness we conclude that my mother, who grew up in a farm, daughter of a great farmer, bought the wrong tuber.  We call it apio, and I swear apio is NOT celery so I don’t know how to translate it and google is failing me.

 

The real piece of ginger reached my hands last night and I got down with it.

I crushed a good piece, about two inches long and boiled it in 2 cups of water for 30 to 40 minutes.  I strained it and added about half of that (undiluted tea) to two cups of hot milk.  I finished with three tablespoons of organic honey from the Dominican Republic because I like my teas on the sweet side.

It was HEAVENLY.

 

The undiluted tea can be stored in the fridge so it can be made ahead and added to very hot milk on any night when you want to feel embraced by the warmth of something sweet and spicy.

 

I have about three post waiting to be written, there’s a dog and a horse and things that need to be recorded somewhere… in fact, I’ve been thinking if I should re-start my pen & paper diary this year.

 

Anyway, ONWARD!

 

Movies kick ass

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It’s been a week already?!  My.

During the last couple of weeks I’ve watched these movies.  That’s more movies than I watched during the last six months.  Yay for the first shift!

 

 

• Captain America – I didn’t watch the trailer so when I saw that it was set in the ‘50’s I was all WHA?!  And then I reaffirmed my long-time desire to dress as a ‘50’s soldier.

• Colombiana – You know it’s a good movie when Ms. Zaldana is going to be kicking ass.

• The Change-Up – I’m SO SORRY for all the people that paid to see this in the theater.   It just has no good parts.  At all.   Not even Reynolds hotness saved this one.

• A Dangerous Method –  Very interesting characters.  Awesome portrayal from Ms. Knightley.

• X-Men First Class – You mean to tell me that Beast’s powers before being Beast were hand-feet?  And how does Mystique know what she looks like without scales?

• Footloose – I’m an angry teenager.  Fear me for I shall… DANCE!  I’m gonna break a window and do jazz hands.  Teen angst! Portrayed by thirty year old people.  Excuse me while I spit out the flavor of rancid remake.

• The Help – Did this win something?  Because it should have won everything.  By the way, had I lived at the times of segregation I’m sure I would’ve been shot to death for “mixing”.

• One Day – If you are going to watch one romantic drama, let this one be it.  Also, Anne Hathaway is pretty awesome.

• Breaking Dawn – These comedies never disappoint!  The whole honeymoon/pregnancy/birthing thing was so funny.

  • Transformers Dark of the Moon – Bumblebee continues to be awesome.  That’s pretty much the best thing about this movie.

 

I began watching The Green Lantern but I haven’t finished it.  So far it looks like even though it’s not the best movie ever made, it’ll be entertaining.  I also watched Gone With the Wind yesterday which was awesome, as it has been from the moment it was premiered.

 

I missed watching movies.  It’s harder on other shifts, specially on the third one, where most of my energy was spent trying to eat and sleep as much as a normal person.

 

 

Onward!

I knew I had it in me, somewhere very hidden

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Victoria, from Advice From a Single Girl, recently made a post about how she doesn’t really like cooking and inspired me to finally share a recent transformation in my daily life.

 

You see, I’ve never been one to love cooking.  I really LOVE food, but mainly, I love it when it magically appears in front of me, all warm and tasty.  Or if it appears inside my grandma’s cookware.  But I’ve always liked sharing, get togethers, entertaining.  One of my friends used to say I got all Martha Steward-y when I had the chance.  And the thing is, when I want to cook something, it usually comes out decent.   Say, I love my lasagna, so when I make it, I do it knowing that it’s going to be yummy and I think that helps it come out awesome.  In that list of things that I’ve always known I make well there’s also breakfast (yes, any kind of breakfast;  mandarin pancakes are my “specialty”), mash potatoes and potato salad.

On the other hand, I hate to cook for me.  If I’m the only that’s eating, I’d rather just heat any pre-made meal, throw it on a plate (or maybe skip the plate because then I don’t have to clean it!) and get it over with.  What’s the fun in a one person meal?  NONE it’s what.

 

There’s been a change to this lately.  I have found myself looking for new (simple) recipes, trying them out and, wait for it, making my own adjustments to them.  Who am I and what have I done with me?!  I’ve been encouraged by my very small, but very meaningful, accomplishments.  I started making some really simple desserts as a gift and people loved them, so I moved on to some other recipes and some weeks ago I made a rice recipe that no one I knew had ever made before and it was a hit.

It’s called Arroz Vago (Lazy Rice) and it has steak, spicy pork sausage, bacon, chicken, pork ham and chickpeas (I’ll share the recipe upon request!).  It wouldn’t have been impressive except that I made about ten servings.  That thing was HUGE.   And I made it after working a second shift, I finished cooking at almost 2am.

 

I think the point is that it makes an immense difference if you know you are cooking for other people.  When you are sure someone else is going to appreciate the effort you put into that meal, when you know they are going to eat it and be grateful because they had something nice to eat after a day of work and when you are able to share that moment of OMG I’m so thankful because I have FOOD! it makes it all worth it.  I could never enjoy filling my belly as much as I enjoy filling someone else’s.

 

It is also encrypted in my genes that I shall enjoy making meals for others, but I think I had a switch that needed to be turned on by maturity and company.   In any case, it’s almost Christmas and there might be more home made meals around here.

 

Onward!

Reading: Amber Chronicles

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A couple of weeks ago I finished reading The Complete Amber Chronicles.  For a  while there, right about the middle of it, I thought that would never happen,  so I consider this a win close to the one that was finishing Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell.   (A year and half of not giving up.  Seriously.)I don’t remember who recommended or where I saw the Amber Chronicles  (this is happening with the Game of Thrones series too, did any of you recommended it?  I can’t see  why I have that in my wish list)  but as soon as I did I bought the whole series.   It was a jump of faith.  I usually never buy a whole series before I can read at least one part,  but I liked the period setting, it sounded interesting and it came in a bundle.

Thankfully, the opening lines are gripping so I gave it a shot.   I loved the story, I mean you can never have too many super-human princesses and princes in a novel and the story telling is delightful.  I also LOVED Corwin.  He is witty and sensitive and more importantly;  he kicks ass.  So as soon as he disappeared I almost gave up.  I gave myself some time to warm up to Merlin, since he is, you know, HIS SON, and he kept me reading until almost the end.  Almost.  I hereby admit shamelessly that I skimmed the last two books pretty much in their entirety.  It was when all those characters that I had never heard of before began appearing (I wanted to mention some of them here, in a parenthesis, but I can only remember Jasra’s name.  That’s how forgettable they are.) and I had to keep going back to track their existence that I gave up on it and decided to follow only the principal story line, and by that I mean I only cared about what was Merlin doing.  I see how this was a flaw for me but might be a point of interest for someone else, someone who is so into the world of Amber, that they want more characters and story lines and things but me?  I just wanted to read something cool before sleeping (by the way, book is not comfortable for bed-reading, HUGE) and all those extra people were just confusing me.
And since I’m apparently a reading pussy, I gave up.  It must be because when I was younger I had a rule that one MUST finish all books begun.  Now if I don’t want to read it after the first ten pages, gone it is.  Oh, hello the War of Art, I’m so not sorry I threw you aside after I chuckled three times in your introduction and then fell asleep.
Anyway, the book has a lot of awesome characters that don’t come up front enough, a lot of interesting plots, and a whole lot of magnificent description and witty lines.  It will keep you reading, even you decided to skip a few pages.