Critic's Corner

Books I've recently read:

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Safran Foer: This is a terrific book, recommended to me by my good friend Anderson Cooper.

Well, so actually I heard AC singing the praises of this book when he was co-hosting Live with Kelly a few weeks ago, but in my head he and I are good friends. 'Kay? So naturally I dashed off to the Kindle Store and downloaded a copy, using the Amazon Gift Card my good friend Sonya gave me for Christmas. Yay!

This is a terrific book, and I can't wait for the movie (that'll be Netlix for $1000, Alex - we can't afford to go to the theater anymore!). However, this book was incredible difficult for me to read, because the Point of View (POV) keeps switching from the protagonist to other characters, some of whom even have the same name (Thomas) which is doubly confusing, as you try to grasp any straw to get a foothold in the context, and while the POV is switching between characters, all the text is delivered in the same frantic, frenetic style of the pre-adolescent protagonist. I was constantly having to reread pages to figure out which character was speaking, and ultimately realized I would be better served to just finish as best I could, and once it was all sorted out, I would re-read the entire book, knowing who everyone is. But it is definitely one for the Must Read list!

Lucy, by Laurence Gonzales: I am glad this was a digital library loan, and that I didn't fork up any money for it. This book has a terrific premise (from Amazon: "Primatologist Jenny Lowe is studying bonobo chimpanzees deep in the Congo when she is caught in a deadly civil war that leaves a fellow researcher dead and his daughter, Lucy, orphaned. Realizing that the child has no living relatives, Jenny begins to care for Lucy as her own. But as she reads the late scientist’s notebooks, she discovers that Lucy is the result of a shocking experiment, and that the adorable, magical, wonderful girl she has come to love is an entirely new hybrid species—half human, half bonobo.") Very appealing to the science geek inside me. But the execution is awful, written to appeal to pre-teens, in my opinion. I found it juvenile, and yes, I still read it all the way to the end. So it wasn't so horrible that I quit, as I wanted to see how the author resolved the ethical quandaries he had developed, but even that was disappointing.

And a movie recommendation for you: I just watched Dolphin Tale on Netflix - what a delightful, fun film. I highly recommend it!

This is STILL bugging me.

Can anyone explain this to me? Maybe I just missed something, though I don't think so.

I previously blogged about seeing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - I think I actually saw it on the day it opened. Anyway.....

One scene in the movie just really bugged me, and I still can't figure it out, and I'm wondering if anyone else is scratching their heads over this, or they just write it off to "movie magic", or "poetic license", or just what exactly did I miss...

So, after taking the briefest of glances at the Baby Benjamin's face, Benjamin's father grabs him up when the infant is only a few minutes old, wraps him up and never looks at the kid again, and dumps him on a doorstep.

Then, sixteen or however many years later, this bio-dad spots much older, and extremely physically altered Benjamin, NOWHERE NEAR the place where he dumped the infant, and yet he instantly recognizes him as his son? The now grown man who in NO WAY resembles that infant the father last saw, for all of 3 seconds, years and years earlier?

No way.

Someone please explain this to me, or agree that I am right to be bugged by this.

Not that this was the only thing about this movie that bugged me - but this was my major issue.

Thanks.

12-26-08

I decided to close the shop today, and enjoy a day off - I'm not one of those after-Christmas shopper/returners, and I really did not want to fight the traffic to get to my shop, plus I really didn't think most after-Christmas shoppers would be hitting up the bead shop.

So I'm home today with Bailey, doing some beading (that is, I'm doing the beading, Bailey's doing the napping).

This is my latest project:

I've been experimenting with silver crochet, and enjoying it.
In my first project I used a mixture of brown freshwater pearls, champagne freshwater pearls, several earthy, shiny colors of Czech fire-polish beads, and some taupe pinch beads.

It turned out beautifully, with a very organic look, and goes with a lot of my outfits, but it's just kind of plain, for me.

For my second attempt, I chose gorgeous iolite chips, white freshwater pearls, and 4mm silver AB finish Czech fire-polished beads. I love the colors, and the combination, but I just felt like it still lacked "oomph."

So the beadweaver in me jumped up and insisted that I embellish it with fringe. I should make it very clear at this point that I HATE adding fringe to stuff, and usually limit it to a few (as in less than 10) strands on a peyote bail, or some such.

But yet, this seemed like a good plan to me.

Emphasis on "seemed."

It took me maybe 4 hours to croched the necklace you see above.

When I finished, I picked some matching seedbeads, and started adding fringe. 2 and a half DAYS later, I had fringed 6 inches of this necklace, and realized that although I kind of like how it's turning out,

a) the fringe isn't full enough, so when I complete this pass, I will have to go back and add a second full pass of fringe.

b) this is going to take forty forevers to finish.

This shot shows the current status - the point where fringe meets unfringed,

and here's how the first few inches look - the fringe is just a little too sparse for me.

I worked on it for 2 hours this afternoon, while watching some "Bones" reruns I Tivo'd Christmas Eve. Then I just HAD to take a break.

Fringing is tedious.

I was going to work on it some yesterday, but then I got a reprieve - a friend called and invited me to go to dinner and a movie with her and her fiancee. She and I voted for "Marley and Me", but the fiancee voted for "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," stating that "Marley and Me" was a chick flick, and he wouldn't be caught dead in a chick flick. And he figured Brad Pitt would never MAKE a chick flick.

So we saw Benjamin Button, and as we were filing out, my friend asked Mr. Macho Fiancee what he thought of it, and his snarly response was "Chick Flick". Of course, we were laughing hysterically at this, as he defensively responded that it was a "love story", and hence a chick flick. And that we should have seen "Valkyrie". Good grief.

Then we tried to find some place open for dinner at 10 PM. In Augusta, Georgia. Know what's open at 10PM on Christmas Day in Augusta? Convenience stores, and Waffle House. So we had a delicious post-chick flick meal at the Awful Waffle. Of course, the Waffle House near the theater was already packed, undoubtedly with like-minded movie folk, so we drove several miles to the next closest one.

Just a little clue for restaurants and bars, especially in this area - opening up for the dinner and theater crowd on Christmas evening = good for business... Just saying...

And now I have run out of excuses to not fringe, so I guess I'll go back to it.