Category: entertainment

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Getting Ready for a Yard Sale

This time of year my neighborhood has “Yard Sale” signs popping up on every street corner every weekend. It’s the perfect time to get serious about clearing out your clutter and getting ready to sell it off to strangers who happen to drive by and see all your stuff in the yard – or garage. Most of the houses on my street have a garage that faces the street, so if it happens to rain during the yard sale, we just move it all into the garage and people will come.

I’m the first one to admit that I have hoarder tendencies, but I try to  keep everything organized and clean. About twice a year I will do Spring Cleaning and toss a bunch of things that I don’t want into some big plastic tubs that I keep in the garage in anticipation of having a yard sale. There are some things that were easy to discard, such as all the old VHS tapes that I’ve had since the 1990’s, a bunch of old CD’s that I have to admit that I don’t listen to, and this weekend I will be purging my closet of clothes that don’t fit.

Today I realized that I have 4 media shelving units full of DVDs and they are covered with dust. I seriously cannot remember the last time I walked over to the shelves and looked for a movie to watch. Everything is pretty much on demand digitally, so why are all these old movies taking up space and collecting dust? I’d be better off selling the old DVDs for a little cash and put that money toward my vacation this summer.

My last boyfriend was a big movie fan and loved to collect DVDs. It seemed like every time we went to WalMart, he would pick up one or two movies to add to our collection. The only problems is that they are all guy movies. You know, the action movies with Bruce Willis or Mel Gibson. A few comedies with Adam Sandler or Ben Stiller. And those crime dramas with Robert De Nero or Al Pacino. As far as I’m concerned, once I’ve watched those kinds of movies, I’m not really interested in watching them a second or third time. So, what’s the point of having them on the media shelves?

There are probably only 4 or 5 movies in each different genre that I can watch over and over again. Maybe I should grab 10 desert island picks from each genre to keep and then just sell off all the rest. My boyfriend left them all behind when I had to kick him to the curb, since I’m the one who actually paid for most of him while he was “looking for a job” for so long. It will be nice to having a little extra money when I head to the beach in August, and selling the DVDs – that I don’t even watch – in a yard sale is a pretty painless way to raise that extra cash.

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Dexter is a Stranger Show this Season

I love the premise of the show, Dexter, which is on the showtime cable channel. He is a serial killer who hunts other serial killers.

This season he has a sister who is causing him a lot of concerns. And his friend used to date her. And his “mother” shows up asking him for help. It has a lot of twists.

One of the cool things is that this show makes a lot of commentary on politics and our society. And it seems very realistic – real settings and scenes.

Tonight I watched episode 2 of the season 8 – last season for the show. One of these days I will watch the whole show, from beginning to end. I don’t want to buy all the DVDs, but I would not mind renting them all or ordering them from Netflix.

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Renn Faires and Steampunk

Now that I have been to a Renn Faire and had so much fun, I am interested in learning more about the Steampunk festivals. It seems that the Renn Fests also spawned Pirate Days and Fairies Festivals, too. I had no idea that dressing up in these kinds of fantasy costumes was such a big deal to so many people. I think it is great fun, and I want to get a costume for next year.

There is a site on Facebook with a web site called Holy Clothing that makes beautiful long dresses at affordable prices that I might use as a base for my own costume. I would like to buy a nice dress and then use slightly different accessories to make it more Steampunk, and then other accessories to make it more Renn Fest appropriate. The accessories include shoes, hair ornaments or hats and different types of jackets, capes or vests.

This costume thing is very exciting – I have not been this interested in costumes since I went to a Halloween Party at a co-worker’s condo several years ago. I wish I had known about Renn Fest and Steampunk back then – I would have had a head start on this costume!

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Thank God Its Friday!

graphic celebrating Thank God Its Friday!

My friend, Jim Hunt, is a cartoonist who lives in Maryland. I love his style of drawing and lettering. He has a Facebook page where he shares a lot of his cartoons and drawings. This one really fits the occasion today. If today was not really Friday, I think I would go to be dearly and pull the covers up over my head and cry myself to sleep! It’s Friday – and not a moment too soon!

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Fun at Renn Fest with Wendy

Yesterday my girlfriend, Wendy, invited me to go to the annual Tennessee Renn Fest with her and her two kids. At first, I was reluctant to go. I’m not used to being around little kids and I was not sure I would enjoy the Renn Fest with the distraction of kids running around. I told Wendy that and she was very understanding, and she suggested we take separate cars to the Renn Fest so that if I was not having a good time I could just leave. That sounded like a good plan, so that’s what we did.

Parking was not a big issue although the Festival was PACKED. I was really surprised at how many people went to this event in costume and seem to take the whole Rennaisance era very seriously. There are paid actors who roam about in costume, but a lot of the attendees were also in costume and sometimes you could not tell if they were actors or tourists!

Wendy’s kids are very well behaved and absolutely adorable kids! I think watching them have fun at the Renn Fest actually enhanced my personal experience there. I had a wonderful time, we watched every show and bought a few souveniers and the only reason we left was that the festival was over and packing up for the night!

Thank you, Wendy, for inviting me!

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Really Funny Commercials Lately!

There have been a lot of good commercials on TV lately. Have you noticed? Maybe the Super Bowl inspired a lot of companies to get busy and come up with cute commercials. One of my favorites is about a little kid riding in the backseat asks his parents where do babies come from. They tell this ridiculous story about astronauts and babies parachuting to earth. When the kids says, but my friend says that babies come from… and the dad freaks out and turns up the car radio real loud and starts singing. That one just cracks me up!

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Wow! Lincoln is a MUST SEE movie!

Just saw the movie, Lincoln, last night. All I can say is, “Wow!” What a great movie! It is nothing like I expected. Everyone knows about Abraham Lincoln and how he got assassinated and all that part of our American history. This movie was NOT about that! This movie was about politics in the old days and how the end of the Civil War affected the end of slavery – and it almost did not happen!

Daniel Day Lewis is SPECTACULAR as Abraham Lincoln. You totally believe that you are watching the real man – not an actor who has won the Academy Award for other movie roles like Last of the Mohicans and his other great movies. There were several excellent actors in this movie. I loved Tommy Lee Jones and Sally Field, too.

This movie was nominated for all kinds of Academy Awards and should have won them all. It’s a GREAT MOVIE! Don’t wait for the DVD – go see it!!!

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Have You Heard of the Mummers Parade?

Since I do not live on the East Coast, I do not get all the news that others might get. I have never heard of anything called a Mummer’s Parade, but it is a really big deal in Philadelphia every year. It has been going on since the 1800’s. So why have I never heard of it? This is like Philadelphia’s Mardi Gras – big floats, fabulous costumes, music, dancing – a huge all day street party. They even judge the entries and give out trophies to five different Divisions of parades entries:

  • Comic Division
  • Wench Brigades
  • Fancy Division
  • String Bands
  • Fancy Brigades

I’ve never even heard of the word mummer, so I looked it up. “A masked or costumed merrymaker.” So I guess all the Mardi Gras and Carnival parade people are technically mummers, too.

I don’t know that I will ever have a chance to be in Philadelphia on New Year’s Day, but if I do have the chance, I will go with the plan to see the Mummers, too. The Mardi Gras parade I saw was so much fun! I wish I had a fancy costume and could party with people at one of the carnival balls. That would be something to look forward to all year long!

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Have You Been to a Dog Park?

Most days I take my dog for a short walk in my own yard every morning. Then, in the afternoon we walk up and down the street in my neighborhood. That’s the only safe place I know and that all the exercise we get. I’ve never taken him to a dog park. In fact, I don’t think there are any dog parks anywhere around this area. I think there is one about an hour from here, but that is awfully far to go for a walk in the park with my dog.

Oddly enough, there was a movie on cable last night called, “Dog Park.” It’s about several people in California who have dogs and develop romantic relationships because they meet at the dog park or dog obedience classes or they work together. I admit that I did not watch the entire movie, but watch I did watch was awful. It is a really lame story line, the sound track sucks, and the actors are pathetic. I have no idea how this movie even got made. Do not waste your time watching this awful movie, even if you are sick in bed with the flu and can’t find the remote control to change the channel. The dogs in the movie are the only interesting characters, especially the two Boxers.

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Finally Got to Watch the Movie Version of The Help

Book cover of The Help

Having rad the book over two years ago, I have been wanting to see the movie version of The Help. I missed the chance to see it when it was first in theaters, and for some reason I did not notice when it became available at Redbox.

Thank goodness for cable TV and On Demand movies. Some of my friends love Netflix, but I get along fine with Comcast movie channels, On Demand, and Redbox. That is plenty of resources for watching most movies.

So I stumbled on the movie guide and found The Help was running on Cinemax. I flipped right to the channel and caught the end of the movie – just the credits part. Then in just a couple of minutes the movie started from the beginning because Cinemax was running the movie back to back for the whole day. I don’t know if they normally do a single movie marathon like that, but i lucked out and got to watch it. It was really just as good as the book, and the actors were cast perfectly!