Bearshorty's musings

I was making a list of Top Five for a fest on LJ so I thought I would post it here too. I didn’t allow myself much time to contemplate so I wrote what came to me (for books and movies and tv it was a little hard – the hardest was making the list of top 5 books.)

List of 5
Top Five Bands.
Coldplay, Leonard Cohen, Beatles, DDT (russian rock), Adele

Top Five Movies. Dirty Dancing, Titanic, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Love Actually and Princess Bride

Top Five TV Shows. Buffy, Star Trek: TNG, Farscape, Friends, A&E's Pride and Prejudice

Top Five Harry Potter Books. HBP, DH, OoP, PoA, SS

Top Five Books Of Ever. Harry Potter series, Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy, Jane Austin "Persuasion," Sharon Kay Penman "Here Be Dragons," "Tomek" series of Polish books I read in Russian as a child.

Top Five Places You Want To Visit (regardless if you've been there or not). Grand Canyon, Prague, Greek islands, Australia, Alaska

I spent the day reading for my classes tomorrow: mostly excerpts from Wollstonecraft and the articles on hagiography.

Oscars – I haven’t seen any of the movies so I was not really into the Oscars this year but I loved the show and a lot had to do with Billy Crystal – I love him sneaking political jokes and just his attitude in general. He just fits on that stage so well. Cirque de Soleil was probably my favorite part. I loved the stage design too. Now I have to see “The Artist” for my Oscar list. But I really haven’t been excited for movies lately. I think TV is doing the best storytelling work.

Bear drove me home this morning and I was trying to hold as much conversation in Russian with him so he could practice talking in it more. That was fun.

Then, after lunch, I actually did some work. My goal was to have a free evening so I could watch the Oscars. I never miss the Oscars and I watch the whole show. This year I’ve seen four out of ten movies and I know enough about the rest and I’ve been all the animated shorts and two animated movies. And it was fun show.

Anne Hathaway and James Franco were not the best hosts, but they were not too terrible. Anne Hathaway was trying her heart out. But the rest of the show when very smoothly. “Lost Thing” won the short animation - my least favorite animated short. I really don’t understand why since it wasn’t that special.

Colin Firth – I’m so happy for him, he really deserves his and not just for this movie.
And “King’s Speech” won! Yes. I actually saw it before it won this year, so my Oscar list in complete. (In high school, before DVDs, I made it a project to watch all movies that ever won Best Picture. It took me many years and tracking movies on VHS in the local library, but I have watched all of them, even terrible ones. So every year I make sure to add to my Oscar list.) My favorite bit was autotuned movies like Harry Potter and Twilight.

I also bought 1995 Cabaret recording – the Alan Cumming one. I do love the music in that show.

I woke up this morning and read my Henrietta Lacks books a bit before getting up to watch Oscar nominations. That I actually don’t miss; it is my favorite award show and I watched every single movie that ever won an Oscar and this in the years before Neflix where I had to track them down through the library. This year I’ve seen 3 out of 10 movies: The Kids and All Right, Inception and Toy Story 3.

In the morning I put together Assignment 1 for the writing classes – it actually came together very quickly. This is my question for the first 5 page paper based on Jenkins’ essay on new media: What role, if any, should traditional institutions like corporations, cultural conservatives or educators play in the new media?

I hope some would be on the side of corporations or at least make their arguments more complex than regular people should do whatever they want online, but they rarely go against authors they read or make complex arguments.

Again my Section 2 is much better than Section 1 – group dynamics and class personalities matter so much. In my section 1 of the writing class I got a few smirking boys who really don’t want to be there or want to read or care and they throw the whole class off. When I asked all students to go around the room and tell me what they thought of the reading, if they liked it and why, if they disliked it, maybe some sections they did find interesting – my first section just found the reading repetitive and boring and all pretty much answered the same way. In the second section, although some found it long, everyone found one moment or point that they found interesting. I have so much more fun and better discussion with this class. It helps that all students who had to present in the reading showed up. In the first section, two out of three skipped out.

I watched the State of the Union while cross stitching which was a great combination. I do like see the State of the Union live, even during Bush era, I get a little optimistic about our country after listening to its rhetoric although I logically know that it is not like something would be accomplished. But I did like the congress people sitting together. The standing ovations while still obviously partisan did not present such a clear division visually. Lots of emphasis on education in the speech but humanities matter too – if you can’t write or think it is hard to innovate. Good speech.

Exercise: 31 minutes on Wii. I did Wii Fit plus routines today with a combination of yoga, strength and games. I get bored a bit doing this but it was a change.
Cross-stitch: all nice deep pink on the little bear’s blanket

Late in the evening I was working on my Egypt lecture, outlines and Powerpoint until midnight.

“The Painted Veil” with Edward Norton and Naomi Watts – one amazing movie and a very lovely if unusual love story. I randomly watched it but I just adore it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a love story quite like this – two people who marry but don’t really know each other; she marries to get away from her mother, he loves her but he doesn’t really know her. They only fall in love later, after her affair and his anger at her for it, as they actually get to know each other and learn to forgive. The movie, like the book, does not have the happily ever after ending, but the acting and emotions the actors evoke are wonderful. The story takes place in 1920s China and the background is beautiful as well. This is a movie that is staying in my mind. The plot definitely doesn’t fit a standard Hollywood love story and it feels all more real and interesting because of it. Highly recommend it.

Oscars rule. This is my favorite award show of the year and I watch it religiously, at least for the last fifteen years. I’ve seen every movie that won a best picture Oscar (it was a really long project that took many years since this was before Netflix and having to track down all movies on VHS at a local library). So I was looking forward to the show. And it was awesome. Here are some reactions as I watched (and followed EW blog too – yes, I’m a nerd):

Neil Patrick Harris – unexpected awesomeness; Martin and Baldwin succeed as hosts much better than I expected – lots of funny jokes from them; great speeches from many award winners, much more interesting speeches this year too; Go “Hurt Locker” – I had this on Neflix queue for the last two month but it is still on Long Wait for me; SYTYCD dancers in a great tribute to movie scores of this year – I recognized Kayla and Russell but I wish I could recognize others – you couldn’t see that well; Kathryn Bigelow looks so shaky – she is really in shock, but good for women directors; good thing that “Avatar” did not dominate. Overall, I had a good time watching it and managed to tape it for Yeva too. Yes, I still have a VCR.