Things I Love Thursday!

Here's a few things I'm loving on this beautiful Thursday!

Covet is like playing paper dolls for grown ups. It's an app you can play on your phone or your tablet, so if anyone asks, you can just say you're checking email or reading a book, so no one has to know you're playing grown up paper dolls! Basically, you dress up your person for themed challenges using clothing that you've purchased (using the in-game money). Each challenge has a little story behind it, as well as guidelines, such restricting your outfit to only formal gowns, needing at least 3 striped items, or requiring an item from a particular designer. Once you've submitted your outfit, you earn money to buy more clothes, and then other users will vote on your outfit against another outfit and choose the better one. If you get a high amount of votes, you can win more clothing items! The really cool thing is that all the clothes and accessories are real items that you can actually buy, except you can't afford them in real life, so you can live vicariously through the game! Nothing is cartoon-ized; it all looks pretty realistic - for example, if you put a belt on an outfit, it will actually cinch in, instead of just being superimposed awkwardly over it, like I thought it might. Covet is a surprisingly fun app, and I think anyone with even a passing interest in fashion would really get a kick out of it.

One of my new favorite clothing brands is Pink Rose. I went shopping a couple weeks ago, and bought 3 Pink Roses pieces at 2 different stores, completely by accident. I love how soft and cozy their clothes are. They've got a lot of great sweater-y clothes, so perfect for winter. I love the description on their website: "You're a laidback girl who always has an eye on the latest trends.You never sacrifice your comfort for style, but you never give up your style for comfort, either." 

I've really into watching makeup tutorials on YouTube. I've watched a ton but I still couldn't do a winged eyeliner if you held a gun to my head. Honestly, I really have picked up a lot of tips and tricks from a few of them. They always make want to go out and buy a bunch of makeup that I don't know how to use. One of my favorites for makeup tutorials is Lauren Curtis. She has a great Australian accent and looks like Barbie. She used to a makeup artist in real life, and now she gets paid to put makeup on herself in front of her computer! What a great life that must be! Someday I'm going to pay super close attention to one of these videos, and use all the exact products they do in the exact same way they do, and then maybe, finally, at the age of 30... my makeup will finally be perfect! Until then, it's fun to have them on in the background while I play Covet (look, it came full circle!).

John Wick: Or, Why You'll Get Murdered If You Kick A Dog

John Wick is the latest in a line of movies featuring dudes who no other dudes want to mess with, that's how crazy and good at murdering they are. It was just as good as any of them, and this one had the added bonus of starring Keanu Reeves. Where you been at, Neo? You were missed. I know his acting can seem a little wooden, but I thought he did a great job of being growly and angry and punchy in this movie. 

John Wick is about a former contract killer who got out of the game for the love of a woman, who ended up dying of non-murdering-related things. After her death, to help him grieve, she sends him a puppy posthumously. This puppy's adorableness helps to start John Wick's healing process. At least, until Theon Greyjoy comes along and kills this poor puppy as revenge for Wick not selling him his vintage car and also because he is a dick. I knew this part was coming, and also knowing this movie was somewhat graphic, I was completely on edge waiting for some brutal puppy-killing scene. Thankfully, it is more implied than anything, so I didn't need to start crying right there in the theater.

John Wick then goes on a killing spree trying to find Theon Greyjoy (dude, Ramsey Bolton's got him locked up in the North and is totally taking care of it, don't worry) (am I mixing up my fandoms?), and it's pretty intense. The fight scenes are really well choreographed and super realistic. When someone gets punched or shot in the face, you feel it. When he shoots people, he doesn't just shoot in their general direction, hit them in the shoulder, and then they fall over dead like it seems in some movies. He shoots them several times and then in the head for good measure (aka zombie killing best practices). 

Adrianne Palicki is also in the movie as another hitperson who is staying in the hitperson hotel where John Wick goes to get information on Theon's whereabouts. BTW, another cool part of the movie was the world they set up, where you call a cleanup crew after you killed a bunch of people and say 'I'd like to make a reservation for dinner for 12' and that's how they know how many bodies to bury; and where there's a hitperson hotel with no-killing rules and a cool club and sauna. Anyway, she was super kick-ass, and I kept wondering where her spin-off was. Where are all the cool hitwoman movies?? 

Anyway, in conclusion, John Wick was a pretty good time at the movies, no puppies were harmed in the making, and I need to write a movie where Adrianne Palicki is the one who kills everyone after her boyfriend dies and someone kills her kitten.

Candy, Rides, and Good Times at Mickey's Halloween Party 2014!

In case you somehow weren't aware, I'm a pretty big Disney fan. My boyfriend and I have been Annual Passholders for several years. This is our second year attending Mickey's Halloween Party. Halloweentime is one of my favorite seasons at Disneyland, second only to Christmastime (obvs). There are Mickey-shaped pumpkins and ghosts everywhere, and all the characters are in costumes. There's also a lot more villain characters out and about than usual. Two rides even have Halloween overlays - Space Mountain with Ghost Galaxy, and Haunted Mansion with Nightmare Before Christmas. Frontierland has a Dia De Los Muertos theme, and Big Thunder Ranch has all kinds of Halloween activities for the kids.

The castle during Halloween night.

For Mickey's Halloween Party, the park closes down to the general public after 6pm, open only to those with wristbands for the party. It still seems like there's a lot of people there, but the lines are much shorter. We didn't wait longer than maybe 15 minutes for any of the rides we went on - and we went on a ton! Astro Blasters, Space Mountain, Star Tours, Jungle Cruise (which was really cool to do at night), Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, Indiana Jones - and these were all within the span of a few hours. Normally this would take a whole day, at least! 

Another fun feature of the Halloween Party are, of course, the candy stations! There are multiple ones spread throughout the park. We like to wander around and find them as we go, but you can also find them marked on the map.They hand you a plastic bag at the front when you arrive to put your candy in. The bags are on the small side, though, so you may want to bring your own! I brought my Mickey Jack-O'Lantern that I bought last year. It didn't hold much more, but it lit up, so that made up for the size. The stations are marked with a Mickey's Halloween Party sign, and usually consist of several different stands that you just walk straight through, bag open. The candy they give out is your standard Halloween sizes of name-brand candy. Last year, several stations gave out carrots and apples, but I found there were far fewer of those this year. We ended up with a TON of candy - probably close to 8 pounds of it.

So much candy!

This year, we found a special Annual Passholder candy station at the Opera House on Main Street, where we got a special Big Hero Six backpack bag, and a big rice krispie treat! They were also screening Halloween themed cartoons in the theater where Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln normally is. It was a fun, unexpected bonus!

Mickey's Halloween Party is also the only time that adults are allowed to wear costumes in the park. A lot of people took advantage of that and we saw a ton of fun and creative costumes. My favorite was the group of people dressed as characters from The Little Mermaid. They even had a guy in a big fluffy Flounder costume! I didn't wear a costume, but maybe next year!

We also tried some new Disneyland foods I'd never eaten before. Pizza Port in Tomorrowland had mac and cheese pizza, which was unsurprisingly delicious! If I'd known that was an option there, I'd have eaten there every time we went!! We also got a bread bowl with clam chowder from Royal Street Veranda in New Orleans Square, and I'm pretty sure it's going to be added to the list of my favorite Disneyland foods. Now I want to try the one at Pacific Wharf in California Adventure.

The next day, we hit up California Adventure since we got on all the Disneyland rides the previous day. They don't really have much (or any?) Halloween decorations, which is kind of disappointing. It wasn't super crowded, so we were able to get several rides pretty quickly. It was a very nice day, so we sat and people-watched for a while before walking over to Downtown Disney.

California Adventure!

We had a late lunch at Uva Cafe. I got the Uva Burger, which was yummy but pretty overpriced, though I guess that's to be expected in Downtown Disney! We made one last stop before we left - World of Disney! They didn't have the tsum tsums I was looking for, but I did unexpectedly find a set of hard to find vintage attraction posters!

I'm looking forward to next year's Halloween Party! Hopefully I'll have finished all this candy by then... 

Ballooooons.

Candy apples, in the Minnie and Olaf varieties.

Artisanal LA Fall Show 2014

A very large chair outside the venue. I don't know why.

On Saturday, I went to Artisanal LA's Fall Show at LA Mart downtown. Held seasonally, it is what's known as a pop-up community event.

It was kind of like a more hipstery farmer's market. The show hosted a bunch of independent local vendors selling all kinds of food - like tons of jarred stuff like pickled cauliflower and salsa and jellies, jerky, chocolates, cupcakes - and crafts like jewelry, succulents, and pottery. 


The first thing I saw were a couple pens containing a goat and 2 pigs! Of course I immediately rushed over to pet them. The pigs were pretty chill, but when I tried to take a selfie with the goat, he chomped on my hair! Not okay, Mr. Goat. Not okay.

Oink oink!

WTF.

There was a lot of pretty, shiny things to look at and yummy foods to sample. We tried some tiny cupcakes from Cupcake Kissis - they are about the size of a quarter and were super yummy! The Donut Snob had some very yummy looking donuts with flavors like Campfire, Rise & Shine, and the Oinker. We purchased a bottle of ginger beer from Stowaway Ginger Beer.

I also bought a cute little succulent in a tiny ceramic pot from Nora Flower Studio, and a maple bacon macaroon in the shape of a pig from Three Jerks Jerky!

Piece by Paz candles

Piece by Paz were selling cool candles using recycled wine bottles cut in half!! How clever! I love this line I saw on their Pinterest page: "The bottle of wine you drank last night crossed the path of a candle, and they became 1." They had really fun scents like Spumpkin and Old Money.



A full list of vendors can be found here.

In addition to all that, the show also had a full schedule of panels and classes, with names like Making Fermented Soda, Producing Goat Cheese, and Fall Tablescaping. I didn't go to any of them, but I'm sure they were fascinating.

Tickets to the show included a really cool tote bag! You can see the little bitty succulent I got, and the pig shaped macaroon, and the very yummy more chocolates we also picked up.

Stuff I bought!

Things I Love Thursday!

It's Thursday, so it's time for a few Things I Love!!

I've been playing a lot of Disney Magical World on my 3DS as of late. It was released earlier this year to little acclaim, which is unfortunate because it's really a very fun and cute game. Set in Castleton, it looks somewhat similar to Disneyland. It's comparable to Animal Crossing, but unlike that game, you have badges with particular goals to accomplish, like catching fish of certain size, building certain amounts of furniture, making certain amounts of clothes, and having your picture taken with various Disney characters. Similar to AC, you can do things like go fishing, decorate your house (and cafe, in DMW), and plant things. There's also a lot of other worlds you can go to for quests and to earn more materials to make more things. There are 100 badges to earn in total. I'm at 96, and the last few are so so hard to earn! My favorite part of the game are all the costumes, and getting to talk to the various Disney characters. It's just a super cute game, and I'm really pretty sad that it didn't become more popular.

I'm a bit of a productivity nut (not that I'm good at it, I just like reading about it), so I'm always looking for ways to improve my to do list. Currently, I'm using the website/app Trello to keep track of not only my daily to-dos, but also my monthly and yearly goals. It's intended to be used as a collaboration tool for teams to keep track of their projects, but I like to use it for goals, as well as other things like blogging ideas, gift ideas, travel ideas, pretty much anything. I have separate boards for all these things, so I can keep track of things but also not have them cluttering up everything else. One of the things I like best about it is that you can drag items from list to list, so that if I don't get something done on the Tuesday list, I can move it over to the Wednesday one. It's super convenient, and thus far is the best tool I've used for to-doing.


I'm also loving LootCrate! It's a monthly subscription box full of geeky stuff. I used to subscribe back when it first started a few years ago, but ended up canceling after a while. It's about 20 bucks a month, but you get all kinds of cool stuff. I resubbed to it because I heard they were doing some exclusive stuff with Funko, so I figured, why not! For this first box, I got quite a few cool things - like a replica pack of bank robbery money from an episode of Firefly, a Funko Sci-Fi Mystery Mini (which ended up being Mal from Firefly!), a retro arcade looking magnet, a poster of Han Solo encased in carbonite, a ReAction figure of Kane from Alien, and a Tribble!  I'm looking forward to seeing what's in my next box!

Movie Monday: Gone Girl

I saw Gone Girl over the weekend! I was really excited to see it because I loved the book, and I like a lot of David Fincher's movies, so I knew it would be a really great adaptation. I kind of envy people who hadn't read the book before seeing it, because the twist in the middle is pretty crazy. I know when I was reading it, I was like, whoa, this just got a lot more interesting! And then after that, I couldn't put it down. The 'unreliable narrator' thing probably comes across better in the book, perhaps, but it's still pretty cool in the movie when you find out what's really happened. 

The first part of the story seems like a typical scenario that we've seen played out too many times in the news (especially in today's world of 24 hour sensationalist news) - a wife (Amy, played masterfully by Rosamund Pike) goes missing, and her husband (Nick, a very well cast Ben Affleck) is the suspected murderer. Everything seems to point in that direction, from their money woes and growing emotional distance, to his infidelity. Halfway through, however (SPOILER ALERT!), we find out that Amy has masterminded the whole thing - every last shred of evidence was meant to make it seem like Nick murdered her. Even her diary entries, which to this point have framed much of the narrative and led you, and the investigators of the case, to believe that he had to have done it. 

I think everyone is probably quick to label Amy as a crazy psycho bitch, which, sure she is. More than that, though, she is a sociopath, which is a type of crazy that I find particularly fascinating. Cold and calculating, and both emotionless and full of emotion, and like a force of evil or of nature, one can be virtually powerless to stop them. They don't need a reason to try to destroy your life, although Amy feels like she has one, which is basically like, how dare Nick not continue to be the charming man she had a rom-com meet-cute with. Instead of, you know, communicating with him about how to improve their marriage, why not frame him for her murder to get his attention instead? A lot of reviews I read about the movie talked about how it was about the difficulties of relationships and marriage. I can't say that I've ever wanted to fake murder myself and frame my boyfriend for it, but maybe I'm doing something wrong. 

Anyway, Gone Girl is really great, and probably on my top ten list of 2014 so far. If you liked the movie at all, definitely read the book too!

Movie Monday: Nightcrawler & Gone With The Wind

Recently, I was thinking about movie reviews, and movie critics, and how they are typically negative and seem to always be looking for what's wrong with a movie, and virtually ignoring what is right. I always find it hard to write about movies because I read so many of these reviews and feel like that's the only way you can talk about a movie is to talk about it's flaws. I have a pretty open mind when it comes to movies, and it takes quite a lot for me to think that a movie is bad. I believe that even if a movie isn't perfect, as long as you enjoyed it, you haven't wasted your time. So I decided, rather than let that keep me from writing about movies I enjoy, I'm going to embrace it and write the way I want to. Thus, I'm starting a new regular feature called Movie Mondays! Here we go!

Nightcrawler

I had the opportunity to see an early screening of Nightcrawler last Friday at Beyond Fest. Jake Gyllenhaal stars in this thriller/drama about a creepy guy who gets involved in the surprisingly crazy world of video-taping accidents and crime scenes and then selling them to news stations.

Jake Gyllenhaal's incredibly creepy portrayal of an amoral guy trying to find his way in life is amazing. If there were an Oscar for Best Creeper, he would for sure win it. Seriously though, I don't see why he couldn't be an Oscar contender for this role. He does such a great job at being an overly friendlyish creeper, which is the worst kind of creeper. With his bug eyes, and over-earnestness, you both kind of hate him and kind of root for him. The lengths to which he goes to to secure good footage is chilling, and even more chilling is how matter-of-factly he does them. The world of crime scene journalism is really interesting and one that I'd never really considered before. You just don't really watch horrific accidents on the news and think about how they got the footage. I really hope that this film does well when it opens wide on October 31. It's such a great, original film, and it deserves to find an audience.



Gone With The Wind

OMG this is my favorite movie of all time. OF ALL TIME. Cinemark is doing a Classics series this summer, and Gone With The Wind was thankfully included. I haven't seen it on the big screen in either a long time, or never, I can't remember which. Though I have it on DVD and Blu-Ray, I actually hadn't watched it in a long time, so I was seeing it with somewhat fresh eyes this weekend. I realized that it was STILL AMAZING. Even at four hours long, my attention never wavered, I didn't wonder how much longer; I just sat there, entranced.

It is as much Scarlett and Melanie's story as it is Scarlett and Rhett's. Both women must figure out how to survive in the post-war South, and despite being very different, they both do. Scarlett is manipulative and ambitious, willing to do anything (before the war) to land Ashley Wilkes as a husband, or (after the war) to never be hungry and powerless again. Melanie may appear weaker than Scarlett, but her quiet strength holds everyone together.

Anyway, Gone With The Wind is amazing and everyone should see it. I read the book several times when I was much younger, and now I have a hankering to read it again. I wonder how different it will seem 10/15 years since I last did.

Salt Lake Comic Con 2014

A couple weeks ago, I started writing this blog post about attending Salt Lake Comic Con, but because I am the world's worst (or is it best??) procrastinator, I am only now finishing and posting it. So, this is happening.

SLCC is another new (to us) convention! This is the second year of the con; last year made records as the biggest year for a debut convention ever! Pretty impressive! 

We arrived in Salt Lake City on Thursday, staying at a hotel next to the convention center with a great view from our room! On our way to the hotel, we saw the line going into the convention center, and figured that we would relax a bit and have dinner, and let the crowd dissipate so that we could waltz right in and check out the exhibit hall for a while. So we checked into our hotel, had a nice dinner at Red Rock Brewery down the street, and then went over. The line was still long, but there were two separate ones, one for for regular attendees and the other for people with gold passes, which we had. For some reason that no one could really explain, they stopped the Gold Pass line, while continuing with the regular attendee line - for like 2 hours. A guy in line behind us actually got out of our line, went into the regular line, and got through before we had even started moving again. It was totally ridiculous and a sour start to the weekend. We did eventually get through the line and got our passes, but by then the exhibit hall had closed, so we didn't get to do anything.

A real live owl!

The next day, Friday, we finally go to see the convention! We checked out the exhibit hall and purchased a few goodies. There was lots of awesome cosplay - several people dressed as Lego figures, several Jack Frosts and Elsas, a couple of Star Lords, and a ton of female Loki and Thors - like, literally more female ones than male ones. C'mon dudes, step it up! There seemed to be a lot of live animals out on the floor - there was a booth with snakes and lizards, and a guy walking around with a real live owl! I even held a bearded dragon who I found oddly adorable!

We also attended a couple panels. Alan Tudyk (of Firefly fame)'s panel was pretty unique - for the Q&A, he had each person who wanted to ask a question sit on stage with him and answer a question from him! And then he gave them some 'shit', as he called it - incredibly random stuff like CDs, programs, a harmonica, some sunglasses. Later, we went to Manu Bennett's (of Spartacus and Arrow fame) panel. He was incredibly open and honest about his life and his career, and he seemed so grateful to have fans. He answered a few audience questions, for which the lines were awkwardly off to the sides of the stage. At the end of every answer, he made sure to direct his attention back to the person who asked the question, which I thought was a very nice and personal touch. There was this one question about Arrow, about what would it be like if he and the main actor traded roles, and he gave this incredibly honest answer; that Hollywood relies a lot on stereotypes, and so someone who looks like him (meaning Maori and thus somewhat dark-skinned; probably not referring to his super buffness), simply doesn't get those kind of leading man, hero roles. He could have given a fluff answer to that question, and instead choose to be super honest, but not at all bitter; simply stating a fact. I always liked him on Spartacus, now I like him even more, and I'm definitely going to have to check out Arrow now.


Saturday! The last day of the show, unlike most cons that also have Sunday. I guess it's the lord's day, and this is probably the lord's town, so no sinful cons on Sundays! 

Upstairs from the exhibit hall, they had an area dedicated to a few rows of arcade games! We played Captain America and the Avengers until we beat the final boss. I played Iron Man and hit those buttons until my fingers were sore! 

Later, we went to a panel featuring Simon Helberg from Big Bang Theory. This panel was more of a traditional moderated one with Q&A. Most of which, to be totally honest, sucked. I guess they didn't take a page from San Diego Comic Con, and didn't screen the questions before they were asked, leading to a lot of annoying 'Can I have a hug?" questions, questions that had already been asked, and questions that were just plain lame. I'm gonna be harsh for a second and say that the audiences in SLCC seemed to be a bit less... savvy... about how things work. Like, someone asked if Simon could have Howard and Bernadette have a baby on the show - as if the actors just show up and make things up themselves. These kinds of questions make for an awkward moment (and wasted time) as the actor then has to explain how writers and actors and television works. Also, there were a ton of questions from little kids. Is TBBT really a show for small children?? You know, it's cute maybe once, but when every other question is a small child, it gets old fast. SLCC definitely needs to step up it's game, Q&A-wise.

Clearly I needed a drink after all that, so we hit up Bourbon House for some bourbon, and some delish bacon wrapped jalapeno tator tots! We then bar hopped over to The Red Door, which had some very clever Comic Con themed cocktails!

All in all, Salt Lake Comic Con was a decent show. It definitely has some growing pains, and some improvements to make. Does it compare to San Diego Comic Con, though? No, it doesn't, and they should stop saying that it does, and that SLCC is for quote-unquote real fans. Can't we all just get along? Hopefully, they will take a page from SDCC and learn from mistakes year-over-year. SDCC makes a huge effort to do that, and it is always noticeable that when something isn't working one year, they do something to improve upon that the next. Hopefully, SLCC comes back next year bigger and better (maybe not bigger; it's already pretty huge).

Some goodies I purchased

I am Balloon Groot.

Seattle, Redux!

Last weekend, I accompanied my boyfriend on a business trip to Seattle, Washington! We were actually just there a few months ago for Emerald City Comic Con; this time, we were in the city for just 25 hours!

We stayed at the Crowne Plaza, in the heart of downtown Seattle. Because I am a member of the very exclusive rewards club (not really that exclusive; any club that would have me as a member, etc.) our room got upgraded to one of the top club floors - we even had to use our key in elevator to get to our floor! Super fancy! It also came with a cocktail hour and complimentary breakfast buffet! And the view from our room was amazing - we could even see the Space Needle and the ocean!



Upon arriving, we had dinner at Hattie's Hat in Ballard. I had a really yummy Voodoo Burger with pico de gallo on it, plus a drink called Bill Murray! It's their #1 best selling drink; I can only assume because it's called Bill Murray, and who doesn't like Bill Murray? Nobody, that's who. It consisted of bourbon, amaretto, and probably Bill Murray's actual blood.

Last time we were in town, we didn't have enough time to go to the Space Needle, so I really wanted to go this time, to add it to my list of towers I have been in. We got all the way there, only to find out that the next available time to go to the top was 3 hours later! No, thank you. Whatever, we got some great pictures from the bottom anyway.






While the boyfriend was working at his business job, I went to check out the Nordstrom Flagship, mere blocks from our hotel downtown. I believe it's the first Nordstrom ever, but don't quote me on that. It was 5 floors of shopping goodness! I checked out every single floor, and even went across the street to the Nordstrom Rack! Our one checked bag was already packed full, so all I could buy were some socks and underwear!










Later on, we went to Pike Place Market, which was surprisingly packed for a Monday afternoon. Don't you guys have jobs? We went directly from there to the airport, back to our home in LA! What a wild 25 hour trip!

The End of Bar Method Month

I can't believe it's been 30 days since I started this challenge, and I can't believe I finished all 15 classes! I feel amazing and kind of really proud of myself for sticking to it and really pushing myself each class to do better.

I can definitely tell a difference in how I feel from when I first started. I'm able to push myself further, sink down more in Thigh, crunch more in Abs, and even do pushups on my feet instead of my knees. Plus, I haven't had any more trouble with my shoulders, my hip flexors, or my knees, all of which had caused me pain in the last several months. My body just feels really great, less creaky and crunchy and jiggly, overall!

It seemed appropriate that for my final class of the challenge, the instructor was Mimi Fleischman herself - the owner of Bar Method Los Angeles, and sister of the founder of the Bar Method! I felt really honored and lucky to be in her class, as she doesn't teach very often anymore. She was, of course, amazing, which I'm sure is why all the instructors at Bar Method are also so amazing! They are a huge part of why I love and keep coming back to Bar Method.

After 15 classes, you think I'd be sick of Bar Method classes, right? Wrong! Here's a twist ending - I actually have 6 more classes to take, from a series I had purchased previously! Woo hoo! However, instead of taking them 3-4 times a week, I'm going to just do a couple times a week, and combine them with Zumba and other classes. I really enjoyed dedicating 3 to 4 times a week to exercising, and I want to keep up that pace.