Anime Report: Ai Yori Aoshi Enishi: Destiny

The end of the Ai Yori Aoshi anime comes with all the intensity of floating down a lazy river. There's no tension, no drama -- just gentle resolutions to long-simmering questions, and a hint of what the future holds.

It's all feel-good love-love stuff, but it's almost an anticlimax -- Aoi and Kaoru are in love -- shouldn't they be happier about it?

Anime Report: Ai Yori Aoshi Enishi: Bond

More sweet and fluffy tales, most ripped from the pages of the manga.

Mayu's got a pretty new dress, and to celebrate, she coaxes Kaoru into taking her on her first date. The problem is, she doesn't know what to do on a date, and she's not very good at the things Kaoru wants to do.

Then Kaoru's got to get his schoolwork done or his summer will be ruined, but he keeps getting pulled away from his books to play with the girls. Aoi has to step in and firmly, but sweetly, lay the hammer down.

A swim team episode with Chika and her friends is a toss away, but Tina gets a nice speech about looking for her place when she doesn't seem to fit anywhere.

And when Tina suggests a vacation, everyone takes off for a spa -- unfortunately, Taeko's driving! But she says the people at the video arcade think she's a very good driver.

Charming and relaxing, but I prefer it when the focus stays on the Aoi-Kaoru-Tina triangle.

Movie Report: The Legend of Zorro

Antonio Banderas is a little slower, and Catherine Zeta-Jones' corsets are a little tighter, but the stars of 1998's stellar The Mask of Zorro are back in 2005's family-friendly sequel.

But now there's too little swordplay, and too much family bickering. There's too little drama, and there's entirely too much of that annoying kid.

Banderas and Zeta-Jones have lost much of their chemistry from the first film, but they ring true as a couple bickering their way to a divorce. And I got tired of Elena protesting how adventurous and daring she was, and then doing the *exact* opposite of adventurous or daring.

The humor's somewhat silly, and the best action sequence in the film is the first one. But there's entirely too much punching where there should be dueling (the fight scenes are too safe and tame) and the action takes great liberties with the laws of physics.

Not a terrible popcorn sequel, but not a great one either. It might be worth a watch on cable, but I wouldn't go out of my way.

Movie Report: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End

Whee!!

Talk about a fun movie!

Now, I would happily watch Johnny Depp read a cookbook for two hours, but I'm glad I didn't have to. Instead I got magic and spectacular action and humor and charm and some wonderful swordfights.

There was much swash buckled. I'm a happy girl.

Depp, of course, was perfect, in a role that he's made his own. You get some peeks into Jack's head this time around, and wow -- it's a freaky place. Orlando Bloom, thankfully, has grown into the role of Will Turner. I'm glad he no longer looks like a little kid, so I can get over being creeped out by thinking he's hot.

Keira Knightly's given more to do as Elizabeth, who is far more than a damsel in distress, although I was struck by her ability to have pearly white teeth and perfect lip gloss no matter what the situation. (She's got at least two costumes that would be *fabulous* con outfits.) Even Geoffrey Rush, who I delighted in hating as the dastardly Barbarossa, makes a pretty good good guy.

And Keith Richards was *great*.

Surprisingly, they didn't take the Disney way out -- don't expect everyone to have a happy ending. I think it's better this way.

Big movie, big cast, big plot -- and one of the biggest, best final fight scenes I've ever seen.

Don't get caught up on the details -- let Pirates sweep you away like a tidal wave.

BTW -- there's a scene at the end of the credits. Stick around.

OMG

So I said it was decision time, right?

A couple of years ago, I got crazy addicted to a MMO called City of Heroes. I still play danged frequently.

Over the course of a couple of years, as I met a few of the people from Cryptic Studios at conventions and such, I always had the little voice in the back of my head that said "wouldn't it be cool to do that?"

So last summer at GenCon, Cryptic's got a booth, and they're hiring. The little voice gets a little louder.

About the end of October, it got loud enough that I sent in my resume. It was a "why not?" decision -- one of those things you'll always wonder about if you *don't* do it.

I didn't hear anything back, so I forgot about it.

Fast forward to early January, and I get a call from California.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

Much stress and drama ensues. I didn't get a firm date on when I'd have my first phone interview, so I didn't leave my house for *two weeks* except to go to work. Then I broke down and got a damn cell phone.

More drama, more stress. J had *serious* doubts about leaving Indiana, as did I. Seven interviews, two writing tests, two whirlwind trips to Cali, exhaustion issues, getting stuck in Denver in a snowstorm, Korean gangsters, terrorism threats, a pint of blood ... you so don't want all the details. Several of them I'm doing my best to block out of my memory forever.

I would have had an easier time being named head of the World Bank -- I hear they're hiring.

I thought about telling them to buzz off half a dozen times, but I didn't. The people I met there were really cool (and really smart, which is a nice change). The job? Beyond cool.

But to anybody who had to put up with me being emo in the weeks and weeks I waited for one call or another -- I'm sorry. I'm really sorry.

In the end, it came down to this -- I'm moving to California to write. I'm doing what I always wanted to do, and someone's crazy enough to pay me for it.

So yeah, it's crazy cool, but I'm crazy stressed at the same times.

Some of the good:

1. I won't ever have to write a headline that involves the words "Iraq," "welfare fraud," "Colts" or "tornado" again.
2. No more working on holidays!
3. No more working on a schedule opposite most of humanity!
4. I was in danger of becoming a cliched, burnt-out journalist. That's not good.
5. I could really love this job, in a crazy kind of adoration way.
6. The San Francisco Bay area looks amazing!
7. We need a fresh start. Too many things are piling up here, too many things left unsaid. J and I need to rethink and recharge. We also need to get rid of at least half of our stuff.
8. Sunshine, mountains and redwoods, with the beach 25 minutes away.
9. I finally have a response for the people who say I spend too much money on comic books -- a big, fat raspberry.
10. Did I mention I was getting paid to write?

Some of the bad:

1. My mom, J's family, and a bunch of good friends will be 2,300 miles away :(
2. The housing market in California officially scares me. I have fears of living in a Hyundai.
3. I have a house to sell, and the last act of Hamlet is more cheery than the Indiana housing market these days. My house has lost $30,000 in value in *six months*.
4. We're breaking up two good gaming groups, and gaming groups are hard to find.
5. I have to clean, sort and pack all my drek, and I've got a month to do it.
6. Did I mention driving across country with three cats?
7. My irrational fear that I'll start my new job, and two days in someone will scream "N00B! I thought you said you could write! Pwned!"

So I'll keep you up to date, as best as I can. Please forgive any gaps in the next few months, as I'm gonna be kinda ... yeah .. distracted.

At least I'll have lots to blog about.

Oh, and this may be the first and last time I ever mention my work on this blog. I've got a thing about keeping my personal and professional lives separate. Ya'll understand, right?

Decisions, Decisions

I Made It! Hat Trick

So I wanted to make my mommy a hat.

She wanted a white hat, and it needed to be easy and washable -- Mom's not big on the hand-washing. So I grabbed a skein of Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick, and cast on my favorite hat pattern.

And I knit and I knit ... and I shoulda looked at the damn pattern, because I got involved in the movie I was watching and didn't decrease when I should have. When I was done, I had a hat that would have fit Galactus. It looked like a white version of Dumb Donald.

So ... very ... sad.

But my friend Rosebride felt sorry for the ginormous hat, and said she wanted it. Here it is being modeled by her sweetie, DR.



She's got it tipped *way* back, but really, this thing is ridiculously large.

So I got *another* skein of yarn, and made *another* hat. That's the one my mommy's wearing in the top photo. It fit, and it's got the happy blue ribbon she wanted -- Colts colors.

But when I was making Mom's hat, Rosebride tried it on, and she liked that one, too. Sigh. So I made a *third* hat, and now I don't think I'm gonna make this pattern again for a while.

Bonus picture: My cat Gabriel doing his best impression of a rug.

Movie Report: Vertigo

I can't decide on which movie I think was Hitchcock's best -- I can't even decide on a favorite. It changes depending on my mood. But Vertigo (1958) is at or near the top of both lists.

Vertigo is a odd movie, though -- intensely personal and complicated, with a hypnotic vibe and deliberate pacing, it's a master class on filmmaking. It's also a movie you need to watch more than once to appreciate, because the first time you're likely to get caught up in the plot inconsistencies. Once you've "solved" the mystery, you can get caught up in the atmosphere.

Jimmy Stewart is simultaneously sympathetic and cringe-inducing as a retired police detective who had to give up the job he loved after a bungled arrest leaves him with chronic vertigo. An old acquaintance asks him to check up on his wife -- one of Hitchcock's famous cool blondes, this time played by Kim Novak.

"To reveal more," as Leonard Maltin wrote, "would be unthinkable."

Intelligent, stylistic, mysterious and almost unearthly, Vertigo steps into a San Francisco that may have never existed.

Simply suberb -- this is a must-see.

Movie Report: Spider-Man 3

OK, so I went to see it. So did everyone else in the entire country -- did you see the box office totals?

It's tough for me to totally catagorize this movie, because I'm looking at it in a couple of ways: as a standalone popcorn flick, and as part of the Spidey series.

As a standalone flick, it ain't bad. Cool action, lots of fights and big stuff getting smashed -- typical summer blockbuster.

As part of the Spidey series ... sigh. After the uber coolness that was Doc Ock and Spider-Man 2, we get this?

Peter's emo. Mary Jane's emo. Harry's emo. They stand around for much of the movie and whine about how emo they are. And the sheer number of emotional scenes must have worn the actors out, because in parts they're barely reading the lines. Any acting talent has been beaten out of them.

I'm still unsure how to take the "Dark Peter" bit in the center of the film. Was it parody, or *exceptionally* bad acting? Dark Peter has bad hair and bad eyeliner, and looks like a mathlete at a Cure concert. He reminds me of a cross between a high school nerd and Quagmire from Family Guy -- to the point that J and I were cracking "giggity-giggity" jokes in the theater.

And the jazz club sequence? Was that a cut scene from The Nutty Professor? I think Tobey Maguire owes Jerry Lewis royalities.

But to the bad guys ...

Goblin Jr.: Wicked cool. I liked the updated look, and the actor was the best one in the movie. This storyline could have carried the entire film, and been a satisfying wrap-up to the trilogy.

Sandman: Thomas Hayden Church looked the part and was good as the Sandman. The special effects were cool. The update to his story made him more sympathetic. But the character was *completely* unncessary, and should have been saved for another film.

I hate, hate, hate it when Hollywood execs think they have to cram a superhero's entire rogue's gallery into two hours, and then kill 'em all off in the finale.

Venom: Should have gotten his own picture. Eddie Brock was changed to make him less sympathetic, and I disliked that. The liquidy special effects were cool -- the "just like Spidey" only blacker wasn't. The should have altered Topher Grace's voice when he was Venom, and WTF was up with those scraggly racoon teeth?

Gwen Stacey: Why was she even in this movie? "Hi, I'm Gwen!" "Ahh, I'm falling!" SMOOCH! "Is that your girlfriend?" "Bye!!!" Totally pointless, and a complete waste of Gwen and Captain Stacey.

Ursula: Awwww. Makes cookies. Peter should dump MJ and hook up with her.

But the sign of a good movie can be learning something. And I did learn a few things from Spider-Man 3:

• If you have a super-expensive, super-science experiment that involves flashing big lights at a pile of sand, don't have a video monitor pointed at the sand so you can see what it's doing.
• These same scientists also believe there are 250-pound birds ... in New Jersey.
• Alien symbiotes make you crave cookies with nuts.
• If you're a superhero, you can do *anything* to your girl and she'll forgive you before the credits roll.
• Just because the hero blows it up, it doesn't mean it's dead.
• A bump on the head and a kind word from a butler can totally get rid of a villain's motivation.
• Who needs 40 years of comics continuity when you can connect Sandman to the death of Uncle Ben?
• Stan Lee and Bruce Campbell are teh leet coolness. Their cameos were *perfect*, for completely different reasons.

I Made It! Tall Oaks

The sampler isn't crooked -- I just take terrible pictures ;-)

A few years ago I made Teresa Wentzler's Noah's Ark Sampler as a baby sampler for a friend of mine. Beautiful, but crazy itty-bitty animals -- I thought I was gonna go blind.

But when she took it home and showed it off to her family, her oldest son said "Hey! How come I never got one?"

I don't know -- maybe 14-year-olds are down with the cross-stitch, yo!

So she picked out another pattern, and I cranked out another sampler. This is "Tall Oaks" from the Cricket Collection, on 28-count Ivory Monaco with DMC floss. The only mod I made was to add the acorn by Matthew's name to make the line balance a little better.

This would have been a fast stitch, but the folk art thing is not my bag and I wasn't fond of the colors, which means I kept putting it down. The danged checkerboard tree didn't help, either -- but once I got through the trunk it was a breeze.

Comic Report: Batman: Hush Vol. 1

As fond as I am of Bats, I've got to get more of his stories in my comic pulls.

So once in a while I pick up a trade that looks interesting. This time it was the first half of the Hush miniseries.

This has certainly got an all-star cast, with appearances by Huntress, Poison Ivy, Killer Croc, Superman and Oracle, just to name a few. It's even has a surprise appearance by a character I didn't even think *existed* in the DC universe anymore -- I was sure that mutt had gotten retconned out of existance in one of the Crisis storylines.

Oh, and Catwoman. There is a lot of my beloved Catwoman, and things between her and Bruce are heating up. While the art by Jim Lee is good but not groundbreaking, Selina is at her sexiest.

A lot of fun, and the second half of the story is in my "to be read" pile -- I'm looking forward to seeing how it ends.

Movie Report: Hot Fuzz

I'm so glad I got to the theater to see this movie :-)

Part parody, part homage, Hot Fuzz takes on every buddy cop movie of the past twenty years and gives them a distinctly British twist.

Fresh and witty, Hot Fuzz starts a bit slow but ramps up nicely to an over-the-top, screamingly funny action climax. You will never look at miniature villages the same way again. Simon Pegg proves he can really act, Nick Frost is touching and funny and Timothy Dalton looks like he's having a great time chomping on the scenery.

The plot has some depth, the main characters are charming (and so, so, like the buddy cop cliches) and even the most off-hand bits are well thought-out and well done. Paperwork montage!

Tons of shout-outs to dozens of genre movies (including Shawn of the Dead and The Warriors!) -- I think this may actually be better than Shawn of the Dead, and I love that flick.

Another addition to my purchase list.

What's the situation?
Two blokes and a fuck load of cutlery!

Movie Report: The Return of Doctor X

I was in the mood for a movie, and lurking in the depths of my DV-R was this 1939 horror flick.

And ... what in pie?? Is that Humphrey Bogart???

Wow -- there were some interesting casting choices under the old studio system.

A potboiler of a thriller that interestingly enough has *absolutely* nothing to do with Dr. X, Return follows another wisecracking reporter, this time chasing the story of an actress who may or may not be mysteriously deceased.

But this film needs serious suspension of disbelief to make it watchable. In the early part of the film, the police respond to the death of the actress after reading about it in the newspaper! Then the reporter greets the cops outside the hotel room of the actress, but the body is gone!

The time structure of this sequence is completely unexplainable, and adds to the nutty flavor of this film.

The plot of murders, vampirism and synthetic blood has sci-fi overtones and even a shootout -- but it's pretty much unimportant. This is for fun, not fright.

It's terribly amusing to watch Bogie in heavy makeup, stroking his pet bunny and laying on the camp. It's obvious he didn't want this role, but being stuck with it, he does his best Karloff imitation.

Props to the art direction -- Warner's New York street set is creeped up nicely, and the maze of tubes dripping dark liquid that fill the mad doctor's laboratory are evocative of a circulatory system.

Book Report: The Freedom Phalanx

Having finished The Web of Arachnos, I just had to read the second half of the story, didn't I?

Freedom Phalanx moves time up into the 1980s, and there's a new group of heroes in town. These are some of City of Heroes signature characters -- Manticore, Positron, Synapse, Sister Psyche, etc. Statesman's still around, and he's hecka cranky as usual -- but at least this time he's got a good reason.

I liked this book better than Arachnos -- the writing was tighter and more polished, and I was impressed at the subtle shifts in style as the point of view changed. And it made Synapse fun and somewhat charming, which surprised me, because up until that point he'd almost been dead weight.

There's a running joke among CoX fans about the number of times Synapse has been knocked unconscious and used as a human-shaped projectile.

There's also a wider variety of baddies in this story, and I'd like to see more of some of them in game -- Protean and Dr. Null especially. And I liked the jackbooted, "we're taking over" climax -- it had a nice 1984 feel, and made the stakes suitably high for a bunch of superpowered types.

But poor Sister Psyche! I understand that her powers would have put the kibosh on the majority of the plot, and so the author had to get her out of the way. But the poor girl just got jacked.

Did her "big battle" have to be against the *only* female villain in the book in a women's restroom? And doing more damage with her fingernails than with her powers? Sigh ... I'm a woman who loves comics and superheroes. It's tough sometimes.

A quick and easy read, but I'd still only recommend it for CoX fans.

Book Report: The Web of Arachnos

The origin of Statesman and Lord Recluse from the City of Heroes mmorpg, The Web of Arachnos will hold a certain appeal for fans of the game.

And it's an adequate novel, if extremely fluffy. It tries to dip into Shadow/Doc Savage style pulp, but never stays there long enough to get really fun. And some of the characters are good, especially the Furies, but I preferred Marcus Cole the roguish thief to Statesman the hero. He seems to have gotten a large stick stuck in his nether regions along with his superpowers.

But it is an interesting editorial choice to have the premiere character for a line be pretty danged unlikable. I've got to respect it.

Instead of Superman's eternal pursuit of normality (Love me! I'm just like you except I'm really strong and I can fly!) Statesman appears to *know* his powers set him apart from the world and he doesn't care to pretend.

I think part of my problem with book was that I read it with an editor's eye. I could have trimmed at least thirty pages of useless words and overblown hyperbole. A great many men in Paragon City have "fingers like sausages."

And while none of the characters are particularly "deep," some of them crossed the line into cliche. Recluse is a little too "Bwahahahahaha" evil for me, and I didn't buy that his resentment of Cole fueled it. And Maiden Justice was such a bland, lifeless caricature of the plucky girl reporter that she should have been named Lois.

So not perfect by any means, but not terrible, either. But don't bother if you're not a CoX fan.

Book Report/I Made It! Mason Dixon Knitting

OK, I looked at my list of reviews I need to catch up on and it looks ... manageable. I can do this. If I kick it, and actually post my damn photos for once, I could catch up.

Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt. But here's to hoping.

I consider Mason Dixon Knitting more of a book about knitting than a "knitting book." Yes there are patterns -- about 30 of them, mostly for the home. Blankets, dishtowels, washcloths, felted boxes, baby bibs, etc.



But really, it's more of a look at how knitters look at the craft, having fun with it, and freeing yourself to toss the pattern to the side and do your own thing with color and form.

Want to make that dishtowel out of the cheapest-of-the-cheap cotton? Go ahead! How about a subtle sea silk? That works too! The writing is warm and funny, and gives the impression of gossiping with two old friends over coffee.


There are some projects in the book I'll *never* make (the authors seem to have a strange obsession with potholder loops and rag rugs) and some I'm lusting over. The Moderne Log Cabin blanket, in particular, takes a quilting technique and makes it sleek and sophisticated enough to look right at home in a Manhattan condo. With my fondness for mid-century styles (and cozy blankies), this is right up my alley.



Has this book improved my knitting? Not necessarily. This isn't a book of techniques. Am I having more fun? Definitely.

I picked up a big bag of cheap cotton in neon-bright colors (2 for $3 Sugar and Cream) and cast on my first Ballband Warshcloth. They're so much fun to knit!! I've been cranking them out like crazy, and I practically giggle while I do it.

Then I started a Moss Grid hand towel in a variegated Sugar and Cream, didn't like the way the colors pooled, ripped the sucker out and made it in the Baby Genius Burp Cloth pattern instead. Then I added a hanger that I winged without a pattern, a pretty white rose button and now I've got the prettiest little dishcloth hanging from my stove.



The only problem? I made a Ballband in a sunny shade of yellow and a variegated that reminds me of Starburst candies. It made me happy. Then I put it on the sink, and no one would use it. They said it was too pretty to use!



Scrub the danged pots -- I've got six more washcloths to put out there! Cheap, easy, fun and machine-washable. What's not to like?

I'm no longer afraid to toss the pattern and just knit -- you should see the afghan I've started. Thanks, Mason Dixon Knitting.