Last weekend I went to Nashville for Stefanie’s graduation! My sister, brother, brother-in-law, and now (hopefully) future sister-in-law have all gone to the same small college, so we’re old hat at their outdoor graduations by now. We were thankful for the pleasant weather – last year was FREEZING. One senior is chosen to sing at graduation, and this year it was Stef! She sang “Call on Jesus” by Nicole C. Mullen, which happens to have special meaning for my family because my sister used to perform it in sign language at church. My mom was expectedly weepy. :)
As is usual now when I go to Nashville, I was also able to hang out with my BFF Emily and her family. She recently moved back to the Nashville area after living in DC for several years, and I still haven’t gotten over the fact that I can see her so easily. :) I was especially happy to see her new baby son. He’s adorable!!
As I write, my brother Kevin is on a plane to Alaska, where he’ll be filming grizzly bear hunts deep in the wild for three weeks. (Fun fact: 95% of America’s wild bears live in Alaska.) We won’t have much contact with him, and I’m officially not dwelling on the whole grizzly thing.* I’m just focusing on excitement that he gets to do something really cool, and reminding myself that God is sovereign over the animal kingdom. LOL. Someone gave Kevin this magazine about bear attacks, and he advised me and my mom not to look at it.
* = However, I am totally dwelling on THIS Grizzly thing. Believe Memphis!!!
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We just hit the double digits of May, but I can already feel myself shifting into Summer Mode. Like one of my favorite authors, Sarah Dessen (who has a new book coming out today!), I’m a big fan of summer. It promises relaxation, fun, happiness, and possibility. Of course, to me, every change of season holds a sense of possibility, regardless of whether the past few have delivered. But humor me. :)
I’m dreaming big for Summer 2011. I have high hopes for pool days, lake days, margarita nights, picnics, concerts, Sonic runs, and cookouts with friends. I’m looking forward to reading stacks of fun books in my hammock, and walking or riding my bike at 9:00 at night because it’s too hot to do it any earlier. I’m excited about cooking fresh summer recipes with my own produce. I’m already thinking about my annual Fourth of July party. I can’t wait to see Deathly Hallows Part 2 and some of the other movies coming out. I MUST get to the beach at some point (the sooner the better, really). I’m even excited about painting my house, which I’ve talked about doing for about three years now – my dad and I might attempt it over Memorial Day weekend.
Basically, I’m ready to have a good time. With other people. (And I wouldn’t complain if cute, interesting guys were involved. ;)) Last summer was restful and contemplative for me as I started putting my life back together. It was an almost sacred time and I’m glad I was able to have it. But this summer I’m in more of a party mood! :)
I’ve been listening to this song a lot in the car, and it always makes me happy. I don’t care how inane the lyrics are. You know you love it too!!
A few things I wanted to share:
My friend Danielle is giving away a DVD based on Abby Johnson’s book Unplanned. Her summary of Abby’s moving story is much better than mine would be. If you want to enter the giveaway, leave a comment on the entry by Wednesday, May 11.
Random links (some of these are pretty old!):
An inspiring, Mother’s Day-appropriate story from Life Lived Fully.
The perilous world of blogging self-doubt, from Becoming Jamie. Also: On Being a Survivor.
A Great Many Things, from Enjoying the Small Things. This post puts words to why I can’t settle on one thing to do for the rest of my life. And reassures me that it’s okay to cast the net wide!
Of Eowyn, Dragons, and Healing, by Joy.
Searching For My Crown, from Suburban Turmoil.
Is it irresponsible to trust God too much?, from Conversion Diary. I’ve always struggled with this concept, and there are some great thoughts here.
Why Amazon MP3 is awesome: I started downloading music from Amazon MP3 instead of iTunes about six months ago. The music is already in MP3 format, so you don’t have to convert it (which, not long ago, meant burning it to a CD and re-ripping it to the computer). It imports straight into iTunes, so you don’t have to move anything. Most importantly, Amazon’s music is consistently cheaper! They frequently offer $5 MP3 albums, some of them new releases. I’ve been introduced to lots of great music that I wouldn’t have paid full price for.
Anyway, I recently made the switch from PC to Mac, and lots of file-shuffling ensued. Despite quintuple-checking everything, I somehow lost two albums. One of them was the new Adele release. I was really upset at the thought of paying for it a second time (doing without it wasn’t an option :)). I e-mailed customer service with those order numbers, explaining what had happened. I wasn’t too optimistic, but they quickly refreshed the code so I could download the music again! I am now a customer for life. :)
“Everybody.”
Most people I know, even fellow sci-fi lovers, don’t understand why I love Contact. They find it slow and boring, and the ending unsatisfying (even Mr. Garrison from South Park weighed in on that :P). But if you don’t mind a thinky movie and don’t need to be entertained by an explosion every 30 seconds, I recommend giving Contact a chance.
Jodie Foster plays Dr. Ellie Arroway, a brilliant physicist who works for SETI. After years of battling for funding and dish time, she is the first recipient of a message from space. She helps the government decode the message and is involved in the building of a mysterious space vehicle (assembly instructions were embedded in the message). While all that unfolds, Ellie has a complicated friendationship with a priest, Palmer Joss, played by Matthew McConaughey. (This and A Time To Kill are the ONLY movies in which I can take McConaughey seriously.) Their relationship serves as the movie’s main vehicle for respectful discussions of faith vs. science. I feel that faith and science are equally represented and supported by the end of the film, leaving you to draw your own conclusions. I like that.
Ellie’s loss of her father to a heart attack at a young age also plays a big role in the plot. Jena Malone plays young Ellie, and I still consider her performance one of the best child acting jobs I’ve ever seen.
I don’t want to say more because the story has many twists and turns. This is an alien movie, but the aliens are mainly a catalyst for the real story – their active role is very small. I read on the Wikipedia page that one of the producers’ goals was to make the story seem very real, like what would actually happen if a message from space were discovered. They incorporated real news footage, used real media personalities, and filmed at real observatories and at NASA. Although it’s a little dated now, since this movie came out in 1997 (gosh I’m getting old), it still feels very real to me.
I’m ashamed to admit this, but it took me a lot of viewings to realize that Ellie’s research partner/best friend, Kent, is blind. Some of his lines are kind of mumbled, and I thought he was just squinty or something. LOL!!
Now I want to watch this again! :)
6 Comments + Posted in: movies
Many years ago, I bought a pair of denim rhinestone flip-flops at Target. The flip-flops quickly became my constant companions. They went with everything in my closet, and I wore them nonstop for several summers in a row. But eventually the cheap footbeds totally compressed, and they became too painful to wear anymore. I grieved.
Despite extensive browsing every year, by me and by friends nationwide, I’ve never found another pair of flip-flops like these. I should have gone back that first summer and gotten several more pairs, but I foolishly believed that Target would keep making them. I hadn’t yet learned that there’s no continuity in fashion retail, and that if you love it, you better buy ten of it because it’s not coming back. But that’s a complaint for another day.
I love the denim, but I’d also be happy with a nice pair of non-denim dark blue flip-flops that will go with denim. I need to find something, because I can’t spend another summer in navy blue flip-flops with the Corona logo on the soles. They were the closest substitution I could find, and that’s just sad. There are TONS of cute denim options in wedges right now, and I love wedges, but they’re not ideal for running errands or walking long distances.
3 Comments + Posted in: fashion