Obsessions and Upsets

I am obsessed with Bulk Barn knock-off chocolate mini-eggs. Last year they were SO BAD but it's like the crazy kitchen people with the company decided to work on the recipe and now they're amazing!!!! I'm in trouble for sure.
I would really like the major people in my life to just simmer down and stop moving around. My manager, Kathy, at the Penningtons store I work at has been transferred to another location effective Sunday. I'm pretty bummed about it. Kathy is like the raunchiest person I know and I love spending time with her. She's hilarious but she's also really wise, and I've learned a lot from working with her. The ladies at my work and I are taking her to Montana's for dinner tomorrow night so I'm baking a cake to eat for dessert. I'm really sad to see her go, no matter how good the new manager is apparently going to be. Her name is Sonja and she's described as "everyone's mom". I don't need another mom, I have one. I need a crazy, hilarious, somewhat innapropriate older woman to idolize.
Life is so not fair.

-Laur

Who's blogging now???!!

I am now sitting in my Contemp Lit class (where all excitement in my life is born) and we're talking about Blogs. What is a blog? If you're reading this right now, you know very well what a blog is. A blog is a window into someone's mind, or a window into someone's world.

I read a book called The Baghdad Blog for this lecture. It is a collection of blog entries written by a man named Salam Pax, who wrote about the American occupation of Iraq and how it was affecting himself and the people around him. It is at times hilarious (Pax has an excellent sense of humour and an engaging writing style) and at times horrifying, as well as sad and all too real. Pax had to go into hiding after his blog gained notoriety, but now he's resurfaced to come do interviews in North America. He hasn't posted since sometime in 2004, but his blog is a compelling read. You can read his blog at http://dear_raed.blogspot.com .

An active Baghdad blogger is http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com. Riverbend is the pseudonym for a woman posting in Iraq, and her blog is called "Baghdad Burning". It's recently been turned into a book as well, though I'm not sure my prof knows that. He was really concerned about this lecture because Riverbend hadn't posted anything since Saddam's hanging execution at the end of December but she posted yesterday and quite passionately as well.

Blogging is a strange creature; you can use it to be personal, to be passionate, to be objective or to be offensive. I just like to share.

-Laur

The end of an era?

So 2 weeks ago I discovered that a series that defined a lot of my adolescence is finally coming to its long-awaited end. "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" will be released on July 21st, 1 week after the film version of "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" is released in theatres.
I remember the first time I read "The Philosopher's Stone". I had had the book in my possession once before but it was the adult-cover version and I didn't bother to read it because it looked boring (I admit it, I was shallow). The second time I got my hands on it I was in the eighth grade; I bought it at a Scholastic Book Fair at school for my sister, who had just had her tonsils and adnoids removed and was home from school recovering. I read it first, of course, and since then I've been hooked. I went to fansites, partied it up at bookstores every time a new book was released, won a brand new set of hardcover copies in a Toronto Star contest, and wrote scores of fanfiction. I was the ultimate teenage Harry Potter fanatic.
Now I'm 20 and that period ended a while ago. The last book is going to be intense, moreso than "The Half-Blood Prince", so July is going to be a very exciting month.
Here's a countdown thinger for both the book and the movie, courtesy of the HP fans at www.mugglenet.com, the world's biggest Harry Potter fansite.
I don't know whether to smile or cry. The evening of July 20th is going to be an emotional one.

-Laur

Day of Action

I am such a bad student. Today was the Day of Action to lower tuition fees in Ontario and I didn't go to protest. What kind of effect am I ever going to have on the post-secondary educational system if I don't stand up for what I believe in?
Shame shame, know your name.

-Laur

Politicians are stupid

So I just found out that there was going to be a Caribbean Federation of Islands in 1960, but the guy running for Prime Minister in Jamaica convinced the population that it was a bad idea. This guy was elected as the new Prime Minister shortly thereafter and then guided Jamaica to independence. A Federation of Caribbean islands would have been AWESOME! It would have cut down on travel costs, would have formed a universal currency, and made the Caribbean a more politically stable place, but NOOOOOOOOO. This jerk had to shake everything up, and not in a good way.
I would have moved to the West Indies Federation if it had formed. Boo!!!!!!!!!!

Cold and not sunny,

-Laur

Sky High

So this post is to preach the wholesome goodness that is the movie "Sky High". I have now watched it 27 times. I'm actually not exaggerating, I really have watched it 27 times. It seems that since the boys (Matthew and Benjamin Bongard, the two boys I babysit on Saturday and Monday nights) got the DVD from their parents, it's the only movie they want to watch. And the scary thing is, I never get sick of it. It's an awesome movie. I absolutely love it.

Sky High is one of those movies that was canned by the critics but had kind of a cult following after it hit the shelves. Basically it's about a group of adolescents who have just started high school, but their high school floats thousands of feet above the earth and the curriculum is for either superheroes in training or "hero support", A.K.A. sidekicks. The kids are the progeny of super parents, and the main character, Will Stronghold, is the only son of The Commander and JetStream, his super strong dad and flying ninja-like mother played by the hilarious Kurt Russell and the always lovely Kelly Preston. His friend Leila can manipulate the growth and movement of plants and is a cutesy tree-hugging pacifist. Their other friends can glow, shapeshift into a guinea pig, and melt into a puddle, respectively. There's only one problem: Will's powers haven't appeared yet. He's designated as Hero Support with the rest of his friends when the school coach, played by Bruce Campbell (ALWAYS A WINNER!) discovers that he has neither super strength or flying abilities. When things can't seem to get any worse for Will, he learns that he already has an enemy; Warren Peace, a dark and dangerous firestarter, is the child of a superhero and a supervillain, a supervillain who Will's father defeated and put in super prison when Warren was a kid. During an explosive showdown in the cafeteria, Will's powers emerge when Warren threatens his friends and everyone finds out that Will has super strength. He wins the heart of the student body president, Gwen, but as we soon find out, something sinister is happening at Sky High.

Sky High is as clever as it is cute; Principal Powers is played by Linda Evans, formerly of Wonderwoman fame, and games like "save the citizen" are played in PE class. Dave Foley plays the Hero Support teacher, All-American Boy (or Mr. Boy) and the kids who play Will's friends are hilarious.

Anytime you need a light-hearted laugh, Sky High is definitely worth a rent.

Other noteable kids movies that are good for grown-ups, too: "Night at the Museum", "High School Musical", "The Karate Kid", "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" and "Flushed Away". And anything to do with the Muppets, PERIOD.

-Laur

Winter's Fall

For those of you living far away (because I won't send you a copy of the paper, I'm a poor student) here is the link to the Excalibur website, specifically to the page that contains my winning contribution.

http://www.excal.on.ca/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2916&Itemid=99

The poem by Adebe DeRango-Adem is great too, make sure to give it a read.

Enjoy!

-Laur