My roommate has gone home for Thanksgiving, giving me the apartment all to myself for five days.

Never has an icon been so appropriate.

OK, I'm crap at remembering holidays. Last March, I noticed it was Pi Day at like 11:45PM.

So just in case I forget to say this tomorrow: Happy Star Wars Day.

MAY THE FOURTH BE WITH YOU!

There. Now I won't have a *headpalm* moment on May 5th.

I just got back from an Aladdin Sing-Along, followed by a 90's music video sing-along. Guys, I totally didn't realize I ever knew all the words to "Tearing Up My Heart," but I guess I do. On the other hand, I definitely remember writing down the lyrics to "Flagpole Sitta" and putting them on the front of my 3-ring math binder when I was bored in 9th grade Pre-Algebra, which was quite often.

Unpleasant realization: There are people in the world who do not Mulan, who in point of fact consider it an inferior Disney movie. One of the hosts said it has NOT ONE memorable song. EXCUSE YOU!

BRING IT!





Best part of the night, though: I was walking down the street talking with a friend about food we miss from the South. I said "Steak 'n Shake," and this girl literally whipper her head towards us and said "STEAK 'N SHAKE?!?!?!?!?" Yes. That is the reaction you should have to Steak 'n Shake, case closed.

I'm 4 episodes into Twin Peaks, and I just realized season 1 is only 8 episodes long. Considering the pilot was 93 minutes long, I'm more than halfway done with S1, and I've heard S2 sucks. WHYYYYYYY?!

I should've known better than to start watching a show that'd already been off the air for 20* years. DAMMIT! That's why I don't let myself get into Arrested Development or Freaks and Geeks. It's the ever-present air of TV mortality.

It's better than when a show draaaaags through the seasons even though it's become a shell of its former self, like with Seinfeld or The Office. But I still don't want to finish "Twin Peaks" and miss out on David Lynch's strange, straaaange obsession with food.

* It's been 20 years since 1991. I repeat: IT'S BEEN 20 YEARS SINCE 1991 *cue panic attack*

So, here in NYC it's time for the Tribeca Film Festival. I've seen four films so far, along with an event in which Brian Williams interviewed Robert De Niro (!!), and my faaaaavorite thing that I've seen at Tribeca so far, even better than watching Brian Williams geek out over Goodfellas, was the film I saw tonight, Romantics Anonymous.

It's about two pathologically shy people and their road to falling in love and getting over the emotional hurdles and anxiety that have prevented them from connecting with other people. It's a cute--nah, adorable--romantic comedy that's really emotional at times. Jean-René and Angélique bond over their shared love of chocolate (they both work at a chocolate factory), and Angélique dances around and sings "I Have Confidence" when she feels stressed. As you might have guessed, it's French.

There's also an "Oh noes! There's only one room in the hotel, but there are two of us!" scene. That's right. We've all read a fic that uses the trope (ADMIT IT!), and this film goes there.

After a lot of awkward shuffling, looking at the floor and a some attempts to avoid having to be in the room together, the following exchange takes place:

Jean-René: I'll sleep on the couch.
Angélique: . . .There is no couch.

This moments in the trailer, OK, so at least watch that. Here, I'll put it behind the cut for you. You have no excuse.

( It's 1 minute, 36 seconds in. WATCH IT.Collapse )

I can't even explain why I love this movie so much, but I do, I so so do. It's at Tribeca now, and it doesn't have a US distributor yet, but if it gets any sort of release, you will all hear about it, MARK MY WORDS.

I was trying to convince my friend E that Thomas Jefferson in the John Adams miniseries is really (really really) attractive. She said he was too "jowly," and when I tried to challenge her to a duel, I accidentally ended up challenging her to a JEWEL instead. *facepalm* Well, I guess there can only be one Alexander Hamilton. But still. Sorry, TJ. I failed at defending your honor.

When I mentioned the majesty of TJ's lavender jacket, she said it would look good on the lead singer of the band Versailles, so we ended up watching YouTube videos of various Japanese bands, with some Death Metal music videos thrown in for good measure. We also watched the pilot ep of "Twin Peaks" (HOLY FUCK WHY HADN'T I SEEN THAT BEFORE?!) and listened to some of Richard Cheese's lounge covers.

I went to a midnight showing of Clue with E and I (that's another initial, not a clone of myself) tonight--without the Landmark Sunshine's midnight series I would be a less happy person. Anyway. It was wonderful, even though E prefers the first ending, which I can forgive, but only because of our mutual love of mocking Angel during BtVS rewatch nights. I initiated a round of clapping after Mrs. White's "FLAMES!. . .on the SIDE of my face!" scene, which I'm proud of.

There's a The Princess Bride midnight show in mid-May. OH, I AM THERE.

Also, I have a discovered something very distressing. MY CAPS LOCK KEY IS SEMI-STICKY. IT REQUIRES MORE PRESSURE FOR ME TO TURN ON CAPS LOCK, WHICH I DO QUITE A BIT. SOMETIMES I PUSH THE KEY AND THE LETTERS ARE STILL IN LOWERCASE! *tears out hair*

I've just returned from a the sneak peek of the first two episodes of the new season of Doctor Who at the Bell House. Now that I've discovered that I live within walking distance of it, I think I'll probably be going there quite a bit. They have an Aladdin Sing-Along next weekend. An Aladdin Sing-Along

Anyways, no spoilers, but it was great. I am frustrated, but just because in the trivia contest my team name (Totaly Awesome Robotic Dogs In Space) came in second for most creative. The winning name was My Regeneration, which I like better, but still! Bitter!

Also, I saw a few ONTD people there! It's been a while, wow, geez.

I had a customer come up to me in the store today--I'd recommended World War Z and The Hunger Games to her a while back, and she loved them and wanted more recs. Wow, just. Strange. The idea of a bookstore being a place where the helpful staff happily provide recommendations to appreciative customers? Not so much at my store, where customers want a specific book and get very snappy if you don't do things their way. New York thing? Manhattan thing? Upper West Side thing? Who knows?

What makes it even better is that, if I'm not mistaken, when I was recommending World War Z and The Hunger Games to this customer (a teacher, I think) I mentioned how much better The Hunger Games is than Twilight, which I told her I dislike, and she said she liked Twilight and my brain was screaming "ABORT! ABORT! DO NOT START ON A RANT ABOUT TWILIGHT! RESIST!" So now that customer's read and loved The Hunger Games and sequels, and now she says she's really into dystopian books. Yeeeeah *thumbs up*.

I recommended I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith (I'm rereading it now, and every time I put it down my internal monologue has a British accent for like 15 minutes afterwards), We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (same general premise as I Capture the Castle, but filled with psychosis and murder) and Gail Carriger's Soulless (the recommendation of which involved a bit of confused babbling on my part when she asked what Steampunk is).

I looked up my store on Yelp today, and one reviewer gushed about how nice the employees are because we have no problems with her sitting on the floor and reading books. And yeah, they don't have comfy chairs scattered around, but there are wide aisles for you to sit in, and the employees are totally OK with it! And I buy a cup of coffee in the cafe, which is my way of "giving back." WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?! The fact that we don't forcibly move you from your aisle-blocking sprawl does not mean we're OK with your rudeness. Most of the other reviews were about how the store's a nanny-infested zoo where toddlers can roam free, which also doubles as a habitat for double-wide strollers. Accurate.

I could write a long, rambling post about what happened today, but it boils down to two things:

I WILL BE WORKING FULL-TIME AT THE MAGAZINE.

TOMORROW I WILL BE GIVING MY TWO WEEK'S NOTICE AT BARNES & NOBLE.