BEST HISTORICAL FICTION EVER

Yes, that title needed all caps for a reason. I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce you to one of my favorite authors. If you've read this blog at all, you know my obsession with history. You know that I can't watch historical films that pretend they're the real deal because they are so wrong in so many ways that it hurts. But you also know then that I do reading historical fiction as long as it's done right. And Ann Rinaldi does it right. She's written countless books about fascinating periods in history and what I love about these books is that she is straight up honest about what is true and what is from her imagination. Her richly created characters all come into contact with famous individuals like John Adams, John Brown, Jefferson Davis, John Wilkes Booth, Thomas Jefferson, etc., but most are fictional creations. She details in the back of each book who is real, who is made-up, where she found and did her research, when I read these books, I know that I'm getting a slightly fictionalized version of real historical events. And that is what good historical fiction is about. So let me summarize a few of my favorites and encourage you to go out and read them on your own. For a complete list, please visit, http://www.annrinaldi.net/docs/Rinaldi_books.html.

I'm not sure if this was the first Ann Rinaldi book I read but certainly the one I've read the most. A Stitch in Time is the first of the Quilt Trilogy (the other two books are Broken Days and The Blue Door). The trilogy follows the Chelmsford family through three generations. In A Stitch in Time, Hannah attempts to hold together her broken family. Her older brother Lawrence never lives up to standards, her younger sister Abby elopes under her father's nose, Thankful is the wicked beauty of the family and her father's favorite, and Cabot is revealed to not be Father's son and is therefore shunned and ignored. The three books deal with conflicts, resolutions, trust, secrecy and above all, family. Hannah tries to keep everything together through a quilt that she and her sisters are creating. This quilt theme comes back when in Broken Days, a half white/half Native American returns to the Chemlsford family, claiming to be Thankful's daughter (Thankful had been kidnapped by Indians on a trip out west). In The Blue Door, Abby's granddaughter returns to Massachusetts as well but when her portion of the quilt is stolen, she has no way to prove that she is a Chelmsford and ends up having to work in the Lowell Mills. Although no major characters in history are seen in this triology, the characters come into contact with major events such as the Indian massacres of the post-REvolutionary War era, the War of 1812 (Abby's son is killed in a battle), the plight of the works in the Lowell Mills, etc., Hannah is my absoulute favorite character in the entire Ann Rinaldi canon and I would highly recommend the trilogy as your first foray into her world.

Time Enough for Drums is another Revolutionary War story. Jemima Emerson is a Patriot through and through, despite being tutored by John Reid, a Tory. She finds herself in the middle of the Revolutionary War conflict, desiring freedom for herself and for her country but feeling restricted on every single level. There's a wonderful twist in this book that I won't spoil that makes me love this story even more.

The Fifth of March is told from the point of view of Rachel Marsh, a nanny and housemaid for John and Abigail Adams, living in Boston Massachusetts at the height of pre-war activities. At this time, the British begin posting sentries on street corners and Rachel, after resisting as much as she can at first, begins to create a friendship with a British private named Matthew Kilroy. Her loyalties are divided when Matthew ends up as one of the soldiers on trial for his participation in the Boston Massacre. Things are complicated even more when John Adams decides to defend the soldiers, putting his role as a Patriot himself into question. Rachel is a fictional character, but much of the background for this story was taken from letters and diaries from John and Abigail Adams (John Adams is my favorite president) and from court proceedings from the Boston Massacre Trial. It's a wonderful story about loyalties and love.

This time, the scene of the action is in Salem during its most controversial years. Susanna English is a young girl caught in-between her fear of being accused of being a witch by Ann Putnam and her posse of hysterical girls and her knowledge that these girls are not possessed but using their power to get what they want. It's a thrilling story about a town that, for several months, becomes frighteningly captivated by the cries of several young girls and their accusations of witchcraft. Susanna stands watching in the shadows as innocent people are accused, jailed, tried and hung and only is able to step forward when her own family starts to be accused. The Salem Witch Trials is an absolutely fascinating time in history and this story just adds to the excitement of the times.

Who doesn't love a good story about grave-digging? Narrator Emily Pigbush is sent to live with her Uncle Valentine after her mother passes away. Life in Washington, D.C. at this time is chaotic as PResident Lincoln has been assassinated and Emily discovers that her best friend's mother was an accomplice to John Wilkes Booth. While she deals with this piece of news, she also begins to slowly discover that she's not entirely sure what her Uncle's profession is. Again, there are some great twists that I don't want to give away but this is a much darker novel and well worth reading.

Collection of Cartoons

Here is a collection of my recent favorite cartoons from the best website ever. Please visit marriedtothesea.com for their incredible cartoons and buy their t-shirts!

this could not be truer.... just look at all the articles in people about will and kate in people magazine

yes....... the only thing i remember about pre-calculus..... not that i remember what exactly sohcahtoa stands for... i think it's sine=opposing angle over hypotenuse, cosine=adjacent angle over hypotenuse and tangent=opposing over adjacent.... anybody? can anyone corroborate that this is correct????

oh snapppp

oh snapppp again.....

i would NEVER have gone to bed if something had sung this song to me..... it's like he's not even trying. i understand the banjo is hard, but look at that mustache. that's gotta be a reason to come up with good old macdonald lyrics.

Clever Quotes

I've been doing a LOT of reading lately and wanted to share a few of my fave quotes from recent books.

From Little Bee by Chris Cleave: ...... I then started to think about ways I would kill myself in different points in history. Queen Victoria's time- drink the water. Churchill's time- stand outside during the blitz. Henry VIII's time- marry Henry VIII.....

From Irrepressible, The Life and Times of Jessica Mitford: .... The House Commitee of Un-American Activities they had thought bizarre.... a joke... Imagine a committee on un-English activities. What's that? Not taking tea?

From Diana Mosley by Jan Dalley:... In 1929 Oswald Mosely acquire a flat in Ebury Street, only a few hundred yards from the family house in Smith Square, supposedly so that he had peace and quiet in which to get his ministerial work done, and for political meetings. However, this flat had one enormous and palatial room, with a large bed on a raised dais in a curtained alcove at one end: only the most naive could have thought it was a place where Mosley might entertain Ramsay Macdonald or other members of the Labour cabinet.

From Counting My Chickens by The Duchess of Devonshire: Could some clever reader tell me what a quantum leap is and where I can see one performed? Who the chattering classes are and where I can listen to them? And what a learning curve is and how I can climb onto one?

LAFF

Despite it being the week of Sonrise Island and Allie having to open the next morning, we decided to hit the road for a jaunt up the 5 to the LA Film Festival. I see myself as quite the connoisseur of Film Festivals, seeing that this is my second of the year. Just kidding- I just really like independent films.

I had done quite a bit of research on the LAFF, picking out a perfect afternoon of movies and finding out exactly where we needed to go. There was a little bit of a traffic on the freeway, but we arrived in plenty of time to get our six-ticket pass as well as explore the area. While in line for our tickets and discussing our movie choices with the lady giving us our passes, we were told by the guy standing behind us that he was one of the actors in "The Dynamiter" (our first movie of the day) and they'd love to have us in the audience. Very sweet guy with a very thick accent and it was nice to see him up onscreen later. I've never really been to LA other than UCLA, USC/Exposition Row, the Getty, Santa Monica and Hollywood and Highland area, so this was a brand new area. We wandered around the Staples Center, LA Live Center, Nokia Theater and then decided, since we had plenty of time, to figure out a good place to have dinner. We walked down Figueroa and found ourselves a CPK, getting the number so we could order something later to pick up in between movies. On our way back, we found this sweet little courtyard and sat down to chat for a bit since it was hot as Hades!

Our first movie was called "The Dynamiter". It was the story of a 15-year-old boy growing up in Mississippi named Robbie who was struggling to keep his family together. His mother was in California getting treatment and his older brother Lucas had a dangerous streak that Robbie sometimes found himself emulating. He also took care of his grandmother, a toothless woman who never spoke but made the greatest facial expressions, and his younger half-brother Fess who is really his whole world. Robbie is not well-liked by his class-mates and struggles to fit in. Things are complicated when Lucas comes home and puts a wrench into the well-oiled life that Robbie and Fess have built. Robbie is forced to get a job that starts at the crack of dawn and Lucas's clear dislike, even hatred, for Fess drives a wedge between the brothers. Robbie eventually needs to decide is keeping the family together is best or if letting his brothers go their own way would give them a better life.

The movie had some really awesome cinematography and the scenery in Mississippi was gorgeous. All of the actors were brand-new, having never really acted before, and that was kind of obvious, but you could tell that they really supported the project and were interested in learning more about the acting/filmmaking world.

After the movie, there was a Q&A with the two cast-members who were at the film: the older brother- the guy we had run into earlier- and the younger brother. Both were incredibly sweet and I just wanted to squeeze the little boy. How adorable is he in that suit of his!?

Unfortunately we didn't get to stay long because we had to head downstairs to get our rush tickets for the next movie. We were given numbered tickets (10 and 11) and instructed to be back about half an hour before the movie, so we took the opportunity to go and get some CPK. We still had time so we got to sit in "our" courtyard and eat our pizza and bread. Gourmet dining on picnic budgets. Just how we like it.

We were lucky enough to get into the second movie that we wanted which was called "Somewhere Between". This movie was incredible. The filmmaker had just adopted a baby girl from China and was realizing that there was no way that she would be able to answer all of her daughter's questions or fill in all of the pieces of the puzzle. So she decided to follow four girls who had been adopted from China themselves.

There was Fang (pronounced Fong) from Berkeley who had a white mother (who spoke Mandarin), a Chinese father (who only spoke English), and two other sisters both adopted from China. Her story took her frequently back to China where she would spend time in markets and villagers, trying to see if people could help her identify even what her Chinese cultural group was. She also spent a lot of times in orphanages and really connected with a little orphan with cerebral palsy who she began to support monetarily and eventually helped transition into an adoptive family in the United States.

Jenna was from the East Coast and was affected by her adoption in a totally different way. She was highly intelligent and spoke very candidly about the feelings of loss she had from being abandoned, which is unfortunately what happens to most of the Chinese orphans because of the One Child law. She discussed how she felt like she has to overcompensate and strive for perfection to combat those feelings and how that's affected her life. As a result, she was going to Phillips Exeter Academy twelve hours a day, participating in crew and skating. She also spent a lot of time traveling and talking to parents internationally who were ready to adopt Chinese children. It was clear that this impacted her very strongly as well. And luckily, this experience has helped her cope with these feelings and she stopped a lot of her competitive sports and has begun to work on her individuality with personal skating levels and taking up yoga instead of crew. I really liked her a lot.

Ann and Haley were the last two girls who also did a little bit of international traveling. They didn't really talk too much about Ann but Haley was the only girl who was lucky enough to find her biological family. She went to China and put up posters in the area around the orphanage she was sent to and a woman recognized her as looking kind of like someone that she new. As unlikely as it may be, it turned out that this was her biological family. She met with her bio dad and the expression on his face the entire time was one of shell-shock. Eventually, after several months of waiting for DNA test results, it was confirmed that this family really was Haley's biological family. So, along with her adoptive parents and older blonde sister in Nashville and younger adoptive sister also from China, Haley had two biological parents, four older biological sisters and a younger biological brother. The two families were able to meet and Haley was able to spent time in the family's home village. Haley was incredibly lucky because it is incredibly rare and difficult to find biological families in China.

Overall, it was a fantastic film. There were some light moments, which was great because the majority of it was incredibly emotional. I know that all of us in the first three rows (yes, we were sitting in the SECOND row of the theatre) were all crying at some point. We certainly needed to decompress after that experience. We also saw a few of the girls from the film in the lobby afterwards.

Our last film of the night was actually seven different short films. We wanted to see a film called "L!fe Happens" with Emma Bosworth, Krysten Ritter and Rachel Bilson, but we were petty sure we weren't going to get rush tickets (the movie was already sold out and we were number 35 and 37) so we decided to go for a short film package instead. Some of the films were great, some were a little over our heads (it was also pretty late).

The first one was called "Bukowski". A janitor cleaning the bar on a hotel after hours finds a twelve-year-old boy sitting at the bar, nursing what looks like a whiskey and ice (don't worry... it's really apple juice). When asked who he is, the boy replies "Charles Bukowski". It turns out that this boy calls himself a different writer in each hotel and spends his nights laughing, sharing stories and drinking apple juice with the staff and chefs. And then when he leaves the hotel, it's time for a new identity. Maybe this time he'll be Hemmingway. Or Steinbeck. We'll just have to wait for the next film to see. It was very cute and I greatly enjoyed this one.

Next was "Everybody's Nuts". This was a very different film, lots of long shots of Kern County agriculture life with narrative voice-overs. The narrator talked about his family and how his seventy-year old father has been exploited by his company that forces him to farm and rent a house near orchard and fields that are right next to oil fields that contaminate water. Each time he spoke about the contaminated oil, the picture of the screen would be of gorgeous bright, clean water, either from a shower or from an aqueduct or flowing from a pipe. The problem with this film, even though I absolutely loved the gorgeous cinematography and photography, was that it was in Spanish with subtitles so if I was so enamoured by the visuals, I would sometimes miss the subtitles and get a little lost. But really enjoyed this one too.

Wapawekka was about a budding rapper forced to go off to a cabin in the Canadian wilderness with his father, a Cree Indian. What I loved about this one was that when they spoke in English, there would be Cree subtitles. I thought that was very unique. It was interesting to see the juxtaposition of the two cultures and how eventually the rapper son was able to integrate his rapper present with his Cree past.

"Grandpa Looked Like William Powell" was Allie's favorite. The narration went over shots of the narrator's grandfather's autograph book with some fun animation to go along with the words. The narrator discussed how he didn't really know or had spent any time with his grandfather but with his autograph book, he now had a little bit of his grandfather's life. It was very clever and reminded me a lot of David Sedaris.

"Sunny" was about a little girl in a very rural community in Brazil who is spending one last day with her family. She doesn't really like the outdoors, the sunshine, the river, the experiences of living in this rural community so her family has decided to send her off to school where she can learn and grow and be challenged. Even as a six-year old, she understands what's going on and deals with an inner battle of not wanting to leave her family but also knowing that she is destined for something better in the future. Lucky for her, a pair of sunglasses in the car that takes her away, helps to make things a little better.

"The Death of an Insect" was indescribable. It was basically that- stylized, very bizarre and random shots of dead insects. There's really no other way to describe it. I seriously wish that I had a video to show you what was going on. Honestly no words.

The last one was called "For You I Will Fight". A girl discovers that she's had a near scare with HIV and decides to go and join the French army to experience a complete change in her life. She and three other women recruits are isolated together as they go through the training sessions with all the other men. You barely saw the rest of the soldiers except for one commander and it was interesting to see how the four of them bonded together and how their lives changed through their training.

There was a slight snafu on the way home- the entrance that we needed to the freeway was closed and the signs for the 10 quickly disappeared as soon as we crossed over into the ghetto (an incredibly EMPTY ghetto though....). Despite lots of U-turns and out loud frustrations at the overabundance of freeways there are in Los Angeles, we made it to the 110 South. However, we had no idea, not being from the crazy world of LA, if the 110 would hit a freeway we wanted. Eventually we saw signs for the 105 West which would take us to LAX. Awesome, we know how to go from there. After almost getting hit by a semi and then being followed by a car with very dim headlights (not at all suspicious) we saw signs for the 405. Even better than expected! From then, it was an easy drive down to Jamboree to take Allie home but for awhile there, we were worried for our safety and well-being (especially driving through Inglewood). The next morning, it was a miracle that I was still standing by noon and Allie was lucky enough to get to go home early from work so all worked out for the best. I would definitely recommend the LA Film Fest- it was a total blast.

I know....

... that most of you won't get this but I decided to post it because it never fails to make me laugh. And I needed this tonight as I get ready for a craaaaaazzzzzyyyyy week. I am more than happy to translate if needed :) Who does like hearing about an awkward blind date that ends in happiness?

Calling it Now

Today I will be tired. Why do I guess this? Last night's dream was out of whack. And I don't care if you don't want to read about it- this is more for me. This was one of the weirdest ones I have had in a long time.

It started out with me acting in an outdoor production (backyard practically) of a Tom Stoppard play. Just like I was watching on the Tonys last night. I have no idea the name or plot of this play, I Just know that it was written by Tom Stoppard and it revolved around a rich lady, her maid (I'm pretty sure I was the maid but I can't be sure....I might have been a younger granddaughter of the rich lady) and a football player all solving a mystery. IN this dream, we rehearsed the play and finally opened it. When we opened, we all forgot our lines. It was mortifying. At one point there was one audience member. But we pulled it together and performed several times.

Then it was part 2 of the dream while involved the Glee kids and some weird school. All I remember is that they had us pair up and at first Finn and Quinn were together (Rachel didn't even try to pick him) but then he said something to her and she ran away to Trouty-Mouth and I got to be with Finn. We worked together for the next part of the dream but I just can't quite remember what exactly it was that we were doing. But it was bizarre.

Then it was back to the play. Except this time, our football player character had to be played by Finn because our usual actor (who I'm pretty sure was Carl from HIMYM.... or possibly Bobby Cannavale who I also saw on the Tonys last night...) had disappeared. Unfortunately, after one of the shows, Finn had disappeared into the audience with the rest of the Glee kids and we had to improv. When the football player was supposed to show up, he didn't, so I had to improv my lines and go back stage to get him. Instead of a football player, there was a freakishly tall, skinny man (almost caricature-ish, like a Phantom Tollbooth illustration), in pointed high heels, cropped stretch pants, a low cut dance tank top and a purple sweater that he put ontop. Yes, this man was playing the footballer player. That's when I couldn't take it anymore and woke up.

Yep, probably will be taking a nap at some point today. If I'm lucky, it'll be at the pool.

BQOTD

Youval: Why do I have know the Hebrew alphabet in order?

Michal: Why do you have to know the English alphabet in order?

Youval: For filing!

Jim Spear: So what is an example of a bad change?

7th grader: It's like when that one angel, I can't remember his name, fell and became the devil.

Jim Spear: Well... um... yes... but I'm looking for something a little more on our level...

This is why...

... I love Colin Firth.

"Sixty minutes has discovered that I have no shame. I am a drag queen."

This man can go from this...

To this...

How can you not be madly in love?

Turtle

I wasn't going to post this but then I watched it and couldn't resist.... man, remember when TV shows were decent? Yes, I know the acting isn't Emmy winning, but it's certainly better than the junk that's on today.

Subbing Second Grade

On Thursday, I took a job in a second grade classroom. Totally out of my realm, right? Actually it wasn't too bad! Once you look past them correcting you every two seconds, they were actually quite fun! The best part was that I got to read a ton with them. We couldn't find their usual afternoon Read-Aloud book so I took matters in to my own hand and we read "The Enormous Crocdile" by the incredible Roald Dahl. They absolutely loved it. I got to read in voices and accents and they recited parts of it along with me and guessed what was happening next. It was a blast.

I will say this for second-graders. They are cute. The certainly tug at your heartstrings. I mean, let's be real, if you have low-self-esteem, work with second graders. Maybe I should have gotten on this train earlier. Although not really.... as lovely as this note was and all the hugs I got, even as a sub, I certainly couldn't work with the little ones day-in and day-out. Oy.

I did love seeing all the books in this teacher's classroom though. It brought back so many memories of my childhood book loves. First of all, the Polk Street Kids. Emily Arrow with her four braids and bows. Richard Beast Best who was held back a year. Matthew who wet the bed and always eat peanut butter and fluffer-nutter sandwiches (I had NO IDEA what fluffer-nutter was back then). Dawn with the pencil box. All the adventures they went on. So many memories.

Oh my goodness, My Father's Dragon was one of my favorite books growing up. It follows the story of the narrator's father who goes to an island to rescue a yellow and blue striped dragon. Along the way, his wonderful wits keep him safe. I loved the illustrations in this book, they highlighted so well what was going on in the text. Plus, two great sequels with the same great illustrations. Read these immediately if you haven't.

And my my word, guys, did you know that this was a real thing? They made a TV SHOW out of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle? With Jean Stapleton? And Joan Cusack? And Eg Begley, Jr.? I don't even have words to describe this! It's like a cartoon but with live-people. Just look at the costumes! Look at the pots/cans of make-up on the vanity table. They look like they were taken from Winnie-the-Pooh! "Baby Bean, bathe thyself!"- I love this. Also, I'm intrigued by their speech- it's very intelligent. What seven-year old says "I won't be a party to it"? I had totally forgotten than Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle lived in an upside-down house. Way to stick to the original story, random production company. But I don't remember her having a talking/sneezing tree. And who is this awful reporter man? Norbert? Definitely do not remember him. I don't think that anyone but Jean Stapleton could have played Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle. PLEASE take the time to watch this- it's amazing.

Also, did you know that they made a TV show out of the Fudge Books? I was such a huge fan of these- maybe it was because my sisters as a whole reminded me of Fudge? I won't confess to that being true or not but I definitely empathized greatly with Peter Hatcher. There are a couple of places in these books that make me just die with laughter. The part in "Fudge-A-Mania" where the folding bed snaps up and closes on Fudge? Fall-off-the-bed laugh so hard.

And speaking of books that make you laugh so hard that you want to die, has anyone ever read the Anastasia books? If you haven't, RUN, don't walk, to your nearest library and check these gems out for you. Anastasia is an intelligent yet awkward twelve-year old with many dreams. She wants to be a writer, makes loads of lists, makes friends, wants to become a model, sometimes dates equally awkward Steve Harvey, gets a little brother named Sam, and gets into many scrapes. I absolutely adore her parents, Myron and Katherine. Each book is incredible and honest and funny and I just live for Anastasia's conversations with her parents. Plus, there are two great books about Sam, just for extra kicks.

Funny how one day spent with super-cute second graders leads you down memory lane!

Fabulous and Famous!

One of my favorite events of JAM is Oscar Night. The girls get dressed up in gorgeous dresses, the boys get dressed up in suits and ties and cute outfits and we all get to walk the Red Carpet. We go into a gorgeous room with food (this year we had cookies and cupcakes, popcorn and licorice and of course, a chocolate fountain!) and decorations and a big screen.

Each group got to debut their feature film. This year we got to see "March of the Penguins", "Tangled", "Enchanted", "Titanic", "Most Boring Man in the World", "Snow White", and "Spaceballs". Each was hilarious and ridiculous and snort-inducing and creative in their own way. There was some great dubbing, excellent costumes, marvelous choreography, dancing and singing, animal co-stars, action, drama, light sabers and eerily similar sets in several of the movies....

Of course, Best Actor and Actress as well as Best Supporting Actor and Actress were crowned and there was a massive clean-up job at the end. Nothing less than that for the infamous JAM Oscars! I felt so blessed being around such fabulous movie stars!

If You're Going to Go to San Diego...

.... you might as well do it the proper way!

A few weeks ago, Michael and I drove down to San Diego in his mom's convertible. It was my first time legitimately driving in a convertible and it was a blast! We had no traffic on the way down which was rare and lovely. We met up with Mariah at Pat and Oscars, our usual go-to place. We had a great time catching up, as well as an hour at the house Mariah was staying at for awhile, before heading back up the coast to Irvine.

I always have a blast with Michael and the convertible made it even better! Let's do this again next time (as long as we continue to go to Pat and Oscars!)

Side-note.... this also made a great entrance for Oscar Night, pulling up in a convertible!

20 Statements

1. You end up looking/sounding like a schizophrenic if you try to have a conversation/pretty much do anything while listening to what's going on over the headset you are wearing.

2. Beethoven hated sopranos and double basses but the man was still a bloody genius.

3. Butterscotch candies are actually quite delicious (sorry Shiri)

4. I am kind of infatuated right now with the Mitfords and also kind of wish I was in their family. I wonder what I would have ended up being? Communist like Jessica? Fascist like Unity or Diana? A chicken farmer and farm manager like Pamela? Shot in the chest like Tom? A flip-floper like Nancy? Or a Duchess like Deborah? Or maybe I would have shocked everyone and run for Parliament...

5. Unity Valkyrie Mitford was conceived in the town of Swastika, Ontario in Canada. She later went on to be a passionate if not slightly obsessed member of the Nazi Party and a near-stalker of Hitler. If that is not foreshadowing, I'm not sure what is.

6. I sort of with that I had pets like Harold, Chester and Howie. Well, only to some extent... Chester is a little crazy.

7. The back of my legs itch like MAD because they were sunburned a week ago. I'm in misery, and not in the fun Maroon 5 song kind of way.

8. If you don't care enough to leave sub plans (and really, unless you are on your deathbed, you can email/call something in- this is the era of smart phones), then I probably don't care enough to make your kids do work.

9. I'm sorry, do kids go to high school this day or hoochie-clothing school. Because I'm appalled at what kids wear these days.

10. Are there people out there who don't give a rat's tail about the NBA finals? If so, please let me know. I'd like to be their friend.

11. My commitment to subbing is either strengthened or weakened when I hear the school and the grade the job is for. I'm been avoiding elementary school positions- I don't know if I"m suited for that. I would have no idea what to do with them 95% of the time.

12. I'm going camping on the beach this weekend and I'm totally stoked. I also just realized that I'm waaaayyyyy behind on pictures for my blog and that will be remedied tomorrow if I don't have a job.

13. I've completely caught up on RSC Podcasts. I'm not quite sure what to do with myself anymore.

14. Oh did I cry when (spoiler alert!) Tosh and Owen died on Torchwood. Ugh, I was finally growing fond of Owen too!

15. I just read the synopsis for this new show this summer on NBC. Love in the Wild (NBC)

It's like speed-dating in the jungle. Twenty men and women are paired off and dropped into a Costa Rican jungle with only a map and each other to navigate through various challenges. At day's end, winners will be treated to romantic dates, after which they'll choose whether to remain together or try a new partner for the next task. Um, I'm sorry but a) ridiculous premise and b) what is this, Amazing Race meets the Bachelor? Ugh.

16. Then I read this: The Lying Game (ABC Family) Foster child Emma (Alexandra Chando) learns she has an identical twin sister, Sutton, who was adopted by a wealthy family. The sisters trade places while Sutton pursues a lead on the identity of their birth mother. So basically the Prince and the Pauper. Way to steal for Mark Twain ABC Family.

17. The conclusion about the previous two statements is that summer TV sucks and I will be sticking to my Netflix queue and my books/books on CD (and maybe Psych and White Collar, duh...)

18. The new face cream that I got a few months ago SUCKS compares to the one I got last year in Oxford. SUCKS!!!!!! Even though it's the same brand. SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

19. I really like everything to do with books. Free books. Book stores. Book clubs. Big books. Little books. Kids books. Adult books. Books on tape. If it's a book, I'm probably a fan of at least something.

20. If I don't end up getting a job tomorrow, I"m going to the pool. Maybe all day. The end.