Why you shouldn't think too hard about princess movies

I'm on a roll with this blogging thing lately. Just trying to keep Jill interested at work. :)

So last night, I re-watched The Swan Princess. Shut up, I was bored, and it was on-demand. Upon re-viewing, I couldn't help but notice just how STUPID Prince Derek is in that movie. He has to be one of, if not THE most stupid cartoon fairy tale princes EVER.

Besides the obvious in-story stupidity (the "what else is there" answer):

• He spends what looks like several months "practicing" saving Odette. However long it is, it's enough time for his mother (and the entire kingdom) to think he needs to just move on already.
• When not practicing, he is "studying" to better save Odette. His plan is to apparently read every book in the library, hoping to decode the cryptic message Odette's father left before he died.
• He interprets the message WAY wrong.
• He goes skipping out to the forest, thinking his genius interpretation is going to make him save Odette before the ball THE NEXT DAY. The interpretation? That the "great animal" could be anything. So his uber confidence comes from the fact that he's probably looking for any animal. What was his plan? Kill everything?
• The only thing he almost kills is Odette herself, accidentally. Because he is a dumb ass. (And another note: after all that amazing animal shooting practice...he can't hit a swan? Not just a swan, but a human being that only just recently turned into a swan?)
  
• Odette is being held captive in a place that he can WALK to from his house. A castle owned by a reclusive crazy wizard. Yet Derek had to study for months (at least long enough for Odette to become quite adept at the whole flying thing) to figure out where to start.

Blah blah blah, it ends happily ever after. It should have ended that Derek tripped down the stairs and accidentally killed himself with his own arrow. That would have at least been believable. Odette can just learn to live as a swan. She'd still be better off than her dad, who dies and no one seemed to care.

So what are your thoughts? Can you think of a stupider animated fairytale prince? They aren't the smartest lot of fictional characters, but I don't think anyone can be as dumb as Derek.

If you write a story using these plots, I want a copy

And, you know, royalties probably. At least some kind of mention in the forward.

I started using Melatonin again, which means my dreams go up a notch (or ten) in vividness and craziness. And bonus! I actually remember them when I wake up! Feel free to ignore this post since dream retellings are usually annoying. But if you do care, here are my dreams from the last two nights.

Saturday night:
I live with my family in some crazy post-apocalyptic future where men terrorize people with streamer guns--they're like t-shirt guns, but shoot out enough party streamers to bury you in a pile. They are operated by dollar bills, which are rare in this world. I steal 22 dollar bills from various men. It's considered a huge crime, publicized all over the news. Because I have ties to a female anti-streamer gun resistance group, the government assumes I stole the money and choses to punish me by forcing my sister to get breast implants. The implants are very uneven, and her nipples won't stop bleeding. My dad is very upset with me. I contemplate running away from home.

Last night:
Three low-life men sit at a long table in a tent. You can line up to see if one of them is your father. I hijack the event with some hired goons and force feed these men five spoonfuls of something that looks and smells like liquid raw chicken. [Still trying not to gag over that.] I offer them the option to salt and pepper the goop. Only one man opts to salt the fifth spoonful. With great difficulty, the men swallow all five doses. I'm working for some sort of pharmaceutical company, and take notes on a clip board. I plan to return several hours later to see if the men are dead.

So... what do those dreams mean? Other than the obvious fact that Melatonin is awesome.

Lard, mustache, huge, little, head is ice cream

I just caught up on Community this weekend. It is so hilarious. I keep forgetting how hilarious it really is. Why must all good shows be on at 7 pm on Thursdays?! At least there's Hulu.com. I missed episode 3 because I'm too slow. I guess now I'll have to buy it on dvd.

Here is a remix of a couple of this show's most hilarious clips. It's hilariousness will bite your face off.



(Hilarious count: 4. It really is that funny.)

Random thoughts that only make sense if you watched Survivor last night

I kept thinking... if a contestant died on Survivor, we'd have heard about it in the news... right? No one died on last night's episode, but Russell (also known as OtherRussell and LeaderRussell) got pretty close. Jeff Probst was pretty adorable with his nurturing bedside manner and fatherly pep-talk.

A lot of people (on the internet, in forums) have said that Russell was really stupid to not sit out for the challenge, but I disagree. On Survivor, I don't think a tribe ever really votes someone out for being weak, losing food, or losing the team challenge. Those are just convenient excuses for voting out a person they were planning on voting out anyway. Russell really should have sat the challenge out, but I think he correctly ascertained that he was on the outs with his tribe. They were already murmuring about Russell not choosing the tarp, and about him working a little too hard. The team was looking for a reason to vote him out. I think, had he sat out of the challenge, the team would have pounced. They had been told that they had to vote someone out that night no matter who won the challenge; so sitting out, playing the strong people and winning the challenge would not have saved Russell. (The winning team would just get to eat pizza while they voted someone out.) In the end, Russell had to leave the game anyway and no one was voted out. Jeff obviously thought that Russell really had a good shot at winning the game, but I disagree. He might not have been voted out this time, but I think he'd have gone before the merge.

If you read the fan reaction online, it's kind of funny that most people are outraged over the fact that Jeff Probst didn't just let everyone have pizza. I thought the exact same thing. The editing was great this episode. At the end, both teams were at tribal council, and you could hear the rain start to pour. Again. After several straight days of it. They kept cutting to individual reactions of people looking up at the sky in hopeless sadness. These people not only willingly signed up for this, but they consider it an honor. A great life achievement. But you couldn't help feel so bad for them! Please Jeff! Let them just have some pizza!

Some of the music I like

Here are some videos of music I like that I found through Pandora or emo tv shows.

"Closer" by Kings of Leon


"Fidelity" by Regina Spektor


"My Skin" by Natalie Merchant


"Buttons" by The Weeks


"Lazy Eye" by Silversun Pickups

All that Bet Red / Tomato Nation / Donors Choose stuff I've been tweeting about

So I've been spamming all my social networking outlets with links to the Donor's Choose: Bet Red (Tomato Nation) contest. The couple of people who have responded to my links seemed confused as to what I was talking about, so here's some further explanation. And another shameless plug.

First of all: Donors Choose. It's one of my favorite charities, along with Kiva. With Donors Choose, teachers post funding requests for a specific need their school or classroom has. They outline all of the costs, explain why they need what they are asking for, and submit it to the website. Donors can browse all of these projects and chose to donate to whatever project they want. Like Kiva, it puts the donor in (almost) direct contact with the recipient. It's all fairly anonymous, for safety reasons, but you - the donor - have complete control over where your money goes. It's a lot of fun. You get to help buy band instruments, or help beef up the sci-fi section of a library, or buy math games, or even an air conditioner for a classroom in Texas. (Could you imagine going to school in Texas without an air conditioner?) There's a lot of variety. Browse through the projects, I'm sure you'll easily find something that resonates with you.

So what is Tomato Nation? Tomato Nation is a blog I like to read that encourages its readers to donate to Donors Choose during the month of October. You can read more about it here. "Bet Red" is their slogan for 2009. It's great if you donate at all, but donating through Tomato Nation's contest page has definite advantages. For example, earlier today, Sars (the tomatonation blogger), informed her readers that a particular donor was willing to offer a matching donation once our total donations reached $90K. At the time, we were at $83,106. If we met the goal by Friday, the match would be $4K. By Thursday, $6K. If we got to $90K by Wednesday at midnight, they'd donate $8K. At that point, I posted links on facebook and twitter, hoping some people might chip in a few dollars, if they could. (Jill did! Thanks Jill!) Turns out, we got to $90K before midnight TODAY. With 25 hours to spare! I think that's pretty awesome. Besides matching donations, Sars offers lots of fun mini-prizes along the way. Check her site regularly for more details on those.

So while the urgency for this particular deadline is gone, I still think it's a great charity and a great contest. You can search by state and donate locally, or search by subject matter and donate according to your passion. Excited About Encyclopedias! was the project where I chose to contribute. It's in Utah, and it's in the language/literacy category... both of which are important to me. Their goal is not yet met, so if you want to donate, this would be a great place to do so. I'd really love to see them get what they need, and the finish line for that particular project is within reach. And if you can donate through the Tomato Nation "Bet Red" link, that would be even better! (If you want to pick another project, through Tomato Nation, you can use this spreadsheet to sort by state and subject. And if you want nothing to do with Tomato Nation at all, but still want to donate, that's fine too... use this link.)

If you have questions about any of this, check out one of the billion links I put in the post, or just ask me in the comments. :)

Oh no! Don't eat me!

The best Halloween candy ever? Boo Peeps! They just might be the best candy ever, regardless of holiday. Not just for taste (though sugar coated marshmallows are quite delicious), but for cuteness and overall eating entertainment.

Oooh noooo! Don't eat me! Noooo!

The worst candy ever? The life-sized gummy severed foot I saw at wal-mart. I can't find it anywhere on the internet, or I'd post a picture. Maybe that's for the best. It was quite disgusting.

My spare frog club, pending

A short while ago, my supervisor at work offhandedly mentioned that she thought my bedroom looked nice. Apparently, she had a seen a picture of it, somewhere on the internet. Understandably concerned, I asked a few followup questions. From her description, I realized it was a picture of my bedroom at my parent's house. The room that is now Jake's room, which is now a festering mess of old socks and bedspreads that will continue to fester until Jake gets back from his mission. Even though I no longer lived there, I was still unsettled. Where on the internet was a picture of my old bedroom? "Oh, it was on your blog," she answered.

So... I have a lot of blogs. I'm not interesting enough to justify that many blogs, but nonetheless, they exist. I really enjoy the layout aspect of blogs. Sometimes, when I hit a blog funk, I blame it on the layout, open a new account, and play around with a different look, feel, and blog theme. Sometimes I stay there, sometimes I get bored and go back to the old blog. It's a cool story, I know.

I looked through all the blogs I could remember creating. No picture of my old bedroom. My supervisor couldn't remember the web address. I had resigned myself to the fact that there were pictures of me and my things floating around the internet. Since I am in no way famous or noteworthy (yet, anyway), I was reassured that while I couldn't find all of the pictures, I was likely the one that uploaded them in the first place.

But then, I found it. Not too long ago, I was poking around my hotmail account and I found it. It wasn't on a blog, it was on my msn profile page. (Why? I don't know.) So here it is, my old room.

(In case that link doesn't work.)

These are all the blogs I've opened (that I can remember). I know I should delete a bunch of them, but I don't know... I kind of like them all. I'm the same way with journals. I have over a dozen different journals, each with random entries in no logical order. In fact, I remember with one journal, I decided to write my "bad" feelings (frustration, anger, sadness) starting from the back, turning the journal upside down. I envisioned a completed journal, each page with writing on both sides: one upbeat and positive, the other depressingly emotional (and upside down). That didn't last long. But I still like each of these journals, and each of these blogs. In 10,000 years, they'll be a fun challenge for any archaeologist.

Fire up the grills, it's a blog party! Woo!

• Stalling - You are here. Right now. Really.
• Waterford Writers - Work-related creative writing blog.
• spare story parts - A project I'm trying to work on, based on the video in this post.
• WELL I NEVER HOW CRUDE - The bestest blog that ever blogged. VIPs only, though.
• Enrichment Book Club - An idea Jill and I had. We'll follow-through one day! Also exists on livejournal, here.
  
• Cool story, Katie Holmes - The first version of the project in spare story parts. I almost forgot this blog existed, actually.
• My Blue Chair - My main blog, for a while. Not updated anymore.
• Highway Crossing Frog - Same as above.
• [title pending] - Holy crap. I tried to do the NaNoWriMo challenge once. This blog is what happened. If I was going to delete any blog, this would be the first to go.

Because, for some reason, it isn't obvious

New Rule for the universe!

When in a public restroom, you are NOT allowed to talk to your stall neighbors.

Apparently, this isn't some instinctively understood code of behavior. I have had this happen to me THRICE in my lifetime, the third time being today. And I'm only 27. That means, if I live a slightly longer than normal life time, this could happen to me nine times. That is nine times too many. So I'm taking a stand. Talking to the person in the bathroom stall next to you is NOT ALLOWED. And yes, [name removed], this rule applies to sisters.