December Round-Up - 2012

Yes. Another post of lies. But at least this is a little closer to what the real date actually is!

Movies Seen: Six, with one in a theater. That one was Django Unchained, and even though it was a press screening, I didn't get to review it because time just got away from me. (Shocker.) So my capsule review is, Django Unchained is a terrific 90 minute movie. Unfortunately, it's actually three hours long.

Books Read: Four, with that damned The Passage finally out of the way! Click through to read my brief reviews:

Sex and the Single Girl by Helen Gurley Brown

People Who Eat Darkness by Richard Lloyd Parry

The Accidental Feminist: How Elizabeth Taylor Raised Our Consciousness and We Were Too Distracted by Her Beauty to Notice by M.G. Lord

Furious Love: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, and the Marriage of the Century by Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger

(Yes, watching the horrible TV movie Liz & Dick set me off on a bit of an Elizabeth Taylor binge. She was much more interesting than I'd ever been lead to believe!)

Live Shows Seen: Two! The Nutcracker at the San Francisco Ballet, which is always super fun. The last part of act one gets me every time, what with what looks like a literal ton of fake snow that falls on stage. Love it!

The second was a New Year's Eve show, and it resulted in one of the funner New Year's Eve's I've had in a while: Nick Waterhouse at Bimbo's.  I got to wear a Lurex gown, everyone there was dressed up sharp, and we had a table with a great view of the stage. It was an all-around fun and non-stressful NYE, which is really all I want from the night.

Fancy Dinners Out: Three! Dinner at Bix, my fave. Truffle deviled eggs, omagahhhh. House of Prime Rib, wherein I had, yes, prime rib. Pro-tip: If you like your prime rib medium rare, order it rare there. Their medium rare is not. And lunch at the Rotunda at Neiman Marcus. I had a lobster BLT which was probably one of the best sandwiches I've ever had.

Shoes Bought: I know I bought some myself, but I'm drawing a blank right now on what they were. I did get two pairs of rain shoes for Christmas though, this green pair, and this black pair. Of course, it's only rained once since I got them. Doh! I find rain boots impossible to walk in, so these are a great alternative. And cute, too!

The Year in Pictures - 2012

Picture the Day - 2012, a set on Flickr.

For the second year in a row, I took a picture every day of the year, and posted them to Flickr.

It ends up being a nice literal year-at-a-glance, and has become a tradition I am continuing with 2013.

Take a look! 2012 included two trips to Disneyland, two trips to Palm Springs, a new full-time job, and my getting a new roommate. Quite the year! I wish I could get a poster featuring all the thumbnails!

November Round-Up - 2012

If you read my blog regularly, you know this post is a post of lies. It's not actually December 31st, and this round-up is actually showing up months late. Well, sorry. SORRY! Christmas and all that made life kinda crazy, and I am only now really able to catch up on my blogging duties. So let's just pretend. AGAIN!

Movies Seen: Six, with one in a theater. That one was Skyfall. Here's my review!

Books Read: One! Just one goddamn book, and it was The Twelve, the sequel to The Passage. Now, I loved The Passage. LOVED IT. I read it in just a few days, and it's a monster of a book. But the sequel? It was a damn chore to get through, and I can't really pinpoint why. I will say the biggest problem I had was trying to keep track of all the characters. I never really did, and it wasn't till I was about 50 pages away from the end that I discovered there's a damn character guide in the back of the book. AAARGH!

Fancy Dinners Out: One, and that was during a trip to Disneyland, at the always fun Steakhouse 55. I had steak!

Live Shows Seen: None, though Disneyland is always a show.

Shoes Bought: One pair, these vintage gold pumps, which I had been eying on eBay for a while, and got for half off the asking price after making an offer.

October Round-Up - 2012

It seems like I begin most of these posts with some variation on "OMG I can't believe it's already ____!" This month is no different. The holidays are barrelling towards me so fast, I didn't even really realize the first of the month had passed.

So let's pretend it didn't!

Movies Seen: Five. Only five?! And three of those were theatrical viewings. Click through to read my reviews of Argo and Cloud Atlas.

Books Read: Four! Brief reviews, where linked!

How To Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran

Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolical Virus by Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy

The Girl In the Song by Michael Heatley

The Boy In the Song by Frank Hopkinson and Michael Heatley

Fancy Dinners Out: Two! Plouf, where I had mussels, some of which were not very good, and Locanda, where I had something I can't remember, but do remember was very good.

Live Shows Seen: None!

Shoes Bought: Two pair! This pair of pristine vintage yellow pumps, and this pair of sparkly open-toe pumps that were super cheap at DSW.

September Round-Up - 2012

Oy, once again, having to actually WORK for a living is putting a damper on my blogging duties. So let's just pretend it's Halloween again. Woo! Candy! Tricks! Costumes!


Aaaand, September!

(And as an aside, I really really hate the new Blogger set-up. Blame it for why this post looks crappy. I tried and tried to fix it, and it was an exercise in sheer frustration.)

Movies Seen: Six, with three in a theater. Click through to read reviews of two of those.

Trouble With the Curve
Looper

Books Read: Four. Click through to read brief reviews.

Making of the Misfits by James Goode 
 

The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker 
 

The Cranes Dance by Meg Howrey
 

When It Happens To You by Molly Ringwald    

Fancy Dinners Out: Six! 

Deviled eggs and BBQ shrimp at the Elite Cafe. 

Two dinners at La Traviata.   

Mac and cheese and steak frites at Grand Cafe.   

More steak at Forbes Island.   

Calamari steak at Tadich Grill.   

And, this wasn't fancy, but they sure made you wait around like it was something fancy, mac and cheese at Homeroom in Oakland.   

Live Shows Seen: None!    

Shoes Bought: One pair. Black ballet flats at H&M that I had to get because the shoes I wore to work that day tore my feet up.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 31

We made it! Happy Halloween, everybody!

Thanks to Countdown to Halloween for putting together this little blogathon every year, and thanks to all the people who came a knocking at my virtual door looking for treats. I hope you enjoyed it.

If you haven't already, be sure to check out the list of other blogs that have participated this year, as there's a lot of fun to be had out there.

As for today's picks, of course the first one has to be It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, which is on ABC tonight at 8 P.M. Halloween just isn't Halloween without a visit from that nutcase Linus.

I also have to watch Halloween every year, although it's kind of a bummer that the only place to watch it on TV is AMC today at 4pm, as it's not letterboxed and will be edited for content...

It is available on YouTube in parts, though...



Finally, TCM is, once again, the place to be if you can't be bothered to change the channel, as they've got a full line-up of fun. Check out the full schedule here, but my pick would be Frankenstein at 5pm. Can't do much better than that on a Halloween night!



Have a great time, be safe, and I hope to see you all again next year!

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 30

David Cronenberg's 1986 remake of The Fly is one of the best horror/sci-fi movies ever made. It's equal parts horrifying, funny, and touching (yes, touching; I think the ending is quite sad!). And it's also one of Jeff Goldblum's best performances ever. He was robbed of an Oscar nomination. Robbed I tell ya!

Watch it at 9pm on Sundance.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 29

There are many reasons to watch Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein, but this scene is probably one of the biggest reasons.

Two words: Gene Hackman.

Watch the whole movie at 7:05pm on Retroplex.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 28

When it comes to Phantoms, I prefer the non-singing ones to the singing ones. In fact, if they don't talk at all? So much the better.

Thus 1925's silent classic The Phantom of the Opera, starring Lon Chaney, remains the best of the Phantoms. Watch it at 10pm on TCM, or right here, right now!

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 27

The late 1960s and early 1970s saw the release of several horror movies starring aging actresses as nutcases. A lot of these had questions as titles, like the most famous, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, but there was also, Who Slew Auntie Roo?; Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice?; and Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte.

There was also tonight's film, What's the Matter With Helen?, starring Debbie Reynolds and Shelley Winters, as two women who...actually, I won't say anything. Just watch the trailer. It's NUTS.

Watch the movie at 9pm on TCM.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 26

Gimmick king William Castle's first foray into the horror genre was the 1958 suspense tale Macabre, about the kidnapping of a doctor's daughter and a race against time to find the girl before she suffocates. Audience members were issued a $1,000.00 insurance policy against death-by-fright, which in itself sounds like a good starting plot for a horror movie!

Watch it late, late tonight at 1:45am on TCM.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 25

I'm kind of over the whole demonic possession genre at this point, but this one stars Donald Sutherland and Sissy Spacek, so I think it at least deserves some consideration. Also, it isn't a mockumentary, which is another horror subgenre I've just about seen enough of.

You can watch An American Haunting at 10:15pm on IFC.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 24

Basically, you can just leave it on Turner Classic Movies tonight, as they're running a marathon of Edgar Allan Poe-inspired movies, starting with The Raven (1963) at 5pm, followed by Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932), a 6:45pm; The Black Cat (1934), at 8pm; The Fall of the House of Usher (1949), at 9:30pm; the aforementioned animated short, The Tell-Tale Heart, at 10:45pm; and my personal pick, Spirits of the Dead, at 11:15pm.

Of that last one, which is a 1968 trilogy of short films, directed by Roger Vadim, Louis Malle, and Federico Fellini, it's the Fellini one--titled "Toby Dammit," that is really worth watching. I saw it as a kid, and it scarred me for life, instilling in me a lifelong fear of driving over bridges in convertibles, girls with long blond hair, and bouncing white balls.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 23

I usually like to save my inclusion of Night of the Living Dead for Halloween night, or the week of. It's kind of like my Halloween version of It's a Wonderful Night, in that it's one of those "I can only watch this once a year, right before the holiday" movies.

Of course, that's where the similarities end, because I don't usually end up crying my eyes out when I watch Night.

And great, now I'm thinking about an It's a Night of Your Wonderful Dead mash-up/remake, and whether or not that would end with me in tears.

ANYWAY, you can watch the original Night of the Living Dead today at 1pm on IFC.

Musty TV's Maniacal Movie Countdown - Day 22

Hey, remember this one? I forgot Scarlett Johansson was in it. And I forgot the title is grammatically incorrect, unless the movie is actually about eight freaks with legs, in which case, I forgot about that, too.

Eight Legged Freaks is on AMC at 5:30pm.