Holding My Breath

My Most Important Goal this year: Write my thesis proposal, defend it and at least start data collection.

The new year has started and I am struggling to stay the course! I've been very good this first week, checked off items from my list, postponed others because I tend to list too much. (heh)

Please let me stick to this!


In other news...

What movies/shows are you looking forward to this year? Here is a partial list of mine:
1. Hunger Games
2. The Legend of Korra
3. Rurouni Kenshin live action movie (I hope they release this outside Japan with English subtitles)
4. Breaking Dawn Part II (sort of)

New Blog Title, New Content

I'm through with depressive blogging.

New Blog Title, New Blog Content! That's my New Year's Resolution!

Watching Zombieland

I'm kind of loving Woody Harrelson in Zombieland.

"I just love red-necks!"
"I haven't cried like that since Titanic..."

:)

Lifeline from God

No land in sight... but not drowning anymore

Art done in MS PowerPoint.

The road to somewhere

Have you ever had a "religious experience"? I mean, that distinct feeling that God is moving in your life and talking to you through other people? I've never had one until this weekend.

Last Friday I said things that really, really hurt someone. It was like my inner bigot decided to come out and have a party. It's a miracle I was even forgiven.

Even so, the Saturday that followed was possibly one of the worst I've ever had in my entire life. Weeping my eyes out in shame and guilt, you know? At dinner with the family, my sister asked me, "Are you sick?" I guess I looked really bad.

The worst part of it is, it was my own fault. There's nothing worse than that. And of course I've lost that person's trust.

And then at Mass the next day, failing to catch the 7:15 AM one at Don Bosco, I heard the one in our condo. And the priest's homily went like this, "Words are powerful. They should uplift and not destroy," exactly like someone was chastising me. You might think that's a common enough sermon to hear, but considering that the Gospel was about how Jesus drove a demon out of a possessed man, it was only slightly related to the literal meaning of the passage. Plus, it was delivered by a priest I usually feel weird hearing mass from, well, because he always seems to insert some self-congratulatory reference in the homily. And yet, and yet... he was the one who spoke the words that reached me, for the first time, in a long time at mass. So it seemed all of a theme. Speak gently. Amazing things can come out of the most unexpected people. Never judge too quickly.

And it was amazing. To hear God, even if it's just to hear him say, "Yeah girl. You have been bad." I actually felt slightly better.

It's going to be a long road. I don't know when I'll reach the end of it. But I remember a prayer I was praying some time ago and realize it has been answered. And the lesson learned from that is that next time, I should clarify what I'm asking for.

And the other lesson is that at the end of this road, there is a beautiful clearing.

This just needed to get out of my head

I was gonna put a Michaelangelo reference here but... never mind. It feels silly now.

Anyway saw the series finale of Avatar and this "fan-writing" just needed to get out of my head. Its a narrative version of one of the scenes and the words were demanding to get put on paper. Seriously. I have something like this for Return of the Jedi too. Haha I know, I know, I'm such a freak.

Anyway, since my sister isn't online, I'll paste this here.

***

The lightning charge gave an odd blue cast to Azula’s skin, washing out the dark shadows under her eyes. Her arms circled around her in the familiar form that served to build up the energy. I waited, watching her face carefully as she smiled. Azula’s eyes locked on mine.

… and slid past…

Almost too late, I realized as she threw the bolt, that she wasn’t aiming for me.

“NOOOOOO!”

I ran to catch the wave of lightning that flew past me with ferocious power, and knew I would never be able to make it. So I leaped directly into the path of the charge, shielding Katara, and tried to guide the flow of the energy as my uncle had taught me.

But I was off balance and the jump threw me just slightly out of focus, so that the energy didn’t flow into me.

It exploded into me.

The pain was like nothing I had ever known in my life. I dropped heavily to the courtyard floor and couldn’t even writhe with the agony. I wrestled to control the power inside me as it burned uncontrollably. But I had lost my hold on it and it continued to burn me from the inside out and I knew that if I didn’t find a way to release it, I would die.

Push it out.

It was not how my uncle had taught me.

PUSH!

And the power seemed to erupt out of every pore in my body.

The sky grew bright, briefly, as the lightning found release, carrying with it a strange sound. Then I realized that the sound was my own scream.

***

They had been fighting long and intensely, the air thick with the heat of their fire. It was as frightening and as powerful, I imagined, as it might have been between two dragons duelling. But I knew Zuko was gaining the upper hand when his last attack broke through Azula’s defense to send her spawling across the floor.

I had never seen Azula bested quite so soundly.

And then Zuko taunted her to use lightning, and I understood why. He was taking a calculated risk, a huge risk, that he would be able to redirect Azula’s attack and thus end the match decisively.

“I’LL SHOW YOU LIGHTNING!”

I watched her shape the deadly power with deliberate movements. Brother and sister stood directly in front of each other and I prayed that Zuko’s gamble would work.

And then Azula struck…

… at me…

The lightning came faster than I had time to react, and I felt the power of it even as it was still meters away. And then somehow Zuko was in front of me, shielding me from the lethal strike, and the lightning hit him full force.

He fell, shaking with pain, and I stared in horror as the lightning screamed, uncontrolled, out of his body.

Desperately, I ran toward him.

***

Yeah, this is a show on Nickelodeon. And it's nowhere near Spongebob :)

Are you a geek?

My definition of a geek is someone who specializes in esoteric knowledge that the mainstream population doesn't really care to know about THAT well. And a geek would know it VERY WELL.

--- Spoken like a true geek

And this is what students at GaTech Campus had to say:

I'm trying to come up with a list of the BEST DORKS/GEEKS evar. There are already two in my list. Know of any others? :)

Doldrums

Three points to the one who can tell what book(s) actually use that word?

I feel hugely guilty today. I find that whenever I talk freely about how I feel I find myself wishing afterward that I hadn't.

How Can I Ever Get Around...

... to concentrating on all the work I have to do, when they always have some kind of obsession-inducing update??? (Easy Kathy... DON'T GO ONLINE! duh...)

Actually I had started keeping an eye on the making of the Twilight movie because of initial fan reactions expressing strong objections to Robert Pattinson being cast as the vampire Edward Cullen. Reasons revolved around the general theme, "He's not hot enough!" and I felt so sorry for the poor boy. (In case you didn't watch Harry Potter: The Goblet of Fire, Robert is the British actor who played Cedric Diggory) So I started looking up his acting creds and found out that in between he's been trying out all kinds of roles: really weird roles --- deliberately. Like nerds/losers, tortured WWII bomber pilots, and sexually ambiguous artists (i.e. Salvador Dali). The kid's not bad! That plus the facts that in interviews he's always disarmingly unpretentious, a-dork-ably shy and poking fun at himself, have naturally transformed me into one of his legions of followers! (read: fan). I do wish for him that he can prove all those shallow-haters wrong. :D (Although I'm afraid that even if he does deliver, they will still refuse to acknowledge because they don't find him pretty enough. sigh.)

In the meantime, here's a promo video from Summit on the Twilight movie. Robert's American accent kind of reminds of Tobey Maguire's. Which is funny because of what he says. Listen to it.



Credit for the youtube video goes to movielover247.

P.S. Since I am fangirl-ing, I might as well do it thoroughly. Robert Pattinson pictures for your reference. The many faces of... :) I like that he has been deliberately choosing odd roles after his Harry Potter stint (read: non-pretty boy roles).

As Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter:


The closest look I can get you for how he looked in The Haunted Airman:


As Daniel, the nerdy guy friend in The Bad Mother's Handbook:




As Arthur, the down-and-out guy trying to come to terms with who he is in, How To Be:



As a young Salvador Dali in, Little Ashes:



My sister is scolding me already for blogging too much. Bye!

A New Spin on Old Horrors

There's going to be a movie version of Twilight coming out in the US on December 12, 2008. I hadn't realized that I'd stumbled on a book with such a huge fanbase. Apparently, Twilight stayed on the bestseller list for 56 weeks and has sold 5.5 million copies worldwide.

So I would like to correct myself. This story isn't Romeo and Juliet crossed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In terms of emotional impact, it's probably more like Titanic crossed with Interview with a Vampire.

Here's an MTV report on the movie.



Robert Pattinson looked embarrassed to play the dazzlingly attractive vampire. How cute.

Mad Skills

This is just too cool not to share. It's a fan video for Avatar though... you have thus been warned!

Video was made by ravenhpltc24.