| Sunday, May 04, 2008 |
| Ready for the scrapheap |
This is slightly embarrassing, but it goes to show what a drooling "Indiana Jones" fangirl I am: I had read that the trailer to the upcoming "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" was playing before "Iron Man," so I actually brought my iPod to the theater so I could close my eyes and play loud music during the trailer because I was afraid of spoilers. I don't want to know anything about the movie before it unspools onscreen in 3 weeks. I want to be surprised, just as I was when I saw the original "Indiana Jones" movie many years ago. I may not be a kid anymore, but I still have a childlike enthusiasm when it comes to this series. (Of course, I don't want to get too excited... as one blogger of my acquaintance pointed out, "I do have three words of warning we should all keep in mind. Star. Wars. Prequels.")
[Warning! Warning! Warning! If you are planning to see "Iron Man" and don't want to know anything about the movie's plot points, stop reading now.]
Anyway, I agreed to go with Joe to see "Iron Man" because it had gotten a lot of rave reviews ("Cartoon thrills for thinking people!"), but after seeing it, I honestly think I'm done with the whole comic book movie genre. I am so obviously not the target audience for "Iron Man." It's a movie for 14-year-old boys who are impressed with girls, guns and gadgetry. Seriously, the first hour of the movie is about a guy building a robotic suit, and the second hour of the movie is about a guy perfecting the suit. Ho-hum. Yes, Robert Downey Jr. does a nice job sending up his pre-rehab/jail reputation, but in the end the movie is just one guy in a CGI robotic suit fighting another guy in a CGI robotic suit, and I'm thinking maybe I should have gone into the city to see "a film that uses indigenous nonprofessional actors to tell a simple but transcendent story of daily life" instead.
I Sit Through The Credits So You Don't Have To: If you liked the movie, you really should stay for the credits because at the very, very end, the filmmakers include a scene setting up the sequel. I mean, wild horses couldn't get me into the theater for "Iron Man II," but there it is. |
posted by 125records @ 3:24 PM  |
|
|
|
| Saturday, May 03, 2008 |
| The adoption saga comes to an end |
On Wednesday, I mentioned that the puppy was spending a few hours with some potential adopters. The good news is that they really liked him. The bad news is that they really, really, really liked him.
The Dad and his adorable young daughter returned Ace on Wednesday evening, around 9 PM. He had already submitted an application to the rescue organization, which would have to evaluate it and make the final decision. I tried to explain the process to him. Afterwards, I sent an email to the rescue group stating that they seemed like a perfectly nice family and I thought they would give the pup a good home.
Thursday morning, I got the following email from Dad: "I was wondering when we might hear from the rescue group. My kids are very excited about adopting Ace and we would like to bring him to our home as soon as we can." I responded that presumably, someone would contact him shortly, and mentioned that I had put in a good word for them. In the meantime, I had a tremendous amount of work to do so I kind of hoped myself that it would be sooner rather than later, since caring for the tiny pooping, eating and sniffing machine was a time consuming project.
Thursday afternoon, another email from Dad: "I hate to bother you, but I have still not heard from [rescue]. I'm actually confused... I would have thought that when you have a family ready to adopt one of your puppies, you'd want to jump on that and 'close the deal' so to speak. If for some reason she doesn't want us to have the pup then I'd appreciate her just telling us that we can tell the kids, but they're excited and its not really fair to keep them in suspense like this. Anyway, sorry for venting to you, but I'm a bit frustrated."
For any of you reading out there, here's a tip: adopting a puppy from a rescue organization is not the same thing as going to the store and buying a bag of oranges. It's analogous to adopting a baby -- anybody with functioning lady parts can make her own baby (with a cooperative gentleman involved, of course), but if you want to adopt or foster a child, you're stuck enduring home visits, interviews and reference-checking. Pretty much everyone involved is a volunteer, most of them with other jobs. It took about 2 weeks between the time I first saw Hobie and when I brought him home.
Anyway, I was dealing with about 10 other things that were stressing me out, and coping with a pushy puppy adopter was pushing me over the edge. I was caught in the middle. However, Joe and I determined that the family had to be the perfect match for Ace, since he was just as jumpy and impatient as they were.
Finally, late Friday afternoon, I got the word that they had been cleared to adopt Ace. They picked him up this morning. Incidentally, they are planning to rename him Scruffy, which is kind of cute and appropriate, I think.
One of my projects was attempting to house-train the pup, which I did with mixed success. He went about a week with no accidents in the house, always using the same part of the yard to do his business, so I slacked off a little bit in watching him like a hawk/keeping him confined to whatever room I was in at the time. Of course, then he had another accident, so I went back to monitoring his every step when he was indoors. This morning, we came downstairs to wait for Ace to be picked up and found the messy remains of an accident. I have no idea when he could have done it, since he slept in his crate all night and I thought I'd had my eye on him all day Friday. As Joe cleaned it up with a roll of paper towels and a spray bottle of orange-scented wood cleanser, I could only sigh fondly and think, He's someone else's problem now! |
| posted by 125records @ 6:52 PM |
|
|
|
|
| About Me |
Name: Sue
Home: San Francisco Bay Area, California, United States
About Me:
See my complete profile
|
| Previous Post |
|
| Archives |
|
|
| Links |
|
|
| Powered by |
|
|
