The Greatest Movies

Last night Peter and I watched the AFI special on the 100 Greatest Movies of all time. We love shows like this, with film clips and people talking about their favorite movies.

When the list got to 50, Peter suggested that we try to predict the first 50 movies - which is something we like to do. A few weeks ago, while watching a Friends episode where Ross had to name all fifty states, we decided to take on that challenge (and we were almost defeated by IDAHO!!).

We predicted so many movies that were NOT on the list including:

Witness
The Untouchables
Field of Dreams
Dances With Wolves
(I say Diehard should be on this list, but I know it would never be)
Fight Club
Malcolm X
Reservoir Dogs

We decided that we are going to create our own list of the greatest films of all time.

Cheating on My Garmin

Yesterday I drove my mother's Pilot, which has a different gps than the wonderful device that is our Garmin. It kept tripping me up because the navigational lady didn't tell me when to turn until it was too late. Our Garmin lady tells me about 0.2 miles before the turn, and once more at the turn, so I kept missing crucial turns. I turned to my sister and said, "My gps lady is so much better than yours."

She said, "What? Just because she isn't constantly jabbering away?"

A Good Example of a Bad Example

My sister was over this weekend and we've been keeping up with the whole Paris Hilton thing. The one thing that we don't understand is why Paris Hilton's attorney is so indignant about the fact that she is being used as an example.

"Isn't that the whole purpose of a justice system?" Jenny said. "Someone does something illegal, everyone sees what happens to him. Everyone is now too too scared to do the same thing."

J Mascis = Saruman

We went to the Dinosaur Jr. concert the other day and I discovered something. J Mascis is Saruman!!

Breaking New Ground

I recently watched the movie "The Brothers Grimm" starring Matt Damon and Heath Ledger. The movie was so terrible that it was a pioneer in terribleness, breaking new ground in the field of terrible.

I mean, the funding of this movie could have fed starving Sudanese children for weeks. My sister said that there were some movies that warrant the obscene operating expense of Hollywood, but this one is just ridiculous.

The producers must have gotten their hands on a steamy sex tape featuring Matt Damon and Heath Ledger. That would be the only explanation.

Everyone who watches DVDs with me knows that I am a sucker for the Special Features of any DVD I watch, and when I clicked on the screen, we saw that this DVD contained DELETED SCENES.

I can't even imagine how bad those deleted scenes might be, I'm afraid to see them.

Teenage Drinking Isn't Just About Teenage Drinking

While watching the news the other day, there was a report on teens drinking at the prom. There are a lot of proms taking place in catering halls in New Rochelle and the New Rochelle police departments are inspecting limos and confiscating any alcohol they find.

A police officer was interviewed saying:

"Teenage drinking isn't just about teenage drinking; it's about teenage drinking, date rape..."

That'll Teach Them

Peter and I watched an episode of Cheaters today and this show horrifies me, not because the show is about cheaters who get caught on television, because THAT would entertain me.

This show does not fool me. Most of the couples are completely staged, with the fake crying and the hidden cameras placed just where the action is. As punishment, I told Peter that he should call them so that they can waste a few days tailing me.

The report would look like this:

"Here's your wife sitting on the sofa watching T.V. and eating Terra Chips."

"Here she is taking out the dogs."

"Here's your wife going to Target and arguing with the customer service people...again."

You Aren't Going To Eat That Are You?

Peter and I finally brought his mother to my dad's Japanese restaurant. She looked completely uncomfortable, but wouldn't do anything to fix the situation. The is like what my sister Judy used to do in the wintertime when she was eight. She NEVER took her coat off, so we would be in a nice, well-heated place like my mom's friend's house and beads of sweat would be collecting on her forehead and sliding down her face, but if you even mildly suggested the she take off her coat, she would throw a tantrum.

Anyway, Peter's mother looked incredibly stiff and every time we gave her something to eat, she made a face as if we were suggesting she place the sushi into another orifice.

So for Mother's Day, I suggested that we could spend the day together with both mothers at the restaurant because my mom had to be there that day. Since Peter's mother refused to go again, we decided to go to her house first before going to the restaurant.

When we got there, Peter told her that we weren't going to be eating a lot because we were going to eat at the restaurant. Plus, she only ever makes two things and now we are sick of ravioli and manicotti.

Her response was, "You have to eat here, that isn't REAL food."

Nice, right?

Of course, right in the middle of the meal, my mother called and when I went to answer the phone, I saw a MOUSE!!!!

So it took Peter about a half-hour to trap the mouse into a bucket and tape the bottom of the bucket to a piece of cardboard. Why did he do this when it's much easier to just whack the mouse over the head with a broom? Well, if you're asking this question, you just don't know my husband.

After the mouse incident, we didn't have much of an appetite. We couldn't really eat the whole rest of the day, so the discovery is that seeing a mouse at your mother-in-law's house is really great for the new diet we're both on.

And the food at my mom's is way more appetizing. At least MY MOM doesn't have mice at HER PLACE.

Lives Are Changed

On my Digital Video Recorder, last night's Oprah show was:

Wishes are granted, dreams come true and lives are changed.

Whew! That's some show!

Larry King is s'old

I watched the Larry King show last night, the one in which he is interviewed by Katie Couric. He said he has interviewed Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and Eleanor Roosevelt!

All that, AND he's been married more times than King Henry VIII.

Celebrity Sighting

I have this uncanny knack of never recognizing anyone famous. My college art professor took us to the Whitney Museum one time, and since I wore these really uncomfortable shoes, I lagged behind everyone else and sat on a wooden bench alone in an exhibit room.

A man walked in. I looked over at him and thought to myself, "Wow, that guy looks just like Jack Nicholson...and he's even wearing sunglasses indoors."

A few minutes later, a stampede of women raced into the room, shouting, "Jack Nicholson's in the house! Jack Nicholson's in the house."

The point of this story? If I can't recognize Jack Nicholson, what good am I at celebrity sightings?

So far, I've not recognized Julie Andrews, Julianne Margolise, Jerry Seinfeld, and...oh yes, I walked right into Jimmy Fallon outside a Starbucks and didn't know it until Peter told me.

So last week, while we were in Manhattan, a man with a really shaggy mustache walked past the car and I said, "Hey look! That's Geraldo!"

Peter looked over and said, "That's really funny...Actually, I think that is Geraldo."

Mithery thuckth

Last week, right after my sister got her wisdom tooth pulled, I drove to the dentist's office to pick her up. I drove past the office by accident and had to pull around. As I made a U-turn, I saw someone waddling toward me, someone who was holding something to her face. She got a bit too close and I thought to myself:

"What is that retarded Hispanic girl doing? I she trying to get run over by me?"

After I did the U-turn, I saw the same girl turn around and waddle toward me and I realized that the retarded Hispanic girl was my sister.

Her face was so swollen that I didn't recognize her.

Later, during the car ride, she asked me if I had seen the movie, Babel and I said no, was it good?

She said:

"It wath a two-and-a-half hour ethplorathion into the depths of human mithery."

What Would We Do Without the Internet?

Before the internet, we sang along to songs on the radio without knowing what the lyrics were. For instance:

Blinded by the light.
Revved up like a douch in the middle of the night.

This is what the Springsteen song lyrics are in actuality:

Blinded by the light
Cut loose like a deuce another runner in the night

I do believe I like mine better.

Please Don't Flip For Me

My sister came over and we spent a really fun weekend applying ice packs to her recently removed wisdom tooth. Sometimes we have house guests who drive us crazy with their incessant demands and then Peter and I huddle in our bedroom whispering about how annoying they are. My sister was perfectly behaved. Peter was introduced to the joy of having a younger sibling around. Which means that we didn't have to get up off of our fat-asses to get a bottle of Aquafina from the fridge. Jenny, you go get that.

There was a Nor-easter blowing across the country so I actually woke up before noon - I woke up at 8am(!!!!!) to make her a nice breakfast and see her on her way before the heavy rains set in.

Two hours later, I get a phone call from her, and this is what she said:

"I got into an accident. The car flipped over twice and it's totally trashed, but I'm fine."

Of course, being raised the way I was, into thinking that ANYTHING happening to my siblings is somehow MY FAULT, my brain careened into all the different things I could have done differently (I was raised by people who told me that I was the only one who could cure my developmentally disabled sister).

Even though Jenny got into the worst car accident in the history of our family, I am extremely grateful that she's fine. That she escaped unharmed except for some smiley-face shaped bruises. Especially in the light of what happened in Virginia, and all those people who died during the storm, and all the flooding that has been going on around here, we have a lot to be thankful for.

Later I calmed down and realized that you can't control it all. Sometimes, you just have to take the car keys away. I've been trying to convince my parents not to let Jenny drive until she's thirty, because my heart? It just can't take this.

Is Anyone Up for Buffet?

Peter and I went to an Indian restaurant for their buffet lunch. The buffet is supposed to go on until 2:30pm, and we arrived at 2:00pm to find the last dregs of the day's lunch. No more food came out, and there were only unsatisfying bits of chicken in the Makhanwala - the only dish I really like.

Later, this HUGE guy in a blue parka takes a spoon from the Bhindi Masala and accidentally drops it on the floor.

What would you do in this situation?

1. Give the spoon to waitstaff.
2. Put the spoon on the table.
3. Put the spoon back into the food.

The dude put the spoon BACK INTO THE FOOD!!!!

I looked around the room, expecting the waitstaff to whisk the pot away and appear with a fresh pot. But the only waitstaff who saw the man do this looked around with confusion, and then decided to ignore the whole thing altogether.

Needless to say, Peter and I are no longer going back to this restaurant.

Okay, so now we no longer go to the Indian Restaurant in Mount Kisco (closing down one hour early incident), The Flying Pig Restaurant (gross chicken bits incident), Temptation Tea House (rude waitress incident), Cosi (bad waitress incident), Bangkok Thai (chicken in Peter's vegetarian Pad Thai incidents - twice!), Pizza & Brew (lower food quality incident), and many other restaurants in Westchester because the food just isn't really very good.

The list of restaurants we won't frequent again just grows and grows.

And you know the grossest part of the whole lunch? The guy who put the dirty spoon back into the pot went back for seconds! Using the same dirty spoon!

Next Time I Will Say Jambo!

I was walking down Stanton Street today in downtown Manhattan and a black guy walking in the other direction said, "Ahnyeeahsayo."

First of all, I am NOT Korean. Secondly, I do not look Korean. This annoys me about ten times more than when people say "Kombahnwah," to me. And twenty times more than when people say, "Ni-hoooooooow."

Yes, I am ASIAN. But I am AMERICAN.

Next time a black guy says hello to me in an Asian language, I am going to say to him:

JAMBO!

Countdown to HOUSEGUESTS!!!!

Peter and I have finally gotten around to finishing up the bathroom project - or rather, the nice people we have hired to put in the new bathroom are almost finished.

I am very excited, especially because this means that now everything that needs to be painted has been painted. And everything that needs to be bought has been bought. Now I can set everything up to our liking, just in time to move out...just kidding.

We already have a waiting list full of people ready to come over and have my very delicious sour cream lemon pancakes for brunch the next day. (C'mon, I don't get up early enough to have actual BREAKFAST)

Plus, we are walking distance from TARGET!!!! Isn't that enough of a reason to visit?

Cate Blanchett is Great, I Just Haven't Seen Any of Her Movies

I asked Peter yesterday who his favorite actress was and he said, "Cate Blanchett."

I said, "Oh, really? Name one movie she's done that you've seen."

"Uhhhm...uhhh...."

"You can't think of one?"

"What? Should I say Sandra Bullock, just because I've seen ALL of her CRAPPY movies?"

Brad Pitt and Don Cheadle? Exactly the Same.

I have been wanting to get a new mobile phone for the past month. And since I have the Verizon Wireless 2-year $100 credit, I've been lurking Verizon stores the past few days.

Every time I go to a store, the salespeople tell me the phone I want is a different price. Apparently, mobile phone prices change all the time, like ocean tides. Oh, did I say this cost $99? No, it is actually $150. Did I say $150? It was on sale for $39 up until yesterday, but today it is $150. Oh, did you think that you had a $100 credit because you have the 2-year $100 credit? Oh, no. You need to subtract a $20 activation fee. So it's actually 2-years $80. That's in the fine print.

I went to the Verizon store on Bedford Ave in Mount Kisco, and I asked a simple question about the phone. But then I saw another phone and asked:

"What's the difference between these two phones?"

The answer?

"They're exactly the same."

Oh really? The Motorola Krazr and the LG 8300 are exactly the same?

That's like saying Brad Pitt and Don Cheadle? Oh, they're exactly the same.

My sister said that they purposely make things really difficult so that you will be overwhelmed and say, "Okay, this one, I'll pay $100 for this one. Now can I go home?"

Right, but I'm not built that way. I'm more like, "Huh? I can't handle this right now. I need to go home and take a nap."

My Next Party Will Be a Goddess Party

There is one television show that has overtaken the nation and my living room. And this season, what with the woman with the fake leg, Dancing With the Stars is good American fun.

The scenes that are ridiculous, the ones that make me cringe, are not the dancing scenes, but rather the scenes of celebrities in their real life.

Leeza Gibbons actually said, "My 50th birthday party was a goddess party."

Cut to scenes of children in togas dancing for the birthday goddess.

I turned to Peter and said, "Why, that's a great idea! Our next party should be a GODDESS PARTY."