'Tis the Season...

...for holiday flicks! Here are some my favorite non-Christmas "Christmas" movies:

1) The Family Stone
Dermot Mulroney, Sarah Jessica Parker, Claire Danes, Diane Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Luke Wilson. The all-star cast portrays the eccentric Stone family celebrating a holiday gathering full of surprises.

2) Stepmom
Julia Roberts, Susan Sarandon, Ed Harris, Jena Malone. I love almost any Julia Roberts movie. Humorous and poignant, this is a tale of an unlikely friendship between two extraordinary women.

3) Love Actually
Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson, Colin Firth, Laura Linney, Emma Thompson. It's coined the "ultimate" romantic comedy, but I didn't fall for it the first time. It is, however, a great and unique story depicting the twists and turns of love.

4) The Holiday
Cameron Diaz, Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Jack Black, Eli Wallach. Probably the most holiday-ish of the bunch, this is a charming love story that happens to take place during the most wonderful time of the year.

5) While You Were Sleeping
Sandra Bullock, Bill Pullman, Peter Gallagher. It's schmaltzy and sentimental, but it's a hilarious story of mix-ups and choices.


Happy Holidays to all!

everywhere I look, I see rain

I have recently discovered something new about myself.

If there is one pet peeve my friends and family know best of mine, it is that I hate wet socks! This is then followed by socks with holes in them. Apparently I am very picky about my feet.

Living in San Diego, there is not much in the way of "inclement" weather. This week, however, we have been doused with rain. It rained all day on Monday. While enjoying the seldom-heard pit-pat pit-pat of drops, I found there is something I really don't like about a rainy day. Something that irks me even more than a damp sock...and that...is a soggy hem. I hate it when the hem of your pants gets soaked. Not only does this increase the chance of acquiring a wet sock, but you cannot simply put your trousers away upon returning home and slipping into comfy-cozy sweats. They have to dry.

So, knowing full well that we were in for another rainy day today, I tried to devise the best possibly way to avoid the same mishap that befell my pants on Monday. I did not come up with anything clever...but I did decide to wear my boots today. So far...my pants are still dry. But I am not done going outside yet.

power

I tend to want to keep this blog free of posts that are seasoned and spun of politics, economics, and the like. But I feel I must say something in regards to this news article.

Over this 2008 year, I have loosely followed the string of news (mostly bad) coming out of Zimbabwe and its tyrannical leader, Robert Mugabe. Despite the increasingly rising number of deaths due to the recent cholera outbreak, still he insists things are under control.

Mugabe has been in control of the Zimbabwean government since the country took its independence from Britain in the early 80s. Since then, a spiral of disaster and strife has claimed hold on the country.

Because of one man's compulsion for total power, authority, and dominance, hundreds of people have been and are dying while that same man tells the rest of the world--anxious to help--that he has everything in hand.

"Those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth. And let me remind you, they are the very ones who almost always create the most hellish tyrannies. Absolute power does corrupt..."
-Barry Goldwater-