Bowling with friends

I'm a terrible bowler. Awful. Great at Wii but pathetic when it comes to the real thing. Last time I went bowling with my friends it was a disaster. A funny disaster, but a disaster nonetheless. Our collective score for the four of us playing didn't break company. Birds of a feather and what not. I don't even think my score was in the fifties. (For some reason I feel as though that is a high guess.) Tonight wasn't a repeat performance.

I started the night playing myself. We ended up playing on two lanes. A bunch of the guys were in the middle of a game and one of the girls had started a game with no one to play with her. Everyone else was either eating or decided not to participate. After a while she lost interest and decided to eat herself. I decided to play and after trying to coax someone to play with me I decided I didn't really want to embarrass myself by losing terribly to someone. I just started chucking the ball down the lane as both players.

I was actually hitting pins. My only thought was that of course I actually score something when I'm not playing anyone. Then my co-worker decided she was ready to play again. I immediately started rolling gutter balls. It seemed that my ability to concentrate did depend on my not playing anyone, but I got it together. I ended up coming out on top scoring my highest score ever, 95. I was beating the score of some of the guys throwing 20 mph balls next to us.

It was a fun night. We also threw in some pool and laser tag. I was just happy with my newfound abilities. I don't know when I got better at bowling but I'm glad I did.

I've done it

Thanks to one of the guys that I'm subscribed to I have finally uploaded my first YouTube video. Talk about nerve wrecking. Granted it wasn't exactly original material. He posted a compilation of the videos he shot on his cell phone and asked his audience what they had collected over the past year. I'd been wanting to answer his video based questions and was happy to participate this time. So I pooled the video from over the past year. The end product was rather strange.

I don't know how YouTubers edit themselves. I find it embarrassing at best. There were plenty of moments where I cringed at the sound of my own voice.* Once I cut the video together as best I could, I filmed an opener and closer and saved it. Looking at all of the footage, I am realizing that my camera either comes on when I am bored or having far too much fun. I do appreciate this opportunity to look back on as well as do something with the footage from the last year.

Either way, Camera Phone Clean-up is now my first video.


*How do my friends put up with my voice?

I want to go to Warped Tour

It's back. The desire to experience live music is bugging me again. Between a couple of church concerts and being able to see a musical, I am left with even more desire to satisfy my ears with live music. Last night I was thinking that it would be cool to experience Warped Tour. That's all. Since it was coming through my city, why not go and see a band that I've been watching from afar for a while. Then, of course, there is the thought that once I see that band I'd be in the middle of an opportunity to discover other bands.

The thought process grew from there demanding reason in the end.
I could go see a band I like.
I'm always looking for new music.
My favorite way to find a new band these days is to hear them live.
I'd be at a music festival with bands I haven't heard before.
Thirty odd bands that are new to me performing in a spot I'd also be occupying.
Thirty odd chances to find new music.
What's really stopping me from going to Warped Tour?
I can afford to go.
There would be music everywhere!
MUSIC!
Your all time favorite thing in the world after laughter.
All around you.

I went to bed with these thoughts running rampant in my mind. Sleep didn't slow them any. My brain worked on my decision of whether or not I should go to Warped Tour while I was sleeping. I woke up way past my slight musings about going. Instead I was furious at the thought of not going. I freaking wanted to go to Warped Tour. I'd go alone if I had to. Why miss this opportunity? So much within my reach. The thought of having a person I was a fan of so close to me and me missing it because I was too indecisive was sickening. I needed this. It isn't just Warped Tour. Another artist I know is planning on stopping in my city the week following Warped Tour. Armed with my newfound reasoning I decided it was stupid not to cash in on this opportunity to experience them live. There was nothing left to do but pen them into my calendar.

I'm always saying that I need to experience my city. Well, concerts, plays, and festivals are perfect ways to do so. What is there to stop me? It's time I did something. I feel like I'm waiting for some reason to start really experiencing my life. I can't even figure out why I'm waiting. This time that I have only comes once. I need to go places and do things. It looks like I'm starting with a summer of music.

Noah...Whoa

I went to see the movie. I have two points of view that are conflicting with each other. First things first, I have no problem with telling God's story via the cinema. If anything it might help get the Word out there. So my two POVs happen to be 1. Girl who just likes a good story [henceforth referred to as G1] and 2. Girl who can't stand deviations from the book (in this case, the Bible, the history) [henceforth referred to as G2].

G1:
The cinematography was good. The actors were incredible. There was conflict and resolution, classic good versus evil, and some routing for the underdog. They took a step back from God's hand in things. Any message sent from above was cryptic at best, left to be deciphered by man. This, as I'm sure can be guessed, leads to many problems throughout the movie. Noah's internal struggle of deciding whether or not there should be humans in the new world was very potent. As the viewer, you feel for both sides of his argument. The was a use of angels to speed the plot along. They also gave us a definite evil in Cain's descendants. Desire to live vs. believing God wanted didn't want man to destroy his world again. Personally I can think of many other ways that God can blight a single species, but whatever. The struggle was real.

G2:
 Accuracy wasn't there. If you go into this movie expecting an accurate depiction of the Noah builds an ark that we all know and love from our Bibles, well... No. It doesn't happen. Lamech gets killed in the beginning while Noah is just a boy. Check your Bibles people. Lamech lives to see all of his grandchildren born. Noah doesn't even have kids until after he's been on the planet for five, count 'em, 5 centuries. Just when you think this thing is going to catch up with it's serious lapse in accuracy, it surprises you and doesn't. I thought he would finally age when they needed to grow a forest strong enough to build an ark. Then God shows up and gives him a forest in ten years. One of three time lapse allowed in the whole movie. Even they couldn't ignore that childhood takes some time to pass. I don't really want to go into a diatribe over who made it onto the boat. I fear this entry will never end if I do. I will allow myself to pose this question. An ark big enough and sturdy enough to hold eight people and two of EVERY kind of animal has walls thin enough for a man to peck his way through them in a matter of minutes? Umm. Shh. Don't. I don't think so.

So recap:
G1: It was magical and whimsical.
G2: There was more wizardry than God's miracles.

G1: Eight people made it to the new world. That's accurate.
G2: Umm, Ham and Japheth had wives before the rain started. This movies way of them getting wives muddles the ancestry considerably.

G1: Noah struggles to understand the message God send. In the end he makes the correct decisions.
G2: In this time where God's Spirit was chilling out on Earth with us, He wasn't big on ambiguous messages. He tended to just flat out tell you what He wanted. None of this up-to-your-interpretation crap.

G1: Simple Cain created an evil act so his descendants lived in sin as well.
G2: Everyone save Noah lived in sin. Maybe even Noah, he just happened to find favor in God's eyes. Seth's lineage was not just Noah. Plenty of other people came from Seth who also died in the flood.

G1: The world was destroyed and created again.
G2: The world was destroyed and even though it didn't take a century to build the ark, there were times where you felt the movie couldn't end fast enough.



Frustration aside, I did appreciate the raw emotion put into these roles. Noah was an intensely complicated man who had the fate of mankind in his hands. He had to sentence them to death and that decision took it's toll. As a person familiar with and looking for the Bible story in cinematic form I had difficulty sitting through the movie. I later decided after discussion with a friend that if it at least provoked the exploration of the written Word or started a conversation than it has done something for Christianity. 

Beauty and the Beast

My first experience with a Broadway on the road production. I went to see Beauty and the Beast armed with the knowledge that it is over produced yet fun. Going into it I was just looking to enjoy myself. Part of the excitement comes from me just being happy to see a production in a style the likes of which I have only dreamed. Through a connection I got a really good ticket to see a really cool show in a really great opera house. All of these things beyond my ability to get, I have happily took the place of someone else for one night of extravagance.

The production was large with a pointedly large budget. The thought occurred to me that if it wasn't a travelling show it might have had three times as many people in the cast. However, it was a travelling show so the chorus was the same group of people for every scene. This is something that I love about theater. Being involved in the production from beginning to end, on and off the stage. I watched trying to figure out how crazy it was backstage with all of the costume changes. That's my thing with watching live productions. Even when the play is good, I go from watching the story to watching cast and crew work.

With Beauty and the Beast, I both loved the crews work and questioned the choices made to portray the characters. I have a soft spot in my heart for the Beast that Disney gave me. The voice, the actions, the reactions and the transformations, these are all things that I foolishly looked forward to from the stage production. They gave us some of it. I did find myself wishing for more though. They played a lot with levels. Many a balcony were wheeled across the stage to show intimidating height difference and changing scenery in the castle. All of the musical numbers that Disney placed in our hearts were present plus a few others to show off the voices of the leads. I had to remind myself that not everyone portrayed the characters the same. I had to tell myself that there wasn't any reason to get paid to act if you never brought anything fresh to the role. That being said, I appreciate the innovation used to bring these characters to life. It left me with the desire to watch the movie again.

All in all, the musical was pretty funny. I went with my sister who enjoyed every minute of it. She helped me appreciate the new songs as well as the old. She kept me excited for what we was going on on stage. Having her there allowed me remember the play as well as the experience of the entire night.

Darn it, Google+

I'm late to the game, as per usual. Google+ is driving me nuts. I connected the account thinking that I could combine them. However, now I have two G+ accounts that are constantly logging each other out. As a person who is always doing too many things at once, I like to have all of my emails open at the same time. I can't do that if every time I work in one, the other is logging out. I just need to figure out how to combine the two accounts. Sometimes I'm happy that Google has become this super parent site that umbrellas all the others, but usually I'm just annoyed.

Forcing me into a single umbrella account, okay I can see the convenience in that. Telling me which email to attach it to, now you're just mucking up my system. It doesn't help that Outlook seems to be fighting back. I get a new computer that is predisposed to Outlook while Google is trying to take over the world. It's my computer's programming against Google's global takeover. Needless to say, my computer and I are constantly arguing over what our next move. I need to figure out a better plan of attack.

So cranky

I don't know what to do about my mood. It's been one of those days where there isn't much to pull me out of my crummy mood. It's good that I was pretty much in solitary confinement for most of the day. I ended up spending it grumbling to myself how much I hated aspects of my money maker. None of which were good enough for me to outright quit. (I'm usually all talk. Sad, I know.) I just spent the day having a moment. Nothing could please me.

I could mull over all of these ridiculous reasons but everything boils down to the same thing. I just need to exercise. It really solves all of my problems: moodiness, exhaustion, weight control... I wonder if it would curb my appetite. There's something to consider.