So the other day I was doing an interview and afterwards stopped at Del Taco for a drink as I was hot and incredibly thirsty. I wasn’t ready to head home, so I sat for a while in my car reading. I was parked near the door next to a Ducati motorcycle. I just love Ducati‘s, they are just so awesome!
Now I don’t know a lot about motorcycles, but I do know about Ducatis. I read this book series as a kid, and one the characters wanted one. I decided to read more about them, to see what’s so special and I was hooked. Beautiful machines.
So anyways, as I was sitting there this gorgeous, tall, dirty blonde in a leather jacket comes out of the Del Taco.
And I’m thinking, he may not be a Dean Winchester:
But he comes pretty smack close to being perfect.
Ah, so handsome with the best smile. How you may ask? Because I talked to him.
I had parked crooked so I asked him if he could get out alright. He told me he couldn’t that it would be impossible.
Oh no! I can’t believe I did that! I told him I would get out of the way, but he said it was fine. He was just kidding. And then he laid out that snile.
Shot me right through the heart.
After that we flirted a bit and I complimented his Ducati. He was surprised that I knew bikes and impressed. He started on his way, but shot one last smile at me.
After he left I was like why hadn’t I asked for his name! Ugh!
Stupid, stupid
I then had to text my friends and gush over him. Pretty much the same thing I am doing to you all. Their responses were hilarious.
Me: I just talked to the cutest guy. Tall, dirty blonde, black leather jacket, and a Ducati. Swoon! Too bad I didn’t get his name.
Friend 1: Or number, he probably would have given it to you.
Friend 2: What! How could you not? I’m disappointed in you.
Friend 3: Well now how are you going to facebook stalk him?
Oh well. At least I had the moment. And who knows, maybe in the future we’ll meet again. Probably not, but:
So last year I ended the Romance is in the Air posts with Northanger Abbey. I thought this could become a tradition, always ending on a Jane Austen film. Hmmm…I wonder what next year will bring? Who knows?
Anyways, so two of my favorite Jane Austen books/films are Northanger Abbey and Persuasion. I mean I love the others, but I feel like these two are really forgotten by the fans and never gets any love. Which is just not fair because they are fantastic books and movies. They deserve fans!!! Love them!
Okay, let’s step back from the crazy. Sorry.
So Persuasion is a wish fullfillment piece by Jane Austen. Jane fell in love with a rich man from a good family, very Pride & Prejudice, but his family strongly disapproved and took him away from her in order to make sure their attraction didn’t turn into something scandalous like marriage. While Jane had offers from other men, she never stopped loving him and waited for him to come back into her life. (So now that you know this you will understand this movie/book even better.) Another fun, fun is not the right word let’s go with interesting an interesting fact, Jane died before this and Northanger Abbey were published so she didn’t name them. Her brother, who had them published, decided what they should be called based on what he thought would be interesting.
So, anyways, the film begins with nineteen-year old Anne Elliot getting engaged (secretly) to young naval officer Frederick Wentworth. However, her mother figure (as her mom is dead) and family friend, Lady Russell, convinces her to end the engagement. She tells her she is too young, that it is risky marrying an officer going off to war, he could die, she could end up a widow, she could be penniless, etc. (Lady Russell brings up some good points, but she also wanted to end the marriage as Anne was a higher station and had more money. She thought Fredrick Wentworth wasn’t good enough for her Anne.) Anne really values Lady Russell’s opinion and breaks off the engagement, even though it breaks her heart and she regrets it everyday.
Fast forward eight years and things have drastically changed. Anne’s father, Sir Walter, and older sister, Elizabeth, have squandered A LOT of the family fortune on their vanity. Anne tried to reign in the spending, but no one would listen as her sister has the position of running the home (that is until she is married). They now have to lease out their home and reside somewhere else. And just who should be living in their home, Admiral Croft and Mrs. Croft. Mrs. Croft just happens to be Frederick Wentworth’s sister. And to even add to it, her brother has had an increase in his fortunes. He made so much money in maritime victories during the Napoleonic wars. (He had no one to live for so he took A LOT of risks and they paid, boy did they pay.) He also was promoted to Captain.
Her father and sister leave for Bath, where they will be spending the season. Anne goes to see her bratty, hypochondriac, annoying, selfish, younger, sister, Mary. (As you can tell I don’t like her.) Mary is married to Charles Musgrove, a guy who wanted to marry Anne but she turned down as she still loved Frederick. He then married his sister to spite her, and spent the rest of his life (and family’s life) regretting that choice. Mary lives nearby the old Elliot homestead, so wouldn’t you know it, she runs into Frederick several times.
To make matters worse, Frederick is so hurt and still heartbroken that he just ignores her and won’t say anything. This pains Anne as she still loves him and is just bursting to tell him how she feels but scared. And then to further rub salt in the wound, Charles’ younger, pretty, single, sisters are both making a play for him.
And not only does he like it (of course, duh); but he totally plays it up in front of her. Just like a guy.
Although I totally get what he’s doing. I mean she turned him down and didn’t do it in the best way. He started thinking she was only interested in the fact that he had no money, otherwise a “Good Charlotte Witch“.
Anyways, so the rest of the family has no clue what happened between Anne and Capt. Wentworth. So they purposely keep trying to bring Wentworth over. The one sister, Henrietta, stops her flirtations with Wentworth as her cousin is deeply into her. Everyone believes that Wentworth will ask for Louisa’s hand, but he still hasn’t gotten over Anne, but is just trying to get at her.
The whole family decides to travel down to Lyme Regis, with Wentworth to visit his friend, Captain Harville and Captain James Benwick. Benwick recently lost his fiancé, the sister of Harville, and is stilll grieving her. He loves poetry and he and Anne become close. People start speculating about more happening between them, which does not make Wentworth happy. Anne also attracts the attention of the Elliots’ long-estranged cousin, and her father’s heir, William Elliot. Also disturbing Wentworth.
Things change when Louisa suffers from a fall and gets a serious concussion, because of her stubborn behavior (she’s the girl that does whatever she wants). Anne is the only able to keep her head and assist her. The Musgroves care for her and Anne goes to Bath. Captain Wentworth faces the fact that when Louisa recovers he may be tied to her forever, which is something he is not so sure he wants to do.
In Bath, Anne finds out that her father and Mr. Elliot, her cousin, have fixed their relationship. Elizabeth assumes that he wishes to court her while Lady Russell more correctly suspects that he admires Anne. Anne doesn’t really like Mr. Elliot, she feels like something is not right about him and tries to avoid him as much as possible.
Admiral Croft, having heard a rumour of Mr. Elliot’s proposal to Anne, sends Wentworth to ask Anne if she and her new husband require them to quit Kellynch Hall. Anne informs Wentworth that Admiral Croft has been misinformed.
There’s hope!
Soon the Crofts, Musgroves, Benwick, Harville, Wentworth, etc; the whole crew comes to Bath. Louisa is engaged, but not to Wentworth, but Benwick. Wentworth is not happy about Mr. Elliot’s attentions to Anne, not at all. Anne also goes to visit her friend, Mrs. Smith, who is a struggling widow. She tells Anne that Mr. Elliot is not a nice guy at all. He has been so determined to inherit everything that he has been going after Sir Walter’s love interest in order to ensure he doesn’t remarry and have a son. Anne is shocked, but it reaffrims her feelings of mistrust toward him.
Wentworth is moved by what he overhears Anne says about women never giving up their feelings of love even when all hope is lost. This makes him brave enough to share his feelings and he writes her a letter telling her how he feels. Anne recieves the letter and runs after Wentworth, there he proposes and she accepts. We fast forward, and Wentworth is surprising Anne with a gift. It’s her old house!
Most Romantic Moment:
He writes one of the most beautiful letters ever! Now the thing I really love about Persuasion is you can just feel for the characters, everyone has experienced rejection and heartbreak; and the hardest thing can be trying to put yourself out there. So we have Wentworth who loved Anne, had his heart thrown through a shedder. He realizes that he loves Anne, but should he say something? Does she still love him? Is she angry over the way he treated her? Has she moved on? Will she reject him again?This has to be one of the bravest and romantic things ever.
I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others. Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed. You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in
F. W.
I must go, uncertain of my fate; but I shall return hither, or follow your party, as soon as possible. A word, a look, will be enough to decide whether I enter your father’s house this evening or never.
So romantic!
That is so romantic, just laying everything out like that. He totally threw caution aside and just told her everything.
So romatic! And that is just one of the best ways to try and win a girl back. Conclusion:
So now because it is my blog, and I want to, I am going to review my favorite parts of the letter.
So that ends this Valentine countdown. I hope you all have a wonderful holiday whether you are single or in a relationship. Eat lots of candy, wear red, watch sappy movies; that’s what I’ll be doing. 😀
I hope you all had a fun new years eve and safely enjoyed yourself. I went to two parties; both of which bored me :(, oh well there’s always next year. 🙂
Anyways, I thought it might be fun to do a year in review type thing as I start out with the great things that happened this year and what I hope to bring in the future! 😀
1) The Views
So according to WordPress I received 2000 views on my blog this year. Wow, that is more than I thought I would get and I would like to thank all of you for being a part of this. It really makes me feel as if I am doing something special to see that.
I just found out that I know have fourteen followers! That’s amazing! I want to thank each of you that chooses to come back and check out my blog. It really puts a smile on my face to know that my thoughts and views interest others.
Now that we have reviewed some stats lets move on to reviewing the highlights of the past posts!
The many handsome men who have played Mr. Darcy
4) Mr. Darcy
I also started the first of Mr. Darcy filled posts. There will be many, many more to come as there is just so much to say about him. My favorite Darcy filled posts were Darcy’s Dream Date and The Beauty of Darcy. I recommend reading both, but especially the second!
4) The Verne Saga
In September, a guy named Verne tried to hit on me, but I brushed him off never thinking I would see him again. That was proved wrong as he kept popping up. To read the whole story check out Flirting With Disaster, Bowled Over, Bad Penny, and Return of the Verne.
5) Character Sketches
I did two posts of literary/film characters I really like and admire. Forney Hull from Where the Heart Is, and George Knightly from Emma. I hope to do more later on, as it is something I enjoy doing.
Well I hope you’ve enjoyed the posts of this past year, I loved writing them. Here’s to a new year full of new surprises, ideas, and adventures. I wish you all the very best in the upcoming year; may it satisfy you all and me a memorable time. Happy New Year!
I think it will be one lucky year, no matter what the superstitious say!
So if you have been following the Verne saga, you are well aware of his habit of popping up in random places and trying to talk to me/convince me to go out with him. I hadn’t seen him in weeks, and was convinced the reign of terror was over. (J/K it wasn’t that terrifying). But it wasn’t over. Just like in Return of the Living Dead, nothing is ever truly over, they only just begin once again.
So I went to a dance this week, and me and my friends were just cheering and having fun hanging out, when I look across the room and there he was! Verne! I want to be a lawyer Verne.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m not particularly proud of this but I hid away from him, and had my friends run interference for me until he ultimately left. I know that’s mean, but all I wanted was a nice time with my friends and no one to bother me. It was a great night beside that.
So a week ago I had some free time and was flipping through channels, planning on just zoning out in front of the TV until my next class. I landed on FX and started watching this movie with Halle Berry and Bruce Willis. It seemed really good, but I couldn’t finish it as I had to run off to my next class. I decided to rent it and finish watching it as the plot really intrigued me. Unfortunately; it wasn’t very good. I thought it had too many sexual scenes that were just awkward and painful to get through, I ended up having to fast forward through them all. I also thought they dropped the F-bomb too many times. I’m not one who curses at all, but I think everyone who does will agree with me that there are times when the F-Bomb is said too many times that it loses its meaning and makes the person just look stupid.
I also didn’t like Halle Berry’s character Ro. I thought that she was a mean, selfish jerk. Her friend Miles is head over heels crazy for her, and Ro knows this and instead of letting him off gently; she is totally rude to him, just using him for all the information he can get. Now I know I have been a total witch to guys (check out the Elton Saga: 1,2,& 3 plus lame lines and flirting post), but at least I never toyed with a guys affections to get him to retrieve information for me.
The only really good part about this film is the end. It was amazing! I wish there was a way one could just watch it and understand the rest of the film.
So the movie starts out with Halle Berry’s character Ro, a journalist, tricking a senator into revealing all of his dirty secrets.
Ro is pretty high on her recent sucess and goes out to celebrate with her best friend/computer whiz/guy madly in love with her that she doesn’t care for, Miles. After she becomes extrremely drunk, she ends up being told by her boss that they are burying the story. Extremely angry that her freedom of press is being stomped on, she quits.
She starts on home feeling angry and crappy. She’about to board the subway and head home, when her old school friend she hasn’t spoken to in years; and is really mad at, because she slept with her boyfriend, Grace approaches her.
Hey girl, what up?
Turns out Grace met this guy, ADEX, online and had cybersex with him, later meeting up with him in real life. It turns out that “ADEX” was really the rich and famous Harrison Hill. She and him had a big fling and now she is threatening to blackmail him. She also wants Ro to write this up for the paper and completely embarass Hill. Ro blows her off and continues on home.
A week later, Ro gets a call from Grace’s mom telling her Grace is thought to be dead. Ro goes and identifies the drowned body, confirming that it is Grace. From here Ro decides she is going to take on Hill, and get him for what he did. She enlists Miles who has all the knowledge and contacts to pull off a caper like this.
She starts working at Hill’s Ad agency and quickly makes friends with the biggest gossip there; thus learning all the dirty secrets on everyone. Apparently Hill has had many affairs, all of which his wife is tired of. In fact, if he does it one more time, she’s leaving him. Now you might think, so what? He can get along without her. Wrong-o! Turns out Hill has nothing, nada, zip! His wife has the money, the company, EVERYTHING! He wouldn’t dare let her know that he was having another affair or else he would be kicked to the curb. He pretends to be the dutiful husband, going along with her to fertility tanks, because his wife is infertile. Sounds like a motive to me.
Then Ro witnesses what Hill does to people he thinks are betraying him. He beats up on one of his employees that he thinks is spilling secrets to their competitor.
Don’t make me angry
So more and more he is looking like the villain. But is it ever that easy?
Now there are a lot of web chatting, and online sex, and gross things…between her, TruBlue (random guy she meets online), and ADEX.
Oh and Ro has these weird flashbacks throughout the film that involve her father. They don’t outright say it, but strongly hint that he was molesting/raping her as a child. At times they become a mishmash of flashback/present day dream/nightmarelike things. They get very confusing at times.
Then the movie gets intense again. Ro has pretty much confirmed that ADEX is Hill. And she starts talking to him online AT WORK! I mean COME ON! HOW STUPID CAN YOU BE?
I mean the stupidity level is on par with taking a shower when there are monsters running about. Just saying.
So of course she has stuff on her screen that she doesn’t want Hill to see, and he just HAS to come over to talk to her. The scene is actually pretty intense ands set up very well.
So Ro is able to get out of that tight spot, and turns down her boss’ offer to go out with him, wanting instead to keep things “professional”.
That night she meets up with Miles, once again being complete dermo (a word I created for loser/jerk who uses someone. I actually found out the definition for the “true” word isn’t that far off. Cool, huh?) to him. Miles brings a friend who works with the coroner. Apparently Grace was not just drowned but drugged with Belladonna and had some put in her eyes. Hill’s wife’s family has donated a ton of money to medical research, a majority of that which used Belladonna. Hmm…suspicious. Also, after she was poisoned, Grace was drowned. She was also pregnant. Things are looking worse and worse for Hill.
*At this point in the film I have already decided that it is not Hill. It is way too obvious and I think that there is another character who has a stronger motive, Hill’s wife. What if Grace approached the wife right after talking to Ro. Maybe the wife was one of those women who couldn’t stand to lose her man and would take out any woman who dared try to take him from her. What if all those past affairs have just been compounding on her brain all these years, and she just snaps hearing about this one. But the most likely motive; she couldn’t bear to hear that after trying so long to be pregnant and being infertile, that this little tramp got pregnant by her husband. The one thing she could not do, being done by some harlot? That’s enough to drive any woman to the brink of insanity. It would be easy, all she would have to do is meet up with Grace to see the proof, give her a drink laced with the Belladonna, which of course would be easy for her to get, and kill her. If she didn’t want to do it herself she has plenty of money to hire someone to do it for her.
Anyways, so Ro goes out with Hill after all to try and probe his mind a little. She ends up being slightly charmed by him instead.
The next day he comes to pick her up and we see his wife is creepin’ on them from a taxi. Makes her look totally suspicious.
Ro is trying to get into Hill’s computer to get a look at his emails. Miles give her a spyware program on a flashdrive, but it tkes some time so she has to do it when Hill won’t be around. She waits until after work, when everyone is gone and sticks it in. Only prob is, Hill hasn’t left yet. She’s caught red-handed.
She ends up making up a dumb story involving a private joke the two shared the night they went out.
For some strange reason he buys her answer and takes her out to dinner. They are having fun, making out, etc; and Ro leaves to go to the bathroom. And she leaves her purse and phone behind.
Okay, hold up now, what woman does that? What woman would leave to go to the bathroom and not take her purse and phone. Bad call writers, bad call.
So while she is gone her phone goes off, and Hill decides that he’s gonna read her text message. Seriously, who does that? Does he not understand the word “privacy”?
She comes back, and Hill starts driving her home. He stops in a random place and then starts yelling at her. Telling her he knows her secrets, that she is a spy from their rival competitors. Ro, trying to save herself, admits to it. Hill becomes so angry that he almost hits her.
Let’s rewind and back that up. Almost hits her.At this point in the film I knew it wasn’t him. He just had the sense that he would never hurt a woman. And I found it odd that the only thing he thought Ro was trying to discover about him was spying for another company? It just seemed off to me. I mean if he had killed Grace, Miles message would have made him think that Ro was onto him about that, yet the only thing that comes to mind is a rival company spy? Hmm….
So Ro is fired. Now this is where the story gets weird.
Miles decided to go in and save the day. The next day he pretends to be an IT guy for Hill, ready to do a complete inspection on Hill’s computer. Hill tells him to wait a bit and check out the office. He looks at these photographs done by Mrs. Hillof eyes dilluted with Belladonna.
At this point I’m completely sold on the fact that Mrs. H is the murderer.
Meanwhile, Ro goes to Miles house to make him dinner and discovers that he has some freaky, jacking-off, man-cave, room thing. Really gross and freaky. She also sees that Miles was TruBlue and had been sleeping with Grace.
He also channeled Helga from Hey Arnold with a super creepy Ro shrine. Its actually talks and says “Miles is sexy” in Ro’s actual voice. Very sick.
Yeah, pretty freaky!
Miles comes home and Ro starts yelling at him, and accusing him of being the murderer. Miles admits he’s a freak but shows her Hill’s company’s website with the Belladonna pics. He is now absolutely convinced that Hill or hiswife killed Grace. Ro still won’t listen and walks out, never wanting to speak to Miles again.
The next day she takes all her info to the police and they set up a sting to catch Hill. Everything pretty much falls apart as the evidence is so high against him. His wife gives some pretty damaging evidence against him. Hill is convicted and sent to jail.
Ro goes back to work and starts writing an article on everything that went on. She has a really great opening:
“Ro: It’s a world where you *think* actions have no consequence, where guilt is cloaked by anonymity, where there are no fingerprints. An invisible universe filled with strangers, interconnected online and disconnected in life. It will steal your secrets, corrupt your dreams, and co-opt your identity. Because in this world, where you can be anything you want, any *one* you want, you just might lose sight of who you are.“
So here, the movie seems pretty wrapped up, but you just know there has to be one last twist. I’m waiting for the wife to go crazy or be discovered or something.
So then we have this great shot of Mrs. Hill going to the medicine cabinet (where she kept the Belladonna) and opening it. Then we see gloved hands pull out some hair spray, unscew the bottom (like in Jurassic Park) and pull out Belladonna. The person is………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Ro.
Yes Ro. Ro is trying to dump out her secret Belladonna down the drain. Ro then has a flashback and we get the whole story. Her father was going to molest her, when her mom stepped in and beat her dad with the fireplace poker. Instead of calling the cops they buried him in the backyard, and Grace saw the whole thing and has been blackmailing her for years. Watch the video:
Great ending. Only great part of the film.
I especially love how they review the scene between her and Grace. You know get the full meaning of the words that she used when talking to Ro.
The only thing I didn’t like was the moving around of Miles and Ro when he is telling her he had it all figured out. I thought it was just weird. Ugh, and Miles was so gross trying to blackmail her into sleeping with him, yuck!
I love how in the end Hill wasn’t the “perfect stranger”, but they all were. Each character had secrets and things about them they were hiding; in the end being someone completely different than you expected.
So that’s today’s freaky tale. More are on the way.
So I don’t understand how I always manage to run into people I don’t want to see, but never those I do. In fact it is always the people I want to leave me ALONE, that tend to come by. I’m a total Anne Elliot, avoiding people I don’t want to see, trying to get them to stay away from me. This is my total MO, more info on that later
Avoidance sounds like a GREAT plan!
So anyways today I was walking to my class completely lost in my own thoughts about all the stuff I had to do.
La-di-dah! Just minding my own business
When all of a sudden someone grabs me from behind!
I could just not get rid of this guy! Like no matter what I did he was like a bad penny coming back again. Or an evil teddy bear. (more on the teddy bear story later!)
All I could think in my head was this:
So he started talking to me again, asking me for the 3rd TIME what my name was. Seriously, how many times am I going to have to tell you?
He told me I had embarrassed him in front of all his friends, and how I totally rejected him. I was just like, get over it! There are plenty of girls on this campus; you can find another one! Ha, trying to make me feel guilty? He doesn’t know who he’s dealing with. I’ve been through ARGS before. (Elton series; part 1, 2, & 3)
Don’t mess with me!
So I was able to get away from him and back to my work, but unfortunately I’m still a Pinocchio. He asked me again about the “boyfriend”, and I was like
Yeah, he’s good! Everything is great with him.
Just call me Pinocchio
Guess I better start getting ready for that nest, because at this rate my nose will be becoming a tree.
6)Embarrassing Moments
