Thanksgiving Day Leftovers

I'm sorry I haven't taken the time to blog in a long long time. I've been taking a bit of a break from writing posts in order to focus on some other things in my life, namely my "Web Application Development" studies, Toastmasters meetings (I've gone to 2 meetings since I joined on Nov. 10th), and searching for various life-opportunities. Anyway, I'd like to take the time right now to share what I did this year for Thanksgiving.

For the third year in a row, my family went to the Annual Thanksgiving Vegetarian Potluck Feast. It's a wonderful delicious party where everyone brings a dish that has no meat or cheese in it, and it's held in a big beautiful park with lots of trees and several picnic benches. My family brought to the potluck a delicious sweet salad (lettuce, apples, carrots, coconut, and raisins with orange juice poured all over), rice with curry (an excellent combination), and a special sweet-potato mash. There were about 50 other people that showed up, and dozens of vegetarian dishes to sample from. It was a smorgasbord! It was just like going to an all-you-can-eat-buffet, with the only expense being the fee for entering the park. There was plenty of food for everyone, and I was very thankful for the abundance that was all around me. And absolutely no turkeys were harmed!

After a couple plates of food, me and my sister noticed a couple young guys throwing a Frisbee around. They looked about in their early 20s, and pretty good-looking (as guys tend to be). My sister was brave enough to casually walk over and initiate a game of catch with them. I followed her even though my stomach was almost full up. Is it healthy to exercise right after eating? Well if it's wrong, I don't want to be right. We had a good time playing Frisbee, and it was just a casual game, throwing it to each other in no set order. My brother Adam joined in for a few tosses, then left when he got tired. When we all got tired of playing, we gave the guys their Frisbee back and that was that. No name exchanges or anything, just a fun, memorable moment that we created out of thin air.

Another fun moment was when a guy named George brought a Mastermind set and I played a few rounds with him, guessing his color codes in about 5 tries. George kept saying things like, "How did you get that?" and "You're so smart," and "I would never have been able to guess that," which made me feel so good and intelligent inside. I also played with a gal named Lisa, and another man named Matthew. I had such a blast!

My family had such a great time that we didn't leave that park until almost sunset! I didn't want that day to end, but as days tend to do, it ended anyway. Fast forward to evening, back home where my whole family is watching "Analyze That" (the sequel to Billy Crystal and Robert DeNiro's great comedy "Analyze This") and laughing out loud all together. Best. Thanksgiving. Ever!

I am so thankful to have so many things to be thankful for: family, friends, health, wealth, home, happiness, knowledge, abundance, free time, technology, nature, growth, plants, animals, oceans, mountains, stars, galaxies...Okay, I think I may be going a bit overboard. Maybe I should just end this post with a Seasons Greetings and a Happy Harvest Holiday!

"Toastmasters" Visits!

Has anyone ever heard of the public-speaking club called "Toastmasters"? Well if you haven't, find the nearest club in your area, and go visit it! It will be one of the most fascinating experiences you've ever had! At least I hope it will be as fascinating as my two visits were. I knew about Toastmasters long ago, because my dad went to one of their meetings once, but that was many years ago! I had to discover for myself just what "Toastmasters" was.

This last Monday at 7:30 p.m., I got my whole family to drive to this church near us where the club met (we don't go because we're Jewish), and we were welcomed as guests and sat in on the meeting. There seemed to be about 20 or so other people, all of whom wanted to further their public-speaking/effective communication skills. Each time someone spoke, everyone else would applaud. The atmosphere was very friendly and supportive, and of course supportive applause is contagious. I saw wonderful speakers that night, and it was amazing for me to realize that these people lived in the same city as me!

The next day, Tuesday at 12:30, there was another meeting at a completely different Toastmasters club, and I wanted to make an intelligent decision to see if the two Toastmasters clubs were different in any way and which would I rather choose to join. My dad dropped my sister Bettina and I off at our local A.I.U. (American Inter-Continental University) and we went alone this time to the meeting. It was a bit of a smaller group than the other club, but it was no less friendly, supportive, and exciting.

After weighing the benefits of joining either club, Bettina and I both decided to join the one at A.I.U. because of it's convenient time, even though it's also slightly further away than the church club. I'm very excited about this opportunity, because it's very inexpensive to get started, it's educational, and it's a great way to meet new people. If you'd like to learn more about Toastmasters, here's their website, www.toastmasters.org.

Happy Thursday!

Hallowe'en (looks cooler with a comma)

Before I talk about my day today, I just wanted to treat you to some cool pics of all my costumes from Halloweens past. (Click on the icons to get a better look of me and my sister Bettina.)

(This is only a semi-complete series of costumes; when I was six I dressed as a Dalmatian puppy. Oh that was so many years ago...Where is that picture?)

You don't know how long it took me to put this entire thing together! So many links....

Anyway, tonight my family went to two parties, and Bettina and I dressed up as hippies, as you can see below.

The first party was in the late afternoon, and the second one was in the evening. Both parties had costume contests, and Adam entered as Edward Scissorhands both times. At the second party, Adam won the grand prize of a $25 Wal-mart gift card! Now he can go shop till he drops!

I'm happy to say I'm not as drowsy as I was yesterday after eating a bunch of candy, but I'll have to admit I've completely satisfied my chocolate cravings enough to last me the whole year, until next October.

Yakko: "And the moral of today's story is: Brush your teeth after every meal. This moral brought to you by the American Dental Association"

I just had to borrow this quote from one of those "Wheel of Morality" skits from "Animaniacs". It's just so appropriate.

Pre-Halloween Highs (and then after candy, big low)

Whoa, I am so tired! My mom and my sibs went to this huge party at the park, and we all got dressed up!

I dressed up as a makeshift Indiana Jones,

Bettina went as Michael Jackson (come back from the dead),

and my brother Adam (I saved the best for last,) went as Edward Scissorhands!

His costume was so great! People everywhere, especially grown-ups, would point and say, "Look! It's Edward Scissorhands! Hi Edward!" and my brother would wave and be all smiley, and show off his cardboard blades with pride.

It was a HUGE party; thousands of people showed up, most all the kids were in costume, and some parents/grown-ups were too. I love mingling with characters of all sorts during Halloween to-dos. I saw many princesses and pirates, Buzz Lightyears and Transformers, pumpkins and cats, clowns, even a couple more Kings of Pop, (although I do think my sister had on a better Michael Jackson than the others had. I'm biased.) The most creative looking costumes I saw besides my own family was a girl dressed in huge polka-dots and with a Twister spinning board on her head (I call her "Twister Girl") and a successful punky looking girl with a cool Mohawk!

There was candy gathering, loud music, and tons people. What more could I ask for? Adam kept getting asked to pose for pictures by complete strangers! How cool is that? I am so very proud of him! We spent about 2 hours at that party, dancing and eating candy and having a great time. Then the tiredness sunk in.............

I just can't believe it. I only ate seven pieces of candy. SEVEN! And I feel soooooo daaaaaamn tiiiiiiiiired!!!!!!!! I need a lie-down! It was hot in my Indiana Jones jacket.

Another thing; every Friday since about early September, Adam, Bettina and I have been learning new songs and performing them so as to build up our own individual repertoires. Tonight, I was supposed to do the Michael Jackson song "Thriller", in honor of the scariest holiday of the year, but I just don't have the energy to do the song and dance. What a shame. Doesn't really matter though, we post-poned the whole thing until the night of November 1. Tonight my parents are at a Halloween party of their own, adults-only. Benny is going as Captain Hook, and Shira's dressed as Tinker Bell. They made a great looking dressed-up couple.

That's all I have to say for now. I'll report back tomorrow with some more candy/costume-related news. Goodnight, your moment is in.

"Whisper of the Heart" Review

This anime film was produced by Studio Ghibli, as all my latest favorite anime films are, and written by the great Japanese storyteller Hayao Miyazaki. It's a wonderful romantic story, about a girl who at first reads fairy-tale stories all the time when she should be focusing on her junior-high school studies, but then becomes a writer after falling in love with a nice guy, even when he had to go to Italy to follow his dream a violin-maker. The story is a lot more involved than that, but that's all the details I'm going to share. You'll have to find out the rest by watching the brilliantly made movie. It's got breath-taking animation, and takes place in a Japanese city, which was pretty great for me since I've never been there. I sure would love to go to Japan someday, I really respect their cultural values, like bowing all the time in respect to elders, and being generally friendly. It's just not the same in America, I find. I love the characters and sets and the graceful movement that comes with slice-of-life anime films like this one. It makes it seem sooooo real!

"Fame" Review

I'm here to talk about the movie I watched in the theater tonight, the 2009 remake of the 1980 film "Fame", a story of various students of the New York High School of Performing Arts. The film follows them and their studies from auditions to graduation. First off, before I really get started reviewing this movie, let me just say that I've seen the original "Fame", so I have with what to compare this movie too. In my humble opinion, this millennium's version was much better by virtue of it's filming, music, choreography, acting, and pacing. The 1980 film was grittier and more intense, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy watching it. I just liked watching the remake better.

One of the things I really admired was the voice of Naturi Naughton, who played a girl named Denise in the film. At first she only plays classical piano (thanks apparently to an oppressive dad who doesn't want her doing anything else, and an oppressed mom who won't say otherwise), but then her friends (and the audience, and even her parents) discover what fine vocals she has. I loved it!

I enjoyed being a witness to such a spectacle, and it was a welcome relief after the previews of such films as "Couple's Retreat", "All About Steve", and "September Issue". If I'm going to be a satisfied pop-culture consumer, I only want the quality stuff, or content of sentimental/historical value.

Goodnight everybody! (Remember, Yakko backwards is Okkay! Dangit, I'll do anything to stick an Animaniac in my blogpost, won't I?)

"Julie & Julia" Review

Oh. My. Gahd! Have you seen this movie? You have got to see this movie!

Meryl Streep as Julia Child was absolutely sensational! I mean, I had no idea who Julia Child actually was, but she's such a wonderful character!

Amy Adams as the author of the book of the same name, Julie Powell, was adorable. The main idea is that Julie cooks every single recipe in Julia Child's famous cookbook, all 524 of them, in only one year! And she blogs about it all!

Masterfully woven into this story is the life of Julia Child and how she started cooking as a hobby and began working on her cookbook, "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". Both women get wonderful love and support from their husbands, which is truly an admirable thing to show in a movie.

Now, I'll only give this complaint: I'm a vegetarian, so anytime somebody cooks, eats, or talks about how delicious meat is, I'm not cringing or giving loud sighs, but I am thinking to myself, "Alright, enough already, next part please." There's a part in the movie where Julie cooks 3 lobsters, and she's all nervous about killing them and all. It was so interesting and funny to see how other people actually go about preparing home-cooked lobster, because I know I would never go about doing it myself.

Well, besides all the food involved, the movie was above and beyond fantastic! (I so love using extremely positive adjectives.) I felt so very good after walking out of the theater with my family and talking about our favorite parts on the car-ride home. On an unrelated note, I had fun with my brother Adam, making him laugh by pretending my arms were his arms and doing goofy things with them. You ever played that sort of game? Done right, it's hilarious!

Goodnight, god bless. Check out my Art Blog for kicks.