It's been awhile, but I'm here!

Hello everyone. It's been awhile since I've been to this blog, huh?
I've gone through quite a lot since I've last posted anything here, and I'm sorry I've been a stranger to those who still follow this "Welcome to my World" blog (whoever you are. o.O).

One of the reasons I haven't been posting more personal stuff is I consider myself a fairly private person, and I find it's challenging to post updates on my own life that would seem the least bit interesting to other people besides myself. Plus I've gotten back into the habit of writing long-hand, journal-ing most every day, so I haven't been that motivated to keep up my online presence that much.

Another reason I've been away from this blog so much is that I have 2 other blogs that are easy to maintain because they deal with specific facets of what I'm interested in. My art blog showcases many masterpieces of my own creation, and my movie-review blog deals with my opinions on what films I'm watching these days. For a very general blog like "Welcome to my World", it's a challenge at best to figure out just what to post about.

For those who are still here with me, let me ask you a question, and be honest:

Would it be so terrible if I didn't update this blog anymore, but kept on maintaining my other 2 blogs?

It's been a nice long run, almost 3 years in fact (started in December '08), but I believe it's about time I retired this specific web-log, "Welcome to my World". It's gathering dust on the metaphoric shelf, and it serves no identifiable purpose.

If anyone reading this post feels differently, please leave me a comment.
Unless I get at least one response, this just might be the last post you read on "Welcome to my World", so here's to going out with a tired over-used Animaniacs catch-phrase:

Good-Night Everybody!

My Brand New Blog!

Today, I have decided to create an entirely new blog specially made to store and create all my movie reviews.

It includes all the critiques for films I have seen in the past and written about in this blog, and it will be the place to go to read my opinions on the different "flicks" I watch.

Here is the link to my spanking-new site: Annette's Movie Reviews. Go ahead, click on it!

Now in this blog I can focus on the things in my life that don't involve movie reviewing.

Until next time, my dear readers! ^_^

Edit: Just so this blog wouldn't be so redundant, I deleted the movie-review posts on "Welcome to My World" so that you have to go to my new blog in order to read them.
Now this blog will only be for matters special to me besides art and film. See ya later!

Superbowl XLV + Jekyll and Hyde

What a night last night!

My whole family spent from about 6:30 to 10:15 watching the Superbowl from beginning to end (National Anthem to Post-Game show), PLUS all the commercials! There were snacks and munchies, most were crunchy. Potato chips, vegetables and dips. (Hey, I made a mini-poem ^_^ )

As to which team I was rooting for (Pitsburgh Steelers VS. Green Bay Packers), I'll have to say that I was rooting for both at the same time. I cheered whenever one team made a touchdown, and I groaned whenever somebody missed a catch. I'm happy that the Packers won, but I'm also a little sympathetic for the Steelers. Still, the best team really did win, Packers-Steelers, 31-25.

The commercials during the Superbowl were fun to watch. Some were clever, some were waaay over-the-top, some were cute, and some were just plain weird. My favorite ads were the ones with cars, because they're the coolest in my opinion. Remember the talking cars chatting about the review site Cars.com? Recall the Volkswagen spot with an actual beetle racing past CGI insects? Does Chrysler's "Imported from Detroit" commercial ring a bell?

Anyway, I think that's quite enough about football and commercials for one post.

The other thing I wanted to write about in this post is the fact that earlier today I finished a really great book!

It is the timeless classic, "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde" by Robert Louis Stevenson. One day a week or so ago I saw it on the fiction-shelf of our local library and I thought to myself, "Wow, I know this story, but I've never actually read it before." Much like Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde" is simply one of those widely known stories that most people can summarize for you without having read the book itself. There have been quite a few movie adaptations of this story (one of the more famous versions being "The Nutty Professor"), and just the names Jekyll and Hyde evoke familiar mental images of mad science and split-personality disorders.

Reading the actual book was an interesting experience for me. At first the story starts off from the point of view of Dr. Jekyll's lawyer and good friend, Mr. Utterson. In this way the reader observes whatever Mr. Utterson is observing, and starts out just as curious as he is about the strange and frequent disappearances of Henry Jekyll, and the sudden appearance of the unsavory character Edward Hyde. As the story progresses, Mr. Utterson gathers information from Dr. Jekyll's colleagues and servants, and also receives strange letters from Jekyll himself. In the end, he catches Mr. Hyde in Dr. Jekyll's laboratory just as Hyde commits suicide, and he reads a full confession from Jekyll about what he's been up to. The confession is then written from Jekyll's point of view, and in my opinion it's the best part of the whole story.

Robert Louis Stevenson's writing style is so unique in that he knows how to paint compelling images in the reader's mind of the setting (foggy 19th century London), the characters, and what happens to them. He seems to use just the right words for just the right situations, and the beginning and middle build up the suspense pretty well. The language is a bit old-fashioned and formal for some folk, but if you're patient for the first couple chapters, I think you're in for a good literary treat. "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde": a classic novel that I recommend for those who know the story but never read the book.