Alright, I saw Pirates of the Caribbean. And it was horrendously boring. The reason most people seem to hate it, however, is its disregard for the Will/Elizabeth romance, which given that when Jack and Elizabeth were making out at the end, I felt the need to stand up and shout "I HOPE WILL IS WATCHING" I think we all know how I feel about it. 

Seriously, who the goddamn hell cares?

Honestly? Orlando Bloom is so wooden and boring on screen that everytime he appeared there by himself, I looked at my watch and hoped we were closer to the end. I enjoyed four scenes: the four scenes that contained only Johnny Depp and Keira Knightley because they are two accomplished actors who rose above the crappy plot/script and WERE INTERESTING. No joke, if Elizabeth were forced to watch the other half of the movie with just Will in it, she would have had sex with Jack Sparrow immediately. Or killed herself. Whichever.

Secondly, I was completely confused by the plot. It takes a lot to confuse me. In fact, I cannot think of a film that has ever confused me. EVER. I could not understand what half of the people talking were saying--a mental note: don't vacation in Jamaica--and typically, when one witnesses large amounts of action on screen, one expects to understand the motive/purpose of it. PotC lacked there. 

Other random notes: the guy who played Collins in P&P is the evil Lord Bennett which was amusing, if in a geeky-ironic way. Keira Knightley looks good with a tan. The giant squid thing was not scary. The fallen Commodore Norrington was sort of hot towards the end of the movie once the mud had been cleared off.

I'm certainly going to see the third one when it comes out on Memorial Day next year, but my expectations will be spectacularly low.

Alright, I haven't been keeping track so much, though I have been reading. So, points for me.

More (on other books) later.

Yes. That's right. I'm playing art journal now, too!

See, it's true:

Alright. I've joined the 50 Book Challenge for the year of 2006. I'm way behind and figure to be astonished if I even make it to thirty by the end of the year, but it's something I've been thinking about for a while. Between the books for school, the books of Katherine, the books I will likely buy when I likely work at Barnes & Noble, Borders, or B.A.M. in McLean, and the books I will read next fall at college, there has to be quite a few there. 

Anyway.  #1 and #2 were Empire Falls by Richard Russo and Atonement by Ian McEwan, respectively, which were previously mentioned and ranted about.

Anyway. Really good book.

Okay. So, Celebrity Playlist.

This is like a goal of mine in life. Write a book, go to law school, own a major league baseball team, have a house with a pool table and a dark room in the basement, make a celebrity playlist. There they are.

Anyway, this list totally excludes my love for Missy Elliott, No Doubt, Franz Ferdinand, and Led Zeppelin. So, keep that in mind, I guess.

Also, somewhere along the way I developed tendencies of those people who really like certain bands, thus I had to include Honorable Mentions for Tim McGraw, the Beach Boys, the Dixie Chicks, and ELO.

1. “Bennie and the Jets” by Elton John— The first song I remember liking. I honestly believed it to be about Joe Namath and the New York Jets, rather than a fictional rock band. I was about five.

2. “Sloop John B” by The Beach Boys—A Beach Boys song is tough for me. I know virtually everything that the Beach Boys ever sang. In the eccentricities of my younger elementary school years, I, along with John, listened almost exclusively to the Beach Boys and Motown. Consequently, I was unaware of Mariah Carey’s presence on Earth until about age ten or eleven, and for that I am grateful, to say the least. “Sloop John B” along with the other Pet Sounds singles, “God Only Knows” and “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” are essentially the heights of Brian Wilson’s songwriting abilities, excluding “Good Vibrations,” of course. “Sloop John B” hasn’t been terribly overused, however, and so I think I prefer it to the other two. [Beach Boys’ Honorable Mention: Good Vibrations, Heroes and Villains, Wouldn’t It Be Nice, Barbara Ann, Don’t Worry Baby]

3. “Forgot About Dre” by Dr. Dre, Eminem, and Snoop Dogg—My all-time favorite rap song. Incidentally, I have a very vivid memory from the summer I went to sleep-away camp concerning this song. My friend Marisa and I were sitting on this wall sort of thing, looking out on this bay watching people water ski and wakeboard, waiting for our other friend, Lyndsey (whom neither of us have seen in years). Anyway, we were bored and Marisa, who is black, rapped out this entire song, complete with all the unedited parts I had no knowledge of—this was all from her brother, Jon.

4. “Turn to Stone” by Electric Light Orchestra—My borderline obsession with Electric Light Orchestra is a recent phenomena that slowly began with “Don’t Bring Me Down” and has continued henceforth. I love this song to the, uh, infinite power. No, seriously, I do. Not that I’m a big lyric freak but:

“And so the songs are way down low turning turning turning
A sound that flows into my mind the echoes of the daylight
Of everything that is alive in my blue world

I turn to stone when you are gone, I turn to stone.
Turn to stone when you comin’ home, I can’t go on.”

That’s quality. [ELO Honorable Mention: Showdown, Don’t Bring Me Down, Rock and Roll is King, Mr. Blue Sky, and so on.]

5. “It’s Now or Never” by Elvis Presley—Reminds me of vacation in Captiva and just Summer in general.

6. “God Put a Smile upon Your Face” by Coldplay—This song is sex, literally. I heard it on an ALIAS episode and it remains, and will probably always remain, the only Coldplay song I enjoy. I have fueled any happy feelings I may have had about that band into this one song.

7. “Everybody’s Changing” by Keane—If I were making the soundtrack to my life this would definitely be included. I think this song, and all of their songs, play to my Elton John meets Electric Light Orchestra weakness.

8. “Eleanor” by Low Millions—During Spring Break last year, my first few days were spent in complete annoyance, as Jess has a Bose iPod, er, amplifier, and she and Genny chose to play this song constantly. Strangely enough, it grew on me. Not only does it have some of the coolest album art ever, each time I hear the lead singer mumble-sing, “Fine, I understand,” I immediately think about our CSI binges and massive junk food stash.

9. “All These Things That I’ve Done” by The Killers—I wasn’t going to put this on here, but then I off-handedly listened to it again and I remembered why I love so much. Yes.

10. “All the Small Things” by blink-182—This is definitely a sixth grade song. I remember watching the video—back in the days when TRL viewership was second-nature—and I can sing the whole thing back to anyone. I love all the sarcasm—“she left me roses by the stairs/surprises let me know she cares”—and all the na-na’s. For some, inexplicable reason “I’ll be your thrill” is the sort of thing I would love to hear.

11. “My Old Friend” by Tim McGraw—I could wax poetically on the merits of Tim McGraw for literally an hour. His last three CDs (Set This Circus Down, Dancehall Doctors, Live Like You Were Dying) are the epitome of excellent contemporary country. He has even made me like Faith Hill. Well, kind of. Not so much on her music, for the most part. [Tim McGraw Honorable Mention: Jeez. Watch the Wind Blow By, The Cowboy in Me, Please Remember Me, Everywhere, Kill Myself, That’s Why God Made Mexico, Old Town New, She’s My Kind of Rain, Unbroken, Angry All the Time]

12. “I Believe in Love” by the Dixie Chicks—The Dixie Chicks have been there through all my softball days and will, especially the first two CDs, be inextricably linked to Morgan, Mrs. Simpson, my mother, and the All-Star tournaments of old. I really like their more bluegrass approach to their last album and this is my favorite song of theirs from Home. [Dixie Chicks Honorable Mention: Ready to Run, Without You, Cold Day in July, You Were Mine, There’s Your Trouble, Tortured Tangled Hearts]

13. “Jolene” by Dolly Parton—Clearly, I’ve got a bluegrass weakness. This is another one (along with the next song) that is the kind of song that Nashville just isn’t making today, along with having some really great lyrics.

14. “I Walk the Line” by Johnny Cash—Lyrically, I love this song. I actually prefer “Rusty Cage” if I’m picking a Cash song to listen to, because of the electric factor of the American Recordings, but this is arguably Cash’s best song. There’s a strange eloquence in the simplicity in all his songs, but especially this one. Also, the fact that John Cash and June Carter spent so many years apart, basically writing songs about each other (he wrote this one, she wrote “Ring of Fire”) gives “I Walk the Line” an entirely second life.

15. “She’s Got You” by Patsy Cline—There is no discussion about traditional country, or at least Nashville Country, that does not include Patsy Cline. Because, damn, she was that good. This song, along with “I Fall to Pieces,” “Crazy,” and “Why Can’t He Be You” are just insanely sad and so classic in their blues-y Southern way.

Okay, so this quarter in good old AP English Lit, we read three books: Their Eyes Were Watching God, Pride & Prejudice, and Atonement by Ian McEwan. I also, over Christmas Break, read Empire Falls by Richard Russo.

So. Empire Falls. People--mostly male teachers, so I'm wondering if that's a factor-- keep referring to it like it's this mediocre novel which I feel like I should disagree with, but I still haven't quite formulated a final verdict on it. The pacing is off, I'll definitely admit that; the sudden leap into action seems a little forced, whether intentional or not, Russo seems to suddenly remind the reader that this is a novel and therefore must have a major, dynamic shift in preception and inter-character relationships. The climax of the novel is certainly foreshadowed, and it's very surprising, but it still comes off as slightly maudlin. But overall, there's so much to think about, especially the juxtaposition of atonement and escape, and it's the first book in quite a while that almost made me cry simply for the heartbreaking truth in some of the scenarios. The characterization is also so rich and realistic that it's difficult to deny the novel its merit. For the first time in a while, my faith in award-winning books has been restored. The Corrections. I mean, what?!

Their Eyes Were Watching God was very good, though it's definitely paraded around as the, like, definition of Black American love, which I have no bearing on whatsoever, with my being extremely white. It reinforced the fact that I would much rather read anything out of the Harlem Renaissance than Fitzgerald and most Hemingway. Well, I like Hemingway on a good day especially the short stories, but that whole iceberg/man's-man thing requires a little too much examination for me. Their Eyes, though, was well-written, very lyrical, and very much the Oprah's Book Club book that it is. Strangely, however, my mom grew up where the majority of Janie's life with Teacake happen. She grew up in Belle Glade. "On the muck" as they say in the book. That was my mom, forty years later.

Pride & Prejudice, of course, only improves with time. Like the third time. And, incidentally, I can now thank Jane Austen for my A for the semester in English. Much more fun to read after a couple years and directly after watching Matthew Macfadyen take very large, though extremely sexy, liberties with Darcy's character. Yes. Seriously, the most recent movie sort of captures my thoughts on The Prisoner of Azkaban, which is my favorite Potter movie. Though they deviate considerably from the plots of their respective novels, they, in my opinion, capture the spirit of the novels much better which I prefer over the overwhelming attention to detail of the BBC miniseries and the rapid fire pace of GOF, which seems almost petulant in its insistent to move the damn plot along. But, anyway, Pride & Prejudice the third time around only strengthened my Darcy love and managed to identify the real life Lydia Bennet. (Her name rhymes with Kim. Oh, wait, it is Kim. Damn.)

And, finally, Atonement. Eh. I liked it alright. The more I think about the pulling-the-rug-out-from-under-you ending, the more I become confused about the entirity of the novel itself. It's a very peculiar concept and one that cannot be explained without giving away the entire book, which is aggravating.

Okay, but seriously. Major McEwan issues here. This is a British novel, of course, and with those there will always and forever (in my head) be some sort of irritating connection to Austen, Dickens, Tolkein, Rowling, Lewis, and all in between. Here it's Harry Potter. For one, there's a character, Aunt Hermione, who is off cavorting in France with some younger man in the years before WWII. This book was written in 2001. Some names just go off the registry, Ian; Fredo, Indiana, Buffy, Leia, Hermione. No. None of those. Next, she has three children who are pale, freckled, and red-headed that she dumps off at her obnoxious as hell sister's countryside estate in England. Um, Ian, there is no need to throw your deluded Ron-Hermione-ness around. The only saving grace there was imagining that Hermione was off with Harry in France. In addition the oldest daughter, Lola--this name on its own has the horrible Lolita connotations, which I'm fairly sure was intentional--was like the Ginny Weasley clone. Of course she had two brothers who were twins and were dead on for Fred and George. Seriously. This bothered me the entire time.

That's it, I suppose.  

Anna and I had already figured out that lunch on the Day of Imminent Doom, also known as the Day Mattie Had Spanish, was going to be a total waste. So, to reconcile this unfortunate development, we went with the sensible alternative to the social microcosm that is a high school cafeteria: the library.

Of course, I realize that I’ve now solidified my geekitude with this solution, but desperate times called for desperate measures. I know when it’s time to pull a Von Trapp and say goodbye and it’s when there are only three tables of seniors in a lunch. Because high school odds are pretty good that one is the Track Cult table—really, they’re lovely people, especially individually, but as a collective they will put a new healthy life into the word awkward if you personally don’t carry a Nalgene water bottle (I do, incidentally) and live and breathe running (I don’t, quite intentionally). The second table is usually the girls’ soccer team, the cheerleaders, the dance team, and other assorted members of the Stepford Teen Girl Squad stuffed around one table sharing a bag of goldfish, two Diet Cokes, a bottle of self-tanner, and enough black eyeliner to make Billy Joe Armstrong envious. The third table is inevitably cluttered with sweatpants and Tims, either lying about how much they can lift or telling dirty jokes and tossing food items at the aforementioned girls’ table.

So, library! The library didn’t even function as a library during the lunch periods; people were constantly talking in normal voices, sneaking food when the Ice Maiden librarians turn around, playing games on the computers. Personally, I was a Washington Post crossword kind of a girl, while Anna usually pulled out homework to do, sometimes bringing her laptop.

Unfortunately for us that first day in the library, there was a full-fledged Rebecca Nixon alert coming our way in the library. Rebecca was the girl that everyone could not help but hate, what with her second identity as the most sacrilege of all high school identities: the unapologetic, boastful Curve Killer. And, alas, she was approaching me, likely with the generic “How was your summer” misdirection that would somehow segway us into the blatantly intrusive “So, what schools are you looking at?” or perhaps the more nonchalant “Applying Early?” This was nothing strange or unfamiliar, of course, just a cloying reminder that the month of September, much like the months of August, October, November, and December would be brought to us by the word “admissions.”

“Jeez, look who’s coming,” I whispered. Whispering in a high school is like wearing a giant red sign that reads Hey, I’m gossiping! This is especially evident when even the library is more an African bazaar than a back-door black market meeting.

“She’s nice,” Anna said after a not-so-furtive glance to the right where Nixon had been detained for a second by a fawning teacher. I stared at Anna for a long second while she set up her laptop. “She tries really hard,” Anna concluded, as if this mitigated the obnoxiousness, which admittedly it did somewhat.

“At being nice?”

“No, at school. Wait, no, I mean, sometimes she can be a little…”

“…Presumptuous?”

“Difficult, but she means well.”

“She’s in Owen’s Calc class, which means good-bye to any sort of generous curve—”

“Score! My laptop picks up the school’s wireless connection!”

“Excellent. Would you be interested in checking up on my fantasy baseball team?” I was starting to sound a bit like Teddy, which was disturbing.

“Actually, I wouldn’t be—”

“Hey, guys! How was your summer?” Two decibels too high and dressed like she was a tennis mom, Rebecca Nixon had entered the Mattie Shepard Zone.

Anna replied, with the diplomatic my-father-is-a-congressman smile, “It was nice, but I’m actually a little glad to be back at school with my friends.” This answer was clearly the hello to Have a Great Summer’s goodbye. Expectant eyes turned toward me.

“Mine was an extravaganza of fantastic, actually. Made a dime dealing cocaine and started a forest fire. Yours?”

“Oh, I spent the summer, the first part anyway, as an intern in the County Executive’s Office. Then for the month of August I studied at Princeton in their exclusive chemistry summer program. I love it there.” She sighed happily. Throughout this, Anna and I worked to maintain the most monotonous, unmoved facial expressions. Anna broke down first, by staring in indignation at an oblivious Rebecca when patronized Princeton, like, summer camp to us.

“Oh, speaking of colleges,” Rebecca intoned, “where are you guys thinking about?”

Anna and I stared at each other over her computer. She started with her oft-repeated refrain of “I’m thinking UVA. I really liked it when I visited and my brother went there. Plus in-state tuition and all. If I get in, of course.” Expectant eyes turned on me once more.

This was the moment of truth. This was also the moment of dealing with the girl who point-blank asked me what my SAT scores were the previous June and then refused to tell me hers. In addition, this was the moment of the day in which I had already been asked three times about my interests in higher education like I was in some Edgar Allen Poe hallucinogen bender with a stone bird. So I made a decision before my subconscious cued up “A Moment Like This” as I rambled off Michigan and UNC and UPenn.

“I’m applying to Morehouse College early decision. It’s a small liberal arts school.” Morehouse is, quite conveniently, my mother’s maiden name. The look on the Curve Killer’s face was priceless.

“Morehouse College? That’s up North, right?” Well, sure, it’s up north.

“Yeah, it’s in Vermont, actually. They’ve got an excellent creative writing program,” I said smiling and actively avoiding Anna’s incredulous stare.

“Oh, yes, I know exactly where you’re talking about. Morehouse…isn’t that where Ollie Davidson’s sister went?” Ollie Davidson’s sister went to Tufts before a pleasant stint at the Moorehaven Clinic to address her painkiller addiction.

“She went there and so did Harrison Whitt,” I replied. Harrison and Whitt are two names I have always felt would serve as excellent, if a little quirky, first names; Anna made a sort of choked noise, clearly offended by these choices.

“Oh, look, there’s Ms. Russo; I need to talk to her about a grade,” Rebecca said, obviously flustered by her lack of knowledge of something so ironic as an institution of learning, though she was the kind of girl irony was usually lost on. She scampered away to Ms. Russo’s enchanting world of militant feminism.

“You’re turning into Teddy. I hope you realize that,” Anna said, her voice low.

“You have to admit that was funny,” I replied, now feeling slightly guilty that Anna didn’t quite find this as hilarious as I did. If only Murph had been there to revel in the glee of the horrified look on the Curve Killer’s face, I thought.

Silence engulfed us for a few minutes as Anna paved a road of word processing. I, after finding my iPod battery to also not have found my joke funny, idly picked at a crossword puzzle and wished for deafness to shield me from the awful melodramatic conversation behind me. The two girls were discussing either The OC or their own very traumatizing lives but either way I had to restrain myself from jabbing my Ticonderoga in my ear.

“Mattie,” Anna said, almost giggling, breaking my efforts to find an infectious song to hum, thus preventing me jumping up on the table and screaming, “This is a library! A LIE-BREAR-REE! So, shut the god damn hell up!”

“Yes?”

“Not that I think lying to people about what schools you’re applying to is funny or anything but—”

“Okay. I get it. No more college lies. Except for when I sit down to write out my applications. Kidding. Go on.”

“Here’s the thing. I just googled Morehouse College.”

“And?” This was looking good.

“It’s a historically black men’s college in Atlanta.”

“I think I am going to go into a corner somewhere and weep tears of mirth into Rebecca Nixon’s transcript.”

[	book of the moment	|	crazy	]
[	music of my crack induced variety	|	rascal flatts ((skin))	]

            I’ve been contemplating a rather serious issue lately that I feel concerns the fate of the entire world as we know it today: what if Moses, Jesus, Siddhartha “Buddha” Gautama, Muhammad, a few popes, Confucius, some Aztec priests, Chandragupta, Martin Luther, and Joseph Smith were forced to spend the day together. And I’m not talking about spending the together in the Bahamas or at Six Flags (although...). I'm thinking of a light gray, carpeted conference room with horrendous fluorescent lighting and one chair that squeaks everytime it moves. And, as an added bonus, the group gets to come up with ideas for world peace.

            Everything goes fairly smoothly at first; everyone is speaking in tongues and sampling the scones which Jesus made out of some paper clips and a dry erase marker. The first sign of trouble arises, however, when Martin Luther demands that the notes Muhammad’s assistant is taking on the white board should be translated into at least five to ten different languages in easily understood prose. Confucius, the popes, and Chandragupta are outraged by this blatant demonstration of so-called idiocy. They feebly claim that the masses only care about their own religion’s views and who J. Lo is married to now. After several minutes of heated discussion, the one consensus everyone comes to is that they all intensely dislike Jennifer Lopez—Jesus finds “Jenny From the Block” hypocritical, the popes haven’t liked her since she annulled that marriage, the Buddha says that the incessant horns on “Get Right” interrupt even his meditations, and the Aztec priests say they’ve never liked Marc Anthony.

            Luther, of course, drudges up the translation issue again leading to a room filled with taunting and insults. This state continues on for about fifteen minutes until the Buddha interjects an age-old adage about non-violent communication and contemplation. He starts to suggest something else but is cut short when a scone hits him in the third eye. The Buddha scans the room looking for the culprit, clearly struggling to retain his tranquility. Jesus coughs lightly, clearly knowing who threw it, whilst the Aztec priests snicker under their breath, and Luther subtly mouths “You da man” to Moses when the Buddha turns.

            Lunch is an entirely different ordeal, seeing as Panera wasn’t quite prepared to be serving a group of people with a host of dietary restrictions; Luther promises to write a letter listing the group’s grievances with the service. The afternoon break goes surprising well given the difficulties that the morning brought. Muhammad and Joseph Smith reminisce about a world in which polygamy was legal, though Muhammad becomes a bit annoyed when he describes the importance of protecting women and Smith chuckles a little. Moses and the Buddha trade bitter stories of their former days as royalty, while Confucius and Chandragupta chat fondly about a time when people accepted their place in life.

            Ultimately, though, it is the discussion on world peace that causes the downfall of the evening. Various ideas are tossed around by the group, few are able agree on anything. Muhammad momentarily comes to the defense of the popes who are trying to explain the how the idea of uniting everyone under one religion is the best solution, until he remembers that he’s still got his own religion to unite, let alone reform the Catholic Church to his standards. The Buddha and Confucius hesitantly agree that order and balance are essential components in the search for peace. Moses and Chandragupta are totally incredulous when Jesus touches on faith and equality, made worse when Luther agrees; the two combat this lesson on equality with a response that sounds suspiciously like the lyrics from a Missy Elliot song, chanting something about “my people.” The Aztecs’ contribution, in all regards the most popular and agreed upon, is “Oh, hell, just kill ‘em all.”

Alas, though, the end of the day finally arrives and people start to file wearily out of the day’s cramped quarters. Jesus and Muhammad decide on a later tee time for Tuesday—St. Peter has to give orientation to newcomers and Gandhi is, well, he’s drinking some herbal tea while Martin Luther King Jr. has breakfast—while Chandragupta and Confucius exchange screennames. Before flipping the lights off, a pope idly wonders if we’ll ever reach world peace. The Buddha responds gravely, “Perhaps if people learn to have a greater understanding of others’ cultures and become slightly more willing to compromise. But, hey, if they can’t they’ll probably just blame us and point to us throwing scones at each other…It was Moses wasn’t it?! It was! I knew it! He gets me every, single time. I wish for once I could…Gah.”