Many of us have traditions we repeat each year around Christmastime. And lots of these involve movies. I know many people enjoy "It's A Wonderful Life" or "Christmas Vacation."
But my biggest tradition I can't stray from is my "Christmas tape." I've had my Christmas tape since I was 2. Granted, I don't remember it then. But every year, I have to watch this thing from start to... almost-finish. I'll explain...
My Christmas tape is an old, Polaroid VHS tape that my mom and dad recorded for me sometime between 1987-1990. It contains 5 main shows that I have to watch every year, and a few towards the end that I might watch.
First up on the tape is Christmas Eve on Sesame Street. It was made in 1978, and my parents recorded it in either 1987 or 1988 from PBS. What a trip down memory lane as far as PBS goes... remember how all episodes of Sesame Street began with the Ralston-Purina sponsorship? And the blue screen with the text "Financial support, from viewers like you." Anyways, Oscar the Grouch gets Big Bird believing that Santa is not real and since so many people don't have chimneys, they won't get gifts. So Big Bird and gang set out to prove Santa is real. Also, there is a great sub-plot with Bert and Ernie and Mr. Hooper that is essentially "Gift of the Magi." It's a great, great movie. I just looked, and it can be bought on Amazon, but I'm curious to know if it is truly the original or has been edited. My guess: edited.
Moving on to Christmas special #2: Rudolph. In all it's claymation glory. Who doesn't love Burl Ives?
The third one on the tape is old Frosty the Snowman cartoon. My favorite part of this whole cartoon is: when the kids are trying to name the snowman, one kid says "Oatmeal?" in the cutest, high-pitched voice ever. If you know me, you've probably heard me say "Oatmeal?" at some point. I use it when I can, but no one ever knows I'm referencing something.
Fouth in line is A Charlie Brown Christmas. The Vince Guaraldi Trio made some of the best music for that show. I listen to that soundtrack the most out of all the Christmas music I have. It's timeless, half of it's just a piano and a bass, and it's great. And, if you ask, I might do my little dance from this movie. I have a weird imitation of the kid that just bobs his head unnaturally from side to side during the Linus and Lucy song. This is a yearly request from my friend/cousin Jeff.
Fifth is my favorite, partly because of who it is and also because it is lesser-known: Muppet Family Christmas. This one originated in 1988, I believe. I'm not quite sure when we recorded it, but I'm pretty sure it is the original. I say that because (didn't realize this until recently) this one got seriously edited through the years because of copyright laws and some of the songs. But this one is a lot of fun. It is quite possibly the only time where nearly all, and I REALLY mean that, of the Muppet creations of Jim Henson were united together for one movie. I'm talking The Muppets, I'm talking Sesame Street, Baby Muppets, AND Fraggles. Not to mention a little cameo from the master himself at the end. It. Is. Spectacular.
Since I am a big fan of Sesame Street and the Muppets, it is also interesting to me (in a fun way) how much they have changed over the years. Not just voices and puppeteers, but in main characters and minor characters. For instance, in both Sesame Street and Muppet Christmas shows, Elmo is not a main character. At all. He doesn't even talk in the Muppets one. Bert and Ernie, Cookie Monster, and Big Bird used to be the real stars of the show, yet nowadays they have been pushed aside for Elmo, Abby Cadabby, Murry, and Rosita. Interesting little things to notice, that's all.
Sixth on the tape, which I don't have to watch every year, are Winnie the Pooh Christmas, and the infamous cartoon where Donald Duck plays hockey with his rambunctious nephews Huey, Dewey, and Louie.
And that's my "Christmas tape." Year after year, I would start to worry that the tape might break, snap in two when I'm rewinding, or just become so fuzzy it became unwatchable. Well, this year we got in preservation mode and my dad lovingly put them all on DVDs for me. I can't explain how excited this makes me. No more worries [for now, haha]! Oh and the other best part about this tape/now-DVD: it still has all the old commercials in it. And those are a riot in themselves.
Anyone else have a movie or two they have to watch every year? Thanks for readin'!
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Sunday, December 4, 2011
First Android experience: D+
I'd been up for an upgrade to my phone since August, and my husband had been for quite some time. Still rockin' a Palm phone, he really needed the upgrade more than myself. We decided we were ready to delve into the smartphone universe, and finally made that jump in the middle of October.
Then the obvious question: which phone to buy? I wanted to wait to see what kind of new iPhone Apple released, and if I maybe wanted to get that or the iPhone 4 for cheaper. Not all too impressed by the 4S, I didn't feel it was worth $200, and the more I looked into the specs, I didn't feel the now-outdated 4 was even worth the reduced price of $100. So, I went with the HTC Inspire.
The Inspire turned out to be nothing by trouble for me. My Facebook app crashed every frickin' time I tried to post a status update. I had to uninstall the updated app and run the old one in order to ever post anything. I'm not a Facebook addict, but come on. That's pretty ridiculous. Then, other things started to never work on the phone. I finally had it when, in trying to open a game, the phone did nothing buy black out. The screen went black and I couldn't do anything. I tried tapping the home button, which lit up, meaning the phone was still on, but nothing would respond. I couldn't hold in the power button to turn it off either. I finally had to take OUT the battery to shut the damn thing off. I was done. I had only had the thing for a week and had this many problems. I wanted Jarrod's phone, the Infuse. He had not experienced any problems, and I was still in the one-month span of time you can trade your phone no questions asked. I will never buy an HTC again. It was an awful experience and not to mention, the thing was a brick. I know 5-6 ounces doesn't sound like much (the Infuse is, like 3 oz.), but my arm would actually be tired from holding the phone up to my ear. Their phones are all really heavy for some reason.
So I traded in and got the Infuse to much excitement. Things seemed to work better, the screen was much sharper, all was well. I was delusional... The only noticeable 'flaw' was that wifi signals were weaker, which Jarrod did warn me about. Other than that, seemed fine. Until... I went to the Facebook app. Same problem. I am currently running the old version, because once again it crashes every time I want to post something! Furthermore, turns out the Infuse is still running Froyo, with no upgrade in sight (for you non-tech'ers out there: this is kind of ridiculous.) Despite it's flaws, the HTC was at least on Gingerbread. I've toyed with the idea of rooting my phone, but never actually have gone through with it.
Anyways, so Facebook still crashes, and in less than a month's time I have also had another wealth of problems:
- I can't send picture messages--this only works about 50% of the time.
- I can't download picture messages--the message says it's "downloading" but never ever finishes downloading and I never see the photo.
- I can't watch any YouTube videos. My video player NEVER works, in either the YouTube app or the web browser.
- My internal video player never works, so videos I myself record on the phone never play. The only time it will work is if I restart my phone. But the fact that I have to do that is stupid, and then it never fails that it just goes back to not working soon after.
- Just in last week: my phone's video recorder does not work either. I tried to take a video at a store, and it would not work. I had to resort to a boring photo instead.
- Half of my games never load properly, so I never get to play those.
Since I've had both the Apple experience and now the Android experience, I now understand why Apple costs more. iOS is more refined, and if you want that, then that's why you pay extra; makes sense, that's how all of Apple's products are. Granted, a lot of the little buggy things that tick me off about Android (like how your text box where you're typing does not expand, so if you have more than two lines of type, you can't see the rest of it and have no way of seeing it unless you want to tap and tap away trying to get the cursor up there) have probably been fixed with the newer OS versions.
But still. For my first Android experience, I can't say I'm impressed. I guess I just have terrible luck with phones, too. Yes, I do plan to go by the store sometime soon and tell them all of these issues I'm having with my phone. I've done nothing wrong, so hopefully they can help me out.
Next time, I think I'm just buying an iPhone.
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Muppets
We saw The Muppets last night, and we saw the late show. I only mention this because that dictates the type of audience you get, meaning no kids, a handful of adults, and some teens.
I'll start by saying I really liked the movie. If I could do half-stars, I think I'd give it a 4.5 out of 5. I'm a huge Muppet fan; love the sense of humor, but mostly love it for its pure creativity, and I truly enjoy those little characters as if they were real, which is how it's supposed to be. I've been known to cry a few times listening to Kermit sing "It's Not Easy Being Green." And I gotta say when they were panning through Kermit's old office last night, looking at all the banjos on the wall, the pictures with multiple guests on The Muppet Show, and numerous other iconic props, I teared up.
We saw the movie with my cousin and his fiancé, who are also fans. The rest of the people in the theatre, hard to tell. We were definitely the 'most-laughing' group in there. And as I mentioned there were teens there too, who, as teens usually are these days, were completely disrespectful of everyone else there and annoying. They made fun of the movie the entire time. Why in the world would you go see something you have no intention of liking? And when they weren't doing that, they were talking, for the whole theater to hear. I seriously contemplated being that chick who walks out, asks management to ask them to leave, and hope they can't subconsciously pick out my car in the parking lot. It was beyond annoying. So this leads me to my [now obvious] realization: if you are under the age of, let's say, 20, you should not see this movie. Exceptions to this rule are if you are indeed a Muppet fan, like British and dry humor, or are involved in the arts somehow.
So moving on from that. The movie was great. They took an angle to the story similar to Toy Story 3. In Toy Story 3, the 'old toys' are dealing with the fact that Andy got older and doesn't play with them any more, and they've been kind of forgotten about. It had been ten years, I believe, since the previous Toy Story 2, so that is exactly what they acknowledged with the story: Hey, it's been ten years, so let's do that and ask what has changed in the last ten years? The Muppets is a similar thing. The story is set up around the fact that it's been years since their last gig, and they've been forgotten about and replaced by other things. So they try to round up the gang, and you get to see what each Muppet found a separate career in once "the old gang" fell apart. The story itself felt natural and geniune, as did Toy Story, because it is fans like myself revisiting things we loved in our childhood that have since gone by the wayside.
I don't think it was quite the epic, comic genius of Jim Henson 30 years ago, but it was as good as it will ever get for modern times. Yeah, some of the voices were a little off, but the differences were forgivable. The jokes were very well done though, and they referenced themselves often just like they used to; referring to the camera being there, Statler and Waldorf asked a question and were like "Did we just reveal a key to the plot?" "Well I hope so, otherwise I just wasted the audience's time!" "Doh-oh-oh-oh!", etc.
There were a few more songs than normal, though. Even though I'm a fan of musicals, some of them just felt unnatural. When Amy Adams sang a song solo at a diner, it just felt kind of off. That song was not needed. But! Many of the other songs were hilarious and the lyrics would take you where you didn't think they would go, one of my favorites being the "Am I a Muppet? Or am I a Man?" or whatever it's true title is.
I had heard from a movie critic that Jason Segel, who helped write, and the director, James Bobin, approached this movie very carefully. They didn't want to blow it out of the water or make it so over the top, as many movies are these days (kids ones especially.) They really wanted to make it like the Muppets they remembered as a kid. I appreciate that, and it definitely came through. They did NOT try to outdo the movies of old, just be on par with them. All in all, it was a lot of fun and if you laughed at the Muppets back then, you should give it a shot.
I'll start by saying I really liked the movie. If I could do half-stars, I think I'd give it a 4.5 out of 5. I'm a huge Muppet fan; love the sense of humor, but mostly love it for its pure creativity, and I truly enjoy those little characters as if they were real, which is how it's supposed to be. I've been known to cry a few times listening to Kermit sing "It's Not Easy Being Green." And I gotta say when they were panning through Kermit's old office last night, looking at all the banjos on the wall, the pictures with multiple guests on The Muppet Show, and numerous other iconic props, I teared up.
We saw the movie with my cousin and his fiancé, who are also fans. The rest of the people in the theatre, hard to tell. We were definitely the 'most-laughing' group in there. And as I mentioned there were teens there too, who, as teens usually are these days, were completely disrespectful of everyone else there and annoying. They made fun of the movie the entire time. Why in the world would you go see something you have no intention of liking? And when they weren't doing that, they were talking, for the whole theater to hear. I seriously contemplated being that chick who walks out, asks management to ask them to leave, and hope they can't subconsciously pick out my car in the parking lot. It was beyond annoying. So this leads me to my [now obvious] realization: if you are under the age of, let's say, 20, you should not see this movie. Exceptions to this rule are if you are indeed a Muppet fan, like British and dry humor, or are involved in the arts somehow.
So moving on from that. The movie was great. They took an angle to the story similar to Toy Story 3. In Toy Story 3, the 'old toys' are dealing with the fact that Andy got older and doesn't play with them any more, and they've been kind of forgotten about. It had been ten years, I believe, since the previous Toy Story 2, so that is exactly what they acknowledged with the story: Hey, it's been ten years, so let's do that and ask what has changed in the last ten years? The Muppets is a similar thing. The story is set up around the fact that it's been years since their last gig, and they've been forgotten about and replaced by other things. So they try to round up the gang, and you get to see what each Muppet found a separate career in once "the old gang" fell apart. The story itself felt natural and geniune, as did Toy Story, because it is fans like myself revisiting things we loved in our childhood that have since gone by the wayside.
I don't think it was quite the epic, comic genius of Jim Henson 30 years ago, but it was as good as it will ever get for modern times. Yeah, some of the voices were a little off, but the differences were forgivable. The jokes were very well done though, and they referenced themselves often just like they used to; referring to the camera being there, Statler and Waldorf asked a question and were like "Did we just reveal a key to the plot?" "Well I hope so, otherwise I just wasted the audience's time!" "Doh-oh-oh-oh!", etc.
There were a few more songs than normal, though. Even though I'm a fan of musicals, some of them just felt unnatural. When Amy Adams sang a song solo at a diner, it just felt kind of off. That song was not needed. But! Many of the other songs were hilarious and the lyrics would take you where you didn't think they would go, one of my favorites being the "Am I a Muppet? Or am I a Man?" or whatever it's true title is.
I had heard from a movie critic that Jason Segel, who helped write, and the director, James Bobin, approached this movie very carefully. They didn't want to blow it out of the water or make it so over the top, as many movies are these days (kids ones especially.) They really wanted to make it like the Muppets they remembered as a kid. I appreciate that, and it definitely came through. They did NOT try to outdo the movies of old, just be on par with them. All in all, it was a lot of fun and if you laughed at the Muppets back then, you should give it a shot.
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