please ignore vera dietz

1. I got Please Ignore Vera Dietz from my school librarian who told me she was reading it on the subway and crying hysterically. So of course I knew I had to read it.

2. Please Ignore Vera Dietz is about a girl named Vera who works as a pizza delivery girl and lives with her ex-alcoholic and "parsimonious" father. Vera's best friend Charlie, also the boy she has been in love with since she was a child, has just died, and she is trying to deal with this, as well as how much she hated him because of the terrible things he did to her the year before he died. The book goes back and forth from her past memories of Charlie to what is happening in the present, and also goes between the point of views of Vera, her father, dead Charlie, and the Pagoda, which is a building in the town that I still cannot seem to understand the significance of. Yes, the inanimate object has a point of view.

3. I really really love Vera and respect her. Charlie is right: she's classy. And I give her a lot of credit, considering her father was an alcoholic, and her mother was a stripper who had her at the age of seventeen, and then ran off with a podiatrist when Vera was twelve. So considering all of this, Vera is pretty cool. Plus her love for Charlie melts my heart. The only thing I don't like is all of the alcohol she consumes throughout the book. Not that I have a problem with alcohol, its just that it makes me super nervous when she drinks as she delivers her pizzas...especially since her father and grandfather were alcoholics! But even with that, Vera is still pretty great!

4. I loved Vera, and I loved Charlie. And I loved them together. Honestly, by the end of the book I was so in love with Charlie, despite everything he did. Charlie was NOT a bad person, no matter what he did. And it KILLED ME because the whole book I was getting that VERA AND CHARLIE MUST BE TOGETHER feeling but then I would remember that Charlie is dead. So sometimes I would get the VERA AND JAMES MUST BE TOGETHER feeling instead. But anyway I loved the intensity, especially around part five. And dead Charlie was pretty cool. And oh so sweet. Dead Charlie narration plus Vera narration equaled a really awesome book.

believe the legend beware the wolf

Yay for the super huge movie poster! So as I mentioned in my last post I saw the movie Red Riding Hood over the weekend. And contrary to other reviews, IT WAS A GOOD MOVIE.

Personally, I think that the only reason this movie is getting hated on is because its director, Catherine Hardwicke, was also the director of the first twilight movie, and well YOU KNOW how people cannot stand anything related to twilight. But I'm sorry, I thought she did a good job. So it's not the MOVIE OF THE CENTURY or anything, but it was still a decent movie.

This apparently was the weekend for spinoff movies, because Red Riding Hood is also very obviously a spinoff and I don't have to tell you on what. The main character, or Red Riding Hood, played by Amanda Seyfried is Valerie, who lives in this little mountain town that occasionally gets attacked by a werewolf. Because of this, the village people live in constant fear, especially on wolf nights, aka, the nights in which there is a full moon. Valerie is in love with Peter, a childhood friend, but is arranged to marry Henry, who is a blacksmith, and therefore will make much more money than Peter, the lowly woodcutter. Personally, I thought Henry was cuter than Peter, but oh well.

The reason I thought this movie was good was really because of the suspense and the mystery. You know the wolf has to be one of the villagers, but you really DON'T KNOW WHO. It's like every other scene makes you suspect a different person, and then when you finally find out who it is, well, I can't say anything about that. It was scary in a very non-horror movie way, which I also liked because I really can't take super scary movies. And the scenery was gorgeous. I would love to know where they filmed it.

I don't know. I just keep reading these reviews where people say how bad it is. Maybe its just me. (And my friend, because she liked it too). Okay, the ending I wasn't really a fan of...they could have done a much better job. But overall it really wasn't half as bad as anyone is saying. I swear. Go see for yourself if you don't believe me!

i just saw the most beastly movie...

So I saw TWO MOVIES THIS WEEKEND. YAYYYYYYY. Movie number 1 which I saw on Friday was BEASTLY. And that title kind of makes me want to use Beastly as an adjective. Though I'm not sure if it will be a positive or negative adjective. Anywayyyy then the second movie which I saw on Saturday was Red Riding Hood.

And here was the Beastly poster! (I am still thinking of it as an adjective!!!)

And now I just made this SPLIT SECOND decision to make this into TWO POSTS instead of one because this may be longer than I thought. Only because I thought it would be unfair to put a post about Beastly and not include a picture of Alex Pettyfer and his abs.

.

You can thank me later.

Anyway, Beastly is a modern day spinoff on Beauty and the Beast. Apparently it was based on a book? But anyway I don't think I need to tell anyone the Beauty and the Beast story. If you didn't see Disney's animated version than I am quite sorry that you were such a deprived child. So the beginning of the movie was okay...actually that's a lie. In the beginning of the movie, all I could think was WOW THIS SUCKS. It's only redeeming quality was Alex Pettyfer, but then he had to get all ugly so it ruined it. Boy do I sound shallow. But seriously, the beginning was MEHHHHHHHH. Then that blind guy appeared and suddenly it got a whole lot better. That blind guy was FUNNY!!!! And then some cute romance happened, you know, some AWWW moments that made me smile, and when I was walking out, I probably still had that goofy smile on my face that is the result of said AWWW moments. I think they could have done better with this movie. Especially if it was based on a book, though I'm not sure if that's true quite yet...*Googles* Okay I just looked at the wikipedia article on the book and that was wildly different. Geez. Okay maybe if they went along with the book? I don't know, but it could have been better. Not that it was terrible or anything. I mean it was decent. But nothing I would go home and blog about, ya know? Oh wait...

river viiperi

So the next male model I'm going to talk about is River Viiperi. Nineteen year old half Spanish half Finnish River was born in Ibiza, Spain. He started modelling in 2009 and is currently with Soul Artist Management. You might have seen him on American Eagle's website for the fall/winter 2010 looks, and more recently, in Calvin Klein's CK One campaign with a bunch of other big models, including the models.com's number one female model, Lara Stone and Yuri Pleskun, something he mentions on his blog, Never Back Down. It's pretty interesting and entertaining, and has good insight on the life of a model. If you're curious the link is riverdelfin.blogspot.com. Oh that's also awesome about him. He uses blogspot like me! :)

(Random update: I don't know if it was like this when I wrote this entry or if it just changed, but I was just looking at models.com's rankings and apparently he's number 35...not sure if I missed that before or what. -April 1st, 2011)

yuri pleskun

I always used to think that the whole male modelling thing was pretty stupid, until very recently when I discovered just how awesome they really are. And that they're not all gay. So I decided that for a couple of posts I'd just go over a few of my favorite male models, and maybe even some female models, just for the fun of it. Number one is Yuri Pleskun, who as of now, is my absolute favorite.

Yuri Pleskun is a 20 year old model with Request Management with a bad boy vibe and a totally different look from the stereotypical pretty boy model. He is of Ukranian origin, but grew up in the Bronx, which is where he was discovered in 2008. Since then he has risen to one of the world's highest ranked male models. A couple of quick facts: he loves fried chicken, hates the fact that he's sometimes treated like an object (in France they call the models mannequins), and is good friends with fellow Request model Cole Mohr. He's definitely my favorite because he's funny with a good personality, and well, who can't resist that wink he gave the cameras during the Nylon Model Citizen interview? Plus he comes from New York City, which is where I'm from so that makes him doubly awesome! Look out for him on Calvin Klein's new CK One campaign.

humanity

I've been meaning to write this entry for a few days. Its kind of something I always think about, and figured I'd might as well put into words.

I love the concept of individual people. How every single person has so many layers, and how no two people are exactly the same. How everyone sees and feels everything in a different way. We all have likes and dislikes and emotions and everything that makes us human. Everyone has something that they are passionate about, even if they haven't discovered it yet. Like how I live and breathe my writing, and some people live and breathe their sports or other hobbies. And how everyone has a different color that they just love, or music that just speaks to them. I always think about that, especially with music. What is it about trance that I love so much? Well I love it, I can't even explain it, because to me its just the best thing ever, but to people like my dad for instance, it couldn't be more annoying. I can't understand people who like country, but there are people who just love country, probably just as much as I love trance.

In some cases its a question of nature or nurture. I like reading, so does that mean its in my genes? But liking music isn't really in your genes. A lot of time it depends on your culture and your age group. To my grandpa everything on the radio isn't music, it's just noise, and I can't imagine what he'd think of my trance and techno.

But this isn't even about music. It's just about our individuality as a human race. We are the only animal with such a wide variety of likes and dislikes, when it comes to everything. We're attracted to different people and colors and settings that goes beyond basic survival instinct. I mean, though I don't know how I'd live without it, I wouldn't actually die if someone didn't let me write.

I think its one of the reasons why i like writing so much. Writing stories I mean. I love creating the characters, mostly my main characters, because I can create someone with all of the depth, all of the layers, as every human being. I can show what makes them happy, what irks them, how they talk, every little idiosyncracy. I just like creating humans.

We're all so unique. It's really true. And its amazing that we all have these different souls. It can't be genetics or what we're brought up with. It must be something more. I don't think this is something that science can explain. I guess I'm a romantic, but I just love this idea of humanity.

and the academy award goes to

So in honor of the Academy Awards (which I had a great time watching, I might add) I decided that it would be TOTALLY awesome if I came up with MY OWN ACADEMY AWARDS. Not exactly like the Oscars exactly though. Because I am choosing the categories, and then it counts for all the movies in the world! That I've seen. Ahem. Anyway here we go.

The best OMG endings:

1. Inception

2. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

3. Black Swan

The best soundtrack (I am a sucker for soundtracks, I'm sorry)

1. Pirates of the Caribbean

2. Inception

3. Harry Potter

The best to make you cry

1. Titanic

2. Pearl Harbor

3. The Last Song

The best based on a book

1. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

The best animated

1. Toy Story

2. Mulan

The best songs

1. "Belle" from Beauty and the Beast

2. Basically every song in Mulan

The best kiss

1. Jack and Rose's first kiss in the Titanic

2. Will and Elizabeth's first kiss in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Best Scenery

1. Lord of the Rings

2. Inception

Best Lead Actress

1. Natalie Portman in Black Swan

Best Lead Actor

that's a good question.

When I think of the best lead actor, I'll add that haha. But now I'm finished!

By the way, I made a tumblr. I actually like tumblr. But its just for pictures. I swear I won't be like those other people that put their life stories :)