Remember When It Rained

Prepare yourselves for a shock. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was falsely advertised! (cue gasps, dropped jaws, etc.) Now you may ask, how would I know how a movie that is eighteen years old was advertised? And, perhaps more importantly, why would I even care? I should clarify: I don't really think of it as a huge blow to my outlook on life. But it came as a big shock to me, my friend Charity, and her husband, James, last Thursday evening. On a whim, Charity and I made plans to watch Robin Hood (guess i'm on that kind of a kick, thanks to mr. richard armitage, otherwise known as guy of gisborne in the bbc robin hood tv series . . . -sigh-). James, once the movie was done, went to the special features and wanted to watch the original trailer. My initial reaction was, "Why would you want to watch the trailer to a movie you just watched?" But as we watched the trailer, we were all astounded by the music in the background. Was it the Robin Hood soundtrack we heard? Oh, no. To our chagrin and amusement, we all three recognized the music as the soundtrack to Willow (which, coincidentally, was the last movie i watched with charity . . . oh, the irony)! And naturally, we're all very nerdy that we recognized the music, but this poses the question: Did anybody go to the movie theater to watch Robin Hood, hoping in vain to see Val Kilmer in a cameo role?

Last Friday evening, Esther, Rachel, and I were at home, twiddling our respective thumbs and trying to come up with something fun to do. Then, in a moment of sheer un-Esther-ness, Esther took charge, came up with an idea, and made us do it. Well, I wouldn't say she forced us, but usually Esther is so indecisive that it came as a surprise to me when she very authoritatively said, "Let's have a girls' night! And do make-overs!" So we did. And it ended up being really fun, too. I was in charge of Rachel's hair and Esther's make-up, and we were all pretty pleased with the results, with Rachel's Audrey Hepburn updo and Esther's 1940s-movie-star look . . . and my 1940s-mom look . . . (for the record, i looked pretty dang cute; but i will not attempt to deny that i looked like a mom, especially when i put on the apron and posed with the cookies when we took pictures.) It was a long process, even the picture-taking ordeal afterward, but it was something fun and different to do. And thank goodness I didn't have any early-morning plans on Saturday, otherwise I would have been suffering after going to bed at 2 am.

Us lovely girls
And really, it's the return of Doris Macafee
with the cookies.

Tomorrow I'm hoping for three reasons that the weather will not turn into a torrential downpour. Reason #1: Our company summer activity in Provo Canyon. I'm on the Spirit Committee, which means I've helped plan it, which means I most definitely have to be there, which means if we have tons of food left over because nobody shows up, I will not be a happy camper. Reason #2: We have a tri-ward activity tomorrow night, also in Provo Canyon. This is something that I would actually find fun (i guess i don't have a great attitude about the company picnic), but again, if the weather's bad, people won't show up. There is an alternate location in case of inclement weather, but I wonder how many people will be willing to go there. Who knows? But yes. Two activities in the canyon tomorrow, threatened by this very unnatural weather. Reason #3: The Utah Valley marathon that starts in the canyon. (what is with all the events in provo canyon?) Not that I'm running in it; no way! But Esther is. And I hope, for her sake, that it's not raining cats and dogs.

-Me

"'I love you, Sorsha!' I don't love her; she kicked me in the face!" -Madmartigan

I Hope You Don't Mind That I Put Down in Words . . . Lots of Things

In case those who read this haven't figured it out by now, I really like to write. I have ever since I was a little girl, composing four-page stories from the age of nine. It was the pride of my life to read my stories to my fourth-grade class and hear my fellow students tell me that my stories were really good. I continued the story-writing up until I was about fourteen. I stopped when I realized that my old masterpieces really weren't all that great. One of my biggest regrets is that I threw away all but one of my school-girl stories in a moment of teenage stupidity, and now their plots are distant memories. They had really gripping titles, too. "Snow Camp", "Daddy's Home", and "Basketball Wars", just to name a few. But I still really enjoyed writing, even after I gave up writing stories regularly. I took a Creative Writing class my senior year in high school, and I was so proud of myself when I managed to create a sonnet in iambic pentameter within twenty minutes. Shocking. And a long way from my first thrilling epic ever written, "The King and Queen Are Missing!" (gee, i wonder how the plot of that story went.)

I have never aspired to be a great writer, though, and I don't really think I ever will be, but I've been really surprised at the last year of my life and how much time I have spent typing away at story ideas that pop into my head at random times. Sometimes it's a dialog that I think of first, or an image of a scene that I want to describe, and suddenly I think of a whole story to go along with it. Just last week, between the states of sleep and wakefulness, a scene popped in my brain that was crying out for an explanation. Once I was fully awake, I couldn't put the scene aside. I had to create a story to it. Once I had, I shared the storyline with Esther. I'm not sure she was really all that enthralled with it considering it's my hobby and she was lying in bed, but I think she did find a couple of plot points kind of interesting.

If you're curious about the kinds of things I end up writing about, it's not really worth it to ask me for an excerpt or anything. I may be an extremely loud and obnoxious person, but I'm incredibly shy when it comes to sharing these little tidbits of stories, especially when I want to expand on them and actually write something book-length. It was a big deal when I read a mere paragraph to Becky and Esther from something I'd been working on for a couple of months (i'd written more than a paragraph after two months of working on it, but the paragraph was all i shared with them). I'll just say that one of my greatest wishes has been to write a really great American Revolution historical fiction epic. Well, maybe "epic" is too grand a word. But I have a tendency to exaggerate, in case you missed that, as well.

I don't think I have the ambition to really try and ever publish anything I write. I think I'd surprise even myself if I ever did. For now, it's still a hobby I love. But just in case I ever branch out and write something that I don't just post to a blog, you can all say you knew me when. Because, naturally, whatever I write will immediately be a big-time best-seller, complete with a feature film option, and I will be a hit celebrity, like Stephenie Meyer . . . but not like Stephenie Meyer. So far, none of my stories have centered around hormonal, teenage vampires. I have a feeling they never will.

-Me

"Typos are very important to all written form. It gives the reader something to look for so they aren't distracted by the total lack of content in your writing." -Randy K. Milholland