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A Book to Love

My co-worker Ketty and I have started trading books. She's one of those great people who belongs to an old people book club, and volunteers to trim the historical society's rose garden. I just daydream about being that sort of person, and then base frivolous characters after them in short stories. But she's the real thing! Anyway, as a true testament to her character, the first book she loaned me was The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. Apparently it's all the rage, but I had never heard of it. I started reading it last weekend at the Donut Whole in Wichita (PS - fantastic little 24 hour donut shop - a Kansas hipster's dream) and Betsy said that it was quite the popular read. It's all epistolary, but please - don't let that stop you. It's warm and quaint and funny and has a genuine emotion to it. It doesn't veer too far into sentiment, but offers realistic portraits of this idyllic world. Sort of a Stars Hollow set in the 1940's. I highly recommend it. And if anyone can recommend anything in the same vein, I would really appreciate it. Now that I've entered this book trading world, I'm not sure what to give out. I read such dark, strange collections of stories that I don't really have anything equal to the Guernsey folks. Help a poor snobby intellectual out.

Awkward Behavior

On Saturday, I watched my first live production of Hamlet. I know, right. 23 years old and I had never seen Hamlet performed. I read about it on The Hour Badly Spent (fantastic Manhattan blog) and was so grateful. I narrowly missed seeing Michael Wieser's last Manhattan production. As most people in my Fundamentals of Acting class know, I have an enormously creepy fascination with Mr. Wieser. He started at K-State when I did, and I think I've seen every single one of his productions. From Grease to Mamet, Stoppard to Closer, Chekhov, and now... Shakespeare. To watch him end his Manhattan career as Hamlet was truly a gift and I am oh so glad that I got to see it. It also featured my favorite up and comer - Mr. Kyle Myers (who I met at WWU, when I was a director - but I'm sure he doesn't remember.) The point of this story is that 1. I turn normal people into idols when I decide that they are talented and 2. I got to see Hamlet, finally, and I loved it. It was the perfect way to spend my last free weekend until December. Also, I ran into several of our ELP teachers at the production, and one of them told me that Hale Library owns an entire collection of BBC productions of all of Shakespeare's plays. So I don't have to wait until the next Michael Wieser decides to play Othello. I can watch it whenever I want. The magic of libraries surprises me again.

The end of freedom

This week marks the busiest week in ELP history, trying to welcome 14 new teachers, test and place 300 new students, and enroll over 500 in a day and a half. Immediately following, Steven and I will drive to Garden to see Brennen and friends at Tumbleweed (yay!) and then come back for the first week of classes. Then next weekend, I begin my first semester. As a full-time graduate student. Fortunately, being a full-time graduate student is not as expensive as I anticipated. Tuition is comparable to undergrad, and my books only cost me $30. Again, the magic of libraries played a major role. I am not looking forward to giving up my movie watching weekends, but I am looking forward to moving forward. The worst thing about the end of summer is the anxiety I feel about what challenges are about to reveal themselves. From August 1st until the day I get my syllabus, I have this horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that impossible deadlines are going to start popping out of my planner. I get myself so worked up that I'll wake myself in the middle of a dream, convinced that I am procrastinating and shirking my time management schedule. Once the semester starts, there's at least some sort of schedule to make, but until then, it's all worry with no solution. I've discovered the only thing that works at all is baking chocolate chip cookies and reading books about far away literary societies. And, of course, a healthy dose of Friends on DVD. I am not sane. I will not recover quickly. Consider this my formal apology.

Movies are marvelous

As I near the edge of the semester, I feel duty bound to report to you just how many movies I have seen this summer. You should feel impressed, or perhaps envious of my accomplishment. If you don't, there is perhpas no reason for me to post it, and I have been thinking of nothing else since I ordered Netflix.

Movies I have seen for the very first time:

Casablanca, Taxi Driver, On the Waterfront, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Singin' in the Rain, The Maltese Falcon, Vertigo, Tootsie, Bye Bye Birdie, The Godfather, The Godfather Part 2, Raging Bull, It Happened One Night, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Manchurian Candidate, Cool Hand Luke, and Rebel Without a Cause.

From these I have learned some very interesting things.

1. I love Marlon Brando. I would watch him eat cereal. I would watch him decide which laundry detergent to buy. I think he's a genius and I wish that he made more movies. He is absolutely captivating.

(To think, I used to have pictures of Ben Affleck on my walls. For shame.)

2. With the exception of To Kill a Mockingbird, I don't like movies from the 60's. Do I not understand them? Are they too creepy? Or is it just that Janet Leigh is always playing two characters, and we're supposed to not notice? There's just something about it that I cannot connect to. Though I did fall in love with Paul Newman from the very first smile. 100 percent.

(That cool Luke smile. Natural born world shaker. Miss you, Paul.)

3. Sad but true, my favorite movie in this list is Tootsie. Ever since I watched a behind the scenes movie about Dustin Hoffman in a production of Death of a Salesman, he has remained my favorite actor. His work in Tootsie is a bit frantic, but still hysterical. And those scenes with Sidney Pollack! Eternal! Every time we started to watch a new movie from the list, a little part of me wanted to just watch Tootsie again. And, on Netflix, you can watch it any time you want - it's part of the online features.

(Best. Scene. In. Movie.)

4. I wish Robert DeNiro still made good movies. Oh, and movie trivia - "I coulda been a contender!" - On the Waterfront, not Raging Bull. Now you know.

I'm in possession of The Philadelphia Story right now, and the plan is to watch it before the end of the week. As for the rest of the list, I imagine it will be slow going, now that we're up against the double threat of homework and college football. Autumn is truly the best time of year.