The other week my older sister Kate, who knows some people in movie production, emailed me to say, "Here's your chance to send naked pictures of yourself to Tobey Maguire!"

What she meant was, they're shooting a film here in Seattle, currently titled The Details, in which Tobey plays an OB/GYN, and they needed photos of newborns and new parents in the hospital to decorate Dr. Tobey's bulletin board on set. Kate had a bunch of me, Steve, and baby Toby (how about that name coincidence?), so with my permission, she sent a few to them. (None of them were actual naked photos, I hasten to add, though when you're wearing a hospital gown and giving birth, that's always a risk.)

Today Kate received confirmation that two of our photos--one of me with baby, and one of Steve with baby--are on the bulletin board and are official Set Dressing! She sent a photo of the bulletin board, and yep, there we are. I don't know a) if I'm allowed to show you the Set Dressing Bulletin Board photo, otherwise I would, or b) if you'll even be able to see it in the finished movie. But I thought it was a fun piece of news. My son made it into a movie when he was barely one minute old!

As it happens, my regular babysitter is currently working on that film too, as a costume assistant. My degrees of Kevin Bacon are skyrocketing lately.

This all makes it sound like I totally know people in Hollywood. I totally don't, and I don't even really know people who know people. Which is why such small events, like becoming Set Dressing, make me happy.

What with infant rearing and all, I'm not getting out to see the Half-Blood Prince film anytime soon. But! Fortunately the rest of you have, and have provided discussions and reviews, and in at least one case, a really amusing parody version! Thank you, killer_cola, for raising many a giggle in this weary mom.

Some excerpts I particularly liked:

DUMBLEDORE: I'd get used to the bleak colourlessness: that's here to stay.
YATES: What can I say? Hanging around Helena Bonham Carter brings out the Burton in me.
SLUGHORN: Dumbledore! Come in, come in! I've been on the lam for a year, carrying only photographs of teenagers I was fond of.
HARRY: ...
DUMBLEDORE: Relax, Harry, Horace isn't a paedophile. He just acts like one in more or less every way.
HARRY: Well, sir, it was you I was intending to keep my eye on. You've got notably camper since Rowling outed you.
DUMBLEDORE: (swatting him with a women's magazine) Oh, you bitchy thing you. Take my hand.

FRED & GEORGE'S JOKE SHOP/SINGLES BAR
HALF OF HOGWARTS shows up to flirt at one another over love potions. Which is kind of creepy, if you think about it, since they're all thinking, "I'm gonna roofie *that* one."

HARRY: Don't worry Hermione, you'll get together in the end. There are too many Ron/Hermione shippers to allow it to be any other way.
HARMONY SHIPPERS: We know, we know. But can you at least hold her hand so we can kid ourselves?
HERMIONE: (snuggling against HARRY) I know you feel the same way, Harry. I've seen how awkwardly you look at Ginny.
HARRY: (cradling HERMIONE) She is a vision of mousy perfection.
HARMONY SHIPPERS: We love and hate this scene all at once.

HARRY: Ron, you for once don't look as though you've just puked into your mouth. Is something wrong?

DRACO: (in a darkened bathroom, sobbing against his own reflection) I am the new icon for emos everywhere!
HARRY: You're showing your descent to the dark side with a side fringe and eyeliner? What is this, Spider-Man 3?

(And if, like me, you can't even remember the details of the book, I once parodied that for everyone's reference.)

Sometimes Amazon makes me laugh. From the listing of The Ghost Downstairs today:

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

89% buy the item featured on this page:
The Ghost Downstairs

11% buy
Luvs Premium Stretch Diapers, Size 4 (22-37 Lbs), 180 Diapers

Hmm, diapers or a book; it's always the quandary I face when browsing Amazon. Just like 11% of the population, apparently.

I do like the items that have shown up (and sometimes vanished again) on the Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought section: What Does Mrs. Claus Do? by my sister Kate Wharton, of course; the DVD of the Colin Firth Pride & Prejudice; The Ghost and Mrs. Muir by R.A. Dick; and the DVD of Doctor Horrible's Sing Along Blog. Getting lumped with Joss Whedon, even by a computer, for one day once upon a time, is a high honor.

...none of you posted about Robert Pattinson kissing another man and doing gay sex scenes for an upcoming movie. It's called Little Ashes, and (making matters substantially odder) he plays a young Salvador Dali, and I bet I'll be able to keep from snickering right up to the moment when he starts wearing the crazy up-swooped mustache. But in that kiss photo linked above, at least, and thus presumably in some of the film, he's clean-shaven.

I just have to chuckle, since a role like that is such a perfect way to discombobulate shallow teen fans. They're used to their heartthrobs doing predictable chick-flicks, action films, and heartwarming family dramas, not moving straight from Twilight to a biopic about an eccentric Spanish painter. For that, RPattz, I give you bonus points.

Released today online and free:
http://thehuntforgollum.com/

LOTR fans, go watch! This is a short film, slightly over 30 minutes, made entirely by volunteer fans on a non-profit basis. And given the shoestring budget, I must say it looks, sounds, and feels amazing. If it weren't for the different cast, I'd believe it was a long extra sequence from Peter Jackson's extended DVDs. And actually, the guy who plays Gandalf looks so much like Ian McKellen that I might not have noticed the difference there, at least for the first few minutes.

Basically it covers the little sequence mentioned in the Council of Elrond, and the Appendices, in which Aragorn goes out hunting for Gollum, before the main events of LOTR take place. The filming and writing is very much in the style of the New Line movies, complete with a brief dream-sequence by Arwen and some amusing grumbling by Gollum. I'll be keeping my eye on this production team to see what they do next.

Thanks to Dave in the UK for emailing me about this project! Might not have reached my radar otherwise.

One little post here, separate from the upcoming perfume drawing, to simply say that these two photos are making me fangirlishly happy. ( Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr. as Watson and Holmes )

Slash possibilities completely aside, they just look so dapper! And a little Victorian-seedy, which is kind of hot too.

Having been listening to another Holmes story on The Classic Tales podcast, I've been thinking the casting of Robert Downey Jr. is not as weird as it seems on the surface. Holmes has a quick, rational mind, yes, but he's also got a lazy way of tossing himself into armchairs and leaning back with his eyes closed to listen to people, plus that whole wild cocaine-taking side. The role fits pretty well, I'd say. (Plus, he's a good actor, so I think he can tackle it.)

1. A pretty darn impressive bunch of Photoshop jobs melding Star Wars themes/characters into classical art. Weirdly good, and probably even more so if I knew a bit more about art. Thanks to naill_renfro for finding those.

2. Heard on NPR's "Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me," when Carrie Fisher was a guest and in a mood to share gossip: "Alec Guinness once gave Mark Hamill 20 pounds to go away." She added that Mark was a movie buff and kept pestering Guinness with questions. And yes, he apparently took the money and went away.

Huzzah! Verily, I did find ten movies I could recommend. It's easier to recommend movies than books, anyway, since they're so much less of a time commitment. (For the viewer, I mean. Actually making a movie looks a hundred times harder and more complicated than writing a book; otherwise I'd be in the film industry.)

[Edit: Yes, these are films I saw in 2008. Not films from 2008, necessarily.]

10. and 9. (They're interchangeable, really.) Northanger Abbey (2007, Felicity Jones) and Emma (1996, Kate Beckinsale). I don't recall the books' details well enough to know how much they condensed and changed when turning them into films. I'm sure Austen purists hate these concise little pieces. But if you just want some amusing Regency fluff with that veneer of classic lit, then they're quite enjoyable.

8. Atonement. This is one of those movies, like Magnolia, that I admired and found captivating, but wouldn't want to watch more than once--at least, not all the way through. Too depressing by the end. Still, the method of storytelling appealed to my writer's heart, the cinematography was gorgeous, and James McAvoy, just in case you wondered, totally jumped onto my crush list this year. (Also adored him in Becoming Jane.)

7. Imagine Me & You. A mainstream lesbian love story, as sweet and natural as any hetero chick flick. As such, also pretty predictable, but lovely to watch. Those gals made me want to do my hair nicer. And really this movie made the list because Anthony Stewart Head is in it.

6. The Jane Austen Book Club. I'm ashamed that something so Oprah's-book-pick is on my list. But for whatever reason, I found it lots of fun. I assume this has a lot to do with Hugh Dancy's performance, a totally different turn from his usual Masterpiece Theatre costume roles: he played a geeky American software developer who rides his bike everywhere (decked out in all types of safety gear) and prefers science fiction but is willing to give this Jane Austen a try. Too cute.

5. Paris, Je T'Aime. A collection of five-minute films, all from different directors and in all kinds of styles and languages, with nothing in common except being set in Paris. (Plus a few clever overlaps between stories here and there.) Like a box of chocolate bonbons with surprise fillings. Relatively star-studded, too. Elijah Wood fans, take note: this is your chance to see vampire-Lij!

4. Waitress. Mmm, pie. Seriously, the pies make this movie. But everyone turns in a great performance, too, from Nathan Fillion as a creepy/cute/awkward OB-GYN to Keri Russell as the main pie-making pregnant waitress, to the tragically now deceased Adrienne Shelly (who also directed it) as a nerdy coworker, to Andy Griffith as a crochety old guy.

3. Notes on a Scandal. Cate Blanchett always rocks, even when her character is doing morally not-so-wonderful things. For instance, when she plays a high school teacher romancing one of her 15-year-old students. As you might imagine, scandal ensues. Judi Dench and Bill Nighy, who also always rock, round out the film with their portrayals of the rather viperish fellow teacher and the cuckolded husband.

2. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. You know I love perfume, and even if this film has its heroes and villains turned upside-down, they get their perfurmery right. The passion for scent, and where it leads one disturbed young man with the world's best nose, is painted beautifully. I wish a film could be scratch-and-sniff. Well, except for those nasty 1700s-fishmonger-district scenes...

1. My Neighbor Totoro. On those days when you can't stand Disney because it seems too damn saccharine and dumbed-down, thank God we've got Hayao Miyazaki. I've loved his films in the past; Spirited Away was probably my favorite. This one is similar to Spirited Away, and to Alice in Wonderland for that matter, but less wild; gentler and more pastoral. And somehow this studio shows little kids exactly right--not over-cute, not over-obnoxious, just the way they are in real life in every country. Loved it.

I'm taking this space to pay tribute to Modern Male Actors Who Can Sing. Women are encouraged to take voice lessons, and are less shy about singing, so it's no surprise when they turn out to sing well. But men have to get past that whole "singing is for sissies" stereotype, especially in recent decades (unlike the '40s and '50s when, like, every movie was a musical), so I want to salute the ones who have made the biggest impression on me.

In this list I'll only include instances where I've seen the whole movie or play in question, not just YouTube clips. For example, I know Hugh Jackman has sung on stage many a time, but I've never seen one of his performances, so I can't really say I've formed an impression there.

However, I will provide YouTube clips for each of these men so you can enjoy them yourselves.

1. Ewan McGregor, Moulin Rouge. Ewan won me over as a lifelong fangirl through this film. The tragic love story and glittery sets would have been enough, but the heartfelt, skilled singing clinched it.

2. Neil Patrick Harris, Dr Horrible. Neil's a Broadway actor and singer, too, but this is the first time I was treated to his talents. So sweet, so funny!

3. Billy Boyd, The Return of the King. The Lord of the Rings films were full of great music, but Billy's a cappella gave me the biggest goosebumps.

4. James Marsters, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. More Whedonverse here. God love the man for encouraging singing. Not only is James, as Spike, witty and sexy, but he can sing a mean Goth-rock, too.

5. Anthony Stewart Head, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And while we're on "Once More With Feeling," I can't omit Giles and his golden English voice. *sigh*

6. John Cameron Mitchell, Hedwig and the Angry Inch. He's adorable in drag, and the movie is ten times sweeter and more clever than you expect going in. Plus, could the music rock more? I thought not.

7. Guy Pearce, The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. For the most part, Guy Pearce, Hugo Weaving, and Terrence Stamp don't do any actual singing in Priscilla, just lip-synching. But they're so fabulous that I had to find a way to include the film. So here's a clip of Guy singing for a few seconds. (Warning: some cheeky profanity in this one.)

8. Rick Moranis, Little Shop of Horrors. Reaching back to the 80s for this one, but what the heck. I sure hope Rick's gotten a chance to sing more than this one part, because he totally rocked it.

9. Tim Curry, The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Reaching back even further for this one, but how can I not include Tim Curry in Rocky Horror? I rather doubt anyone else ever took camp so far, so successfully.

10. Gerard Butler, The Phantom of the Opera. Okay, not everyone can live up to Michael Creighton, but Gerard did a fine job trying, and is a fine man as well. Way too good-looking for the Phantom, actually.

It occurs to me that I could go on way too long with this list if I wanted, so I'll stop at ten. And I'm sure I'm forgetting someone obvious, so remind me.

And it can be yours, too, with Sephora SuperShimmer Powder, available now, for the holidays!

Which is to say, I went out with many a relative and saw Twilight yesterday. I liked it. I thought it was fun. We did burst into laughter at times where they probably didn't intend the audience to do that--though I'm hoping they did. (Such as Robert Pattinson's extremely weird, yet very adolescent-male, moments of being socially awkward to the point of rudeness.)

Random notes, none of which spoil anything:

1. The pasty vampire makeup, with the red lips, looked a little silly in some shots. My sister Kate put it best: "Maybe he's immortal. Maybe it's Maybelline."

2. The Pacific Northwest looked beautiful. As it always does, thank you very much. Complete with chainsaw-carved bears! That is a very authentic touch, we must admit.

3. But, unless Charlie keeps the house at 75 degrees, I doubt Bella would be sleeping in a little tank top in the cold rainy months. Our shoulders freeze here if we try that.

4. Jasper's alarmed facial expression cracked me up. Looked a lot like Johnny Depp as either Edward Scissorhands or Ichabod Crane.

5. Could the subtext under the vampirism plot be any more clearly about the dangerous allure of teen sex? Approximate conversations from the film:
He: I can't be near you. If I start, I won't be able to stop.
She: I'm not afraid.
He: You should be. I'm not that strong.
She: (nuzzling up close) Yes you are. I trust you.
He: (labored breathing) You really shouldn't.

6. I did like the leads for the most part, especially Billy Burke (Charlie) and, yes, Robert Pattinson. I appreciate that he did the self-loathing, rather creepy interpretation of Edward, rather than Too Suave And Romantic To Endure, as it's possible to interpret him in the books. Flaws are endearing.

7. The Cullen house looked nothing like its book description. But it did look like a typical expensive house in the Northwest, so maybe that's better anyway.

You know, the Twilight trailers look fun and all, but the new Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince trailers look awesome.

Trailer 1

Trailer 2

Trailer 3

I think Half-Blood Prince was my favorite of the books, so I'm excited to see these snippets of scenes.

However, either they added something or my memory fails me. Who's the chick checking out Harry, who Hermione says is "only interested in you because she thinks you're the chosen one"? Doesn't look like Ginny...unless they curled her hair for one scene.

Thanks to mosellegreen for linking this earlier...

Robert Downey Jr. to play Sherlock Holmes, with Jude Law as Watson, in new film(s).

Yum, yum. I love both those guys, and have lately been reading and enjoying more of Doyle's Holmes stories as well. Sounds like fun.

And yes, we will need a new library in Slashland to house all the fics that will get written.

In other news, thank you to those who have signed up so far to read aloud a line or two of "The Raven." There's still plenty of time, so if others are interested, come sign up here!

Narnia fans' must-read link of the day:

naill_renfro has supplied us with another great Narnia film parody: Prince Caspian, complete with Fangorn Forest and witches encased in carbonite. I haven't seen this movie yet (nor read the book in decades), but now I sort of want to, just to enjoy the giggles more...

The premise of Brigadoon has plot holes big enough to drive a horse and carriage through. Anyone who has worked on the play, seen the movie, or ever heard of the plot has seen the immediate problems with the set-up.

Even assuming the magic is possible--that a village in the Scottish highlands could vanish in the 1700s and reappear for one day every hundred years, its inhabitants looking more and more anachronistic with each reappearance--the timeline still makes no sense.

If it were the 1700s when this miracle got instigated, and it's the 1900s when our two American heroes stumble upon Brigadoon in its one appearance during the twentieth century, then gosh, let's do some quick math: In Brigadoon time, the miracle began two days ago. They're placidly walking around as if totally used to it, when anyone who truly lived in such a place would still be going, "Holy *^&@! It's seriously another hundred years later out there?"

Couldn't they have made it reappear, say, every twenty years? Then at least it would have been going on for ten days in Brigadoon time; and twenty years for the outside world is still enough time to be a romantic obstacle.

For that matter, if it's such a remote village, and the citizens are not allowed to leave it, how do they even know the miracle's working? If, in Brigadoon time, no one from the outside showed up yesterday (i.e., the one appearance in the 19th century), how would they have any idea whether a hundred years had really passed or not?

Also, the linguist in me can't help pointing out in this and in all other time travel stories, there's no way the inhabitants of an 18th-century Highland village would be easily understood by 20th-century Americans, or vice-versa. The dialogue really ought to be all:

FIONA: I'se gang wi' thee, lad.*
TOMMY: Sorry, what?

In short, if I'd come up with the idea of Brigadoon, I would never have written it, because all the practical difficulties would have doused my inspirational spark within five minutes. Surely the difficulties occurred to the actual writers too. So how did it get written?

My conclusion: the story is romantic, and the music is great, so everybody dismisses all the outrageously bad plot devices and enjoys the show. It's totally unfair, the passes that musicals get as long as the songs are good.

On the other hand, maybe it means I shouldn't stress so much about believability in my stories, especially the ones with paranormal elements. Readers or viewers want their disbelief suspended. They only ask that you help hold it out of the way with your delightful storytelling, no matter how ridiculous.

Good to know.

Waitin' for my dearie (to get home from work),

Mol

*Stolen shamelessly from a Robert Burns poem.

Spider-Man 3: Wow. As third movies go, this actually made Pirates of the Caribbean 3 look polished and well-written in comparison.

Saw the third Pirates of the Caribbean film at last. Let's see if I got this straight. (THAR BE SPOILERS AHEAD, SHOULD YE CARE.)

1. Will, Jack, Elizabeth, Davy Jones, Barbossa, Cutler Beckett, and the Navy guys are all double-crossing each other to the extent that only 3% of the audience could remember what everyone's true motives actually are.

2. Despite tantalizing us with sizzling Jack/Elizabeth tension in the second film, and despite Will and Elizabeth only sulking around each other for most of this film, Elizabeth suddenly marries Will at the last minute. Then when she has ten years to loll around without him, she doesn't go find Jack. What gives?

3. Oh, I see. She was busy raising a kid. Also, she doesn't age in ten years, despite the hard life of raising her son alone, and possibly some light secretarial work to keep them fed.

4. Tia Dalma is Calypso, and freeing her would unleash the fury of the seas, which sounds cool, so they do that. But all she does is create a maelstrom in the water, which doesn't actually do anything except spin two boats around for a while. It doesn't even kill Davy Jones--that, apparently, was Jack & Will's job.

5. After seeing two pirate ships destroy the trading company ship, the fleet of several hundred turns tail and runs away. Yeah. Right.

6. Keith Richards has a boat. Not that he and the other international convention of pirates actually help, or anything.

7. Jack has multiple clones running around. They're probably inside his head, but then why are they still chatting with one another after he leaves the room? Maybe the Disney writers just need a primer on Point Of View issues.

8. Getting a new captain means the Dutchman's crew no longer has to wear barnacles and starfish upon their faces, for some reason.

9. Argh. They've totally set it up for a FOURTH film. You've got some seriously awesome writing to do for that one, team, if you want to win this audience back.

10. This isn't really a plot summary point, just an observation: Orlando Bloom left me lukewarm for the first 2.4 hours of the film, but looked totally hot in his Dread Pirate Roberts get-up at the end. Plus, the mythological touch of being the underworld's ferryman and getting only one shore leave day every ten years was cool and poignant. Too bad it was buried in all those other confusing plotlines.

But those beaches sure were pretty...

When I wasn't watching TV series on DVD in 2007, I did see a few movies. Here are the best, in alphabetical order rather than ranked by quality:

Borat. Every bit as funny, and not nearly as offensive, as I expected from the hype and outcry. I do hope the nation doesn't become overrun with people imitating this type of filmmaking, but I admire Sasha Baron Cohen and associates for being the *very* bold pioneers in the field. And really, all boring realtor conventions need a pair of angry nude men running through the room.

The Devil Wears Prada. Meryl Streep rules as the worst boss ever, and yet gives the part enough nuance to make it riveting to watch. Also, I looked at my wardrobe and drooped in shame after seeing this film.

Frida. I expected pretentious artsy wankery, with a lot of annoying political posturing, so I was pleased to find how human, approachable, inspiring, and beautiful this film was. Considering I knew so little about Kahlo beforehand, it was educational too.

Jean de Florette and Manon of the Springs. Caught up to the film versions of these after reading the books in 2006, and found them just as wonderful. Major human drama disguised as a pastoral tale about groundwater, set in gorgeous Provence.

Lady in the Water. I tend to love M. Night Shyamalan's stuff, and this was no exception. It's mythological and weird and unique and scary and pretty, and it bugs me that people pick on his movies for being exactly those things.

Little Miss Sunshine. Wow, talk about well-drawn characters each with their own interesting arc, battling and interacting throughout, all in service to the story. And making it funny--really, really funny. The talent show scene had us on the floor laughing.

Marie Antoinette. I'll paraphrase what I posted when I first saw it: I gather it really didn't work for some people, putting '80s music to the glitz of the Versailles court, but to me it was something new, thank God; and anyway I loved the music. And how can I not love a director who intentionally had a rakish character costumed to look like Adam Ant? I smelled the wig powder and the fresh lilies, tasted the cream puffs, felt the silk skirts. Delicious.

The Prestige. A movie deserves to make the list if I lay in bed thinking over the plot afterward and making sure I understood all its tricky twists accurately. Goes to show that not all films are being dumbed down, and I applaud that. Also, it was fascinating to watch the characters fluctuate from seemingly good to seemingly evil and back again, as new information came to light. Plus, David Bowie as Tesla! All movies get extra points for David Bowie.

Stardust. Liked Gaiman's book as well, of course, but the film version had the eye candy of not only a beautifully realized fantasy flick, but of Charlie Cox in an adorable dork-turns-hero role. I think he's my new Orlando Bloom. The film had a lovely Princess-Bride-like humor throughout, too, keeping the mood light and charming.

Stranger Than Fiction. A novelist's whimsical dream of a movie! What if your characters were really out there, and you were really pulling the strings, and you didn't realize it? What if you were someone else's character? Will Farrell, as the probably-doomed character, manages to be sweet and human and serious, not at all his usual type of role, and it works. Really cool.

Furthering my David Tennant interest, I checked out the recent BBC Masterpiece Theatre version of Casanova in which he plays the title role. Had to be all yummy sexy goodness, right?

Uh...wrong. Alas.

Problems were basically, in order of importance:

1) His hair. Sweet merciful Dionysus, what did they do to his hair? His controlled-chaos Doctor hair is adorably hot, and that same bedhead look would, you'd think, be ideal for Casanova. Instead they smashed it flat across his forehead and gave him a rat-tail. Seriously. A rat-tail. And this was filmed just the other year! Not in 1983! What's their excuse, exactly? Oh, historical accuracy, I suppose; pigtails were common enough on men; but that doesn't mean you have to do it when it's going to end up looking like that. Gah. They're making me overuse italics here.

2) His eyes. Blue contacts, presumably to match Peter O'Toole's eyes (as Casanova in later life), were not too bad as contacts go, but they're a letdown to those of us who happily submerge ourselves in his natural soulful brown eyes, episode after episode, on Doctor Who. Also, in some light conditions the blue came off really unnatural. Groosalugg-ish, almost.

3) No one else looking very good either. Everyone seemed to suffer from bad complexions and dull features and unflattering costume colors. (I'm not even going to inflict upon you the awful aquamarines they kept throwing onto Tennant.) The only one who looked lovely throughout was Rose Byrne, and she wasn't really even a love interest.

4) Total lack of chemistry or affection in most scenes. Compared to the Lasse Hallstrom/Heath Ledger version, which managed a great deal of cheeky charm, this was all sleaze and cheeze.

5) Cheesy editing. Mugging for the camera? Having his clothes fly onto him by themselves under a spotlight? Awkward freeze-frame of him reading a letter while dancers blur past behind him? Bleh. Just didn't work for me.

I don't normally bother with negative reviews, but this was so egregious I had to mention it. It's a sad thing when in the middle of a crush on Tennant, I can still find Heath Ledger a hotter Casanova. And this one gets better reviews on Amazon than the Hallstrom/Ledger one! What gives? What am I missing here?

Mystified but still not blaming David Tennant since it really wasn't his fault,

M.

P.S. I swear I'll post about something un-Tennant-related next time. Really.

One thing I love about Doctor Who is the out-of-the-blue moments of comedy, particularly in the form of the Doctor being cluelessly dorky. Two such examples that cracked us up from the episode "Fear Her" (these hardly count as spoilers, just being little moments): 1) his picking up the marmalade jar in someone else's kitchen and dipping his fingers in for a taste, and 2) his responding to the subject line (which, he later realized, was directed at a cat) with, "Thanks! I'm experimenting with backcombing." I'm grinning irrepressibly again in the mere typing of the words.

Which is good, and which I must focus upon, because next comes the two-part season finale of S2, and I know how "Doomsday" ends already (I totally caved and watched the last six minutes without even caring what came before), so now I'm dreading it with a pain rivaled only by my dread of the Grey Havens scene before ROTK came out. And the Grey Havens was almost less poignant because Frodo didn't *have* to leave (he just did to annoy us all), whereas Rose and the Doctor have no choice in how things end up. I shouldn't mind so much. I'm not even a shipper here! But if it hurts him, it hurts me. That, ladies and gents, is precisely how lame I have become.

Uhh, so yeah! Comment if you want to discuss fun moments and smutty fanfic that will make us all feel better. I imagine spoilers will occur, so look out below.

Note One: One or two alcoholic drinks a day might lower risk of heart attacks, but definitely raises risk of a bazillion kinds of cancer. Hm, heart attack or cancer? I'll take heart attack, thanks. I'm sticking to my "dark chocolate with every meal but alcohol only a couple times a week" diet.

Note Two: I finally saw An Officer and a Gentleman. I liked it--you get a good eyeful of our Puget Sound scenery. Also, I now finally see what Hot Shots! was parodying, aside from Top Gun. Hee.

Note Three: Still time to sign up for Operation Ichabod. Read a line, be spooky, be awesome.