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Resolution culture is garbage. It is a New Year, but you do not have to be a New You. You are wonderful and you don’t have to change jack shit if you don’t want to.
But if you want to make a change, the New Year isn’t a bad time to, right? New Year, fresh start, all that stuff. You’re the same person you were last year, but with maybe a little extra motivation.
I spent 2014 making some very big and serious changes to my life partially because I got The Cancer, but also because I was well enough to have a full-time job and sort of behave like an actual Adult Human for the first time in my life, which is kind of cool.1
So, since 2015 is upon us and I did pretty damn good making changes last year, I’m taking my New Year’s Motivation and making some resolutions and sharing them with you. Fun, yeah?
1. Write More
I’m a writer! But I basically forget to write. I cram blogs in at the last second and I forget how much I actually enjoy writing them. When I write one blog, I feel urged and excited to write more of them. I should, you know, follow that instinct. I also write fiction! And, to be fair, I verbally and text-message-ually write almost every single day because I tell my girlfriend stories of all shapes and kinds, but I don’t write enough of those stories down. I have a finished novel I should edit and try to, like, sell and another that’s got a solid shape and tons of ideas scribbled down in a million places. I want to do something with them. I love words. I need to write more of them down.
Concrete Goal: Write 100 words a day! Edit/re-write my MFA book.
2. Consume More
I read and watch a pretty fair amount but I want to consume more and I want to consume things more intentionally. I like liking things and I want to find more things to like. Simple.
Concrete Goal: One new movie every two weeks, three new episodes of TV a week, 50 books this year, and more comics! Update listography and goodreads regularly, including a small review for each book I finish this year. Try to hit at least some of these diversity challenges.
3. Keep Moving and Feeding This Body
I work out frequently — sometimes six times a week! — and I have gotten much better at feeding myself in a way that satisfies my body and doesn’t make me miserable. I want to eat burgers and fries for every meal, but it turns out that my gastrointestinal system doesn’t exactly feel great when I do that? Crazy. Also, I kind of like how I feel after I work out. Gross, right?
Concrete Goal: Keep food journaling, meal planning, and going to the gym. Keep on keeping on.
I also want to be less envious and subtweet-y. I hate how often being cranky makes me think everything is dumb, but it’s kind of hard to resolve to like, be an entirely different human being than you are? And to come up with goals more concrete than “Be less of a dick.”
I am going to try to ask myself “Do you really want to say that?” before letting things loose on the world via social media. And also try to think, “That’s nice” when someone is enjoying something, even if I’m not into it. I love enthusiastic and joyful people! I don’t need to be a passive-aggressive bummer. I want to lift people up whenever possible or at the very least try harder not to drag them down, indirectly or otherwise. I am not a beacon of sunshine and I will never be, but I can strive to, you know, shut up a little more frequently when I’m in a mood.
Are you making resolutions? Are they as boring as mine? Did you resolve to become a superhero? That’d be pretty cool, to be honest.
1: I would way, way rather be sitting on my couch marathoning TV shows, but we can’t have everything.
I didn’t really watch anything this year! This is a theme I am sure you will notice in the coming month of posts. I am hoping 2015 will be better, partly because I like to be able to talk about stuff, but mostly because I really miss stuff. Winter was long this year too, which meant that our trips to the nearest almost city — two hours away! where we have to travel! for a decent theater! — were fewer than the year previous. We did, however, get to watch one of this year’s faves in an actual huge, beautiful theater with reclining leather seats and an extremely enthusiastic crowd. Glorious.
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5. X-Men: Days of Future Past | | AMAZON
I liked Days of Future Past just enough. Like, it was good and all. I did really enjoy it while I was watching it and I was glad I watched it once it was over, but it was pretty much forgettable otherwise and only ends up at number five on this list because I literally watched almost nothing else that was new to me.
My favorite X-Men movie is obviously X2 because I’m not a complete fool, so I was decidedly amped about seeing my babes back together, but we didn’t even really get enough of them for me to love it. I like the new cast for the most part — I think Nicholas Hoult has the charisma of a tree branch — but they just don’t seem fun at all. I didn’t like X-Men: First Class, like, at all, so I am not surprised I didn’t love this one more. X-Men stories need to be fun and need to lay hard into conversations about disability and racism1 and this didn’t do enough of either. Still a deece watch though. |
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4. Veronica Mars | | AMAZON
Veronica Mars is my favorite TV show of all time. I have watched the pilot the second most of any episode of TV ever.2 Crys and I backed it on Kickstarter the day it went live and long, drawn-out Internet arguments about wealth and art aside, I was really happy with what we got. It’s at number four because I loved it, but it’s also at number four because it’s not at all what I wanted for my favorite teen detective.
Veronica was dealt a shitty hand and she didn’t always manage it well, but she is intensely loyal and smart and awesome. The Veronica in the movie…? Eh. She left. She way left. And though I don’t blame her, I do think it doesn’t so much seem like her. But I’m not Rob Thomas, so I don’t get any say so. And that’s okay! Because what we got was pretty great anyway.
Really, just give me, like, an eight hour mini-series about Weevil. Or Wallace and Mac. Or everyone. Can I get another season? Please? |
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3. Big Hero 6 | | AMAZON
I went into Big Hero 6 with little to no expectations — which is generally the way to go in life, let’s be real — and it just blew me away. I thought it was visually bananas amazing with a great story and great, rich characters, and so much — like an amazing amount — heart.
I love Tadashi and Hiro’s relationship and I love Hiro’s very real pain and I, obviously, think Baymax is the sweetest, cutest, best, most awesome robot to ever cross my path. I love each of the secondary characters and I was glad to see so many female characters in roles (STEM!) that don’t usually go their way.
I really loved this one and I think it’s such a great antidote for a lot of what kids — and adults — are getting in media. These are normal kids, young men and women, who rise above, who experience real pain and real consequences, but who keep trying hard anyway. It was multicultural! It was fun! It was moving! It was so, so good. |
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2. Captain America: The Winter Soldier | | AMAZON
I did not love the first Captain America movie. I liked it a lot, but I didn’t love it. I love love loved The Winter Soldier. I think it’s cleaner, less meandering, and since it isn’t an origin story, it has only the meat of the current narrative to carry. I like the way it interconnects to The Avengers and the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe. I like what it did for Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff as characters and I loved Sam Wilson and the absolute agonizing pain of watching Bucky Barnes try to kill his best friend in the entire world.
I cried so much in this movie that it actually started to get weird. Like, I kind of started to worry about my own mental health. And I just yelled “BUUUUUUUUCKY” a lot afterward and then dry-sobbed and wrenched my hair from my skull in a plaintive manner.
A lot of people think the whole MCU thing is getting big and unwieldy and annoying and, sure, that’s valid enough. But I don’t care because I love these characters and I’m going to keep dragging myself to the theater to watch them suffer and succeed. |
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1. Guardians of the Galaxy | | AMAZON
Guardians of the Galaxy was by far the most fun I had in a theater this year. We got to see this one in that big, beautiful theater with a whole bunch of other excited people on opening night and it was so, so incredibly fun. Like everything I watch, I had some issues with it, but I really and truly loved it anyway. I loved every character and I liked that we got less backstory than most origin stories — Quill aside — and that they still felt like whole characters with real lives and a million stories to tell.
I loved the music, like everyone else, and I loved the emotional impact of those songs for Quill. I loved the villains and the visuals and the great big space opera of it. And I particularly loved turning around while I as weeping into my peanut butter M&Ms and seeing the row of teenage boys behind us openly weeping.
Any movie that can truly make me care about a RACCOON WITH A MACHINE GUN and a GIANT TREE deserves an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony. Give Guardians the EGOT and give me the bluray already. |
Honorable Mention
Previously: 2K12 | 2K13 | JAMZ
1: None of the movies thus far have done the latter enough. I mean, there’s so much potential! And it’s never carried through. To be fair, the comics also often fail at it though, so.
2: Parks and Recreation‘s “The Fight”
This is a quick update! To report that I am alive and very well!1 and that instead of being wildly busy with being sick and miserable all the time, I am instead very busy with a very boring but fairly well paying full-time job! Where my fiancée is my boss! Which can get kind of weird, but is largely okay!
So, since I have been a very bad blogger and very, very absent and also, to be honest, pretty boring in general — Truly. Are you an insomniac? Let me lull you to sweet sleep with wild tales of reorganizing an entire employee file system! Let me tell you about entering hundreds of insurance claims at a time and then submitting them! Over dial-up! You’ll sleep like a baby. — I thought I’d steal a meme from the awesome Kimmie at That Girl in The Wheelchair that she posted and I saved about a million years ago!
Currently…2
Loving:
To be perfectly honest, the first answer that came into my head was sleep, but that’s boring, so I’m going with 1. Lumosity since breaking up my work day by playing games that are supposed to make me smarter is actually much more enjoyable and useful to me than taking a lunch. 2. This Smith’s Minted Rose Lip Balm because it’s like, the second lip product I’ve ever tried that I thought actually made a difference to my lips. And 3. Bath & Body Work’s Sweater Weather. I know I’ve talked about how much I love this before, but dude, I really love this scent. Soon it will be too wintery to burn any longer and I will mourn it. It is so strong (such a good ~throw) without being overpowering and the scent lingers forever without getting stale. Oh and also, my new glasses!
zennioptical.com3
Reading:
| Just Finished |
Right Now |
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| FUN! |
WEIRD! |
GREAT! |
TRASHY!4 |
Watching:
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To be honest — and to my dismay — I honestly don’t even know what I watched on purpose last. I haven’t intentionally watched an episode of TV since the end of September and I haven’t seen a movie in theaters since we saw Guardians of the Galaxy on August 1st. Tragedy! We did however manage to get through an entire movie on Netflix last weekend! And a documentary no less! I Know That Voice was super delightful! And fascinating. And definitely worth watching if you have even a passing nostalgia or interest or enjoyment of animated movies. I’m interested in voiceover work anyway, so it was particularly interesting to me. Love seeing the faces that go to the voices. And we’re going to see Big Hero 6 tomorrow! And also I watched a bunch of eps of The Mindy Project and that is pretty fun.
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Oh, and also this. On repeat.
Listening to…
  
  
  
Working on…
The answer to this question should be: my finished book that needs editing, my next book that needs writing, the book after that that’s in need of conceptualizing, my screenplay, my other screenplay, the dozens of projects I have in lists everywhere, but mostly I am working on trying to get better at adulthood. It turns out that managing time is really hard and trying to have a life while working 8-10 hour days is, like, actually difficult? Last time I had a full-time job, I was too depressed to care if I ever had any fun or leisure, so this time around it’s at least an improvement!
I am also working on a post about what I’ve been up to since my last update (The Twin Cities! Great food! Yellowstone! A new puppy!) and the Totally Top 5 series for 2K14! Oh, and I’ve also been posting the #holidayjamz I normally upload to my tumblr (who Cease-and-Desisted me to death! Thanks, Stevie Wonder!) as Youtube links to my twitter instead with #holidayjamz2k14 because the holiday season begins November 1st and if you can’t take that… well, suck it.
1: Cancer treatment is going very well! Can’t use the word remission until I have a hysterectomy, but my oncologist is very chill about waiting for surgery and very confident that we caught the stuff early. Woo!
2: What I’m currently reading/watching/listening to is always over there on the right hand side of the site. I update it fairly regularly even!
3: I am ~feeling a LARGE number of the frames from Warby Parker, but I didn’t like any of the ones in my first home try-on (at least on my face, they looked great off) so I am hesitant to take the plunge and order the ones I really want, since they don’t even have a home try-on option. Free returns and all, but nail-biting! We’ll see how the next box goes.
4: “Her [REDACTED] became a gourd of hot syrup, spilling into Dominik’s mouth.” So, yeah.
I have been promising to write an updated list of my top five holiday movies since, oh, late 2011? When I posted my first version before I endeavored on my 31 Days of Festive-Ass Flicks project. And since, you know, Christmas is, like, the day after tomorrow and it’s now 2013, I thought: why not?! Or something.
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5. Meet Me in St. Louis – previously
I am not into musicals. Not at all. I mean, I break out in song on a daily basis, but I just can’t accept it happening fictionally unless it’s caused by demonic intervention. That said, Meet Me in St. Louis still manages to be glorious. Judy Garland is flustered-charming and beautiful. Lucille Bremer is so wonderful and so underrated. She’s not the star — who could be with Judy Garland nearby — but she holds her own fabulously. The songs are so good. It looks and feels like a great big classic MGM production and even though the romance is typical and the plot sort of draggy — really just because it covers a decently large chunk of time — it’s just so fun.
Meet Me in St. Louis is also super notable because it birthed a classic — and my personal favorite — Christmas song in “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” which is basically way more than, like, any other Christmas movie can say. |
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4. A Christmas Story — previously
A Christmas Story was on the list the last time I did a Christmas top five, though it’s dropped considerably in its ranking. It’s not that it’s not still great, it’s just that I’ve watched a lot more Christmas movies in the interim.
A Christmas Story feels like the epitome of holiday movie making and I believe firmly that it deserves its 24 hour airing on TBS every year. It’s a movie with a kind heart and beautiful holiday visuals and great laughs. It’s a period piece that still feels relevant. It’s got great characters — and great, great kid actors — and truly enduring one-liners. Almost everyone loves this one and for good reason. It’s 100% a feel-good holiday classic.
I do, however, stand by my irritation that no one knows how to deal with a kid’s tongue getting stuck to metal. No one needs no fire department nonsense to handle that ish. |
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3. The Preacher’s Wife — previously
I really, really love The Preacher’s Wife. I hadn’t seen it before the Festive-Ass Flicks project of 2011 and it is another, like Meet Me in St. Louis, that I am so glad I watched. It’s really charming and hopeful and it’s got the cutest, most adorable child friendship, like, ever put to film. It’s the first movie that ever put me on the Denzel Washington boat and it’s because he is charming as hell and frankly, I’d have left my preacher husband for him in a heartbeat, angel or not.
Whitney Houston’s show-stopping performance of “Who Would Imagine a King” is a serious highlight as is the charming and flirtatious erotic angel ice skating sequence. I usually prefer secular Christmas stuff, so I never expected to even like this one, but I ended up totally loving it. Number three loving it. |
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2. Love Actually — previously
I saw — vaguely — on the internet that everyone was having some sort of meltdown about liking vs not liking Love Actually? I don’t know what the deal is and I’m too lazy/disinterested in other people’s opinions to do any googling about it, but, like, what? How do you not like Love Actually? I don’t mean that in a “Oh god, how dare you!” way, but like, it’s pretty inoffensive as movies ago.” Like, who is going to engage in a passionate takedown of Love Actually of all things?
Anyway, I do actually love Love Actually* because — as I find true of all the Christmas movies I really love — it makes me feel warm and happy and pleasantly at ease. I love each of the stories — Billy Mack and Joe’s friendship! Daniel’s bang-up job raising Sam! Sarah’s heart-breaking and powerful love for her brother! Mark who is in love with a woman and doesn’t think he’s entitled to her! Emma Thompson’s killer gentle crying to Joni Mitchell! Colin Frissell Does Milwaukee! Hugh Grant! — and as a whole the experience is super satisfying.
I am particularly fond of Rowan Atkinson’s turn as the sort of cupid-by-way-of-delay-and-distraction because there’s just enough of it to be endearing and it also strikes me as being particularly British. My favorite favorite bit though is Jamie’s nieces’ exuberant cheers and quick turn of “I hate Uncle Jamie!” We’ve had ten years of Love Actually now. Aren’t we lucky? |
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1½. Miracle on 34th Street — previously
Okay, so I’m cheating a little tiny itty bitty bit by including six movies in a Totally Top 5 list, but really, my top spot is being split between two favorites and for the sake of fairness and formatting, I thought I’d give them equal time. Like Meet Me in St. Louis and The Preacher’s Wife before it, I had never seen Miracle on 34th Street before It became a Festive-Ass Flick in 2011. I don’t know why, really, probably just obstinance about “old shit” since that’s a thing I can sometimes be stupid about.
Miracle on 34th Street is super iconic and really and truly lovely. It’s got a complex mother-daughter relationship that can be hard at times — I think Doris does Susan a deep disservice by discouraging her imaginative leanings — but that is so obviously full of love and the desire to do right by each other. It’s got a mischievous and charming Kris Kringle who never veers so far as to seem creepily omniscient, something that happens far too often in Christmas stories. It’s got great secondary characters in Mr. Macy, Mr. Gimbel, Judge Harper, Fred and particularly Alfred. It’s got an iconic New York Christmas setting and a gentle moral that’s about the power of possibility and belief in the remarkable. It is heartwarming as hell and a holiday classic for a reason. It’s worth the little bit of the cheat.
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1. Elf — previously
Elf has so much going for it as a movie that I honestly don’t know where to start. It’s got a killer soundtrack — Ella Fitzgerald! Lena Horne! Leon Redbone! — and another gorgeous New York backdrop and a cast so phenomenally assembled that it’s infuriating. It’s got great, funny one-liners that are sold with this pitch-perfect delivery over and over again — Will Ferrell’s delivery is sometimes so agonizingly good that I just get mad, such a great mix of naivete and goofiness — and a great big heart filled with characters who are good or learn to be. Buddy butting up against a world he doesn’t understand — an often cruel one full of double-meaning and sarcasm he cannot parse — drives the story without ever resorting to meanness at his expense and in that friction, the world gets better instead of Buddy getting worse.
It is just truly great. It’s joyful and kind and it tells a story about Christmas spirit without ever devolving into a tirade about commercialism. Elf is a gift that just keeps on giving. |
Honorable Mentions
  
*: You have no idea how satisfying it was to type that sentence. And then speak it aloud like fifteen times. Glory.
It’s time to talk about movies! And, like last year, I’m just going to let my heart do the talking because, I mean, what am I going to do otherwise? Sit here and break down everything I saw using the basics I gleaned from two college film classes? B-O-R-I-N-G. So here’s what I loved at* the movies this year.
| 5. Iron Man 3
To be frank, I didn’t have high hopes for Iron Man 3. I love-love the first one and The Avengers was glorious, but Iron Man 2 was weak as hell and I couldn’t help but worry a reasonable amount. Iron Man’s not really my dude — I’m an X-Men girl to be quite honest, though I throw down for Black Widow and Hawkeye — but he’s got so much potential and knowing going in that they were pulling Extremis out was both exciting and nerve-wracking. So much potential for failure! Especially with a historically racist caricature of a villain making an appearance. It all turned out great though. I thought The Mandarin was particularly well-handled — especially because I love nothing more than to see fanboys cry about inaccuracy — and the Extremis was, well, it wasn’t great but it was good enough.
None of that really mattered in the end though because this movie had Pepper Potts. Pepper Potts being awesome and strong and vulnerable and human and kicking so much ass. Pepper Potts being a strong female character without being a Strong Female Character. Pepper Potts saving the day and the hero and herself. Pepper Potts being everything. We need more Pepper Potts-es. We need more characters on her level. |
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| 4. ParaNorman
ParaNorman is smart, sweet, funny, and gorgeous. It’s got a ton of heart, strong characters, an openly gay character, zombies, super strong dialogue, depth, and an unexpected ending. It has things to say about being who you are even when it’s hard, family, friendship, and the importance of listening to other people and respecting their feelings. The animation is extraordinary and cool and though similar to the stop-motion that’s come before it, unlike anything you’ve really seen before. It’s not afraid to be kind of gross and it deals openly with death in a way that feels really important. It’s got a great setting, unbelievable set pieces, and the cutest little post-credits tag. It’s seriously wonderful.
We didn’t get to watch ParaNorman in theaters and I am still so bummed about it. What a wonderful story and experience. Unforgettable, really. |
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| 3.The Heat
Watching The Heat in theaters was one of the best movie experiences we’ve had since we’ve been in North Dakota. Okay, wait, actually it was one of the worst because it was packed and a horrible monster woman sat next to Crystal and did her best to ruin the movie for her, but other than that is was genuinely delightful. There’s something really transcendent about being in a theater full of people watching a comedy and sharing that bright, long-winded communal laughter. It feels magical. And it’s particularly nice when it’s a movie fronted by two women that doesn’t make you feel bad for being a woman or fat or kind of a human disaster. Let me hug you, Paul Feig and Katie Dippold. Repeatedly. Please.
Melissa McCarthy is a gift and I feel like this was such a great showcase for her. Her timing is impeccable and her physicality is BANANAS. Sandra Bullock is great too, so good at being the straight-man and hitting the exact right tone at the exact right moment. And they’re both so good at reserved but tender emoting! Give me 100 more movies with them together. |
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| 2. For a Good Time, Call…
The award for most punctuation in a movie title goes to… Just kidding. Well, no, I mean, that’s a lot of punctuation, but that’s not a real award. I guess I could make one, but it’s after midnight and I’m too tired to craft safely. Anyway, what For a Good Time, Call… really wins an award for is friendship. And laughter. And joy. And dogs named Zelda.
I had heard a little about this one on the internet and had mentioned it vaguely to Crystal, but I hadn’t felt any particular urge to run out and watch it, despite my intense and lasting love for Ari Graynor, but Crystal is super good at magically knowing exactly what I need when I need it and brought this home from the Redbox one weekend. What a gift!
It’s just a great, great story with really sweet, human characters who make mistakes and do their best to atone for them and are just generally trying to live their lives in a way that feels right to them. The development of Katie and Lauren’s friendship is so good and true and genuine that by the end you feel sort of agonized and sad that you haven’t lived the movie yourself. It’s hilariously funny and tender and kind and never makes you cringe with secondhand embarrassment, even when you’re sure that’s exactly what’s going to happen. It always knows exactly how long to hold the beat for a laugh and the emotional stuff never feels trite or simple. This one is not to be missed. Seriously. |
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| 1. Pacific Rim
I really loved Pacific Rim and I loved it even more than I expected to. I love these characters — all of them — and their flaws and scars and unrelenting drive to fight back against a seemingly insurmountable force. The Earth opens up and births a bunch of enormous — brain-shatteringly huge — Godzilla-ass monsters from space and these people lose the people they love to these monsters, lose their world to them, and instead of curling up in a ball and praying for a quick death, they fight. They fight and they fight and they fight until they no longer have the blood to drive them. It’s seriously glorious. Had we been in California, I think I’d have easily topped my record for in-theater viewings+ effortlessly.
The movie’s funny and fast and tongue-in-cheek without ever falling on the eye-roll-y side of campy. It’s huge, like, way huge on a scale that is hard to really get your head around — though Del Toro does a phenomenal job of creating scale for the universe — and it’s flirtation and sexy without ever being exploitative. It’s romantic without ever being explicitly so! Watching a movie where there is clearly love of all kinds between the male-female leads where it doesn’t end on a kiss? Straight-up revolutionary. No joke. It’s got great secondary and tertiary characters, unbelievable set design, and great pacing. Seriously, there is never a moment where it needs to move faster or slower, never an extraneous second. I could’ve watched 100 more hours of it, to be frank.
Dude, there are 250 foot tall robots punching even bigger lizard monsters in the face. Do you really, honestly need more than that? Of course not, but you get it all anyway. |
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Honorable Mentions
  
Previously: 2K12 | JAMZ
*: Because we moved to the middle of nowhere and the only decent — and boy am I using that pretty loosely there — theater is two hours away these aren’t all strictly things we saw at the movies or that even came out this year. They are all, however, things I watched for the first time in 2013. So there’s that.
+: I saw The Avengers eight times. It was a thing.
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