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After a wonderfully relaxing Christmas with friends and family, Lindsay and I braved the storm and drove to Portland on Thursday where she left me with Jeff and continued on to her Christian retreat. Jeff and I enjoyed a few days of relaxation and hanging out with friends, laying low in anticipation of an exciting New Year's Eve. We followed the San Francisco Zoo Tiger Mauling story very closely (more to come on that later) and watched some college football.
On Sunday, I decided to head south to Florence to meet the newest addition to the Goss family, Chloe. Unfortunately, that was not how it worked out. About 2 miles away from Jeff's house I was in a car accident. I was driving my sister's car, and collided with a guy driving his friend's van. That proved to be an interesting insurance claim, but luckily no one was hurt and the damage was, well, manageable. I guess we'll work that one out later. Perhaps the worst part of it all was that I didn't get to meet the baby, hopefully I will get to before she gets much older!
Since Sunday was obviously a very stressful day I wasn't in the mood to do much of anything. Jeff and I rented the movie The Lives of Others which was AMAZING. It requires a lot of thinking and concentration - but it's a fantastic movie. It won the 2007 Academy Award for Best Foreign Film and several others internationally. It is about the Stasi (secret police) monitoring the cultural scene in East Berlin. The great thing about watching a film in a language you don't understand is you can really appreciate the actors' talent. With a Foreign Film, you must rely on their non-verbal forms of expression such as tone or facial expression. I highly grecommend this film, but be prepared for a lot of work. Jeff and I were mentally drained after watching the extremely complex story.
To celebrate the New Year we had our second annual party at the Thirsty Lion Pub in downtown Portland. Since we've had so much fun there for two years in a row, we've decided it's going to have to be an annual event going forward. No complaints from me, it's a fun bar with a pretty good band and cheap drinks! We are going to have to make Chez Jose a tradition as well - it's the best Mexican food I've ever had in my life in any city - who knew I'd find it in the Rose City?
Anyway, back to San Francisco and the real world. Vacation has been nice and I'm feeling well rested - which will make it that much harder to go back to work next week :(. I hope everyone else had a wonderful holiday and wish you all the best in 2008!
I need to tell anyone who reads this blog (all 3 of you) about two things that you absolutely must do as soon as possible. I mean, drop everything and go out and do these things. Ok, obviously I’m exaggerating, but if you get around to it, these are worth doing:
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Read The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. I just finished this book over the weekend and it is currently in a 5-way tie for my favorite book ever!
Others tied for this coveted spot (in no particular order)are:- Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
- The Liar’s Club by Mary Karr
- The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
- In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
With honorable mentions for Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Anne Burns, and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt.
If you are familiar with the books on my list, you can see that I am a fan of those with strong character development, where the plot does not distract the reader from getting to know the characters and noticing the subtleties of relationships. In my opinion, quality writing takes far more artistic talent than interesting storytelling. I think Dan Brown (author of The DaVinci Code and Angels and Demons) is a terrible writer – his style is incredibly underdeveloped and therefore so are his characters. Both were excellent stories and I had a hard time putting down both books as I read. But after finishing two of his books in a row, I decided to never read another Dan Brown book again if I can help it. He’s a bad writer, but a good story teller.
I feel the same way about Jon Krakauer. He wrote Into Thin Air and Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith. Again, terrible writing about interesting stories. After reading half of Under the Banner of Heaven I was very put off by his skewed journalism style. He tries to make the book come across as an unbiased look at the Mormon religion, but the sensationalism and one-sided accounts of already over-dramatized events deter from that. He lost credibility with me permanently, so he’s gone the way of Dan Brown in terms of my reading list.
Sorry about the little side note about what I don’t like – the important thing is this book, The Kite Runner. This is one of the first books I’ve come across in a long time that has such powerful character development as well as a gripping plot. I found myself smiling subconsciously during parts, and later in the story fighting back tears and hoping the guy on the plane next to me wasn’t paying attention.
If you have read this book, let’s talk about it. If you haven’t, read it right away and then let’s talk about it. Khaled Hosseini has just released another book about Afghanistan, and I plan to buy it as soon as it comes out in Paperback. -
Watch The Namesake. This movie is based on the book of the same name by Jhumpa Lahiri. After having seen the moving I am only sad that I didn’t read the book. Of course, it is too late now and I won’t fully appreciate the book having seen the film version. I went with a group of friends to see this movie, and almost all of us left the theater crying – but happy. It is an emotional story about family and tradition, and even if you can’t relate to it you will love it.
It stars Kal Penn, who you may know as “Taj” from the Van Wilder movies, "Kumar" from Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle. In contrast to these silly comedic roles, his dramatic performance in this movie shows his range as an actor and I hope to see him in more movies in the future.
I got back from Mazatlan last Friday, and have barely had time to catch up from my vacation. I promised pictures, but am waiting for my parents to figure out how to e-mail them (Mom, if you're reading this please send them soon!). A lot has been going on since...
I caught a SF Giants game on Wednesday, it was the first night game of the year so there were fireworks afterward. I went with my friends Lindsay and Thomas, and despite the fact that our team is having a terrible season so far and we lost the game - we had a good time. My favorite player (duh, Noah Lowry) was not pitching, so I guess I'll have to plan to go to many more games during the season to enjoy the view :).
Thursday my Aunt Kris and cousin Emily visited on their way to Southern California. I booked their room at the Queen Anne Hotel, which is reportedly haunted by the ghost of Mary Lake. It is also the starting point of the San Francisco Ghost Hunt which you may remember from my prior post. I'm a little disappointed that they did not experience any paranormal activity, but will refer anyone there again. The hotel is in a beautiful neighborhood, clean, quiet, and surprisingly very affordable (less than $100/night!).
A good friend from college came into town on Saturday and we went to see The Killers at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. It is one of my favorite bands, and I saw them in October at the Warfield. The other venue was much better, and the acoustics were a little disappointing at Bill Graham. My co-worker Fabian also went, and had the same complaints. We had a great time - the energy from the crowd was amazing and of course the performance was awesome. We met up with more friends at the Bubble Lounge, then headed to Swig, and eventually ended up at Encore Karaoke. My friend Thomas does a mean rendition of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun."
My friend Lindsay had big plans for Easter Sunday, but we ended up losing motivation at the last minute. We were going to bake and dye Easter eggs, but realized that we didn't want cake and would have no use for dozens of colorful eggs so we settled for a nice brunch and a relaxed day. We went to Thomas's house to cook and hang out and relax, but our day was interrupted by a bizarre experience. As we were putting a DVD on, we heard loud banging from downstairs – Thomas figured it was his neighbor slamming the door. But after several loud crashes he went down to investigate while Lindsay and I watched from the window. We were surprised to find a guy (not the neighbor) staggering away from the building and up the street with his bike. He yelled, “you get the hell out of there you ****” and then told Thomas “there’s a guy in your back yard, he just ran through the neighbor’s house.” Thomas turned to look and realized the neighbor’s door had been kicked in. Lindsay and I panicked because the door opening to the shared back yard was wide open. We had no idea whether there was an intruder in the yard or even the house for that matter, and had no intention of going back there to find out. Thomas called the police and they responded quickly – they searched the back yard and found nothing (thankfully). Confused about what had happened, we determined that the guy with the bike was the intruder, and had been trying to distract us so he could get away. This was in a nice neighborhood, in broad daylight (it was about 1:00pm) on Easter. Sigh. City life can be a little bit overwhelming at times – I’m glad no one was hurt and nothing stolen. I know it can’t be easy for anyone, but I think it’s especially hard for a girl from a town where many people didn’t even have keys to their front doors because there was no reason to lock them. If we came outside and saw our car missing, we would assume someone had needed to borrow it and would return it soon. Not the case here.
Later in the evening Jeff and I went to see Zodiac. It was pretty creepy, but surprisingly not as scary as I'd anticipated. Considering it takes place here in San Francisco and has not been officially solved, I figured I'd be afraid to go to sleep afterward. Not the case, I'm ok with the ending and won't lose sleep over it.
Jeff will be in the area all week visiting friends, and there is no shortage of social events planned at work so I think it will be a busy couple of weeks coming up as well. I’ll try to post the pictures as soon as I get them, until then, adios.
Last night my roommate, Sara, and I went to the Snow Patrol concert at Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. It was an awesome concert, all 3 bands were great.
The first opener was Silversun Pickups. You may have heard their most popular single, "Lazy Eye." If not and you're a fan of Indie Rock, you should check it out.
OK GO followed. You may have seen their treadmill video - it's amazing! They performed it live at the 2006 Video Music Awards as well. Unfortunately, they didn't do it during the show - but their set was good nonetheless. I think I'm going to download more of their music now, I didn't realize I liked them so much!
And finally, the main event, Snow Patrol! They were just as amazing as I had hoped. They're famous for "Chasing Cars" after it appeared on the best TV show in the history of the world (Grey's Anatomy for those readers who are a little slow ;). I love both albums, "Eyes Open" and "Final Straw."
I always hear friends talk about certain songs where they totally connect with the music and it has an emotional effect on them. But I have never heard a song that puts me in a different place like that. I guess I figured they were being over-dramatic. But the song, "How to be Dead" from the "Final Straw" album was the first song I ever heard that affected me emotionally. I guess you'll have to download it to understand why it's my favorite song ever.
During the song, "Set Fire to the Third Bar" the lead singer, Gary Lightbody invited a fan on stage to sing with him. I was so impressed, I know I would have passed out! She was a little nervous, but actually had a great voice and did a really good job. Talk about a dream come true...imagine telling your friends! "So I was at a concert for my favorite band when the lead singer picked me out of the audience to come on stage and sing with him. And then he gave me this big hug and got down on his knees and sang to me, and there were thousands of people watching us..." I would have a hard time believing that story if I didn't see it with my own eyes!
Hopefully everyone goes and downloads music from these bands now, you won't be disappointed. Next I get to start the countdown to the Killers next month. I saw them in October at the Warfield, and am very excited about seeing them again. They put on a great show, and I love Brandon Flowers. He's a little weird, but in a good way :) Speaking of that, what is it that makes a musician so irresistible? Sara and I were discussing how Damian Kulash (vocals for OK GO) is very attractive. But if he came up and talked to me on the street I probably wouldn't feel that way - we determined it is the guitar. It must have superpowers of some kind.
The Killers are awesome! I love the entire first album, and Sam's Town was just released. It's different than Hot Fuss, but still great.
I went with my friend Kevin to see them live yesterday at the Warfield in SF - the show was amazing!
Brandon Flowers, the lead singer is too cool for words. He's a drinking, smoking supposed Mormon who may or may not be bi-sexual. And he puts on a damn good show!
