Only Nola

Eyeballing Scissors

You know, I don't know how many of the posts survived the switch some months back, so I'm not sure, from a scientific perspective, how well documented the relationship is between my mood and my tendency to hack my hair off, but I'm pretty sure my readers have walked that particular path to madness with me countless times over the years.  So here I sit, once again looking at the scissors on my counter with a moderate amount of lust in my heart.  The last haircut I got from a professional (and I use the term loosely) did NOT end well.  So now as it's growing out, it's... problematic.  This, needless to say, brings on the twitching and mumbling and inching towards the scissors.  Now, even if the urge were to amp up to, say, Defcon 5, I'd still have to bear in mind that I know a certain someone (well, several, but one in particular) that would probably fall over and hemmorhage on the spot if I cut my curls off.  The funny thing is, I've made it 39 years (Jesus, just writing that was painful) with only one person ever giving a shit about my curls, and suddenly?  In the past 8 months or so, I've met a number of them.  It's baffling.  Lovely, but baffling.  It's like waking up one day and finding your cat emptying the dishwasher.  Bonus!  But slightly off the weirdometer.  (Not to mention... do you know where those paws have been?  I do, and... ewwwwwww.  Off my plates!)

Anyhoo.  Today is a busy day.  I get to meet with my realtor and bitch about my builder (I'll write more on that in a couple of days when the Thanksgiving insanity passes), take my mother (let's not go there) to Wal-Mart (let's not go there, either... God help me), drive to Arkansas and back (picking up moody teenager type offspring), etc.  Tomorrow I drive to Kansas City and back... more festivity!  Six hours plus of driving, all told.  But I'll get to see Mark, and Daddy, so it'll be worth it.  I'll also get to eat at the El Sombrero (we won't tell either of the two aforementioned men that that's REALLY why I'm going to Kansas City.... shhhhhhhhhh!  WHAT?!?!?!?)  and maybe slip in some shopping along the way.  Woohoo @ the Plaza!  If you smell smoke sometime tomorrow afternoon, it may well be my credit cards...

Not my most fabulous update ever, but at least y'all now know I'm a) still alive (always a concern... my love of shiny objects and the presence of fast-moving buses being what it is), and b) I'm finally taking seriously my attempt to be more frequent in my postings.  So see?  I'm full of love!  And responsibility!  And determination!

And shit...

That Movie Thing...

*THERE BE SPOILERS IN HERE, PEOPLE!  READ AT THY OWN RISK!*

So.  There Mark and I were, sitting in a movie theater watching 'Paranormal Activity', right?  The movie, for those of you that don't know, is almost Blair Witch'ian in its execution and concept. It's a slow building movie, for starters, but it's also shot as if it's supposed to be a documentary, up to and including the thanking of the families of the victims and the police department in the beginning credits, etc.  That was a nice touch.  Completely had Miss Gullible here freaking the fuck out.

The movie all takes place within the confines of a single house.  The inhabitants of the house are a young engaged couple (Katie and Micah).  Well, apparently Katie has been dealing with some kind of haunting/fuckery since she was about 8 years old and it's starting to work her last nerve.  This being the case, Micah, a bastion of good sense and character, decides to spend a shitload of money on a fancy-pants video camera set-up that will film their bedroom while they sleep, that being the time that most of the stuff seems to go down.  He figures if they can document it, that will somehow help.  Oh, and he has a penis, so it's also about the thrill and the possibility of getting really good footage to post online or sell to a tv show.  That penis sure does come in handy, doesn't it?  Asshat.  I suppose it's no secret that I was ready to throttle his sorry ass by about 15 minutes into the movie... about the tenth time he shit on some perfectly SANE idea in favor of something RETARDED that he thought would get him 'better video'.  Because when dealing with forces you can't see and that have the ability to drag your ass out of bed by your FOOT?  Great photo ops are the first thing you should be concerned with.  (...)  How do men survive on their own?  Seriously.

Anyway.  The movie progresses, slowly but never so much so that you're ready to walk out of the theater.  Stuff starts happening at a more accelerated rate.  We find out that what Katie has bugging her is not, in fact, a ghost, but instead *insert drumroll here*?  A demon.  Now, your average, garden variety mammal would take that news and head directly to the nearest tub of holy water and marinate in it for a few days.  Fetch a priest.  Tape bible verses to one's forehead.  (Hey, I'm not religious, but I'm not stupid, either... I've seen the movies.  I know what works.  Get thee to the church on time, fuckwit!)  But Micah?  Well, he's not your normal mammal.  He convinces Katie that getting someone who could actually deal with the demon would be (quelle surprise!) a bad idea.  He wants to 'take care of his fucking girlfriend' on his own... plus get more cool video clips.  I'm not sure when taking care of one's girlfriend became defined by putting her, unprotected, in the path of an oncoming minion of Satan, but I'm going to have to go with HE'S RETARDED AND BEING LED AROUND BY HIS PENIS.  Hey, I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'...

So anyway.  Now that I've spoiled some of it for you (that's my job, right?  Someone send me a check.), I'll skip ahead.  Stuff gets worse and worse.  Demon no likey the camera.  Demon no likey Micah.  Demon no likey much, I can tell you right now.  Katie can't sleep (hard to sleep when a demon keeps either taking over your body for short periods of time or drags you out of bed and down the hallway) and is walking around getting progressively more Rainman on Micah.  Hey, I don't blame her. I'm still blaming the penis-wielder.  If he'd let her exorcise the fucking thing to start with, maybe she wouldn't have ended up in a fetal position looking like a refugee from 28 Days Later.  Anyhoo.  The end of the movie comes and... well... okay, I'm going to show some restraint and not tell you exactly how it ends, but I will tell you this...

So there we are, in the theater.  The movie's winding to a close.  Something intense has just happened, and I'm clutching Mark's arm as I'm watching madness unfold on the screen.  A lot of what's happening is out of the camera view, so  you can only hear it (since Micah's not handy to run the camera at this point and it's been left stationary in the bedroom).  I've got my head on Mark's shoulder and I'm so tightly wrapped it's not even funny.  The audio suddenly goes silent as the chaos offscreen apparently comes to an end... and there we sit, staring at absolutely nothing happening.  Right?

Something suddenly happens.  I mean, VERY suddenly.  And you know what comes next, right?

I SCREAMED. 

I mean, the entire theater when dead quiet after it, that's how loud I screamed.  According to Mark, anyway.  I still insist it wasn't that bad.  He says it was better than Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween.  He was still looking at me at random moments and laughing the next DAY, for fuck's sake.  Until TEARS ran down his face...  I was MORTIFIED.  But goddamn it, I couldn't help it!  It's not my fault!  Stupid filmmakers...

I bet the director has a penis...

At the Movies

It's late and I'm tired, so don't expect a long post right now.  I'll probably try to edit this into a longer, more worth-reading post later, but for the minute I just wanted to establish two things... 1) I'm still breathing (quelle surprise!), contrary to what my posting frequency might indicate (You think I suck at this, you should see how good I am with Christmas and birthday cards.  Seriously.), and 2) I actually went out this week and attended an honest to God movie viewing.  This, needless to say, is a rarity.  I went and saw 'Paranormal Activity'.  There's a whole long story about why the people in that theater will never forget me, but I'll write that in when I edit.  Suffice it to say that the movie?  Is sufficiently scary.

And I have witnesses to back me up on that...