Period Panties FTW

Period panties are the best thing since sliced bread.

Which is definitely not a statement I thought I'd ever make.  In fact, when I first heard of period panties, my very first thought was "ew gross, not for me."

Then came the reports about how tampons and pads are completely unregulated and how companies don't tell us what's being used to make them and I realized that that's even worse.  So when a review for Thinx period panties popped up on my Facebook newsfeed last month, I read it.  And, in the middle of one of the worst and heaviest periods I've ever had, while my mind was hazy with pain and my labia was sore from rubbing against my giant, diaper-like pads, I bought some.

Now, as the Thinx website reminds us, each woman's period is very individual - as could be seen by the comments that came connected to the review on Facebook (once woman scoffed at the idea of period panties because she has to change her tampon every hour, so there's no way period panties would work for her - EVERY HOUR.  The mind boggles.  That poor woman).  My period is pretty individual every month.

Thinx gives a pretty clear cut idea of what to expect for each version of panties that it has.  I ordered the sport (1 1/2 tampons worth of protection) and two hip huggers (2 tampons worth of protection) because those were the heaviest that they had.  They recommend using the period panties as back up to a tampon or diva cup, although they also say that each woman knows her flow best and some do use just the panties with nothing else.

Well, I know my period pretty well and I know that after a bad one (like last month's) I will have a very light period the next month.  In fact, after a bad one, I've occasionally had periods so light that I took a pregnancy test because there was so little period.  I figured that after last month, I'd have one of the lightest I've ever had, which made it a good time to try out the period panties with very little risk.  It turns out I was wrong, it's not the lightest period I've ever had, in fact it's been heavier than I would have predicted (although, still light), so it was a better test than anticipated.

So - my usual period protection are the long maxi-pads with wings.  I find tampons to be incredibly uncomfortable and occasionally painful so I only wear them to swim.  Regular pads without wings always fold up in the middle, causing spillover onto my panties and pants, and I need the extra length because otherwise I end up spilling over the front or back of the pad and it gets onto my pants.   So my normal period experience is using something that, while fairly thin, still feels like a diaper, occasionally sounds like a diaper, and by day 3 is irritating to my labia, making them kind of sore and swollen feeling.  Basically - it always sucks, even the light ones.

The biggest thing I had to get around was my mental block.   got over the whole "period panties, ew gross" thing (because for some reason washing them is grosser than just throwing out a pad in my head) pretty quickly.  Mostly because they were pretty comfy when I first put them on.  There's a little bit of extra material in the crotch, but it definitely doesn't feel like a diaper.  It's much more comfortable than a pad and after about 10 minutes, they felt like just a regular pair of panties.

Which is when the next mental block came in.  It's REALLY hard to get away from the feeling that you're bleeding into your panties.  That was definitely the hardest thing to get my head around - that even though I didn't feel like my pants were protected, they really were.  I went to the bathroom like five times in the morning just to check.  Each time - yup, totally protected, and I fell in love a little bit more.

The panties really do "wick away" the moisture.  It's not always immediate.  If you're familiar with wearing pads you're used to the occasional 'damp' feeling when you pull your underwear back up after going to the bathroom.  It's the same with the period panties, but it's just a damp feeling that last for under a minute and then it's gone and you're back to being comfortable - and it doesn't happen every time.

I expected them to feel heavier as the day went on, but they didn't.  They didn't get less comfortable.  They didn't smell.  And they provided complete protection.  I'd never felt so free.

My second day was heavier than anticipated, but the period panties still held up.  I would call this day a light-medium flow day for me.  I was a little bit more worried about the period panties, but they had no issues.

Since I'd known ahead of time that it was going to be a light period, I'd figured I could get through the whole thing with panty-liners and panty periods.  When my period turned out to be heavier than expected and I had to wash the panties midway through, and return my regular pad with wings, I wanted to cry.  Because I didn't want to put on the pad.  I wanted my comfy period panties.

Now, because I only wore the pad for one night it's not like it was all that uncomfortable in the end, but I was smiling when I got to put my period panties back on the next morning.  It was such a relief.  I have no leaks on my pants, no soreness in my labia, and even though it still occasionally freaks me out mentally that I'm just wearing panties and nothing else, I already know I'm going to buy another three pack of panties so that I don't have to use a pad at all next period.

Washing them was the next thing I had to steel myself for.  The instructions said to rinse in cold water and then put through the wash.  Rinsing them... I mean, ok it's period blood.  It comes out reddish of course.  I don't know why my head told me it would be grosser than cleaning up barf (which I did numerous times during and after college) or other bodily fluids (which I'm going to have to look forward to when I have a baby, which is something that I do want out of life).  Heck, my cat sometimes makes messes that are more unpleasant to clean up, but for some reason my head said "eeeeww period blood, worse than ANYTHING!"

The truth is, it's not.  It's just a mental thing that I'm going to go ahead and blame on society for making us feel like it's this unclean, worse than anything else mess.  Rinsing was no bother, tossing them into the laundry was easy, and then sorting them out to hang dry instead of going in the dryer, no big deal.  I checked the crotches afterwards.  Clean and normal looking.  Second wear - just as comfortable and effective as the first time around, and I felt much more confident in them.  Washing them the second time - apparently my mental state had gotten over my weird idea that washing my period panties was going to somehow be gross on a gargantuan scale.  Without the mental issue, it was just a normal wash.

Periods are probably never going to be comfortable, but I don't have to be as UNcomfortable as I have been, and that's definitely something I feel like celebrating.

I would recommend period panties to anyone who has a light to medium flow, or just light to medium flow days and will alternate with pads for the heavy days (which is what I'll be doing when I have my heavier periods), or wants to use them for tampon / diva cup back up, or just wants a pair for when they think their period is coming but isn't there yet and they don't want to wear a panty liner for some reason (they ARE more comfortable than even panty liners).

In my opinion, they are AWESOME.

#33 Friend Recommended: Soulless

I had two friends recommend this book to me actually... one when I first asked for recommendations and one when she heard that I was getting into reading Steampunk literature. Can I just say, I love these books. There's a little bit of romance with a seriously alpha male, a little bit of vampires with a twist, a little bit of were animals and a lot of fun. 

Strong female characters are always a penchant of mine and Alexia Tarabotti was everything I could hope for. No nonsense, even when faced with an angry supernatural, plenty of good logic and yet surprisingly emotional at times.  I loved the take on the vampires and were creatures in these books, just different enough from the usual lore to make it fun for someone who's read a lot about vampires and werewolves.  I especially loved the little bits of mystery, the adventure and the personal relationships. I immediately bought all the rest of the books and I keep looking for new ones.

Lovely, in every sense of the word! And four a book called Soulless, it's got quite a bit of heart (and soul).

#14 Phone Plan

#14. Get off of my parents' phone plan and onto Dear Hubby's

I am officially off my parents phone plan. And I have a smart phone! Two new things =)

I think the phone plan was the last thing that my parents were paying for me on a monthly basis. Granted they still buy me clothes and whatnot, but I'm finally a real adult! I don't think they're paying any other insurance or anything like that for me. It's a good feeling to know that I'm finally not draining them financially in any way.  Not that my old phone plan was in any way expensive (unlike my brothers) but it's still one of those things that I wanted to be responsible for on my own.

So now I'm a real married adult and my husband and I have a phone plan together. YAY!

#70 AFI's Top 100 Movies: #6 The Wizard of Oz

#6 on the AFI's Top 100 Movie List is the Wizard of Oz.

*sigh*

Even as a little kid I didn't like this movie. I used to run out of the room every time the flying monkeys came on screen. Those things are still really creepy, as I discovered when I re-watched it.

I was hopeful that perhaps the long years since the last time I'd watched this movie and my subsequent aging, that perhaps I might enjoy it more now.

Meh.

My childhood impression still remain the same. The flying monkeys are still uber creepy.  Glinda's a bitch. The celebration of the dead witch is morbid and creepy, making the munchkins into something kind of terrifying (village full of Chuckie's AH!). Scarecrow is still annoying. The lion is both obnoxious and amusing. And the Tinman still fails to really catch my notice.

My Mom LOVES this movie, which always makes me wonder what I'm missing out on.  I just don't get it.

Hubby and I synced it up with Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon, as recommended by How I Met Your Mother, and that made the beginning a lot more interesting, but the album ends long before the movie does. Which was kind of a shame.

The best thing I can say is, I didn't mind watching it once it started. I didn't feel like turning it off anything. I just don't know if I agree that it's one of the best 100 movies I've ever seen, although it probably deserves its place on the list just by virtue of its place in movie history.

#97 New Restaurants: Parva

When Parva first opened in Bethesda I was interested but not that interested. It's not in the best location; the building it resides it tends to change hands pretty frequently.  I ended up taking advantage of a Living Social deal to get me there... holy crap, WORTH IT.

First of all, the menu is pretty reasonably priced for Bethesda and the food is incredible. South American deliciousness and SO MUCH FOOD with every order, whether it's an appetizer or an entree.  I haven't been back yet, but I definitely want to go.

Their corn cakes are delicious, the specialty drink menu has some unique and tasty offerings, the paella was fantastic, the chicken dish that I had somehow got completely eaten despite how full I was, and the desserts were to die for.

Definitely a good option for a date night or a ladies' night happy hour because they have some fantastic specials!

#70 AFI's Top 100 Movies: 10th Anniv. #83 Titanic

Titanic is actually not on the original AFI Top 100 list, it's on the 10th Anniversary List that was made and included a bunch of new movies. Well, not a bunch. Maybe fifteen movies that aren't also already on the original list. But Titanic was one of them!

I went to see it when it came out in theaters again. Not because it was in 3D, although that was pretty cool for the most part, but because this is a movie that is worth seeing on the big screen, in so many ways.

What a freaking fantastic movie. I'd forgotten how much I loved it. Are there some historical inaccuracies? Sure. But the sheer amount of stuff they got right has always boggled my mind. I've had a minor obsession with the Titanic ever since I was a little girl, I read up on it, studied the schematics, and I still have the giant book that has all the information I could ever want to know and more, including eye witness accounts of what happened the night it sank.

It's such a dramatic story, not so much because of Kate & Leo's characters, although they do provide plenty, but because of the sheer amount of human choices that had to be made over so many hours. Even before it hit the iceberg, the captain and the ship designer were arguing about how fast the ship should be going, the iceberg warning came a little late thanks to a breakdown in communication between the telegraphers and the ship's officers. The boat did not go down quickly. There was time, SO MUCH TIME, for the earlier lifeboats that only had a few people in them, to return to the ship and save more lives. There was time for them to have been filled to capacity, and yet the crew sent the boats off with less than twenty people in them.

The captain stayed with the ship. The designer of the ship got on a lifeboat.  People in the third class cabins were trapped down below, along with the lower level workers, sealed in by the crew who were trying to keep the decks from becoming too crowded.  Women and children first, as long as they were first or second class. So many tiny human decisions that effected so many lives.

And the movie did such a good job showcasing all of that, even around the somewhat ludicrous love story. Although, I have to admit, I do enjoy the love story as well.

#97 New Restaurants: Shangri-La

This was my first time EVER eating Indian food. And what a way to be introduced.  I happened upon a Groupon that Chef Hubby and I used, gotta love Groupon, and we were not at all disappointed. Shangri-la might not look like much on the outside, but the food was fantastic and the prices were much better than Bethesda's normal.

They had a special where you order two platters for the price of 1 1/2... and you get SO much food. It's like a little culinary tour through India or Nepal.

Hm. For some reason the photo is coming out sideways. TURN YOUR HEAD AND SEE THE DELICIOUSNESS!!!!

I got to try several appetizers, main dishes and sides.  The Chicken Tikka Marsala was OMG NOM. One of my new favorite foods. Determined to get a good recipe for it and make it at home. There was also a rice pudding dessert.

Chef Hubby got a vegetarian platter of food from Nepal. Also delicious judging from the nom sounds he was making and the thumbs up. OMG SO MUCH FOOD.
.

Highly recommend.

I like Indian food. Who knew.

#23 Visit My Grandmother's Grave

On my grandmother's birthday, April 1, my brother and I went out to visit her grave.

My grandmother passed when she was only 70 years old, a cancer victim. She was light and life and fun, she gave herself the nickname "Twinkle Toes" and she wore more fancy dresses in a year then I have in my entire life.  We grew up only 5 minutes away from her, so I was lucky enough to have her presence in a lot of my life, although I didn't always appreciate that luck.

One of my biggest regrets is that I didn't go visit her in the hospital before she took a turn for the worse. We all thought she was going to get better, and I was wrapped up in my own life - swimteam, being in the school show, church youth group, chamber sings and AP classes my junior year - and I thought there would be more time. So much more time.

I miss her and think about her often. Visiting her grave and telling her that I got married this year was hard. I was glad to have my little (ie. younger because the dude is over 6 feet tall) brother with me to cry on.

When we left, the chorus to the song "I'm Glad You Came" was playing on the radio. A little creepy? Maybe. But even so, I like to think that perhaps she knew we were there, and that she was glad we came.

#96 Rock the Dress Photo Shoot

I was lucky enough to find a way to Rock my Dress for free!!! A local photography class needed brides (preferably already married) who were willing to pose in the gardens of a nearby state park. Sounds like MEEEE!!!

Here's some of my favorites:

#65 New Authors: Dead Until Dark

Ugh, what is it with these female characters? I wanted to like Sookie Stackhouse, I really did... it seemed there was a lot to like. And she did end up growing on me by book 5. But mostly she comes off as so callous and cold, just like a lot of the other characters, every time someone dies.  Her grandmother is murdered and she's like, well, guess I'll move into her room cuz it's bigger and has a nicer bathroom. Excuse me, what? I don't care if this is a week after the funeral, shouldn't there be more of a mourning period? Shouldn't it at least be hard for her to move her grandmother's stuff out? Like, come ON.

Same thing happens when a co-worker dies. Sookie's all, oh it's horrible... God we'll have to get someone to cover her shift.

In the beginning of the second book she actually kind of makes jokes about the dead body of another co-worker, less than an hour after finding it. Are you freaking kidding me?

Despite this, the plot line is interesting enough that I kept reading and I liked most of the other characters. And eventually Sookie did stop pissing me off so much. Or maybe I just got used to the fact that she's completely unrealistic when it comes to deaths. Oi. Would I recommend these as some of my favorite books? No. But they do have a certain appeal and once I got over those moments with Sookie I really enjoyed them.  If someone was interested, I'd warn them that they might not like Sookie at first, but that she gets better.  I'm eagerly awaiting the next one because I want to know what's going to happen next in her story.

#68 Museums I've Never Been To: Madame Tussaud's

Not like I didn't already suspect this, but now it's confirmed: wax museums = uber creepy.

But still pretty cool.  Seeing Morgan Freeman scare the crap out of my husband was worth every wax figure that scared the crap out of me. It's weird to be walking around, apologize for almost running into someone, and then turn to find that you've just apologized to a wax figurine.  And then you feel like an idiot.

The museum wasn't quite as big as I was expecting, to be honest, although it did have a lot of stars within it, for some reason I was expecting more.

Considering the size of it, I was glad that I got our tickets off of a LivingSocial deal and that we didn't pay full price. But we had a good time. Took us about an hour to run through the whole museum, despite my penchant for taking constant pictures. =)

#97 New Restaurants: Cesco Osteria

Holy noms!

I love this place.  It's got good food, great atmosphere, and is actually worth dressing up to go to, even the bar. Perhaps especially the bar.  At first I thought I would be sad that McCormick and Schmick's was gone, they had such a good happy hour, but I'm SO happy that there's finally a restaurant with an upscale bar in Bethesda! So many of them seem to be downsliding.

The food is fantastic. Good gourmet Italian. Everything is fresh made, even the pasta, which makes such a huge difference. The price point is about the same as other Bethesda restaurants.  And it's friendly. I've seen both the owner and the chef walking around, introducing themselves to people and asking how their experience has been. So not only do you get the feeling of a classy joint, you get the feeling of a friendly place that cares.

My ridiculously yummy steak dinner:

In the bar you can get Happy Hour, prices are a little higher than other places in Bethesda, but this is a good thing.  Keeps out the riff raff for one ;) LOL. By which I mean, most of the people at the bar are dressed up, some came straight from work but a lot seem to have gone home and dressed up a little before going out. Isn't that awesome?

The food selection is huge and they bring out some pretty darn large portions, so that you don't mind the slightly higher food prices than usual for happy hour. See the giant calzone below. NOM.

If you stick around till 8pm or so then the live music starts.  And people dance. They don't bump and grind, they don't wiggle their hips - they DANCE.

God I love this place.

#70 AFI's Top 100 Movie List: #100 Yankee Doodle Dandy

Seeing as it's #100 on the AFI's Top 100 Movie List and it's an old time musical (which I usually don't particularly like), I was not expecting this movie to be that good. Once again, AFI didn't let me down.

I loved it.

It's not a musical like I was expecting. There is no transition from plot line to song. Instead it's a biographical movie about George M. Cohan, a man who wrote and stared in so many musicals that he became known as "The Man Who Owned Broadway."  The music and dance numbers are all his music and dance numbers, done as close to the original play versions as possible, and all are set on stage or in rehearsal spaces.  It's like getting a little bit of live theater, but in a movie.

The story was fantastic. It was fun to see the hot headed and talented young boy start to realize that talent isn't everything and a bad attitude will mean black listing, and then begin to turn his life around.  He's a good guy at heart, even though at first you want to wallop him for being a self-centered little idiot. By the end of the movie I was a big fan of both him and the movie.

#79 Four Seasons: Spring

Part of my ongoing attempt to capture pictures of myself with the same landscape during all four seasons...

These are May's pictures

#65: New Authors: Fifty Shades of Grey

Yeah I read it. All three of them actually.  I'd never read anything by E.L. James before and I'm not sure I ever will again.  Her writing style is pretty good, she's great at sucking you into a book where you hate the characters but just HAVE to find out what's going to happen with them.

What's frightening to me is just how unrealistically dangerous her characters are. She has admitted that she knew nothing about BDSM, and it's pretty obvious. Not only is her Dom an unstable, out of control, unsafe Dom, but her virginal and inexperienced heroine is immediately having mind blowing orgasms from his incredible technique. Oh, and he's a billionaire who's fallen head over heels in love with her, so much so that he's able to move past years of trauma just from her presence. Yeah right. Talk about setting real people up for major failure. There are definitely guys out there who can be unstable, out of control and unsafe control freaks, but any virgin who's going into sex expecting mind blowing orgasms right from the getgo is going to be seriously disappointed.  And no girl is going to be able to "heal" a man like that.

It's terrifying to me how many young women think that it's super romantic for characters like Edward and Christian Grey to exhibit stalker behavior.  And Mr. Grey takes it to some technological extremes.

This book is great fantasy. It's a fun read. But don't take it seriously. Christian Grey is a terrible Dom. He has absolutely no self control and he exhibits abusive tendencies. Which, to give her credit, Ana does fight against. And to give him credit, he's in therapy. So there are some good things there.

But please... don't think that the majority of this book is in any possible in real life. You're just setting yourself up for massive disappointment and a life of loneliness because you will never measure up to Ana and no man is as sweetly and innocently emotionally abusive and determined to change as Christian Grey.

DC Cherry Blossoms Festival 100 Year Anniversary

One of my favorite parts of living in a D.C. suburb is when April comes around and it's time for the annual Cherry Blossom Festival. This year it was a particularly big deal as it marked the 100th year of the festival.  It was also a big deal because I wasn't sure I was going to be able to go, and I haven't missed a Cherry Blossom Festival in years; my husband and I make it our business to go every year together.  My new job at an accounting firm requires me to work on Saturdays during tax season and his new job requires him to work on Sundays, so our chances were looking bleak... but fate intervened and I ended up having a surprise Saturday off (Yay people unexpectedly filing for extensions and lightening my weekend workload!).

Sadly we missed the peak cherry blossom weekend and most of the blossoms had blown away, but there is always a tree in bloom somewhere - and plenty of people congregating around the one and only tree blooming next to the tidal basin.

If you walked a little further away from the tidal basin it was possible to find more trees, although the FDR Memorial (which can usually be relied on to have blossoms long after the wind has swept the tidal basin clean) was also sadly sparse.  Still, we managed to find a small grove and snap some pictures.

It was also a perfect day for kite-flying, which was fortunate for the Kite Festival that was going on that day next to the Washington Monument.

This year, with the actual blossoms being so sparse, I ended up people watching more than anything, and what I saw made me really happy. Sometimes, reading and watching the news, especially in the aftermath of Treyvan Martin and with all of the political in-fighting going on and Rick Santorum calling Obama a "Nigg-" before he caught himself, it's easy to think about how awful people can be and how different we all are and how can we possibly get along as one country?  Then I sat and people watched at the Cherry Blossoms Festival and I came away feeling a whole let better about the state of things.

There were so many different kinds of people, speaking different languages, wearing different styles, coming from different cultures, socio-economic backgrounds and walks of life, and yet we were all drawn together to see a thing of beauty.  It wasn't just people from the D.C. city and suburbs, citizens from all over the nation travel to the festival every year, and this year in particular. We were all there, together, and everyone was more than just respectful of their fellow-festival goers, they were helpful. Everywhere you could see people pausing in their walks so that they didn't interrupt a stranger's picture, or even accepting a request to take a picture of a stranger. Skin color didn't matter, no one asked if you were gay or straight, no one cared if you spoke perfect English or no English at all. Everyone was there together enjoying the beauty of the day, and it really hit me how absolutely wonderful that is.

#73 Attend a Live Comedy Show

I really lucked out for particular Day Zero Goal.  My friend Dru won free tickets for our group of friends to Baltimore's Comedy Factory... sure there's a two drink minimum, and the tickets were only $17, but I'll still take a free ticket over a $17 ticket any day!  Although it would have been worth the money, just FYI.

We had to get to the venue early to receive our free admission, but that turned out to work out in our favor because it's a seat yourself venue and we had a pretty big group.

We sat at those two long tables on the right hand side of the picture, right next to the stage. Because it's easiest to get made fun of if you're right next to the stage. =) The first performer, whom I'm guessing is a Comedy Factory mainstay / emcee kind of guy, had a couple conversations with us, mostly because when he asked who in the audience is married my husband and I were the only ones willing to raise our hands (although there were other married couples in the room).

The warm-up act, Alabama, had a fantastic time mocking one of our guys for his "Justin Timberlake" hat, and he particularly enjoyed another one of my friend's fantastically loud and expressive laugh.  She made a good counterpoint for another patron's laughter who was sitting opposite from us on the other side of the stage.

Alabama had us rolling. He spent most of his time interacting with the audience and kind of making things up as he went along, although he had a few observations / things to say that were obviously pre-planned - and absolutely hilarious.  While talking politics he mentioned President Obama and started talking about how cool and hip and good-looking Obama was when he was first elected. Then, Alabama went on to say, "I saw him on TV yesterday and I thought it was Morgan Freeman up there!"

Much hilarity ensued.

I was actually rather disappointed to realize that he wasn't the main act... that is until the main act got up there and started. Tony Woods was an absolute riot.

He had hilarious jokes, witty observations, and a fantastic feel for the audience. There was some interaction with the audience... he stuck with his spiel but had absolutely no trouble at all side-lining and changing things up in order to accommodate what was happening in the room. Granted, I was a few drinks in at this point, but I was also crying I was laughing so hard at some parts of his routine. His description of a bison - "I know what a bison is, it's a cow with an afro!" and his subsequent demonstration of how eating bison meat makes you feel, had us rolling.

I really hate going into Baltimore. I avoid it as much as possible. It's a bit of a drive, in addition to the fact that I find the streets hard to navigate. But it was well worth it for this. Comedy clubs are now high up on my list of things that are a lot of fun to do!

#72: Attend a professional live theater performance of a show I've never seen

This is not a show I was ever interested in seeing, to be perfectly honest. My husband has seen it and it's not one he was ever interested in seeing again. Both of us had an incredible time watching Olney Theater's production of it.

The show was fun, funny, nostalgic and heart-touching. It was like reading the comic strips all over again. Every scene was just another little comic strip vignette... was there a plot? I'm not sure. Obviously Charlie Brown was searching for something, a little light in his life, a little direction for himself, and I'm not sure if he ever found it, but I really enjoyed watching him and his friends just live out their daily lives.

The stage was a little sparse at times, but the acting was fantastic and the props, costumes and set all contributed to the comic-strip feel. My husband really enjoyed the production because this production made little modern day tweaks to the script which brought some of the most surprisingly and delightful moments to the stage - such as Snoopy and Sally's rabbit hunt where they suddenly broke out in Beyonce midway through.

I was also delighted to walk in and see someone I knew onstage... the incredibly talented Vishal as Shroeder, rocking out with amazing vocals as usual - and also fantastically obsessive about Beethoven.

My number one favorite character, however, was Sally. That is a ridiculously amazing part. And the actress was fantastic, great comedic timing and her squeaky yet growly voice cracked me up.

all in all it was a thoroughly enjoyable show, a great date night, and it made me want to get out and see more theater more often, especially at Olney where all the seats are close to the stage!

#70 AFI's Top 100 Movie List: #94 Goodfellas

"Goodfellas" is, predictably, about a group of guys who think of themselves as "good fellas," which, the main character explains in the movie means a "good fella to know."  Personally, after watching the movie I'm not sure why anyone would want to know any of them. While they have their own moral code, which is strictly followed, and lead fantastic lives of wealth and privilige (for a time, anyway), they also live in constant danger from both law enforcement and each other.  

 

 

There were a lot of great things about this movie.  Most interesting to me is that it was based on a true story, as told by a mobster turned Protected Witness, who was still alive and in the Witness Protection Program when the movie came out. Normally I'm not a big fan of mobster movies, but I really enjoyed this one. Part of it was the acting, which was fantastic, and part of it was the storyline. It was fascinating even before the end of the movie when I found out it was based on a real man's life.

The movie begins with a lot of class and glamorization... 

 

Henry Hill is the main character and he narrates the majority of the film (occasionally parts are narrated by the voice of his wife, Karen).  

 

We hear from the beginning how Henry always wanted to be a gangster, dreamed of it even. He was impressed by their clothes, their lifestyle and their power. He started by running errands for the local mob and was taken under the wing of the mob boss, Paulie, by the time he was in high school - not that he was going to school.

 

 Although he eventually rose to be a respected and well-liked mobster, he could never be officially "made" (which I guess is kinda like being inducted into a leadership position) because he wasn't Italian. But he made enough money and had enough power that he never seemed to mind.

 

I don't want to give away too much of the story. Suffice to say that the acting is fantastic, I really enjoyed watching all of the characters (even Joe Pesci's, and he tends to seriously get on my nerves). I thought the way the movie went from glamorizing the lifestyle and the power of these men to showing Henry's decline into drugs and the gritty reality of violence and death within the mob was great.  The plot was smooth and seamless, transitioning to a kind of fairy tale into something almost nightmarish. With friends like his, who needs enemies? 

 

 

Mostly I appreciated that it wasn't the kind of in-your-face graphic violence that I see so much of today in the movie theaters. Violence is one thing, but it shouldn't be the main point of the movie and the plot should never play second banjo to the graphic effects. In Goodfellas you get an intriguing and exciting story, just the right amount of violence, and some seriously good acting.  I'm really glad this movie was on the AFI's Top 100 list and that I got to watch it for my blog! Even though it wasn't one I was really interested in, it drew me in and kept me there anyway.

#33 Friend Recommended: Darkfever by Karen Marie Moning

I think I need to get more book recommendations from Courtney, we obviously like reading a lot of the same things!

 

I'd never heard of Darkfever before she recommended it to me, and I didn't look up anything about it before I started reading.  I saw it on Amazon's Daily Kindle Special for .99 and jumped on it - what a deal! Even more of a deal when I started reading and found out how good it is. Although Karen Marie Morning apparently usually writes romances, she's stepped away (just a little) from that genre with this wonderful fantasy novel... that has a lot of seriously sexy romance in it. But it's not your typical romance novel, not even your typical fantasy romance novel, because this book has more blood, guts and violence than it does sex.

 

Now, I don't want to hype this book up too much, especially because about 1/3 of the way through Darkfever, although I was enjoying the plot line and all of the side characters, the main character, Mackenzie aka Mac, was seriously grating on my nerves. She's 22, extremely shallow and completely convinced that she can take care of herself and take on anything and anyone... even though she's never been anywhere more dangerous than occasional trips from her small town in Georgia to the nearby city of Atlanta. *face palm*

 

Still. The interesting plot and other characters kept me going. See, the Unseelie Sidhe (evil fairies for those of you who aren't up to date on your fantasy) are escaping the prison the Seelie Sidhe (good fairies... if there is such a thing) put them in and are invading our world through a portal in Dublin, Ireland.  Mac gets involved after her sister is murdered and she goes to Dublin to seek justice, never realizing that in order to do so she's going to have to immerse herself in a fantastical world that she's never believed in and always thought was stupid... however, it's hard to ignore a Sidhe when you're staring it in the face. Most people woudn't get the chance to but, lucky Mac, it turns out she's special kind of human, a sidhe-seer... the term is pretty self explanatory so I'll leave it at that.  So she's searching for her sister's murder and getting caught up in a world that she wants nothing to do with, and realizing that her sister had already been somewhat immersed in this world really plays havoc with her sense of reality.

 

And in the middle of all of this are the two walking sex-pots of the series, Jericho Barrons who is... someone? Something? helping Mac. Or is he helping her? Or is he just helping himself? The man is a frustrating mystery of walking sexiness. Although Mac isn't interested in him (she likes a man with good moral fiber, and makes the quip that the most fiber Barrons gets is when he walks down the cereal aisle at the grocery store).  V'lane is the other posssible romantic interest: a Seelie Prince with the power of sex. But Seelie doesn't mean he's a good guy, because sex with a fae is addictive and can be deadly (I really appreciate that Ms. Morning actually researched her Sidhe lore and didn't just make something up, the mark of a good fantasy novel!).  Both of them are possessive over Mac, but not just because she's pretty (although there's def some male territorial hilariousness going on), but because she's the first person they've come across that can sense the evil they need to find and destroy (I'm summing up here, it's so much more complicated than this).

 

Now... you might think that I've given you a whole bunch of spoilers here. Nope. You'll get all this information in the first third of the first book. This is not a quick and easy romance. It's not even a quick and easy fantasy series. The series is 5 books long (I love reading an already completed series) and is full of twists and turns and unexpected developments. Plus, some seriously fantastically drawn out sexual tension. 

 

Even though I was unsure about the first book, I'm glad that I didn't put it down, and I was completely hooked by the end of the second book. In fact, I enjoyed this series so much that I bought them all and have added them to my bookshelves. This is a big deal because I've been trying NOT to add books to my bookshelves, that was the whole point of getting the kindle! But for my favorite books, I like to have them around so I can read and re-read, and this series has now been added to that list.