Centaurs and other such nonsense

When I was 5, I loved My Little Ponies. Glittery pink and purple madness galore. We played with them so much that a huge Tupperware box of ponies will prove that half of them had missing tails and bad homemade haircuts, and the other half were dirtied beyond belief. And of course when there a toy as popular as this one, people try to make them seem so much cooler than they are by making bad movies and ghetto tv shows that only air after the Price is Right at 10:00am on Tuesday mornings. Being 5 and not understanding the stupidity of their marketing tactic, I fell in love with the first show, "Escape from Midnight Castle." I ate the thing up. I laughed when they met the scatterbrained wizard, danced with all the seahorses under the sea, and cringed when the bad guy (a centaur) released the Rainbow of Darkness.

However, with my completely sporadic 5 year old mind, I thought that meant all bad guys must be centaurs. I remember my mom sitting me down one day and explaining what the Gulf War was. She showed me pictures of some people on the Iraqi side (only their heads and torsos, mind you), and what did I do? I didn't wonder about the definition of war, the location of Iraq, or what this has to do with me or America as a nation. I wondered what they looked like, automatically assuming that the bottom half of them was shaped like a horse.

Nonsense, I know. But then it got me wondering what it would be like if I still had the mentality of a 5 year old. Magic was a part of the fabric of my life. I don't think I would have second guessed myself if I saw a fairy in my yard, a centaur walking down the street, or if my favorite Nintendo characters randomly popped out of the tv. Experience is great, don't get me wrong. But where do you draw the line from being a believer in magic to a cynical skeptic? Sometimes I think I put myself in the latter category way too often. I expect the worse in people, assume the most terrible things will happen to me, or that life is one big round of hatred, boredom, and cynicism. Why are movies either ridiculously magical or tragically realistic? What ever happened to thinking that life is still magical, even though it's marked with thistles and thorns? I think there is still an element of magic in life, and the only thing stopping me from discovering a taste of it is my grown-up self.

Olyolypimics... I mean Olympics

Sometimes I feel sorry for Olympic reporters. I mean seriously - you have to come up with all this intelligent stuff as who knows what is happening with all the athletes and still make it sound interesting/exciting. I, however, love it because all sorts of funny things come out. Here are just a few of the quotes I have caught from my late night Olympic fetish:

1- Talking about mens' gymnastics: "The mens' gymnastic team can't afford a big mistake... which that wasn't."


2- Womens' cycling (in the rain): "It's important to keep hydrated, but on a day like this they probably just want a hot cup of coffee. And Bob knows just the place!" [cut to some random
Starbucks in Beijing]

3- Beach Volleyball: "He's 180 pounds of string-bean meat!" (I'm not sure I'd want to be a string bean...)

4- Trying to sound artistic: "Today the British empire extends into China."

5- Making up all sorts of interesting words: "May and Walsh are outphysicaling the Cubans."

"Everyone doubts when he goes slow in the prelims. Then he goes fast in the finals and all of a sudden... he's Aaron Piersol!" (And he wasn't before...?)



I also found some really great ones on the internet from 2004 in Athens:

1. Weightlifting commentator: "This is Gregoriava from Bulgaria. I saw
her snatch this morning during her warm up and it was amazing."

2. Dressage commentator: "This is really a lovely horse and I speak
from personal experience since I once mounted her mother."

3. Paul Hamm, Gymnast: "I owe a lot to my parents, especially my mother
and father."

4. Boxing Analyst: "Sure there have been injuries, and even some deaths
in boxing, but none of them really that serious."

5. Softball announcer: "If history repeats itself, I should think we
can expect the same thing again."

6. Basketball analyst: "He dribbles a lot and the opposition doesn't
like it. In fact you can see it all over their faces."

And finally, here are probably my three favorite Olympians this year:

The Twilight Catalog

I must apologize first of all for all of you who actually like (or *cough, cough* are obsessed *cough, cough*) with the Twilight series. I wanted to do a blog on the worst quotes of the Breaking Dawn, but then I realized there was something even better out there... hard core proof of the absolute absurdity of the first book, Twilight. So, here I present you with one of the most insightful pieces on the first fateful book.

(I must forewarn you that some of this stuff doesn't really apply anymore after the fourth book answered some questions for us all. It nonetheless gives me a chuckle.)

http://otahyoni.livejournal.com/130432.html

The Catalog
Number of Pages in the Book: 498
The First Hint of a Plot that Is Not Bella and Edward's Romance: page 328
When the Plot Actually Arrives: page 372

Boys that Totally Love Bella (Including Edward Cullen): 5

Approximate Amount of Time Bella and Edward are Romantically Involved Before Bella Is Begging Edward to Turn Her into a Vampire so They Can Be Together Forever: Like, two weeks. Maybe three. The timeline's a bit fuzzy.

References to Edward's Beauty: 165

Broken Down into the following categories -

• Face: 24 (Favorite adjectives: glorious, heavenly, seraphic)
• Voice: 20 (The voice of an archangel, donchaknow.)
• Eyes: 17
• Movement: 11
• Smile: 10
• Teeth: 8
• Muscles: 7
• Skin: 7 (Note: This only contains accounts of Edward's skin being beautiful. I didn't count references to it as "pale," "cold," or "white." If I had, this number would be about ten times larger.)
• Iron Strength or Limbs: 5
• Breath: 4 (EVEN HIS BREATH IS AMAZING.)
• Scent: 4
• Laughter: 3
• Handwriting: 2
• Chest: 2
• Driving Skills: 1

The Number of Times...

• Bella Is Clumsy or Makes a Reference to Her Clumsiness: 26
• Bella Sneers at Forks or Its Inhabitants: 22
• Bella is "Dazzled" or Rendered Speechless by Edward's Beauty or Touch: 17
• Edward Tells Bella to Stay Away from Him While Completely Contradicting Himself with His Behavior: 16
• Bella is Utterly Desolate at Edward's Absence: 12
• Edward and Bella Kiss: 8
  • Bella's Hormones Get the Better of Her and She Attacks Edward, Almost Causing Him to Eat Her: 2 (She's not even allowed to kiss him back! Where's the fun in that?)
    
  • Edward's Kiss Makes Bella Faint: 1
  • Edward's Kiss Makes Bella's Heart Literally Stop: 1
• Bella Thinks She Isn't Good Enough for Edward: 6
• Edward Is Referred to As Godlike: 5 (Note: This number might be off, as I didn't start counting until three or four mentions in.)
• Edward Tells Bella She's Unnatural: 5
• Edward Sparkles: 3
• Bella is in Mortal Danger: 3
  • Edward Saves Bella from Mortal Danger: 3
• Edward Stalks Bella, For Real: 2 (Note: One of these instances involves watching her sleep every night for, like, months.)
• Bella says "Holy Crow!": 2
• Bella and Edward Argue About Who Loves the Other Most: 1
• Edward's Inability to Read Bella's Mind is Explained: 0

I would have kept track of how many times Edward's mood shifts unexpectedly and for no reason, but I didn't have that much paper. I am sad, though, that I didn't keep track of how many times words like "granite," "stone," and "marble" are used in reference to Edward. His arms, his lips. Explain to me how kissing cold, marble lips is at all appealing. And yet it makes Bella faint. I give up.

+++++++

Lines That Made Me Laugh Out Loud Because...Well, You'll See:

I couldn't imagine how an angel could be any more glorious.

Note: Unless I say otherwise, just assume such sentiments are referring to Edward in all his glory.

He lay perfectly still in the grass, his shirt open over his sculpted, incandescent chest, his scintillating arms bare.

Incandescent. Scintillating. The adjectives in this book cracked me up. Because he sparkles!

The meadow, so spectacular to me at first, paled next to his magnificence.

Paled! Is that a joke? Oh, she's serious? I was afraid of that.

As I had just that once before, I smelled his cool breath in my face. Sweet, delicious, the scent made my mouth water.

This to me was the most disturbing aspect of Edward's inhuman perfection. It's just weird. And gross. And weird.

Edward: "There are other hungers. Hungers I don't even understand, that are foreign to me."

Um, Ed, babe? You were seventeen when you were turned. I highly doubt those "hungers" were foreign to you.

I could smell the unbearably sweet fragrance coming off his chest.

He pressed his cool lips to my forehead, and the room spun. The smell of his breath made it impossible to think.

Because, through the heavy water, I heard the sound of an angel calling my name, calling me to the only heaven I wanted.

He leaned in slowly, the beeping noise accelerated wildly before his lips even touched me. But when they did, though with the most gentle of pressure, the beeping stopped altogether.

...EDWARD KISSES HER AND HER HEART LITERALLY STOPS. I just...I don't even know what to do with this. Other than laugh hysterically while I beat my head against the table.

+++++++

From now on, I'm using the word "Edwardian" to refer to something inhumanly beautiful or perfect. For example: "Joe is totally Edwardian. Did you see his abs?"

And, because I am going to laugh at Edward Cullen for the rest of my life - because why, if you are immortal and so gorgeous that women faint at the sight of you, would you enroll in high school? wouldn't you have better things to do with your time?