Girls vs. Boys

This show was great. At first I was worried it would be cliche or just a modern version of Spring Awakening (which it kind of was) but I really enjoyed it.

The show is centered around a bunch of high school students who are playing "The Game," which was obviously related to love and dating. The actual rules and objectives of the game were the least clear, but from what Amy and I deduced there was no way to win. Only ways to lose. You were out of the game (and "bled" rose petals all over the place) if you got your heart broken. The metaphor mostly seems simple enough, but it took me and Amy a really long time to get to that conclusion. Though you got the general gist of whether the scene was good or bad, the logistics were difficult to decipher.

However, the energy of the cast made up for the kinks that still need to be worked out. The show was young (I'd say "hip" but that automatically makes me not so), relevant, and pretty daring at times. The opening number was spectacular, reminiscent of "Totally Fucked" if I do say so myself. But all the little details, usually involving cell phone usage, were just so accurate in how acutely awkward they were; the phone-tag scene comes to mind immediately. Also, the amount of "real" dancing in the show was impressive. The girls especially were very talented and they incorporated some pretty hard-core contemporary steps, which you usually don't see in any musical.

The second act needed a lot more work than the first. It becamse very dialogue heavy and, in my opinion, had one too many subplots. Jason became a caricature and at times seemed like he was just imitating Heath Ledger's Joker. And it was a poor imitation at that. The excessive gunfire at the end was also irritating. As were some of the incredibly long dances (the number about the pills and sex come to mind). Also, "To Write Love On Her Arms" made me cringe.

Which leads me to my final criticism: I know that cutting is a difficult, sensitive and VERY important topic, and I respected the show for addressing it (because I think it often gets left by the wayside when suicide gets brought up) but that number added nothing to the discussion or the show. Come to think of it now, the show almost threw that issue away, making it leverage for blackmail and, in the end, curing it with the love from a significant other. Also, the severity of the condition was damped by the fact that people were metaphorically cutting themselves and each other throughout the whole show. I get that it was part of that larger metaphor, beating yourself up and breaking your own heart, etc. but...I don't know. Clearly this is an issue very close to me; I was proud I made it through the big song and actually watched the character cut, but at the end I was so shaky and light-headed I had to go lay down in the lobby for a few minutes. OK, sorry this has turned into more of a rant. That was not my intention. Let's get back on track:

I really, really enjoyed this show. There are definitely things to be tweaked or, in very few cases, reworked, but the show took a lot of risks and had a lot of fun. It was loud, it was funny, it was relevant. Definitely 2nd favorite of the summer.

The BBC believes most people will have read only 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?

Instructions:
Copy this into your Notes. Look at the list and put an 'X' before those you have read. Tag other book nerds.

1 ( ) Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 ( ) The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 ( ) Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 (X)Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 (X)To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 ( ) The Bible >>not all of it!
7 ( ) Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 (X) Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 ( ) His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 ( ) Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

Total: 3

11 ( ) Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 ( ) Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 ( ) Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 ( ) Complete Works of Shakespeare >>again, too many
15 ( ) Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 ( )The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien X
17 ( ) Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 (X) Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 (X) The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 ( ) Middlemarch - George Eliot

Total: 5

21 ( ) Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 (X) The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 ( ) Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 ( ) War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 (X) The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
27 ( ) Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 (X) Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 ( ) Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 ( ) The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame

Total: 8

31 ( ) Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 ( ) David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 ( )Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 ( ) Emma-Jane Austen
35 ( ) Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 (X)The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis (Isn't this the same as 33?)
37 (X)The Kite Runner - Khaled Hossein
38 ( ) Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 (X) Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 ( ) Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne

Total: 11

41 (X)Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 (X)The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 ( )One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 ( ) A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
45 ( ) The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 ( ) Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 ( ) Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 ( ) The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 ( ) Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 ( ) Atonement - Ian McEwan

Total: 13

51 ( ) Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 ( ) Dune - Frank Herbert
53 ( ) Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 ( ) Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 ( ) A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 ( ) The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 ( ) A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 (X) Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 (X) The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night - Mark Haddon
60 ( ) Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Total: 15

61 ( ) Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 ( ) Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 ( ) The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 (X) The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 ( ) Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 ( ) On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 ( ) Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 ( ) Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 ( ) Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 ( ) Moby Dick - Herman Melville

Total: 16

71 ( ) Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 ( ) Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 (X) The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 ( ) Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 ( ) Ulysses - James Joyce
76 ( ) The Inferno – Dante
77 ( ) Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 ( ) Germinal - Emile Zola
79 ( ) Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 ( ) Possession - AS Byatt

Total: 17

81 ( ) A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 ( ) Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 ( ) The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 ( ) The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 ( ) Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 ( ) A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 (X)Charlotte’s Web - EB White X
88 (X) The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 ( ) Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle X
90 ( ) The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton

Total: 19

91 ( ) Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 (X)The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 ( ) The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 ( )Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 ( ) A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 ( ) A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 ( ) The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 ( ) Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 (X) Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 ( ) Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Total: 21

Notable omissions:

( ) Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
( ) All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
( ) The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
( ) Beowulf
( ) Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
( ) Don Quixote by Miguel Cervantes
( )Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
( ) The Illiad by Homer
( )The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
( ) Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham
(X) The Odyssey by Homer
( ) The Once and Future King by T.H. White
( ) The Portrait of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
( ) The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane
( ) Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
( ) The Stranger by Albert Camus
( ) Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
( )The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

Extra Points: 5
Total: 35

Adventures in Breakfast

So I've become relatively obsessed with a few food blogs this summer which, in turn has inspired me to bake a lot more. Mostly I've stuck to breakfast and dessert, but have been pouring over old Cooking Light magazines collecting recipes. So I hope to become adept at making dinners that are OTC pasta by the end of next year.

In the meantime, I thought I'd chronicle my trials (and errors), more for my own reference than anyone else's. I'll try to remember to include pictures in the future.

First up: Oatmeal Berry Pancakes from Seventeen Magazine
3/4 cup egg whites
2/3 cup chopped strawberries
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/2 tsp. sugar
Non-fat yogurt and blueberries (optional, for serving)

1. Beat the egg whites, strawberries, rolled oats, and sugar until smooth
2. Coat a non-stick sillet with cooking spray and heat. Ladle 1/4 cup of batter into the skillet. Cook until batter is set around the edges of the pan (you'll start to see little bubble), then push it toward the center with a spatula. Cook until batter sets in the center. Turn the pancake over and cook for one minute.
3. Repeat with the remaining batter. Serve with yogurt and blueberries.

Result: Made a lot of pancakes for a recipe that said it yields one serving. I can't remember exactly how many there were, but there was leftover breakfast after Patty and I had our fill. The pancakes were a little mealy with kind of a funny aftertaste. I may have needed to beat the batter longer (there were still whole oats and flecks of strawberries) but the egg whites were already so fluffy, it didn't really have the consistency of batter. Also, 3/4 cup of whites is actually a shit ton of eggs (4 or 5!). I know there were a healthy recipe, but it took a lot of ingredients and the end product wasn't that great.


Next: Cottage Cheese Pancakes from Smitten Kitchen
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon or pinch of ground nutmeg (optional)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1 cup full-fat or low-fat cottage cheese
3 tablespoons butter, melted
2 large egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/3 cups finely chopped walnuts (optional)
1/3 cup dried currants, plumped (optional)
2 large egg whites
Pure maple syrup or honey, or plain yogurt (optional, for serving)

1. Lightly butter, oil, or spray your griddle–nonstick works best with these, if you have them–if needed, and preheat it over medium heat. If you are using an electric griddle, preheat it to 350 degrees F. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees F if you do not plan to serve the pancakes hot off the griddle.
2. Whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon or nutmeg and salt together in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk, cottage cheese, butter, egg yolks and vanilla.
3. Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients and gently whisk them together, mixing just until combined. Stir in the walnuts and/or currants, if using them.
4. Beat the two egg whites until they are stiff but not dry and fold them into the batter.
5. The batter will be thick and bubbly - similar to cake batter. Spoon 1/3 cup batter onto the griddle for each pancake, nudging the batter into rounds. These are thick and might take a little longer to cook than most other pancakes. Cook until the top of each pancake is starting to dry around the edges - you will get a few bubbles here and there - then turn and cook until the underside is lightly browned. These will keep in a 200 degrees F oven while you finish making the rest, but they are best served immediately, when they are at their lightest and puffiest.

Big changes: I didn't include any of the optional ingredients. I also halved the recipe and didn't separate & beat the egg whites (it just seemed like too much work).
Result: They did take a while to cook, as the recipe said they would. I tried turning the heat up, but they burned quickly. The extra time is definitely worth it, though. The pancakes were extremely fluffy and had a hint of cottage cheese flavor (I may actually add more the next time I try these). The half-recipes made 10 pancakes total.

A few more coming...

Barefoot at CVS

30 Rock Drinking Game

Drink every time...

...Tracy says "Liz Lemon."

...Liz says "baby," "blerg," or "poo."

...Jack gives Liz advice.

...Kenneth says "television" or "mother/mama."

...Jenna whines about something.

...Dot Com is the voice of reason.

...Jonathon makes an awkward sexual reference about Jack.

...Toofer wears a sweater vest.

...Dr. Spaceman is on screen.

...Frank makes fun of Jenna.

If you really want to get fucked up...

Drink every time Liz is eating something.

Another Apology

I have never been that crazy about Harry Potter.

This does not mean I am a Communist.

My Apoplogies

I'm sorry, but I have almost no desire to see 500 Days of Summer.

There are a lot of reasons I don't want to see it, but they can pretty much be described by the much-used comparrison:

"It's this year's Garden State."

It's an anti-love story, but I think it looks just a cliche as anything else, only in different ways. It's an indie cliche. The only way it could be more so would be to include a Gllenhaal.

My Newest/First Ambition

For the past few days I have been reading Leg the Spread, a book all about one woman's adventures as a clerk at The Merc. I've plowed through it, which is nothing new for me, but I am having uncharacteristically strong emotional reactions to it. The reason, I believe, is that it is the first female perspective I've been offered. Also, the first of a newcomer to the floor. So much of the terror and pressure she describes were absent from the other trading books I've look through, books that are written by seasoned, male traders.

It has provided me with a new perspective on the trading world and ignited a passion in me that I've never had before; it has opened my eyes to a job that I want. I don't want to be to hasty in this decision, but I really want to be a trader.

There are pros (defy stereotypes, gain respect, earn shitloads of money) and cons (be constantly stressed, huge risk, become obsessed with money) of the profession, but as I read and the more I'm around trading, the more I want to do it. There is something, an "it factor" if you will, that outweighs all of those logical considerations. It doesn't matter that I don't have the personality for it or I still don't really know what's going on nor how much of the book is accurate, I want this. And I'm going to work to get it. I've never felt so focused on anything (at least career-wise) my entire life.

We'll see how I feel at the end of the summer, first semester, and my Duke career, but right now I'm gonna give it what I've got.

Checking In

Where I've been so far this summer

Theater:
Jersey Boys
Lieutenant of Inishmore
Rock n Roll
Boleros for the Disenchanted

El Grito del Bronx
*Still to see: Rod Blagojevich Superstar, Boys and Girls

Movies:
The Soloist
The Hangover
Up
Away We Go
The Proposal

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
*Still to see: Public Enemies, 500 Days of Summer, The Ugly Truth, Julie and Julia, Time Traveler's Wife

Music:
The Dirty Projectors and The Sea and Cake
Lupe Fiasco
Ne-Yo
Explosions in the Sky
*Still to see: Maybe Lolla?

My Face Just Melted

I cannot believe I almost didn't go. That would have been the biggest mistake of my life and I would never have known what I missed. That is, unless I saw Explosions 10 years from now and then I'd be kicking myself for not going earlier.

I was first introduced to Explosions in the Sky during my first year as Talent Show producer. A band named Shazbot auditioned with the song "First Breath After Coma" and we put them as the second to last band in the show (an honor, the closing band was always a feel good DMB/Phish cover, the penultimate band was always the most talented). Rehearsals were always long and stressful, usually upwards for four hours after most of us had already been in rehearsals for The Music Man. By a stroke of pure luck, Shazbot was always the last band to rehearse on their scheduled days. With most of our responsibilities taken care of the production team plus the tech directors would settle into the plush seats in the shadows on stage right, breathe a sigh of relief, and allow Shazbot to calm us all down. Needless to say Explosions in the Sky holds a great amount of sentimental value, talent show was my life and family for the second half of my high school career.

Explosion's "The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place" was one of those albums my friends and I discovered and felt a personal responsibility toward. The music was the soundtrack to a lot of important moments in our lives and began to define our group (before our collective ska phase). Each song reminded me of a different person or moment and could bring me to tears in a matter of minutes.

But what was different about last night was that it was not a group experience. Though I was there with friends and hundreds of other people, I didn't feel the need to connect with anyone except the musicians. I stood still and let the music move through me, which sounds ridiculous but it wasn't. Since they have no vocals, Explosions in the Sky can play turn their amps up as loud as they fucking want and I swear you feel the pulse of the music almost as much as you hear it. I allowed myself to think about nothing and be consumed; I lost myself and all of my stress in the music and came out in a much better place that when I went in. So even though I freaked out with Lizzy and Grant after the show, I was completely alone for an hour and a half and was allowed to cry, smile, sway, and just BE, which -even in the lazy days of summer- can be very difficult.

Fort Sheridan, the Moon, and the skunk in my garage were all enjoyable but relatively inconsequential because I was still recovering from the experience of the show. But it was really nice to see new people who know and related to a very, very different side of me. It was exactly the evening I needed and I would urge anyone to go see EITS as soon as they possibly can.