First off, a reminder to myself: flannel sheets are awesome. Mom and I realized that there ARE twin sized flannels at the farm (they didn't all go with me to college). There's a pair of flat sheets that were my Great-Grandmother's in the house. THANK JEEBUS. I'm so much more comfortable now. :D

Today it snowed. A lot. Stayed in and set-up the 'rents new Blu-Ray player. It's got streaming, so we watched some cheese getting made on youtube. Then we watched Super 8 on Netflix - geeze J.J. Abrams, you worship at the alter of Spielberg much? Also: lens flare! (taught my step dad that :P). Watched some Big Bang Theory, cause that's the step-dad's new favorite show. Then Tintin! OMG, I'm soooo happy I saw that. It was fabulous - story wise and cinematographic wise. Enough plot, enough slapstick, enough emotion, enough crazy ass chase scenes to keep it interesting. I love that they chose this traditionally 2D comic to translate into 3D, motion capture. It gave the story (especially the case scenes) such a sense of DEPTH. Thank you Moffat, thank you Spielberg, and THANK YOU Hergé.

Made a smashing stew today - browned some onions and garlic, added 3 kinds of chili powder and a dash of nutmeg. Added a package of frozen beef cubes (our last? that would suck! cows are you dinner yet?) and covered the whole thing with a home canned quart of tomatoes, added a bay leaf and a dried pepper. Added some leftover brown rice in the last 20 minutes, to warm it back up. So easy, no real standing over the stove and cook, and SOOO GOOD. Ate it with a bunch of deviled eggs. Spicy all around to warm us up.

Now, on family & Christmas. I'm both pleased and annoyed at the peeps. ( cut b/c this is getting long. and it's family related stuff, so maybe you don't want to read it? )

I've ordered my iPad, should be here by the end of the week - baring anymore crazy weather shit *arrrrgh* I've gotten 'Here be dragons' engraved on the back. And I've bought a 2 cases - one with a keyboard and one that is map patterned :P

OH, and I wanted to ask my flist. How do you feel about kindle/e-books/noooks/etc? I have put all these books on my amazon wishlist as KINDLE editions. I don't want anymore books. I don't have the room, I don't want to use the paper, I don't want to hold the book while I'm reading. Kindle editions are cheaper (generally), create less waste in manufacturing, and take up a hell of a lot less space. And I can access them from my iPod, my computer, google chrome, my actual (soon to be defunct) kindle. SNAZY! So I put some books on my amazon wishlist, as kindle editions. My aunt, in all her wisdom, got me a hard copy of the book. Apparently my mother tried to convince her that I REALLY DID want the kindle edition, but no go >:( This makes me cranky, ya know. So what do you think? Do you ask for kindle editions as presents? Do you still prefer books? Why or why not? I've been asking everybody, I'm insanely curious what others think.

I had a rant about textbooks prepared for today. fadeintodawn will appreciate it so I think I'll save it for tomorrow. Which is actually the first day of classes for us :)

But I've gotten distracted! An email arrived that listed some homework for my film class (full name: Film Form and Culture). So I had to watch a bit of Sherlock Jr. (1924) and all of Uncle Josh at the Moving Picture Show. I also had to read an excerpt from Plato's The Republic and something else about the movie theatre. Fascinating! I'm looking forward to this class.

aside: you know, if the worst that the national news has to talk about is the weather and the GOP convention, IT'S A GOOD DAY. I'm tired of hearing about shootings >:(