i fell in love with the dj.

Okay, not really. But I've fallen ridiculously in love with this all-too-catchy, poppy, head-bopping song. Stupid So You Think You Can Dance and your hot and sexy samba dancing. This is all your fault.

everyone needs a vacation.

It doesn't matter how old or young you are. It doesn't matter if you sell vacation packages for a living. It doesn't matter how happy or miserable your job makes you, but it's always nice to go somewhere new and I firmly believe that everyone needs to go out and get some fresh air.

I had the chance to go with a couple of girlfriends to the partially-sunny city of Gulf Shores this weekend. It was a serene 8-hour drive through 3 states - wait, scratch that, did I say serene? I meant boring. I meant 8 hours of corn fields, soybean farms, plains, and a few small country towns. And then, finally, the beach.

Gulf Shores was a bit larger and more populated with vacationers than I expected. Up until I moved to Arkansas, I'd grown up surrounded by an ocean for 75% of my life. I didn't recognize this kind of beach. Gulf Shores' air didn't smell quite as salty as the Pacific Ocean, but it brought back fond memories of having the beach as my backyard in Hawaii as a teenager or floating on an inner tube as a young girl the Philippines.

We stayed in a rather humble hotel which only had 5 floors. We sat on the beach, I read, I stuck my toes in the sand and waded in the water, I ate shrimp (my favorite type of shellfish), splashed around in the hotel pool, shopped, and walked about. It was a good vacation.

I brought along a video camcorder to document the trip, and only ended up shooting less than 10 minutes. Pretty sad. I brought along a digital SLR and only shot 75 photos, even sadder. I had every intention of capturing as much as I could with hopes that I could make a great photo book, slide show, and video, but I came up pretty short to my high expectations.

But I'm okay with that. I was on vacation.

*Edit*
I actually recorded 30 minutes of video whilst on vacation. But only because I accidentally left the camera on for 20 of those minutes. I have some exclusive documentation of my elbow, a leg, and the side of my book.

t-minus 3 days.

I'm trying to come up with an adjective that I could use to describe this week's events. "Intense" seems too serious. "Fun" seems too lighthearted. "Challenging" seems imprecise. But, don't worry, I'd rather not pore over thesaurus.com all night. ;)

There are a lot of things I like to do for fun. These include, but are not limited to: eating Popsicles, playing on the Internet, and watching chick flicks. But as far as my day job goes, I'm a producer. This may mean very little to your average Joe, so as far as my career is concerned, I tend to keep details at a minimum. The lines blur in some areas, but are rigid in others. One day I could be invoicing, one day I could be writing, and another day I could be crawling around underneath a symphony stage trying to find a power outlet.

Right now I'm three days deep into a shoot that's proving to be a unique challenge. Mostly exterior shots. Children & animals as extras - this industry's most dreaded bane. It's a lovely high 90's. Nothing feels quite like "Insta-tan" than a shiny board reflecting an angry high-noon sun in your eyes and pushing a 20-degrees hotter wave of heat in your face.

We've been shooting in a town about half an hour away for a client (an agency) that is based in Hawaii. The creative work is awesome: the concept is simple, funny, and aloof. It has an air of "The Office" humor mixed with childlike curiosity. The concept: three different "Explorers" have just discovered this on-location city and find themselves popping up in interesting places and interacting with their environments in unusual ways. Sorry for the lack of detail - I'm bound to this description until the spots air in September.

We've had high points and low points. The low points were few: we had a screaming 5-year-old who was afraid of one of our actors' costumes, and in the middle of one take, we had a principal actor's suit tear a nice long 9-inch rip in the arm and back. The high points are great, and hopefully still ongoing. The diversity of our locations has been pretty fun. We shut down a busy intersection for a sweet dolly shot with tons of extras - that's a pretty cool feeling. We shot in a Hibachi joint, a creek, a bike trail, a performance hall, a lake...Another high point - Our client's client (the city, essentially) is one of the best group of people I've worked with in my short career. Cheery, smiley faces and accommodating attitudes are my favorite. =)

But the lowest point has to be the heat. It's bad enough that it's in the high 90's...What's even worse is that the nice brown tone of my skin loves to soak up the sun just that much more. Oh, and it never helps having black hair, either. I'll be lucky if I don't turn the same shade as my hair by the end of the week.

Speaking of which...

Ah, yes, the title of this post. T-minus 3 days and counting to my awesome, much-deserved vacation to Gulf Shores with some girlfriends. My body has been itchy to relax next to an ocean shore for the past month, and this Saturday afternoon will bring me sweet, sweet relief. Pictures will be taken, videos will be shot, and much fun will be had.

If only I can find time between now and then to get ready for it!

if fonts were people.

I've been busy as of late, and I have oodles to talk about, but for some reason, the only thing I want to post is a link to this video.

I am such a font nerd.

That, and I've always wondered how to properly use Comic Sans. Answer = personify it in a parody video!

top ten hottest geeks?

Okay, so I dugg the story anyway, because I thought that a few of the geeks on Shiny Shiny's list were cute, but come on.

The internet is far more vast than these guys, right???

youtube music & weekend shopping.

I've found someone else on YouTube whose music has started to grow on me. And, even though I'm always months (sometimes years) behind on music, I figured I'd go ahead and spread the love while I was at it.

Her YouTube name is KokoKaina. (I think of Brendan Frasier in Bedazzled when I read her YouTube name aloud). Her voice reminds me a little of Norah Jones, and her songwriting is sweet and sincere.

I was browsing for a specific search term when I happened upon her, actually. I'll definitely be subscribing soon.

Also, in response to my previous post about the Twilight feature in the latest EW magazine...I opted to read the online version instead of picking up a hard copy like some crazy obsessed 14-year-old. I prefer to play the role of the cool, semi-obsessed twenty-something that I am, thankyouverymuch.

The article was decent, and I learned a few things I didn't already know...
But I wasn't a fan of the photo shoot. It was ultra-glamorized, super shmoozy, Bram-stokery and I suppose I'm being so cynical because come on, these are high school kids. Then again I can err on the side EW as it's their job to Photoshop everything to a pulp nowadays. I can see the art director now -- "He's not pale enough! Make him paler! And his eyes, make them more brooding!"

This weekend has been another big purchase weekend. A new piece of art for my kitchen. Two new bar stools. A new mirror for the bathroom. New vases. The chances of me purchasing anything out of explicit entertainment purposes are growing slim.

Read: I may have to pass my on-line designing of those super-fancy Chucks I've been dreaming up in my head.

Then again, there's always next weekend.

oh, sigh.

For crying out loud. They're teasing me.

paint me in your sunshine.

I'm one of those types who, once they find a song they like, play it over, and over...

And over and over again. You would never want me to be your radio DJ. Ever.

I recently came across Marie' Digby on YouTube, and have taken kindly to her music. She's a bit of Vanessa Carlton, a little bit of Ingrid Michaelson. I'm a sucker for sweet and charming music.

Below are the lyrics to Paint Me In Your Sunshine. It's that song I'm playing over, and over, and over again.

Paint Me In Your Sunshine

Paint me in your sunshine
Wake my sleepy eyes
Round me in your comfort
Stay with me for all of time

Reach your hand,
I'll follow
Darken clouds for your rays of hope

So paint me in your sunshine
Walk with me, stay by my side
Fill my head with stories
For love and war and glory

Reach your hand,
I'll follow
Light the path that will lead me home

Oh, oh, Home

One day the world will grow colder
Everything we've come to cherish crumbles
And only then will we turn back and remember your glow

Paint me in your sunshine
Leave the part of you behind
Tell me where I'll find you
And send me off to another day
Till we meet tomorrow

Reach your hand,
I'll follow
Hold me close till the day that I grow old

twilight.

It's been an embarrassingly long time since I've posted, I know. I could go on all day about why: because of work, because of extracurriculars, because of projects at home, because of friends, but I won't. I'll just spare the details for now.

While this post will mostly be dedicated to its title, let me preface to say that this entry (not unlike most of them) will mostly be shaped by my own personal history and bias. Read: this is a personal post. You've been warned: it's going to be a doozy.

First, a little back story into my penchant for reading and writing.

I think it officially started when I was in the 4th grade. I'd enjoyed books up until then -- I was a part of the Book It! program, I volunteered in the library reading to first graders, so on and so forth. But it wasn't until I entered in the Young Author's Contest (I lived in Illinois back then) that I realized that I could actually enjoy writing. Young adult adventures were my favorite. There was excitement, newness, not a lot of internal dialogue, and it stirred my imagination. It reflected my personality at the time; I was easily curious about anything and everything I didn't know about. This included, but was not limited to, trying to find Big Foot tracks, analyzing baby birds, and breaking into vacant houses.

So there's the brief back story. I ended up getting an honorable mention that year for my short story, "The Bad Dream." And while I felt as though my brief, young writing spirit had been crushed, it didn't stop me from writing in the following year's contest. I won that year.

Fast forward several years, and you'd find yourself watching increasingly more and more frames of time spent writing -- my love for the adventure genre had evolved to now include romance, mystery, and sci-fi. I read a lot of the same stuff: X-Files, Dean Koontz, various trashy romance novels, Stephen King, Bruce Coville.

But during my sophomore year of high school, it all came to a halt. I simply wasn't interested any more, or my priorities had changed. I stopped reading, and the only writing I did consisted of poems or brief, inconsistent journaling.

Fast forward again to this week, where I picked up the book, Twilight, by Stephenie Meyer. My first recommendation was from my friend, Lauren, who divulges in reading as a hobby. I was curious as to why she brought up this book, I knew she read, but she hardly ever recommended anything to me, so I decided to look into it. I realized later that while the book was new to her, that it was in fact, pretty old -- 3 years old. I also learned that it was going to be displayed later on the silver screen at the end of the year.

Three days ago, I decided it was time to pick up the book. I opted to buy it, instead of checking it out from a local library. I started that night, around 11:30PM, intending on reading it for half an hour until I got sleepy. But I stayed up until 1:30AM.

Then finished it within 24 hours.

I know, it sounds dramatic. To think that a nearly 500-page teen romance fiction novel could hold my attention for that long. For starters, I'm not the target demo. I'm simply not a vampire junkie (although I did enjoy the Buffy film). And I hadn't read a fiction novel in years.

I'll start with the basics, I guess. (There won't be any spoilers) The story revolves around Isabella "Bella" Swan, a new permanent transplant to the town of Forks, Washington, where she spent various summers with her father. Her parents had been divorced for years, and she decided to permanently relocate when her mother remarried and wanted to travel with her new husband. The 17-year-old Bella struggles to fit in at Forks High School, where she happens upon the Cullens, the family that purposely outcasts themselves from the rest of the high school. They're all different, they're beautiful, and they're vampires. She takes specifically to Edward Cullen, and the rest of the story revolves around their affair -- the internal and external pressures of the dangers that surround their relationship.

There are several reasons why I was fascinated with this book. To say "I loved it" simply wouldn't be enough. There are many poignant scenes throughout this book that drew me back to them as soon as my eyes skimmed over the last few words of the epilogue.

I'm a helpless romantic at best. My personality wouldn't allude you to believe it, but the handsome hero in this book made me melt into a puddle of goo. There, I said it. But it wasn't as though Meyer described him as "hot," "rippled," "cut," or "amazing." She used other words..."Beautiful." "Dazzling." We see through the eyes of Bella that he's enchanting, that his scent is breathtaking. And of course, that half smile, the crooked smile. Seriously, who uses words like this? And how is it that they have such an effect that they make me want to absorb each and every description?

I listened to the first episode of Three Chicks and a Mic's podcast after finishing Twilight and they mentioned that one of the things they disliked about Bella's character is that she doesn't stick up for herself, and is pretty much a pushover. While I do agree with them, I felt that every time this weakness was displayed with Edward, it made him all the more attractive and alluring. Today's heroine is strong, smart, beautiful, and unique. Bella is not. She's awkard. She trips over herself and likes to hide behind her hair. She's terrible at sports and hates playing in snow. For me, it made their relationship and connection all the more meaningful -- this dark romance that seemed kindled for all the wrong reasons made perfect sense.

It's not a sappy love story by any means. The back of the book describes this element well, a story of "secret love and hushed affection." But this is not to say that the book did without suspense. It holds romance and suspense in a pretty even and healthy ratio, which also kept me flipping pages. This could be the naivete talking, but the fantasy element of the Cullens abilities as vampires was epic for me. Okay, epic might be too strong of a word, but it certainly helped. It was intriguing, the different powers each of the vampires have, and I'm curious to see how this plays out in the movie.

I haven't read a good share of teen romance novels, but I'd be surprised to find if Twilight handles stereotypes in a similar way to other teen fictions. At Forks High School, there aren't any cliques (save for vampires). There aren't jocks, snobs, or geeks. The others are just...there. The background characters supply subtle color to this book, but nothing bright and overpowering. A lot of the narrative consists of Bella's internal dialoging -- her fearless and inquisitive thoughts aren't annoying or meaningless, and compel the reader to learn about her as even she learns about herself.

I really could drone on for days, and days, but like I prefaced earlier, this is my personal take on Twilight. It's hard for me to articulate the fact that it's awakened me out of my imaginative coma. The book is an easy read -- no pretentious words, no confusing plot lines. And yes, there are predictable moments, not unlike most books in the same genre. Lastly, I'm not particularly excited about the movie, as books always seem to take us deeper into characters and stories than film ever will. I've grown to understand that they're two completely different mediums, oftentimes with differing agendas.

In closing...I do have expectations, mind you. I have high expectations in the physical and personal characters of Bella and Edward. Throughout the novel, Meyer describes Bella as unconsciously brave, unaware of her own frailty. This can be pulled off onscreen. Edward's eyes are smoldering -- I expect to see the glowing topaz and a lot of character expression; the book almost revolves around this entire physical feature. I think if they did away with the rest of his body in the film, fans would still be appeased as long as his eyes were in there somewhere.

Although that might be a little creepy.