I took a few days off work. Three to make a very long weekend and I am ready to be retired. I spent a lot of time, soon after the arrival of the blessing, thinking I needed work. I needed people to talk to (the H being of the very quiet sort). Forget the money, I needed to work for mental balance. I am revising that view. I think I could be quite occupied in just managing my life if I didn't go into an office each day.

Meant to spend the time shopping. Seriously thought about going to Ikea and buying candles and shelves and a bar stool or two. Really wanted to go to Junction One and look at the Clark outlet. In the end, the only shopping I did was at the Disney store for a birthday present for the blessing's best friend and they were having the start of the 50% off sale and it was complete and total madness. I really mean that.

Instead I spent the time indulging in a little visual popular culture, which was a more than fine way of using up my free time. Saw Mean Girls because I love a good teen age comedy and while it was okay, it really isn't a patch upon Heathers, Clueless or even Ten Things I Hate About You which has my favorite teacher in a film. I also went and saw Van Helsing because I will watch any movie with a vampire in it. I am somewhat ashamed of this. I saw the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Blade II was the first film the H and I saw after the arrival of the blessing. I have even watched Wes Craven's Dracula 2000.

I didn't like Van Helsing. And the more I thought about it, the more I didn't like it. I was annoyed first because there are a number of scenes in a central European city. I am watching it, thinking doesn't Prague look lovely. Then the characters all talked about being in Budapest and I thought well, maybe Budapest looks a lot like Prague. Then the credits came up (now I love going to the movies alone because I can stay and watch all the credits. A hold over from my LA days when I was often at the cinema with people in the industry who wanted to see all the credits. Nowadays, I am only allowed to do this if it is a Sam picture and we are waiting for her credits to appear, but I digress) and it mentions Prague. Over and over again. They lied to me. On film. This annoyed me. Also, it wasn't a film with a lot of down time, what the H refers to as the sunset on Tatooie moments. It was action scene after action scene. Far too many brides sweeping and diving through the sky. I would have liked a little more quietness to develop some things. And another thing, when did werewolves get the ability to climb walls like spiderman? There was a lot of that. Finally, I saw the Van Helsing murdered dracula the first time around coming pretty early on. No surprise there. I am curious though, why he murdered him in the first place. There had to be a reason. If anyone knows it, could they let me know?

I also managed to watch a lot of quality TV. You can draw your own judgments as to what kind of adjective to add to quality. Watched a fair amount of Pimp My Ride. Now I originally watched thinking it was just cribs on wheels but I think it is more than that. I think it is the embodiment of the California dream. That no matter what shape you are in, no matter how bad things are, in California you can re-invent yourself as the epitome of hedonistic glamour. It offers hope for us all. And if the Pimp guys at West Coast Cars would like to do some work on my Citroen and make it a truly amazing family car (the radio hasn't worked in over a year), I would not say no. Of course, I am also worried that I may, after only one episode, developed an addiction to American's Next Top Model. Its enough to drive me to drink. One of these, in keeping with the weekend.