I laughed, I cried...I saw a lot of movies

As I shared yesterday, I saw quite a few movies in 2009. Some of them were unexpectedly good while others we unexpectedly bad, and yet others delivered exactly what I was expecting. Here is my look back at the best - and worst - of 2009 cinema (based, of course, only on the movies I managed to see.)

**Beware some items contain spoilers

Best 3-D movie of the year
Now last year, I wouldn't have dreamed of adding this category to the list because the 3-D movies I'd seen were so gimmicky and not all that fun to watch. But of the half-dozen three-dimensional films I saw in 2009, one was clearly the winner.

"Avatar" takes the prize for its awesome HD-quality scenery, lightweight 3-D glasses and for making me forget I was actually watching a 3-D film. Director James Cameron reportedly worked on the film for 10-15 years, waiting for the perfect technology in which to build the world of Pandora. The animated parts of the film and the live-action parts are almost seamlessly entwined with a new motion-capture technology that Cameron dubbed "performance-capture" for its ability to get the real emotion from the actors who play the animated characters. As a side effect, the animated characters bear a striking resemblance to the actors playing the parts. The storyline was a little light, but if "Avatar" is the vehicle in which the new era of film making is ushered in, then bring it on.

Biggest tearjerker of the year
Now there are two movies that could take the prize for this one - "Marley and Me" and "Up." I'll admit that both these movies had me crying in the theater. Disney Pixar's "Up" condenses a lifetime into just a few minutes to let viewers see the heartbreak that left an old man a grumpy curmudgeon. But the man's whimsical journey to South America in his house (with balloons tied all around it to make it float) and the discovery of a Boy Scout stowaway is lighthearted and funny for most of the movie. But "Marley and Me" draws out the aches and pains of a lifetime over two hours. The movie is about a couple who adopts a bad dog, has kids, give up or change their careers and never seem to be all that happy.

But the thing that clinched it for me was the scene in which Owen Wilson takes old Marley into the vet to be put to sleep. Perhaps it was because my own aging cat had started to lose some weight in recent months (we actually had to put Bailey, who lived 12 good years, to sleep in September,) but even thinking about this movie makes me tear up a bit.

Best comedy of the year
At least half of the movies I saw in 2009 can be categorized as comedies, but it's really easy to pick out the front runner. So many of the movies, especially the romantic comedies I saw, just weren't all that funny.

But I did go see "The Hangover" after it had been out for a few weeks because I kept hearing people say how funny it was. Plus Bradley Cooper is super cute. The movie follows three groomsmen as they try to find the groom they lost in Vegas the day of his late afternoon wedding. The thing I liked about the movie is that it wasn't really predictable and it had that same crazy, zany, "let's backtrack and see how we got here" as "Dude, Where's My Car?" Ed Helms was the star in the movie for me as an engaged guy whose uptight fiancee keeps him on a short leash - until he let's loose in Vegas. He even pulled off the missing tooth, which made him look a little bit hillbilly-ish.

Best romantic comedy
There weren't a whole lot of good offerings in this category in 2009, though I saw quite a few romantic comedies. The one that made me laugh the most was "The Proposal" with Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds. Bullock plays a high-powered publisher who finds her control snatched away when her green card expires (she is Canadian.) To keep her job, she promises her assistant, played by Reynolds, a promotion if he will marry her long enough so she can stay in the country.

Of course, nothing is that simple, and the couple ends up in Alaska to visit the groom-to-be's parents when a suspicious ICE officer believes they are faking the marriage. Betty White plays Reynolds grandmother and she is a hoot, though a cameo by actor Oscar Nunez (who plays Oscar on "The Office") could have been skipped. The chemistry between Reynolds and Bullock just works well and the movie is genuinely funny, and a little moving.

Worst trend of the season
I'm not the first one to say this as I've read other critics who feel the same way, but one of the worst thing about the movies this year is that so many of the female characters were portrayed as sappy, dippy useless creatures. It started with Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway in "Bride Wars" in January and continue all the way to last week's "It's Complicated."

The characters in "Bride Wars" drove me absolutely bonkers as two best friends who are driven apart when they both select the same date at their dream venue for their weddings. One, I'd like to believe that most women don't plan out their weddings starting at age 6 (or at least I never did,) and two, I really hope the brides who have invited me to be in their weddings don't turn into whack jobs like that. The main fault in the movie is that it wasn't very funny.

Though I enjoyed "It's Complicated," mostly, the one thing that drove me crazy was that Meryl Streep's Jane is a strong, independent woman who gives in to ex-husband Jake's advances knowing full well he has no intentions of leaving his current wife for her. Jane settles for way less than she deserves just to keep from being alone.

Other annoying female characters include the ensemble cast from "He's Just Not That Into You," Isla Fischer's character in "Confessions of a Shopaholic," Katherine Heigl's character in "The Ugly Truth," Julie Powell in "Julie and Julia," and Sandra Bullock in "All About Steve." I'd like to think women don't have to play dumb or sacrifice their careers just to be in a relationship...but perhaps that is why I'm single.

Worst romantic comedy of the year
There are a few movies in the running in this category including a few mentioned in the category above. I really disliked "The Ugly Truth," "He's Just Not That Into You," and a few others. But the winner has to be "All About Steve" since there wasn't a whole lot of romance or comedy in the movie. In it, Sandra Bullock plays a nerdy cruceverbalist (which means someone who likes crossword puzzles) who is introduced by her parents to the son of friends. Bradley Cooper plays the dreamy cable news cameraman Steve. After one date (that lasts about 30 seconds), Mary decides to follow Steve around the country after he makes some flip remark about how he wishes she could come along with him (when what he really means is "boy I am sure glad I have to go to work to escape your craziness.") Mary can't take a hint when she first finds him and he brushes her off, but hopefully viewers who haven't seen it will take a hint and skip it.

Strongest female performance
Given how weak so many of the female characters were this season, the creators of "Blind Side" deserve some kudos for bringing Leigh Anne Tuohy to life on the big screen. Bullock played Leigh Anne as a strong Southern woman who controls her husband, stands up to her hoity-toity friends and isn't afraid to put a few gangbangers in their place. The movie is about a homeless teen who is taken in by a well-off rich family, with Leigh Anne as its matriach, who eventually help him finish high school, go to college and become the No. 1 draft pick for the NFL this year. The movie is based on a true story so it's hopeful that women aren't as crazy as filmmakers often want to portray them.


Biggest surprise movie of the year
Sometimes the best movies are ones I don't know much about, and of which I have little expectations. That was the case with "Bandslam," a little movie geared at the Disney and Nick teen set. I didn't know anything about it expect that Lisa Kudrow is in it and it was about a band competition. Will (Gaelan Connell) is a nerdy kid who doesn't fit in at school. When he and his mother move to a new town, he expects more of the same. But somehow he catches the eye of pretty, popular girl Charlotte Banks (Alyson Michalka,) who is enlists Will to be the manager of her band. She just wants to win the Bandslam competition for the year, and Will just wants friends. The movie has more depth than an average teen movie and has way cool music. I even downloaded the soundtrack to my iPod.

Worst movie of the year
There were quite a few movies I saw this year that I didn't like, but the honors of worst movie has to go to something that didn't just fall a little short of the mark. It goes to a movie that had bad acting, horrible dialogue, little plot and decapitations in the first three minutes of the movie.

The honor goes to "Ninja Assassins," a movie I only saw at the suggestion of my sister who wanted to see it. The movie was gory and just plain bad. I recommend everyone but teenage boys skip the bloodfest and see a real ninja movie instead.

Best movie of the year
There are a few contenders for the honor of best movie (which went to "The House Bunny" last year). But it really must go to a movie that put it all together - meaning a good story, humor, good dialogue, well-developed characters. It needs to be something I would see again and something I would add to my home movie collection.

My favorite movie of the year was a sweet, but heartbreaking movie that came out under the radar. It stars Amy Adams, Emily Blunt and Alan Arkin as a broken family that keeps trying to hold itself together. Adams plays a single mom who is having an affair with a married detective who sees how shabby her life is when she is cleaning the house of a rich client who turns out to be a former classmate. Rose decides to take some initiative and start her own cleaning business - cleaning up homes after people have died or committed suicide. It sounds morbid - and it is - but it gives Rose a sense of control that has been lacking in her life.

Other movies worth seeing:
Gran Torino
Paul Blart: Mall Cop
Coraline
Disney's Earth
The Soloist
Julie and Julia
Ponyo
9
Zombieland
The Men Who Stare at Goats

A few dozen trips to the movies

Last January, I wrote a movie year in review for the Weekend Pinnacle. I was kind of shocked that I had seen 30 movies in the theater, and more on DVD, cable and Netflix instant play. Last year some of the movies that earned a mention included "The House Bunny," "Juno" and

I am a big movie fan, but the sheer volume of films I see is simply research for the weekly movie column I write. Before I took on the column a few years ago I probably went to the movies a maybe five times a year.

I looked back at the columns for 2009 and discovered that this year I saw 35 movies in the theater - which a friend pointed out is time-consuming and expensive - and even more if you count the stuff I watched at home. Some of the movies were good, some were really bad, and some were bad but still enjoyable.

Here is the list of what I watched in 2009. Tune in tomorrow for a break down of the best, the worst and my all-time favorite movie of the year (based, of course, only on the movies I've seen.)

Marley and Me
Bride Wars
Gran Torino
Hotel for Dogs
Paul Blart: Mall Cop
He’s Just Not That Into You
Coraline
Confessions of a Shopaholic
Slumdog Millionaire
*Smart People
*Twilight
*Away from Her
*Breaking and Entering
*Milk
*Persepolis
Sunshine Cleaning
Disney’s Earth
The Soloist
X-Men Origins Wolverine
Ghosts of Girlfriends Past
*My Sassy Girl
Disney Pixar’s Up
My Life in Ruins
The Brothers Bloom
The Proposal
The Hangover
Public Enemies
*The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Ugly Truth
*Taken
Funny People
Julie and Julia
Ponyo
The Time Traveler’s Wife
All About Steve
9
Bandslam
Fame
Zombieland
The Invention of Lying
Where the Wild Things Are
*Spring Breakdown
*The Maiden Heist
The Men Who Stare at Goats
Disney’s A Christmas Carol
The Blind Side
Ninja Assassin
*The Accidental Husband
Brothers
Avatar
It’s Complicated

* Movies watched on cable/DVD/etc.

An actress remembered at her best

When I saw that Brittany Murphy had died of a heart attack at age 32, I was surprised in the same way I was when I heard that Heath Ledger and Michael Jackson had died. Murphy never achieved the same level of celebrity as some others, but her sudden death has lead to speculation about the cause.

Though Murphy's star may have been fading in recent years, she had some good turns earlier in her career, including in one of my favorite movies.

She starred as Tai in "Clueless," which has remained one of my favorite movies ever since I saw it when I was a teenager. My mom rented it for me and my friends for a New Year's Eve party when I was 14. We tried to get it from the newly-opened Blockbuster in Morgan Hill, but it wasn't in. We ended up reserving it at National Video in Gilroy, and we got it just in time for the sleepover.

Murphy's turn as Tai is still endearing to me, with her curly red hair and Valley girl accent. Though she is not really the main character in the movie, she helps Cher (Alicia Silverstone) and her friend Dion (Stacey Dash) find a greater purpose in life - even if it is just making over the new kid. Tai is from the poor part of Los Angeles (which is most of it) when she transfer to a high school in the rich part of the city. Cher and Dion take Tai on as a project. They make her over and invite her to the cool parts, and even play matchmaker for her. Murphy is transformed from a clueless kid to a girl who becomes a little too full of herself, but it all works out in this funny movie. This is one of those movies that I can watch from any point because I pretty much have the dialogue memorized.

Murphy was at her best playing offbeat characters who seemed a little bit lost in their lives. When she played Molly Gunn in "Uptown Girls" she had a great chemistry with her young costar Dakota Fanning. Murphy's character is the daughter of a rock star who finds herself without many friends when her father dies and leaves her penniless. She takes a job working as a nanny for Ray (Fanning), who is a neglected kid whose rich mother ignores her. The two hate each other at the beginning, but eventually grow on each other.

Though Murphy mostly had roles in comedies and low-budget horror films (at the end of her career,) one of her best turns was in the drama "Girl, Interrupted." The movie is based on the experiences of writer Susanna Kaysen's recollection of spending a year and a half in a mental hospital in the '60s. Murphy plays a fellow patient, Daisy Randone. Daisy is a fragile girl with an eating disorder and Murphy embodied her struggle well. Though Angelina Jolie nabbed a supporting actress Oscar for her turn in the movie, Murphy perhaps would have been nominated if her role had had a bit more screen time.

According to Internet Movie Database, Murphy had roles in more than 64 movies, television shows or as a voice on animated series. She was well-known as the voice of Luanne on "King of the Hill" and she is in three movies that are in post-production, though it is unclear if or when they will be released. I may not see the new movies, but I am likely to watch her again in "Clueless," in the first role in which I saw her.

Amazon, how could you get it so wrong?

I've been a fan of Amazon.com since its early days and I've watched it evolve. I was there when they started adding more than just books, movies and CDs to the offerings. I've had a wishlist online - and its been recently updated with some holiday gifts I'd like - for ages. I love that I can now add things from other sites with the universal wishlist button. I'm a member of prime (thanks to my mom) so I get free two-day shipping on almost anything I order. That means if my shopping trip this weekend is a bust, I could technically still order some gifts and they will arrive in time for Christmas. I like having that safety net.

But the other day when I logged on to search a few wishlists and look for some gifts, I was offended by what I saw. Amazon.com had actually recommended to me the "Twilight" movie. Amazon.com, how could you know me so little, after all these years?

I know the recommendations are manufactured automatically by some sort of system I will never understand that takes into account all the things I've purchased through the years, the items I've clicked on and the ones I've added to my wishlist. Sometimes the recommendations are spot on, like when I get notices about a new U2 CD coming out or books by Nick Hornby or cookbooks for things like Old-Fashioned homemade Ice-Cream.

But sometimes Amazon is just way off the mark. Some of that is because most of what I purchase through Amazon.com are gifts for other people. I get recommendations for romance novels (which I've never read in my life), thanks to my mom's reading habits. And Japanese anime, thanks to my sister's viewing habits. And there are a few other random things in the mix, for which I can forgive Amazon.

But "Twilight?" Really?

I have to confess, though, that I know exactly why the movie made its way onto my recommendation list. Before the movie even came out in theaters, I thought I ought to see what all the fuss was about. I read tons of vampire books when I was a kid - everything from "The Vampire Diaries" to "Bunicula," a book about a vampire bunny. I figured how bad could the Twilight books be, and someone my sister knew just happened to have a copy of the first book.

I read it - it was bad - but since I waded through the bazillion pages of book one, I thought I should finish the rest of the series. But alas, no one, had copies of the other three books so I order them all from Amazon. I read them all and each one got progressively worse, though I'll save my rant about what a bad message the books are for teen girls for another time. I have all the books piled up on my computer desk to donate to the library, but I haven't yet decided if I should allow the books any more circulation in the world.

So that's how Amazon.com pegged me for a Twilight fan. Perhaps if I had left scathing reviews of the books, the movie wouldn't have made it onto the list of recommendations.

But today, Amazon has come back to its senses and there is no "Twilight" to be seen. Now if only they would stop advertise the Kindle to me.

Bah humbug to Christmas shopping

My favorite part of Christmas shopping is usually finding the one perfect gift for someone and waiting for them to open it up on Christmas morning. One year it was a digital camera for my mom, back when 2.5 megapixels was cutting edge. My sister, dad and I split the cost three ways. Last year it was accessories for walking the dog (yes, I know it doesn't get THAT cold in California, but it's cold enough to us lifelong residents), including Ugg boots and a cashmere scarf.

I usually get more excited about seeing other people open their gifts than anticipating what I am getting. But something was off this year. Maybe it's that several friends and family members asked not to exchange gifts because money is tight. And perhaps that's the other thing, money is a little more tight for me this year (guess I shouldn't have bought tickets to two U2 concerts in one year).

Mostly I think its that I wasn't very inspired so far this year. I really haven't felt like going to any stores to shop, and online shopping is much better if you know what you want already. I tried Amazon.com, where my mom and sister both have wish lists, but I feel a little bit like its cheating if I just put something in the online shopping cart. And most of the stuff on my mom's wishlist was kitchen-related and I feel bad buying a Christmas gift that I am as likely to use as she is.

I have a Christmas gift for my sister. But I still need to get something for my dad and mom. With my dad I can always go with the old standby of cologne, which he loves to use WAY too much so he's always in need of more. I'm still stuck for my mom, though.

I went out tonight to a few places, but the slow service and long lines on a work night left me with little patience. So though it might be even worse, I guess I am going to head to the mall first thing Saturday morning, do some power shopping and hopefully get home by noon. Maybe inspiration will hit somewhere between Macy's or Nordstrom's.

Award season starts

The Golden Globe nominations came out this week and as always, some of the nominations were predictable and others were a little bit of a shock.

Some of the movies nominated haven't been out more than a week - and at least one hasn't even opened to the public yet. "Avatar," which opens this Friday, is nominated for multiple categories including best motion picture - drama.

I've seen some of the movies or TV shows that garnered nominations and here are a few thoughts on them.

Best motion picture - drama
I haven't seen any of these movies, though I plan to see "Avatar" this weekend. I have contemplated seeing "Up In the Air," but I'll wait for the DVD for "Precious," "The Hurt Locker" and "Inglorious Basterds."

Best performance by an actress in a motion picture - drama
The only nominee I saw was Sandra Bullock in "The Blind Side." It's the only Sandra Bullock movie I've ever seen where I forgot I was watching Sandra Bullock so she deserves a nod.

Best performance by an actor in a motion picture - drama
A few of the movies in this category are on my list to see, especially "A Single Man" with Colin Firth and "Invictus" with Morgan Freeman. The only movie I've seen yet was "Brothers" and Tobey Maguire does a bang up job as a soldier who returns home to his family broken.

Best motion picture - musical or comedy
It's a pet peeve of mine that the Globes group musical and comedy together since they aren't really the same thing. But of the movies nominated that I've seen, which include "The Hangover" and "Julie and Julia," I have to give the edge to "The Hangover, which made me laugh my ass off. It will never win, though, and "Nine," the musical, is my prediction to take it.

Best performance by an actress in a motion picture - musical or comedy
I've only seen "The Proposal" with Sandra Bullock, and while I enjoyed the movie I don't think it was Bullock's best work. Marion Cotillard, in "Nine" and Meryl Streep in "Julie and Julia" are my picks to win (though I haven't seen "Nine," given it hasn't actually been released yet.)

Best performance by an actor in a motion picture -musical or comedy
I haven't seen any of the movies nominated in this category so my vote goes for Daniel Day-Lewis since he is amazing in most everything he's done.

Best animated feature film
I've only seen two of the five movies nominated so far and of "Coraline" or "Up", "Up" gets my vote. It made me laugh. It made me cry. It made me want to fall in love and spend my life with someone even if it means losing them and starting over all alone.

Best original song
Do I even need to say that U2 should win for best original song for "Winter" from the movie "Brothers?" No, I haven't heard any of the other songs, but what could be better than U2?

Best television series - drama
I watch four of the five series nominated, and after watching the season finale last week, "Dexter" gets my vote. The writers threw me for a loop all season, and somehow managed to make my entire family root for a serial killer. I can't count how many times we said we wished Rita would just give Dexter a break (so he could go out and kill someone) - if only we'd known where the season finale would land us, we may have been nicer about Rita. Michael C. Hall also gets my nod for best performance by an actor in a television series for taking Dexter out of his comfort zone this year. John Lithgow also deserves his nomination for guest star on "Dexter," though he was really more of a regular this season as the Trinity killer.

Best television series - musical or comedy
I watch four of the five series nominated, and I have to admit I am a little bit torn about which I would want to win. I guess I would go with "Modern Family" because it is a new series which makes me laugh like crazy and a win could cement it for another year.

Best performance by an actress in a television series - musical or comedy
I do love Liz Lemon on "30 Rock" and Rachel on "Glee." I guess I have a thing for the dorky over-achiever girls - they remind me of me. I'm still waiting for my book deal and for a football player to fall in love with me, though.

Best performance by an actor in a television series - musical or comedy
Alec Baldwin takes the cake for his performance as Jack on "30 Rock." He gets better every season.

There are other categories and all the nominees can be seen online here. The awards will be televised Jan. 17, so I'll have my take on the actual winners then.

That's the way the cookie crumbles

When it comes to baking, I often have more failures than successes. It's probably the reason I am more likely to pick up sweet treats at Elegant Touch in Hollister or Gayle's Bakery in Capitola than make them at home.

But this holiday season it seemed like a good idea to bake some breads, cookies and other treats to share with family and friends. This last weekend we tackled four cookie recipes. Now making one batch of cookies from scratch isn't too much trouble, but making four, or five, or six is a lot more trouble. In the oven in my house, only one sheet of cookies can go in at a time, which means even for a small bath it takes quite awhile to bake them.

We decided to take a shortcut with a semi-homemade recipe from Sandra Lee that used store-bought sugar cookie dough. I had made candy cane shaped cookies from scratch once before a few years ago, not very successfully, and this seemed like it would be easy. The only problem was the sugar cookie dough didn't really seem to want to roll out into the white and red ropes needed to make the candy cane shape. The dough kept falling apart, and I got only half the cookies I was supposed to get out of it. As I was twisting them into candy cane shapes, the dough kept cracking. And then when they came out of the oven, the cookies kept falling apart.

Then we made what were supposed to be white peppermint snow ball cookies - snow ball as in round. But the cookies we made turned out flatter than pancakes. But the cookies still taste alright, and the other varieties I made turned out just fine. Next weekend I will take on crinkle cookies and plain old chocolate chip. For recipes of the cookies pictured below, visit the Weekend Pinnacle on Friday.

Mexican mocha cookies with Kahlua frosting

White peppermint snow ball cookies

Cranberry white chocolate chip cookies

Candy cane cookies

Director Sheridan delivers another movie about love and war

Most of the time I don't think much about who directs a film before I go to see it. But once in a while I know what to expect from a movie based on who is at the helm. That was the case with "Brothers," the latest film from Jim Sheridan. Sheridan is an Irish filmmaker and two of his previous films have dealt with the conflict in Ireland. "In the Name of the Father," and "The Boxer" both starred Daniel Day Lewis, and in addition to a nation's troubles also touched on how individuals were affected. Sheridan also directed "In America" about an Irish-immigrant family. All these movies are dramatic and some of them are heart-wrenching.

While "Brothers" is not set in Ireland or about Irish immigrants, it touches on a war and a family in turmoil, as well as love and loss. I wanted to see the movie long before I knew who directed it because it starred Jake Gyllenhaal and Natalie Portman, two of my favorite actors. But when I knew Sheridan was directing it, I knew it would be good.

The thing I love most about Sheridan is that he allows quiet moments to embody his movies, and he allows the kids in the movie to have full roles. Bailee Madison and Taylor Geare are allowed to say things the adults in the film hold in. Madison especially does a good job as Isabelle.

While some might think the movie is slow-moving or a little mundane, I think that is exactly the point. Sheridan creates a world were life slows down after a tragedy, and the family struggles to do all the little things together, like making breakfast or fixing up the kitchen and then that slowly transforms into celebrating birthdays or ice skating until life is almost normal again.

Gyllenhaal and Portman work well together, and the only character that seemed a little underdeveloped is Tobey Maguire's Sam Cahill. He is in the film with his family so little it is hard to believe the bond he has with them. But Maguire makes up for it in the scenes after he returns from Afghanistan.

It's worth a watch, but be prepared for a serious film. Plus the movie has a song from my favorite U2 album, as well as a U2 song written just for the movie, which made it even better.

Feast or famine

The feast of independent and dramatic films is under way as studios make a play for next year's Oscar nods. It's a welcome change from the famine that started right around Halloween when for about six years there was really nothing playing in the theaters that I wanted to see.

That would be fine for anyone else, but as a movie columnist, I had to come up with something each week. It led to reviews of two movies I really didn't want to see, "A Christmas Carol" and "Ninja Assassin." At least Disney's 3-D version of "A Christmas Carol" looked cool. I can't say the same for "Ninja Assassin," what with the multiple beheadings in the first 5 minutes of the movie. The one surprise in this dryspell of movies was "The Men Who Stare At Goats," with Ewan McGregor and George Clooney. I probably wouldn't have seen it had anything else been out - since it wasn't really hyped much and I didn't even know what it was about before I looked up a synopsis online - but it turned out to be quite a funny tale of the U.S. military's attempts to use psyhic abilities at war (which may or may not be true as its based on an allegedly true story.)


I even had to resort to writing about a couple of movies that were out on DVD, such as "Spring Breakdown," which I found to be absolutely, laugh-out-loud funny. And last week I reviewed "The Accidental Husband," which got yanked from its theaterical release for a DVD release more than a year later, since I spent so much time making tamales.


But now that I am ready to head back to the theaters, it's going to be a tough call this weekend. I can count at least four movies I want to see this weekend and two more that are opening up next weekend. I would just camp out at the theater for a while, but with the holidays coming quickly I have plenty of other stuff to do, too.

So I am not sure which movie I will choose, but suggestions are invited. Here are the options.


"Invictus," which stars Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela and Matt Damon as a South African rugby player right around when apartheid first ended. The movie appeals to me because I've been to South Africa and I like to watch movies where I can say, "I've been there" to my fellow movie watchers. I also know a lot about South African history from studying it so I can seem smart by explaining things to people after the movie. The downsides are possible long scenes of rugby games (which I understand even less than football) and really bad South African accents.


"Brothers," which stars Natalie Portman, Jake Gyllenhaal and Tobey Maguire is about two brothers, one who is a well-respected army man and the other who is an ex-con. The pluses are Natalie Portman, who've I've loved watching since I saw her in "The Professional" as a kid and Jake Gyllenhaal who've I've loved watching since I saw him in "Donnie Darko." Plus Jake is dreamy. Also, the film is directed by Jim Sheridan who made "In America" and "In the Name of the Father," which I really enjoyed. Also, U2 wrote a song for the soundtrack. The downsides are that the movie will probably make me cry (based on the previews) and Tobey Maguire gets on my nerves. I didn't recognize him in the trailer though, so maybe he will be less annoying.


"Up in the air," which stars George Clooney as an executive who spends most of his time flying around the country firing people. I don't really know much about the movie, but it is directed by Jason Reitman, who also directed "Juno" and "Thank You For Smoking," both movies I enjoyed.


"The Princess and the Frog," which is the latest animated film from Disney, puts a New Orleans spin on the classic tale. It is likely to have the humor, music and happy ending of all Disney movies.


Of course, the decision about what to see will be based on family input, schedules and where movies are playing so who knows which movie I will end up seeing this weekend. And then there are even more movies opening up before the end of the month - "Avatar," "The Lovely Bones," "It's Complicated," "Did You Hear About the Morgans?" "Nine," and "The Single Man." That's an awful lot of movies for one month...

The tamale family tradition

The smell of Christmas morning at my grandmother's house when I was growing up was a mix of scents that until a few years ago I had never really identified. But it's a smell I learned to recreate the first time I made tamales with my father's side of the family a few years ago.

My aunts and older cousins worked with my grandmother every year to make tamales. I don't know why, but my sister and I were never involved in the tradition. It wasn't until I was in graduate school and working on a class writing assignment that I got my first invitation to make tamales. I asked my aunts for a recipe, and instead they told me to come along to help the weekend before Christmas.

I soon realized why. As with many family recipes, or meals that are handed down year after year, there isn't really an actual recipe. My aunts know the basic flavor profile, but other than that making tamales is sort of a matter of throwing in the right spices until the sauce, masa dough and meat start to taste right.

Since I've made tamales with my aunts, I've attempted to make them on my own twice, the most recent time being last weekend. I invited over a few friends and purchased all the ingredients - the corn flour, shortening, spices, rump roasts and more - but unfortunately only one of my friends could make it over.

It made for a long day, but it was worthwhile when the house started to smell just like my grandmother's house used to smell when I was a kid. We ate our share of tamales out of the first batch and stored away the rest for a few lucky friends and family. It wouldn't be the holidays without it.

The filling for the beef tamales is made by cooking rump roast with beef broth and spices in a crock pot all day, then shredded the meat and adding more spices. The sauce is a tomato-based sauce with the same spices as the beef.

The masa dough for a Monterey jack and green chili tamale is seasoned with the same spices as well as the liquid from the green chilies.

A pile of tamales wait in a pan to be steamed.

And so it begins - the Christmas movie marathon

My mom has a little addiction. It really only kicks in for about a month every year, but like any addiction it causes tension between the members of my family. When she is indulging in her little habit, we can hardly stand to stay in the same room.

My mom is addicted to Christmas movies.

I can't say when it first started, but I guess there were signs all along. We always watched more than our fair share of Christmas movies in our house - one of my mom's favorites is "Miracle on 34th Street." She likes the original and the remake. So most years we would watch a few Christmas movies each season and the classic Christmas cartoons such as "Frosty the Snowman" that air most years.

Things really escalated one year when she discovered the wishlist feature on Tivo. With the feature, you can program in a keyword and Tivo will automatically record any movie or TV show that has that word in the description or the title. I used it with keywords such as U2 or Joseph Fiennes, one of my favorite actors. But my mom one holiday season programmed in Christmas and hundreds of movies and shows popped up over the month.

For anyone who doesn't know, Christmas movies become a staple in the month of December on Lifetime and the Hallmark channel. And the Christmas movies start in force the day after Thanksgiving. So far this weekend my has watched "Secret Santa" starring Jennie Garth about a journalist who shows up in a small town to find out who has been giving out miraculous gifts anonymously and "Comfort and Joy" starring Nancy McKeon (Jo from "Fact of Life") in what is sort of a rip off of "The Family Man." The main character is a career woman who wakes up from a car accident with no career and a ready-built family. She also has a few more movies set to tape including "A Dog Named Christmas" and "The 12 Men of Christmas"

The worst Christmas movies are the ones that have sequels. There is one batch of movies that stars Kathy Ireland as the daughter of Santa Claus who comes to earth to make one nasty family believe in Christmas again. Most of the movies are usually super cheesy and not very well acted or written. But my mom gets a kick out of them so in the holiday spirit we indulge her addiction a little every year.

The Thanksgiving feast

Dry brine roasted turkey seasonsed with thyme, rosemary, parsley and lemon zest.

Homemade cranberry sauce.

Best ever string bean casserole - recipe courtesy of Alton Brown.

Roasted garlic mashed potatoes.

Roasted garlic for the mashed potatoes.

Our Thanksgiving feast included a few other things at my aunt's house, but these were my family's contributions to the meal - or extras we cooked for leftovers at our own house. The dry brine turkey turned out moist and flavorful - but the salt measurements did throw me off when we started the brine process on Monday so the meat was a little on the salty side. We also released that roasting garlic on the bottom rack in the oven when the turkey is on the top rack can cause it to cook a little unevenly. Luckily the turkey I cooked was just to have some meat for sandwiches and it worked out fine. We will probably experiment with the dry brine again soon so we can perfect it for next Thanksgiving.

For now, I am enjoying a breakfast of leftover string bean casserole and a turkey sandwich topped with homemade cranberry sauce.

Day three - Thanksgiving prep

Day three of Thanksgiving preparation didn't get off to the best start. Somehow my mom missed the part about the dressing needing to go into the oven and she popped in a Gizdich apple pie - that required nearly two hours of baking time. So that tied up the oven until 8:30 p.m. Then I went to pull out the Italian sausage for the dressing - and it was frozen. So my dad offered to drive out to the store to pick up some so we didn't have to deal with defrosting it. We can always thaw out the frozen one another day for baked ziti.

Then we realized that the casserole dish we planned to use for the dressing leaves us without something for the green bean casserole I am making (from scratch) tomorrow morning. So that led to a search for another baking dish. We found one under a cabinet that had a paycheck stub and a box of pepto bismol inside...so guess we haven't used it in a while.

So after nearly an hour of browning sausage, sauteing vegetables and chopping fresh herbs, the dressing went into the oven. Cooking it tonight will free up the oven for the green bean casserole and, of course, the turkey.

We still have pies in the oven - not homemade but again from Gizdich. At this point, I don't think we are going to get to all the other items we expected to prep tonight - the cranberry sauce and the roasted garlic for the roasted garlic mashed potatoes. I'll just plan to get up early tomorrow and get started. Deadline is 2 p.m. to have everything done since that is around when dinner is traditionally served at my aunt's house. It might be a little like one of those cooking challenges tomorrow morning as we race to prep everything on time.

Photo by MELISSA FLORES

Dry Lake Dressing comes out of the oven crispy on top

Day two - Thanksgiving prep and a little reminiscing

So day two of my Thanksgiving prep is pretty simple. Really all I have to do is check on the turkey and "massage" it through the plastic bag.

I also need to check on the progress of my sourdough bread for the stuffing. The recipe calls for stale sourdough bread and though the bread I bought has been sitting in an open bag for two days, as of this morning it was still pretty soft. Today might be the day to pull it out of the bag to speed up the process.

For anyone who is a little bit OCD like me, this is the time where I start to panic a little bit about how difficult the recipes I've chosen to make might actually be. Will the green bean casserole take more time to prepare than I've set aside on Thursday morning? Will the stuffing dry out too much if I cook it Wednesday night? And what if I used too much salt to dry brine my turkey. Russ Parsons said to use only a tablespoon per five pounds, but Martha Stewart said to use 2/3 c. for a 22 lb. turkey for the dry brine. I'm really bad at math and measuring so maybe I calculated wrong and the turkey will turn out too salty.

But really I guess the meal is secondary to spending time with the people I care about. I have only been away from home for one Thanksgiving. I went to college and graduate school a five-hour drive from home and had benevolent professors who who always gave us Wednesday off. And I have always been fortunate for find employment close to home that offers paid holidays.

The one Thanksgiving I spent away from home was when I studied abroad in Ireland when I was 20 and though I was a long way from California, I had a makeshift family with whom to celebrate. The Irish guys I know made a little bit of fun of us Americans that year since we all had to throw a Thanksgiving feast far from home. Actually, a couple days ago I was chatting with one of my Irish friends and mentioned Thanksgiving was coming up and he said, "Oh yeah, that's a big deal for you guys."


One of the perks included in the program I selected in Ireland (which was run through Butler University) included a turkey for Thanksgiving. Not per student, but per site. So the dozen or so of us at the University of Ulster at Coleraine coordinated a meal for ourselves and our newly found Irish friends. For some of the natives I knew it was their first Thanksgiving. For many, it may have been the only one. All the Americans picked a traditional dish to bring to the meal and the Irish guys, well, they offered to provide the beer, wine and spirits.


I brought the mashed potatoes and I remember searching all over the Teske's grocery store for a can of cranberry sauce. My mom even offered to send a few cans express mail, but eventually I found a tiny jar of Ocean Spray whole berry sauce on a shelf. It turns out the Brits save cranberry sauce for Christmas. But ever since then, I am been a big fan of whole berry cranberry sauce.

One friend made stuffing with raisins and the idea of something sweet in the mix surprised me since my family's version is savory. Another made candied yams, which I'd never had before, either. And there was a dish of Southern greens cooked with bacon and butter.


But more than the food, I remember the feeling of sharing a tradition with friends. The things I remember are the bear hug from a boy who was more than a foot taller than me, who said he didn't want me to miss my family. And another asking everyone if they included mushrooms in their dishes because he was allergic.

There was something about the meal that made everyone feel a little bit at home even though half of us were thousands of miles from it.

Day one - Thanksgiving prep

So Thanksgiving might not be until Thursday, but when you try out a new recipe every year like I do for the main course the preparation has to start early.

Every year since I started working at the Weekend Pinnacle I've tried a new turkey-cooking method. One year I followed the example of a coworker who smokes his turkey with rosemary. The low-and-slow method left the turkey moist while the rosemary gave it plenty of flavor inside and out. That was also the year I learned about aromatics - basically herbs, celery and onions that can be stuffed into the cavity of a turkey in lieu of stuffing to offer up some more flavor.

The next year I tried a brine I saw on Alton Brown's show. A brine is basically a mix of salt and seasonings, usually in a chicken broth and ice bath. The turkey sits for up to 12 hours in the wet mixture before roasting it as desired. It was the moistest turkey I'd ever had and the most flavorful. The basic principle of a brine is osmosis - the salt helps draw the other flavors into the turky so whatever flavors are in the brine - honey, pepper, rosemary - ends up inside the meat, all the way down to the bone.

This year I was all set to put together a wet brine and roast a turkey when I happened across an L.A. Times article by Russ Parsons, a food columnist. He wrote about how he discovered the dry-brine method works just as well as wet brine without all the hassle of keeping a turkey in a water bath for days. So I was intrigued enough to try out a new method this year. Hence the prep work on Monday for a Thursday meal.

Dry-brining a turkey basically means rubbing it down with salt and letting it sit in a ziplock bag for three days. According to Parsons the turkey can absorb whatever flavors are mixed in with the salt, such as herbs or lemon zest. For our turkey, we created a salt mix that included fresh rosemary, thyme, dry poultry seasonings and fresh lemon zest. The mix only smelled just like Thanksgiving as it was sprinkled onto the turkey. The hardest part of the method so far was trying to get a frozen turkey into a large ziplock bag - for some reason, the rock salt messed with the zipper so it wouldn't seal. Our solution was just to double bag it. The turkey is back in the freeze to absorb lots of flavor before its time to cook.

Check in for more updates on the Thanksgiving feast later this week.

Photo by MELISSA FLORES

A still frozen turkey is sprinkled with salt and herbs before being put in a plastic bag as part of the dry-brine method.

I don't think I can dance - but these guys can

I missed "So You Think You Can Dance" when it aired this week, but I had a good reason. I saw the season 5 tour in San Jose. The first year the producers of the Fox dance competition show sold tickets for a tour, I was a little skeptical, but even in a down economy HP Pavilion was sold out Wednesday night.

Though I've been watching season 4, 5 and 6 in HD, there is something about seeing the dancers live that can't compare to TV. One of the things that drives me crazy about the show is that as TV viewers, we don't get to see the dances straight - the cameras are constantly switching views. And we have to deal with Mary Murphy screaming all the time about the people she likes.

The live dance performances were great, and a reminder of how lacking some of this year's contestants are - sorry, but tap dancers are cool to watch but their dance skills don't carry over to other styles.

I might have mentioned it before, but I am a person without any rhythm. I can hardly clap on beat, let alone dance, and that's probably why I was so amazed by the performances on "So You Think You Can Dance" the first time I saw it. I started watching halfway through season 2. I was wowed by the moves of Benji Schwimmer, Heidi Groskreutz, Doynelle Jones and Travis Wall. Benji won the title of "America's Favorite Dancer" that year, and I was hooked.

At the show on Wednesday, my favorite dance was a Wade Robson piece to Roisin Murphy's "Ruby Blue." Dancers Janette Manrara and Brandon Bryant performed the jewel-heist themed piece to perfection. Actually, most of the performances were good since for the tour the producers pick the best dances from the whole season.

The only thing I found less than entertaining were the cheesy intros that the dancers were forced to do. All 12 of the dancers took turns introducing their colleagues - decked out in "So You Think You Can Dance" clothing that was also available for sale at the souvenir booths. These guys on the tour are dancers, not actors, and it's clear in their delivery of their lines. The only piece that I found at all entertaining was a sales pitch by Kupono Aweau for some new "So You Think You Can Dance" workout videos. For some reason, a skinny Hawaiian boy running around in short shorts was hilarious.

When I was watching last week's episodes yesterday I was thinking about which dancers this year I would most want to see on tour - generally the top 10 or 12 go along for the tour. I don't really have a favorite for season six yet, but I do know which dancers I could do without. But there is only one more week before the top 10 is decided on so I'll know soon whether I want to get tickets for the next tour or not.

3-D movies offer hits and misses

For me, a really good movie is one that makes me forget I am watching a movie at all. If I get engrossed in a movie, lose track of time, laugh or cry or forget that it is actors on the screen, that's usually a good sign.

This is one of the biggest downfalls for me of the 3-D movement in movies right now. I have no problem watching a 3-D movie for 12 minutes on a ride at Disneyland, but it's a lot harder to sit through a two-hour movie with the heavy Dolby Digital 3-D glasses pressing down on the bridge of my nose.

I've seen a few movies in 3-D since this whole trend started about two years ago. One of the best was a U2 concert in Imax, though I will admit I probably loved it because I am such a huge fan of the band. It was almost better than seeing the Edge in concert since there he was towering over me from the screen instead of me watching from 68 rows up in a football stadium.

Other 3-D movies haven't been as successful. Many of them are made so that viewers become hyper aware that they are watching a movie. In "Journey to the Center of the Earth" there were just so many gimmicks that were thrown in just to take advantage of the 3-D aspect of it that had nothing to do with the plot or storyline. It irritated me when the filmmakers through in a scene with marbles just so they could bounce out at viewers.

The most successful movies have been the ones that tell the story without paying much attention to the 3-D effects. That was the case with Disney's "Up" and the movie "Coraline," two animated films where the 3-D enhanced the story. It could just be that since they are animated the movement fits more smoothly into the storyline. And "Up" and "Coraline" both had storylines that drew me in.

Disney's latest movie, "A Christmas Carol" was a mixed bag. It was a classic retelling of the Charles Dickens story so the only thing new that was really brought forth were the 3-D effects. It looked pretty stunning with some of the scenes that fly over the Victorian-era London buildings feeling a little like those 3-D movie rides at Disneyland. But again, it seemed like some of the scenes were made with the 3-D in mind. And it was a little disconcerting to see an animated version of Colin Firth and Jim Carrey. See more about "A Christmas Carol" and other adaptations of Dickens' classic in the Weekend Pinnacle on Friday.

It will be interesting to see the next big 3-D movie, the much anticipated "Avatar" from James Cameron. The movie uses new 3-D technology that Cameron invented that allows the regular and 3-D version of the film to be recorded simultaneously in the same camera. Though I am not a big fan of Cameron's work - I am the only person I know who hates "Titanic" - it will be interesting to see if he pulls off the very expensive movie.

Mustang power

I am not one to watch football, and I have never been full of spirit for my old high school. But I have to admit I certainly got into the game last Friday between the Gilroy Mustangs and the Hollister HayBalers. The rivalry goes back 53 years to the very first Prune Bowl, as the annual game has been dubbed.

Trust me when I say people take the rivalry seriously. Working in Hollister, I often get razzed by San Benito High School graduates for being a Gilroy high grad. In fact, I picked out several of my coworkers on the other side of the field, and I am sure I was the only one sitting on the visitors' side of the stadium.

This year was the last Prune Bowl since a new high school opened in Gilroy this year and there will be some new rivalry created between the two schools. It will probably be dubbed the Garlic Bowl. So there was a lot on the line this year.

The trophy has been in Gilroy for two years, but the team hasn't had the best run this season. There was a new batch of coaches, the star quarterback graduated last year and some seniors quit the team mid-season, from what I hear. With only a couple wins under their belt, Gilroy's players went up against the Balers, who had lost just one game all season.


We arrived at Andy Hardin Stadium just after 6 p.m. after parking in a secret lot that only locals know about, and we found a front row seat in the bleachers. The JV game was half over and the Mustangs lost by a few points. But as anyone knows, only the varsity game counts. The varsity Mustangs came out strong and scored quickly. The game kept the crowd on the edge of their seats as the teams took turns in the lead.

The weather was cold, as it always is in Hollister, and we were still unprepared for the chill even with a handful of blankets and hoodie sweatshirts. But it was a good enough game that we were willing to sit through it to the end even as our cheeks turned bright red from the cold and our teeth chattered.


I still can't say I understand the game, but there were some plays that even I knew were awesome as one of the Mustangs intercepted the ball and ran all the way down the field for a touchdown. The crowd collectively stood up and cheered, "Go, Go, Go." And it was as though the players could hear us. It was the first game all season that the cheerleaders actually seemed to get into, leading the audience in chants. It was the only time in my life where I could kinda understand the reason so many people get so into football.


In the last quarter, the Mustangs were still down a few points. Minutes from the end of the game, they scored the final touchdown and kick, taking the lead. The Mustangs won 35 to 30 and secured possession of the VFW trophy for perpetuity. It was a good game and it was exciting to watch my home town win. But I guess I feel a little bad for the Balers, who I know really wanted the win, too.

But don't think this has made me into a football. The last three years have been enough to last me for at least a decade.

Bad dubbing can ruin a beautiful movie

I'v been a fan of foreign films for a long time. When I was a high schooler, I would check out the few shelves of overseas movies at National Video on a regular basis. It was there I discovered "Wings of Desire" and "Faraway, so close," two German films about angels who chose to become human - the latter a sequel of sorts to the first. I rented "Farewell, My Concubine," a Chinese film about two young boys who grow up in the world of Chinese opera and war. My friends and I ogled over Vincent Perez, the beautiful actor in the French films "Indochine" and "Queen Margot."

Most of these films I watched alone in my room since my parents were not fans of anything with subtitles - and had they known the mature content of some of the films, I probably wouldn't have been watching them at all. But I've always had a weak spot for a good foreign film. There is something so different about them from most American-made movies that is hard to describe - there is less talking and more emoting.

That is certainly the case with the French film "I've Love You So Long." I rented this a few weeks ago when there wasn't much else out on DVD or in the theaters. I was looking for a couple of good comedies, but settled instead for a movie about a woman out of prison after 15 years who tries to regain her life.

It had been on my must-see list for a while, but due to the somber tone I had to be in the right mood. So we rented it, got it home, and that's when I remembered it was a foreign film. The DVD cover doesn't really give it away, but the subtitles certainly did and my mom requested watching the dubbed version. The great thing about the dubbed version is that Kristen Scott Thomas (who plays Juliette Fontaine) does the voice in both versions. The bad thing is everyone else in the movie sounds like a Japanese anime character in the English dubbing. There is little actual voice acting going on, and it sounds mostly like the characters were just reading from a script.

It made it really hard to get into the movie, even though it was superbly written. The movie follows Juliette who is just out of prison after serving 15 years for murder. Her sister Lea (Elsa Zylberstein) invites Juliette to stay with her, and Juliette slowly starts to put the pieces of her life back together. There are long pauses in the movie where Thomas lights up a cigarette and says little. It allows the facts about her to come out slowly in the movie, and little by little the reader learns pieces about her life that seem incongruous with her being a murderer, especially once we learn who the victim was.

Unfortunately, the ever cheery voice given to Lea does little to show the younger sister's torn feelings about accepting someone guilty of murder into her home. The movie is worth a watch but to do it justice, please just read the subtitles and skip the English-dubbed version.

'Dexter' keeps delivering a good twist

Oh, you sly "Dexter" writers, you really threw me for a loop this season. Last night I caught up on the last two episodes of the Showtime series about a serial killer. And boy, was the episode from Oct. 25 a shocker. For anyone who watches the show, I won't disclose what was so unexpected but I will say John Lithgow's Arthur Miller has much more depth than many viewers were expecting. I knew there had to be a twist since it was too early in the season for Dexter to catch the Trinity killer, but the thing that keeps Dexter from his kill is a surprise to be sure.

One of the reasons I enjoy Dexter so much, besides the way Michael C. Hall somehow manages to make me root for a man who can't keep from killing people, is that the writers are very good at keeping viewers in suspense. They don't use so much foreshadowing that they give all the action away before it happens.

I can't remember the last time I hadn't figured out the bad guy or the coming twist in "Law and Order: SVU," which is so formulaic - and often based on real-life happenings - that it is easy to see what is coming. And when it comes to movies, perhaps the last one that really caught me off guard was the 2001 film "The Others" with Nicole Kidman.

While I absolutely can't take the horror genre, I do like a little bit of suspense, and "Dexter" certainly offers that up season after season.

Rose Bowl a nightmare of a venue

So last Sunday at this time, I was nearly to Pasadena in anticipation of the U2 concert at the Rose Bowl. I have never before traveled to a concert that required me to drive five hours one way and rent a room for the night. In fact, I am really not much of a concert person - except for when it comes to U2.

The boys from Ireland really played a little bit of a trick on all of us from the Bay Area. Tickets went on sale for the North American tour last spring and there were no tour dates in Northern California. The closest options where the Rose Bowl in Pasadena or Vegas. Most of the die-hard fans I know opted for one or the other. I chose the Rose Bowl because I figured it would require one day off work and one room in a hotel - saving time and money.

Like I mentioned last week, I did not really think about the Rose Bowl as the venue, or the logistical issues created by it. Partly this is because I've never been to a real football stadium, and partly because I was blinded by a need to see U2 live, no matter what the challenges. If only I had known that the Monday I'd arrive back at home from the concert that an e-mail would be waiting for me from U2.com to announce an additional leg of the tour in North America next spring - with a concert scheduled at Oakland Coliseum.

Of course, the tour promoters obviously did this on purpose to get people to go to the Rose Bowl for a concert that broke attendance records for both the band and the venue, and was broadcast live on YouTube, and was filmed for a concert DVD.

If I'd known about the Oakland show, I certainly wouldn't have gone to the Rose Bowl. The experience was an interesting one to say the least. The concert was great and it was pretty amazing to see close to 100,000 U2 fans all in the same place. A U2 concert is kinda like a grab bag, too, since you never know who the opening act is going to be almost until the concert begins. I didn't know Black-Eyed Peas were opening until we were waiting in line to get into the stadium a couple hours before the concert was set to start and the announcement come over the loudspeakers. Through the years I've seen a few opening acts at U2 concerts. I've seen Kings of Leon and Damian Marley, whose performances I didn't really enjoy. But I've also seemed No Doubt and now the Peas, who both put on great opening shows.

Everything inside the stadium was great but it was everything outside that was a nightmare. We got down to Pasadena around noon, checked into our hotel and with my sister's g-phone got directions to the shuttle stop for which we had purchased tickets. The shuttle was 1.1 miles from the hotel so we opted to leave the car behind and walk to Old Town Pasadena for lunch before heading to the shuttle. Though it was late October, temperatures in Pasadena were about 89 degrees, and every restaurant had long waits. We ended up at an Italian restaurant I'd tried before with a 30 minute wait for a table. By the time lunch was over we headed to the shuttle stop. There were signs from the shuttle station saying the Rose Bowl was a 1.5 mile walk away, but we had our tickets secured so we lined up for the bus.

The shuttles from two locations in Pasadena started running at noon and continued to run throughout the evening. We had no wait when we boarded the shuttle around 3 p.m., though I wondered what things would be like after the concert when everyone was trying to board at the same time.

The bus dropped us off near the stadium and we headed over to the Picnic in the Park, which had been described in e-mails from the Rose Bowl as a place to hang out before the concert, get food from local vendors and see live entertainment. By the time we arrived, the area was pretty packed and if there was entertainment lined up, we couldn't find it. It was hot, dusty and crowded. We stood in line for bottled water and lemonade. The only highlight at picnic in the park was that El Cholo was one of the food vendors. El Cholo is one of my favorite restaurants in Los Angeles from when I was in graduate school down there. It was just a 20 minute drive from my apartment and had the cheapest valet in the city. The warm tortilla chips, the green corn tamales and the cheese enchiladas are amazingly good. Since we were still full from lunch, we opted for a couple of green corn tamales to share. The tamales are only made seasonally in the fall and the masa is a creamy sweet mix that is stuffed with cheddar cheese and mild green chilies. It was the only good thing about Picnic in the Park.

So after we had rehydrated a bit and snacked, we decided to find our gate and get in line. We were pretty close to the front of the line and gates were supposed to open at 5 p.m. But as with most large events, the gates opened half an hour late, and as the wait went on, more and more people pushed and crowded in front of us. We grumbled a bit about it, but mostly let it go since we had assigned seats unlike all those general admission fans who were pushing to get to the front of the standing-room-only crowd.

The concert itself was pretty great, even though U2 skipped my favorite oldie "I Will Follow." They sang a lot of stuff from the latest album, and it was clear that most of the people seated around me didn't know many the newer songs. I think I was the only one around me who knew the lyrics to "No Line On The Horizon" and "Magnificent." But the group did play some older, more obscure songs such as "In A Little While" and "Ultraviolet." They also sang a song from my favorite album "Unforgettable Fire" so I was content.

After close to two and a half hours, the band was done and it was time to leave the stadium. We opted to wait until the stadium cleared out a bit before walking down the steep steps (we were in row 68 of 75 rows) since my mom and I both have fears of heights/falling that can be triggered in big stadiums. Probably the lowlight of the night was when we were sitting and waiting for the crowd to clear a bit and the woman behind us started saying that her friend (who had been smoking marijuana and drinking beer all night) wasn't feeling very well. Soon she was puking into a beer cup and we decided to get a move on.

Outside the stadium we looked for the shuttle bus line, and things were kind of in chaos. We could see the two lines for the two different shuttles, but there seemed to be no end in sight as security guards blocked every seeming entrance to the line. We walked and searched, and walked and searched for the end of the line for at least 20 minutes before we gave up. We knew there was a way to get back downtown since we had seen the sign that said the walk was 1.5 miles from the shuttle stop. But my sister's phone was dead so we had no directions to get back. We asked a security guard who gave us directions, but then noticed no one else was walking the same way. Then we asked a police officer and he gave us the exact opposite directions of the security guard.

But soon enough, we found a crowd and started the 1.5 mile - largely uphill - to the station. Along the way we walked past cars that were close to a standstill - and even saw the passengers of two cars get out of their vehicle to fight about something (a bit of ironic considering Bono's strong message about world peace). It would have been a fine walk had we not been standing/walking for the greater part of 10 hours and had we not been up at 5 a.m. for the drive to Los Angeles. But somehow, at a snail's pace, we managed to make it to the shuttle station. I even felt sympathy for some of the other concert goers who were walking in heels, and those who stayed behind to wait in line for a shuttle that surely would deliver them home later than us.

Along the route back, there were signs telling us how much further we had to go. The first half mile seemed impossibly slow, but then as the terrain flattened out, we picked up a little speed. When we got to the shuttle station, we knew we still had a mile to go to get to our hotel and we considered stopping for water at one of the open bars or an ice cream shop that was open late. But we feared if we stopped, we would lose our momentum so we kept trudging along. We made it back to the room by 2 a.m. and all opted to take a shower to get rid of the sweat and dirt from the day.

We were up by 8 a.m. for an expensive room service breakfast since no one felt like going out to eat since we just wanted to hit the road for home. We got home by 2:30 p.m. on Monday, and I logged onto the computer to check my e-mail and work on some assignments for the office.

And there, of course, was the e-mail announcing the Oakland show. I was irritated for a while, thinking of how I could have avoided the logistical nightmare of the last two days. But then I got over it and made sure I had secured a presale ticket for the June show. After all, I haven't missed a Bay Area U2 concert since my first show in 1997 - Popmart at the Oakland Coliseum.

CNN gets it right: a reporter's life is stressful

I hate when I follow a blog or a columnist and it is days, weeks - or even months on a rare occasion - between postings. So I feel a little guilty that my postings have been much more infrequent in recent weeks. In fact, as anyone who follows this blog knows, it's been nearly a week since I posted.

Blame it on the Pinnacle Awards special section I had to design, edit, and partly write, last week. And on the day I took off to drive back from the U2 concert in Pasadena. Or the student interns who called in sick or took a week off to go to Hawaii. This week felt like I was weeks behind schedule, even with the work I did on Saturday, and writing a couple columns late in the day on Monday, after getting very little sleep and driving for nearly six hours. It's the life of a journalist, and probably one of the reasons "reporter" was named to CNN Money's list of stressful jobs that pay badly.

Others jobs that made the list include social worker and probation officer, so basically reporter is right up there with people who are breaking up families or following around criminals.

I am technically not a reporter anymore since my official title is city editor, but I still do plenty of reporting, writing, page designing and sometimes even handle receptionist duties since that position is filled by a part-timer. But perhaps I am not the only reporter in the world who is grinding my teeth in my sleep and having nightmares about work on a regular basis - and occasionally crying a few frustrated tears.

But there is a reason some of us reporters stick with a job that offers a mediocre salary and lots of stress. There are moments that make it all worthwhile, such as the reader who came in today and said he feels like he knows me since he always reads my food column. Or discovering last night that someone who has been a mentor with the Puente program at Gavilan College for going on three years (I am a mentor with the program, too) signed up originally when he read a story I wrote about the need for more male mentors.

It might be a world of stress, but the little impact I can have on the world makes it worthwhile.

U2 will rock the Rose Bowl and YouTube

I might have mentioned a time or two, or a dozen times, that I am a big fan of U2. So when tickets went on sale for their latest tour I knew I had to see them. I've seen every tour since Popmart and didn't want to miss the latest tour, but when tickets went on sale for the U.S. stops, nothing was listed in the Bay Area. The closest options where Pasadena or Las Vegas. Being a working journalist - which means I don't have a lot of expendable cash (and the tickets were already pricey) or free time - so I thought going to Pasadena would require less time and money.

But when I bought the tickets for Pasadena there was one big thing I didn't take into account - the venue for tomorrow's concert is the Rose Bowl. It hit home about two months ago when I started getting mass e-mails from the Rose Bowl staff encouraging U2 ticketholders to pre-pay for parking or shuttle bus passes and that the parking lots would open at noon - for a 7 p.m. concert. The first e-mail said 96,000 people are expected at the concert. That is a lot of people to transport to a venue. Suddenly, the quick trip to Pasadena seemed like it might require a little more planning. So we rented a hotel room near Old Town Pasadena, got tickets to one of the shuttles, and planned for an earlier arrival time just in case there is mass traffic on the highways and streets of Pasadena.

By this time tomorrow, I will be wading through a sea of people to my seat, awaiting the Edge, Bono, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen, Jr. For anyone who hasn't scored tickets for the concert and wants to see it, it is supposed to be played live on YouTube at 8:30 p.m. PST.

Now I better go find those tickets and prep for the long drive early tomorrow...

Two Eggers' movies take characters on a journey far from home

I have never read a Dave Eggers book, but somehow in one weekend I managed to watch two movies based on screenplays by the writer. The first was a movie that is out on DVD that I wanted to see when it came out in theaters, but it never opened locally. The other is the movie with mainstream draw that opened this weekend, "Where the Wild Things Are."

In some ways both of the movies are about finding place to belong and learning how to be a family. In "Away We Go," which starts on a note not for anyone with prudish tendencies, Burt (John Krasinski) and Verona (Maya Rudolph) discover that they are expecting a baby. They are both 33, unmarried and not quite sure what to do when Burt's parents announce they are moving overseas for two years. Burt is an insurance salesman and Verona is an artist of sorts. So when she is six months pregnant, the two decide to set out on a cross country trip to find a place they might belong. They criss cross to Phoenix, Madison and Montreal, visiting old friends and the few family members they have left. Verona worries constantly that she will be a bad mother or that the two of them are, as she says "fuck ups."

The whole point of the movie seems to be that Burt and Verona discover that even the people they know who seem to have it altogether still have their faults, their pains and their breakdowns. In the end, the thing that matters most is not whether they are married, have good jobs or have a complete plan for parenthood, but that they love each other and the baby on the way. The movie isn't quite a feel-good journey, but there are some funny and heart-breaking moments along the way. The main downside of the movie is that Burt's character isn't developed strongly enough to make people forget that Krasinski plays Jim on "The Office." Verona comes away as the more developed character, with a family background that explains her actions and concerns about becoming a family.

"Where the Wild Things Are," based on a children's book by Maurice Sendak, is also about finding a place to belong. Max (Max Records) runs away from home after he feels ignored by his sister and mother. The creatures he finds when he sails away to a far away island represent all the angry, hurt and scared feelings he has about his family. Though it is not spelled out in the movie, it's clear Max's parents are divorced and his mother has just started seeing someone else. The creatures make Max king, but he learns that it's not so easy to be the one who is responsible for keeping everyone safe and happy. The creatures are voiced by James Gandolfini, Catherine O'Hara (who also plays Burt's mother in "Away We Go"), Lauren Ambrose and Paul Dano, among others.

The movies may have completely different premises, but in the end they are both about going home.

My dreams are keeping me up at night

This week has been a rough one for me, and unfortunately I haven't even been able to escape into a good night's sleep. I've been sleeping just fine, but my nights have been full of very vivid and disturbing dreams. It seems as if my stress during the day finds a way to manifest itself at night.

I've always had very vivid dreams and have been pretty good at remembering them. Whatever is going on in my life is usually what makes it into my dreams - my friends and family make a lot of appearances as does work-related stuff. I usually know I am developing a serious crush when a guy I know shows up in my dreams. But some weeks the dreams just seem to come out of nowhere.

One night this week I dreamt that I argued with the owner of my company, a man with whom I speak probably just a few times a year. Most of the other details have faded, but it was an argument about a membership renewal not being paid.

The next night I dreamt about vampires, perhaps because I had watched an episode of "Vampire Diaries" right before bed. The dream incorporated some of the ideas from the show, and in it someone was trying to get me to let a snake bite me because then if a vampire bit me they would get poisoned and would leave me alone. I woke up in the middle of the night scared until I realized it wasn't real, and then I thought if I could only remember all the details it might make a good screenplay some day. And then I went back to sleep and dreamt some more about vampires.

The night after my brain incorporated characters from "Dexter" and the guest star from the last "Law and Order: SVU." I wasn't involved in this dream, but was watching it like a movie. Dexter, Astor and someone else were driving all around trying to track down Stephen Rea (who played the guest role on SVU) so that Dexter could murder the bad guy. There was even some elaborate scheme set up at Rea's hotel for Dexter to get him. I woke up again feeling on edge.

I got one night's reprieve before I dreamt about going down to the U2 concert at the Rose Bowl (which I will be doing Oct. 25) and not being able to get to the concert because we didn't have our shuttle bus tickets. The dream was full of waiting in line and struggling to get to the venue. And for some weird reason, the shuttle stop was in an amusement park, and was like an amusement park train instead of a real bus. We had yet made it to the concert when I woke up. Luckily our shuttle tickets came in the mail today, our reservations for the hotel are set and I've got the U2 tickets put away for the day of the concert.

After nights like these, I often wake up feeling almost as tired as I did when I went to bed. But, of course, the worst nights are the ones when I dream about work. There are nights when I dream about designing pages and missing deadlines. I guess the worst dreams, however, are the ones where I dream that I have already gotten up and gotten ready for work, and then wake up to find I haven't done any of that.

I'm not really sure what to do to eliminate these dreams. I could stop watching so much TV, I guess, but I think these dreams are probably coming more from a stressful few weeks at work. I can only hope that tonight when I go to bed my dreams will be normal again, or better yet, maybe I won't even remember them.

I love a rainy night

There is something about a good rain storm that makes me nostalgic for the few months I spent in Ireland when I was 20. When the hills around Gilroy and Hollister start to turn green in winter, and there is a fog in the morning, this area looks surprisingly like parts of Ireland.

I studied abroad in Northern Ireland in Coleraine at the University of Ulster for three months one fall. While it might seem like it's been raining forever as the storm continues into its 16th hour here in the Bay Area, it rained every day I was on the emerald isle. I went nearly 90 days without a sunny day.

In Ireland, no one uses umbrellas or raincoats. The rain is heavy and wind so strong that these barriers to the weather offered little protection. For most of the time I was in Ireland, my outergear consisted of a pea coat and a variety of sock caps, especially after I did the unthinkable and shaved my head.

My memories of Ireland are scented with damp wool and stale cigarette smoke, and the smell of whiskey on a cute boy's breath. Most of my weeknights were spent at the student union pub with the quick friends I made. We'd shrug off our jackets and huddle together in a booth, and my friends would drink Guiness while I sipped cider or Bailey's Irish Cream or vodka and orange juice. After I gave up drinking toward the end of my adventure (because I had a crush on the only boy in Ireland who didn't drink or smoke), the bartender took to calling me O.J. for the orange juice I ordered all night long.

I had a love-hate relationship with the rain in Ireland, and there were times were I missed the sun as much as I missed my family and friends. But sometimes it felt like the weather was something that drew my new found friends closer to me, as we huddled together in the booths at a restaurant or a pub and drank to warm ourselves up, or the night my crush took my hand as we walked home from a party because as he said, it was cold out.

There was something exhilarating about heading out in the rain for class or to the grocery store or just for a night out with friends without worrying about how wet my clothes would end up or what my hair would look like without an umbrella - certainly not an issue after I cut most of it off. It was a time when I felt braver, and freer, and more innocent than I do now.

Now that I am older and less spontaneous, I worry about the flooded streets I will encounter on the way to work, about my heels becoming slippery in a puddle, and about the electricity going out on my busiest day at work. So I'm glad I'm in California, where I know the storm will pass, to be followed by plenty of sunshine.

In Bray, Ireland, circa fall 1998, with my pea coat and my minolta 35 mm slr.

Two new shows that are doomed for failure

Most of the time I give a new show a few episodes to grow on me. It offers a chance to get used to the format of the show - like the characters talking to the camera on "The Office" - and a chance to get to know the characters. But sometimes the networks come up with shows that just seem like they are destined to be a bomb from the very first episode.

There are two new shows that make the list so far this season for me. The first is "Three Rivers," yet another hospital show. But this one is focused on transplants. The only reason I started watching it is because my mom heard the main character would be played by Alex O'Loughlin, who starred in the short-lived vampire series "Moonlight."

The show was supposedly so bad that the creators reshot the pilot and added in a new character. The one review I read said that the whole episode showed about a hundred close-ups on Alex O'Loughlin's bright blue eyes.

Now my first issue with the show is that at the beginning of the episodes viewers watch people get sick or get into accidents. It's a little like Sesame Street's "one of these things is not like the other" skit because one of the people gets into a much more serious accident. And guess what? That's going to end up being the organ donor for all the rest of the sick people. And that's probably my second problem with the show - that somehow this one organ donor just happens to match blood types and markers with multiple people awaiting organs in the transplant unit.

The other issue is that the dialogue is sooooo bad it's hard to stomach. Instead of creating characters and letting us get to know them, the directors give up too much time to gazing into O'Loughlin's earnest eyes. Case in point: When one man finds out there is a kidney donor match for him, he tears up and says "I've been connected to this dialysis machine three days a week for eight hours a day for years" and I guess we are supposed to get from that how happy he is and how crappy his life has been. It just isn't very sincere.

The next problem is that since the pilot was reshot, the second episode repeats tons of things from the first episode. It reintroduces characters and seems to backtrack on other things we already know about the characters. It was a little bit like reading the second book in a trilogy and then going back to the first one. After epsiode two of this, the season pass is getting deleted. Better luck on the next series, O'Loughlin.

The other show that will probably get the ax is "Flashforward." It is an interesting sci-fi premise and it stars Joseph Fiennes who is adorably British (though he doesn't have his accent on this show.) On the first episode all the characters are going through their lives when suddenly EVERYONE on the planet suddenly blacks out for two-plus minutes. But it turns out everyone wasn't blacked out - they were all having visions of the future. Now the FBI is trying to investigate what caused the black outs and is looking into how to keep them from happening again. And everyone is dealing with what they saw in their blackouts - a relapse into drinking, cheating on a spouse, or not seeing anything at all.

The problem with the show is that it is likely to go the way of "The 4400" and "Heroes" as shows that get so overwhelming that viewers can't keep up. It's just not a premise that can be carried over multiple seasons. It would have made a better movie than TV series.

I will watch one more episode, just to see dreamy Joseph Fiennes, who has been absent from the movie and TV scene for far too long. But I don't have much faith that the show will last long.