Entry tags:
What a long day.
I try not to let silly things irk me as much as in the past, when after reading a magazine article that showed the writer clearly didn't understand the Marik Ishtar character, I wrote a long letter to the magazine pointing out a bunch of things the writer either didn't understand or didn't know. I doubt I'll write a letter to the publishing company Little and Brown now. But ... I can't help feeling annoyed that on the case for a set of Equestria Girls novels, they made some actual errors about Sunset Shimmer when describing the book plots. You'd think that a case of the books would make an effort to get things right. Instead they make it sound like Sunset is still a problem for the characters following the first movie. They have the idiocy to say that the Dazzlings is her band, when in reality she had nothing to do with being in the band and instead wanted to stop them. And they call her "always rebellious."
...
Completely aside from the fact that she had a complete change of heart at the end of the first movie and wanted to be good and not rebellious, the books actually portray her as even more insecure in the succeeding adventures than the movies do. Even in the most recent book, the Friendship Games adaption, this is done. In the movie, a key scene has Applejack making a remark that could be taken as guilting Sunset about her past. But Applejack means it as a joke; they are close enough friends now that such jokes can be made. Sunset half-smirks in response; she knows it's a joke. But in the book, Sunset takes it as a way to guilt her and show they'll never forget what she did in the first movie.
Apparently the publishing company will certainly never forget, or forgive, since they want to portray her so unflatteringly on the box and even accuse her of things she didn't do. **headdesk.**
Saturday was an extremely long day. Where to even begin? I feel terrible everything took so long, especially since Mom wasn't feeling well enough to go and we had to leave her home and call in every little while or so. But things can't fully be explained on the phone, so she was still plenty worried and I felt plenty horrible at the time it took. Even moreso since some of the time didn't have to have been taken.
So let's see. We made good time getting to the church and made it for the viewing/wake, as we were aiming for. The following funeral service was lovely and all the kids spoke, but gah, it was so sad. They were all so sad and some of them kept breaking down. These were grown men. It was moving to see how much they loved their mother (and for most of them, she was a stepmother, but they still considered her a mom just like their other mom). But man, it was heartbreaking. I don't often cry at funerals, but it was a struggle not to cry at this one.
The luncheon for the family and close friends was pretty amazing. I've never been to a funeral luncheon like that before. It was Mexican food. There were giant tortillas to fill with beans, chicken, cheeeeese, salsa, avocado spread.... It was so awesome. And there was ice water and several kinds of cake.
We hadn't actually planned to go to the cemetery part of the service, since it was even farther away and Dad just didn't see how he could afford the gas. But then my sister offered that we could go with her and her youngest daughter. We had to make a spur of the moment decision because everyone was leaving right then. I was worried to go with someone else, since then we'd be captive to their whims, but I could tell Dad really wanted to go to the cemetery, and I did too, really, if we could manage it. And I hoped it wouldn't take too long afterwards to come back to the car. So I figured we'd better try it. He left the decision up to me and I didn't want to be responsible for Dad not getting to go.
She didn't seem to know her way around too well for some reason, but her daughter set up the Google Maps app on the phone and used that to guide her up to the city where the burial would be. This was where we all used to live, and the cemetery is one of my favorites ever. It's so huge and old and mysterious.
The burial plot was in the newer section, so we drove over there, my sister got us to the wrong burial service even though we told her it was by the fence, and we had to try again. That time it went right and we arrived early.
I was surprised not to see the jagged triangular headstone in the area. I had thought it was right near the family plots in that area. Since there was a little extra time, I wandered off to find it. That thing creeped me out so bad as a kid, but it morbidly intrigued me too. It's just so unique. And then it's also creepy to me because from a distance, the only thing you can see written on it is the surname going vertically down the stone. The name is unusual and it's similar to the name of an aunt (just minus one letter), which only adds to the unsettling nature of it. I've tried to put it in every cemetery picture I've drawn (albeit I don't put the name).
I finally found it, over near where some family friends are buried. It still creeps me out, but it was daylight and didn't seem so creepy then. I walked right up to it. It's pretty big in person; it was about as tall as I am. Of course, I'm pretty short (five feet even), but that's still pretty big for a tombstone. I wonder why they used such a jagged piece of rock like that for the marker. That would make for an interesting story, I imagine. It's sad too; the person buried there was only 19.
I walked back and they still hadn't started yet; they were waiting for the hearse. When it finally got there, we did a little graveside service and tried to sing some family hymns, but we didn't know all the words, especially on the final one we tried. I'm glad we made it to the cemetery to participate in that final part of the service. It was after we left that the problems started.
We needed to drop my niece off at a friend's house where she'd arranged to spend the night. My sister detoured a bit to look at my dad's birth house (yeah, he wasn't born in a hospital) and the old shop where he used to work with his grandfather. Along the drive up, I had remembered that I wanted to check Marshalls for the rare Adagio Dazzle doll, as she's been turning up in a lot of them lately. The only Marshalls here are up in that approximate area, and my sister agreed we could try one on the way back down.
After some trouble with rush hour traffic, we finally got to the place and I went in to look around. I was really impressed with the store; it looks really upscale, even though it's a discount place. I wish Mom could see it; I think she'd love it as much as I do now. I couldn't find the doll, but I did find the big Twilight Sparkle figure. I'd just been thinking about her and that she wasn't in stores any more. I had wanted the original unicorn one and had not paid attention to the winged version, but I finally knew I'd never get the unicorn one since she's rare and expensive now and I was willing to get the winged one. When I saw her at Marshalls for $10, I figured I'd better snap her up.
We headed back to where we'd left our car at the church. We got off the freeway too early and started wandering around. Even though I saw street signs that said we were not in the right town, my sister didn't believe it. We wandered around some more as it got dark and ended up in yet another wrong town. Finally we all saw a sign proclaiming the name of the place and my sister believed we were lost. She didn't know how to work the Google Maps app, but the directions were still programmed into it from that morning as to how to get to the church. So she brought that up, followed them, and finally we were able to get back to the car.
I suppose I really should have just said for us to go home then, since we'd been out eight-nine hours at that point. But since we hardly ever get out that far and there were sales I needed to see about right then or they'd be kerplunk, I could hardly bear the thought of just going home then. I really tried to hurry regardless, but it didn't work out that way.
We also tried finding some stuff Mom wanted for Christmas presents, but we didn't have any luck finding stuff for the adults. We did get the stuff she wanted for the kids, so that was good.
I checked T.J. Maxx and Ross for the doll and still didn't find her, so then it was on to Toys R Us. They had a 30% off sale on all Pony stuff, and I thought I'd planned I'd get the archery Applejack and that would be that, but when I actually got in there and everything was on sale, suddenly it wasn't an easy decision. I debated for ages over several things I'd wanted, couldn't decide, and then we had to rush to the mall to see about the Build-a-Bear discounts. I had discounts adding up to $15 off, plus there was a 2 for $35 sale on. Both of my discounts worked with that, which meant I could get two for $20! Naturally I couldn't pass that up. I'd planned to get Zecora and Teegan (the purple cat/tiger) if I could get two, so that was what I did. It was fun and the girls were so friendly and sweet and fun. And since Teegan comes with a tank top (as well as sewn-on underwear), I found some cheap swim trunks for her to wear at least for now. Maybe later I'll have money to get her a nice outfit, but right then I just wanted to clothe her good enough and save more money for other things. But it took a lot longer to get two than I'd planned on; it was about thirty-forty minutes later when I got back to Toys R Us.
During the interim I thought I'd decided what to get at Toys R Us, the two-pack with Twilight and Flash. But every single copy Toys R Us had featured a stray glitter problem. It was shedding off of Twilight's skirt and getting everywhere. That didn't seem appealing at all, so I wondered if I'd rather get the characters separately and buy a Twilight without that skirt. I turned my attention more fully to the two-pack I'd tried to get in the summer, with Sonata and Aria from the second movie. There were only two copies of those, they're phasing out, and with the sale they were only $13.99. That was definitely the best deal. (Well, actually, the best deal was Photo Finish and her two band members, but I don't really know those characters other than Photo Finish herself. They don't even have any dialogue.) So I preferred Sonata and Aria. I still debated for a moment, feeling guilty as always to get antagonists, but I knew I really wanted them. They bicker like sisters, which makes me have a certain fondness for them. Plus, I knew I probably wouldn't be able to find the set before long. And I have a chance to get the Adagio doll from someone on the forum, so I wanted to have the other girls in the band right ready in case I could. It would be too sad not to have the whole group.
(Also, I have plans for a story where Sunset finds them post-movie and tries to extend friendship to them. One thing I did like in the book version of the second movie was that she felt some pity for them. I can definitely picture that, since Sunset had some similar goals of wanting to be popular/well-liked.)
With that taken care of at last, I wanted to just try one more Wal-Mart looking for Sunset Shimmer. (We'd tried one around the time we got the stuff for Mom.) That was a fizzle, of course. We had planned to try one more store looking for DVDs for the adults, but it was so late by then and I was exhausted and panicking, knowing Mom would be so upset and worried that it was taking so long. So we went home, arriving over twelve hours after leaving home. GAH. Mom didn't like the long time we'd been gone one bit, but she did like seeing what I'd brought back and was happy I'd been able to get those items, so that made me feel a little better.
I felt awful that I was too exhausted to stay up for long with Ladyamberjo and JP, though. That's the night I chat with them and Ladyamberjo and I have had all kinds of trouble having a conversation the last several weeks. And of course, on the night when Ladyamberjo tried extra hard to be available and awake, I'm so tired I'm falling over in the chair.
With weather reports of storms coming up this week, we decided we needed to look for the other DVDs on Tuesday. That was just two towns over. We left earlier than we do sometimes and spent the latter part of the afternoon checking out the DVDs at K-Mart and ShopKo. I also discovered that K-Mart's two-packs of Twilight and Flash are glitter-free and gorgeous, so I'm back to wanting the two-pack again and not to get the characters separately. I wonder if it would be worth paying full-price for it to get a nice glitter-free one.
I still couldn't find Sunset Shimmer, but I did at last find a good Scootaloo at Wal-Mart! All legs were the same length and her face wasn't shaped weird (yes, those are problems with Funrise sometimes), so I decided I should get her.
Also, I very randomly saw the 12-inch Applebloom at ShopKo. It was frustrating, because from a distance I momentarily thought she was Sunset. Sigh. But it was interesting to see a rare character turn up at ShopKo, of all places. ShopKo doesn't even have any Friendship Games dolls yet! I wonder if seeing her is possibly a good sign. Scootaloo just started showing up last month, and now an Applebloom.... Maybe, possibly, Sunset will still come? I don't hold out much hope of that, though. And I still wish I had taken that person up on her offer to get one for me in the summer. I was worried about shipping costs and I was fully convinced back then that we were just about to get her for fall stock. And then we didn't.
Well, anyway, we had some good luck with the DVDs, and I got a couple of Christmas presents, and it was a pretty nice little outing. We got back in time for me to chat with Crystal.
I also had good luck with one of my survey companies and got an Amazon gift card again already! I got a couple more Christmas presents with it, as well some more Get Smart for myself. Hopefully it will arrive in time for me to send one of the presents on and have it arrive before Christmas....
I also discovered that I need to watch every episode of The Persuaders!, ohmygoshsquee. It's wonderful! I plan to buy the DVD set with my next gift card. Meantime, I found it on YouTube and watched an episode in the morning. The friendship between the main characters is glorious, and it's even more awesome because they start out hating each other, and they go from that to really caring about each other and being really close friends. It's such a shame it only ran one season. It should satisfy my Roger Moore withdrawal nicely. I love his character, and the friendship with Tony Curtis's character, and I won't be surprised if I want to write fanfic somewhere down the line. As much as I love Simon Templar, he's a loner, and it's harder for me to relate to writing for loners if they don't have one good friend or family member to interact with. And if they're the only steady character in the cast. Then they work better in crossover fics. I really love to write about friendships. (Plus, I still worry about the fact that I prefer the TV show Simon while the few fanficcers prefer the book Simon. I'm still going to write that one fic with Simon appearing to be dead and Inspector Teal reacting to it, though. Then it flashes back to tell what led up to it, comes back to the present, and of course Simon will be alright when the drug wears off.)
I also became obsessed with the song Little Talks by Of Monsters and Men. It's absolutely haunting and gorgeous. I'm thrilled Ladyamberjo found that song and shared it with me! I am totally going to want to write a fic based around it at some point, although right now I'm unsure what characters such a fic would involve. I'd also like to sing it, but I don't know how well it would go over if I tried recording me singing it, since it really does need to be a duet.
...
Completely aside from the fact that she had a complete change of heart at the end of the first movie and wanted to be good and not rebellious, the books actually portray her as even more insecure in the succeeding adventures than the movies do. Even in the most recent book, the Friendship Games adaption, this is done. In the movie, a key scene has Applejack making a remark that could be taken as guilting Sunset about her past. But Applejack means it as a joke; they are close enough friends now that such jokes can be made. Sunset half-smirks in response; she knows it's a joke. But in the book, Sunset takes it as a way to guilt her and show they'll never forget what she did in the first movie.
Apparently the publishing company will certainly never forget, or forgive, since they want to portray her so unflatteringly on the box and even accuse her of things she didn't do. **headdesk.**
Saturday was an extremely long day. Where to even begin? I feel terrible everything took so long, especially since Mom wasn't feeling well enough to go and we had to leave her home and call in every little while or so. But things can't fully be explained on the phone, so she was still plenty worried and I felt plenty horrible at the time it took. Even moreso since some of the time didn't have to have been taken.
So let's see. We made good time getting to the church and made it for the viewing/wake, as we were aiming for. The following funeral service was lovely and all the kids spoke, but gah, it was so sad. They were all so sad and some of them kept breaking down. These were grown men. It was moving to see how much they loved their mother (and for most of them, she was a stepmother, but they still considered her a mom just like their other mom). But man, it was heartbreaking. I don't often cry at funerals, but it was a struggle not to cry at this one.
The luncheon for the family and close friends was pretty amazing. I've never been to a funeral luncheon like that before. It was Mexican food. There were giant tortillas to fill with beans, chicken, cheeeeese, salsa, avocado spread.... It was so awesome. And there was ice water and several kinds of cake.
We hadn't actually planned to go to the cemetery part of the service, since it was even farther away and Dad just didn't see how he could afford the gas. But then my sister offered that we could go with her and her youngest daughter. We had to make a spur of the moment decision because everyone was leaving right then. I was worried to go with someone else, since then we'd be captive to their whims, but I could tell Dad really wanted to go to the cemetery, and I did too, really, if we could manage it. And I hoped it wouldn't take too long afterwards to come back to the car. So I figured we'd better try it. He left the decision up to me and I didn't want to be responsible for Dad not getting to go.
She didn't seem to know her way around too well for some reason, but her daughter set up the Google Maps app on the phone and used that to guide her up to the city where the burial would be. This was where we all used to live, and the cemetery is one of my favorites ever. It's so huge and old and mysterious.
The burial plot was in the newer section, so we drove over there, my sister got us to the wrong burial service even though we told her it was by the fence, and we had to try again. That time it went right and we arrived early.
I was surprised not to see the jagged triangular headstone in the area. I had thought it was right near the family plots in that area. Since there was a little extra time, I wandered off to find it. That thing creeped me out so bad as a kid, but it morbidly intrigued me too. It's just so unique. And then it's also creepy to me because from a distance, the only thing you can see written on it is the surname going vertically down the stone. The name is unusual and it's similar to the name of an aunt (just minus one letter), which only adds to the unsettling nature of it. I've tried to put it in every cemetery picture I've drawn (albeit I don't put the name).
I finally found it, over near where some family friends are buried. It still creeps me out, but it was daylight and didn't seem so creepy then. I walked right up to it. It's pretty big in person; it was about as tall as I am. Of course, I'm pretty short (five feet even), but that's still pretty big for a tombstone. I wonder why they used such a jagged piece of rock like that for the marker. That would make for an interesting story, I imagine. It's sad too; the person buried there was only 19.
I walked back and they still hadn't started yet; they were waiting for the hearse. When it finally got there, we did a little graveside service and tried to sing some family hymns, but we didn't know all the words, especially on the final one we tried. I'm glad we made it to the cemetery to participate in that final part of the service. It was after we left that the problems started.
We needed to drop my niece off at a friend's house where she'd arranged to spend the night. My sister detoured a bit to look at my dad's birth house (yeah, he wasn't born in a hospital) and the old shop where he used to work with his grandfather. Along the drive up, I had remembered that I wanted to check Marshalls for the rare Adagio Dazzle doll, as she's been turning up in a lot of them lately. The only Marshalls here are up in that approximate area, and my sister agreed we could try one on the way back down.
After some trouble with rush hour traffic, we finally got to the place and I went in to look around. I was really impressed with the store; it looks really upscale, even though it's a discount place. I wish Mom could see it; I think she'd love it as much as I do now. I couldn't find the doll, but I did find the big Twilight Sparkle figure. I'd just been thinking about her and that she wasn't in stores any more. I had wanted the original unicorn one and had not paid attention to the winged version, but I finally knew I'd never get the unicorn one since she's rare and expensive now and I was willing to get the winged one. When I saw her at Marshalls for $10, I figured I'd better snap her up.
We headed back to where we'd left our car at the church. We got off the freeway too early and started wandering around. Even though I saw street signs that said we were not in the right town, my sister didn't believe it. We wandered around some more as it got dark and ended up in yet another wrong town. Finally we all saw a sign proclaiming the name of the place and my sister believed we were lost. She didn't know how to work the Google Maps app, but the directions were still programmed into it from that morning as to how to get to the church. So she brought that up, followed them, and finally we were able to get back to the car.
I suppose I really should have just said for us to go home then, since we'd been out eight-nine hours at that point. But since we hardly ever get out that far and there were sales I needed to see about right then or they'd be kerplunk, I could hardly bear the thought of just going home then. I really tried to hurry regardless, but it didn't work out that way.
We also tried finding some stuff Mom wanted for Christmas presents, but we didn't have any luck finding stuff for the adults. We did get the stuff she wanted for the kids, so that was good.
I checked T.J. Maxx and Ross for the doll and still didn't find her, so then it was on to Toys R Us. They had a 30% off sale on all Pony stuff, and I thought I'd planned I'd get the archery Applejack and that would be that, but when I actually got in there and everything was on sale, suddenly it wasn't an easy decision. I debated for ages over several things I'd wanted, couldn't decide, and then we had to rush to the mall to see about the Build-a-Bear discounts. I had discounts adding up to $15 off, plus there was a 2 for $35 sale on. Both of my discounts worked with that, which meant I could get two for $20! Naturally I couldn't pass that up. I'd planned to get Zecora and Teegan (the purple cat/tiger) if I could get two, so that was what I did. It was fun and the girls were so friendly and sweet and fun. And since Teegan comes with a tank top (as well as sewn-on underwear), I found some cheap swim trunks for her to wear at least for now. Maybe later I'll have money to get her a nice outfit, but right then I just wanted to clothe her good enough and save more money for other things. But it took a lot longer to get two than I'd planned on; it was about thirty-forty minutes later when I got back to Toys R Us.
During the interim I thought I'd decided what to get at Toys R Us, the two-pack with Twilight and Flash. But every single copy Toys R Us had featured a stray glitter problem. It was shedding off of Twilight's skirt and getting everywhere. That didn't seem appealing at all, so I wondered if I'd rather get the characters separately and buy a Twilight without that skirt. I turned my attention more fully to the two-pack I'd tried to get in the summer, with Sonata and Aria from the second movie. There were only two copies of those, they're phasing out, and with the sale they were only $13.99. That was definitely the best deal. (Well, actually, the best deal was Photo Finish and her two band members, but I don't really know those characters other than Photo Finish herself. They don't even have any dialogue.) So I preferred Sonata and Aria. I still debated for a moment, feeling guilty as always to get antagonists, but I knew I really wanted them. They bicker like sisters, which makes me have a certain fondness for them. Plus, I knew I probably wouldn't be able to find the set before long. And I have a chance to get the Adagio doll from someone on the forum, so I wanted to have the other girls in the band right ready in case I could. It would be too sad not to have the whole group.
(Also, I have plans for a story where Sunset finds them post-movie and tries to extend friendship to them. One thing I did like in the book version of the second movie was that she felt some pity for them. I can definitely picture that, since Sunset had some similar goals of wanting to be popular/well-liked.)
With that taken care of at last, I wanted to just try one more Wal-Mart looking for Sunset Shimmer. (We'd tried one around the time we got the stuff for Mom.) That was a fizzle, of course. We had planned to try one more store looking for DVDs for the adults, but it was so late by then and I was exhausted and panicking, knowing Mom would be so upset and worried that it was taking so long. So we went home, arriving over twelve hours after leaving home. GAH. Mom didn't like the long time we'd been gone one bit, but she did like seeing what I'd brought back and was happy I'd been able to get those items, so that made me feel a little better.
I felt awful that I was too exhausted to stay up for long with Ladyamberjo and JP, though. That's the night I chat with them and Ladyamberjo and I have had all kinds of trouble having a conversation the last several weeks. And of course, on the night when Ladyamberjo tried extra hard to be available and awake, I'm so tired I'm falling over in the chair.
With weather reports of storms coming up this week, we decided we needed to look for the other DVDs on Tuesday. That was just two towns over. We left earlier than we do sometimes and spent the latter part of the afternoon checking out the DVDs at K-Mart and ShopKo. I also discovered that K-Mart's two-packs of Twilight and Flash are glitter-free and gorgeous, so I'm back to wanting the two-pack again and not to get the characters separately. I wonder if it would be worth paying full-price for it to get a nice glitter-free one.
I still couldn't find Sunset Shimmer, but I did at last find a good Scootaloo at Wal-Mart! All legs were the same length and her face wasn't shaped weird (yes, those are problems with Funrise sometimes), so I decided I should get her.
Also, I very randomly saw the 12-inch Applebloom at ShopKo. It was frustrating, because from a distance I momentarily thought she was Sunset. Sigh. But it was interesting to see a rare character turn up at ShopKo, of all places. ShopKo doesn't even have any Friendship Games dolls yet! I wonder if seeing her is possibly a good sign. Scootaloo just started showing up last month, and now an Applebloom.... Maybe, possibly, Sunset will still come? I don't hold out much hope of that, though. And I still wish I had taken that person up on her offer to get one for me in the summer. I was worried about shipping costs and I was fully convinced back then that we were just about to get her for fall stock. And then we didn't.
Well, anyway, we had some good luck with the DVDs, and I got a couple of Christmas presents, and it was a pretty nice little outing. We got back in time for me to chat with Crystal.
I also had good luck with one of my survey companies and got an Amazon gift card again already! I got a couple more Christmas presents with it, as well some more Get Smart for myself. Hopefully it will arrive in time for me to send one of the presents on and have it arrive before Christmas....
I also discovered that I need to watch every episode of The Persuaders!, ohmygoshsquee. It's wonderful! I plan to buy the DVD set with my next gift card. Meantime, I found it on YouTube and watched an episode in the morning. The friendship between the main characters is glorious, and it's even more awesome because they start out hating each other, and they go from that to really caring about each other and being really close friends. It's such a shame it only ran one season. It should satisfy my Roger Moore withdrawal nicely. I love his character, and the friendship with Tony Curtis's character, and I won't be surprised if I want to write fanfic somewhere down the line. As much as I love Simon Templar, he's a loner, and it's harder for me to relate to writing for loners if they don't have one good friend or family member to interact with. And if they're the only steady character in the cast. Then they work better in crossover fics. I really love to write about friendships. (Plus, I still worry about the fact that I prefer the TV show Simon while the few fanficcers prefer the book Simon. I'm still going to write that one fic with Simon appearing to be dead and Inspector Teal reacting to it, though. Then it flashes back to tell what led up to it, comes back to the present, and of course Simon will be alright when the drug wears off.)
I also became obsessed with the song Little Talks by Of Monsters and Men. It's absolutely haunting and gorgeous. I'm thrilled Ladyamberjo found that song and shared it with me! I am totally going to want to write a fic based around it at some point, although right now I'm unsure what characters such a fic would involve. I'd also like to sing it, but I don't know how well it would go over if I tried recording me singing it, since it really does need to be a duet.
