I'm the Oscar champ!

I handily beat Rian in this year's Oscar race. I got 18 correct to his 13. I ended up changing a couple of my "blogged" picks when filling out my official ballot. Here are the ones I picked correctly:

Best Picture--"Slumdog Millionaire"
Best Actor--Sean Penn "Milk"
Best Actress--Kate Winslet "The Reader"
Supporting Actor--Heath Ledgeer "The Dark Knight"
Supporting Actress--Penelope Cruz "Vicky Cristina Barcelona"
Director--Danny Boyle "Slumdog Millionaire"
Animated Feature--"Wall-E"
Best Score--"Slumdog Millionaire"
Film Editing--"Slumdog Millionaire"
Sound Editing--"The Dark Knight"
Visual Effects--"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"
Documentary Feature--"Man on Wire"
Cinematography--"Slumdog Millionaire"
Costume Design--"The Duchess"
Art Direction--"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"
Short Film Animated--"La Maison En Petits Cubes" **ok, so that was a total guess*
Adapted Screenplay--"Slumdog Millionaire"
Original Screenplay--"Milk"

Ok, so there it is. I did great this year! I had a pretty "educated" guess on most of the categories and it paid off. Although, I did find it funny that the winner for sound editing wasn't the winner for sound mixing. From what I understand, those kind of go hand in hand. "Slumdog Millionaire" took home every Oscar it was nominated for except sound editing...wonder how that guy's feeling??

I really enjoyed this year's Oscar format for the most part. I liked the different sets and how they seemed to give the awards out in a somewhat orderly fashion (screenplay, costume, makeup, etc). Also, the way they presented the screenplays was cool! It was fun to see the typed words on the screen as the actors followed the directions and lines. The past winners coming out and saying a little piece about each nominee made it feel more personal. It's easy to forget that these actors are people too. I guess the only thing I would change is to bring back the performance of the nominated songs. I had read a couple weeks ago that Peter Gabriel wasn't going to perform his song because he was upset about the editing down of the 3 nominated songs into one medley. I don't blame him! Why did we need the other singing dancing numbers when the nominated songs were just all blobbed in together? There were only 3 songs! I can see how that would be upsetting to the artist if you are expecting him to smile and say "sure, I'll smash my Oscar nominated song into 60 seconds." So, come on Academy, I want the songs performed in full next year!

I guess that's about it for this year's Oscars. Oh, wait, I'd better give my opinion on best/worst dressed...

Best Dressed--This year, I was a big fan of the white/beaded dresses. Penelope Cruz, Jennifer Aniston and Anne Hathaway's were my favorites. Inside joke with my friend Amber, "it's really sparkly!" Sean Penn took home my award for best dressed man. Loved the black on black.

Worst Dressed--I did not like Amy Adams' red dress and huge necklace nor did I like Beyonce's black and gold atrocity. So, it was a tie. For men, I don't really have one. Mickey Rourke definitely went outside of the box but I liked his look. What I don't like are the basic, boring black bow-tie tuxes. And, there seemed to be a fair share of them this year...

Oscars, Oscars, Oscars!!!!

It's Oscar time again and I wanted to officially post my picks. Rian and I did a great job this year in seeing the nominated films. We had a ton of them seen before the Golden Globes so that gave us a good head start for the Oscars. Other than the documentaries, short films and foreign language films, we saw everything except "Australia", "Happy-Go-Lucky" and "Defiance." We had the opportunity to see "Defiance" on Thursday but I hurt my back on Wed night and have been laid up ever since. I am writing this while lying on the couch with the laptop in my lap. I tell you what, you never really realize how much your back does until you hurt it. I have hardly been able to move for 3 days. It's really getting annoying since 800mg of Ibuprofen and a low-dose steroid has yet to cause me a moment of relief. And, we are scheduled on a flight out of Buffalo at 8:25am on Mon heading to Grand Cayman. I am NOT looking forward to that flight. I took a short car ride today and feel like I've taken 2 steps back. Oh well, I will suffer through the plane ride in order to begin my 5 weeks in Cayman. I suppose the diving, however, will have to be postponed until I'm feeling better. Anyway, I digress. Here are my picks for this year's Oscars:

Best Picture--
"Slumdog Millionaire" will take this one. I really enjoyed all of the nominated movies but this one will win. It is the golden child of this year's award season and the Oscar will be it's final prize.

Best Actor--
Sean Penn for "Milk" He did an amazing job portraying Harvey Milk and it was a movie with a powerful mesage. The Oscar people love those movies. Of course, they love a good comeback as well so I really won't be surprised if Mickey Rourke walks away with the award. But, my pick goes to Sean Penn.

Best Actress--
This one is a toughy for me to pick a clear winner. So, for the sake of who I think will win, I'm going with Meryl Streep for "Doubt." However, I'm not sure she deserves the award in my opinion. I honestly think that all of the nominees were standouts in their own way but I would like to see Kate Winslet take home the Oscar.

Supporting Actor--
Heath Ledger will take this one, hands down. Once again, I feel all the actors in this category gave enjoyable performances (although, Robert Downey Jr for "Tropic Thunder"??? Seems like a stray from the usual "Oscar movies"). Michael Shannon in "Revolutionary Road" almost made the movie but the Oscar will go to Heath Ledger.

Supporting Actress--
All good performances but I'm going to vote here for who I THINK should win. Taraji P. Henson absolutely deserves the Oscar in my opinion. I will say, however, I have absolutely no idea if she will indeed take home the award.

Animated Film--
"Wall-E"

Best Director--
"Slumdog Millionaire" As I said before, this is the golden child this year and should win this award easily.

Adapted Screenplay--
"Slumdog Millionaire" You can't have a movie with as much buzz as this if it didn't have a great screenplay to begin with.

Original Screenplay--
"Milk" I had tears in my eyes more than once during this film and tears running down my face at the end. I feel that it deserves the Oscar. The writer/s on this film did an incredible job telling the story of Harvey Milk.


The next several categories I really don't know much about what they are looking for but Rian and I still make our picks...just for the competition. So, I really can't claim much expertise in these categories:

Art Direction--
"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"

Cinematography--
"Slumdog Millionaire"

Costume Design--
"The Duchess"

Film Editing--
"Slumdog Millionaire"

Makeup--
"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"

Original Score--
"Slumdog Millionaire"

Original Song--
I only know that it will be one of the 2 nominated for "Slumdog Millionaire." I know, I know, that is a cop out but I need to hear them before I make an educated guess and right now, I can't remember either one.

Sound Editing--
"The Dark Knight" From what I read on Wikipedia and understand about this category, it's the selection and assemblage of the sound recordings in preparation of the final sound mixing. So, I would assume "The Dark Knight" will take this one due to the difficulty of all the action sequences. But, that's a total guess.

Sound Mixing--
"The Dark Knight" This is the mixing of speech, ambience, sound effects and music so I feel this one will win this award as well if it's the final product of Sound Editing. Again, a total guess.

Visual Effects--
"The Dark Knight"

Well, that's it for me. I'm not making any predictions for Documentaries, Short Films or Foreign Language Film since I have not seen them. Any picks I make in these categories would be blind. And, that's not even worth it.

So, tomorrow is the big day! I need to pack for our trip as carefully as I can as to not irritate my back any further and then will send Rian off to the kennel with the dogs while I settle in and watch the Red Carpet arrivals with my friend, Gina. 8:30pm and it will be "Ladies and Gentleman, please take your seats. The show is ready to begin." Yay!

Product plug

I'm a bit of a gadget girl so when my sister told me about the Amazon Kindle she saw on Oprah, I had to check it out. I was a little skeptical about an electronic book (since I LOVE to buy actual books at the bookstore) but was very intrigued by the convenience of having so many books on one device. That evening, I went to work and found out one of the Neonatologists had one with him. Long story short, I thought it looked awesome! So, I ordered myself one "from Santa" and got it beginning of Dec. I immediately loaded it up with books and have never looked back. It is very cool and never again will I travel to far away places with 15 lbs of books in my suitcase. Here I am enjoying my Kindle on Orient Beach in St Martin...



The clarity is incredible and there are 5 font sizes so you can have the type just the way you want it. It isn't backlit however, so reading at night still requires a book light. There are a ton of books available at the Amazon Kindle store and so far I've not found one that I wanted that wasn't available on my Kindle. It works wirelessly, but like a cell phone signal so you don't have to be near wifi. You add the books on the website and *poof* it sends it to your Kindle. You can also subscribe to newspapers, magazines, and blogs. The only thing I need to figure out is how to add them when I'm out of wireless range (ie. out of the country). It comes with a USB cord but instead of a plug and play feature, you need to download the book to your computer and transfer it to the Kindle. My computer wasn't cooperating in St Martin so I will have to figure that out before we take our next trip. However, the Kindle holds numerous books so I can put them on before we go and not run the risk of finishing them all. I just find that sometimes I'm really enjoying a particular author and want to add more books from him/her. I'm sure I will figure it out once I sit down and read the instruction book. Once you purchase a book on your Amazon account, you always have it. When you finish it on the Kindle, you transfer it back to your account and there is room on the Kindle to add another book. The battery life is extremely long so I haven't had any problems with that running out. One downfall is obviously it's an electronic device so you can't use it on take-off or landing on your flight. But, that's a small price to pay when I can travel with one small device and have several books at my fingertips...I'm hooked!

St Martin

For the second year in a row, we've taken a trip to St Martin with our good friends, Brian & Amber. And, for the second year in a row, we had a great time. Lots of sun and sand and alcoholic beverages. We decided to try a new resort this year so we stayed at L'Hoste Hotel on Orient Beach. Orient Beach is on the French side of the island so feels even more "international" than the Dutch side (which is where Rian and I stayed on our first trip to the island in 2005). Orient Beach is very interesting...you sometimes see things that you later wish you hadn't, considering the nudist resort at one end of the beach. The beach is very fun and active during the day, filled with people. About 5pm, most everything shuts down. And, I mean shuts down. The bars on the beach close and board up. They put the chairs away and we even got told one night (at 5pm) that we needed to get off the chairs so they could put them away. It is evident that this beach is more for the day people and the nightlife happens elsewhere. One funny thing we found was that pretty much every person walking out of the little grocery store was carrying a baguette. The French love their baguettes! No matter what time of day, people were buying baguettes.

There is a small beach and bar at the end of the runway at the airport. We went for a couple beers while awaiting Brian and Amber's flight. This is definitely a cool spot to sit and watch the planes come in. They (literally) land right over top of you!





My favorite beach on St Martin is Baie Rouge. It's pretty secluded so not too many people but there are chairs/umbrellas to rent as well as Chez Raymond, a little beachside grill that has the best shrimp kebabs and beans and rice (oh, and delicious grilled plantains!) on the island.




We celebrated Rian's 32nd birthday in Marigot at the marina. We went to Le France restaurant and had a delicious meal and good wine. Rian said "just what I wanted to do, get all dressed up and go have an expensive dinner on MY day." Well, sorry, I guess sitting in the basement playing x-box all day wasn't an option! ha ha But, he did get to have a piece of apple pie so all was not lost.

We all took a cab into Philipsburg one day and "people-watched" while enjoying drinks and lunch at the Blue Bitch Cafe. There were 4 cruise ships in that day so the people watching was great. Went to Ballerina Jewelers to see our friend Deepak (whom we like to visit each trip) and I got a beautiful new watch. Might have been the highlight of the trip for me!



Rian is like a big kid when we're at the beach and enjoys jumping around in the waves. He says it's good exercise but I like to think it's also just "fun." Here he is at Orient Beach...



All in all, it was another fun trip to St Martin. We got plenty of sun and beach time and it was nice to get away from the Buffalo weather...