Day: January 3, 2011

Best movies watched in 2010

While the book committee was meeting and deciding about all the best books of 2010, the movie committee spent time agreeing on the Best (and worst) movies seen by Patricia in 2010. Here are their results:

Movie that I totally got more out of as an adult than I did as a teenager:
Some Kind of Wonderful

Movie with great performances by the actors, but overall left me feeling empty:
Up in the Air

Movie that I just loved because everything about it was well done:
An Education

Slow moving, but incredibly enjoyable love story that happens to involve a monarch:
Queen Victoria

Movie that I avoided because the premise annoyed me but which won me over anyway:
The Blind Side

Incredibly funny stop motion animated movie that you must find and see, but not watch after you’ve had surgery because you will laugh so hard your stitches will fall out:
A Town Called Panic

Movie I didn’t get around to seeing for a long time, but enjoyed so much I didn’t want it to end:
Stardust

Movie that never really explained how the main characters were so fabulously wealthy and so I was distracted the entire time:
Also
Movie where John Krasinski perks up every scene he is in:
It’s Complicated

Movie that should be boring but, instead was so incredibly funny and gripping that you should see it.
The Informant!

Best movie that I appeared in:
Raw Faith

Movie that reminded me once again how incredibly dumb it was to cancel Firefly:
Serenity

Movie where Matt leaned over four separate times and reminded me that it was my pick:
Hot Tub Time Machine

Best movie that passes the Bechdel Test:
I’ve Loved You So Long

Best movie I had low expectations for and really enjoyed much more than I though possible:
Date Night

Movie where the DVD extras are almost funnier than the film:
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story

Best movie about family life that you can watch with your church-going grandmother:
Dan in Real Life

Best use of visual effects I’ve ever seen:
Inception

Best movie about Desert Storm without very much war:
Also
Another good movie where John Krasinski perks up his scene:
Jarhead

Movie that was much funnier than I thought it would be, and I thought it would be pretty funny:
Also
Best bit parts ever by Samuel L. Jackson & The Rock:
Also
Best credits that actually try to make an important point to the viewing audience:
Also
The movie with the best new twist on the obligatory drunken celebration scene:
The Other Guys

Clever movie where I learned it is very hard for me to stay awake past 10 pm:
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Best modern teen noir I’ve ever seen:
Brick

Oh my god, so incredibly slow it sucks the life out of the story:
The Bridges of Madison County

Best movie to watch with the boyfriend after we’ve attended four weddings (and no funeral):
Four Weddings and a Funeral

Most uncomfortably juxtaposition of characters:
Happy-go-lucky

Best movie starring “twins” played by one person, thank goodness. For if there were two men that good looking in the world I don’t know what I would do with myself:
The Social Network

Best funny premise that stays funny pretty much the whole movie:
Also
Best movie where Ricky Gervais‘ sad sack character actually worked for me:
The Invention of Lying

Best mini-series I watched all year and perhaps ever:
Also
Best movie to get me to actually read and finish the book on which it is based:
Pride and Prejudice (1995)

Movie with the best script whose message left me a bit uncomfortable, but which I ultimately loved:
Easy A

Movie where my expectations were low, but which I really liked:
The Town

Best movie I could hack and you should see it too:
127 Hours

Best funny movie that apparently was in the theaters for a blip, but many people discovered and appreciated on DVD:
Idiocracy

Best montage:
The Wedding Crashers

Best books read in 2010

It’s the annual “Best Books” Awards.

People, I read a lot of book in 2010. And, looking over the awards, I see that I read a lot of really good books this year. So this post is a bit long. You may want to make yourself a cup of tea and settle in.

The awards committee has met and has recognized the following:

Best book to keep me in bed all New Year’s day despite
the fact it contained torture AND a serial killer:
Heartsick
Chelsea Cain

Best book that connected new dots about a beloved series from my youth:
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Pamela Smith Hill

Best book I couldn’t stop talking about
despite other people’s obvious discomfort:
Columbine
Dave Cullen

Best book about food you will read
in 60 minutes or less:
Food Rules
Michael Pollen

Best book featuring little gems of delightful writing
scattered throughout a vaguely coherent narrative:
A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints
Dito Montel

Best book I read this year about teaching:
The Teaching Gap
Stigler & Hiebert

Best of the Anti-Racism Books I read this year:
Uprooting Racism
Paul Kivel

Best book featuring an author back on top of his game:
Juliet, Naked
Nick Hornby

Best book about teaching Math:
Math: Facing an American Phobia
Marilyn Burns

Best novel written by an essayist:
Downtown Owl
Chuck Klosterman

Best bunch of interconnected short stories:
Olive Kittridge
Elizabeth Strout

Best book that was delightful, moving and interesting
far beyond my expectations (which were fairly high):
The Guernsey Literary Potato Peel Society
Mary Ann Schaffer

Best book by Audrey Niffennegger that kept me from spring chores:
Her Fearful Symmetry
Audrey Niffengengger

Best book that draws you in, sets you up and
keeps you reading despite how hard it is:
Every Last One
Anna Quindlan

Best unexpectedly interesting scholarly study of my people:
Radical Homemakers
Shannon Hayes

Best examination of one family’s life in the Midwest:
Also
Best description of the ghosts among us:
Sing them home
Stephanie Kallos

Best beginning wild food plant guide:
Edible Wild Plants
John Kallas

Best gardening book to get me motivated in the middle of summer:
One Magic Square
Lolo Houbein

Best large collection of poems it took me probably a year to read:
Essential Pleasures
Robert Pinskey, ed.

Best non-fiction book for anyone to read:
Also
Best book about a subject I care nothing about:
The Blind Side
Michael Lewis

Worst fantasy novel I’ve ever read that clearly
needed a map, among other things:
River Kings Road
Liane Merciel

Best nonfiction examination of matrimony and its place and purpose:
Committed
Elizabeth Gilbert

Best nonfiction book I would have read out loud in its entirety
to Matt if I had my druthers:
Also
Best book by my writer boyfriend:
Also
Best book I probably brought up in conversation
with the largest number of people:
Manhood for Amateurs
Michael Chabon

Book that I wanted to like because I really loved the other two I’ve read by her, but solved the mystery very early on, alas:
Faithful Place
Tana French

Book that pointed me toward the author who will perhaps
fill the gaping hole left when Olivia Goldsmith died:
This Charming Man
Marian Keyes

Absolutely drenched in sugar and incredibly annoying book
that I’m sorry Fannie Flagg ever wrote:
Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven
Fannie Flagg

Best premise of the year:
Also
The book that some other people I know
need to read already, so we can discuss it:
One Day
David Nicholls

Best tiny book about downsizing:
Put Your Life on a Diet
Gregory Johnson

Best premise for a futuristic apocalypse book, even if
the expressions of the Pagan lead character did get annoying:
Dies the Fire
SM Stirling

Best novel about: prodigies, first (or seventeenth) love
and also math, that I have ever read:
Also
Best book in general that I think you should read. Really! No, I mean you. Even if you don’t like math or “get it.” You should read it:
An Abundance of Katherines
John Green

Best book of poetry by a poet I know:
Slim Margins
Alison Apotheker

Best book for getting me back on the tiny house bandwagon:
Tiny, Tiny Houses
Lester Walker

Best book highlighting a healthful practice you
could easily implement in your daily life:
Perfect Breathing
Al Lee & Don Campbell

Most awesome book that is totally not from our
“overprotective about the children” times:
Housebuilding for Children
Lester Walker

Book that I just did not like even though I really did hold out until the end with a small flame of hope that was extinguished on the last page:
The Lonely Polygamist
Brady Udell

Best reminder of my love for J.D. Salinger:
Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenter
J.D. Salinger

Best book by Audrey Nifflenegger that kept
me away from autumn chores:
The Time Traveler’s Wife
Audrey Nifflenegger

Best library book club book I read:
Also
First novel about slavery and reconstruction I’ve read in ages and why are there not more published these days?:
Jubilee
Margert Walker

The Oh. My. God. You must read this book, seriously!
It is hard and oh so good, I’m not kidding award:
The Help
Kathryn Stockett

Best end-to-a-series and book I read in one day this year:
Moonlight Mile
Dennis Lehane

Best book to get me started on a very smart,
modern pen-pal series set in Australia:
Feeling Sorry for Celia
Jaclyn Moriarty

Absolutely worst book I’ve read in a decade that I feel like spitting
on the ground whenever I think about it:
Nothing
Janne Teller

Best cooking book I read this year by
two authors with difficult to spell last names:
The Lost Art of Real Cooking
Abala & Natziger

Best book with a character I could not help
but grow overly attached to:
Also
Best third book in a four-book series:
The Murder of Bindy Mackenzie
Jaclyn Moriarty

Best fourteen year old protagonist:
Also
Best dialogue I’ve read in years:
True Grit
Charles Portis

Best book of the 10 books I read for the Mock-Printz Workshop :
Finnikin of the Rock
Melena Marchetta

Best book I had low expectations for but was pleasantly
surprised as to how much I enjoyed it:
Prince of Thieves
Chuck Hogan

Best non-fiction historical book I read that was written for Young Adults, but that adults would also enjoy:
They Called Themselves the KKK
Susan Campbell Bortoletti

Best practical gardening guide I read:
The Resilient Gardener
Carol Deppe

I read 97 books this year. Next year, if all goes according to plan, this list will be shorter because one of my goals is to read fewer books. I’m aiming for about 70 or so.

Resolution 2011

My resolutions for 2011 are in two realms: the food realm and the physical realm.

In the food realm, I want to prepare vegetables at least four times per week. I need a variety of vegetables to keep myself healthy and, due to the lack of a staff, need to prepare them myself. So, each week I shop, I will purchase four different kinds of vegetables in proper quantities (see below) and get them ready to eat throughout the week. I’ve actually been doing this since November and it is going pretty well, though I think four times to week doesn’t happen as often as I think it does.

In addition, I will strive to cook food in quantities that I can eat before it turns and must be thrown out. To do this, I have made a few lists and posted them on the fridge. The first list is “Things to Prepare” where I write down what I have bought that needs to be made into something before it goes bad. I also note the date I bought it, which will spur me into a frenzy of preparation when too much time has passed. I also have a list called “Things to Eat” where I write down what there is to eat and cross it out as I finish it. This will help me keep my eye on when I have forgotten the last bit of Lima beans in the refrigerator. I can then dig them out and eat them before I have to throw it out.

I have a notebook to keep track of what I have prepared this week. This will let me see my progress, track the food I throw out and be able to determine how many pounds of beans I eat in one year. I will also mark my calendar with an F when I do something food related and a V when I cook a vegetable.

In the physical realm, I will do more push ups this year. I enjoy a good push up or two (or ten) and I would like to increase the number of push ups to at least my age, if not more. I’ll start with the number I can currently easily do and add one whenever I feel like can hack it. The time to do them will be before I stretch after doing my jog/walk each morning and I will keep track on my trusty calendar.