Lack of pop culture consumption ...

So this seems like a good place to insert house hunting updates. I figure my Weakly Review is a total skimmer anyway, unless some bold or hyperlink attracks attention. So why not include the deets here.

In other news:

G'DAMN FOOD


Root Vegetable Curry: There is nothing really special about this. A few of my favorite vegetables, plopped into a makeshift curry gravy that is the color of a trail in April, and served over couscous. I won't not make it again, but if I do, it will be accidental and just because I am throwing root veggies into a curry gravy.



Pear-Berry Clafouti: This was yum. A layer of pear, mixed with raspberries, with batter filling in the cracks. Likey loo. I forgot to add an essential ingredient (butter), and it still turned out fine. Awesome.



Shakshuka: This is poached eggs in a spicy tomato sauce, AKA "Breakfast For Dinner" and a classic Israeli breakfast, according to the cooking mag, Saveur. Easy peasy and yum. I totally burned the pita bread I was warming.

BOOKS
New Moon (The Twilight Saga, Book 2) by Stephenie Meyer: Phase two of Stephenie Meyer’s beloved vampire series begins on our self-loathing heroine Bella Swan’s 18th birthday. In New Moon, the gothess is struggling with a Matthew McConaughey-ism: She will keep getting older, while her boyfriend stays the same age

Full review here. Summary: It still sucks, just not as hard.

MOVIES
Last House on the Left (2009): Rookie error. I should know better than to begin watching a movie like this at 5 a.m. on a Saturday morning. I have a barely detectable level of self control, and I was frustrated with my own lack of pop culture consumption this past week.

This film starts like all scary movies start: two deputies are transporting a criminal to a prison. They are T-boned by a pickup truck, things get wonky, and the criminal escapes. Cut to the upper middle class family with shiny hair getting ready for a week of vacation at their cabin in the woods, a resort-like edifice 6 miles from the next resort-like edifice. Their daughter, a former pot smoker turned swimmer with Olympic aspirations, goes into town to hang out with her summer friend and crosses paths with the fugitive and the people who T-boned him to freedom.

This movie is pretty terrifying, filled with all sorts of "Oh, shit. I hope that never happens to me" moments. But it is also over the top in a way that made me really uncomfortable. Case in point: I have never seen such a graphic rape scene in my life. I actually started crying. It was just too, too much -- it's seriously like seven minutes long and filmed from many angles with lots of detail.

This is not a spoiler, but the last scene in the film is so ridiculous that it actually nullifies anything that happens before it. It's like telling a bad three guys walk into a bar joke with a punchline about aliens and unicorns. So: Scary, yes. It's terrifying. Good? No.

TV-ISH
America's Next Top Model: Nicole is going to win, obvs. But if Laura wins, I'm going to cry three times as hard as I normally do, and probably send her a homemade piece of fan fiction. She's just so damn likable.

THE GREAT HOUSING PROJECT OF 2009
I looked at three places this week. The first was an adorable bungalow with a certain hippie accoutrement that really appealed to me. It also had a fantastic attic filled with places the 7-year-old me that is trapped in this ridiculous body would like as fort space. That's where I would lay blankets, grab a camping flashlight, and hang a bunch of posters of Corey Feldman. Unfortunately, it is just too small.

House number two was pretty standard, and pretty gigantic. The nagging annoyance: Sharing a driveway with one's neighbor. Okay, fine, at least it has a driveway, which obviously means parking, which is more than some homes have. But I just think it would feel a little bit like have rabbit ears made of tinfoil, and using pliers to change the channel.

The gates of heaven opened up, and there was this amazing house. The kind of house where you wear high heels with your sweatpants, and eat the cheese off a plate rather than just gnawing at the hunk. The place was swarming with fancy-schmancy blue hair couples who saw the price plus the neighborhood and went "Well, who do I make the check out to, pray tell?" The Realtor's opening monologue included information on how, for just $50,000 in repairs, this place could be a really good place to live. The upstairs: Mint. The main level: Awesome. The kitchen was awful. It looked like a good place to make microwave popcorn. You know, the really good stuff with extra butter.

I cried the whole way home. Such a great place for someone who knows which direction to turn a screwdriver.