Obsessed

I am not normally the kind of girl who hears that something is the bag/skirt/accessory/makeup of the moment and then has to rush out and buy it. Sure, I like to look all up-to-date and super-cute, but that doesn't mean that I'm shopping every day.

But, when I heard that there was a limited edition Chanel nail polish that was selling out worldwide, and was going for around $100 USD on eBay, I thought to myself "Alice, you must have this nail polish."

The colour? Black satin. Ooh, doesn't it just sound pretty?

I thought that I should give myself a bit of a treat, what with the breaking in and the nightmare of dealing with insurance, so I thought, what the hey, I'll buy it.

I found it on eBay for an amount that I considered reasonable, although far more than I would normally ever spend on nail polish. I bought it, and due to the super speediness of the seller, it was at my house when I got home from work the next day.

I didn't get a chance to put it on until last night, and my nails do look cute. But it's black nail polish though. It's nice nail polish, obviously, as it's Chanel, but it's still just plain black nail polish.

I thought that this was just what all the fuss was about, until today when I did a bit of a Google for "Chanel Black Satin". The third result? This page, which informs me that

the Black Satin Nail Colour released for the U.S. is a limited edition of Black Satin Exclusively in the USA. It was sold at Saks, Bloomingdales, NM, Nordstrom, etc. It is different than the euro version. The European version is plain black. The U.S. limited edition has a small amount of platinum shimmer, just enough to give it the look of satin, as oppose to a vinyl finish of the straight black. They are similar, but the LE version has a different depth to it, and a slightly softer finish.

D'oh! I have the European version!

And of course, now am I happy with my cute black nails? No. No, I am not.

I want nails that have a small amount of platinum shimmer, just enough to give the look of satin. Do my nails have that? No, they do not. My nails look cute, but they do not look like satin.

What's that you say? A slave to fashion? Why yes, it seems that I am.

Now, off to track down the good kind of Black Satin nail polish.

Painting, finally!

It finally happened, people. I finally got around to getting my place painted. Woo hoo!

Sure, it may be a full eight or so months after I picked the colours, but it's done, and it looks fabulous!

Using a clever lure of pizza, red wine, beer and snacks, I enticed five friends to help me. So last Saturday, Leanne, Alexcia, Sarah, Buni and Heather came over and we painted.

Look how pretty!

Such hard workers! That pretty colour is Sea Urchin 6, in case you were wondering.

Look at them paint their little hearts out.

The kittens were not happy with whole thing, and spent the whole day either hiding in my bedroom or trying to escape the kitchen in order to hide in the bedroom. Buni managed to make friends with them, but other than that brief moment of friendliness they spent the whole day being VERY unhappy. And Beez hissed at poor Alexcia, which didn't help her terror of cats much, I have to say.

I didn't get any photos of the bedroom painting, which was less fun than the living room because it was smaller, hotter and more crowded.

But isn't the purple pretty? That's the Homebase own brand equivalent of the planned Spanish Serenade. Stupid Homebase's paint mixing machine was out of order, but luckily I found a pre-mixed colour that was practically exactly the same. Sweet! It was crappier paint though, and necessitated a second coat.

My plan to reward the girls with pizza didn't go exactly as planned though, because they delivered Heather's supposedly no-cheese vegan pizza was delivered with no mozzarella cheese, but with parmesan. Because that's clearly not "cheese". It took over an hour and about six phone calls to get a replacement. Poor starving Heather. But she kicked some ass and got the money back for it.

But look! Success!

This is the living room before (as it was just after I moved in):

And after (well, before everything was put away, but after painting):

And my bedroom before ( just after the move, again):

And after:

Yay!

So Awesome!

Oh, there's good stuff going on over at the Steve Guttenberg Project!

Lists, lists and more lists!

Inspired by both Heather and the exicited Video-DVD exchange, I've taken a look at imdb.com's 100 greatest films.

A random list based soley on totally subjective user votes? I love it!

How many have I seen? Let's find out. I've bolded the ones I've seen.

1. The Godfather (1972)
2. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
3. The Godfather: Part II (1974)
4. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
5. Casablanca (1942)
6. Shichinin no samurai (1954) [aka. The Seven Samurai]
7. Schindler's List (1993)
8. Buono, il brutto, il cattivo, Il (1966) [aka. The Good, The Bad & The Ugly]
9. Pulp Fiction (1994)
10. Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
11. Star Wars (1977)
12. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
13. Rear Window (1954)
14. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
15. 12 Angry Men (1957)
16. The Usual Suspects (1995)
17. Cidade de Deus (2002) [aka. City of God]
18. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
19. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
20. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
21. Citizen Kane (1941)
22. Psycho (1960)
23. Goodfellas (1990)
24. C'era una volta il West (1968) [aka. Once Upon A Time In The West]
25. Memento (2000)
26. North by Northwest (1959)
27. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
28. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
29. Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, Le (2001) [aka. Amelie]
30. Sunset Blvd. (1950)
31. It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
32. Fight Club (1999)
33. American Beauty (1999)
34. The Matrix (1999)
35. Vertigo (1958)
36. Taxi Driver (1976)
37. Apocalypse Now (1979)
38. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
39. Paths of Glory (1957)
40. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
41. Se7en (1995)
42. Untergang, Der (2004) [aka. Downfall]
43. Léon (1994) [aka. The Professional]
44. Chinatown (1974)
45. The Third Man (1949)
46. American History X (1998)
47. The Pianist (2002)
48. Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi (2001) [aka. Spirited Away]
49. Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
50. Boot, Das (1981)
51. Hotel Rwanda (2004)
52. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
53. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
54. Requiem for a Dream (2000)
55. M (1931)
56. L.A. Confidential (1997)
57. The Maltese Falcon (1941)
58. Alien (1979)
59. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
60. Metropolis (1927)
61. Reservoir Dogs (1992)
62. Rashômon (1950)
63. Double Indemnity (1944)
64. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
65. Sin City (2005)
66. The Shining (1980)
67. Modern Times (1936)
68. Singin' in the Rain (1952)
69. Raging Bull (1980)
70. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
71. Million Dollar Baby (2004)
72. All About Eve (1950)
73. Some Like It Hot (1959)
74. Aliens (1986)
75. Rebecca (1940)
76. The Great Escape (1963)
77. Vita è bella, La (1997) [aka. Life Is Beautiful]
78. Touch of Evil (1958)
79. Amadeus (1984)
80. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
81. The Sting (1973)
82. Batman Begins (2005)
83. Jaws (1975)
84. Strangers on a Train (1951)
85. On the Waterfront (1954)
86. Forrest Gump (1994)
87. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
88. The Incredibles (2004)
89. Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)
90. City Lights (1931)
91. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
92. The Apartment (1960)
93. Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957) [aka. The Seventh Seal]
94. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
95. Braveheart (1995)
96. Nuovo cinema Paradiso (1989) [aka. Cinema Paradiso]
97. Crash (2004/I)
98. Ran (1985)
99. Blade Runner (1982)
100. Donnie Darko (2001)

By my count, I've seen 72 of them. That's not too shabby. I'm surprised by how many recent ones I haven't seen.

Well, not really surprised, since I'm well aware of how few recent movies I've seen. Let's call it disappointed.

This just in: I am a dork

Long ago, I accepted my dorkiness. I understand that I get unreasonably excited about things that so-called "normal" people have virtually no interest in. These things include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Spreadsheets and databases
• Organization of most kinds ...
• ... Especially alphabetizing
• Trivia of all kinds ...
• ... Especially film and TV
• Several TV shows that safely fall into the "geek" category
• Pub quizzes
• Steve Guttenberg films
• The collection of the above films
• Board games
• Bullet pointed lists

I mean, come on. I have more than one blog. That should sum it all up right there.

So it should be of absolutely no surprise to anyone that I am very excited about my newest project: replacing all my videos with DVD's.

Seriously I am excited about this beyond all reason. This is largely space motivated. The shelves that I bought for my living room are full. Each of the little shelves can fit either six videos or eleven DVD's.

People, it's just about the math.

So, naturally, I went a bit crazy on the ebay and the play.com and bought a bunch of super cheap replacements. Luckily, it turns out that most of what I have on video is not worth very much money, so easily replaced.

The next step will clearly be to sell all the videos to some other suckers who have no problem living in the past. Videos. Can you even believe we still have those? They may as well be records run by a prehistoric bird on the Flintstones.

Of course, this will mean that I will have to hold on to my VCR for the sole use of the Steve Guttenberg Collection (which, by the way, has a special shelf all to itself.), because many of those bad boys are on video. But doesn't that just make the project more special?

Why, yes. Yes, I think it does.

World's Best Singer

So, before the upsettingness of the burglary on Wednesday night, I discovered something magical.

People, I have a spectacular singing voice.

Now, I have always made fun of my singing voice. "Oh, I have the voice of an angel!", I will laughingly say. And I will be joking. Because in my head, I always had the following equation all mapped out: Alice + singing = a sound so bad it makes people cry.

This is not to say that I don't belt out the occasional (and by "occasional", I mean "frequent") number in the privacy of my own home, or my own car. Clearly, I do this. But not ever when anyone can hear me.

See, I had a friend who was an excellent singer and she would always wince whenever I tried to sing something that was stuck in my head. That, added to my own singing insecurities, meant that I didn't ever sing in public. Ever.

But last Wednesday, I ended up at a bar that had a karaoke night on. We'd just sat down with our first bottle of wine, when the 15,000 long song list was thrown down at our table.

"Karaoke! As if!", we scoffed.

Then we cracked open the second bottle of wine. And we peeked inside the song list. The two guys at the table beside us noticed us looking and asked if we were going to sing.

"Us? As if!", we scoffed again.

Then we cracked open the third bottle of wine. No one was singing, so the karaoke organizer type guy was going around to all the tables trying to coerce people to sing.

Karaoke organizer type guy (KOTG): You guys should sing. I bet you're great. Come on, it'll be fun!

Us: Thank you, no.

KOTG: What if I give you a song that's really easy to sing?

Us: Hmmm. Like what?

KOTG: Sounds of the Underground by Girls Aloud?

Us: Um, no.

KOTG: Like a Prayer by Madonna?

Us: Oooooh .... what the hell. Okay.

So, he announces us. And the three of us make our way to the microphones and sing Like A Prayer. And rather than the sneery "nice job ... not" type applause that a shoddy karaoke performance can elicit, we got real applause.

When we got back to the table, the guys at the next table were cheering for us. Apparently, we were awesome. And were the world's fastest karaoke converts.

Our next song (because you knew there was going to be a next song, didn't you?) was Your Song by Elton John. Now, rather than the regular version, we ended up singing the version from Moulin Rouge. This was a mistake. A big mistake. One that I confess was my fault. We were shamed, and needed to make a dramatic comeback.

Clearly, the way to do that was Papa Don't Preach by Madonna, which was once again awesome. We were back on top, baby!

By then, we were good friends with the guys at the next table. Our grand finale? A five person strong version of Sweet Child Of Mine by Guns N' Roses, which was quite the dance floor filler.

I now love karaoke. Love it!

And I no longer have to be shamed by my singing voice, which is also nice.