Confessions of a Bookworm (Disguised as TV Talk)

Hey, it’s July!  My goodness, that snuck up on me.  I like July; it is full of birthdays!  (oh, no one’s in particular)  ;-)  And just like my hair used to turn green every summer because of the chlorine in our pool, Sunshine’s paws now have these lovely emerald highlights from racing happily through the grass every day.

Let’s start with the requisite So You Think You Can Dance talk:  OK, first of all: OUTRAGEOUS that Chelsea was kicked off!  Boo!  I had her all picked out for the Top Ten!  I wanted to see her dance with Will!  SIGH.

But the funny thing is, all those dances I guessed for last week that were wrong?  Fast-forward one week and fully half of them are right on.  Crazy!  Spoilers suggest that all the couples are doing two dances each (which does improve my odds) (and HUZZAH!  MORE dancing, less shrieking and pontificating!): and, just like on my list, Katee/Joshua have swing, Will/Jessica have jazz, Gev/Courtney have hip-hop, and Matt/Kourtni have mambo.  Whee! 

And I have to say, I love Twitch even more than I did before, ever since Kherington revealed that his glasses…his big, goofy, lovable-dork glasses…are FAKE!  There’s no glass in them!  They’re just frames!  AAAH ADORABLE!

First of all (big surprise), I totally think boys in glasses are the cutest (Doctor Who, anyone?).  :-)  And secondly, I can identify with this, because…I totally did the same thing!  Admittedly, when I did it, I was nine.  But I might still be doing the same thing today if I hadn’t ended up needing the real ones!

Yeah, this was back in fifth grade — the good half of fifth grade, when we were still in Paraguay, before we moved to traumatizing Miami with all its traumatizingly mean fifth graders (what? totally over it!).  ;-)  In Paraguay my eleven classmates at the American Christian Academy were all sweet and equally out of touch with American pop culture and completely used to my brand of weird by fifth grade.  So when I showed up at school wearing empty glasses frames (NO IDEA where I got those!), they were like, OK, no problem, let’s go play kickball.

What prompted this spectacular fashion choice?  (get it?  spectacular…spectacles…ok, I’ll stop now.)  Well, that’s unclear.  I think I just decided I looked better in glasses.  Hopefully that’s actually true, since I’m stuck with them now!  :-)  (Oh, I’ve tried; contacts don’t work in my eyes.  But that’s OK…they were so much less convenient than my happy glasses.)

Yes, so I abandoned the fake glasses before I got to Miami (although I’m sure my popularity there would have SKYROCKETED  if I’d whipped those out).  ;-)  And then a couple of years later I came home from traumatizing seventh grade and told Mom I couldn’t see the blackboard.  She told me to sit closer to the front of the room.  So I copied my friend’s notes for a few weeks, until Mom finally gave in and took me to an eye doctor, who said, yup, go figure, your nerdy bookworm daughter needs that key nerdy bookworm accessory.  And the best part about this?  Mom STILL feels guilty about it!  Ahaha!  I don’t think I’ve milked that guilt enough, do you?  Hey, Mom, have I mentioned I would love a Wii for my birthday?  😉

Hee hee hee.  Anyway, I think everyone should be able to wear glasses as a fashion accessory if they want to.  After all, Tina Fey has totally made them sexy now.  Maybe Twitch is like the vanguard of a hot new fashion trend!  Woo hoo!

Speaking of Doctor Who (I was! go back and look!), I am finally all caught up on the season that’s airing over here right now.  Apparently next season it’s being handed over to a fellow named Steven Moffat, who, it turns out, is a big honking genius, as he happens to be the writer of my two favorite ever Doctor Who episodes: the one where the Doctor meets Madame de Pompadour (which I blogged about ages ago) (p.s. the internet says the actor actually dated the Madame de Pompadour actress for a while!  scoop!) and one called "Blink".  If you only ever see one episode of Doctor Who, it should be "Blink."  You hardly need to know anything about the show to watch it, and it is BRILLIANT.

I mention this because in Moffat’s most recent episodes he created the most incredible wonderful thing.  The Doctor travels to the 51st century, to a planet called The Library.  Yes.  The entire PLANET is a LIBRARY.  He says it contains every book that was ever written in human history, stored in beautiful buildings linked together all across the planet. 

You want to know how crazy authors are?  When I heard that line, I actually thought to myself: "Oh wow!  So MY books must be there!"  ;-)  Well, hey, I bet I’m not the only author who had that reaction.  And I did manage to refrain from pausing every time the camera passed a bookshelf just to see if I could spot any titles.  I did not do this!  🙂

But I did think this planet sounded like a pretty good template for heaven.  Don’t you?  If I had eternity to read everything…wow.  (And they’re all real books, too!  Real paper and pretty covers and smell-of-books books!)

Right now I’m reading Mark Twain’s autobiography, since we are so going to see his house like next week, according to my version of our plans, quick-quick before it has to close.  So, more on that later!

By the way, I know I talk about TV more than I talk about books, so maybe you’re like, pfft, all Tui really wants is a planet full of Buffy DVDs (oooooooo…).  But the truth is I just love talking about stories and characters, whatever form they come in (dude, "Kherington Payne" and "Twitch Boss" are definitely characters), and I figure there’s a greater chance of you all having seen the same TV show as me than there is of us having read the same book recently. 

Also, I can’t be rude about books in case I ever meet the authors (well, you know, unless the authors are long dead and in no danger of suffering from my low-brow criticism).  ;-)  Whereas I feel fairly safe saying anything I like about Nigel (such as, for instance, SHUT UP NIGEL), whom I would be very surprised to ever meet. 

But rah-rah books!  And isn’t it wonderful that it’s summer, and you have time to read instead of being swamped with homework?  Well, I hope you do.  I wish you all hammocks and lemonade and sleepy puppies…

Sunshine - May08 - 9

Quote of the Day:  “I’m a time traveler.  I point and laugh at archaeologists!” – Doctor Who