Little Mermaid Give-Away

I'm so excited - this is the greatest give-away ever! Okay... maybe not ever... but I am SO excited about it.

When I heard that Disney was making a prequel to The Little Mermaid, I was ecstatic. Here's the review as written by Erica of 5 Minutes for Mom:

Jodi Benson as Ariel and Samuel E. Wright as Sebastian, reprise their famous roles and put on an incredible show as they help to tell the story of a time when music was banned from the underwater kingdom of Atlantica. We watch as Ariel, torn between family duty and her love of music, makes a difficult choice in hopes of restoring music, friendship and love to the kingdom.

Since a Disney movie isn’t complete without a villain, Sally Field joins the stellar cast as the voice of Marina Del Rey, the evil governess for King Triton’s daughters.

I enjoyed watching the beginning portions of the movie, where we get to see Ariel, already a daddy’s girl, as a young tot. As a mom, I was also touched while watching Ariel’s mother as she lovingly sang to her daughters.

The animation is definitely up there with the original film. The musical numbers are also fun, but don’t compare to those we instantly fell in love with in the original Disney classic. For a straight to DVD movie, however, The Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Beginning is superb.

In stores, the movie retails for $29.99, and I do feel it is worth every cent.

I've entered the contest, and I hope I win, but if I don't, I'll definitely go buy the DVD myself.

Turbo

My "About Me" mentions my spastic miniature dachshund, and just in case there was any confusion about him... I thought I would post some pictures so you could get to know him a little bit.

He loves sleeping in our clothing... sometimes he even burrows down into our laundry basket.

As much as he loves sleeping in our clothing, it's only a substitute for our laps. I really think that this dog wants nothing more in life than to be cuddled up on Zach and my laps, and if he can't be on top of us, then he settles for cuddling up next to us.


I realize he doesn't look especially long or dachshund-ey in any of these pictures so far, but really... he's a hot dog.One afternoon when I was sitting on the computer next to the coffee table, he crawled down my shoulder from the couch, and slowly extended himself so that he was sitting on my shoulder, but had his front paws on the table. He's such a funny little dog.

He's also one of the least photogenic dogs EVER. I've taken what must be hundreds and hundreds of pictures of him, and in ALMOST EVERY SINGLE ONE he either squints, closes his eyes, moves at the last second or does a special combination of the three. I've tried everything I can think of: flash, no flash, calling his name, jingling things behind the camera, hold treats behind me, but nothing results in great pictures... except for chance.

PRIZEY

So I recently discovered this, and it's amazing! Prizey lists dozens and dozens of great give-aways, and while a lot of them are aimed at kids or moms, a lot of them are just awesome for anyone, like one of their more recent ones, a $200 American Express Gift Card. See? Cool.

And what's even better... Prizey led me to discover PrizyBooks! Give-aways... for books! Free books! It isn't updated quite as often as Prizey, and doesn't have as many give-aways, but I'm still excited about keeping an eye on it. I really can't imagine many things more exciting than a list of chances to win free books.

One of my favorites!

The Warm Biscuit Bedding Co. is holding a give-away for one of my favorite childhood toys: the Fisher Price Chatter Phone!

I'm so excited - if I had kids (or was planning on having them anytime in the near future) I would definitely participate in this giveaway.

New Quote

“You read your first draft to find out what you have written. As simpleminded as that sounds, it’s both true and profound. You can’t revise intelligently until you have an accurate and comprehensive sense of what is actually on the page, and the difference between what you intended to write and what you actually wrote can mean the success of failure of the project. Don’t assume that you wrote about what you set out to write about.” Philip Gerard

Goal #99 Reread 1984, Brave New World, and Farenheit 451.

I just finished re-reading Farenheit 451, and I loved it just as much as the first time that I read it. I can't remember exactly when that first was; I've read the book at least three or four times.

I held my breath as Montag went through his transformation; I fell in love with Clarisse and books all over again with Montag; and I looked around with wonder as Montag discovered the whole new world of scholars that existed outside of the normal civilization.

Today I started re-reading Handmaid's Tale because I thought that it was also part of this goal. But I was mistaken. I have to re-read Brave New World and 1984. Ah well, I'll read a different good book.

Miscellaneous Poem

I found this poem that I had written when I was in high school. I thought it was cute, and being how I have a couple goals about writing things and getting published, I thought I would post it up here. I realize that this isn't going to be published, but it's heading in the right direction.

Untitled Poem
Fall '02

I sit gently upon the grass

pondering.

Watching the brown and red leaves

drift gently to the ground.

The surrounding forest offers

a splendid array of trees to

shed their summer clothes around me.

Are there faeries guiding

each and every falling leaf?

I catch a glimpse of a leg

and hear a soft giggle.

The flutter of a wing,

a soft whisper;

I believe that faeries

truly do exist.

Is that their elixir?

Does faith feed them on

just as disbelief kills?

A gold leaf with blood red veins

lands gently on my outstretched hand

and floats away

inviting me to follow it.

I rise and stroll down the path

leading into the darkness of the trees.

Soft fae music seems to

come from the trees

as I walk among them

inviting the sprites to come and join me

in a dance of joy and life.

23. Re-read the Tao of Pooh and finish the Te of Piglet.

I read The Tao of Pooh for the first time in 10th grade. There was an amazing English teacher at school that year (I didn't have him, he was just so wonderful, that he reached out to everyone in the school). My best friend and I would stay after school just to talk about books, literature and life in general. We formed a mini book club, and I read some really amazing books that year.

One of them was The Tao of Pooh. It opened my mind so much. It was my first real influence to Taoism. At that point, I had rejected Catholocism, and my interest in Wicca was beginning to fade. I was still searching for something that made sense to me, and Taoism seemed to. I tried reading the Tao Te Ching, but that's a bit of hefty reading for a 15 year old. The Tao of Pooh was perfect for me. It used Winnie the Pooh and his friends to teach the principles of an ancient way of thinking. I still think that Benjamin Hoff was a wee bit of brilliant for thinking that up.

The Tao of Pooh encouraged people to live simplicitically, saying that Pooh (in his simplistic existence) had found the secret to a happy and peaceful life. The Te of Piglet takes everything one step farther and encourages readers to embrace their inner self, but somehow Hoff manages to make it seem like your inner self is only valid if you are meek and humble. Now, while I like to think of myself as humble, I'm definitely not meek. Obviously, the main character of The Te of Piglet is Piglet, the other 100 acre woods characters made cameos, but they were mostly only used as if to contrast with Piglet's purity and worth. Pooh was portrayed as arrogant and selfish, Rabbit as conceited, Owl as a know-it-all and Eeyore as hopelessly pessimistic. While all of this may be true, they aren't necessarily bad things. These traits are all perfectly acceptable as long as they are balanced by other, more positive, traits.

And there was also this entire section where Hoff compared Eeyores to feminists, who apparently are out to take down the current society and destroy the educational system. Granted, I'm not the most active feminist in the world, but I'm pretty sure I would have noticed people running around pulling down the country's schools.

Overall, I enjoyed re-reading The Tao of Pooh. I didn't enjoy it as much as the first read, but it was still pleasurable. I found very little worthwhile in The Te of Piglet, and I actually wouldn't even recommend it to anyone. It just seemed like Hoff was rambling throughout the entire book, and I guess, when you're trying to write a sequel to a best-seller that you never even intended to write, you might have some difficulty putting in decent topics.

Goal #24

This goal was to get my Tree of Life tattoo. I've been wanting this tattoo since high school, and I realized that I would always push it off if I didn't have something pushing me towards it.

I haven't crossed this goal off completely because I need to have a few things touched up with it, but I plan on doing that within the next month.

My tattooist's name is Ralph, and I went to him after he did an amazing peacock feather on my best friend's leg. I went into the shop with a few (really) rough sketches of what I wanted, and he sketched this right in front of me. After a few alterations, we were both happy, and he started tattooing my back.

It took over 2 hours... and it hurt... A LOT. My back was numb throughout most of it... but the parts over my tailbone and the detailing on the ribs was excrutiating. I only ended up taking one break, and went through the rest of it non-stop. My skin was very angry at me.

But voila! It looks amazing! I can't wait to take the next step and finish up the whole thing.

Goal #80

80. Stay completely up to date on the news for three monthes.

I decided (since I'm a lazy boob) to have the NY Times emailed to me every morning so that I would be able to read it, and it's been working wonders! When I'm busy, I only get to read through the headlines and skim through a few of the more important articles, but when I have spare time, I leisurely read through as much as I can. I love it.

I also read Feministing, a great feminist blog that helps to keep me up to date with everything pertaining to women that's happening around the world. I love reading it because the things they write about A. pertain to me a lot more than most of the Times articles, B. focus on things like women's rights in Israel, which the Times often overlooks.

The most recent article that I saw on Feministing, I just had to reprint here.

Georgia rape case dismissed because of victim's sexual history?

Valena Beety is an attorney and a board member of Students Active for Ending Rape (SAFER), an organization that works to empower students and hold colleges accountable for sexual assault in on- and off-campus communities.

Melanie Ross thought Daniel Day, her college classmate, was fun and a decent date - until they were having sex and she told him he was hurting her. She asked him to stop - and he didn’t. After that, Ross broke up with Day, and avoided him.

Unfortunately, that didn’t stop Day from raping her a month later.

Her lawsuit against Day is now on appeal to the Georgia Supreme Court, in part because of the victim-blaming actions of the trial court judge. Judge Phillip Brown, despite a Georgia rape shield law, compelled Ross to disclose every person she had ever dated, or engaged in any sexual activity with, including their names, dates of interaction, and contact information. This evidence was supposedly to show “consent;” the actual purpose was to humiliate the victim and discourage her and other victims from pursuing these cases. Under Georgia state law, and federal law, a victim’s sexual history with third parties is supposed to be irrelevant. The result of this case is that any victim who brings a civil claim for sexual battery in Georgia must be prepared to discuss all of her previous sexual partners. The judge ultimately found Ross was not raped in part because, as all that testimony showed, she was not a virgin.

The trial court judge not only dismissed Ross’ claims - he ordered her to pay $150,000 for the court costs of her attacker. The judge found there was no evidence to support her claims of rape, in large part because Ross did not remember anything from the encounter: “There’s no witnesses in there. There was no evidence. It’s a closed door. And there’s no possibility that there could be any proof that there was rape...”

This was after the judge had dismissed the evidence: Ross could have received lacerations and redness documented in a rape kit from shaving, and “[b]ruises can come with a bump into furniture or from other causes.” As far as the claim that Day gave Ross a rape drug, defense counsel responded, “neither Day, nor anyone else for that matter, would have to use any type of drug to convince Plaintiff to participate in sexual conduct.”

The judge found that since Ross and Day had previously had a sexual relationship, Ross should have known her claims were “frivolous... there was no reasonable belief that a court would accept Plaintiff’s claims...”

The nightmare of this case, for Melanie Ross and for all future rape victims in Georgia, is that she was forced to discuss in elaborate detail her sexual past, and then she had her claims dismissed in part because she wasn’t a virgin. Moreover, not only did Ross lose her case, the judge fined her $150,000 for bringing it in the first place - a fee sure to dissuade other victims from coming forward with their own claims. This case is currently being appealed to the Supreme Court of Georgia, which can choose to hear it or not - let’s hope they right this wrong before it hurts more victims.

Posted by Jessica at 04:04