Friday, November 16, 2012

I Shall Not Go Gently Into This Twilight Girls' Night, Or, A Requiem for the Undead, by Allison

So seeing as I have had little sleep, much gym, trip to school for special snack for M the seven year old stylist who is Star of the Week at school,

(Note: Any and all teachers of M, she does not need you to tell her she is Star.
She already is aware, has designated that role to herself permanently, and good luck taking down her pictures and moving her special toys and doll and hair brush to brush the doll's hair out of the Special Star chair come next week,
I see a coup d'etat in the making)

So cornbread and blueberries snack
(Note: M wanted salmon and blueberries, which are her favorite foods because I am Awesome Mom, otherwise known as blind luck but I sound like a very health conscious parent when she tells people that, and it is true, she does love those foods, but I was fearful of somehow poisoning a room of first graders with rancid fish at 9:40 in the morning so cornbread was substituted)

And fun with M and friends, followed by deranged Target spree,
unloading of said spree,
and now copious emailing or texting or messaging or smoke signaling with friends regarding Girls Night Out, Last Vampire Standing Edition.

I think I am being frantic today because:

1. I get slightly manic when running on very little sleep, which I am currently on fumes due to Twilight Movie Marathon yesterday, in which all of the movies were shown in a row, culminating in Breaking Dawn Part Two: Or, You Came Back After That Birth Scene?,
which is (Spoiler!) the last movie in the Saga,
Series,
Allison's Irrational Teenage Regression Issue,
whatever you want to call it.

2. I get slightly to very giddy plotting Fun Girls' Nights, especially with the crew I have assembled for tonight, involving lots of different women from various parts of my life with common denominator of AWESOMENESS,
plus they aren't embarrassed that I carry a life-sized cardboard cutout of a movie vampire around with me on said girls nights.

(Note: It was a GIFT. And people act insane and take pictures with him as if he is real.
 I realize I am carrying around a cardboard cutout, but I do not pet him and feed him and call him George, duh, his name is Edward, and I know he is not real although he does scare away the bad guys and M likes to put hats and tutus on him.)

3. I do not want this to be the last Twilight movie so I am even doing chores I hate like laundry and dog maintenance to distract myself from fact that it is in fact, last movie.

 (Note: Alleged future spin-offs involving werewolves, characters with stupid names, or any character that is not currently in cardboard fashion in my home, played by actor of required Britishness, tallness, moodiness, floppy haired-ness, and remember the music part, does not count.
Not the same.
Is New Coke.
Boo.)

So instead of distracting myself further, because I am really totally not interested in any more chores, I shall wallow.

I choose to wallow.

Here is why.

Allison's Reasons For Being Totally Sad Cheesy Vampire Series Is Approaching Its Pop Cultural Shelf Life And Now We Are Supposed To Like Zombies?:

1. It is not my fault.

 I was lured into a seemingly innocuous book by my friend B who also babysits the girls and knows the good dog and the bad dog and that I read books all the time.

She is all, "So there's a book series? I don't know if you read Young Adult books, but I think you might like it."

Note to universe:
This is how they lure young Midwesterners into becoming prostitutes when they get off the bus in the Big City.
Just saying.

Three days later, books absorbed, when's the next one coming out, oh they are casting a movie? Let's obsess on that.

And new book coming out the day I leave at 6 am for family vacation flight?

Kind YA fiction drug pusher B goes to midnight book release and delivers one to me for my flight, a flight in which I sit separately from my family and have a read-off with a lady who also had procured the familiar black and red covered book.
(Spoiler! It got ugly. The read-off, not the book. Except the werewolf parts.)

Actual conversation between me and Lady Next To Me With Same Book On Long Flight:

Me:  "It seems you are ahead of me in your book. Please do not make any sounds, say any names, or react in any way to this book until I catch up to you. Which I will, I am a fast reader. And I will not reveal plot points once I pass you. Deal?"

Lady: "Fine. But I am a fast reader too. Good luck." (This is said with look of disdain.)

Me: (internally gleeful for not only long flight with book I want to read and no toddler biting me (that is not a spoiler. E bit on flights at that age), but now also get to have a read-off,
and I always win at those, due to total obsessive reading habits, choosing subjects to study in which I had to read a lot to get good grades and I am clearly goal oriented person when ranking is involved, continued obsessive reading, and also smelling a whiff of Smug from Lady, which does not sit well with me.
She does not have to do the "oh, no, I am sure you read way faster than me, I just learned to read yesterday" fake insulting of herself thing I hate we all do to ourselves, but really, Lady, I am sure you can beat me in most things in life unless it involves reading books, typing really fast, or discussing who did or did not get beheaded in Tudor England. But on this? You are going DOWN.)

"Good luck to you, too."

An hour later, minus the distraction of biting toddlers or finding the correct special colored marker that won't stain stuff or distributing wet wipes, plus motivated by read-off with Smug Lady, I am ahead. Since I am only 99 percent brat, I do not call attention to this.
But get this: She DOES.

Lady: "You are skipping pages."

Me: "What? No I am not. I am a fast reader. You can ask those people over there I am ignoring right now, since I am reading fast instead of parenting."

Lady: "I went to law school. I read very fast, and you are now ahead of me."

Me: "Um, before I became mom to those people I am ignoring, I also went to law school, and before that a college where I read a lot, and before that was a person who read both Jane Austen and Sweet Valley High compulsively. I type fast too."
(I do not tell her that those things are basically my skill set in its entirety, and if the book were not a Zap Me Back To Being Fourteen book but instead the dishwasher manual, I would be on page 1.)

Lady: "Harrumph."

Me: "You can quiz me if you want. I love quizzes. Only essay, though. No word limitations."

Good grief, now I have totally forgotten my trajectory in sadness over series conclusion due to remembered fury at Smug Lady.

Long story longer, I won, did not rub it in her face as did not need to, plus she was boring and I had to start re-reading it again, since my rule was four times through and then I had to read something that won a Booker Prize, or at least was in the grown up section of the bookstore. 

But retroactively, Ha ha, lady, plus Matt, total thanks for dealing with the kids so I could read my book and have irrational read-off with that lady.

2. Ok, back to Why I Am Wallowing.

I theorize the introduction of this book series came upon me at a time in which I was reading a lot of little kid books to my little kids, so a Young Adult series seemed like Nietzsche. 

This is of course complete nonsense, but I don't care. 

The Venn Diagram of People Who Like Twilight Books, Flaws And All is a large one.
There are many cross-sections of circles going on.
And I am too sleepy to do math to figure out how many I fit in.

But I do know that friends from all parts of my life either secretly or not so secretly Have a Thing for it too, and I am not secret, as I am self-proclaimed PR person for Things I Like. 

So when movies come out, I throw a party!!!

First party was for the DVD release of the first movie, since it was not totally a huge thing with people in tents weeping and Team this and that yet.

 (Note: No need for teams. Is obvious. Please.
I do not even engage in discussion with people on that issue, because, it is not an issue, I do not have a cardboard cutout of a wolf in jorts in my house, gift or not.
No brooding, no tall, no Britishness even though American accent is used, TOTALLY NO FLOPPY HAIR, only bad wig and then crew cut?
No music whatsoever?
Carved wooden gifts? Bleh. )

I get all excited for my party, and get apples and ribbons and fake diamond decorations and make up a whole trivia contest, and because I am still in the phase in life in which I have ballerinas and indoor ponies at my children's birthday parties,
I decide the prize for winning the trivia contest,
questions written by me, requiring essay answers of course,
should be exact replicas of the gray mittens Bella was wearing in the movie when she almost gets hit by the van.

And because as I mentioned earlier, people were not trademarking everything attached to Twilight yet,
I muster enough Nancy Drew to find the lady in WALES who knitted the mittens,
email her daughter, they are starting up a website for her knitting but haven't done it yet so we chit chat, and the lady, who now has a whole site and is completely lovely and her work is wonderful, mails me the mittens
(I ordered two pairs, one for me, I am not a dummy) all Euro-wrapped with a personal note saying "Allison, I hope your party is a smash. Love, Ruth Cross." 

That was totally awesome.
And my trivia quiz was like 30 pages long, and my sister edited it a bit, by reading it and saying "Ok, the question, Which of the Cullens is wearing a wig, extra credit which wigs are of the actor's existing hair color and which are of a different hair color, extra extra credit which wig does Allison hate the most (Spoiler! It is always Jasper's. He looks like an evil clown)
is ridiculous."

And of course because I have decorated, coerced a bakery into making red velvet cupcakes with sparkles that I then added extra sparkles to because they were not sparkly enough,
got mittens knitted in WALES, did I mention?

And collected assembly of fun friends and ordered other prizes for the non-winner of the mittens, such as Rosalie's necklace, which my cool friend KR wears to every premiere since she won it for coming in fourth place,
and was super excited for my crazy party,
OF COURSE my appendix bursts the day of the party.

Boo.

Totally not cool.

Matt had to email people from the hospital, and he was all witty like "Allison was so excited for the Twilight party her appendix ruptured" or other doctor gallows humor.

Note: appendixes hurt when they decide to get rotten, FYI.

And there is no call button in the ER,
because I guess all sorts of people for various reasons would push it 24/7,
so I had to literally beg for mercy,
and the nurse who had me on morphine and was like, really, it still hurts?

And she pokes me and I jump off the table, I then am given dilaudid.

Which is like, chloroform on a rag, or knocking you in the head with a hammer old school medicine.

Which works, by the way, but made my eyes shut but I was still awake, and may have made me paranoid too because I was convinced they were going to take me into surgery and think I was unconscious and operate on me even though I was awake, which is a horror movie, and NOT a vampire movie with sparkly nice vampires with good hair.

Bad horror movie.

So I kept announcing, with eyes shut "I am awake!" every two seconds until they actually made me un-awake.

And party was rescheduled, fun was had by all (I hope), next movie coming soon, now midnight releases!
Whee!
Whole nother level of fun.

Otherwise known as, Allison and Hardcore Friends go to Midnight Show, and then Allison Has Girls' Night Party For Her Semi-Normal Friends The Next Day.

Rinse, repeat, times 3, tonight makes 4.

So I am wallowing.
Because they are fun!
Fun is fun!

I like using my Ph.D in Extreme People Watching to assess the crowds, assign myself and them on the Bell Curve of Crazy
(Note: I am fully aware I am on that curve, but I do not make scrapbooks, t-shirts, put fake bite marks on me, or think they are real),
love the fun evening with friends, am entertained by people trying to maul my cutout vampire,
and the general fizz and whee of fun.

So now I have to go get the cutout vampire ready for the party,
 and also myself, and since the stupid stripper movie girls' night had to be broken up into 3 blog posts, this movie marathon and girls' night will probably do the same,
especially since yesterday's marathon involved tea smuggling, car keys,
deranged ushers,
me remembering how much I loved the music in all the movies

(Seriously, I have an Ode just to the soundtracks. They introduced me to The Black Keys! Best Florence and the Machine song! Fave Radiohead! Learned about Band of Skulls! Lykke Li! I will stop now),

and finding out that car keys plus tea smuggling sometimes turns into a ridiculous situation nobody would believe but I have witnesses.

I shall begin getting sparkly now.
(Just clothing. There was a girl there yesterday though who was all over sparkly, it was impressive).

 But not too sparkly, as am in mourning.

Would be tacky to go over the top.
And would wear all black similar to Civil War widows except everybody already does that at Twilight movies, and I have to stand out somewhat, in case they come to life and jump off the screen?

 Right?