Heard some good tunes at Jersey Boys on Broadway

Guest post written by Ellen Gordon

There are all kinds of things that I loved about my recent trip to New York City. I think that really the only thing that i didn't like about the trip was my experience with public transportation. But going and seeing a Broadway play was by far the best thing out of our entire trip!

I looked up a whole bunch of information about what to do during that trip and while I was doing that, I ran across some info on a hearing test and decided to go and get one of them. Once I did I got fitted with some hearing aids and I was even more ready to go on our big trip!

Out of all the plays that i looked up information on, I decided to go and see the play Jersey Boys. It was so great and it was a whole lot of fun to hear all of those songs. Plus, it wasn't way too dramatic. I can't stand it when I see something that's more dramatic than I expected, which pleasantly wasn't how that play ended up being. I'm more into the uplifting stuff.

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Shopping for great deals

I spend a lot of time viewing movies. It's a good thing I enjoy watching them...at lease, most of them. Some leave something to be desired, of course, but you take the good with the bad.

Sometimes I get really distracted by things in the movies, such as costumes or sets. I even take some fashion or decorating cues from movies because it seems like everything they have is so "pulled together".

This, in turn, leads me to search out sites that offer urban outfitters coupons and other online coupon deals. I like shopping online and I like saving money. Well, who doesn't like saving money? So, I visit coupon sites to see if I can get good deals on items I'm going to buy anyway. Of course, some sites are better than others, so I select the very best deals I can find.

I like the idea of getting percent off, free shipping, dollars off, or buy one/get another for less.

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What is entertainment?

This blog deals mostly with entertainment. Well, for me, entertainment can include my jewelry making and organic gardening. Ok, maybe those are not technically entertainment the way most people think of them, but these activities relax me so that I think I'm 10 feet tall and bullet proof. Who needs a life insurance lead when you feel that good?!

Well, I really do know that my life has an end eventually, but for now I'm living it to its fullest and enjoying things while I can. That includes all kinds of movies, music, and, yes, my hobbies.

Technorati Tags: entertainment

Addicted to work

Am I addicted to work?

I was off Tuesday. By early afternoon, I had a raging headache and was feeling groggy. I rode with Son to where my truck is, near where I work.

While he was working on the truck, I walked to my work place and got some coffee. I sat in the lobby, trying to fight off the headache and feeling of fatigue. While there, they got a terrible rush so I got up and helped them through it. Being a manager, it's one of my responsibilities to fill in if needed when something like that arises. By the time the rush was over, I was feeling a lot better and more energetic. Sometimes I think that working these few extra hours works as well as fat burners, giving me energy and a lower appetite. In fact, I worked another couple of hours just tonight because they were so short handed!

Strange, huh?

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Yo-yoing weight

Did you ever see an actor or actress play a chubby person in a movie, then in the very next movie, they were thin? I have, and I always wonder what they have to eat to get the chubby role, and if they use diet pills to thin down for the next role.

Of course, we see many of them on talk shows or sponsoring fitness equipment and nutrition plans for weight loss. But it still has to be hard to drop 30 pounds, even with help and support. I know I've always fought the "battle of the bulge" and I have to watch every bite that goes into my mouth in order to drop just a couple of pounds!

Technorati Tags: diet,weight

Halo

While Son is checking his Facebook account, he's also finding some secret stuff to locate in his Halo game. One thing about sitting in this location is the excellent 3G connection we've both got. So, he's been on YouTube to find the secret stuff.

I've never played the game myself. He sometimes plays it downstairs on my HDTV for better visual effects. By the way, the secret stuff he was trying to find were skulls. Not bathroom faucets or weapons of mass destruction. Skulls. I still don't know what he plans to do with those skulls from secret, hidden locations, but I'm sure he does so it's all good.

Commuter blogging

Between the heat locally, and the hours I've put in at work, I seem to be on a pretty good weight loss program. For instance, right now I'm sitting in a commuter parking lot, blogging. Son is sitting next to me with his laptop, looking at his Facebook account. Why are we here? Waiting on one of my crew people.

The crew person needed a ride to work, so I brought him this far to meet a ride that would take him on to work. Now, I'm waiting here again for him and his ride to get back. Then I'll take him to his house.

I know. It's complicated. I'd rather be at home right now but we needed this person to work tonight and this was the only way to get him there!

Mojo

After watching Transformers for about the fifth time, I finally started looking more at the details in the movie and less at the story itself. I tend to do that when I've viewed a movie several times. Anyway, I just realized last night that Mojo, the chihuahua owned by the movie hero, is injured but no one ever says how the injury occurred. He just has to take medicine for it and there's a cast on his leg.

Of course, the Mom in the movie has shopped for dog supplies and come back with some "bling" in the form of a sparkly dog collar. But I still wonder how the dog got hurt to start with?

Hot spots

If it weren't such a long, hot drive out there, I'd see about getting a reservation at one of the reno hotels to get a better idea about the night life and excitement of that town. I see a lot of movies with places like the casinos as the "hot spot" for adventure, riches, and even love, so it sure seems pretty exciting to me!

With the heat wave we're having now where I live, it surely couldn't be any hotter out there!

Do you know where your movies are?

Do you know where your movies are? I know where most of mine are - still in the storage building! Since moving, I still haven't had a chance to get everything I want out of there and into my house. This means I'm watching the same few movies, over and over again.

Not that I mind seeing them again. After all, I made sure to bring my favorites with me in my car. However, I do like to watch other ones, too. Even favorite movies get old after you have viewed them dozens of times!

This has forced me to get up off the other side of my lap, though, and do things like weed eat around the front steps and do some crafts. The down side of it is that I also wind up eating from boredom. That's not good. I don't want to wind up a total couch potato, needing diet pills to get my weight back down to normal.

Children's entertainment

Given the right circumstances, movie and television watching can actually add to your child's life. However, the printed word is so very important and it's important for parents to foster a love of reading and a love of learning in their children. Learning and entertainment don't have to be mutually exclusive, either.

Beginning at an early age, introduce your children to learning coupled with entertainment through children's books. These can be found in many forms, from cloth books for the very young toddler to chapter books for the more experienced reader. Maintaining a library of books just for your child isn't difficult and it will help them throughout their life.

Stories that are familiar to them can often also be found in movie format. Find stories that captivate your child's interest and have them read the stories before viewing any movies. Better yet, bond with your child by reading aloud to him and discuss the story, the hero, and the outcome as you go along.

Intermission - DVD shopping

I have found that almost any movie or movie collection can usually be purchased at prices lower than retail if one is willing to just wait a few weeks or so. It's the desire for instant gratification that steers us away from the good deals on DVDs and makes us spend more money than we should on them.

I would guess that the average price for my DVDs is around $5.50 each. This is because I am always on the lookout for deals on them. Sometimes, it's buy one, get one for a penny or it's two for the price of one. Sometimes, it's a flat $5 each. I don't generally spend more than $10 on a DVD, so I know they are very affordable if you are careful when shopping.

After we moved into this new house, I wound up watching my movies on my notebook computer and it worked out great for me until we got at least part of the home theater set up. I still need to find the box that has the remote control and other components in it, though, so I can get the full benefit of all these bargain DVDs.

Buy dot com

With all the shopping I do for movies, techie gadgets, and home entertainment, you must know by now that I always shop for a bargain. And bargains are exactly why buy.com rocks! See, any time I can get a great deal on the things I love to buy and get free shipping, I figure it's all good.

Besides, I know I can read reviews from other buyers, and those will let me know if the product I'm looking at is worth the effort and money to purchase it or not. Since my sister is currently in the market for a laptop, so she can do her journaling when she's on trips, this would be a great place to point her to!

So go ahead. Shop around at the place where they advertise "Always Low Prices" or at the local office store. Even shop at the local store that tells you their geeks are the best squad around. I'll wait here. Then you'll know exactly why buy.com rocks!

That just takes the Blu-Ray cake

Apparently, the fine HD DVD player I have now has just gone the way of the dinosaur before I even got to use it! See, I have an analog television, so the HD player won't show on it. I have been hoping to get an HD TV soon, and the prices are coming down pretty nicely.

But guess what? Before I get it, I'll probably have to update my whole system again because HD is on the way out and Blu-Ray is exclusively on the way in....at least as far as Walmart and Toshiba are concerned.

What do you think? Take my poll in the sidebar!

Intermission - Sold mortage?

My nephew and his wife have bought a house and some land in a very nice area. It's out in the country where it's quiet, and the house is a double wide mobile home that's absolutely huge. Their master bath is as large as my living room!

However, they have recently received papers that their mortgage lenders have changed. The original lender sold the account to another lender before their first payment was even made. This was a bit disconcerting for my nephew, but on the upside, his payments are actually lower now than before.

So, tell me, does this happen often? Does it happen to everyone, or just to folks like us who are not in the upper echelon of income and notoriety? What if it changes hands again? Will the payments go up? It's supposed to be locked in at a certain interest level so they would know from month to month and year to year what to budget for their payments. Of course, if they were among the rich and famous, they could just pay the whole thing off and not have to worry about any of that!

Actors and early works

Have you ever watched a movie, and found yourself wondering why you were watching it at all? I have, and it's no fun. It seems that a lot of movies made early in an actor's career are about as entertaining as a colon cleanse. They seem to have chosen to do them just to have work and a paycheck, or maybe to get their name "out there" to the public eye. Sometimes I watch these early films and wonder how the actor ever overcame them enough to actually become famous.

Denzel Washington comes to mind immediately. He's a superb actor, handsome, and plays every role as if he really is the character. However, some of his earlier works are either just bad writing or bad directing, as his full talent is never shown in them. They are, at best, at the high school play level, in my opinion. I'm very happy he has become more discerning in the roles he accepts. I am never disappointed with his more recent movies.

Other actors, such as Mel Gibson, seemed destined from the beginning to be stars and even in early roles were able to step out beyond the script and truly become the star of the movie. Gibson's Mad Max series catapulted him into stardom not because the movies themselves were great or classic, but because Gibson became larger than the actual role required. His acting talent superseded his good looks in these films and to me it seems as though he created the character himself.

Britney Spears and kids

Recently, reading updates about Britney Spears and her escapades, including the times she's been late or not shown up at all for court, I wonder if the law is stretching just because it's her. How does a young mother of toddlers live the way she does, flaunt court appearances, and carry on as though she has no impact on her children's lives? According to sources at Fox News, the judge claims this is going the way any other custody process would go, and that it's generally believed the mother will be the more fit parent for such young children.

Still, she is risking losing her children completely. Showing up naked in stores certainly doesn't help. Inviting paparazzi into her home for who-knows-what also doesn't help. She needs some real psychiatric intervention on a long term basis. It's apparent she's unbalanced.

As for the court system not stretching for her due to her celebrity, I find that hard to swallow. They've been known to snatch kids away from better parents than this at the drop of a hat and on the advice of an anonymous phone call. She's been seen and video taped at public places. Who knows what she would do in Hilton Head rentals, considering she is seen with Paris Hilton, the ultimate "bad girl" of celebrities.

Children's Theater

If you aren't regularly attending Children's Theater in your area, you're really missing out. The plays here are extremely entertaining and are often originals or are taken from familiar themes and stories, and re-written with a new slant.

I attended The First Christmas Elf tonight and it was funny and charming. Of course, one of my granddaughters was in it, so that made it extra special for me.

The acting isn't professional, but they surely do a fine job hamming it up on stage at these plays. I highly encourage you to support your local community theater and children's theater. You won't be sorry.

Intermission - Old theaters

I can remember going to see movies as a young girl, with my family. I can also remember a time when smoking was allowed in every public place. Can you? I wonder if this is what created the need for air purifiers in public places. They were large and usually mounted somewhere on the ceiling.

I must admit, I'm glad that smoking is prohibited in public places now. Especially in theaters, where people must sit so close together and where there is little chance for stale air to escape. Of course, I'm also glad it's prohibited in restaurants. Remember the "smoking section"? I always wondered how they made the smoke stay only in that section and not drift over to the other patrons. In fact, they didn't.

Intermission - Who's getting married?

You know, big time movie stars can afford any kind of decorations and flowers they want when they get married. When they allow their weddings to be a public event, they want the most elegant weddings they can get. After all, press matters. However, I wonder if they ever try to save a little on wedding flowers so that their wedding budgets can stretch even further. After all, it makes good sense to do so.

They could be getting up to a 75% discount on their flowers, and still know that they are freshly cut from growers worldwide. In fact, they are only two or three days old when they are shipped. I am sure stars desire to skip the middleman whenever possible and get the best money can buy for an even lower price. Or maybe it's just my own sense of saving money on purchases that makes me think that way.