Things I Learned While Sick: Film Edition

To ring in the New Year this year, my body decided to shake things up and send me on a 7+ day vacation to internal function hell. I couldn't eat, things wouldn't stop aggressively forcing their way out of my body, and coughing led to a few Depends moments. It was great in that I could finally be the reclusive shut-in I always aspire to be and spend my days watching shows, but in reality that dream stopped being fun after hour #4, and attempt to hold down food #3. But I sure did watch a ton of stuff, and I still love Beat from Timber Kings. This is the other, much briefer list I wrote (from the passenger seat) and forgot about, while driving to our surf spot with my pal/Wellness Fairy shortly after. A drive I managed to make 3/4 of the way before yelling to pull over so my breakfast could make an emergency exit. I vaguely remember him yelling from the car if I wanted him to hold my hair, but I could be wrong. I think I also went for a big wave that day not because I was feeling gutsy, but because I was too tired to know what I was doing and pull out. I likely fell at some point. I guess I am just lucky I managed to stay awake:

Tim's Vermeer- A really rich man in need of a hobby spends like a year painting a fucking music lesson. I fell asleep. 

The Armstrong Lie- Lance Armstrong told lots of lies and became the winningest of winners in competitive drug cycling. Also fucked Sheryl Crow. 

Korungal- A bunch of American soldiers get shot at, it fucks them up, and then I fell asleep, but not because it was boring, but because the fever inside me had won. They were probably still fucked up by the end though. It was sad all around. Falling asleep likely spared me from crying from start to finish like I did with Blackfish. Oh boy, DO NOT watch that one unless you are prepared to be shattered and have a field of Corgis to wipe the oceans falling out of your face.

The Dark Side Of Love- Russians think Americans are stupid idiots. Their orphans feel the same.

The Interview- James Franco plays James Franco if he had a talk show, goes on a field trip to North Korea.

Jodorowsky's Dune- This is a guy who spent a decent amount of his income on LSD. I also fell asleep.

More Life Lessons with Pharrell

"Should your heart point you in this direction, let me be your guide." P.W.

Pharrell! You beautiful bottlenose dolphin spirit guide, you keep bringing it! Even Angie, hands clutched over her chest, blurted out, "I feel like he just reached inside me and pulled something out." 

Fuck, you are SMOOTH. Do you know what he told two of his contestants this week? 

"One of you is fire, the other ice. If you do this right, we're going to have steam." 

!!!! GOOD GRIEF. I can't get enough. I want to be a big, overly sensitive sponge soaking in everything that comes out of that man's mouth. My new life dream, other than see Celine Dion in concert, is to be able to sit down and have a heart to heart with Pharrell. Except it would probably be so intense I'd have to stand up and act out everything I was feeling. And then we could go hat shopping or something. 

I love that this man is willing to say the things that scare the shit out of just about all of us. It's the real deal. It's heartfelt and full of big emotion, and we're not used to talking like that! I think for a lot of us, when you get right down to it, we aren't used to feeling. We aren't used to feeling. We're used to our default settings, to a certain level of ambivalence. It's so much easier not to care too much! The stakes are so much lower if we don't go all in! But when we're confronted or challenged or come up against opposition, don't we already know what it looks like when we go down the path of fear? Don't over-think it, over-feel it.

Should your heart point you in this direction, let these Pharrell-isms be your guide:

***

How does someone move you? Seek out the people and things that stir something inside you. Be relentless of finding the truth, be moved, be willing to take a chance and change things up- that's the only path to progressing forward.

Where are you holding back? You're afraid to engage, but you're chasing your opportunity away. Has that ever worked for you? You've been afraid, and it's not resulted in any kind of positivity, so why bring it to the moment right here? This is your moment; step into it. Let us see who you are.

Take a risk. Go inside yourself and pull out all the things you're afraid to say, and externalize them through words, movement, art, song, whatever works. Make it raw and gritty and full of truth. Because the truth is what matters, and that's what moves other people and makes them feel something. That's how you connect. The most vulnerable part of yourself is the most convincing part of yourself, because that's when people see you letting go, that's when they see you. 

***

Care too much. How could you ever be faulted for moving with conviction? How could you ever regret it? Go deeper, move inward, and then shine out. Be the sun. Don't worry about getting burned, you've already got a big hat.

Life Lessons With Pharrell

I make no excuses about the fact that despite having a higher education in Film & Television, and believing myself to be a fairly intelligent person with upstanding taste, I LOVE The Voice. Specifically, I love the words and feelings and declarations that Pharrell Williams takes from inside himself and moves them out into the world. It's a fancy way of saying, I fucking love how that man talks. If I could have a spirit animal for being able to speak with conviction and feeling and eloquence, he would be it. And although his hats are fantastic, Lapo Elkann is already my fashion spirit animal. Sorry, Pharrell, I guess you can't win them all.

P.W., that'll be the nickname I'll use just between us, you are a beautiful, fearless eagle soaring above us, compelling us to look upwards and outwards and see beyond ourselves. When you tell people to take what's inside themselves and tell their story through their voice and through their movements, I feel you. 

If there's one thing that hooks me right away, every time, is when someone or something makes me really feel something. Those are the people and things I seek out, because they're taking a risk. They're willing to open themselves up and let you feel what they feel and see their hearts, and that's rare. But it's such a gift! It's such a special and beautiful moment to connect to someone's soul and feel their story. I want big emotion! I want big risk! Be a big fucking sensitive soul and speak to the depth of what's possible when you move with conviction and intention and purpose! You might trip and fall right on your face in the most embarrassing way possible; the beauty is in trying anyway. 

Live like Pharrell: Don't over-think, over-feel. See what happens when you surrender to the moment? Also, get a great hat. You will always look cool with a great hat.

I Was Sick For 7 Days And Here Is What I Learned

This Christmas I caught a terrible case of the flu that seemed hell-bent on ending my puny mortal existence, or in the least, just fucking me up royally. 

At first it wasn't so bad, I was still making jokes, "Sorry can't hang out! I'm really sick, but I'm gonna be so HAWT from all the weight imma lose, hahahaha!", "Damn, I'd love to come out, but I'm still pretty sick. At least I'm saving money on all the cash I'm not blowing on food, lol!".

Do not ever tempt fate by laughing in its face because it will take that as a challenge, and that is a challenge you will not win.

I couldn't keep food down for 3 days. I peed my pants a few times from coughing too hard. I tried making a bed on my bathroom floor so I wouldn't have to keep walking to the toilet to throw up, but the floor proved too cold. I eventually texted a friend asking what they were doing that night, because if they were free I might need a ride to the hospital. And because they are a gem, my own Wellness Fairy swooped over and pumped me full of coconut water, Gatorade, Gravol, and soup. It worked! But I still had some recovering to do. 

Christmas is maybe one of the most fortuitous times to get sick because they run goddamn marathons of everything on TV. It was a life saver. I watched so many fucking marathons and documentaries. I watched entire marathons of Timber Kings, Guy's Grocery Games, Cutthroat Kitchen, Chopped, House Hunters, and House Hunters International. I even watched the first two seasons of Glee, which I forgot actually started out really good?!?! Oh god and really sad at the same time. Here is what I learned:

. Timber Kings- This is a show about guys who make timber houses out of Williams Lake, BC. I think it's on the History Channel. I had never seen this show before my killer flu, but it pulled out to be one of my favourites. I admit, I developed a pretty big crush on the little Swiss, Beat, and that dreamy lilt in his voice. It was like an oral Vicodin for my withering body and soul. That day I had described how I felt as feeling like my entire body was stuffed with cotton balls, except cotton balls that actually had hundreds of tiny little razor sharp spikes and also made your hair inexplicably gross, but Beat turned them into little puffs of fluffy clouds to sweep me away.
Tell me someone else has seen this?? Also, is Peter also Swiss? Either that or he sounds some kind of Scandy. I liked him too because he was good at being grumpy and making snappy comebacks. I don't ever plan on wanting a timber house, but I wouldn't mind Beat bringing his chainsaw into my bedroom! Do a little logging in my bed! Construct a 2,800 square foot timber frame in my pants!! Does that even make sense? Fuck I'm so lonely.

. Guy's Grocery Games- As much as I hate Guy Fieri, and I dislike him as much as those tips are frosted, he is surprisingly restrained in this show. And it actually works really well! I enjoyed this, however, I was also on day 2 of not being able to eat, so my standards may have been low. The challenges were pretty fun, and they had great guest judges like Aarti! I like the way she talks. My favourite episode was with the Italian guy who was completely eccentric and an insanely good chef and wanted to win so he could afford to bring his wife and daughter to America. Ahhh! I cried. 

. Cutthroat Kitchen- I also had never seen this show, but as soon as I saw my man Alton Brown I was sold. I'm not sure what makes him so likable, but he gets me every time. The challenges were so sneaky! And yet the food still looked SO GOOD! I liked when they made one of the chefs cook on a treadmill, and also on an upside down wok, and the super hero hands too. How do they still make gourmet meals out of canned chicken and I can't even bake kale correctly??

. Chopped- Oh god I don't know. Watching cooking shows when you are struggling to digest crackers is a cruel form of personal punishment. Fuck, I don't remember, they probably cooked a bunch of shit. The end. I'm going to go sleep in the bathroom.

. House Hunters- The girl in the relationship frequently seems to be high maintenance and bitchy and wears lots of tall boots and long necklaces and decorative scarves and wants to live in a master-planned community, whereas the dude just wants to live on the beach and surf. I feel ya, brah. Lose the dead weight.

. House Hunters International- Oh fuck off this show is so fixed. Who only goes to see 3 houses and then chooses 1??? Also my friends signed up to be on this and they told me you have to have already bought your house and they make up the rest. THEY JUST MAKE IT UP. Thanks for ruining Christmas.

So then I took a bunch of Gravol and had trippy dreams about walking on the beach with this guy with Katy Perry's "Firework" playing on loudspeakers everywhere and then that guy actually did take me to beach but we sat in his car because I was still feverish sweaty but no Katy Perry was playing and his sweater looked really cozy. 

Today is my first day in 7 days eating real solid foods. 

I still dream of Beat.

Where have you been?

It's okay to be a ghost; it has its pleasures. You're light. You float. You slip in and out unseen. There's no love to lose. Or burden to be. You have so little to hold you down. You are free.

Some pearls are never found. They hide under the sand, on the ocean floor. No one knows they're there. But the pearl knows. Maybe there was a time he wanted to be found. To be seen, and to be held. But now, only hope hurts.

I am my own secret. A secret kept by me.


- Mike White
 Enlightened, season 2, episode 5

Conversations I'm Pretty Sure My Dogs Have: The Voice

Probably a true story. 


Goblin 1: Hey, where's Mom?

Goblin 2: Probably still arguing with her bike.

G1: Wasn't it her body?

G2: Yeah, whatever. She knows that bike has like 24 gears, right? I mean, that's pretty much enough to get her up Everest, so I don't understand what all this bitching and moaning over some hill is all about.

This is horseshit, it's almost 8pm! If she isn't here soon to feed us dinner I swear to god I will eat that pair of boots that I've never so much as sniffed and she has wrongly assumed are safe to leave on the shoe rack because we've always left them alone.

G1: Also, she's going to make us miss The Voice, and she's way too cheap to get a PVR.

G2: I am NOT waiting to have to watch it OnDemand two days later.

G1: Well, if she would just learn to pedal faster, then we wouldn't have to.

G2: Blake is really falling behind on building his team this year, and I want to see if he picks up anyone good.

G1: Adam really scored with that Avery Wilson, eh?

G2: OMG, such a wow moment. Just raw fucking talent.

G1: Agreed. But I really liked Nelly's Echo too. Maybe because we are part evil, but the emotional manipulation those shows try to pull with the sad backstories usually makes me feel completely unmoved. But that guy? Shit, he made me want to cry little goblin tears.

G2: It was pretty dusty in here.

G1: Okay, if you could pick any of the coaches, which one would you choose? Don't even think about it, on the count of three we'll both just say it.

One, two, three--

G1 & G2: BLAKE!

G2: The tallness?

G1: The tallness.

G1: And kind of a babe!

G2: Such a babe. He's got that assertive charm.

G1: And he seems funny. I liked that he brought his award.

G2: Never heard any of his songs though.

G1: Nope. Me either.

G2: Fuck, Mom. We're missing our show!!

G1: Oh, I just heard a bike on the balcony. You better go put her boots back.


-Natalie Bell (Mom) would like everyone to know that although her bike does have 24 gears, she's still the one powering it. It's not like the gears are pedaling the bike for her, okay?