985 area code? Who's that?

I didn't hit 5,000 words yesterday like I said I would. You know why? Because I'm lazy. Because writing is work, and last night I didn't feel like doing anymore. But I just hit 5,008 this morning, and I'll probably plug a couple more hundred away before the end of the day.

I saw Catch and Release the other day with my best friends. As a flick, it's decent. My friends would disagree because they found the romantic plot underdeveloped and, well, sorta wrong. And really, I would have to agree with them. Susannah Grant also wrote Erin Brockovich, which is a far superior movie, but I think her writing skills were once again validated by Catch and Release. Because when I thought about the romantic plot I had to agree with my two friends about its shortcomings, but that only happened when I seriously turned my attention to it. Maybe there was just enough going on in the movie (or too much, if there wasn't enough time to develop the romance), but I was engaged enough to not notice the fact that Jennifer Garner and "Fritz" (okay, better name than that please? What is this, the Von Trapp family?) rarely talked or had any reason for any romantic interest. Suspension of disbelief. I'm still not quite sure how Susannah Grant did it, but she got me to enjoy the story enough to let it slide that the romance was a little contrived, unrealistic, and pretty much superficial. Which is funny, because I'm not sure if my two non-film student friends would agree.

I'm in the semi-middle of watching Sideways, as I had to put it on hold about 2/3 of the way through yesterday. At least I hope I'm at least 2/3 of the way through. Optimistically I only have 10-15 minutes left. The thing is, I'm all for stories about men in mid-life crisi and conflicts with present and past marriages and yes, especially about writers, but I am so bored. I think what they did with the wine motif is amazing and intelligent. I really like that part. There just seems to be very little movement in the story, and honestly, one of the main characters is a real jerk. I know we're not supposed to like him, there's no way he could have been written like that and we're supposed to like him, but he's one of the main characters, come on. The two main guys get in the same argument over and over and over again, the one guy that we like is slowly descending into an awful pit of depression, and the other one's a complete jerk. Maybe the ending will redeem the movie, but right now I just feel disappointed. The wine motif was so great. Couldn't they have come up with an equally great movie?

"I think the first duty of all art, including fiction of any kind, is to entertain. That is to say, to hold interest. No matter how worthy the message of something, if it's dull, you're just not communicating." - Poul Anderson

On the to do list today? Fill out all my paperwork for my camp job - which I'm super excited about!