Okay, all I can say is that this is a) Awesome and b) a little bit out of hand. FOUR more movies within the last few weeks?!?! Yep. I think I’m addicted.

Transformers 2
July 21 Chris & I met up with Andy & Christy for dinner (Chipotle… yum!) and to see Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen. I had heard that it was bad, but I went in expecting it to be good. We saw it on the IMAX and I really liked it. There were a lot of battle scenes & they definitely could have cut out some of the military action to make it a more reasonable 2 hours, but overall, I enjoyed the movie!

The Reader
Tuesday, August 4 after playing Tennis, we had some dinner & watched The Reader. Once you got past the nudity of the first hour or so, it was actually a really good movie even though it was pretty sad, too. I didn’t really know what to expect, but it kept our attention pretty well.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
We had date night on Wednesday, August 5 and finally saw the latest Harry Potter movie! I was really looking forward to it and am sorry to say that it didn’t meet my expectations. It seemed like some of the story-lines from the book were really forced into the movie. Don’t get me wrong, it was good and I’ll add it to my collection when it comes out on DVD.

Julie & Julia
It was girls night on Monday, August 10 and we went to see Julie & Julia after having dinner at Tavern on France. This movie was EXCELLENT. I LOVED it. I can’t wait to watch it again, on DVD, with Chris. I enjoyed both characters and Meryl Streep is just awesome. There were plenty of laugh out loud parts & you could feel the emotions the characters were feeling. Highly recommended.

Wow. This is getting crazy. I’ve now watched two more new movies! I think that I’ve found a good balance between spending time outside & then taking some time to crash in front of the TV.

Jumper
On Sunday evening Chris & I watched Jumper which was the most recent delivery from Blockbuster. When I saw the movies they sent I was a little disappointed because neither one looked interesting to me, but this one was pretty good. It’s definitely sci-fi, but somehow Chris has me hooked on that kind of crazy stuff! I think 90 minute movies are perfect for Sunday evening, dinner time flicks.

My Sister’s Keeper
Monday night was Movie Monday. Anne, Jenny & I met at California Pizza Kitchen for dinner and catching up before the movie. We saw My Sister’s Keeper and it was sad! The sick sister is played by the oldest sister on Medium which I didn’t know. Both of the sister roles were played very, very well. That’s about all I can say, it was good and I’m glad I saw it, but the whole movie was sad.

* Movie Monday is a girls night thing I’ve tried to schedule every couple months where we go to dinner and see a movie at an AMC theater because it’s only $5 for movies all day Monday thru Thursday!

In the past week Chris & I have seen 4 movies. I think that’s a record, for me at least! We watched two of our Blockbuster movies (Australia & Seven Pounds) and then went to see Public Enemies with Liz & Casey. We finished out the week by watching The Curious Case of Benjamin Button which was borrowed from my Aunt.

Australia
Australia was good. But, it was way too long…and seemed too short at the same time. It was obvious that they had cut some parts out as the movie jumped around, and I think Chris got it right when he observed that this movie would work well as a mini-series. After all the bad things I had heard about Australia, I am definitely glad I watched it because I enjoyed it.

Seven Pounds
I watched Seven Pounds not knowing what exactly to expect. I thought people had told me that this movie ‘made them mad’ and the description on the Blockbuster envelope wasn’t helpful either. I’d say I enjoyed it. It was sad, but pretty good and kept my attention. Definitely not something to watch if you’re already depressed though!!

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
I saw Benjamin Button with Robyn when it was playing in the theater, but Chris hadn’t seen it & I decided to watch it with him. Let’s just say that I was equally as emotional during the second viewing…and I cried a lot the first time! The story of his life is interesting and even knowing the ending, I still enjoyed it. This is another long movie, but really, I love it!

Public Enemies
Chris & I had a double date on Tuesday and after dinner at the Tavern on France, we saw Public Enemies. I didn’t like this movie. at all. The first part of the movie was filmed in a very choppy way & I think I was getting motion sickness from all the movement! I also thought it started out way too slow and went too long. It’s too bad because I usually really like Johnny Depp movies, but not this one.

I have been to see more movies in the past few weeks than I have in the past year or so I think!

In late January I met Robyn at Southdale for girls night. We enjoyed a quick dinner at Cheesecake Factory before sobbing our way through The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I think we both left emotionally drained, but happy that we had taken the time (2 hours and 45 minutes!) to see it.

Then, Chris & I shared a Valentine’s Day movie with my dad & brother. Yep - so romantic! Actually, we all went to see The Wrestler and although I didn’t go in with any expectations, I liked the movie. I found out that Josh and I are different types of movie goers…he really liked the ending & I would have preferred it wrap up the lose ends a bit. Oh well. After the movie Chris & I had dinner with my parents and played a couple board games before calling it a night.

Finally, this past weekend in Chicago Chris & I needed to kill some time (while not walking around) so we caught an afternoon showing of Slumdog Millionaire. LOVED IT. Seriously. Very good movie.

For someone who doesn’t usually see movies as they come out…I’m pretty happy with the fact that I saw 2 of the 5 Best Picture nominations prior to the Oscars! And, just for the record, I also saw the Best Animated Feature Film, WALL-E.

P.S. Did everyone know that AMC has $5 movies ALL DAY Monday thru Thursday? Jackpot.

I just got this announcement from a Minneapolis message board I’m a member of:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
” RIVERVIEW THEATER BENEFIT FOR THE FOOD SHELF ! -

Riverview is celebrating their 60th anniversary with a generous outreach to our
food shelf.

On December 22 and 23 they are showing ***A Christmas Story*** at 5 and 7:15
and charging just 50 cents for admission, popcorn and drinks!

Then they are donating ALL ADMISSIONS TO THE MINNEHAHA FOOD SHELF! ”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I know MANY people love that movie…maybe you should go check it out!

I was off on Friday & we had Sex and the City: The Movie out from Blockbuster Online so I started out my morning with that one. I LOVED it. I’m not sure if I’m just emotional because I’m getting married or because life has been crazy or what, but I teared up a few different times! Anyway, this has made me want to watch the TV series so hopefully I’ll make time. I’ve even thought about setting up the DVD player downstairs with the series so I could just watch it while doing some rebounding.

After that was done I put in Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, also with SJP. Love it! Anyway, it was a great way to spend a day off…combined with some cleaning and a trip to the Post Office to drop off our Save the Dates! OMG! Save the Dates have been sent out! There’s no turning back now!

Oh what a difference a day makes!

Last night Chris & I had date night. We went to Birchwood Cafe for dinner and then saw Iron Man at the Riverview Theater. My coworker (who happens to live nearby) has mentioned both of these locations on multiple occasions so we finally decided to give them a try and we’re glad we did!

To quote from their website…“At the Birchwood, we create fresh, unique food with down-home appeal.” I enjoyed a Spicy Black Bean Burger while Chris was more adventurous and tried a crab dinner. Mine was better. But, we both agree that we’d like to go back sometime. (Mostly I want to go back & try some of the carrot cake!)

Riverview is a “cheap theater” which means that the total cost for both of us to see the movie was $6. Yep…cheaper than ONE ticket at the normal theater. We are definitely going back to see more movies there. Also, I was very surprised by the movie. I went into the theater expecting to think Iron Man was ok. I came out thinking that I really enjoyed it!

Fast forward to tonight. Chris headed out of town for the weekend so of course I had a “nikki” movie lined up to watch. There are just some movies that I would like to see that I don’t want to torture him with and Blonde and Blonder is one of them. Let me tell you…this was one of the best decisions I’ve made. That movie is horrible! I can’t really believe I watched it until the end. I think the only thing that saved me was that I was working on my laptop through the whole thing.

I did watch one additional movie tonight: Word Wars. Word Wars is a documentary about people who play Scrabble competitively and I thought it was interesting. Not as good as King of Kong, but definitely worth my time to watch. The passion that some people have for specific things like Scrabble, crossword puzzles and Donkey Kong is amazing to me.

Now, it’s way, way past my bed time so I’m going to sleep!

I have decided to abandon my Netflix account. Chris uses Blockbuster Online and we decided that 2 online video rental accounts were probably not necessary. We decided to go with Blockbuster for a couple reasons. First, Chris just got a PS3 and he said he could get BlueRay discs free. Second, we can take the movies to a Blockbuster store and trade them in for a rental there if we want. That way you don’t have the 2 day delay when you just want to watch something right away!

Also, we haven’t watched many movies lately. I did get a chance to catch up on a couple that I had at home today. Here’s a list from the past few months.

Mad Money: This one I actually really liked. It was cute, funny, silly, and thoughtful.
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark: Fell asleep. I’m sorry to those of you who are offended but I just can’t get into that series.
Juno: LOVED this one. I don’t know if I loved it enough to watch it again because most of what I liked were the twists and turns in the story, but I highly recommend it.
The Painted Veil: This one I liked but some parts were really tough to watch.
Helvetica: Boring. I thought it might be interesting since I’m in the print industry and we come across many different fonts, but nope.
Breakfast at Tiffany’s: This was okay but I think my expectations were too high for it so I didn’t love it.

This weekend was just busy enough to be relaxing while still getting out of the house. Friday night Chris and I met up with Pete and Sarah for dinner and a movie. We saw Run, Fat Boy, Run which is one movie that I had heard pretty much nothing about. Turns out it was very predictable, but also super cute!

Saturday Chris was planning on helping his friend move but that was moved to Sunday due to lack of moving truck availability. So instead we cleaned and ran some errands that need to be done. It was nice to spend the afternoon together. Saturday night Chris went off to hang out with some co-workers & play in a poker tournament which my brother and I went to First Ave to see a show. Before going our separate ways we all had a drink at Buster’s which is always enjoyable. The show at the 7th Street Entry was Le Loup and The Ruby Suns. I had only listened to a few songs from each group online prior to going to the show and I have to admit, my first impression was wrong. The Ruby Suns opened and I felt like they could have used one more person on stage. The group of 3 didn’t have a full time drummer but instead used a drum machine. I guess maybe I’m just old fashioned but I thought they seemed a little rushed trying to get the drum beats all going before getting into the song. Le Loup was excellent. Josh immediately mentioned that the 7 people on stage seemed a bit like Arcade Fire and he was right. They had intense energy, they all worked well together and everyone appeared to be having a good time. For a music lovers review, check out what Josh had to say about the show here.

Sunday was my relaxation time. I am participating in the Raw Diva’s Body Enlightenment System which began with a fast that was scheduled to start at 6pm on Saturday evening. Well, technically I didn’t start at 6. I was done with dinner by 7 but had a couple more beers afterwards. I feel only slightly bad about that…I still had a 19 hour fast and I think that the long haul is much more important than one mistake. So, I updated my blogs, followed up on some of the blogs I haven’t read in a while and read some of John Grisham’s The Appeal. Chris and I watched I am Legend tonight and much to my surprise, I enjoyed it. Perfect way to end the weekend, snuggled up on the couch with my man!

Chris & I had a fun Friday night playing cards and watching movies. We’re house sitting at my parents house & this was just what the doctor ordered as far as a relaxing night.
Movies we watched:
No Country for Old Men - Didn’t really like it.
Hook - Well, we didn’t actually watch this. I picked it from the Free HD Movies on Demand and Chris vetoed it. But, I own it on DVD and I LOVE IT!
Karate Kid - Yes, believe it or not, this is the first time I have watched this movie. I really, really liked it! Fun. And Mr. Miyagi is simply adorable!