Kids will be kids....right?

Today I've read an article about Suri Cruise (the daughter of Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise) that claims that she already has a $150,000.000 shoe collection. She's often photographed with her mother, using high heels and fur coats making her own mum (the adult) look more like a servant than anything else. She's also only 5. I not going to criticize a parent from giving her kid "everything she never had", specially since we are talking about a super Hollywood couple,however I can't help but think the amount of pressure that's not only in Suri but also in all the little kids who were not as lucky to be as rich as her.
When I was 5 I used to try everybody's shoes but my shoe collection was resumed to a pair of flip flops in the summer and a pair of sneakers in the winter. I was out playing all the time. I was a kid and even though we were in a really bad financial situation, I was happy. That was until I moved to middle school.
There everybody had a mobile, changed sneakers every 2/3 months and always had good clothes. My shoe collection, though, was still the same, had about three outfits that would wear all year round (track suits) and only had a mobile when I turned 18, that I've paid with my own summer money.
I was miserable, not because of my financial status, but because of all the pressure surrounding me to look good and well dressed. But my childhood, is still the sweetest memory that I have. I was a kid.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that the fact that this little girl is already on every media outlet and is considered a fashion icon at the age of 5 might be stealing her the joy of being a toddler and also putting extreme pressure on every 5 year old kid. Too soon for all that adult drama.
Let's let kids be kids, shall we ???

When does personal opinion become bullying ?

Everyday, religiously, I'll read three newspapers: the Correio da Manha (Portugal), the Daily Mail (United Kingdom) and the Boston Globe (US). I do this not only to know what is going on around the world but also to compare how the reporting is done from one country to another.
When it comes to reporting news, most journalists (no matter what country) are on the same page by following the number 1 rule of journalism: "neutrality" resuming their job to simply "report".This is the news section. For the celebrity/showbiz section there's a whole other issue going on.
The other day I was reading the Daily Mail and there was this article about Kloe and Kourtney Kardashian. The title was something like: "Kloe and Kourtney: the long and short of it (refering to their height)" with a subtitle that went as follows: " Well, at least one won the size battle."
As I said before, the article turned out to be about their height, but considering the fact that Kloe has been under severe scrutiny because of her weight lately, I consider this journalist's writting filled with double-meaning. In a camouflaged way, I think he was actually intending to be mean about her shape.
The interesting part of it is the fact that the Daily Mail is known for writting several (good) articles about "curves", "health" and "women shapes and sizes" so my question is what side are they on ?
a little further down there's the "oh-so-lovely-NOT" public comments section.
I'm always gobsmacked by the amount of rubbish that these people publish. There's a lot of angry people out there but to let it all out in a newspaper comment section? Really though? Completely unnnecessary.
Another fine example on how to be a terrible TV presenter (and downright bully) is Graham Norton (an UK tv host) from the Graham Norton Show.
This man makes me question the hiring proccess at TV stations.... I've stopped watching his show (he was always terrible but at least his celebrity guests were good-which amazes me even more!!!!) when he presented an European dance competition (similar to Eurovision) and trashed Portugal at every chance he had. Sad but true. And he didn't stop here. EVERYTIME there's a competition of this sort he manages to slant another country with his very unique style.
This leads me to two questions:
Why and HOW does he always get picked to do these shows? AND HOW is he on TV?
In my opinion, and as a Communications major, he's everything a communicator should NEVER be.
There's a very fine line between personal opinion and bullying but at the end of the day it's all about being professional.

The Girl with Dragon Tattoo ... and how Stieg Larsson became the Stephen King of Sweden after his death

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo... the first time that I've came across this book I was seating down at some random chair at Border's waiting for my mum. I was so desperately bored that I've picked that book and I remember thinking: "who in their right mind would buy this? It's probably another annoying book about how some girl went dark and yada, yada, yada." I started reading it anyway and quickly realized that I was SO wrong. After I went through the first pages I was hooked. Needless to say that I've bought the book and read it all in two days. This is a story of an antisocial, extremely introverted and completely pierced girl named Lisbeth Salander who is a computer hacker and very good at was she does. She's hired by Henrik Vanger who partners her with Mikael Blomkvist, a disgraced journalist for the magazine Millenium (curiously the name of the whole Larsson's book series or aka hint for sequels). They're job is to find out who killed Harriet Vanger but what would be at first a simple investigation turns out to be something a lot more complex than that. I immediately started researching Larsson's other books (I firmly believed that there HAD to be a sequel to that story and this time I was right) and the two following ones came up: "The Girl who played with Fire " and "The Girl who kicked the Hornet's Nest" both of which I've wasted no time in reading it (please note that I'm not that much of a reader but I am an incurable cinephile and these stories, along with King's, keep my creativity flowing). Having studied filmmaking before, I could visualize almost instantly how those stories would work in a movie: "what shots would I use ?" , "what kind of actors would fit in these heavily concentrated characters ?", "what would be places used for the shooting?"  and so on. It turns out that I wasn't alone. Danish director Niels Arden Oplev tought the same thing and along with filming it  in Sweden (using both Stockholm and other Swedish rural areas) he did a spectacular job in casting Swedish actor Michael Nyqvist and the superb Swedish actress Noomi Rampace (yes, Salander is my new hero due to Rampace's terrific performance). Considering the movie was all filmed in Swedish (which showed true loyalty to the original story) it achieved the unthinkable by breaking European box offices like never before.
The new Hollywood version of it it's coming out on the 21st of December 2011 and if you haven't yet I suggest you read the book before you go watch it. Believe me, it's worth it  :-)

Fun 107 and its 'special' way of overplaying music...

Today after my 9 hour shift, I drove back home and turn on the radio only to hear "E.T." by Katy Perry which so happened to be the same song I had just listened to not even 5 minutes before leaving work. SO ANNOYING !!!
It seems to me that radio stations these days, FUN 107 specially, seem to play the same songs from the same artists over and over again which causes two (bad) things: it overplays the song, which is never good, and it keeps other artists from having some play time too.
I dare to say that this reminds of the payola scandals back in the 1950's. Why are theses artists on at all times?
Personally, I love Rihanna but her latest hits, "Only girl in the World", "What's my name?" and "California King Bed" specifically, make me want to pull my own hair out everytime they come up... which happens to happen every 5 minutes... it's mind blogging !!!
The other day, I came accross a band called Crystal Antlers that my friend accidentally downloaded to her Ipod, and it quickly became one of my favorites. I'm saddened that I never get to hear these amazing bands on the radio because of fact that these stations are polluted with comercial garbage... ENOUGH !

Since when did vampires become so interesting ????

Twilight, True Blood, The Vampire Diaries ... It's official: now that the boy wizard fever has toned down the vampires had invaded Earth.
It all started with a couple: Bella and Edward.
In Twilight you have this 400 year old vampire, whose a bit of a loner, hanging around in school until one day he saves this girl from being attacked by a bunch of creeps.
From then on there's several culprits to this love story in the sequels New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn (the last divided in two sequels just like the Harry Potter finale - surprise, surprise). Before I could even catch my breath TV became invaded by everything vampire. Well, to be fair, it was kind of invaded before with Buffy, the vampire slayer but though it was a very popular show, it was nothing compared to this.
Even books are being read on the suject, with everyone at my job (I work at a Dunkin Donuts and I'm NOT included in this mix) swaping copies of the Twilight Saga.
To be honest, and as cool as it may seem now, vampires and wizards were never really my thing. And as soon as something starts to contaminate everything else it makes me lose interest because it stopped being original. So let's keep it fresh shall we ?????

P.S.: by the way I did see the first Twilight movie, and even though I do think Edward is cute (in a weird, 'vampirish' way) I did not wait on the line for the 12 00 am screening nor did I see any of the ones that followed suit.
 :-)

Woody Allen ... what's the secret ????? (if there's any that is...)

Woody Allen is a veteran director who's been making movies for like ever.
As controversial as he might seem in his personal life, I cannot help but to be amazed at how he does his movies.
I used to overanalyze them in every aspect ... how does he create the scripts??? does he even write the scripts ???? why does improvising seem to be a very common method used by his stars???? why do the characters do what they do ???? is there any reason to it or none at all????
So many questions.....
Recently I've watched Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Annie Hall.
Let me start with the latter.
Annie Hall, for those who haven't watched it, is about the relationship of Alvy, a kind of anxious comedian, and Annie, the ditzy part of said relationship.
Both characters are so different that their realtionship ends up being somewhat tumultuous, and after many on/off's they break up for good. The movie ends back in New York with both characters and their different partners and questioning what really is a realationship.... Now without wanting to sound like to much of a 'Juliet' this movie pretty much says it all about relationships. They cannot be overanalyzed and in order for you to understand and move on to better things heartbreaks and disappoitments have to take place.
In Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Allen takes relationships to a whole other level. Vicky and Cristina are both American and together they travel to Barcelona for the summer to meet up with some friends that live there. They are completely different from each other. The first is the smart one who is engaged (and eventually ends up married) and is studying for her masters and the latter is the one who doesn't know what she wants from life and/or love.
They both fall for a painter, Juan Antonio, who likes them both but who also has a crazy relationship with his ex wife-the emotionally and mentally unstable Maria Elena.
After some unexpected twists both women return to America in the end with Vicky leading her 'perfect' married life, Cristina only knowing what she doesn't want in hers and Juan Antonio and Maria Elena separate yet again. If you try to overanalyze and explain why do these characters act the way they do, you'll quit before you know it. That's why that for the latest Woody Allen movie 'Midnight in Paris', another one of Allen's very own relationship comedies, I'm not going to make any judgement or preconceived notion. It is what is because it feels like being it. And that's that.
:-)

Technology, Technology, Technology ... its everywhere but that doesnt necessarily mean that I'm good at it !!!!

It seems to be everywhere these days. Tonight, as I'm sitting at my desk, I have my laptop on, my Blackberry right next to it, my sister makes sure that I can clearly hear the radio and my mum is very inbterested in the latest episode of her favorite soap opera.
But just because it seems like we're surrounded by something 24/7 it doesn't mean that we are actually good at it.
In my case, the situation is so bad that I've spent the past hour and a half trying to figure out how to comment on a classmate's blog. Still didn't get it.
Same with my phone. I just figure out the basic stuff I need to know like how to sms and how to activate my email account on it so I can be kept up to date when I'm somewhere where laptops are not permitted.
Maybe it doesn't help the fact that I'm much more of a talking person than a technology person. It's much easier for me to ask directions in French or order food in Spanish, than to comment on a blog.
Maybe I'm just to much of a bookworm who only got her first computer when she was 20, and therefore couldn't quite exactly hone my computer skills like many of my age.
Or just maybe because my comment hadn't really that much of an interesting opinion and therefore save me the problem of public embarassment by not allowing me to submit it.
Either way, I guess that at 12:52 pm after several attempts, I'll just take a break and try it again tomorrow. I'm pretty sure I'd be able to do it by then. :-)