A visit to Stars Hollow

Another reason I wanted to visit SoCal is to step into the world of Stars Hollow. I saw a post on Pinterest once that said "Visit Stars Hollow" and linked to the WB Studio Tour. I knew I had to go!

The Starbucks barista at the WB lot spelled my name right!

The WB Studio Tour is pretty cool and very informative. Our guide, Jose, was excellent and pointed out all the cool things about the studio lot. You can tell he loves movies and TV. Before coming on this tour I felt like I watched a lot of TV. That was not the feeling afterward.

Well, because they are in the midst of filming the Gilmore Girls revival for Netflix we were not able to see as much of Stars Hollow as I hoped. I was pleased with the small parts I did see--Luke's diner and Lorelei's house and car.

Just a small piece of Luke's Diner

This was the Pie Hole from Pushing Daisies at one point

Everything was Batman vs Superman theme for the new release

The prop house

I've never really watched Friends, but this photo op was a must.

Oscars are quite heavy!

We also went to Medieval Times! We had the blue knight. He ended up dying, but he lasted awhile. It was a fun show and good food!

Spouses Night Out: Mad Men

If you remember from this post, I helped plan some tables for the annual Spouses Night Out at our base. The event was a couple weeks ago and pictures were posted the other day, so I am happy to share them with you.

Our group's theme was Mad Men and we filled our three tables with great vintage items.

The first table was based on the office or work part of the show. We featured a bar cart, coat rack and office items. I searched far and wide for a bar cart and am happy to have found the one we used. Now it lives in my house. One of the girls found the typewriter for only $10! What a deal! Also, a local antique store let us borrow a bunch of items for free--rotary phone, really neat lighters, ash trays, and other bar items. You can't really see the ads we printed out, but we used ads that were related to men likes ties and office furniture.

The second table was based on the home life in the series. It had a TV tray, ironing board and lots of kitchen items on it.This table featured ads related to the home like cereal, clothes, and appliances.

Our third table was kind of a short-notice addition. I decided to make it travel themed because our master bedroom has a lot of vintage-style travel ads. Plus I have a Pan Am bag (not original, but in the style). These ads obviously dealt with travel.

We could bring "treats" to share at the event. On one episode, they made stuffed celery for a party; I thought that would be a great treat to share. Plus it was really easy to make! Everyone said the stuffed celery was tasty. I also made a jell-o mold, but it was not eaten...just for looks. 

Everyone was encouraged to dress to the theme and our girls did a great job! We are lucky to have a neat vintage clothing shop near the base and the owner was super helpful. Luckily I already had a dress and shoes to wear. I replicated the Betty Draper hair the best I could.

The other table themes were: The Flintstones, Downton Abbey, The Price is Right, Big Bang Theory, Duck Dynasty, Miss America, Project Runway, Survivor, Bones, Batman, Once Upon a Time, The Office, and Monday Night Football. Everyone did a wonderful job. The Flintstones, for example, actually built a Flintstones car.

They announced next year's theme at the end of the night. It is board games! A couple of us already have started thinking about how big we can make it!

Behind the times

My week without Charles has been pretty boring. He's having fun on vacation and we've been able to talk a couple of times which was more than I thought we would. Technology is great!

Since he's been gone, I reinstated our Instant Streaming portion of Netflix. We got rid of that part when they changed the pricing and before I had a job. But I figured it would keep me entertained while he was away.

So far, I've watched the last season of Army Wives. I got hooked on that show last year while he was at Tech School all thanks to Netflix. It's a great show and comes close to capturing what military life is like, although some of the story lines are a bit far fetched. It was a good season.

Now I'm on to Mad Men. I'm a little behind the times with watching this show. I don't know when it first came out, but it has always been on the back of my mind to watch. My sister likes the show. I have to say that I'm disgusted with the majority of the characters, but I find myself engrossed in the show, nonetheless. Each episode brings something even more awful, but you are also shown small glimpses of why the characters are so awful. Plus, I love all the clothes and the style from that era. I wish I could travel back in time, stock up on a bunch of gorgeous dresses and return home to enjoy them all. And it's interesting to see a little how advertising worked back then. It makes me wonder how accurate some of the dialogue and scenes are. Where women really treated that horribly? Did women really let men treat them like that? I think some women still let men treat them like that, but I hope, as a whole, we're better than that now.

Under the knife

Tomorrow I am getting my wisdom teeth taken out. I'm not at all excited (I guess no one really would be). The last time I had surgery was when I was a baby and I don't remember anything about it. We've stocked the pantry with soft foods (soup, pudding, Jamba Juice popsicles--which are amazingly delicious). I'm not sure when I'll be feeling up to posting, so I just wanted to give everyone a head's up.

One thing that I am excited for is that most of my TV shows start back this week. Last week Parenthood started back. I was underwhelmed by the season premiere so hopefully the rest of the season is better.

Tomorrow the Sing-Off premiers. If you haven't watched it, it's the most awesome singing competition because it's all A Capella. The past two years it has been on right before Christmas while all the other shows were on break. This year, they are bringing it out early. For both of the previous seasons I was able to guess who was going to win from the very first episode, so I'm wondering if I'll be able to do that again. However, I'll probably be too sleepy or drugged out to even watch it. Thankfully I can watch it online later this week.

Also starting back this week--Modern Family, Grey's Anatomy, The Office and Parks and Recreation. The only other show we watch (Chuck) doesn't start back until October and it will be it's final season.

Gilmore Girls inspired wall decor

I've been feeling very uninspired lately. Part of it is the fact that I've been feeling down about the lack of prospects in my job search. And part of it was that I've been too busy with my parents coming to town and now my brother-in-law will be visiting.

However, last week I did come up with a fun art project for my half bath. As you all know, my favorite TV show is Gilmore Girls. I've been watching it for the billionth time and I'm now on the last season. In the first episode there is a quote that I absolutely love. I though it would be cute painted on something and hung somewhere in my house. I was at Michael's and they had all their canvas on sale so I got a 12x12 sized one. I painted it to match the rug in the guest room. I was very impressed with my near accuracy at matching some of the colors that are in the rug. Then I printed out the quote and transferred to the best of my ability onto the painted canvas. I rubbed pencil on the back and wrote over the print-out so the words would transfer. It worked pretty well after I got the pencil rubbing dark enough. Then I wrote over it with a Sharpie. It turned out really cute.

The quote reads, "It's like my life isn't even real to me unless you're there and you're in it and I'm sharing it with you..."

* This post was shared on the following Link Parties:

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Spunky Junky
Homework

Tube Time

I have a list of topics to blog about and today I have chosen to write about all the TV shows I watch. When I think about the shows I watch, I feel like I watch a lot of TV. But the TV is hardly ever on.

Chuck (NBC)
It's about a Nerd Herd (think Geek Squad at Best Buy) guy that turns into a CIA spy. He basically has a "computer" in his brain and he'll flash on things that matter to the CIA. For example, he can look at some evil looking guy and know that he's the arms dealer from Mexico that they need to catch. He can also flash and instantly be able to do kung fu or other useful things. Charles got me hooked on it. We were unsure if it would be coming back for another season (it's always up in the air), but we heard that NBC re-upped.

Parenthood (NBC)
I was unsure about this one before it started. NBC really hyped it up, but they did so for a good reason. It's a great show about a family of brothers and sisters and their families. The characters are easy to relate to. I think I heard it's coming back next season.

The Office (NBC...seeing a pattern here?)
I jumped on the Office bandwagon a few seasons after it started. Last season was a little weird, but it got better. And this season has been pretty good. I honestly haven't watched it in the past month or two. Charles didn't get to watch it because it started while he was at BMT and they didn't have the older episodes online for him to catch up on. So I'm just going to wait and see the end of the season on DVD.

Parks and Recreation (NBC)
I absolutely love this show! It's filmed like the Office, except the show is about the Parks and Rec department of Pawnee, ID. I love the main character, Leslie. She is so naive and optimistic about local government. It's very endearing. The show makes me really want to work for the local government. If only they weren't so broke right now...

Modern Family (ABC)
It's another faux-documentary comedy and it's hilarious! This is another one that I haven't watched in the past two months because Charles hasn't been able to catch up with it.

Grey's Anatomy (ABC)
I got stuck on this show a little late in the game, as well. But I have recently back tracked, so I've seen all the episodes I've missed. Thank you Netflix! It's a very addicting show. It always makes me appreciate having Charles in my life and makes me appreciate life in general. It also scares that crap out of me. Some of the things on the show are just crazy!

I love being able to watch the shows I've missed online. I think NBC has a better website for it. But both are good enough for me. :)

One of the Gilmore Girls

Gilmore Girls is my all-time favorite TV show. It started during my 8^th grade year, although I didn’t actually start watching it until the 2^nd season. It was on for 7 seasons and I have acquired all seven. Of course, I have watched the seasons several times. Recently, due to my lack of a job, I have started watching the series again. This is probably the 4^th or 5^th time that I have watched Gilmore Girls. And it’s possible that I have watched it more than that. 

Things I love about Gilmore Girls:

• Main characters—Lorelei and Rory Gilmore. They have a great mother-daughter relationship. Since Rory is about a year older than me, I always felt a connection to her. I watched as she graduated high school and started college. If Rory could do something, then I could handle it too. Although, she was pretty lucky and got a dream job right after graduation. But she also went to Yale and I did not.
• The Lorelei and Luke Dynamic. Luke owns the diner in town and throughout the series they leave you wondering if they will ever get together.
• The characters in the town. They live in a small town outside of Hartford, CT, called Stars Hollow. The town folk are hilarious and very quirky. (Hartford is not exactly what I imagined. Charles and I visited CT last summer. Stars Hollow is a fictional town)
•  The dialogue. It’s fast-paced, filled with cultural references and witty. It keeps you on your toes.
• The dynamic between Lorelei and her parents. Lorelei grew up in Hartford with her wealthy parents (think Rolls Royce). But she never felt like she fit in and then she got pregnant at 16 and moved out. So her parents have a long-held grudge and Lorelei resents them for how they raised her. The way their relationship evolves over the series is really interesting. 

One of the characters, Kirk, seems to work at every business in Stars Hollow at some point over the course of the series. I feel slightly Kirk-ish in that sense. It seems like I’m just going to work at various seemingly meaningless jobs over the course of my life. I know that’s probably not the case, but lately I feel doomed to work retail the rest of my life.

social network

I finally rented The Social Network from Netflix (I love Netflix, by the way. I don't know why everyone doesn't use it). I had heard the movie was really good and I was interested to watch it because I owe a big, important chunk of my life to Facebook. As many of you already know, my husband and I met via Facebook. I joked that we should invite the creator of Facebook to our wedding. Anyway, I didn't think the movie itself was that amazing. Charles refused to watch it with me because he didn't care to watch a movie about rich people fighting over money. I didn't think that's all it was going to be about. However, that's pretty much what it was about. If you haven't already watched the movie, don't bother. It's about rich people fighting over millions of dollars and Mark just settles with them anyway.

But it did get me thinking...during one part of the movie the president of Harvard says something about how the students just want to invent new jobs instead of finding one. I have to say that I agree and I am guilty of wanting to do that, as well. I absolutely hate the job search, especially because it feels like I'll never find anything. But only if I could stumble across some billion dollar idea... Of course that's very misleading. Just because you come up with a billion dollar idea doesn't mean you don't have to work hard to make that billion dollars.

I do think it's amazing how Facebook has evolved and become such a major part of everyones' lives. Almost everyone I know uses Facebook. We all update Facebook regularly. We all look at Facebook regularly. It must be amazing to be the creator of Facebook and know that you changed the way people interact forever (or at least until the next big technology comes along).