Cousin Fun

Well, I thought it was time for another post, and since most people who read my blog are more interested in seeing pictures of Matthew than anyone else, I thought I would try to satisfy those desires.
These four pictures are of Matthew and his cousin Jake. Since, growing up, I was not around many cousins, it is really fun to see how much fun Matthew and Jake have together. It is like they are brothers when they see each other. That is, brothers who are only 3 months apart in age. That would be tough to do. Anyway.

The picture of them looking at the computer is because Matthew loves to watch my screensaver come on and pages through the pictures I have on the computer. He now identifies many of the people in the pictures. He knows some of the college students: Josh, David, Sparky, Jenny. He knows his cousins, of course. He knows Gramms and Papa. He knows Nana Patti and Pap Charro (still don't know where he got that one). And he knows many of the Aunts and Uncles also. And, yes, Dave, when the picture of you and him fit-bumping comes up, he says, "Fuzzy." That is one of my favorites.


Well, while I'm giving reports, I might as well throw out a few another things. For those of you who care, I got contacts.
I had wanted to for a while and now I am getting used to them. It only (ha ha) took me about a half hour to get them on the first time. Now it is pretty quick. I was worried that first night when I was struggling so much. I was thinking, "What have I got myself into? I did this for convenience sake, and now I am spending half an hour to get these in when I could just walk into the other room and throw on my glasses?!" Anyway, now it is way worth it, especially when I am wrestling around with Matthew. He used to grab for them, which was understandable. Now I'm safe because he does try to reach in and take out my contacts, but he doesn't yet have the hand-eye coordination to get in there, and when he gets close, I just shut my eye.
As a side benefit to the contacts, one of the students in the college group said that having contacts instead of glasses took some serious years off my appearance. I can't say that I
was disappointed to hear this. But it did bring me to ask him how old I looked with the glasses. To this he replied, "52." I think he was kidding. He said that I look 26 now, which is much closer to my real age (28, if you don't know).
So, as a random public service to move-watchers, I thought I would give a little help. I know that the holidays are a time to kick back and many movies are watched (and not only Christmas movies). So I thought I would give five movies to avoid as you're making your selections, and five underrated Christmas movies to check out.



Five Movies to Avoid:
5. Poseidon. See it only if you want to laugh and do Mystery Science 3000 with some friends while watching it. Hilarrious!
4. The Sentinel. I pretty much knew this would be dumb, but we watched it because Keifer was in it. Man, was it bad! The only cool part was hearing Keifer do his Jack Bauer lines: "Holster your weapon!" was my favorite.
3. House of Sand and Fog. I watched it on an airplane, and afterwards I wanted to jump. Maybe the most pointlessly depressing movie ever.
2. The Recruit. I know some people liked this one, but I thought it was so bad that it made me cringe.
1. Excalibur. It sounds like it should be a classic, but we rented it when we were on a craze of reading Stephen Lawhead books about Arthur. No joke: Worst move I have ever seen.

Five Underrated Holiday Movies:
5. Scent of a Woman. This one revolves around Thanksgiving. Amazing movie. Really powerful. One dialogue scene on the airplane that is worth fast-forwarding.
4. Edward Scissorhands. Actually, I don't know if it had anything to do with holidays, but there was snow and I think it has a good feel. Really imaginative movie.
3. Die Hard. Come on, it's a Christmas movie. It even ends with "Let it Snow," playing in the background.
2. The Family Man. Really great movie.
1. 24: Christmas Special. This is not really well-known, but 24 had a Christmas special that took place between seasons 3 and 4. Terrorists were looking to ruin the U.S. by giving kids even more presents than they were already getting so that they would grow up to be bigger brats than they already were. Jack had to race against time to find out who the mail carriers were working for and foil the plan to prevent this catastrophe. You may have to search Overstock.com or Ebay for this one since it is a bit less well-known, but if you find it, you will be glad you did.