finally have the house semi decorated for the party (still have some work to do but first there has to be some cleaning). Also been finding the cafes at Lccc a good place to go between classes since their sandwiches are lowfat, cheap, and in decent variaty. Not a real meal by any means but it works out great since I am rarely hungry in the morning and I don't want to break my diet.

We can tell I have been sick. It took until last night for me to finally pick out a costume for the halloween party we are having. It should be interesting since I am going to be a hippy (dad would have killed me if I had been one before) and i got the funky jewelry and stuff. Just need to either paint up an old shirt or find a cheap tie dye that fits since I got some beat up jeans that will work great for it plus a tie die bandana. Was originally going to be a pirate but couldn't find anything that I wanted to wear or use and the idea of being a hippy sounded cool when I was at the costume shop the other day. I wish Halloween U.S.A had a store year round instead of having a shop only in October. They do have a website but it just isn't the same was wandering around the cool layout of the stores. Target and Walmart don't even come close to it, I will say that flat out!

Ghost hunters still hasn't stated what place they are thinking of going for Halloween so they might not be having the special. I hope that isn't the case because I love watching those shows. I mean I will busy with the party since I am in charge of the music. Got to love winamp and its playlist features.

I have to admit that I have been sick for a while. The reason I am admitting this is because I am getting better and now almost feel normal. I still cough occasionally and suffer from dry throat sometimes but I am not wheezing whenever I walk to class and can breath deeply again. It is strange the appriecation we get for things we normally take for granted when we lose them.

Greetings to anyone from LCCC's Internet Research Tools class that is viewing this blog. I have some information about myself to the right but I can provide more here. I hope you have fun with the widgets I have put up. I personally am a widget freak so that tends to be mostly what I add to it.

I am crazy about Nightmare Before Christmas as you can see by how often I have posted about it and the widget below. I am also nuts about dogs and fantasy beings such as dragons and wizards.

It is getting closer to Halloween and I have been keeping up with my favorite show ghost hunters. They haven't stated what place they are planning to investigate this Halloween but I hope it is as haunted as the last two places. I still am waiting for Nightmare before Christmas 3D to come out on dvd or blu ray but so far no luck. The closest I have got is Coraline which is wicked awesome in its own right. My family doesn't get why I adore 3D versions of stop motion films but they just add a depth nothing else does and increases the detail of the characters which is pure eye-candy to me.

Oh well, maybe Disney will eventually give in. At least I have Coraline, the TNBC 3D trailers, and some "old school" style nightmare before christmas 3D pictures to help me deal with my craving.

The images can be found at
http://www.joelfletcher.com/3d-nightmare.html

Be warned, you need the old red and blue glasses or similar to see these at their best.

I have been not very active lately as this blog can tell so I figured I would add some feeds to a couple blogs I follow. I posted feeds on the bottom of the page for anyone interested.

Recently I went to see Igor the movie and I found it very amusing. The majority of the professional critics didn't however and after reading several reviews, I got a headache from how almost identical they were. The most common complaint was that the style was a bland imitation of Tim Burton's work. This I have to disagree with greatly.

First of all, Tim Burton did not invent the general concept of distorted and Halloweenish characters. That is a concept that has been in all art mediums since humans bothered to make anything creative. Tim Burton's particular style of design was inspired by the German impressionists and I feel that the art in Igor takes more from that inspiration then Tim's work. Even if it was inspired in some way by Tim Burton, it isn't like his work is the only work that has those particular elements. Another individual that also produces works in a similar style is Henry Selick among others. In general, Igor's art style is much more colorful in its palette then any of Tim's work and creates a setting of gloom from a wide variety of colors instead of limiting the palette to a small number of colors as is done in Tim's best-known films.

The second biggest complaint is that the story is yet another "outsider struggling to find his/her place in the world" story. Hate to break it to them but it is practically impossible to be completely original. If anyone bothers to read most literature written today then compare it to common works in past ages, you will find plenty of similarities in terms of themes and (sometimes) plotlines. The thing people should be looking for isn't so much if the themes and skeleton of the story are original so much. They should be looking to see what was done differently. If they had bothered, they would have discovered that the film actually had plenty to offer them in that regards.

The third complaint is that it is just a "shrek" for the horror genre. To be honest, it is just another farce based on horror movies. Something that has been done but not enough in my opinion. Not a huge genre for children but there are plenty made for adults so it doesn't hurt to give kids a movie or too that is both funny and Halloweenish for them. Lets face it parents, which would you prefer for your kids? This or Scream? One thing to keep in mind is that it was aimed at kids. There are some witty moments that adults will like that most kids will miss but it is mostly a kids film so don't go in expecting a rival for Shrek. In other words, I love the Shrek series but complaints about how anything of a satiric nature in animation is now "trying to be another Shrek" is just getting old. Shrek did not invent farce and satire so lets drop it already and let us have some laughs!

In other words, don't listen to critics of these kind of films. Go see it yourselves or if you must have another opinion before going to it, ask your friends about it. They are more likely to give a reliable review of this and any movie that you might ever see.