Home Where My Music's Playing

We arrived home last night to three very excited dogs! You'd think we'd been gone for a year, or that Ren had abused them while we were away. Eric and I snuggled with those canines a lot and caught up with our Tivo. We still have quite a few shows to watch. It was so nice to sleep, for the second night in a row, in a real bed! My back was just on the brink of getting really sore, but is feeling so much better now.

Our trip to Park City, Utah for the Sundance Film Festival (followed by a one-night stop over in Las Vegas) was awesome! Good, good times. Three of our condomates were the same as last year. Added to that mix were two new ones and a few (two friends of ours plus one) who only stayed for part of the time. Everyone seemed to get along and we made do with some cramped quarters. I'm looking forward to hopefully renting a bigger place next year and getting a full bedroom.

My time consisted of little sleep, watching a lot of movies, and drinking a fair amount of alcohol. I initially forgot that we were in the mountains and couldn't figure out why I got so drunk so fast at the Filmmakers Alliance party. Oh yeah, the altitude. Duh. I finally felt like I was living up to my New Years' motto of "Eat less, drink more!" Well, the drink more part anyway. I did eat quite a bit too.

Here's a list of the Sundance films I saw:

• TV Junkie
• So Much So Fast
• Wristcutters: A Love Story
• The Darwin Awards
• Forgiving the Franklins
• small town gay bar
• American Hardcore
• Destricted

It feels like I saw more than that, but I guess that's it. I'm glad I saw all of the ones I did. I was somewhat disappointed by both The Darwin Awards and American Hardcore, but I don't regret seeing them. Both films were quite flawed, but had positive attributes as well. My favorite was definitely Forgiving the Franklins, which I only hope gets some kind of distribution. I'm not much of a writer or film reviewer, so check out my friend Matthew's review if you are interested. He sums it up quite nicely.

I did get shut out of two movies I wanted to see. The World According to Sesame Street, which Eric saw and enjoyed, and An Inconvient Truth, a documentary about global warming that was narrated by Al Gore.

I shouldn't forget to mention CondoDance, a private party/screening we hosted at our condo. I did watch several short films there, including a hilarious one about two serial killers trying to off each other. I can not remember the title though.

All in all, the trip was well worth it. We had smooth driving both to and from Utah, aside from some high winds leaving L.A. last week. Luckily Eric, who was feeling quite ill a few days prior to and the day we left, feels better and is now only plagued with the lingering cough that all of us who have been sick this winter seem to have. I did lose my Jack Skellington skull cap somewhere in Park City and had to buy a new hat at Albertson's. It was much, much colder this year and snowed quite a bit more. I didn't mind it though, as I knew that I'd be returning to the warmth and sunshine of Los Angeles!