Introvert

So hear I sit in front of the computer as random children scream off in the distance for no reason that I can figure out. They're either doing it to be annoying or vast numbers of them are being tortured. It's actually getting to the point soon that if they're not being tortured, I'm willing to go down there and work on it.

Hard to believe I don't have kids, isn't it?

I haven't been posting as much as normal. It's been surprisingly hard to get back into the swing of things. It's one of the reasons I always try to blog every day because once you get out of that habit, it's a complete pain in the ass to try and get back into your rhythm. It's all right to miss the occasional day of posting, but once you start missing three or four days in a row, well, then you've got to work to get back into the swing of it. I've been writing this blog for near four years straight now, with very few gaps or breaks. There's more than 1,400 posts accumulated. I'm not saying every post is filled with wit and wisdom, but you have to keep going to keep the writing muscles strong.

I mean, there's all the stories about the kids sleeping at NorthMart and I haven't written about that yet. So clearly I need to get on the ball.

So to make sure that happens, at least one post a day, every day, for the rest of the month. No more excuses. Hell, if I want to keep my plan of one post for every day of the year, I think I have some catching up to do. The last couple of weeks have seen me drift behind.

So let's see, what else...

Cathy and I actually did a rare thing last night...we were sociable. A couple of days ago Cathy did the Brigg-Myers personality test on Facebook. I did it a couple of years ago during a professional development course. Perhaps not surprisingly, we're both introverts (although Cathy argues, rightly, that I am far more introverted than she is). But here's the thing, which I never realized until the instructor explained it to me, is how much both physically and mentally it takes out of an introvert to go out and do things and be sociable.

When the instructor pointed it out, it was like a little light went off. It did make sense to me. I can be sociable, but I need far more recharging than most people.

Granted, there's always the risk of becoming too introverted. You do have to go and do things and be with people. So I was glad when one of my friends invited us out last night to a house party. One of Cathy's friends showed up as well and nearly had a stroke when we appeared. So yeah, we clearly need to break out of the shells a bit and go to a few more parties and see a few more people.

People seem to like us, so we really have no excuse for it. So that's also on the list of things to do from now on.

The only other thing to add is that we finally saw Up today. Circumstances contrived to prevent us from seeing it before now (for example, it doesn't open in Australia until September), but there was one last matinee at the local theatre that we greedily took advantage of. After it was over, the owner came in and asked people what they thought and then added "that's going to be nominated for Oscars, you watch."

He's absolutely right. And not just for Best Animated Picture, which is a lock. Since the Best Picture category has expanded to 10 nominees this year, I think Up is a lock there as well. It's the most sentimental and touching of the Pixar movies, but no less visually stunning and fun. And the critics were right, the first 10 minutes of the movie were absolutely devastating. If you don't get misty during that sequence you don't have a heart.

Is it the best Pixar movie? No, probably not, but that means it's only better than 98% of every animated movie of the past 20 years.

And for the record, this is my current Top 5 Pixar movies.
1. Monsters Inc (because this was the movie where I met Cathy so it will always be #1)
2. WALL-E
3. The Incredibles
4. Finding Nemo
5. Up

Last Five
1. Live on - Sloan
2. Glass onion - The Beatles
3. Beautiful thing - Andy Stochansky*
4. Eleanor Rigby - The Beatles
5. Lillian, Egypt - Josh Ritter