I suppose I can share some of my personal presents. From my grandmother, I got a cologne. This cologne had leaked, so it really, really stank--yet fascinatingly enough, our dog absolutely LOVED it. As in, on the spot I had opened the spilled present, he was rubbing...and rubbing...and rubbing himself, over and over and over again. Later, he rubbed against my hand, which I could smell trace remnants of the cologne on, too.
There were also cases of minds thinking alike--two people got the latest Die Hard film, for instance. And then, there were my gifts. My family knows I make a webcomic, apparently. I didn't actually know they knew I posted stuff online. (I mean, I scan it, but I didn't know they knew it was something I shared with others online.) Fortunately, it appears none of them have done their research on what said webcomic IS. It would be ridiculously easy for them to find Red Hood Rider online. (The main fact I have in favor of obscuring it is that it is a close enough title to Red Riding Hood that there are lots of irrelevant results).
There aint a mirror in existence which doesn't make it immediately obvious the author/artist is a girl. So, yeah. It's a good thing they don't actually follow through on their research. But they do at least KNOW that I am an artist. Sooooooooooooo...my sister got a bunch of colored pencils for me, along with sketchbooks for them. Then, my MOM got me a bunch of colored pencils, with sketchbooks to use them in. Also included: each of them bought a smaller book for me to write notes in. You know, the kind of thing I've thought would be handy before, a pocket-sized notebook to write thoughts down as I have them for better blogging.
So, lots of duplicates there. Also included was Kubo and the Two Strings, a film I want to see but haven't yet had the chance to. (It's something important enough to me that I absolutely did not want spoilers for it.) There was plenty of good, funny stuff which happened, yet I can't really vocalize it, unfortunately.
After we finished, we four kids went to see Star Wars: Rogue One. I knew the spoilers about the end, and was surprised that my siblings were okay with it. I thought it was actually a pretty decent film, and my siblings echoed the thoughts about it that I had read others, and which I myself therefore noticed and agreed about. It was, in summary, pretty good. I thought it could have been handled better in some ways, and there's plenty of flawed logic involved, but it was FAR less annoying than the seventh film was, I'll say that.
And given my critical view of modern action films, that's as close to glowing praise as I can give. In some ways, I actually have to say I admire the guts of the filmmakers for this film. Not everything they did worked perfectly, but a lot of it worked well. While there were some small things which felt they were there just to make money (for instance, Jin's final outfit with the two swords looks made to be a toy), but for the most part, in contrast with the seventh film which REEKED of cash-grabbing, this film actually felt authentic. It may not have been perfect, but I actually felt like it could have fit as expanded universe material, which it is supposed to be.
I mean, sure. It wasn't perfect. It had flaws. It probably contradicts film canon in a dozen different ways. But even the films themselves do so, yet alone the original expanded universe material. The general rule for that seems largely to be, "make it as consistent as possible, knowing that there is no way to make it 100% consistent since consistency with one thing contradicts another". But I suppose that's the hazard of handling such an immense franchise as Star Wars, so overall, I'd say the film did really good.
Also, my family is done with Chuck. We finished the last episode. It was alright, but could have been handled better than it was.
Let's see...what else? Today was Christmas dinner, meaning it was a big meal. The main event aside from that was...*shudder*...tree packing. You know the drill. My hands were not only filthy by the time we finished, they were also freezing. As in, I couldn't feel my fingertips, freezing. As in, my hands felt pain from the electrical signal to move, frozen. Not fun, and also really revolting.
And speaking of packing...we're doing that tonight, because we leave tomorrow. At least, us kids do. This...will prove somewhat challenging for me, since I have more stuff now than I started with. We also have one less car than before, and I didn't bring anything which could be left behind, aside from maybe a few games here and there. Basically everything I brought needs to come home, for one reason or another. Using it for art, for the most part. Also, pillow/blanket. That sort of thing. Oh, and clothes. Those, too, need to come back, especially since I may have brought with me the equipment I use at staff meetings.
This also means I've got a long night ahead of me. Wish me luck--I will need it. But hey. If all goes extremely well, you'll have blog posts from me starting tomorrow! Now if you don't mind...I kinda need to start packing my computer.