The King's Speech

The King's Speech is a movie based on the true story of Bertie, King George VI of England.  It chronicles his quest to overcome his speech impediment, a stutter that he has suffered with since his early childhood.  His wife, Elizabeth, the future Queen Mother, arranges for her husband to see a speech therapist, Lionel Logue.  Logue uses many exercises to help Bertie loosen his jaw muscles, strengthen his diaphragm, and find confidence in his own voice. 

After the death of his father, King George V, his brother becomes king.  But King Edward VIII cannot uphold the title or the job, and has to pass the crown his brother, Bertie, the Duke of York.  He begins his rule just as England is on the brink of war with Germany.  The country desperately needs to hear the King's voice for reassurance, so King George VI trains with Logue to deliver flawless speeches.  With the support of Logue, his family, and the government leaders, King George VI is able to overcome his stutter and become an inspiration of success for his country.

I highly recommend this movie.  It was amazing.  Hands down, the best movie I have seen since Black Swan.  The story is inspiring, the characters are sensational, and the message is touching.  Truly a story of companionship, trust, and faith.  In addition, The King's Speech has some great witty jokes and comments that help juxtapose the scenes that reflect the King's anxiety and unhappiness concerning his stutter.

No Strings Attached

On Saturday I saw No Strings Attached with Andrea.  This is a romantic comedy starring Ashton Kutcher and Natalie Portman.  The basic plot is boy and girl meet, boy and girl like each other, girl is afraid to fall in love, boy and girl end relationship, and then boy and girl try to resolve what could have been lost.  The plot has been done many times with many different actors and place settings, and while the movie was overall a crowd pleaser with a couple of great one liners, it didn't surpass any other movies of its type.  It merely just falls in line with all the other romantic comedies that have this same plot. 

Even though the plot was stereotypical, I found the actors quite appealing.  Natalie Portman does a good job portraying the insecure, awkward, smart, and pretty girl, and Ashton Kutcher definitely can put on the charm of the cute, hopeless romantic that makes woman drool.  Also, Kutcher is looking real good these days...and I mean REAL good.  The lead characters were backed up by their funny and quick witted friends whom they turn to for relationship advice.  These characters are what keep the movie from becoming predictable and overdone, and are the reason that many people will probably see this movie.

Thus, I found No Strings Attached charming and cute, a good date night movie or chick flick with the girls.  I would recommend it to anyone would like to have a good laugh and to watch a movie that can just let one unwind or relax for the evening.

Anguished English

"Bloopers and Blunders, Fluffs and Flubs, Goofs and Gaffes"

For Christmas I got a desk calendar that has hilarious linguistic lapses from advertisements, signs, newspaper headlines, and other everyday sources.  Each day contains a lapsa lingua with a header describing where it was found.  Here is a list of some of my favorites for January:

January 11, 2011:
Title: School Daze
"The poet Dante stood with one foot firmly planted in the Middle Ages while with the other he saluted the rising dawn of the Renaissance."

January 20, 2011:
Title: Stop the Presses
"Following the brawl at 5 East Broad St., Detective Delvecchio said, Officer Michael Murphy of the Farmington Police drove down Orchard Street with his department's police dog addressing the crowd."

If you do not get it the first time, read it again, or out loud, and you will find what is wrong with the statement. 

In addition, I came across some funny double entendres the other day:

"Include your children when baking cookies."
"Police begin campaign to run down jaywalkers."
"Drunks get 9 months in violin case."
"Kids make nutritious snacks."

I hope you enjoyed these hilarious statements, and got a good laugh from them! I will keep posting my favorites from the "Anguished English" calendar at the end of each month.

America's Best and Worst Job Markets

Forbes has put together a list of the best and worst job markets in America.  So if you are on the job hunt, perhaps this list will help you find the right place to start your search.

Top 10 best job markets:
10. Hartford, Connecticut: insurance industry hub
9. New York, NY: jobs from health care to finance
8. Salt Lake City, Utah: young, educated, low business costs, growing populations, and transportation hub
7. Milwaukee, Wisconsin: health care and education
6. Baltimore, Maryland: military base and research hub.
5. Oklahoma City, Oklahoma: retail and leisure, energy and government related jobs
4. Minneapolis-St.Paul, Minnesota: manufacturing and professional services, accounting, retail and tourist destination
3. Austin, Texas: technology hub
2. Boston, Massachusetts: tech and financial hub
1. Washington, D.C.: government and government related jobs

Top 10 worst job markets:
10. Orlando, Florida: "Live by the sword of tourism, die by the sword of tourism"
9. Jacksonville, Florida: slowdown in manufacturing and packaging
8. Providence, Rhode Island: high energy costs and low income/cost of living ratio
7. San Diego, California: defense industry reduction
6. Los Angeles, California: high foreclosures and sluggish economic growth for film and tourism
5. Sacramento, California: budget crisis, pay cuts, and sharp decline in construction
4. Detroit, Michigan: auto industry problems
3. Miami, Florida: real estate bust
2. Riverside, California: real estate bust
1. Las Vegas, Nevada: economy built on tourism and was hit hard be recession with a decline in home prices and construction jobs

Follow this link to find an interactive map of unemployment rates across the nation.  You can find your state and city to see whether or not it has been hit hard by the recession.
http://www.forbes.com/2011/01/04/interactive-unemployment-map-counties-economy-graphs.html

Follow this link to read the whole article: http://www.forbes.com/2011/01/06/best-and-worst-places-for-jobs-business-beltway.html?boxes=businesschannellighttop

Happy New Year 2011

To ring in the New Year, I went up to Connecticut to visit Josh.  On New Year's Eve, I took the bus to Penn Station in New York City and met Josh there.  Then we went to Brooklyn to visit his cousin.  We all had lunch and hung out for a few hours and then we went to Long Island to spend New Year's Eve with a friend and his family.  Our friend's family made a huge dinner, and we had appetizers and dessert.  It was delicious!  And they had amazing champagne!  We played Apples to Apples before watching the ball drop on TV.  I can't believe it's 2011!  I have not made any resolutions for this year....I still need to think about them.  Anyway, after watching the ball drop, we went to bed because we were so exhausted from traveling all day.

On Saturday Josh and I drove from Long Island to his mom's house in Connecticut.  The scenery driving up there was so gorgeous!  They live in the mountains and there was a lot of snow up there, so it was very picturesque.  It took about two hours for us to get there and when we arrived we were pretty hungry so we went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant called Senior Ponchos.  After lunch, Josh and I just hung out at his house for the rest of the day.  In the evening we watched Eat, Drink, Man, Woman.  I saw that movie in an Anthropology class I took in college and I really enjoyed it.  It is about a Chinese family and their relationship as a family compared with their relationships with their lovers.  It also involves cooking! I know it seems random, but you have to watch it to understand how the food correlates with love.  Also, it is in Chinese, so you have to read the English subtitles.  Josh didn't like it as much as I did.  He described it as an "Asian chick flick." lol.

On Sunday, Josh and I went into NYC to do some sightseeing.  First we went to the Metropolitan Museum Art.

 Inside the museum, I spotted this beautiful Tiffany's necklace!

 On our way to Rockefeller Center, we walked by the Plaza Hotel, the one from Home Alone 2

And then we walked by Trump Tower.

 Then we saw St. Patrick's Cathedral.  I love the architecture!

 At Rockefeller Center, we took a quick picture at the tree.  It was so crowded that we only stayed for about 10 minutes.

  We then went to Times Square and saw where the ball dropped.

Our last stop before heading back to the bus station was Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum.  Here are a few pictures of the celebrities we ran into:

 Josh with Tyra Banks

 Me with Johnny Depp

 Josh with former president Nixon

 Me with the Spice Girls

Josh and I with Lady Gaga.

The wax museum was so much fun!  I actually didn't think the wax people looked as real as what people had told me, but it was still cool.  On our way back to Penn Station, we walked by Foley's Irish Pub in NYC!  I had to get a picture:

That concludes my trip to NYC and Connecticut.  I hope you all had a great celebration for the New Year and are looking forward to 2011.