Back! From! Mount Rushmore!
Yes, my peoples, I am finally back from my week long trek halfway across America to South Dakota, home of Mount Rushmore, for our nation's beloved holiday celebrating our independence from England. <3
Seriously, I saw so much awesome on this trip... I went to Idaho again, which is a favorite state of mine because it is so much like Oregon PLUS it has a theme park (Silverton) which is super fun and includes a water park. I got my face painted with the flag and Krista got red, white, and blue fireworks painted exploding across her face. GOOD TIMES.
We also went to Yellowstone to see Old Faithful and basically to be able to say we've been. We saw a moose, deer, antelope-like animals, more deer, an owl, more deer, and buffalo. And deer.
In South Dakota, we obviously checked out Mt. Rushmore like mad, which was so awesome to see in person finally. I loved the fireworks show - the end in particular was spectacular - although I think the fireworks show in Seaside, OR still wins in terms of general awesome. Mt. Rushmore is a close second though.
Since for some reason they do fireworks on the third instead of the fourth, we spent the actual holiday wandering around the Rapid City area - we checked out the Reptile Gardens (they had birds of prey, snakes, giant tortoises, crocodiles/alligators, and various other small reptiles), went down a giant slide thing, did some window shopping, swam in the grossest lake I have ever tried to swim in in my whole LIFE, went back to our campsite to wash off that nasty lake after only about 5 minutes of attempting to swim in it, and then had story time.
We got through the entire "House of Many Ways" on this trip (by Diana Wynne Jones), which is the next installment in the "Howl's Moving Castle" novels. (The first sequel is "Castle in the Air") It was, of course, quite fabulous, but I could have done with more Howl and Sophie time. Also, children ruin everything, so they really should be in stories as little as possible (I'm looking at you, Morgan).
Anyway, we spent all of Saturday and today driving back home for the most part, but it was all fun and awesome. On the way home yesterday we stopped by Devil's Tower in Wyoming, which is the first ever national monument, and checked out that business. On the way home today, we stopped by Pendleton and ate a feast :D Good times.
That is the short version of my trip, but suffice it to say that we roughed it better than 90% of the other campers. We actually slept every night of this trip though, so we had it a lot easier than normal.
Now, I caught up a bit on So You Think You Can Dance (yeah, I taped it and watching it was the first thing I did when I got home). Unfortunately, I didn't manage to tape the results show for some reason, but I at least saw all the performances.
Okay, first off, Mia Michaels, I really like your blonde hair. I don't know why, but I think it suits you and I like it. Second of all, you were really low key and tame this episode, which is so unlike you. I really liked your behavior. And since I would not be the least bit surprised if you search the internet for your name (hey, I do it too), you should know that I think your choreography this episode for Twitchington was hella fabulous. Seriously.
I mean, Mark and Chelsea are my favorite couple (with Katee and Joshua as a close second) but I really love your routines, especially when done by a good couple like Twitchington. <3
Anyway, I need to rewatch all this, because it was too much for me to process and I am tired, but I still love Comfort and I miss Chris :C *teeeaaarrr* and I don't care for Comfort's new partner Thaine/Thayne/whatever. Sorry, that's the way it is.
I loooooove Mark and loooove Chelsea and also Katee and Joshua and Twitch and Kerrington. I think all of them are guaranteed spots in the top 10, so no worries there.
I think the judges are way harsh on poor Jessica, and I don't even LIKE her. I think she is really annoying personality-wise, but the judges are such assholes to her that I end up wanting her to succeed to spite them. I think Will is overrated, although a very good dancer regardless, but not freaking Jesus-of-the-dance like they seem to think. Also, to me he has the personality of a rock - and not an interesting rock either, but a plain common piece of gravel.
I don't care for Kourtni or Courtney. They both irritate me to heck and back. HOWEVER, I thought that Gev and Courtney did really well with the hip-hop (judges, STFU) and with the broadway, so they deserve to stick around this episode. Kourtni can leave now though, thanks. Matt I like, even though he is Kourtni's partner, because he is funny (ninja mask = awesome) and yeah. I mean, I will admit that there are a number of Matt and Kourtni's routines I don't care for, so I guess on dance merit, he's rather low thanks to that, but I still like him in general. Unfortunately, I don't think there are any male dancers besides Thaine/Thayne that I would like to go. So I don't know who needs to be kicked out of the top 12, but probably either Matt or Gev, even though I like both of them and dislike Will... because truth is, Will is better than both of them and deserves top 10.
So, I think Kourtni should go this week and Courtney can go next week. That would be perfect.
I wouldn't be heartbroken if Jessica left next week, but I'd prefer for Courtney to get the axe. I think Courtney is kind of a bitch to Gev and seems really fake in all of her performances as well as her clips of various activities. Yuck. At least Jessica seems to be a genuinely nice person who comes off as gratingly annoying unintentionally. I much prefer that to Courtney's fake, bitchy self. Obviously, I don't know her so I am only basing my opinion on what I see, but that's what I see.
So. Now bed. Long day today and I have work tomorrow. I will have to catch up on the past week's worth of LJing tomorrow.
<3
Seriously, I saw so much awesome on this trip... I went to Idaho again, which is a favorite state of mine because it is so much like Oregon PLUS it has a theme park (Silverton) which is super fun and includes a water park. I got my face painted with the flag and Krista got red, white, and blue fireworks painted exploding across her face. GOOD TIMES.
We also went to Yellowstone to see Old Faithful and basically to be able to say we've been. We saw a moose, deer, antelope-like animals, more deer, an owl, more deer, and buffalo. And deer.
In South Dakota, we obviously checked out Mt. Rushmore like mad, which was so awesome to see in person finally. I loved the fireworks show - the end in particular was spectacular - although I think the fireworks show in Seaside, OR still wins in terms of general awesome. Mt. Rushmore is a close second though.
Since for some reason they do fireworks on the third instead of the fourth, we spent the actual holiday wandering around the Rapid City area - we checked out the Reptile Gardens (they had birds of prey, snakes, giant tortoises, crocodiles/alligators, and various other small reptiles), went down a giant slide thing, did some window shopping, swam in the grossest lake I have ever tried to swim in in my whole LIFE, went back to our campsite to wash off that nasty lake after only about 5 minutes of attempting to swim in it, and then had story time.
We got through the entire "House of Many Ways" on this trip (by Diana Wynne Jones), which is the next installment in the "Howl's Moving Castle" novels. (The first sequel is "Castle in the Air") It was, of course, quite fabulous, but I could have done with more Howl and Sophie time. Also, children ruin everything, so they really should be in stories as little as possible (I'm looking at you, Morgan).
Anyway, we spent all of Saturday and today driving back home for the most part, but it was all fun and awesome. On the way home yesterday we stopped by Devil's Tower in Wyoming, which is the first ever national monument, and checked out that business. On the way home today, we stopped by Pendleton and ate a feast :D Good times.
That is the short version of my trip, but suffice it to say that we roughed it better than 90% of the other campers. We actually slept every night of this trip though, so we had it a lot easier than normal.
Now, I caught up a bit on So You Think You Can Dance (yeah, I taped it and watching it was the first thing I did when I got home). Unfortunately, I didn't manage to tape the results show for some reason, but I at least saw all the performances.
Okay, first off, Mia Michaels, I really like your blonde hair. I don't know why, but I think it suits you and I like it. Second of all, you were really low key and tame this episode, which is so unlike you. I really liked your behavior. And since I would not be the least bit surprised if you search the internet for your name (hey, I do it too), you should know that I think your choreography this episode for Twitchington was hella fabulous. Seriously.
I mean, Mark and Chelsea are my favorite couple (with Katee and Joshua as a close second) but I really love your routines, especially when done by a good couple like Twitchington. <3
Anyway, I need to rewatch all this, because it was too much for me to process and I am tired, but I still love Comfort and I miss Chris :C *teeeaaarrr* and I don't care for Comfort's new partner Thaine/Thayne/whatever. Sorry, that's the way it is.
I loooooove Mark and loooove Chelsea and also Katee and Joshua and Twitch and Kerrington. I think all of them are guaranteed spots in the top 10, so no worries there.
I think the judges are way harsh on poor Jessica, and I don't even LIKE her. I think she is really annoying personality-wise, but the judges are such assholes to her that I end up wanting her to succeed to spite them. I think Will is overrated, although a very good dancer regardless, but not freaking Jesus-of-the-dance like they seem to think. Also, to me he has the personality of a rock - and not an interesting rock either, but a plain common piece of gravel.
I don't care for Kourtni or Courtney. They both irritate me to heck and back. HOWEVER, I thought that Gev and Courtney did really well with the hip-hop (judges, STFU) and with the broadway, so they deserve to stick around this episode. Kourtni can leave now though, thanks. Matt I like, even though he is Kourtni's partner, because he is funny (ninja mask = awesome) and yeah. I mean, I will admit that there are a number of Matt and Kourtni's routines I don't care for, so I guess on dance merit, he's rather low thanks to that, but I still like him in general. Unfortunately, I don't think there are any male dancers besides Thaine/Thayne that I would like to go. So I don't know who needs to be kicked out of the top 12, but probably either Matt or Gev, even though I like both of them and dislike Will... because truth is, Will is better than both of them and deserves top 10.
So, I think Kourtni should go this week and Courtney can go next week. That would be perfect.
I wouldn't be heartbroken if Jessica left next week, but I'd prefer for Courtney to get the axe. I think Courtney is kind of a bitch to Gev and seems really fake in all of her performances as well as her clips of various activities. Yuck. At least Jessica seems to be a genuinely nice person who comes off as gratingly annoying unintentionally. I much prefer that to Courtney's fake, bitchy self. Obviously, I don't know her so I am only basing my opinion on what I see, but that's what I see.
So. Now bed. Long day today and I have work tomorrow. I will have to catch up on the past week's worth of LJing tomorrow.
<3