Shopping Excursion in P'ville

Last night, I went shopping in Prattville. I had been planning to go to Ulta after I got off work, but it was pouring. As I drove home, I realized that it was not raining on that side of town... so I decided to drive a little further and go to Sephora instead. While I was out, I also stopped at Books-A-Million.

I spent longer in Sephora that I had really planned to. The only girl working there was doing a color match for someone, which was fine and I didn't mind waiting. I've been there. I picked up a couple other things while I was there. But it got annoying when I was standing at the counter, ready to check out, and the sales girl didn't want to come ring me up. It wasn't like I was making an insignificant purchase. No purchase at Sephora is really insignificant. But the hope of a larger purchase was there and I wonder if they get commission. Anyway, I waited while she pulled out several expensive palettes for a woman who admitted to being new to makeup. Then she just sped through my transaction like she couldn't wait to get away.

I'm not really the biggest fan of this particular Sephora anyway. It's one of the tiny ones inside JC Penny, thus doesn't carry everything a full sized store does. I found this out last time I went to get a Make Up Forever foundation that I'd heard really good things about. I asked about it after looking through the store myself and was told they didn't carry it because they weren't a full sized store. The manager told me that they had a lot of people ask for it and you'd think they would start carrying it. She then offered to order it for me. I can do that myself if I know what I need, but I needed a color match. I had to go 3 hours away to get it done.

Anyway, I went to Books-A-Million after that and picked up some clearance books and some stuff on sale.

My Haul

• Confessions of a Concealaholic kit by Benefit. I had spent my down time at work last night watching makeup tutorials on YouTube and saw a video for this one. I had the Urban Decay stick most recently, but I don't like it much. This kit has several kinds so I can try them all to find what works best. Anyway, the video made this one look awesome.
• The Black Pallette  by Urban Decay. This was one of my impulse buys. Apparently it is a limited Sephora exclusive and has colors that can not be found in their regular eye shadows. I really do like all the colors but got it specifically for Libertine, a black with emerald sparkles. It also comes with a mini black eye liner (which I do need and will keep in my purse) and a primer potion in matte nude (which I have not heard good things about).
• Orgasm blush by NARS. Like I said, this Sephora kind of sucks. This was the only NARS product they had and Orgasm is such a raved about shade that it was the only shade they had. I don't wear a lot of blush and hate really pink ones so this one looked good.

Starting anew with a Nook review

Over the holidays I decided that I needed a new ebook reader. I have had a Kindle for a long time (mine is the weird shaped first gen one) and the battery isn't want it used to be and my replacement battery wasn't much better. It still worked, but I wanted a longer battery life and a newer design. After a long internal debate, though, I decided to go with the Nook. That way I could have both of them and I didn't feel like I was missing out on something.

The Good

• I like the shelf feature. The shelf feature is one of the reasons I wanted to get the Nook. It allows me to separate my books by genres or any other way I want. I just have to create a shelf and place books. I can reorder the shelves so I don't have to flip through the ones I barely read. This would have been so helpful with the Kindle. I've had it since early 2008 and have amassed a large collection of books and I have to flip through over 30 pages (at least) of books to find one.
• I like the LCD touch screen menu though I don't know that it's really necessary. It took me a little bit to get used to accessing my menu that way and then I'd touch the ebook screen, forgetting it wasn't touch also. But now that I'm used to it, I like the way it's organized. The Nook turns on to a screen with just their logo and you can choose your option from the menu. The one I really like is the "Reading Now" button so I can go right to the book I'm reading without having to go to my library. I can't really compare it to the current Kindle menu system, but my old one has a roller ball down the side of the machine that you have to press in to select. So strange, but not hard to do.
• The Nook has a LendMe feature that lets you share books with someone else for 14 days. This would be great if I knew anyone that also had a Nook. It wasn't really a consideration when I was buying. I have been trying to talk other people into getting one, though. It seems that the Kindle has also just announced a similar feature, but I also don't know anyone with a Kindle either so I haven't looked into it.
• The Nook has all the requisite smart phone and PC apps, so I'm able to access my books on my Droid and my Ipod.
• The book selection overall is comparable to the Kindle. The prices are just as good. They also have a section in their NOOKbook menu of books under $5. This was great for me while I was browsing for things to buy when I first set it up.

The Bad

• The Nook does not have a sync to furthest page read feature on their apps. This is so annoying and makes me not really want to use one of the apps because that means I have to remember what page I was on or spend my time scrolling through the book. At first I thought I was somehow missing it but after an internet search I found out it's just not there and B&N isn't saying if they are going to add this feature. They should because this has been particularly frustrating.
• The Nook doesn't have a fraction of the free books the Kindle does. They do have a few that the Kindle doesn't have, though.
• In general, the B&N site sucks. I've never liked their site, even before I had the Nook. It is not as easy to browse for books as it is on Amazon. They have a very attractive initial site when you click on NOOKbooks, but from there it is just not as easy.
• The Nook book covers and cases are not that plentiful. When I bought my Kindle, it came with a cover (I don't know if they still do, however). My Nook did not. I had to buy one separately, but there were not a lot of options. I ended up getting one on eBay, which can be iffy sometimes. Luckily for me it was just what it said it was and is awesome. I also think it's kind of disgusting that there are designer cases that are between $50 and $125. The one that I really liked on the B&N site was a cute hot pink one. Unfortunately it was by Kate Spade and $125. It was almost as much as the Nook itself!

Overall, I think the Nook is a pretty good ebook reader. If you don't have an ebook reader or have an older type, it's worth considering as an option. If you already have a Kindle, I wouldn't get rid of the Kindle to get this. I do prefer the Kindle to the Nook and, if I didn't have either, I would personally pick the Kindle over the Nook.

Paranormal Activity

I heard about Paranormal Activity last month. I heard that it was terrifying. I also heard it compared to The Blair Witch Project and I did find that one a little creepy. So I was excited when there was a campaign to get Paranormal Activity released nationwide. I live in the kind of place where limited releases never go. I bought tickets for the midnight showing last night and stayed up way later than I should have so I could see a movie that might actually scare me.

The movie started with Katie and Micah (pronounced ME-ka) talking about the new expensive camera he bought. The beginning of the movie was trying to establish the relationship between Katie and Micah. They had uninteresting everyday conversations and flirtations. They also had minor arguments. It was supposed to make us believe that they had, in fact, been together for 3 years. The problem here was that the actors/characters were so aware of the camera that everything they said sounded false. They never once forgot the camera was there. This falseness was particularly noticeable with Katie's friend (not sure if she had a name) and the ghost expert.

Speaking of the ghost expert... he was bad. As an "expert," shouldn't he have been able to recognize the description of a demon over then phone? Did he really have to drive to another city to tell Katie what she already knew and that he could not help her? He tells he doesn't want to help her and give her a number of someone who might. It wasn't until this point, honestly, that anything started to happen. If I recall correctly there was once instance the night before, but this was about the time that the characters tell us that Katie has been haunted by something that has been following her since she was 8.

The remainder of the movie takes place in the bedroom and in someone's hand as they run up and down the stairs calling "who's there?" Each night, something a little bigger happens and Micah decides he wants to use a Ouiji board despite Katie's demand that he not go buy one. So you know what he did? He borrowed it... so therefore he didn't lie when he said he wouldn't buy one.

With that, let me take a moment for the characters. Micah was a douche bag. That is all I can say about him. During the part with the Ouiji board, I pictured Spencer Pratt there instead. Katie made me want to slap her. Could she not have lines other than "Please, please, please. Please? Micah, please?"

But back to the movie. After the Ouiji board, things started to pick up and the demon starts getting more physical. They try to contact the demonologist and he is (surprise, surprise) completely unavailable. They call the first guy back and he barely steps in the door before he's telling them that the demon is pissed and he has to leave right away and can't help them at all. This is the beginning of the end.

Apparently there were 3 different endings. This is the end that I saw...
*ENDING SPOILER*
Katie convinces Micah to stay the night and they go to sleep. During the night, Katie gets up in a jerking motion and stands next to Micah, watching him for a long time. Then she goes downstairs. The camera is still taping in the room and you hear Katie screaming. Micah jumps up and runs downstairs without the camera and then everything goes silent. Suddenly, Micah goes flying through the bedroom door and into the camera. Katie shows up in the doorway, blood covering her shirt and possessed by the demon. She leans down and bites, or licks maybe, Micah's dead body and then looks into the camera with a demonic face. The very last part said in text that Micah's dead body was found days later and Katie was nowhere to be seen.
*ENDING SPOILER OVER*

One major problem that I had was the camera movement. I felt carsick with all the close moving shots. I had to look away or close my eyes a lot when they were not having any paranormal activity.

Another thing I didn't like was the random things that reminded me of other horror movies. The TV turning on (Poltergeist) and the Ouiji board and cross (The Exorcist) to name a few.

Final thought: So not worth the time or money it took to see this movie. It absolutely did not live up to the hype. It was not scary. There were a few startling moments, but startling is not the same as scary. I was not so excited that I paid over $20 for 2 tickets and was up until at least 2am to see Paranormal Activity. I could have watched Paranormal State on tv for free.