Grey Day

Sometimes I really hate how much I love TV. I read an article that said that people who are very invested in TV shows often feel like they have very complete lives because they consider the characters on the shows as real-life friends. This is a sad statement if you don't have real friends, but as I do I can take it for what it is: TV shows you love can enter your consciousness.

Sometimes. The past two nights of Grey's Anatomy made me feel alternately gross, happy, sick, uncomfortable, awkward, crazy, sad, and freaked out. It was a harrowing journey, which is not what I'm used to with my shows. The only other show that often ran me through that gamut of emotions was Six Feet Under-- and that was mostly because of all the creepy death stuff. So how did Grey's do it?

Because I think I relate to Grey's on a more personal level than I have to another show, maybe ever. On the Grey Matter blog that the writers' started, one of the writers of Monday night's show had this to say:

"... I was a single woman living in New York City through most of my twenties. And I know from experience that before the happy ending there's a lot of bad choices, bad luck, one night stands and tequila. Not to mention amazing, magical times that make all those bad choices and one night stands worth it. Your twenties are when you figure out who you are, and what matters to you. You're forming friendships that will sustain you. You're making plans. Looking for your soulmate. Wondering if there is such a thing as a soulmate."

Hmmm, what has my life been like since I graduated college? Bad choices? Check. Bad luck? double check. One night stands AND tequila??? Check and check. But there are also those nights when you dance in the rain, watch Pride & Prejudice, or go out drinking with friends and you feel really, geniunely happy. Yeah, those times are awesome.

And the reason that I sat there and watched the show with three of my best girlies who were all making the same panicked gasps and yelling at Izzie to stop being so crazy, was because we all have this common experience. We are all making bad choices and questioning everything and trying to make our way on our own, but together at the same time.

Seattle Grace, you so crazy.

Foolish Muggle

So I was chatting with EJ about my lack of posts as of late and why that was. Have I lost narcissistic things to comment on? Is my perspective no longer broad enough to encompass all my friends and random readers? Well, not quite. I was trying to think of something I've been doing for the past three weeks or so that would so deter my focus on the (blogging) task at hand. And then I realized: Harry Potter.

*Sigh* With my imminent departure to the UK I decided that I should engage my inner anglophile in all ways, and I thought I would start with Harry Potter. I thought the best plan would be to read the first six books and then wait with bated breath for the seventh like everyone else in the world. When I told my friend Emily of this plan she said, "Dude, I'm not going to see you for a month if you do that." Haha, I thought. They're just books.

Em was right. I read the first two in a week and a half (a slow pace, admittedly, but I do have a full-time job and a part-time bar habit) and then it became an obsession. I walked to my friend's house to pick up books three and four and then walked home from his house (2.5 miles) with them in tow. I stayed home on a Friday night to read. I carried book four around every day, which is quite unwieldy and in hard cover, in my messenger bag including kickball games just for the chance to read. When I was in New York over the weekend I knew I had a problem: I finished a 5k walk and, seeing a bookstore, decided to buy the fifth book. I carried 870 pages around with me in New York all day just to make sure that I wouldn't have to stop reading should I happen to finish the fourth book on the train back to DC (I did finish, but then I took a nap. No matter, better safe than sorry).

Now most of you know why these books provoke this kind of response. The story is just so freakin' readable that I can't put it down. It has everything: good, evil, redemption, adventure, friendship, love, excitement, and magic. I often come late to cultural phenomenons, mostly because I refuse to believe that anything could actually be that good, but in this case I was so completely wrong.

I would write more, but I'm cutting into precious reading time. No really, I am. Hogwarts4ever.