I wasn’t looking forward to last weekend because I had to decline the invitation to join my friends in St. George for another murder mystery party because of my midterms.  (I got a 95% on my Doctrine and Covenants midterm and 90% on my Japanese written midterm.  I still don’t know how I did on my Japanese oral midterm or my English midterm, but I’m hoping it wasn’t too bad. )  Luckily, my weekend took a turn for the better when I received a tweet from Natasha inviting me to the book blogger social she puts together twice a year.

I felt really privileged to go, honestly.  I had seen Natasha’s post about it on her blog, but I wasn’t going to go because I didn’t think I’m a “true” book blogger nor am I a member of the Utah Book Bloggers group (soon to be remedied; my membership is pending).  But, I guess I post enough book reviews and talk about books and my interactions with authors enough to get an invite.

The evening was full of fun, food, and lots of social interaction.  Natasha told us that this was the biggest turn out yet.  Lucky for us! It was so much fun to socialize with book bloggers and authors.  It’s always fun to socialize with others that share my same interests.

I sat at a table with my friends Debbie and Catie.  And, because of Debbie’s and my connections to our soon-to-be-published-author friend Brodi Ashton, we also got to sit with Brodi, Bree Despain, Sydney Salter, Emily Wing Smith, and Ann Bowen.   I had already met Bree and Sydney thanks to Debbie and Brodi’s connections, but it was fun to see them again, and meet Emily and Ann.

After dinner, we had a book exchange.  I got Jaleta Clegg‘s book, Nexus Point: The Fall of the Altairan Empire.  After the exchange, Jaletta came over and signed it for me.  The book looks really interesting and I’m excited to read it.  Kristyn Crow also gave me one of her books to read: Bedtime at the Swamp.  It looks very exciting and I love the artwork.

I was happy to see Karey Shane at the event.  I met Karey at the Children’s Book Festival last May when she told me about her upcoming book Secret Speakers and the Search for Selador’s Gate.  I’ve been keeping tabs on her ever since and I’m so excited that her book will be released on April 6!  It has been a whirlwind of events to get her book published, but her time, dedication, and persistence is about to be paid off! I was lucky enough to get a copy of her book in January when she printed a run of ARCs.  Unfortunately, because of school, I haven’t had the chance to read it yet.  It’s the next on my list, though, once I finish Elantris.

I also had the chance to meet James Dashner and because of my interaction with Brodi on her blog, I felt like I was part of the “in” crowd when I talked to him.  I spent a couple of quality minutes with Shannon Hale discussing a fun event my group of friends had with her last September and a charity event Kristyn Crow and other authors will be hosting this August.  (I’ll post more details about it when I have them since I’m sure it will be fun and a good cause!)

I also met Ann Cannon, Becky Hall, Jean Reagan, and a few other authors of whom I can’t remember their names.  It was also fun to meet not only Natasha, the overseer, but Rachelle Rogers Knight, another book blogger and publisher of reading journals, and Suey, another book blogger.  I know I missed out on meeting a lot of bloggers and a few more authors, but I hope to meet them next time.

I’m glad I had a chance to go to this event.  It was so much fun!  I hope I can go to future ones as well.

I have now seen New Moon twice and it’s better than Twilight for all the reasons Twilight bugged a lot of the fans and non-fans.  The special effects are better, the acting is better, the adaptation is better, and all the little nuances are better.  For example, I loved that Victoria’s hair is actually red instead of strawberry blond.  The sparkling was done better too, which definitely added to the story since that’s a part that most fans love.

I actually only have four complaints about the movie, but they’re super small, which is a miracle. The first, what the heck did they have Alice wearing throughout that entire movie?  Her outfits were so unflattering and made her look frumpy.  The second, the circling around Bella’s room during the months she was a zombie made me car sick.  The third, the new Volvo.  It’s not silver.  The fourth, the flashback with the old Volvo added to the inconsistency with the new Volvo.  However, all of these complaints are made better with the addition of Jacob’s smoking pecs, abs, and hip dents!

I didn’t get a chance to go to a midnight showing.  I decided to be responsible and go to bed, so I could go to work the next morning.  (However, I didn’t end up getting to sleep until 4:00 am on Thursday night anyway because of the antibiotics I’m taking. Grrr!)  But, I’m glad I waited so I could go with my niece Megan.  We had fun at the movie together, which made all the difference.  (Pardon the pictures.  They were taken with my crappy phone camera.)

On Saturday, I went to the Twilight Lexicon New Moon Movie Event with my friend Ali.  Corey and I hang out with the Vigues all the time, but I’ve never really just hung out with Ali.  It was a lot of fun to go to the movie together and we’ve decided to hang out with just the two of us more often.  (Also, if you’re wondering, neither Ali nor I won any of the raffle prizes.  We’ve decided we’re just unlucky.)

It was fun to see the movie with all my other friends too.  We have so much fun together and we always look forward to our get togethers.  This time around, it was a little crazy because we were trying to help Lori and Laura with everything for the movie event, but it was still good to see them and all of our out-of-town friends too.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing the movie a third time next week with my in-laws.  And, I’m actually trying to talk Corey into seeing it tomorrow.

All you Twilight haters need to see New Moon because it’s better.  It also captures the essence of the Twilight Saga almost perfectly, so you’ll understand better why the fans enjoy the stories so much.  Plus, there’s a lot more action for you manly men.

First, thank you for your feedback on my previous post.  I really do appreciate it.  It gave me a lot of insight and I’ll stop begging (for now ).

I finally joined the Dark Side.  I’m now an official tweeter on Twitter.  I’m not sure how much I’m going to tweet, other than blog posts, because my life’s really not that interesting.  But, I thought I’d give it try because it integrates with Facebook and will automatically tweet when I make a blog post.  Also, Corey tells me that celebrity tweets are quite funny, so I think I’ll check those out too.  Too bad Ewan McGregor doesn’t tweet.

Happy birthday, Anna!

As most of you know, I’m a member of the Twilight Lexicon and have had a lot of fun with the website owners.  Well, the Twilight Lexicon is the oldest, continuous operating Stephenie Meyer fansite on the Internet and the owners are hosting a New Moon Movie Event in Utah on Saturday, November 21.  The party’s going to be tons of fun and they still have seats.

The cost is $25 and for that price, you get:

• Admission to the New Moon movie
• A commemorative, canvas goody bag filled with theme merchandise
• A chance to win fabulous door prizes

Some of the door prizes you’ll have a chance to win are:

• A prop used on the set of New Moon
• 2 Gold Weekend Passes to the Creation Entertainment Official Twilight Tour
• Merchandise from Borders and Hot Topic
• Autographed items by the cast members and Stephenie Meyer

The event is being held at the Megaplex 20 at the District.  To order tickets or if you have questions, e-mail them at lexiconutahmovie@gmail.com.  In your e-mail, state your name, and the number of tickets you need.  They will send you a reply listing who to make the check/money order out to, the exact time of the performance, and where to send your self-addressed, stamped envelope so you can receive your tickets.  (Tickets are non-refundable and will not be sold at the door.)

Anyway, I hope to see you there!

While my friends and I were in Forks, some of my friends found out that the Forks High School had been condemned and is in danger of being knocked down.  They wanted to help the city of Forks by raising money to help save the high school since there’s no way the city can do it alone.  Through the affiliations that my friends had made in Forks and with the backing of the Twilight Lexicon, they went to various city officials asking them for a way for fans to donate to the city.  The result was the formation of Twilighters for Forks!

There’re so many Twilight fans that have escaped to Forks many times while reading the Twilight Saga.  By helping save Forks High School, we can give something back to Forks!  Just think of how much money could be raised if every Twilight fan donated as little as $2.00!

Visit the Forks Forum website for all the details regarding the high school, the purpose of Twilighters for Forks, and the chance to donate to this very valuable cause.

Well, as you’ve noticed, I haven’t really posted a lot in the last week or so.  Life has been kind of boring. It feels like Corey and I have been holed up in our house, which became old really quickly.  I found out that I didn’t have mono.  I just had some weird virus that acted and looked a lot like mono.  But, I’m much better now, thank goodness!

I’ve been reading a lot, which has been nice.  And, the Twilight Lexicon finally came back up, after being down for two weeks.  Stupid Internet terrorists! So, at least I could talk to some of my online friends.

Corey and I have been hanging out with each other, watching movies and talking.  That’s been nice, too.  Other than that, though, not much has been going on.  Hopefully, life will pick up a bit more and soon!

I’m quite upset at the moment.  As most of you know, I frequent the Twilight Lexicon multiple times a day.  It’s a place I can go to talk about my obsession with the Twilight Saga.  Well, I’m upset because a few people who didn’t agree with the Lexicon’s policies or with the Twilight Saga decided to spam the boards with horrible anti-Lexicon, -Stephenie Meyer, and -Breaking Dawn sentiments.  And, because the admins (who happen to be friends of mine) were having to deal with the spam, they didn’t know the Lexicon was being hacked! So, now the Lex has been shut down while they try to restore a backup.

I’m all for people having their own opinions.  If you don’t like the world Stephenie has created, or you don’t think she’s a very good author, or you don’t agree with the Lexicon’s policies, fine!  That’s your opinion!  Go post your opinion on an anti-Twilight or anti-Lexicon site.  But, why on earth would you be so immature and inconsiderate to destroy someone’s hard work?!  Anyone who does this is no better than a terrorist.  You may not be killing people with suicide bombs, but you’re still hurting people!

Here’s a banner one of my friends made to show our support for the Lexicon.