Do you want to ride in my Mercedes, boy?

I took pics tonight of some of the new art L put up on her wall. The fur seal anti-clubbing pic is my favorite (of course). The others are characters from her new wolf series and a tribute to Baxter & Hallie.

The dogs are especially naughty when M is gone! The cats are always very naughty. They’re driving me CRAZY! They’ve continuously interrupted my sleep all week. I’ve been working on getting ready for my class (which starts tomorrow) and L’s homeschool year (which starts Tuesday). So despite the extra work and loss of sleep, I’ve been pretty productive.

I still have a ton to do, though! I was hoping to have it all done, along with some painting I wanted to do, before they get home tomorrow night, but I don’t see that happening.

M & L are having fun and doing a lot of hiking, in spite of the rain they’ve had. They are at Rock Island again, so there are no vehicles on the island at all. That means no vehicle to keep dry in if the tent gets wet and no way off the island, other than the few daily ferries that run, should bad weather hit. They took the small three-person tent, instead of the big family tent, because they are limited to what they can carry on to the island from the ferry. They haven’t had as much rain as we have gotten this week, at least! L calls each night before bed, and tells me about all the cool things she’s found while hiking. So far, she’s found lots of snakes and toads, which are very thrilling for her. They also found a ‘secret beach’ and were planning to go back today for a swim.

Dej and I went to see, “The Last Exorcism” Monday afternoon (I was off work on Monday).

I hadn’t read about it, so I didn’t really know what to expect. It started out being a very different movie from what I had expected. It wasn’t really a scary movie, but was good. It creeped me out, not from the typical “creepy” factor, but because that church, that pastor, the screwed up family—those were all too familiar to me. I know all of them. The movie was really making a very powerful and honest statement of what these people really are and did a great job with the sadness, pathos, rage, confusion, and desperation that lead people to such twisted fundamentalist beliefs that so often completely destroy the children--particularly the females.

I loved the character, Cotton Mathers (? not sure on the last name), because he is exactly the smarmy, dishonest, sly-as-a-fox Svengali that reigned throughout my nightmarish evangelically-destroyed childhood. It was not at all the movie I was expecting, but I was enjoying it. Not all “flock leaders” are as entertaining and theatrical as Cotton, but they are ALL as fraudulent, and they ALL get off on the power and require more and more to be happy. I’ve seen it happen to someone I would have previously thought immune to that seductive call. Though arguably, Cotton was, as he proclaimed, providing a much-needed and very helpful service to the deluded weak, ultimately the damage done by those playing god (otherwise known as ‘pastors’ in fundie churches) far outweighs any benefits they may provide.

[I am honor bound to say that I knew one minister, though more liberal than evangelical/fundie, who I exempt from my statements. He is the one who married M & I. Though I haven't seen him for years, and things could have changed, JD is excluded so far...I hope he stays strong!]

They also threw in some unexpected twists, and Dej and I both liked the element of surprise. We liked the creepy feeling evoked throughout part of the movie, when we weren’t really sure where they were going or what happened next. We were both enjoying it, and though a little creepy, still wasn’t scary at all.

Then it was like they switched gears completely in the last few minutes of the movie and it changed into a different movie that we didn’t like so well. It switched from being different, honest, innovative and telling an interesting story with very broken characters, and decided to slap on a very cliché, typical “scary movie” type ending. I don’t want to spoil anything, but the end was like they slapped on a five minute scene from Rosemary’s Baby. WTF?!? Dej liked that it was not a happy ending. I liked the fact that it was a surprise, but as far as the content of the surprise—unoriginal and lame and somewhat confusing as we were left to wonder about many of the characters. Had they really stuck with the movie that they started and crafted an original, surprising ending that was more in line with the movie, it could have been good. Instead, it was an interesting diversion from my curriculum work, but not a good movie. It had potential, though.

H called this afternoon, as soon as I walked in the door from work. Today was his first day of school--a new school, so he had lots to tell me. I SO wish I could have seen him this morning before he went! We talked the whole time I was doing my afternoon critter cleaning chores, which was nearly 1.5 hours! I know this because H likes to periodically read the time from the phone to announce how long we've been talking. Very long phone calls, those more than an hour, get him quite excited.