live dangerously.

I can't believe I'm going to do what I'm about to do - but I have to trust my instincts.

Welcome, 2011.  2010 SUCKED, so it can only go up from here, right?

the end of 2010 has been fantastic... good setup for the new year?  I think so.

2011 is going to be good.

I can feel it.

the trimmings

No sleep.  Perfect candy.  Pure fat in the form of scones.  A cute missionary phone call.  Assembling baby toys (okay, finding a way to get the baby toys out of the boxes).  Clothing necessary for my next endeavor.  New makeup.  Games.  A Christmas song sent through a text message from a friend.  Inception with Whitney.

The makings of a near-perfect Christmas.

I love this queen.

Johnny Weir and I need to become best friends.

today is a wonderful, wonderful day.

Today, December 22, is the day we celebrate the birth of a certain Ms. Erika Munson.  Many of you know her - she's a pretty extraordinary person.  We first met when I was 17 years old and she convinced me to compete at the national competition.  I still see her sitting in the embroidered chair in our living room, sitting across from my mom on the red couch, talking very cautiously about how competing at Miss Utah could be fun, but imagine competing at nationals!  Some of us are close to our pageant friends: there are a few that are very dear to me.  But Erika has become so much more.  She is an interesting combination of sister, mother, friend, aunt, and mentor.  I don't know what I would do without her.  I'm a better person for knowing her and I hope that one day I can be the kind of woman, wife, and mother that she is.

Happy birthday!  I love you!

review time.

To say that I resonated with this film is dangerous: on one hand, it makes me seem crazy.  On the other, it makes me entirely narcissistic and obsessive.  It puts me in a vulnerable position in which I open up about my frustrations and heartache through my imperfections, but I cannot help it.  I have now seen this film four times through in its entirety, and each time I have viewed it, I have been struck by the reality Aronofsky has managed to create amidst the chaos of Nina's own multiple realities.  Do you need to love ballet to love this?  No.  Do you need to love Natalie Portman to love this?  No.  Do you need to love mental illness to love this?  No.  But if Natalie Portman doesn't win a Best Actress Oscar for this performance, then I doubt she ever will, because she found a way to make me fall in love with all three (okay, okay, so I loved her and ballet already...whatever).

The script is bare bones, perfectly so.  The film is certainly grainy, but it sets the atmosphere of indecision, and it is only at the end that we see clear frames.  The original score is Swan Lake on narcotics - it's stunning - and the final fifteen minutes of the film are accompanied by Tchaikovsky's original work.  To say that he captures human sadness and despair is a bit of an understatement.  The original collaboration of the ballet score was done in such a way that every minute, every second was intended to tell the dancing story - this is not a piece of music adapted for a choreographer, but is instead a complete work, and although I have seen Swan Lake on the stage before, there's something about Aronofsky's shaky camera work that elevates Tchaikovsky's orchestration.

Costume design?  Her ugly scarf definitely mirrors her youthful demeanor and her practice clothing is both seductive and pure as she attempts to internally, and externally, come of age.  The makeup?  Perfection.  The dancing itself is insanely believable.  I am extraordinarily critical, particularly when it comes to ballet as portrayed in film, and the work Portman put into honing her ballet skills paid off royally.  It is extremely difficult to see when she ends and her double begins.  On my third viewing, I found one area that bothers me: in the middle of the film, during a rehearsal in which her company director (who is married to Monica Bellucci in "real" life - lucky ducky) belligerently pushes her to dance the same sequence over and over, she is released from a hold and her feet are not extended in the way a professional dancer would extend to the ground.

That's it.

The rest of it?  She has believable feet, believable arms, a neck that was made for ballet, a body perfectly shaped for it (although she is a bit short).  Her dedication to perfecting her lines completes the spell of the film, because her believability as a dancer allows the viewer to lose himself in her psychological struggle.

Mila Kunis seemed a bit blah initially, particularly side-by-side with the haunting Portman, and her dancing isn't nearly as believable, but her raw energy sells it in the end.  Barbara Hershey's teeth frighten me almost as much as her own psychosis.  Winona Ryder should have been grateful for the role, but it must have been hard playing a nearly autobiographical part.  Let's talk about Benjamin Millepied for a second, shall we?  A principal with NYCB, he started as choreographer and then worked his way into the role of David, Nina's partner.  He's now dating Portman, which is understandable because he's kind of a fox.

The technical elements are there, and it's an extraordinary film to watch.  It's also the best film of 2010.

I don't discuss this often, but I carry a lot of regret with me: regret that I didn't continue my ballet training, that I didn't continue my work as a pianist.  There are a lot of things I could have done with my life and around the age of thirteen/fourteen, my family life sort of broke down and everything else went with it.  While I may not know what it's like to starve yourself and throw up everything you eat, I understand the ultimate dedication needed for your passion and for your art.  Was Nina crazy because of her need for perfection?  Was she crazy before that?  Did she have this propensity for mental illness?  Did this role give it to her in that short time period?  I don't know.  I don't think it matters.

Her director, Thomas, told her to lose herself in the role, and she did.  The moment she realizes that she is a psychological nutcase is the most thrilling of the film.  We see in her eyes that she's lost herself and she no longer can comprehend or differentiate reality A, or reality B, or reality C.  She doesn't bother to wipe the tears - she merely continues painting her face white, resolved to finish the piece.  The film begins with her dream of transforming into the swan.  Originally, the swan queen needs a prince and true love to set her free (isn't that always the way), but Nina Sayers, either because of her own psychosis or her own passion, needs perfection to set her free.  While the ending is ambiguous, of one thing I am certain: she was perfect.

Christmas sooooo came early!

Oscar season rocks for two reasons: 

1. Great films.

2. Oscar voters who get the movies on DVD right when the film hits theaters.

Already saw it and uhhhhh, will be watching it tonight from the comfort of my home!

{review to come.  hint: I had chills.}

hey....

Lookie lookie!

whoa whoa whoa

freaking out over here.

Just to bring you up to speed: I interviewed a bunch of individuals who are involved with a new site called Truth Is Revolutionary and uhhh, I'm kind of the first person in ANY media outlet in the WORLD to have done so.  An official press release is going out in about 6 hours and they are going to be posting audio on the website.

So uhhhhh, head over here where I will link to the audio as soon as I receive it in my e-mail inbox.

This is how it starts, right?

wah wah wah

Newsflash: sometimes I feel insecure about my body.  Do I want to change it?  No, not really.  But when my own so-called big brother tells me no boy will love me because I am the president of the IBTC, then yeah, insecurities creep up again.
Wanna know what's helping me through?  The realization that I LITERALLY (that's for you, Whitney, in honor of Palin) have a body identical to Keira Knightley, height and all (5 feet, 6 and a half inches).

Nothing a good push-up can't fix.

this is big. you should read this.

Okay, some of you listen to the radio show that Casey and I co-host twice a week (in case you've missed all of my notes about it: Thursday at 2 p.m., Saturday at noon; k-talk.com or AM 630).  Most of you probably don't even care.  Today, however, is a good day to maybe, kind of, possibly, sort of... care.

Today's show is going to feature an exclusive I have with a key organizer of the Anonymous Movement, individuals "hacking" websites that are caving to government pressure against WikiLeaks.  I have found a way to talk about wikileaks in every single show and I am going to continue talking about wikileaks, because I believe it to be the issue that will define our generation: the future, safety, security, and freedom of the internet.  It is the future, safety, security, and freedom of information, and our government is stealthy and beginning to take it away from us.

Wait a second, Jen... a conspiracy theorist?!

I know.  Shocking, right?

I don't think we're losing freedoms.  You can do and say and be what you want (unless you're gay).  But if net neutrality passes, if WikiLeaks is taken down, I promise you that we WILL be losing the freedom of free information.

Perhaps this is a minority opinion; it's certainly not a popular one at the station in which I work.  Perhaps I'm drumming up concern for dramatic effect.  Perhaps I'm completely wrong.

Or maybe I'm not.  Maybe this is just as big as I, and others, think it is.  We already know that the US government can spy on us as much as they want; what are we going to do if we lose the ability to expose corruption in government and big business?

Tune in.  You don't want to miss comments from Anonymous.

ending 2010...single...

just like all of these people (you know, as single as we all want to be, right?)

{as with all ONTD links, remember that they use foul language there... I'm not responsible for a naughty word you might see}

a few of you will figure this out.

read between the lines - then you can understand how I am feeling right now.

note: this is going to take some serious GG fans to catch it.  Let's just say Paris and Rory and I are so much the same in this episode (if that helps you out some).

kind of in love with this girl - go Miss NY!

there's a lesson in this.

For some reason I haven't chronicled the insanely expensive past few days - my car suuuuuuucks.  Anyway, it's show day, right?  (right - listen in at k-talk.com or AM 630 at 2 p.m.  We'll be talking about tax cuts and how I'm probably going to get silenced by the internet gods)  Yeah, that means I need to be at the station soon.  But my car is still sort of at the shop and I have no way of actually getting it.  Well, Whitney had to go to work early.  Leslie is MIA.  Wayne doesn't answer his phone.  Want to see this list of people I have called/texted in the last forty-five minutes?

Garrett T.
Natalie W.
Jared K.
Andrew N.
Emily B.
Jon J.
Zach L.
Sam H.
Ryan W.
Kurt M.
Melissa N.

It's kind of embarrassing.  And the whole time I was thinking, you know, I should just call Drew.

Finally did.

Should have done it first.

This is why we were best buds in high school and why he is still the person I can count on.  Thank you Drewface!!!


postscript: please don't text me during the show complaining about how you can't get it to work online.  I know NOTHING about computers and I know even less about the station's website.

FINALLY

it's opening next Friday at the Broadway.  Whitney and I are all over this.  You in?

some of you may be wondering.

and no.  I'm not ashamed.  how could I be with this beautiful creature?

finally....

no words needed.

........

oh how the somewhat decent have fallen.

Final week!

Pushing through - and I'm actually staying above water.  Fantastic.  So I thought I'd post some photos/videos from the November comp.  We placed fourth (and just a few marks shy of third!) and were really pleased with how it all came together.  If we're friends on facebook (which I imagine most of us are), you've already seen the dresses.  If you're a ballroom person, you already know all about them. But for my pageant friends, just to give some perspective, I've never spent this much money on a pageant gown, nor this much time.  These gowns are why I'll not have any new things for pageants... totally worth it!

Finally, I present the dresses designed by Jamie Gines of J.Nico.  She is so extraordinarily talented and I'm so grateful to have been a part of her team for this competition.  Each of her dresses were fashion forward in their respective style, but they also complimented the dancer in her body, her appearance, and her dancing.  I wanted a classic look with modern accents, and I wanted designs and colors that are unique and difficult to pull off (coming from the girl who always uses brown evening gowns).  This is where pageants and ballroom go perfectly hand-in-hand together!

dress. J.Nico
jewelry. J.Nico 
hair. Jamie Gines
makeup. Jen Gulbrandsen 

Finally, Andrew's wife Lydia videotaped it for us, and then they put them up on youtube.  You can see all of the dances, but if you only have a little bit of time, watch the Foxtrot from the semi (green dress) and the Tango from the final (sequin dress).

ch-ch-ch-changes.

The fun of being a writer is recording everything I can remember, with the detail I want to include, with the feelings I want to evoke.  It's easy to twist things around; it's easy to manipulate memory or history or feelings - and putting it on paper, or on the internet?  Makes it all the better.  Sometimes I lie, and sometimes I lie on this blog.  It's not often, and it's been a while since I've lied, but I've done it.  I have a feeling that my life is going to be changing on this slow incline, and I want to be as honest as possible, but I'm scared to be too honest.  If things change the way I think they're going to, then I don't want to be as exposed... so what do I do?

Do I go back and delete everything?  Do I blur out photos and references and names and experiences?  Do I transfer them to my private blog and change the course of this blog's future?  Do I pretend that certain relationships didn't exist, and certain mistakes didn't happen, and certain experiences didn't affect me?

This probably seems completely silly, but I just have that feeling - I can't explain it and I don't even know how to describe it, but I can feel it.  Things are going to be changing.  I took my first solo step in defining my destiny and future yesterday.  I was in the car, staring at the book, thinking about the manager, wondering what I could have done differently, and then I was in there, taking control, and making myself known.

Although dangerous to make a big deal of this, yesterday was...well...a big deal.  My first big interview (no offense to my mom, or Christina Lowe, or Becky Lockhart but.....), and not only did it go well, I think an impression was made.

It will be fun to look back at the interview and laugh at how stressed I was the WHOLE ENTIRE TIME wondering when he was going to call.  Laugh at how many text messages and phone calls I made while spewing words out of my mouth (I'm not going to pretend that anything said yesterday was even remotely profound).  Laugh at how nervous I got when speaking to Apolo on the phone.  Laugh at what a giddy idiot I sounded like.  But after yesterday, after meeting him, after chatting with his people for a while, I just have a feeling.  It's not going to be my only interview with him and it's not going to be my only big interview.

So Apolo, if you found this through my twitter, or however, know that I loved interviewing you and I can't wait to do it again.  Also, I'm pretty sure you spend a lot of time in SLC, so we should stay in touch.

It's Show Time!

Up here at the studio and freaking out a little bit, because oh my goodness, I'm interviewing Apolo Anton Ohno in two hours!

Listen in at k-talk.com or AM 630 at 12 p.m. for our interview with Apolo.  I've been reading his book and I can't wait to ask him a few questions about it.  Seriously you guys - you don't want to miss this!

exciting announcement soon!

Something REALLY cool is going to be happening around the New Year - I can't wait till things are more solidified and I can clue you in!  But it's going to be awesome.

Also, don't forget... I'm interviewing Apolo Anton Ohno on Saturday!  Yay!