The Music of the Night...again.

Phantom of the Opera, the longest running show and safe to say the most popular musical of all time having been shown in over 27 countries to over 100 million people now has a sequel.

At the end of the original we're left wondering what happens to the phantom as he mysteriously disappears. Now a supposed 10 years later in Love Never Dies we are reunited with our characters; the Phantom, now a wealthy man running a freak show on Coney Island, Christine married to Raoul, with a ten year old son who appears to be a bit of a musical genius in his own right and we watch as Christine and the Phantom navigate through the treacherous waters of a rekindled romance.

I have to be honest here, I never really thought of Christine and the Phantom as romantic, he kind of creeped me out. I have always found his possessiveness and oh I don't know tendency to kidnap Christine and imprison her a little off putting.

Andrew Lloyd Weber says he has poured everything he has into this musical. While I'm sure most of us could agree that the music from The Phantom of the Opera stands alone Weber goes so far as to say that the music from the new show goes further than the original music. He even says one of the songs he wrote for the new show is a stronger song than Music of the Night. That's an awfully heavy statement I think (I have heard the song and it is good but...).

I wonder now after how long The Phantom of the Opera has been in our lives if we really want a sequel. We've spent enough time and exposure to the story (through the movie with Gerard Butler, the music, books and the reproductions etc) creating our own ending to the story, people have kind of made their own closure. Why open that all back up again and answer all the questions people have already tried to answer for themselves...

Andrew Lloyd Weber of course disagrees with me, 'You know, I think it's slightly unfinished business, because all we do is we just leave a mask on a chair,' and what happened?" he explains. "What did happen? Did Christine really live with Raoul happily ever after? I doubt it. So, there had to be a continuation of the story."

And that's exactly what he's doing, whether we like it or not. The show opens tonight at the Adelphi Theater in London and will open on Broadway in November. I'm sure we'll all have more than enough opportunity to go see it at some point. Will you? Or would you rather leave that story alone...

Do you think this show will be another great success? Or is Mr. Weber setting himself up for failure? It's an awfully large risk.

The little gold man strikes again

I don't usually watch the Oscars, I usually get bored or I don't have the time, but because of the genius of DVR and the fact that I can fast forward through the boring parts I indulged. I liked it, I was shocked at some of it (how after 82 years Kathryn Bigelow is the first woman director to win? what?), I'm glad The Hurt Locker won so many awards, it's a great movie. If you haven't seen it, definitely do. But the fashion, oh the fashion...

I don't care what anybody says, I loved Sarah Jessica Parker's dress by Chanel. It was gorgeous. Pretty color, great shape, and lovely details. I've always been partial to a dress you can eat in, let your belly hang out in and no one knows...However...


Tom Fords face is basically exactly how I felt about SJP's hair. I wonder if he caught a look of her in the camera. Girl needs some hairspray.


Maggie Gyllenhall looked beautiful and the colors in her dress were amazing. It was like a painting.


I don't know why for the love of God Victoria Beckham was there (she should have been banned just on principal for Spice Girls the movie) but her dress was very pretty. I like the shape and the understated color. It looks great on her, good advertising for her own clothes.

Anna Kendricks dress is lovely, pretty color and gasp! Not a strapless. She might be on to something...

Sandy (I feel like we can be on a first name basis, she seems like she's that kinda gal) looked gorgeous. How did they get her hair to look like that? And those lips? Fab. Her dress just tied it all together. She could have just won an oscar for that hair. Period. And besides, her accpetance speech made me cry. I watched it again today and it still gets me. Grace, humor, humility and style, doesn't get better than that.



I know that the top looks like she just put on a full body spanx and then put a floaty skirt over it, but I like the color of Miley's dress and I think she looks pretty. Especially for a girl of her age, it's more classy than I would have given her credit for.


The very bad...
Hillary, Hillary, Hillary...what are you doing? We've really gone downhill here, especially from that pretty long sleeved navy number you wore when you won for Million Dollar Baby. Girl you need to reevalute this dress. You have nice boobs, we get it. Now go put on a real dress. You look like a walking advertisement for that new show "V."


I'd be laughing too if I were Zoe Saldana. The top of the dress is stunning, halfway down she looks like a window display for Anthropologie. Um, no.


BORING. And too dark. Dark hair, dark eye makeup, dark dress. Nicole Richey looks like an extra from Twilight. She needs to stick with color.

I know I'm supposed to like Vera Formiga's dress but she looks like something out of the sea. Like a sea sponge, or coral or something. I'm just not feeling it.

This one gets me every time. Its like just in case she needed a snack she just glued 2 cinnamon rolls to her chest. Rosettes on the boobs, why did we think this would be a good idea? I don't care who you think you are...John Galliano...no no no.

Ok there, my favorite part of the Oscars, judging people.

Have a god day!

Alice, a quick review

For those of you that are going to see Alice in Wonderland I thought I would give you my two cents since I saw it last night, I "midnight showed" it as my friend likes to say.

I liked it, the boy did not.

I thought it was good for what I was expecting. It's not life changing but for Tim Burton its better than I thought it would be. It got horrible reviews so I wasn't going in expecting much; and, with that in mind I was surprised at how much better it was than what I was expecting especially after the doom and gloom of the reviews.

Do not go in expecting the Disney storyline that you're used to, the story is completely different, the only similarity are the characters, other than that there's nothing the same, that may have disappointed some people. Seeing it in 3D was cool, but its not required like it was with maybe Avatar.

The boy was a little extreme in saying that its one of the worst movies he's ever seen. Saying it's contrived, over the top, and the whimsical aspects were not whimsical at all merely forced. He thought it was too obvious and there were very few layers where as the original had a lot of hidden messages and meanings in it. He thought the ending was a let down and was not impressed at all.

I thought it was fun, not deep (like I said, not life changing) but it was a movie you go to see and don't have to think too hard about. It was kind of nice to be able to relive a childhood classic but with a little dark adventure thrown in (It is a Burton after all). As I'm sure most of you were expecting Johnny Depp has a main role in the film, he does a good job of being mad but not over the top annoying like I thought he would be, he had a deeper character in this version I think. You liked him and felt sorry for him all at once. The actor I found the most irritating was Helena Bonham Carter, she's extreme and over the top and I'm tired of the same dark angry character she seems to embrace in most of her films. Mia Wasikowska (of In Treatment from HBO) does a lovely job as does Anne Hathaway.

So there it is, it's good, not great. Go see it. And let me know what you think!

Shopping at the GAP means going for the green

THIS is awesome.

Last night when I was in bed I got an email from The Gap with and announcement for their newest sale event. Usually I don't pay much attention to these as The Gap can be kinda boring to me and I usually only shop there for the basics.

The announcement says that if you bring in a pair of your old jeans they will give you 30% off your purchase of a new pair.

Recently they've been making some pretty awesome jeans with their 1969 collection, they're more fashionable and high end and less mom jeans lookalikes. I've bought a couple of pairs in the last year or so and I really like them, they're comfortable and up to date with the newest fashions.

So I went down there today to look at their new jeans. I wanted to know what they were going to do with the old pair, and it turns out if you give them a pair of your old jeans they're going to recycle and send them to be used for eco-friendly housing insulation. I LOVE this! Not only do you get a new pair of spiffy jeans at a pretty good discount you get to get rid of your old ones and know that they are going towards a great cause. SO much better than just throwing them away!

The "Recycle Your Blues" event is going on from March 5-14, so go on down there and get your self a new pair of blues and give your old ones up!

I got these pretty babies,


And I'm thinking about taking more of my old ones down just because I can barely close my jeans drawer as it is, so I might as well. Go for it! And let me know what new jeans you get!

We're all mad here, I'm mad, you're mad

Is anyone as excited about Alice in Wonderland as I am? It comes out this friday and I'll be right in front. It was one of my favorite movies as a kid, and I still love the books. I just watched the movie with my 5 year old sister and its still pretty magical.

Tim Burton is doing quite a different take on the whole thing. His movie starts out with Alice, now 19, revisiting Wonderland after having been there ten years before. She is the only one who has the ability to tame or kill the Red Queens dragon and end her reign of terror.

It seems like it's gonna be all sorts of weird. I can't wait.

These boots are made for walking like a rock star

I have wanted a pair of ankle boots for about 3 fall seasons now and I never am able to find a pair that I really want. There's always something about each pair I'm not impressed with. I thought maybe my "need" for ankle boots would dissipate but it's still there. Then I found these:

Sam Edelman Zoe boots. I love them so much I might just puke. They're very clear knock offs of the Balenciaga boots from a few seasons ago; but I just don't care. These are rock and roll at its finest. These need to be mine.

Mary Kate has a pair of the Balenciaga boots, and I just love them. You will be mine boots.

Rapunzel Rapunzel Girl you gotta cut that hair

So I did it. I cut my hair. I haven't cut my hair in over 4 years. When I was in college I had a short bob so I could avoid having to style it every day and then when I graduated and became a poor struggling research scientist I decided to grow it out and never ended up going to get a cut...ever. It was long, probably the longest I've ever had it. Like this:



The hairdresser cut off almost 3 inches and its still long. Here was my inspiration:



I wanted lots of layers, like I told the boy, I wanted to get rid of my long hippy hair, I wanted less Jonie Mitchell and more Josie and the Pussycats. So after cutting, curling and styling I now look a bit like this:

Hah! This cracks me up. After spending years blow drying, coloring and straight ironing my hair almost everyday I gave up about a year ago with all heat products for my hair, it was destroying it. I was starting to look like a fuzzy tennis ball with how many frayed ends I had on my head it just wasn't looking healthy so I started letting my hair air dry and leaving the wavyness I have just stay there. But I'm liking the barrel curls that I had when I left the salon today, there was a bounce in my step, I felt like a 60's sexpot. The boy even walked in (having forgotten I got a hair cut) and went "Whoah, you look gorgeous. Your hair is so beautiful." So I'm gonna go with it; for now, it makes me feel good!

I was wondering for all of you lovely ladies out there that style your hair in the mornings, are there any recommendations you might have for the best hair rollers or curlers out there I can use to achieve large wavy voluminous hair that isn't going to cost me a ton of money to get? After embracing my long hippy hair I feel out of the loop of styling products for my new tresses. It was like living off the grid but only on my head.

I will post pictures of my hair at some point but after taking a nap and going on a bike ride it no longer lives up to my Farrah standards :)

Have a great day. xoxo