Stubbornness Averted

Well, I was trying to delay posting until I managed to find the aforementioned Capitol Collection in a store near me. Luckily for my readers, something happened in the meantime, and I received a new survival kit in the mail, which I'll tell you about in this post.

Many months ago, my parents went to test drive a car to get a gift card. They actually wanted to test drive the car, but the dealership was busy, so they got the gift card and were sent along their merry way. The gift card was for an outfitter that happens to sell a Deluxe Survival Kit unlike any I have ever seen before. Now it is in my collection of survival kits, and all it cost was like an hour of my parents' time, and $3.50 in RT fuel cost according to mapquest.com.

I will tell you what it includes. It includes a signaling mirror. A map compass (I have other compasses, but this one has a base that you can set down on your map for more accurate orienteering), and a magnesium firestarter because a girl can't have too many of those. But that's not all! It also includes 12 fire sticks. Well, I already have the best fire-starters ever, which I made myself with Miss Gokey, but I'm very glad I looked up the contents of the kit, because I very seriously believed the fire sticks were some kind of high-energy protein bar-type snack. I was mistaken. I'm glad I didn't bite into one.

Further, the kit includes one poncho, two towels that are shrunk to the size of quarters (once unleashed, those towels are NEVER going back into the bag), and one tiny roll of duct tape, presumably enough to tape you up if a branch rips a 1/2" gash all the way up your forearm.

The best parts of the kit are two things that I don't have in my previous kits: glow sticks (! YAY! I let glow bracelets from the dot spot suffice for my homemade kits) and...

drum roll please...

a bug net. Which my dad immediately put on his head. I didn't get a photo of him, but here's a photo of ME wearing it.

It's cammo! Perhaps you'll see me wearing it in the woods of Michigan some summer soon. Just for the bug net, the packet was totally worth the absolutely $0 and 0 effort that I personally put into it. Thanks, mom and dad! 

In other news, I have FINALLY finished reading 1491. You can find my rather abrupt review on goodreads here. I think. Now, since it's October (my favorite month), I'm reading Libba Bray's The Diviners. 

It's A Disaster

This post title is the name of a movie that Amanda recommended to me.

It is available to watch on Netflix. Netflix freaks me out. It's like, "Who are you? Where are you? What is your name? Do you have a profile?" These are things Netflix doesn't need to know about me. It already knows too much, like I've been enjoying watching season 1 (the only season Netflix has) of The New Girl. 

You know what's NOT on Netflix? 1492. It's not ANYWHERE. Not even at Video Escapades, where I'm considering applying for a job. LMS if I should apply for a job at Video Escapades. I'm concerned about 1492 because I'm having a hard time getting through the book 1491 (decided to take a photo so you can see my artistic blogging process, but mostly to have a nice thumbnail for the FB post), just like I had a hard time getting through 1493, which was by the same author. So, I figured...movie...1492. I remember that it came out for the 500th anniversary of the fateful voyage. It was then apparently swept under the rug so that future generations would actually have to read 1491 and 1493.

None of that is what this post is about. I am hopped up on expectorant.

It's a Disaster.

A group of friends meets for a couples' brunch. While they are getting ready to eat, events unfold and interpersonal drama is revealed. Then the lights go out, and the neighbor Hal appears in a HazMat suit. Hal only appears in the film for about 20 seconds, but he's the character I relate to the most. He informs the group that some dirty bombs have hit downtown, and everyone is going to die. The remainder of the film chronicles how the friends deal with this devastating news.

Amanda says, "Fairly entertaining ideas for the end of the world. Not sure how realistic, though."

I would agree with that. It's the kind of quick banter-y humor that reminds me of Sideways. I don't know why I think this, but I think that if you liked Sideways, you'll like It's a Disaster. I did not regret spending 1.5 hours of life watching it.

Do you have any more film recommendations for me? I will be happy to watch and review them, and to shout you out on the Memoir of Narrow Escape. In the meantime, I shall be engrossed in the drama that was ... 1491.