the countdown is on...

In less than 12 hours, Rob and I (along with about 18 other Dordt people) will leave Sioux Center for the much warmer and more beautiful south. We have been looking forward for this trip for a long time, and had a lot of preperation to do, but finally it is complete and we can relax and think about the trip.

Earlier this week, I didn't think that I was going to be able to go because I hadn't gotten my passport yet. We sent in our applications a while ago, and Rob got his, but because we got married, they needed our marriage certificate. There were a couple more problems with that, and when we called the passport information center, they said that it was sent priority mail on the 26th, not overnight, like we had paid for. But it came, and we can go.

We are really looking forward to spending time in a new country. Neither of us have been out of the country, besides Canada, before. Hopefully, we don't look or act too weird. We will take a lot of pictures and will post some when we get back.

Please pray for us and our team as we work and learn more about a different culture.
We will be back on Jan13, and will probably have a lot of stories to tell.
Adios for now.
(we should practice our Spanish a little)

Gingerbread CRC

Our gingerbread house...er... church is done. It is almost entirely edible (there are wood blocks under the cobblestone (necco wafer) steps. The chocolate Meg is pouring in the one photo is for handmade shingles. I realized after uploding these photos that one of the bird's (stick of gum) beaks (chunk of necco wafer) had fallen off... oh well. Anyhow...we had a lot of problems getting this one up, but we got it done... the pillars out front were a disaster... they're still crooked. The stained glass windows (melted lifesavers) are the coolest part... but there are no holes large enough to get a candle in the thing to light them up.

The Nativity Story

So we watched the movie "The Nativity Story".

Good:
• the costumes
• the animals
• the sets
• some of the music with hints of well known hymns and Christmas songs
• the pace
• the overall story

Bad:
• some of the acting
• no strong consistant theme in the score... sorta all over

Ugly:
• Carol of the Bells playing when they arrive at Bethlehem (I think they wanted somewhat of a frantic piece, but it stuck out a bit much)
• they tried to use the wise men as comic relief at parts... some of the wisemens' dialogue was really bad

Overall verdict:
Especially toward the beginning there is a lot of weak acting. Most of the characters show too much emotion or none at all. I felt like a lot of the music was only there to help with the setting... it was just all over with no mood... also got better toward the end. Even though the movie has a lot of shortcomings overall I highly recommend seeing it. It's much better than One Night with the King was. I also feel like the makers want to give one message and do it strongly... in particular the idea that Christ's humble beginning was not only ironic, but necessary to keep Herod from noticing his arrival and putting an end to him immediately. I didn't know how they were going to pull this all together to make a worthwhile film but I think they did at least a decent job. Go watch it for yourself.

*****

We watched the movie Thumbsucker last night. It is probably one of my favorite movies of all time. It's definitely not one that everyone can/will appreciate, but I really enjoyed it. Vincent D'Oreo or whatever his name is (From Law & Order:CI) fits his role in this movie so much better than his role on TV. Vince Vaughan and Keaunu Reeves also make appearances. One movie review is enough for one post though so I won't go off about this movie.

After reading E&L's post I thought Sufjan Stevens' Christmas album would be a good one to have to play during the holidays to fill our apartment with Christmas cheer. Unfortunately there was not one copy of the CD availible in the entire city of Sioux Falls. I couldn't believe it. It must be pretty good. I ordered it online instead... hopefully it gets here before Christmas is over. If not the Vince Guaraldi Trio will have to suffice.

Thanks for checking in on us! Stay warm! Stay safe to those who are traveling.

The Decemberists & the West

Hi. I have been listening to The Crane Wife by the Decemberists nonstop lately. It is sooo good. I've heard the band a number of times on Radio Paradise, in the Humble Bean and maybe other places that play good music... but never really given them a chance. After hearing the song "The Island" on Threadless I decided to get the CD with some early Christmas money from Target (Thanks, Josh & Kris). What really got me interested is that "The Island" has a part that sounds so much like it could be Pink Floyd that it's almost creepy... almost. The rest of the CD doesn't have as much resemblance to Pink Floyd, but the whole album is really good. Check this one out for sure (most people probably have months ago... what can I say... I'm a little out of the loop).

By the way, Threadless is having a $10 sale. Good stuff. Use the link on this page to get there.

For Broadcast Production class we have what the instructor calls "Favorite Film Fridays" every other week. Instead of covering regular classroom material we present our favorite movie. That is, we give a brief PowerPoint about the cast/crew/production/whatever... show 5-10 minutes of the movie... and then talk about it. It is my turn this week. I am going to show the first scene from "Once Upon a Time in the West" directed by Sergio Leone. I think it is probably my alltime favorite movie. Nobody in the class has ever heard of it, let alone seen it. What a pity!

Deja Vu

This post is a little late since I watched the movie Deja Vu last week sometime. Anyhow here's my thoughts on that:

I was really surprised with the movie. I thought that it was going to be something along the lines of Groundhog Day where he keeps waking up to the same day. It is not. It's a lot of science fiction-type stuff but it's pretty good. Like most of my awful reviews I think it's going to boil down to this: I don't want to spoil it so go see it yourself. I think it's definitely worth watching. It's the best movie of its type in a long time.

Okay... so I've said nothing about the movie. What I figured out is this: Without fail if my expectations for a movie are high I am always disappointed. If my expectations are low I am always pleasantly surprised.

In other news... I bought robhaan.com recently. I'm working on the content right now (there's not really anything there right now). At this point I think it will just be a portfolio.

I hope everyone reading this that played Rook over Thanksgiving got better hands than I did. Other than that Thanksgiving was great.

Ummm... that's all for now

happy pajamas

This next picture is ok Rob with his pajamas on. He has these penguin pajama pants that he promises to wear to go see Happy Feet.

I don't have a very big attention span today. I got the minimum work done for tomorrow, and that is about where I stopped. Tomorrow, Rob and I are going to Sioux Falls to do some Christmas shopping. Rob isn't very big on going to stores and malls during the weekends, especially this close to Christmas. I hope to give away some pottery that I have made this year in Ceramics class as gifts. Hopefully the recipients like them. I can't guarantee a whole lot.

my night off

I posted a photo of the tag to this painting on here in July to be a dork. Here is an actual photo of the painting... and Meg contemplating it. This picture is almost half a year old, but posts with photos are more interesting.

I watched the movie "One Night With The King" last week sometime. Parts of it quite good, but a lot of it was really bad. The story is that of Esther from the Old Testament. It's a good story, but they totally tried to turn it into a fairy tale. The worst part was where this butterfly was floating past her á la Snow White's scene with the birds and she looked at it and smiled and it was awkward...oh wait... there were a couple stupider things... but you should still maybe see it for yourself at some point because it is such a good story I don't think it could be messed up to the point of not being worth watching. Or you could just go read it I suppose.

And now a list of my favorite games:
• Texas Hold'em
• Settlers of Catan
• Rook
• Pit
• Bang!

Hey everybody out in blogland, what is your favorite game?

Dave's Muffin

Would you like to see some drarrings?

Today my drawing class hung the show up at the new "tastfully extravagent" coffee shop, Butler's. The shop opens next week Wednesday less than a block away from the house where I lived for 19 years. Soon Sioux Center will be a bustling metropolitan area and the 75 Plaza will take over the universe. The manager offered us muffins which Dave Schierbeek reports weigh three pounds. The only thing I entered in the show was a quick gesture figure drawing. I guess it's alright, but the real reason I only entered that is my first assignment didn't turn out well at all and I never finished my second one yet.

Awww man... the image uploader deal is not working right now... I'll post the photo of Dave & the muffin later.

Film Challenge

It's not too late. You can still vote. Yes you. Go now and watch our movie "The Drawing Board" at www.dordt.edu/filmchallenge. You don't have to be a student to vote... just need to have a name and email address.

I was just looking at the website for Stranger Than Fiction. I think it looks really good. After you go vote on the film challenge website go check out strangerthanfiction.com. For the record we hadn't even heard of this movie when we made ours. We had seen Adaptation, but I think that's quite a bit different yet. This is getting very similar.

For the Price is Trite Meg dressed up as a fairy thing and I dressed up as a newsie. You can't really tell what I'm supposed to be here because I don't have my newspapers with me. I didn't win anything. Neither did Meg, but that's cuz she was running the show.

Friday night was the screening for the prairie grass film challenge. We didn't win. There were some decent entries. Go check them out at www.dordt.edu/filmchallenge. Vote for the one you like best (ours).

48 hour challenge and other things

Meg is in ceramics class this semester. She really enjoys working on the wheel. (This photo isn't the wheel where you make the clay into the pot though... this is the one where you detail the bottom after it's slightly dry... I think... I've never actually done any of that myself.)

Today was the last day of the film challenge. We didn't spend nearly as much time working on the thing as I thought we would. I actually got as much or more sleep than usual. The more I think about our movie the more I like it. There are some things that aren't so great... like you can hear the flourecent lights buzzing the whole time and there is always infinite depth of field so it doesn't look to professional (I guess that'd be my fault cuz I did almost all of the camerawork). But I like the idea. I don't want to say anything else about it now in case you can make it to the screening at 7pm on the 13th in S101. After that the video will be availible to watch online.

Movies I've seen recently:

School for scoundrels: I actually only saw about 2/3 of this since I went in to watch it after work when it was well into the movie. Unless the first 1/3 of the movie is phenominal, this movie is nothing too great. I guess some of it's kinda entertaining... but definitely not worth the time and money.

Dandelion: We rented this one tonight. I really liked it. I'm not entirely sure why. I don't want to say that I totally connected to it... there's a lot of bad stuff in it... but it seemed very real to me. There's a lot of foul language and drug usage, but I still recomend the movie. There is a lot of negativity throughout but the ultimate message is one of hope... I think. I think when you watch this you will either really connect with it and enjoy it or else totally hate it.

In other news, I don't know if I've said this on the blog yet or not... but anyhow... Meg and I are going to the Dominican Republic after Christmas. AMOR (a mission outreach) is a service project organized by Dordt (specifically I think Sam and now Pastor Rod are in charge of it). One team goes to Honduras and one team goes to the DR. We are really excited about this!

So... As of this morning I think I'm done with this poster. I figured I'd post it here. Advancement will probably put it online soon too. The whole CMYK RGB thing drives me crazy. I understand how each works and what each is for... but why does stuff always look better if you print it RGB than if you print it CMYK? This confuses me to no end. I printed one of each and they were completely different.

There are 3 movies coming tonight or tomorrow that I actually kinda want to see... open season, the guardian, and school for scoundrels. They are all getting bad reviews. I'll probably be better off just doing homework.

Well... time for work.
Have a nice day!

old news

so i guess this news is a few weeks old now... but the sculpture garden was destroyed... kinda... all but two sculptures were tipped over. Laurel and Rachel's wasn't really damaged because it's on that cement block. The other ones got their bottoms and some of the sides torn off when they were tipped over. They are all fixed now... back up with a few more patched cracks, but almost as good as new. When I pulled ours out of the creek there was a toad sitting inside it. I like that.

I'm sorta in charge of the art club this year. So far we've had 2 events and four people + myself have showed up for them. The first was a trip to Sioux City to see some Japanese woodcuts. It was okay. There was one really nice one from the tales of Genji, but other than that nothing tooo exciting. The next week we watched a documentary about Andy Warhol on PBS on the HDtv in the classroom building. It was good, but I didn't get to see the second half because I had to work. I put up a quike iWeb website for the artclub. You can check it out at homepages.dordt.edu/artclub. The fonts are all messed up at this point... I haven't got around to fixing it.

Last night Meg's whole family was in town so all 11 of us sat around the kitchen table and played Loaded Questions. We never finished. That game is meant for 6 people max. After that we came home at watched Pride and Prejudice. That movie put me to sleep in record time (sorry, Naomi). I woke up for the last 5 minutes though.

I've been working on a poster for the theatre department. I think I'm almost done, but it needs some finetuning... then maybe I'll post it.

some photos

Playing Bang!
Working on stuff in the living room
The small orange fish is the new guy in our apartment.

a lazy monday

Hi.

I have no movie reviews for you today. I tried to watch a movie on Friday but fell asleep... cuz I was tired... not cuz of the movie... Nothing much going on here. School starts the day after tomorrow. It's about time...
anyhow... I have nothing much to say

Accepted

This review is a few days late. We watched it on Friday night at midnight.

Accepted: C+
The whole concept behind the movie is pretty stupid and the whole thing is extremely unbelievable. I have to admit though, there are plenty of pretty funny parts... or it may have just been the people that I was watching it with. The movie is fairly entertaining... but don't waste your money on seeing it in the theatre.

In other news... I have a jar of delicious, homemade grape jam in the fridge right now. I had some for lunch. It is good. But the most amazing part is I helped make it... okay honestly I just poured some sugar in and stirred it for a while... but that counts, right? Matt and Kevin were the ones that actually made the stuff. Call them if you want to buy some. I bet they'd sell you some.


This is my mom and a little cat on the couch at my uncle's house.


I hope it's okay with Laurel and Rachel that I post these photos of their sculpture. Theirs probably came out of the firing in the best condition... there are few if any cracks. Nice work!

Keep your shirt on...

but go buy another one at Threadless (see link to right... under "links"). They are $10 right now. I don't know when the sale ends maybe today. After using the link on our blog to get to the site and filling your cart with shirts, type "stay classy" in the coupon code field to get $3 off your purchase... I hope I don't get in trouble for leaking that code... but i found it online by googling anyhow.... plus Threadless wants your money... most of all though... you want their shirts... they just reprinted a bunch of the all time best shirts.

Enough advertising.

Oops that was a lie... I was about to comment about a movie... but that would be advertising too in this case... oh well... The movie is Brick... it's out on DVD from Focus. It's pretty much a film noir movie in a high school setting. A little awkward... but I really liked it. Some of it reminded me of the Good the Bad in the Ugly... but reading my explanation of the similarities would be excruciatingly boring.

Summer is almost over. Call me crazy, but I'm glad. I really enjoy school (at least the first couple weeks before I'm months behind on projects).

I spose. Gotta go to work now.

Everybody! Go Check this out now!

Flight Simulator
The things you'll find on your lunch break...

More pretentious movie reviews

Talladaga Nights:
I'm not going to even give this one a grade. It wouldn't be fair. Movies can only be disappointing if you have your hopes up for them. I guess I didn't think it was going to be the best movie ever... but it wasn't even good. Maybe a few funny parts but that's all I'll say

The Descent: B+
I guess this is probably one of the better horror movies I've seen. I don't really want to say much about it cuz I might ruin it if you decide to go see it. I think the problem with a lot of recent horror/thriller movies is they are just trying to show off their capabilities in special effects. There's not a lot in the way of special effects here.

I guess I can't think of much else to say. That's pretty sad. I work too much and I never know how much I should say about that. I should be working on my own graphic design stuff, but 40 hours of computer work seems to be enough for me these days. In the evening I'm perfectly content to watch Jeopardy, Law and Order SVU, and go for a little jog. If anyone out there jogs and uses an iPod & iTunes, check out the podcast called podrunner. Just good dj-mixed beats to keep you moving. Very tasty. And if you're looking for a good album to download check out Imogen Heap's "Speak for Yourself". I'd heard a couple tunes on Radioparadise and ended up downloading the whole album with some itunes credit I got for my birthday.

These photos are pretty much about Meg's post. The photo of the burger will probably make y'all want to never even think about eating a burger ever again... but let me assure you it was delicious, not matter how disgusting that photo looks. I'm not a very good photographer with that little camera yet... there's not enough control for me.

I had decided to set up a separate blog for movie reviews and write good reviews with complete thoughts and sentences and minimal ellipses... maybe another day I will get that set up... over at rottentomatoes.com... but for now... more ellipses...

Miami Vice: B-
There is a lot that I really like about this movie and a lot that I really don't like. This movie is all about the guns. Although there really isn't a whole lot of gunplay, the shots fired are memorable. The sound of the guns is very loud and believable. The music is toned down whenever the guns are fired. The music is the thing that I love the most and hate the most. Three amazing artists/groups are featured: Moby, Audioslave, and Mogwai. However the editing and mixing of the music is awkward. I think they were going for unique, but what they got was awkward. It didn't flow. If you're going to watch this one, watch it in the theatre... but don't go out of your way to watch it.

Monster House: B
I put this movie in a category called "Movies I would have loved when I was 10"... next to School of Rock. There have been more than a handful of kids that have come out of the movie because it is too scary for them. I see that as a good thing. Most movies that are attempt to be scary fall flat on their face. I don't think I was ever scared... or really thrilled... but I guess it's a pretty solid entertaining movie. Don't expect any of the dept or cleverness of Ice Age or Toy Story (did I just make it sound like those are deep movies?) but if you're looking for a fun movie I think it's worth a shot. That's just my opinion. Meg slept through the entire thing.

John Tucker Must Die: C
There is nothing new in this movie. Perhaps I shouldn't admit that I've seen any of the movies that it's the same as, but it's just another dumb highschool movie like She's All That or 10 Things I Hate About You. Nothing memorable here. The thing that I found surprising is that the went and chose a song from 10 Things as one of the songs mentioned and played in the movie (I want you to want me) as if there aren't enough songs out there to chose from. This is probably one of the stupidest of high school movies... but I can't be too hard on it... because... well... what do you expect?

quickly....

I guess it is about time that I add to our life story.
I don't have much time because I am off to work in a little bit.
We just got back from Des Moines for the weekend. We were there visiting Rob's sister and brother-in-law with his parents.
Saturday we went to this shopping area in Des Moines. There were a few antique shops, which I like to look in and scavenge through (I didn't find anything worth buying... except maybe an old autoharp) , and a few other stores that I didn't care for. But it was a fun and hot day. Later, the whole family went to a sports park like Thunder Road. Rob, his sisters, and I all played mini golf... which was pretty much impossible, while the guys road go carts. We joined them later. I think that I had an unfair advantage because while I was on the track I was in the fastest car. We also ate a ton, which Rob has the pictures to prove. I think he is planning to put them on here... he likes to do that.

Now, I am off to slave away.
Good day.

Hendrick & Danielle

Today Professors Van Wyk and Versluis began the installation of our large scale sculptures. I just ran out there to snap some photos to share with y'all. The assignment was to work with a partner to create a 4-foot tall figurative sculpture. I worked with Katy Dekens (You can check out her blog from the link at right). We had a good time working on them even though it was a little stressful and very time consuming. As you can see in one of the photos, a portion of the male figure's rear end exploded off during the firing. Hence the stick holding it on while the glue-stuff dries. The sculptures don't stick out very well since they are all very earthy color and they are on the edge of a dry field (behind the BJ Haan auditorium) So anyhow. They're out there. Not all completely installed yet... but they're there.

The other photo is not of a sculpture. It is of Meg. She made some chicken salads the other night that I thought were pretty photogenic. What do you think?

I made a Mitch Hedberg Lego man for your viewing pleasure.

Yesterday we watched Lady in the Water. I wanted to see it because Sam recommended it on his blog. I guess it's pretty good. I liked it a lot better than the Village. It's not getting very good reviews from critics and I can understand why now that I've seen it. It's could be described as a two hour attack on film critics... that whole theme is actually kinda funny in the movie. The story was just bizarre... but completely original as far as I know... Paul Giamati was really good at times... annoying at times. Overall I'd give the movie a B.

Hello World.
Welcome to the first post of "Rob & Megan" (clever name, I know). So anyhow. We're married now... so that's good. I uploaded some awesome photos for your viewing pleasure... more to come. One photo is NYC (where we went on our honeymoon) and the other two were taken in art museums. See if you can guess which ones. It's funny... I haven't made a blog post in months and now I cannot think of anything to say. I'll give you some brief movie reviews

The Lake House ***
Nacho Libre ****
The Omen ***
The Break-up***
A Prairie Home Companion ***
Cars ****
Pirates of the Carribean ***
The Devil Wears Prada **
You, Me, and Dupree **

So there you have it...I think that's most of the movies I've seen in the past little while The asterisks are on a scale of 4... so I guess 4 is like an A, 3 is like a B, 2 is like a C.... I guess that means if I wanted to give an F I'd give zero *'s... I guess the only movies I really liked a lot were Nacho and Cars... I feel like I may be forgetting a few though. I could probably right a full post about each movie... but that would be boring for everybody. So let me just say that there are 8 billion similarities between Pirates 2: Dead man's chest and Star Wars V: Empire Strikes back (and the rest of the series). But I won't go off about that right now.

Ethan & Laurel dropped by tonight. I felt really weird because I was playing with legos on the kitchen floor at the time. Laurel gave us a sweet etching she did. I was really surprised and consequently probably really rude... so if you two read this, sorry for my awkwardness on receiving amazing gifts while playing legos on the kitchen floor. Thank you though!

I kinda want to go see Lady in the Water before somebody spoils the surprise twist ending for me... I don't think it will even be that good though... we'll see. I want to see Monster House as well... I wish we had the 3D one.

I think Meg will be able to post on this blog too... maybe she'll say something worth reading!