I am pretty much the epitome of a fangirl. And not just about one thing. There are so many things that I love and am interested in. Most of my friends know that I’m a huge Star Wars fan. I have been for a while. I stood in line to be one of the first to buy tickets to see one of the prequel movies. I dated a stormtrooper (yeah, ask me about that sometime). I put together a LEGO Millennium Falcon. I’m going to the Star Wars Celebration in Anaheim this year… and it’s not the first Star Wars Celebration I’ve been to.

I’ve waited in line for other things too… to get authors to sign books, for example. I’ve met and gotten books signed by both Neil Gaiman and George R. R. Martin. For me, it was more about actually getting to meet the author than getting an autograph in a book. Both of those guys are really interesting people, and it was fun to stand in line with some other fans of theirs to get to meet them and see a bit of what they are really like.

Ever since I was a kid, when I find something I like, there are times that I get really into it. I collect every thing having to do with it. As a kid, it was ALF or the Tasmanian Devil (from Looney Tunes). I had a bunch of ALF and Taz stuff. Then as a teenager, I decided I liked Noah’s Ark and started collecting Noah’s Ark stuff. When I was in high school, I met a friend that got me started watching The X-Files. I got REALLY into The X-Files. Having a friend that was into it too only fed the obsession. We joined David Duchovny fan clubs online, and we watched and rewatched episodes over and over again and analyzed them. Eventually, my friend went away to college, and I met a new group of friends and had a busier social life, so I kind of stopped watching, especially after Duchovny left the show. I never have watched the last couple of seasons. But recently, I’ve gotten back into it. The entire X-Files series and both X-Files movies are available streaming online, so I started a rewatch from the beginning. I’m already in Season 6 and through one of the movies. And it’s still just as good as it was 20 years ago.

I recently regretted missing out on another one of those author signings. Being the fangirl that I am, I was excited when David Duchovny wrote a book (of course I’m reading it, just haven’t finished yet!) and did a couple of signings. Unfortunately, they were only in New York and Los Angeles. I debated for like a week on whether to try to make it to the one in LA, but I decided it was just too much time and money to invest. I’m still kind of sad I missed it… I saw that Chris Carter (X-Files director/creator) was there, along with other celebrities. It looked like it was so much fun. I sure wish it had been closer and I’d been able to make it! (He did post today online about writing another novel, so hopefully there will be more book signings in the future that I can go to.)

I don’t know what it is. With TV shows, maybe it’s that the characters become real and I enjoy watching their stories unfold. It could be the very same thing with books. And as far as fandom, well, it’s a lot of fun to get together and meet other people that are as crazy about something as you are. That’s one reason I’m looking forward to going to Star Wars Celebration in April. I’m so excited to meet some of the stars from the original trilogy as well as just be around other people that are into the movies as well.

One other example involves music. I listen to a lot of music, but I don’t have a lot of favorite bands. Jimmy Eat World is my very favorite. I have been a fan of theirs for a while now. Their music has gotten me through some crazy times in my life over the last few years. I love both the music and the lyrics… they are just very relatable, at least to me. The cool thing is that now, they are a local band to me, as all of the band members live in the Phoenix area. They have not only played shows here that I’ve gone to, but I’ve met band members at other events as well. I mean, how cool is that? Think about your favorite band and what it would be like to run into them at places where you live? Pretty cool.

Ricky makes fun of me for my fangirling over things, but I know he gets it too. He’s just as (if not more) crazy about Tiger Woods than I could ever be about any movie, book, or TV show. I think there’s just something about us as humans, as a part of human nature, that likes finding connection in things. Sometimes we find a connection with people, and that’s awesome. But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with finding connection in stories, either. That’s what they are. Maybe not music so much as books, TV, and movies. As long as we have balance between fiction and real life and don’t get caught up in what’s not reality, I think these kinds of things are good to obsess over sometimes. They might even help us see real life in a different way, in a way we might not have looked at it before. Not to mention, in the right context, they can help us connect with other people too.

So, with that in mind, I encourage you to also find something you can obsess over. Nothing harmful, of course, and not to the point of detriment, but find a story that sucks you in, something you can share and analyze with other people. It’s fun, trust me. And I… well, I will keep calm and fangirl on!

I seriously debated on whether to post this at all or not. I know there are a lot of opinions out there about this movie, and the book series for that matter. I will start by saying I have read all of the books, and I went to see the movie this weekend. I’ll get into my somewhat review of it later in this post, but I want to talk about how controversial it is first.

I’ve seen a lot of links and posts on social media from people that are of the opinion that what takes place in the Fifty Shades of Grey book series (and movie, for that matter) is simply abuse – sexual, emotional, and/or physical abuse. I disagree. To me, having read the books, everything that happens in them is consensual. Now, you might disagree. You might say she was manipulated into what she did. But to me, Anastasia (the main female character) was a consenting adult who made her own decisions, so this was NOT abuse. If you choose to disagree, that’s fine. That’s your opinion, and you’re entitled to that. But I don’t think that. And that’s ok. I don’t believe I’m supporting the advocating of abuse by reading the books or paying to go see the movie.

Now, on to the movie review. I’ve heard LOTS of things about this movie. I’ve heard the actors didn’t even like it. I’ve heard that they basically had to get unknown actors for it because more popular actors wouldn’t do it. I don’t know. For me, the main characters were really just not how I pictured them. Not only not how I pictured them, they just didn’t seem… quite right. The actors grew on me a bit as the movie went on, but even then something just didn’t quite feel right. I’m not sure if I just didn’t think they were good actors, if they were wrong for the role, or they just didn’t have the right chemistry or what. Or maybe assuming (based on those above-mentioned articles) that the actors really didn’t want to play the roles just had an effect on my interpretation of their performance. At any right, there was just something off about it.

Other than that, I thought they did a good job of putting the right parts of the book in there. It was a pretty accurate representation of it, and without just being porn. I got into these books because I found the characters and their interaction to be interesting. I know they are sometimes referred to as “mommy porn”, something for moms to read and get off on. But I even found myself skipping sex scenes when I read them because it felt like the same thing over and over again. A lot of people say the books are crap, but well, obviously a lot of people did enjoy them. They were the kind of books that you would probably definitely consider a guilty pleasure… fun to read, but not necessarily something you would consider great literature. And that’s ok. Sometimes things are just fun, and they don’t have to be anything more than that.

Overall, the movie was… ok. I’m not sure I’d give it much more than that. I mean, obviously if you’ve read the books, then go see it, by all means. You’ll enjoy it enough. (It’ll be fun!) And the actors might be much better to you than I thought they were. They weren’t really bad, just not right compared to what I thought they should be. But hey, we all have our own opinion. And without that the world would be a pretty boring place.

If you’ve been following along for more than a year, you know that Ricky and I have attended the Arizona Strong Beer Festival every year since we’ve lived here, and have had the chance to meet master brewers from places like BrewInMind. It’s the only beer festival (and there are a LOT!) that we will attend EVERY year. It’s, well, pretty much the best beer festival in Arizona. Some might argue that, but I believe it would be the consensus. It definitely features more rare beers than any other beer festival here. And that’s what we like – being able to try new beers that we haven’t had (and might never have again, who knows).

The last two years we have gone to the festival as press, covering it for our beer blog, 1001 Bottles. This year, we decided to just go all out and be regular, every-day, beer-drinking attendees. And so we did.

It’s funny, I’m not even really sure what to say about the festival. Obviously, I have been before. And I have enjoyed it every time. It seems to just keep getting better and better every year. I do need to figure out some easy way to control how much beer I drink, though. There are so many to try, it is very difficult!

I keep getting asked what was my favorite beer from the festival. I don’t know that I can pick a favorite. I have a list of over 30 different beers that I tried there.  Here are some of the more memorable ones:

Sun Up Brewing’s Barrel Aged White Russian

I’ve had this beer one time before, I think, at the brewery. It’s located here in Phoenix, but is just not one of the breweries we manage to find our way to all that often, unfortunately. But it is SO good! I love big, thick barrel-aged stouts, and this one definitely didn’t disappoint.

Peoria Brewing’s Imperial Peanut Butter Porter

Here’s another big dark beer (of course, they’re my favorite kind!). I also really love peanut butter, so of course I had to try this one. And I loved it! It was the perfect balance of peanut butter, in my opinion.

Jack Daniels Kilt Lifter

In previous years of the Strong Beer Fest, it has seemed like Four Peaks typically always has the same beers at every festival. But this time, we got some brand new ones we’d never seen before. There was lots of new barrel-aged stuff, including the Jack Daniels Kilt Lifter. This one was quite good. Kilt Lifter is a great beer by itself, but it was fun to get the whiskey flavor in it for something different. Yum!

Dragoon Lazarus

According to Ricky, this was the best beer of the day, and I can’t argue too much. I can’t argue because 1) I do remember this beer being good, and 2) well, unfortunately, I can’t remember this beer QUITE as well as some of the others. It was late in the day… but it was a good beer!

So once again, it was a successful Strong Beer Fest and a successful kickoff to Arizona Beer Week. I know there are plenty of beer events going on in the valley this week, so I hope if you live here you get the chance to check some of them out. Cheers!