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dwayne ‘the mineral’ johnson, jesus christ marie

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watch me

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got no problem with watching a full season of tv in one sitting but when it comes time to pick a movie im like “am i really ready to pay attention to something for two hours”

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when u make a mistake

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the best scene

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An open letter to a super fella!

Dear Vladmir Putin,

I have heard of your deeds and I think that you are very great! I am a pro-Russian separatist in the state of Minnesota, and I can tell you that many of us here feel that we would be better off if only we were part of the Russian Federation instead of our current country (United States).

Will you please invade us and rule over us? It’s so sad for us to be governed by our own sovereign government when we so badly wish that you were in charge instead.

When I was in middle school there were some strong boys that used to protect me. All I had to do was give them my lunch money every day (it kept me skinny!) and let them dunk my head in the toilet sometimes. But it was worth it because no one else harmed me except for sometimes. You could be like those wonderful middle school boys! I have even more lunch money now than I did in middle school.

Please take over my region! My friends and I already held a referendum and the majority of us that voted (just me) have agreed to let you graciously take over by force. I just wish you could have invaded us sooner, but those pesky Olympics made you have to pretend to be diplomatic until after February.

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why are there so many “romantic” black and white gifs of tate from american horror story that aint right did you guys pay any attention to that show at all

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It's Oscar Night and I like the Oscars

So this eventful week ends with an event I look forward to all year, because I’m really into movies and I get excited about the Oscars. I’ll probably do some live tweeting once the actual awards start, but meanwhile, here are my expert predictions, and my even more expert picks (the nominees that I wish would win). 

But this year is hard! There will be upsets! My guesses will be wrong a lot! Which will totally be fun! 

DISCLAIMER: I haven’t seen any of the nominees in the non-feature categories except for the Animated Short nominee that was before Frozen. But I’m submitting predictions and picks in those categories anyway because I feel like it and it’s what I do and hi, I’m zawmer.

Here are the nominees, and below are my predictions and picks. Also at the end, if you get that far, is my personal top ten for 2013.

Read More

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Jesse Plemons and Aaron Paul at the AMC, Sundance and IFC after party

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TIP: Tumblr has quietly unveiled @ notifications for users!

Tumblr unveiled a basic feature on its platform today that will make many users happy—if they notice it.

Did you know you can type @ to auto-link a username? You can! And as of today, you can now see notifications when someone @mentions you on your Activity page and your dashboard:

The awesome: MENTION!!! NOTIFICATIONS!!! ON YOUR ACTIVITY PAGE!!!!!

The cons: - if you have a lot of activity on your stream, forget about being able to find these notifications in the middle of all the other notes - you don’t get email notifications, at least not yet. - Tumblr users haven’t really noticed yet! So reblog! Mention people! Talk to each other!  :)

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When I go to the gym

Expectation

Reality

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Percolation

I dreamt about my dad last night for the first time in a few years. We sat on a swinging bench and played Scrabble. We hugged and laughed. It was nice.

Though she is loathe to admit it to everyone, my mom believes in ghosts. She'll try and soften it by saying spirits or entities or say she's watching Ghost Hunters "ironically," but anyone with a pair of eyes can see that she's in car 3 on the Afterlife train. 

Unfortunately, she accidentally raised me to have thought independent from hers. This failed spectacularly in most cases; most people who've never met either of us are instantly able to tell I'm her daughter. But in a few ways, we're different. 

When I tell her about this dream, she'll instantly think that Dad visited me in my subconscious, sending me a message that everything is fine and Heaven kicks ass. And that's rad. The idea that a mess of chemicals in my brain that made a Dad-related sort-of narrative can be comforting to a living person is bonkers. 

We are amazing creatures, particularly when it comes to denial of All Things Scary. The denial is so palpable that we create scarier things (ghosts) which are actually Not Scary at all because they subtly hint that it could be you one day. Maybe one day, after you die, YOU'LL be the one haunting that suburban family in Des Moines. You could be the one sending knives flying across the room or showing up behind someone in a bathroom mirror.

Somehow, that's less scary than dying. And I'm not denying that. That is a flat-out truth. I don't believe in ghosts or the afterlife, and death scares the ever-living crap out of me. There was a brief time in my teens where I tried to be religious just to give myself some comfort about life after death, but it didn't take.

So, now I just try not to think about it, save for a few inevitable nights where I stare at the ceiling for six hours and beat myself up over not living enough in my very short time as a human being. I'm often envious of the calm and nonchalance many people have when it comes to the inevitable, and I hope to one day acquire it. If anyone has any suggestions, I'm all ears.

  In the end, my dead Dad visited me in my dream just to play fucking "CWM" in Scrabble and get like forty-eight points. Bitch move, Dad. Next time, let's go waterskiing. 

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The Bechdel Test has long been the barometer of women-friendly films, but Pacific Rim fans say it doesn’t give the movie’s female lead enough credit.

An interesting read. This article critiques Pacific Rim for not having enough female representation, but acknowledges that Mako is a integral part of the story and a well-developed female character. Although I thoroughly enjoyed the film and appreciated some parts of Mako’s story, I did not find the film or Mako’s character nearly as empowered or progressive as this article does. Not only because she is the only female given any notable screen time, but because she was almost constantly submitting to men. I appreciate that there was not an overtly romantic or sexual relationship between her and Raleigh, but the power dynamics seemed very clear to me throughout the film and Mako was definitely at the bottom.

Also, I must echo that the Bechdel test is a tool to examine trends in the film industry. I don’t believe it is useful as a pass/fail test on any one movie. A film can easily be sexist and pass the Bechdel test, and a film can have strong female characters and fail. However, I will say that I find it hard to imagine a movie being feminist without passing the Bechdel test. In order to call a movie feminist, it must be a story about women that actively empowers them. Very few movies do this, because most movies (even if they feature a strong female) are about men.