Category: Movies

Groundhog Day

One of my parents’ all-time favorite movies is Groundhog Day, and it ranks pretty high up there on my list as well. We watched it tonight, and so, unsurprisingly, I felt a lot like Bill Murray when I checked some other people’s blogs tonight.
Several of my favorite people are just scattered about the globe right now, and all of them have this amazing ability to not update their blogs at all. And since the most recent post on every one I checked was still from the first week of December (or November… or September) I could just hear “I Got You, Babe” as I went through the checklist of favorite (unupdated) blogs.

Then I thought to myself… “Mine looks pretty much the same.”
Now granted, I’m in Elizabeth City, I’ve been working my tail off the last couple of weeks between practicing various instruments and putting musical instruments into the hands of seemingly every middle schooler from Hertford to Manteo. But I’ve just been totally slack on my writing, both my own stuff and my more public face of dannypeck.net (/facebook).
So thanks to watching Groundhog Day all the way through for the first time in many years, here’s what I’d do if I had a day to live over. And over. And over…
1. Learn piano. And flute. And pan flute. And charango. I’d probably brush up on a lot of other instruments I play as well, starting with the guitar. I’ll probably never be Carlos Santana level. But repeating the same day over and over, I think I’d at least try. And I’d resort to music lessons much faster than Phil Connors (and before Sciuridaedicide).

2. Take up ice sculpting. I promise I’ll stop stealing from Harold Ramis after this one. But I mean, really? How many people can even do that? It’s gotta be pretty lucrative.

3. Reading. I think if I lived to be 300, I could start reading now and not stop till I died and still not have hardly put a dent in my personal reading list.

4. See how many languages I could learn. If nothing else, I’d finally know what Paul was laughing at in that Shyamalan movie, and I could exponentially increase the length of my reading list.

5. Travel. Bill Murray was stuck in Punxsutawney, PA because of a blizzard. Hopefully I’d have better weather. If you’re going to wake up in the same bed in the same place every morning, why not at least make it a challenge for God or fate or Harold Ramis to put me back in bed and make it to Ecuador or India or Japan by 5:59 am.

I could keep this list going. I could fill it up with more interesting, meaningful, or at least funny things than these. But I’m going to return to The Epic of South America and simply attempt to live out number 3 instead. Merry belated Christmas, Happy early New Year, and a prosperous Groundhog Day.

DST Thoughts

I was watching Jon & Kate Plus 8 last night. Get off me, I like it. At any rate, they took a two-stage trip to Hawaii. The first stage was a stop between their Pennsylvania home and their Pacific archipelagic destination for a few days in California. The idea was that they’d put all eight kids on Pacific time so that the transition into UTC-10 (Hawaii time) wouldn’t be as drastic.

It’s something I totally appreciate. Granted James has been home so I’ve not really cared about what time I’ve been going to bed this week. But even taking that into account, I’ve just been exhausted this week because of the time switch. Even five days later I’m not fully adjusted to it (and Pilgrimage this weekend is not going to help). And coming off Daylight Savings Time is only an hour difference. It makes you appreciate how sensitive the human body is to its environment.

My other observation about Daylight Savings Time is that almost every news article about it that gives any kind of history always mentions one the the “pros” of DST being the fact that children can trick-or-treat with more daylight. Why in the heck would you want more daylight? I always thought it was strange when I watched the movie ET and all the kids were trick-or-treating before dusk. Maybe it’s just a Southern thing, but everywhere I’ve ever lived, Trick-or-Treating begins when it starts to get dark and ends at about 9:00.

Are Georgia, Mississippi and the Carolinas just weird?

"Do you have any liquids?"

Quito-

We’ve just said our good-night prayer here at the hostel in Quito. It’s been an amazing day already even after sitting on planes for most of it and not really doing anything productive.

We started the day early at Hunter’s house and already had a story by the time we got to the Norfolk air port. Poor David and Holly Wright had to listen to Hunter’s travel alarm going off in her luggage in their back seat all the way there.

We got through our check-in pretty smoothly. I didn’t really want to let go of my guitar, but otherwise it was fine. We had pretty much two hours to kill before the plan was supposed to leave at 10:45- which turned into noon. So the whole group had plenty of time to eat breakfast/coffee at Starbucks, check out the airport shops, and relax.

So then we all start heading through security. We had to take off our shoes and I set off the metal detector with my belt. Katie was behind me and as I was finally getting my stuff, the security officer comes up to her and asks “Is this your bag?” to which she timidly replied “Yes…?” And the guy just grins and says “Come with me,” in a tone that seemed to say “This will take a while,” as he began to sing to himself. I just laughed and went to tell Sophia her mom was in trouble.

Edla, Carrie, Hunter and some others started trickling through the line, each giving us an update on the situation (and the contraband in Katie’s bag). Bug spray was a liquid and not allowed. 1 bottle of Pepto-Bismol, larger (by a significant amount) than the 3 oz. limit also would not pass. Neither would the second bottle. Then out came the brownies and in inquiry as to whether or not they were “funny.” This resulted in an offer for a trade: bag of brownies to the security officers for 1 bottle of Pepto allowed through. Response: adamantly “no,” (probably a good thing in hind-sight as a liquid-bomb-building terrorist would have chosen the Pepto and aroused suspicion). Brownies returned. It was then reported that Katie wanted to chug the Pepto down to the three ounce limit. Ultimately not entirely true, but hilarious enough that we pretend it was.

Finally she made it. Lots more hanging around and then at last we boarded the tiniest passenger plane I have ever traveled in. You could feel every bit of speed, turbulence, take-off, and landing. I watched out the window and slept for most of it, except for a roller-coaster-like descent which left my mouth open and my eyes firmly shut, Edla’s hands clasped on her cross, and Julie’s arms clasped around Edla.

Arrival in Atlanta was pretty chill. Kinda like being home for me. Interesting after reading Genesis for Old Testament class and God commanding people to return to the land of their birth. Spiritual connection on the trip already.

Lots more hanging around and a gazillion-mile hike. Yes, seriously. A gazillion. We had lunch at a food court in Concourse E and felt like we were in the middle of an Army camp. We took the opportunity to teach Sophia about military uniforms, resulting in a half-hour debate about whether the flag really would be backwards if you carried it on a pole and ran forward (yes, if it was held to your left).

Much less security the second time around and first real passport check. We were mostly together on the play. I got a window seat again with Edla, then Julie next to me and Sophia, Betty and Bradham behind. When we took off (after being 11th in line on the runway) I actually saw the air go over the wings like the show you in 6th grade science class.

In-flight movie: Premonition. Good message, weird ending. I do find it obnoxious how movies can talk about religion and faith and even the priest won’t actually say “God.”

I happened to look out the window while we were over the ocean. All you could see was this floor of clouds stretching to the horizons in all directions and several hundred feet beneath us. I just wanted to get out and walk on them. I know it was a really simple thing. In fact stuff like clouds doesn’t usually get to me. But I think the fact that they were so perfect and everywhere, I was on top of them made me realize that it wasn’t something you see or experience every day. I hope and pray our whole trip will be like that: a new experience that I can’t have every day, and something that will make me think.

So after that most of the flight was pretty chill. My contemplative mood lasted through several stupid television shows, a surprisingly good chicken dinner, and finally flying smack into the middle of Quito.

The airport is seriously crammed into this miles-long metropolis with buildings all around it. It’s in about the only really flat place in the city: the dead center. You just feel like your are scraping the top of every building as you descend. And the whole city was lit up and we could see it miles and miles away.

As we started landing, the first sign I saw on a building say Xerox. Also not something I expected. Maybe it just shows globalization or Americanization, but aside from being cynical it felt like I was at least a little connected to home because of a big bright red English sign.

Disembarking took no time at all and before I knew it I had a stamp on my passport, a guitar and a bag in my hands, as was walking toward a jumping, waving South American man with three super-excited women.

As I guessed, it was Dario, the multi-lingual Youth World host who everyone met and loved last year. I could tell why immediately. He was so energetic and knew who I was the second Julie said my name (“Oh, you’re the musician!”) Pretty soon I met Cameron and Roberto and had Ecuadorian people kissing my cheek and somehow we eventually ended up on a bus and at the hostel. Quick briefing and some snacks and it was time for journaling and bed. Don’t feel extremely productive, but definitely excited, spirit-filled, and completely exhausted.

I Bought Keira Knightley On eBay

So I’ve been having a girly kick latley and bought both Keira Knightley and Julia Stiles on the internet. Granted that means Pride & Prejudice and 10 Things I Hate About You but it’s still fun to say. However, my get-rich-quick scheme (A.K.A. marrying Avril Lavigne) has failed as she was betrothed to Deryck Wibley of Sum41. Darn you Deryk. Oh, well, there are quite enough “Danny fans” (Mike’s words, not mine) right now anyway.

At any rate, today was the first day at Albemarle Music Center. Come see me. It rocks and I’m enjoying it and can’t wait to start it all the time in August. They’re gonna kill me at Goody’s when I tell them, but whatever. It’s almost not like work at the music store. They’re like “hey, make a spreadsheet” or “restring this guitar” which is stuff that I would be doing at home and not paying myself if I wasn’t there. So heck yes.

Really this is just an update of my life. Nothing profound today. I like that about summer. It’s a vacation from being profound. And I’d even let you quote me on that except that it would be too much like a profound statement. So this entire paragraph is off the record.

Confunded

Well, I wrote a pretty nicely sized piece about the Fourth of July the other day and it seemed to have disappeared. Until I just discovered I’m silly and hit “Save” instead of “Publish”. So it’s up 5 days late now.
If you’re reading this on wordpress, cool. If you’re reading it on my new start page, cooler. I’m figuring out this whole RSS include thing and they’re pretty sweet. Makes me feel a little hackerish again. That’s basically it for now. Nothing really to report on other than one month left being at Goody’s all the time and that Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest was pretty darn good. Needed more interaction between characters and less creatures, but otherwise pretty sweet.