Reviews and More

As I get older, I’m naturally paying more attention to things like retirement funds and life insurance policies. I want to make sure that my husband and I have enough money to live on once we both retire and/or that the surviving partner will get a good settlement from our life insurance policies should something happen to one of us.

I’ve also been thinking of what I would do if I didn’t need my life insurance policy anymore. For example, what if I found out that I was terminally ill and would die in just a couple of years? I know my husband wouldn’t need the funds from my policy because he’s still healthy and has a long career ahead of him, so I’m sure we’d want to cash in my policy so that we could use the money to make my final years memorable. Or, what would happen if both of us lived well into our 80s? Life insurance money wouldn’t do us much good then, so there’s another instance where we’d want to cash in our policies to out the money to better use.

That’s why I’ve also been checking out companies that handle life/viatical settlements. These companies, such as SecureLifeSettlements.com, help policyholders sell the rights to their policies for cash that they can use right now. In most cases, the settlements far exceed the typical amount that your insurance company would give you if you simply surrendered your policy. This benefits all parties involved, and is an option that’s worth looking into if the two scenarios I outlined above ever become a reality.

Obviously no one likes to think about death, terminal illness, or life insurance any more than they have to, so I’m just glad my husband and I now have a plan in place to cover these possibilities.

It’s hard to believe, but the current television season will be coming to a close in a couple of months. In order for me to keep my TV recaps going, I want to use the long summer to watch shows that I didn’t have time for during the regular season.

But I don’t want to waste my time on shows that suck or that will just end up getting cancelled, which is why I need your input. Do you have any recommendations for me? What’s a show that you think I’d be able to get into quickly? I’ve heard some great things about Ugly Betty, so I might give that a try, but are there any other ones that you can recommend? The show doesn’t have to be brand-new; in fact, I’d actually prefer if you recommended something that’s a couple of years old so I can watch the DVDs.

Here are the ones I currently watch:

CSI
Desperate Housewives
The New Adventures of Old Christine
How I Met Your Mother
24
Prison Break
Grey’s Anatomy
Boston Legal
Entourage
The Sopranos

I’m pretty much open to anything (except reality/game shows), so send me your suggestions please!

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Right now QuotesAuction.com is running a special offer whereby you can get $200 worth of leads absolutely free. All you have to do is go to the site and submit a short form. There’s no obligation whatsoever, and you can use the leads as you please. I think this is a prime opportunity to evaluate what QuotesAuction.com can do for you, so give it a try today!

I mentioned a little while ago that I rented a bunch of Miyazaki Hayao’s animated movies at one time. Howl’s Moving Castle, his 2004 release, was among the films that I saw at the time. I went on vacation shortly after the viewing, so haven’t been able to write up a review of the movie until now. Here’s what I thought of it.

Howl’s Moving Castle tells the story of a young woman named Sophie (voiced by Emily Mortimer) who has been living a simple life as a hatmaker. Then one day she gets harrassed in the streets by a few unruly soldiers, but is saved by a mysterious stranger who happens to wander along. The stranger acts a bit shifty and we can soon see why: he’s apparently trying to hide out from big black globs of… I don’t know what… that are chasing him. Sophie and the stranger part ways and Sophie goes back to her shop.

Later that night, a customer tries to enter the shop after closing time. It turns out to be the Witch of the Waste (Lauren Bacall), who, for a reason that will become clear later, casts a spell on Sophie, changing her into a very old woman. Old Sophie (now voiced by Jean Simmons) doesn’t want anyone from the town to see her in this condition, so she decides to leave.

As Sophie is walking along by herself, she meets up with a scarecrow that leads her to a strange contraption that looks like it might fall apart at any second. It’s Howl’s moving castle, and we soon learn that the wizard who lends his name to the castle is the very same stranger that saved Sophie in the earlier encounter.

Once Sophie is inside the castle, she gets a glimpse of Howl’s unique world. She meets Markl (Josh Hutcherson), a young boy who has apprenticed himself to Howl, as well as Calcifer (Billy Crystal), the fire that provides the power to keep the castle moving.

Sophie joins Howl’s household as a cleaning lady, and the rest of the movie then deals with two separate plots: Howl’s involvement in both sides of a war between two kingdoms and Sophie’s quest to get the witch to transform her back into her younger self.

My Reaction: I had high expectations for Howl’s Moving Castle both because of Miyazaki’s attachment to the project and because the movie received pretty good ratings across the board. However, I have to admit that I didn’t enjoy it nearly as much as I thought I would.

On the one hand, Sophie’s storyline was more interesting to me than Howl’s, and yet, it was pretty boring to watch this bent old woman trying to talk a witch into giving her youth back to her. Of course, the Howl/Sophie romantic subplot had to come up, but that was largely on the backburner because Sophie was an old woman for most of the film.

On the other hand, Howl’s story might have been more interesting to me if I had understood it. I wasn’t really paying attention to the politics of that plot so I had no idea why Howl was caught in the middle between the two warring nations. I think it would have made for a tighter film to leave that part out and give Howl’s character a different motivation altogether — but that’s just me.

Overall, the movie was visually appealing as usual, but the plot wasn’t as compelling as I would have liked. As a result, I give Howl’s Moving Castle 6.5 stars out of 10. There are far better Miyazaki films out there, so I recommend watching something else.

Although I don’t wear lingerie very often, there are some special occasions when I definitely like to indulge in something a bit different. But since I’m very shy and would get far too embarrassed shopping for lingerie in person, I prefer to do that kind of thing online now, which is why I’m glad I came across the DimOut.com website.

DimOut.com specializes in selling everything from sexy leather lingerie to more traditional teddies, thongs, panties, and bras. They even have products for men, which is something that I don’t see very often on a lingerie site! I doubt that my husband would ever wear any of the men’s items, but it’s still kind of fun to browse through those things.

Anyway, I thought DimOut.com’s selection was incredible. They cater to a wide range of tastes, so you’ll be able to find what you’re looking for whether you want something classy or a little more naughty. For example, I would love to give this embroidered lace bustier set a try, and I think some of these bra and panty sets are very sexy, too. I’ve never actually worn leather lingerie before, but if I were feeling a bit more adventurous, I could see myself trying this leather and fishnet underwire teddy.

Overall, I enjoyed my browsing experience on the DimOut.com website. It was very easy to navigate through the their entire selection to get to the items I wanted to see, there’s a search function that helped me find specific products, and the company’s policies and contact information were prominently displayed — which is something I always look for before buying from an online store. In short, the next time I want to buy lingerie, I’m definitely going to go back to DimOut.com, where I can shop and order from the comfort and privacy of my own home!

After taking a week off, Grey’s Anatomy came back last night with episode 3×18. It was called “Scars and Souvenirs,” and I think I’ll be scarred for life after watching the final scene. Here’s what happened:

Meredith: She’s trying to be a bit more positive after her Near Death Experience, which for her apparently means being nice to people. Her father and stepmother reach out to her after hearing of Ellis’s death, and they all agree to have dinner together at Meredith’s house. At first it’s awkward, but it gets a bit better by the end. When everyone parts, we get the feeling that perhaps Meredith and Thatcher’s relationship can be salvaged after all.

Cristina/Burke: One of Cristina’s old Stanford professors, named Colin Marlowe, visits Seattle Grace, and the rumor is that Chief Webber is interviewing the guy to be his replacement. Marlowe is one of the best cardiothoracic surgeons around, so Burke is anxious to meet him. That is, until he finds out that Cristina used to be involved with Marlowe while at Stanford. Not only that, but she was in a relationship with him for 3 years and turned down several marriage proposals in that time. So of course that leads to even more angst in the Cristina/Burke relationship, leaving us to wonder if these two will ever make it to the altar.

Derek: Derek was surprisingly tolerable this week — probably because there wasn’t all that much interaction with Meredith. Anyway, his big storyline centered around operating on an old friend of his, Dr. Helen Crawford, who has a tumor that can’t be taken out all at once. As a result, Crawford has to come back every two years or so to go through the operation and lengthy recovery again and again.

This time, however, Crawford tells Shepherd that this will be the last go round. She’s alone now and it’s just too hard to go through it without her husband by her side. Shepherd convinces her to allow him to go ahead with a more drastic procedure that could remove the whole thing. She agrees, but there are complications while she’s on the table. Shepherd manages to get Crawford through it, but engenders some ill-will from Burke in the process because he didn’t call Burke in to help.

Alex: Alex has moved into George’s old room in Meredith’s house! Izzie is against it at first, but she softens up towards the end. Alex is still dealing with his Jane Doe: no one has stepped forward to claim her even after all this time, so she’s really leaning on him for support. Karev is being unusually gracious with her…. I could get used to this side of him!

George/Callie/Izzie: George and Callie have a fight because Callie didn’t tell George that her family is very, very rich. So while George thought he was actually contributing to household expenses by chipping in $200 per week, Callie basically told him that money was used for tipping the maids at the hotel. Nice.

Then George made the mistake of telling Meredith that Callie is rich because Meredith waited all of two seconds before telling Izzie. Izzie, of course, can’t wait to make a snide comment to Callie about it, which prompts Callie to start in on George about the whole friends vs. wife debate. Callie pushes it even further this time by saying that Izzie hates Callie because she secretly wants George. George laughs it off by saying that Izzie is “blonde, stacked, a super model…” and would never go for him, leaving Callie to wonder what that makes her.

Callie kicks George out of the hotel, so he immediately goes to Izzie. With a bottle of whisky. To complain about Callie. And then they END UP SLEEPING TOGETHER!!! I cannot believe the writers decided to go there!!!!

My Reaction: I really can’t focus on anything other than George and Izzie sleeping together. That was the one relationship on the show that I thought was pretty much safe from such shenanigans. Izzie and George have always been more like brother and sister than anything else, so the idea of them being together is just disgusting. I don’t know where the writers are planning on going with this, but I have to say I don’t like it so far!!