Elephant by Gus Van Sant is a very disturbing movie. It's a movie that you cannot brush off as "just a movie" in order to fall asleep at night. It was ordinary and tense throughout. Conversations were muted and I could not hear everything being said, as if I were actually in the room, a mere observer, or eavestrougher on these kids' lives. It definately upset me most when Eric shot the principal in the back after telling him he was free to go and then even more so when Alex turned on Eric, his plan all along. I felt awful for Michelle, the geeky girl who wouldn't wear shorts to gym class and was teased the whole time she changed, ignoring other girls brutal comments, looking straight ahead, stoic, into her own locker. Felt sick for Benny, the jock, who was introduced in the very same scene he was gunned down, who tried to save the principal and tried to save the day. I loved every character! I even felt for, and almost understood Eric and Alex. Matt, Amy, this is one I want you to see.

I dreamt of radiation poisoning last night. Poisoning of some kind anyhow. I was on a planet where something deadly existed and new areas were constantly being quarentined. I decided I had to get back to earth where apparently the poison was the worst, in order to pick up my family. Matt and I were in contact by email, oddly enough, the only loop hole the government had overlooked for communication. It seemed to be a continuation of a dream I'd had the night before. Then my dream changed and I was staying at some huge house with tons of other people my age. My bed was huge and 2 guys kept trying to sleep with me. They were hot and I kept turning them down. I was friends with both of them. I woke up one morning and of the 2 fishtanks beside my bed, one was mostly empty, dead fish piled upon eachother for lack of water. Some of them were still swimming in the air of the tank, but were decaying and drying up. I screamed and this girl came running into my room. She called for her Dad (I guess it was their house I was in) and he was asking me all these questions. A girl who didn't like me, picked up a small gold fish and threw it at me. She missed. But I picked it up and whipped it at her face where it splattered and left blood. I left to use the washroom and looking in the mirror, found fish blood splattered on my hair and face. I filled the tub but as I filled it, it filled with dead fish as well as water. I used the sink but I could not wash the blood out of my hair. I left the washroom and found Alex's room. I was crying to him and he cared but there was something between us. The feeling of distance. I think we had recently broken up. No wonder I didn't want anyone else. He gave me a peck on the cheek and I left, crying. Then I got ready to work but it was night time and I had to find where to park the tractor. It was this huge lot and I needed to find spot 46 but couldn't. The owner of the lot and my coworkers were getting mad at me. I still had fish blood in my hair and some of the girls thought I'd dyed it and that it looked "cool." The dream started and ended somewhere within all that. I'm not certain of any order.

I went to Grandma's new place yesterday to help her finish with unpacking. I put her books out, organized the spare bedroom, saved the day with helping Dad fix the sink (I am handy indeed!) and helped him change some light fixtures. We hung pictures, rearranged living room furniture and had lunch and dinner. We were there for 8 hours! Unpacking takes a very long time. In that time we were busy and in retrospect, didn't get that much done. I came across some polaroids of Grandpa and some old snapshots. The comparion of him in his youth operating airplane controls to his last 3 Christmas' at Alberta hospital gave me reason to pause. Alzheimer's visibly gouged out his spirit and ate it away. I showed Mom the pictures and with the last one she said, "No Michelle, this isn't Grandpa." With Grandma's confirmation that it really was, Mom and I cried together. Life is funny, death, is not.

I came across a Canon AE-1 camera with a lens and flash and asked Grandma where I should put it, she said she didn't want it and that I could have it! So have a have a groovy camera that I can do artsy things with! I can blur the background, blur the forground, focus on everything, change the aperature, take high speed pictures by slowing them down and having no blur or keeping some blur to give that fast effect. I can give the fast effect to still objects by changing the aperature and moving slightly myself. It's wicked. I read the handbook front to back and used up the last pictures of the roll without doing anything fancy. I'm getting that roll developed today as I can't wait to see what was one the beginning of it. Then, I will start getting fancy.