Life, Emma, and Lots of Pictures...

Well, dear readers, the time is coming...soon...soon...when I will not have access to the Internet for 3-7 days.
~slight pause for the wailing and sobbing~
I know! But, it must needs be that I move my family from this fabulous place to another fabulous place. Lucky for us, it's not until next week! Whoo-hoo! So, in that frame of mind, on with the post!
Jolene remembered to mention Emma before I did. In fact, I'm glad she said something or else I might have forgotten! Thank you, Jolene! Here's my take on Emma:
Quite good, really. The Gwyneth Paltrow version is very nice (I really like it), but I prefer this one and I'll tell you why:

• Ewan McGregor just bugs me as Frank Churchill. He doesn't seem to be...a deceptive type of character/actor/whatever-you-will. The actor in this Emma (Raymond Coulthard) is much more believable as both a scoundrel and a man in love. Plus he's better looking. Sorry, Ewan, but it's true! This was your pre-Moulin Rouge days, you know...
• The sequence of events is much closer to the book (which is very long, I might add), although the dialogue in both is very, very similar.
• Mrs. Elton, who is played by Lucy Robinson, (the same actress who played Mrs. Hurst in the Colin Firth P&P) is just delightfully perfect! She's seriously got the character down well. (But kudos to Juliet Stevenson in the Paltrow version --I loved her in Bend it Like Beckham! Her Mrs. Elton isn't annoying enough, though.)
• Mr. Woodhouse is much more likable in this one.
• Jane Fairfax is played by Olivia Williams, who was Jane Austen in Miss Austen Regrets. She is an incredible actress, and I really loved her as Jane Austen. What makes it even better is the fact that the character of Jane Fairfax is so different from Jane Austen, and Williams does a spectacular job with both!
• Miss Smith (although played very well by Toni Collette in the Paltrow version) seems more authentic. The actress seems "plainer" and more...believable (yes, I use that word a lot) as a poor "daughter of nobody-knows-who!"
• And speaking of Mr. Knightley, I actually prefer this one. Mark Strong may not be as beautiful as Jeremy Northam (at first), but I find his acting more...dare I say it? Again? Believable. Yes, believable! And after 5 minutes, I find myself swooning over him as easily as I do Mr. Tilney, Capt. Wentworth, and Mr. Darcy. Ooh, I just love these Jane Austen men!
• The costumes/design/set/background all seems more Regency England to me. Not that the Paltrow version didn't, but that version (Paltrow) seemed more "Hollywood", if you know what I mean.

With that said, please know that these are nit-picky things. I still love the Paltrow version. In fact, this is one instance where either movie would satisfy me, unlike all the P&P movies (yes, the Colin Firth one is superior!).
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Brandon is home! We picked him up this morning, but sadly, he has a cold. Which now translates into the chance that I will have a cold when we move next week. Ah, better that than being on my period! But still...
Our plans for this weekend are not as glamorous as they were last weekend. We're just going to pack, visit with family, have a nice dinner date, and go to #1's baseball game. Oh, and speak in Sacrament Meeting. Woot! Oh, what? You want to know what was glamorous about last weekend? Well, thank you for asking! I'll tell you!
Last weekend (before all the Easter stuff I already blogged about), Brandon and I took the kids to the Exploratorium in San Francisco. We decided we needed some time together as a family, since we've had little time for fun this last month or two. The kids loved it. So much, in fact, that we had to drag them away around 5PM. Or did we drag ourselves? Either way, we all felt dragged because it was an amazing place! A fabulous scientific-hands-on-whoah-what's-that?!-kind of place. Loved it.
Before we left, we took some pictures at this fabulous spot (which is just outside the doors of the Exploratorium). I had to search on the Internet to find out what it was --oh, the things I do for you, dear reader! Brandon took most of the pictures, and I thought I would share them with all of you because they are so much fun. So much fun! Sorry that the pictures of the actual Exploratorium is lacking. We were too occupied to take photos. Anyway, after we got home, I picked up a sitter, and Brandon and I headed out on our own. We took our time in Walnut Creek, and had a long, long (3 hours, baby!) dinner at Il Fornaio, out on the patio. It was so nice to just sit and talk. I love talking with Brandon. And looking at him. And loving him. And, luckily for me, he feels the same way about me! Whoo-hoo!
Here are all the pictures of the day for your viewing pleasure (sorry, no date pictures. We usually don't do that --you know, take pictures of our dates. Unless we are hiking. Ooh! Like our last date! I guess we do photograph our dates. Who knew?):

#4 is so smart, can't you see? And yes, that is a toilet. But no, it's not a "real" one. It's a drinking fountain, silly! And the next pictures show part of the Palace Theater grounds...

The rest of these pictures were taken in like manner: Brandon would ask us each questions and ask us to talk while he took pictures, thus the different facial expressions (obviously, I took Brandon's pictures because, well, hey, he's talented, but not that talented!). Oh, and just for those that don't know us, this is the order: #2, #1, #3, #4, yours truly, and hot-stuff hubby.

*Just so you know, #3 threw a rock at me during my session, thus the "is there a cut on my face?" picture...Oh, and isn't Brandon hot stuff? Yeah, baby! And he's all mine... :)