Mittens

Woho!

Finally I don't have to borrow my boyfriends mittens or freeze my fingers off anymore! I have just finished knitting my own really awesome mittens!

I did them with a double yarn using red and black (obviously doh!) and I think it is 100% acrylic, but I ran out of black at the end of mitten no. 2 and I just took the next black ball of black, and it had no label. The black yarn is called "Freja"from Black Sheep and I think the label on the red one read "Big Carina" and then I I put on a pair of buttons from "Scrapbooking Moments" (?)

Unfortunate, I will not tell you how I made them, as I have to refine the pattern before, but if you are used to knitting I guess you can figure it out anyway.

((Halleluja - Jeff Buckley))

I will try and make a similar scarf too or something. I have realized how fun it is to knit again. Right now I'm doing so many different knitting projects that I have had to put some away and stop to 2 at the time, otherwise I will never finish any of them! So right now, a scarf and a grey sweater for me in the same mode as my mittens, but they will only be one color. And I also have came a short bit longer with my "Matrix"-coat.

Later I will do a basic sweater for the boyfriend to, for his birthday, but I have to make sure I have enough money for yarn first.

A project I really would like to try is to make thick leggings that I have knitted myself, but I don't know where to start. What kind of needles I will have to use etc, so if ANYONE has a good idea or a description I would love to see it! (Preferably in Swedish though).

((Total Eclipse of the Heart (literal version)))

Well, I guess I better go finish my studying now and try and get some sleep!

The year is coming to an end.

Christmas is rather overrated actually. Well, it is nice to come together as a family for a few hours, but really, it is rather over rated, and I think it's a bit sad you can't get together with your parents and siblings but there need to be some stupid holiday. I guess you will appreciate it more when your older maybe, but I don't really see the point in Christmas. It's just like any other day of the year.

Right now I feel a bit stressed. I have one essay right now on The cultural history of Japanese film that is really interesting. Deadline 4th January, so holiday for me? No way. Next essay deadline is January 14th, and we will get the essay subject on 28th December, so both Christmas and New Year will not be a time to rest really.

Well, the year has been both great and... Well, not so great.

I still have a lot of pain in my body and the physio therapist I have been seeing says she can't find any problems.

On the bright side though, I met the Mr this summer and that was rather awesome really.

Got a few things to think about next year, and looking forward to a lot of things!

Best memory this year: Well, except for meeting the Mr I would guess that it was actually Xmas Special in Gothenburg, a whole weekend of Kali Sikaran training.

Worst memory this year: Oh, well, hmm... I guess it was when I didn't know (both in Feb and in Aug.) whether I was gonna get money for the uni semesters. It was really horrible not knowing whether I was going to be able to pay the loans on my flat at the end of the month!

The coming year will as I said, become rather interesting. The application for Film Science part II will be sent in, in March, work will applied for in summer, moving...

So much to do, so many things to think about, and still it doesn't freak me out as much as it could, but it seems like the right thing to do!

Well, I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Ju-On

Well, now I'm back home for a few days before going back to Linköping and the last of my course, and a short visit to Gothenburg for a martial arts seminar.

This evening, being very tired, I decided to watch two films that I haven't even got out of the plastic packing yet. The films are the Japanese original versions of The Grudge. The film came out in 2000, and if you want the story, check out IMDb on this link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0330500/plotsummary

What I found interesting was the use of multiple narratives. This can be found in Rashomon by Aikira Kurosawa from 1950, but also in the old German expressionism films from the begining of the 1900's.

After watching myself tired of old German expressionism films, Russian montage films and Japanese films for my two courses, i thought this was going to be a relaxing film session, but no way...

One interesting thing I have noticed that also makes the similarities with the German expressionism films (which have influenced the history of horror films, as you can see up till modern day time) is the use of sounds and exaggerating (sound film became a part of film history during the German expressionism movement). An example is when the small child are making a cat sound when he opens his mouth. This is what the producer are using to scare us.

Sound, are the most important component for this film as of what I can interpret from the film. We have many examples of unnatural sound (like in above mentioned scene with the child and the cat sound), but also in the segment with Yuki, Yuki can hear sounds her friend Kanna can not. We have even an example of non-diegetic internal sound when the teacher (Kobayashi) is reading the mothers diary.

We can also find quite a few similarities with the other film too (in this case not Ju-On 2, but Ju-On: The Grudge II, which I have understood is not second film in the series), both in the plot where we can find for example the pregnant woman and the cat, but also in the way the film is made, with multiple narratives and we can start to assume that sound has a important role even in this film in the opening scene when the radio is not working.