The Spiderwick Chronicles

"It may not touching you, but it works on me."

"The Spiderwick Chronicles"
What's mean "Spiderwick" anyway? to annoy a spider? The movie is talking about the records on annoying a spider? or being annoyed by spider? Ohh... I was confused!
The worst was when I was buying the ticket from cinema counter, the sweet ladies was asking,"Spider? How many person?". (OMG, should I go on with this, or should I wait for next show, 10,000 BC ?)

I'm glad that I didn't change my mind. That's really a good adventurous movie. Quite fascinated to children and teenages. "Spiderwick" was actually a man's name, who had finished his whole life searching and discovering on unseen creatures surrounding him -- fairies and monsters. He had managed to gained friendship with fairies and recorded down all his finding in a book, that's included the secret and weakness of all these fairies and monsters. So, the book had hold the keys, and the monsters wanna have it to destroy all the fairies. Meanwhile, the fairies also worried if the monsters had grabbed this book and reveal their secret and weakness. In order to protect themselves, they brought away Mr.Spiderwick from his daughter, Lucinda.

80 years later, Spiderwick's grand niece, Helen was just separated with her husband in New York, and moved into his house with her daughter, Mallory and her twins son, Jared and Simon. Initially, Jared was misunderstood with her mom, Helen, thought it was all her mom's fault and failure on parentship. And, he was unpleased for moving into this old house. In the 1st.night of their moving in, Jared had accidently discovered her grand grand uncle Spiderwick's book. He was warned ( by a note on the cover of the book) not to read it, but he ignored. ( BTW, if he don't, the story won't able to continue ^^) Then, weird things kept rolling. He'd met Thimbletak, a servant to Spiderwick who loved honey so much. Hogsqueal, a funny monster (good one, according to him, Mulgarath had killed his family) who like to eat birds. And, attacks from Mulgarath and it's monster troops.

Jared and his sister, Mallory and his twins brother, Simon had tried finding help from Spiderwick and Lucinda to fight back with the monsters, but it seem like this father and daughter can't really help them up, and the ultimate fights had to count on themselve. Eventually, they'd convinced their mom, Helen on the existing of all those monsters, and whole family had get together, with the knowledge from the book, fighting with all those powerful monsters.

Other than that, this adventurous story also carried with 2 romance elements. First one is the relationship between Jared and his parents. Jared was hoping his father will come to the house and bring him along, and he also blamed his mom on breaking down their relationship. Only after his sister, Mallory had reveal the truth that it was actually his father had abandoned them, and living with another woman.

The second one is the relationship between Spiderwick and his daughter, Lucinda. When Spiderwick was bringing away by fairies, he promised to his daughter, Lucinda that he will come back one day. Lucinda was so believed on that, and hoping one day his father will return to her again. But, Spiderwick was never show up during this 80 years of waiting. He was actually scrutinised by the fairies and was kept in a far away land, because he had known so much of their secrets. He was only awaked 80 years later, when Jared and Mallory succeed to find him with help from his pet, a giant bird. At the ending of the movie, he appeared again in front of his daughter to ask for her forgiveness, but that would be the last meeting with his daughter, as granted by the fairies. And, furthermore, he was already more than a hundred years old, even though his appearance was never changed by aging. If he resume to the real world, his body might not affortable. However, his daughter, Lucinda who had forgiven him, finally had requested him to bring her along. He was happy to offer his hands and eventually, this couple of father and daughter, after 80 years of waiting, had finally holding hand in hand, disappeared away with happiness. I was so touching with their final meeting, and almost cry inside the dark theater, thinking on my little Eunice. Can't wait to run back, hugging her, giving her a long kiss on her face.

The story of Spiderwick with his daughter, Lucinda, could be too common to you. It may not touching you, but it works on me.

阿B的第一颗乳牙

阿B 终于长出第一颗乳牙了！

3月14日傍晚放工回到家门口，听到大伙儿嚷个不停。吵着要看阿B的第一颗乳牙。可是平时哭哭闹闹的她就爱把嘴巴关得紧紧，不让我们看。我想是害羞吧。始终是女孩子嘛！说到等这颗乳牙，可等急了。上个月周岁的时候，大家还议论纷纷，邻家的小孩比她小两个月，都生了两三颗，可她还在用着光秃秃的牙龈磨稀饭。于是，各式各样的见解、偏方都涌了过来。

记得有一回，在商场上遇到了朋友带着一对孪生姊妹，比阿B小三个月，却有两三颗乳牙了。朋友的母亲问我们阿B几颗了，我答说还没。小阿B听到后，马上转过去，心情超低落。周岁后，带她去打预防针的时候，阿B的妈还特地问医生是不是出了什么问题，为什么我家阿B还没长乳牙。

现在可长出来啦！虽然是晚了点，却叫人兴奋。父母之心叫人莞尔。

(想拍下她刚生出的乳牙，可她怎么也不妥协。转来转去，不让我得逞。)

美国 7,100 家星巴克同时暂停营业 3 小时

据说星巴克（Starbucks）咖啡創辦人舒茲最近重掌大權，企圖力挽業績和股價雙雙下滑的頹勢，由於體認到抓住顧客的心是重新擦亮招牌之道，舒茲一聲令下，美國全國7100家星巴克咖啡店上週二（2月26日）同步暫停營業3小時，讓員工一起“閉關”修練espresso調理絕技，以及研究如何為顧客營造絕佳的星巴克氣氛。

星巴克目前可說腹背受敵，經濟不景氣下，顧客對花4美元喝一杯咖啡裹足不前，而麥當勞等速食業者則努力提升咖啡品質來搶市場。星巴克去年股價下跌42%，分店營業額平均下跌1%，讓舒茲不得不出重手。

舒茲2月重掌首席執行員職務，對星巴克“商業化”表示憂心，一個月來頻頻出招，首先下令停止供應熱三明治，以免破壞顧客最享受的咖啡香氛，並減緩新店開張速度、改進作業、裁員600人。

上週他在公司網站張貼“改造大計”第七號通訊，提出針對提升產品品質和顧客經驗的在職訓練。

26日下午5時一到，各星巴克店關起大門，用衛星連線來為13萬5000名barista（星巴克用語，源自義大利文，指咖啡調理師）上課，從咖啡調理藝術、客服、到腦力激盪，務必找出讓顧客喜歡在店裡留連的方法，好讓星巴克成為談生意、聊天、甚至發呆也好的地方。

Vantage Point

8 Strangers, 8 Points of View, 1 Truth.

A perfect plan, a cruel set up. But, eventually ruined by a second of unconscious mercy, an unexpected innocent little girl.

The movie started straight to the assassination of the president and explosion of the stage. Then, it rewound back 23 minutes ago before the shooting, trying to tell the story from 8 perspectives, 8 points of view, one by one rewound. If you only follow one of the perspective, you only see a simple assassination, but you may not know the truth. So, the movie, or the time frame kept rewound several times, completed the story from different angles, different people and perspectives. The more you go, the more complicated it turned. And, slowly, like peeling an onion, you found the truth.

Barnes (Dennis Quaid) thought the sniper was from one of the windows of opposite buiding. The fact was the rifle was auto controlled by phone remote.

Howard (Forest Whitaker) thought the Spain couple was lover, Suarez was a warm stranger, Enrique (the Spain cop) was killed by the president's bodyguards. The fact were the Spain lady was threatening the Spain guy (Javier) to kidnap the president, Suarez found that Howard had screened him with his videocam, Enrique was actually killed by Javier.

Enrique thought Veronica had betrayed him for Javier. The fact was Veronica had used him to complete the mission.

Everyone thought that the president was shot by sniper ( two shoots). The fact was the president was already replaced by someone look like him, before reaching the location.

So, what you seen, might not be the truth.

As conclusion, I found this movie is very attractive. You can't afford to miss a scene in order solve the puzzle. Ohh... before I end, this film was directed by Pete Travis, and the script was written by Barry Levy.