To quote the great Michelle Obama it’s never to late to find what you were meant to become.

I feel like it’s been forever since I have even opened this site. I didn’t even think that I would remember the password, but here I am back and sitting in a coffee shop on the first beautiful day of 2019.

Over the past six plus months I have been thinking about getting back to blogging, thinking about what I would want to write, when to write or if anyone would even read it.

Lots of things have happened to me so far in 2019. I became mortgage free (!!!) something that really didn’t hit me until this month. Had a very minor surgery, but a surgery non the less, and recently became an aunt to a beautiful baby girl. I have been able to get back to work on my side gigs of live events and Toronto Blue Jays, and recently began looking into what I really want to do for the second half of my life.

One thing that keeps coming back to me is thinking about what I am passionate about. Things that I enjoy doing, that don’t feel like work and make me excited to get out of bed.

When I talk to my friends and family it always comes back to one thing. Pop culture, entertainment, music and movies. I love when they come to me to ask me what I think about this show, that movie or the recent celebrity scandal. Nothing makes me cringe more than when I overhear people in lunchrooms, restaurants, or public transit talking about entertainment information that is full of errors.

So it seems that my passion has been stuck inside my head to get out.

So now is the to get the negative out of my head and out into the world.

Somewhere inside of me is a pop culture critic / writer. It’s time for her to get out.

Here goes.

On Saturday March 24 I attended the first show outside of the US of the Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen talkfest, AC2. Taking place at the Sony Centre I wasn’t sure what to expect. I’ve been a fan of both of them for years. Those who know me know how much I love my daily dose of CNN and the Housewives. When I got the tickets in November I was super excited, then New Years happened and I had my doubts. To say that Anderson and Andy lacked chemistry and were as boring as watching paint dry would be an understatement.

So here I was with an almost sold out Sony Centre, made up of mostly women 30+ ready to hear deep talk and shallow tales, let’s be honest, I was there for the shallow tales. Starting right after 8pm with a video showing the different upbringings these two had. Andy a middle class celebrity obsessed kid from St Louis and Anderson, a Vanderbilt and New York City royalty

How they came to work in TV to where they are today., best friends for over 20years.

With two chairs and table full of drinks, they were ready to begin a 2 hour plus night of funny and entertaining stories.

We heard stories about threatening emails from Tori Spelling, advice from the Judd’s, how Anderson could have missed covering hurricane Katrina by almost drowning off the coast of Croatia after a night partying and what it’s like to interview Trumps mistresses. How both Nicole Kidman and Celine Dion will probably never appear on Watch What Happens Live. A show by the way that I am forced to listen to on a podcast because no Canadian channels will pick it up.

There were lots of Trump stories, but not as many that I thought, which was good. During the Q&A several important topics were discussed. Such as why did BFF Kelly Ripa stop following “friend” Jessica Seinfeld of all social media accounts and not have her on Live to promote her new cookbook? They said they didn’t know (but they clearly did) . The Kathy Griffin mess. Andy wanted to say more, but Anderson interrupted and said she wishes her the best and is happy that she is touring again blah blah. Side note, I am going to see Kathy May 25, so hopefully she will offer a better version. Finally if Andy had any thought about the disaster that was The Real Housewives of Toronto. Thankfully he said the he had not a single episode and had no idea about anything related to it.

When it finished I can honesty say it was a great event. It exceeded my expectations and left me wishing they stayed chatting for another hour. Also it confirmed that my Housewives knowledges is top notch!

I not only recommend seeing AC2, I can’t wait for them to come back to Toronto.

4.5/5

Thank you to everyone who enjoyed my Grammy live blog from a few weeks ago, so now this is the big one. The 2017 Academy Awards. So this will be a long one. I got my rest and now I’m ready. Here. We. Go.
8pm
I am watching the final 30 min of the red carpet pre-show. Its been a long journey. The CTV Etalk red carpet was a complete disaster as I thought it would be. The ABC red carpet was pretty PG, nothing to interesting. In fact it felt like 2 hours. Everyone is great, everyone is gorgeous, everyone has a chance of winning…..blah blah,

8:30
It starts with Justin Timberlake with Can’t Stop The Feeling and it was  fun even if the song is shit. I especially loved the “I don’t know who you are” look that Ryan Gosling gave JT
Jimmy Kimmel comes out and right away throws shade right away at Mel Gibson.
He is actually pretty good, the Meryl Streep bit was very funny so far so good.

8:49
The first award is given to Best Supporting Actor Mahershala Ali. I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I am 1 for 1 on my Oscar pool, so that is a win for me.

8:57
Its time for the make up award. and winner is… Suicide Squad?? wtf and now we have academy award winner Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them for Costume Design. What is happening I have now dropped down to 1 out 3 in my pool. This is stressing me out big time.

9:08
They bring out the real Catherine Johnson, from Hidden Figures. What a nice surprise.
Now Its Documentary Feature time lets hope the documentary about an unknown guy named OJ Simpson wins…and it does and I am now back to 2 out of 4 in my pool.

9:15
The song from Moana is one, its pretty enough, but I could do without the Lin Manuel Miranda intro. I find him a little much, a little too happy and life is great so I have to talk extreamly fast. the poor girl is hit in the head with a flag but continues like a Disney pro

9:26
We make it the sound categories
Arrival beats La La Land in the Sound Editing category. I am losing my Oscar Pool big time.
But it at least its a Canadian team
Now Hacksaw Ridge wins best Sound Mixing, this is becoming a La La Land shut out and my Oscar Pool is a disaster

9:40,
We are not even half way done yet, but it is time for Supporting Actress, I see the guy who robbed Stallone last year is still wearing that ridiculous hat. And the winner is Viola Davis, ok now I am back on track with my picks.

9:55

Nobody in that audience looked impressed when told “average tourists” will be making an appearance
on stage with them. Especially Mel Gibson.

9:58

Surprise the movie The Salesman wins best foreign film and is not allowed in the country. (really not surprised at all)

10:00

Its time for Sting to sing. This could make me fall asleep.

10:11

Thanks goodness Zootopia wins!! I can take that one.

10:20

Jimmy Kimmel brings a bus of tourist from the Hollywood bus tour into the audience and it was pretty funny. Denzel looks about as interested in performing that “wedding” as I would. Interesting Mel Gibson was nowhere to be found, probably for the best.

10:32

The Jungle Books win best visual effects, even better I got that one right on my Oscar Pool

10:35

Back To The Future finally getting the respect it deserves 30 years later and all to present the best editing award. The winner is Hacksaw Ridge. What the fuck???? If someone said Hacksaw Ridge would be the top movie winner so far I would have said you are a fool. Wow

10:43

Its Doc Short subject… who cares, I am getting destroyed in my pool.

11:15 (yes 11:15)

I started paying attention to the show again. Samuel Jackson was to present Music Score, and I have to say he looked pissed this was the award he got to present. Of course the winner was La La Land, makes sense for a musical to win best musical score .

Now Best Song -City of Stars for La La Land ok lets keep this show going

11:20

Jennifer Aniston is introduced to do the In Memorial finally.

Its nice, but at this point I am so tired I can’t even remember it.

11:30

With 6 awards left I am not sure what time this will end. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck present the original and adapted screenplays. It goes the worst movie I saw Manchester By The Sea and one I haven’t seen yet, Moonlight. Either way I picked them in my pool.

11:41

Halle Berry and her hair present Best Director. La La Land, now I am back at my pool. Plus I have to say I loved this movie.

11:52

Ugh, have ever mentioned that like  Zoolander 2 I thought Manchester by the sea was one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen,so great the actor wins the award and Denzel looked PISSED, like 100% roll your eyes pissed when Casey said how much he liked his work. And it was beautiful to see. God I hated that movie.

11:54

I swear if this French woman wins I will lose it.Oh thank god it was Emma Stone for La La Land. By the way Emma Stones lipstick in on point. I must find out the colour* now

12:00

We now have hit midnight and with one award left its the Best Picture.

And its – LA LA LAND!

and it took 10 minutes to announce that…………….

and it was the wrong movie, actually Moonlight won. I may have to blog that in a separate post. I am way to tired to think anymore about it.

Until next Oscars

12:51

*Wait I just learned that Emma Stone is wearing Mona by Nars lipstick so now I can go to bed and will continue this later tonight.

Over the past 10 years or so I have attended the Toronto International Film Festival, I had been lucky enough to have seen some wonderful films, however the last couple of years I have been either disappointed with the process, the films or the lack of people involved in films attending. This year was my deciding year if I was going to continue attending. Not happy with my selection time or process I was on the fence.

I have to say this year saved my from jumping ship. I either loved or enjoyed my 7 movies that I attended this year. So much so, that it was hard to come up with my ranking list. So hear are my reviews and impressions of the seven movies I was lucky enough to see.

1. La La Land
2. Mascots
3. Blue Jay
4. Lion
5. Before The Flood
6. Barry

A special mention for my 7th TIFF movie, Justin Timberlake & The Tennessee Kids
1) La La Land. Just announced as the TIFF Peoples Choice winner for 2016, I was so glad that I was able to see this movie before it opens in December. A last minute addition, I picked up this movie the day before as another screening due to demand was announced.
The movie stars Ryan Gosling as a jazz pianist and Emma Stone as an actress in Los Angeles. They have perfect chemistry together. It is directed by Damien Chazelle who also directed Whiplash.
After a couple of  chance meetings they begin a romance. La La Land is being called a modern day musical. Now it is a musical, but I don’t want this to turn people off of it (I personally love Musicals so I may seem a bit bias)
This is not your broadway type musical where the whole movie is one big song. No the this is more along the lines of a Hollywood musical from the 40’s.
I loved the story, the costumes , the entire style of the movie and of course the music. The entire movie I had a smile on my face even during the last scene which also brought out a few tears.
This is a movie that I will being going to see again when it comes out to a wide release in December.

2) Mascots. This is the movie that I wanted to see the most when the films were announced. It ended up being the last movie I saw on the final Saturday night. One of my favourite movies of all time is Best In Show. So I always always look forward to seeing anything that Christopher Guest and cast of great improv actors come up with. This one was no Best In Show, but it wasn’t A Mighty Wind either, so it was a quite enjoyable movie. It is the mockumentary about the World Mascot competition and who will get the Gold Fluffy Award. The usual cast is here. Jane Lynch,Jennifer Coolidge, Bob Balaban, Ed Begley, Jr, Chris O’Dowd, Parker Posey, and of course Fred Willard. They are all incredibly funny and I can’t wait to see this one again, for those subtle jokes that you miss the first time

This movie will be skipping any sort of theatrical release and going straight to Netflix in October. I highly recommend it

3) Blue Jay. Firstly this not a documentary about the Toronto Blue Jays like my friend originally thought, it is actually the furthest thing from it. Like Mascots this is another movie that is going straight to Netflix at the end of the year. This movie stars only two actors Mark Duplass and Sarah Paulson and it is shot entirely in black and white. It is about two people who meet up unexpectedly in a grocery store and then spending the next 24 hours together. Well written and acted, this was a bit of a surprise for me how much I enjoyed it as well a twist scene in that last 20 minutes makes this film thought provoking about a misunderstanding and age can change the outcomes of your life.

Look for it on Netflix at the end of 2016

4) Lion. Lion was one of the most talked about movies at TIFF, and I was able to get an extra showing for it. I had heard that it was the tearjerker of the festival. Is it bad that I didn’t shed a tear, maybe but I blame it on the fact that I already knew the story. It stars Dev Patel ,Nicole Kidman and I think a forgetabble Rooney Mara. Patel plays Saroo Khan who at 5 years old becomes lost and homeless in a strange city, only later to be adopted by an Australian couple. The movie is based on a true story about how Saroo used the then new Goggle Earth to figure out what really happened to him. The movie of rm e was a little long, but I am sure this will be front and centre at the upcoming awards shows.

This movie is worth a look for sure.

5) Before the Flood. This the big Leo climate change save the world documentary. Also it was my first movie of TIFF.

I am pretty sure the main reason that Leo stars in this, is not that he is passionate about climate change (he is). It is to get people to watch it.  We get to see Leo travel the world in hope of finding answers to how we can help protect the world we live in. Over the 90+ minutes we are giving a stunning visuals of  the Alberta tar sands, how Miami Beach is going to be lost under water, to what is becoming the lack of forests being destroyed.

This documentary is definitely worth a watch, yet I have to say Leo is about as exciting as watching paint dry.

6) Barry

I put this movie last in my ranking. Not necessary because it was bad, mainly because it was just ok. There was nothing really wrong with it at all, but it’s not really that memorable.   Lately there have been a few movies based on some part of Barack Obama’s life. This one takes when a then 20 year old Barry moves to New York City. It offers an insight into is life as an university student. The mistakes he makes and trying to figure out what he should be doing.

The actor who plays “Barry” is Devon Terrell is spot on with his Obama impression. The rest of the movie is worth a watch on Netflix,  but I am not sure if I would pay money to see it a theater.

7) Justin Timberlake and The Tennessee Kids . I am not actually sure why this was at TIFF, but it was fine with me. I am giving this special mention, because it was more an event than a movie. The event would be his 20/20 Experience tour , which I was very lucky to have seen all three times is came to Toronto. This was his Jonathan Demme directed concert film. For those looking to see a Truth or Dare style concert documentary you will be disappointed. This is only his concert performed on the final 2 dates in Las Vegas. While this is third movie that I saw going straight to Netflix in October it seems the most obvious one to go that route.

This screening was showing in the Imax theatre. At that time we learned that originally it was to filmed and screened in Imax prior the Netflix deal. My audience would be the only audience in the world to see this concert as it was intended to viewed. Trust me I felt like I was back at the show, and at times I forgot I was in a theatre and almost started to sing along. This is a must watch for any Timberlake fan and I can’t wait to see it again next month.

So here it is, the 1st real award show of 2016. (sorry People Choice A list shows only)

Instead of bombarding my Facebook and twitter feed I thought that I would do a live blog post.

I was super excited for Ricky Gervais to host. Well he started off strong, the Sean Penn and Caitlyn Jenner joke were very funny, the rest of the monologue. meh. I have heard it before and the joke about putting a globe up his ass was a sad attempt to be edgy. You could have and have done way better Ricky.

Then something happened Jonah Hill for some reason feels that he is a comedian. I really don’t even understand why people think he is an actor, but whatever. He went on and on about the bear from his man crush Leo’s movie. He must have been sad that Leo didn’t pay anyone to put him in that movie, you know like all the past Leo movie’s that somehow Jonah Hill appears in.  Jane Fonda was having NONE OF IT. Like nothing.

Total side question why is Katy Perry there, and why is she in the front table?

Kate Winslet wins for a movie I didn’t even know she was in and no one even saw, Jobs. She even seemed surprised. Sorry the movie is called Steve Jobs see I had no idea

J. Lo and The Rock, probably the best looking pair to ever present an award    appear and really I don’t care who they give the award to, as they are too good looking to turn your eyes from.

Some women wins for a show I have never seen and sooooo annoying that I will now never watch the show that she has just won for.

Ricky is back and does make a good Ben Affleck joke at Matt Damon’s expense.

OMG Star wars wins an award. Oh wait actually its Oscar Isaac for something that I have never heard of.

Lady Gaga (looking surprisingly elegant )and Tom Ford present an award to Christian Slater.Now that is a sentence that I never thought I would write.

Jamie Foxx presents and has the best “Steve Harvey I made a mistake”impression ever about not having Straight out of Compton nominated. Quentin Tarantino’s composer wins for The Hateful Eight and seems not to impressed with the joke.

Now Amy Schumer and her overly reported new “BFF” Jennifer Lawerence. They were as annoying as I thought it would be. Amy repurposed the same jokes for 100th time, yes I get it, your awkward, you swear and want to sleep with lots of men ( my eyes are currently rolling back) Jennifer also attempts to be funny..next.

Matt Damon wins for Best Actor in a Comedy for The Martin. That really is the only thing comedic about the thing. I could go on a rest about how much of an insult that is to actually comedies and comedians, but i have decided to move on.

Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt present together. Proving my motto that  I only want to see  really good looking people on TV. Add to it how funny they were and they could have stayed up the rest of the show.

Now its time for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama Movie and the winner is  Sylvester Stallone. For some reason this made me happy. I was glad to see finally someone win for creating a role that is iconic. It doesn’t matter if you like him or not. Way to go Rocky!

Some show called Mozart in the Jungle keeps winning in the comedy category. I have never heard of it and probably will never watch it.

So how crazy are the Golden Globes. They gave Lady Gaga an award for best actress in a drama. She rambled about how she wanted to act first not sing, but all anyone will remember is the Leo eye raise.

Sam Smith wins for a song from James Bond that I have never heard  or never will

Something called Mr. Robot wins for Drama.

Ricky is back to introduce Mel Gibson.

“I would rather have a drink in a hotel room with Mel Gibson than Bill Cosby” Well done Ricky, well done

“What the fuck does sugar tits  even mean?” and I have now become interested in this show again.

Denzel gets an lifetime achievement award blah blah Jennifer Lawrence wins another for Joy. I really have no idea why but she does blah blah blah some more awards that make no sense at all. The Martin winning best comedy or musical. Please.

At least Taraji P Henson won for a show that people actually watch!

The movie about the kid in a room wins and then what everyone was waiting for Leo for the WIN.

Now best Movie – not a surprise here,  it is for the bear almost killed Leo in the Canadian Wilderness movie – The Revenant. Everyone acts surprised, I go to bed.

Now I wait for the Oscar nominations this Thursday

The Golden Globes – 6/10

Ricky Gervais as host 7/10