In 2007 I read a whopping 40 books (actually a few more than that since I’m counting reviews and a few of the year’s reviews encompassed multiple books) which is up about 20% from last year’s total. Not that it matters.

We also watched a bunch of movies (105 compared to 75 last year). The increase may be due to our each watching quite a few flicks solo that the other wouldn’t have cared about. Here’s a list of what we saw and what we thought of them.

The notes are about where we saw the movie and who saw it. “T” indicates we saw it in the theater (only 7). Other letters indicate who attended. The default is Becky and me. If only R appears then Rachel saw it with us. If just “J” or “B” appear then only the one of us saw it. “B, R” means I skipped that one, etc. I realize that all of this nonsense is really only of interest to Becky and me, but whose blog is it anyway?

rating Title Notes
**** Children of Men  
**** Exotica J repeat
**** Howl’s Moving Castle  
**** The Lives of Others T, L&A
***+ American Masters: Andy Warhol  
***+ Factotum  
***+ Henry and June  
***+ In Her Shoes J
***+ Once  
***+ Rattatouille  
***+ Short Film About John Bolton, A  
***+ Shortbus  
***+ Stranger Than Fiction  
***+ Venus  
***+ Volver L&A
***+ Waitress  
*** Adam & Steve  
*** Aeon Flux J
*** Barefooot In the Park B
*** Bee Movie T B w/ Rosalind
*** Bourne Ultimatum, The T B w/ Lorna
*** Casino Royale  
*** Chuck & Buck B
*** Claudia Beard 24wpm  
*** Eastern Promises T B w/ Lorna
*** Fantastic Four J
*** Fountain, The  
*** Fur  
*** I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing  
*** I, Robot J
*** In Her Shoes B
*** Kinky Boots  
*** Libeled Lady B
*** Libertine, The  
*** Lie With Me  
*** Lonesome Jim  
*** Lost In La Mancha J
*** Marie Antoinette  
*** Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing and Charm School  
*** Motorcycle Diaries, The  
*** Mysterious Skin  
*** Oh in Ohio, The  
*** Open Your Eyes  
*** Painted Veil, The  
*** Platinum Blonde B
*** Porco Rosso  
*** Prestige, The  
*** Price of Milk, The  
*** Prime  
*** Queen, The  
*** Rocky Horror Picture Show  
*** Running With Scissors  
*** Scanner Darkly, A  
*** Science of Sleep, The  
*** Shut Up and Sing  
*** State of the Union B
*** Strange Love of Martha Ivers, The B
*** This Film Is Not Yet Rated  
*** Three of Hearts J
*** Whole New Thing  
*** You Can’t Take It With You B
**+ 2010: The Year We Make Contact J
**+ After the Wedding  
**+ American Dreamz  
**+ Barbarella  
**+ Can’t Buy Me Love repeat
**+ Constantine J
**+ Everything Is Illuminated  
**+ Illusionist, The  
**+ Knocked Up  
**+ Last Kiss, The  
**+ League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, The J
**+ Little Children  
**+ Mad Hot Ballroom  
**+ Meet John Doe B
**+ Millions  
**+ Mirrormask  
**+ Music and Lyrics  
**+ Notes on a Scandal  
**+ Pan’s Labyrinth  
**+ Pizza  
**+ Puccini for Beginners  
**+ Slither w/ K&E
**+ Stardust T w/ L&A
**+ Valmont  
**+ Van Helsing J
**+ Wedding Crashers repeat for B
**+ Where the Truth Lies  
** Arthur and the Invisibles  
** Bubble J
** CQ J
** Driving Lessons  
** East Is East  
** Groomsmen, The  
** Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix T
** King Arthur  
** Lake House, The B
** No Such Thing J
** Pirates of the Carribean: At World’s End T w/ R
** Rumor Has It B
** Strangers With Candy  
** With Honor  
*+ A Good Woman  
*+ Lady In the Water s&h, j&s
*+ Ultraviolet J

That doesn’t include everything we watched that we’d seen before (a few repeats are included as noted). We don’t actually use stars when we rate movies, we use words. I’ve translated our “Don’t Miss” to ****, “Pretty Good” to ***, “Okay” to **, and “Don’t Bother” to * if that helps you make sense of this. If you’re wondering whether you’d like something on here, leave a comment or send email and I’ll expand.

In other anal-retentive data mining, we returned 126 disks to Netflix this year after switching to the three-disk plan in February. That includes most of the TV we watched this year:

  • The Book of Daniel (complete series (cancelled in first season))
  • Heroes (season 1)
  • Joan of Arcadia (season 2 (last))
  • Once and Again (season 2 (just Becky))
  • Scrubs (first season)
  • That 70′s Show (season 1, 2, 3, 4)
  • Veronica Mars (season 3 (last))
  • Weeds (both of us watched season 1 and Becky toughed it out through season 2)
  • Wonderfalls (complete series (cancelled in first season) ended up buying our own copy)

Plus the series we sampled and didn’t continue past the first disk:

  • Babylon 5
  • Big Love
  • Commander in Chief
  • Dead Like Me
  • Eureka
  • How I Met Your Mother
  • Star Trek: Enterprise (just Jeff)