Love Actually.

Although I have watched this movie numerous times, and will probably continue to do so*, I pretty much agree with every single thing this (long) article details about its true non-romanticness. Especially this:

The fundamental problem with Love Actually is that it presents romance as either absurdly easy—something that strikes you like a thunderclap and requires only a single grand gesture in order to be fulfilled—or all but impossible. Notably absent is the idea that love might ever be worth a little sustained effort: some mutual exploration and discovery, a bit of care and nurture, maybe even the overcoming of an obstacle or two.

*I really watch it because I enjoy the Hugh Grant performance so much. It is a nice pairing with either Two Weeks Notice OR Music and Lyrics, both charming lovely movies.

p.s. I just rewatched it last night after totally cracking up over this tweet (& video).

I really loved this little anecdote.

There was a guy I was reading about in the 1700’s whose wife was 10 minutes late at the dinner table every [night] so he took those 10 minutes to work on a novel and he ended up writing 3 very successful novels that way by squeezing in those 10 minutes. I think that’s the trick is giving yourself that time and scheduling it in.

from this interview with Mark Frauenfelder.

I love that idea of even just in 10 (or 15 even!) minutes a day, you eventually DO have something to show for your time.

(It’s repeated again in this article.)

I got to both of these from this article, from this post by Maggie, whose blog I really love.