Getting Mail:

I'm sure that most people grow out of the mail excitement, but for me it just never gets old. There are truly few things that get me more excited than getting a package, but even a letter will do.

New Shoes or Socks:

It probably has something to do with having ridiculously large feet (size 16) but every time I get new shoes I just feel like a little kid on Christmas morning. Socks, especially ones with crazy colors, or that border on the knee high are just as exciting. Yesterday I got new socks in the mail (combining two exciting things) and it was freaking fantastic.

Anytime the Red Sox beat the Yankees:

This one is fairly obvious. There are very few things that I hate more than the Yankees, and like more than the Red Sox.

Voting:

I still get quite the buzz off of going and voting. So much so that I'm the person who'll go vote any chance I can get. Even if it's just a single ballot initiative that has absolutely no effect on me I'll be there voting away. And the "I voted" stickers basically fill me with quasi-orgasmic delight.

Crossing state and international borders:

Even just crossing from Utah into Idaho or Wyoming feels like an adventure. Kind of a lame adventure, but an adventure nonetheless. So if you want to excite me, take me on an edventure.

Packaging:

This is probably the strangest item on this list of things that excite me, but I get very worked up over packaging. Great packaging, whether it's because of an interesting, or functional, shape, the art attached to it, or anything else, can suck me in every time. And if something has absolutely terrible packaging, then you can pretty much assume that I'll complain about it beyond the point of reason. So if anyone involved in creating any type of packaging is reading this, please try harder.

The number 9:

It's a magic number.

Various food items:

Basically anything I like a lot but seldom see. For example: Vietnamese sandwiches, Red Cream Fanta, Bounty candy bars (I'd probably kill a man for the ice cream version of this), dohsa, Phil's Deli pastrami sandwiches, Fenway Franks, asian pears and many others. If they weren't a little rare maybe they wouldn't be so exciting.

Getting a phone call/text/twitter @reply:

Just the fact that someone would make the effort, even if it isn't much effort, to get a hold of me still kind of excites me to the point where I don't know what to say sometimes, particularly on the phone. It's kind of ridiculous.

Crowds of people:

I'm moderately terrified of smaller groups of people, but I just love crowds (with the exception of at the movies 90% of the time). There's just an energy that can't be duplicated by anything else. Plus I enjoy moving through a nice crowd.

So there you go, there's a few things that generally excite me. I also have more specific, individualized items that apply only to specific people (list supplied on request). What excites you?

After traveling through the heat soaked insanity that is Hong Kong and Macau, I don't think I can say enough about how great it is to spend a few days in the gorgeousness that is Yangshuo. It's probably one of the most beautiful places on the planet. Pictures and words can't possibly do it justice.

Yangshuo is extremely touristy (chock full of visiting westerners and Chinese) including having things like a KFC and McDonald's, but it still manages to have the charm of a small, idyllic wonderland.

Between the float down the Li River, and taking in a class at the Yangshuo Cooking School (which is freaking amazing, and our teachers were hilariously fun), this has been the highlight of the trip so far. You should all come here.

But one of the best examples of horror as metaphor is the Nightmare on Elm Street series. Freddy Kruger, even in his most over the top and campy iterations, has always been as much about childhood trauma revisited in the subconsciousness of dreams as he's been a dream bound killer. But the key word in that sentence is subtext. When the childhood trauma comes to the forefront it transforms a franchise which has rarely been great, but has usually been fun into something which is neither.

Sometimes I just get walking around the house with my headphones on. Which inevitably leads to dancing. Which looks something like this:

This is where you start to see the films that I really love from the decade. Every one of these has an insane degree of rewatchability, and has had at least some impact on film making since its release.

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