OperationMAIL

I’ve Started My 1st Project Life Album!

January 18, 2016

If you’re not familiar with Project Life, the simple explanation is it’s scrap booking for dummies. The system involves all kinds of goodies like cards, themes, plastic sheets with different layouts, binders, and all kinds of other items you can use to bring your story to life. I tried getting into scraping years ago (and I mean years) but I have a thing with cutting photos and I was just too lazy to ever finish anything. When I came across this I was intrigued and when Michaels had a sale I picked some stuff up and started to plan! In order to have photos in the sizes I needed (and with cut rounded corners), I went with Persnickety Prints. The pricing was reasonable and the photos arrived quickly. When I opened them up I was pleased with the quality as well. I’ll be ordering more photos from then in the future.

My first book features my OperationMAIL/London adventures! I figured it was something easy and I have plenty of photos from the trip. The perfect equation! I didn’t order a ton of photos, because I wanted to see how it worked out but I’ll be adding to the book later on. I might look into some different cards to use as well, maybe some free ones from the internet. Here’s what I have so far!

It’s not much but it’s a start! I still need to write some notes plus I did create some cards at work that I need to print out and maybe try to use. Plus I might try and organize it a bit more. That’s the nice thing about Project Life. It’s easy to make changes as you go without fear of ruining anything. Do any of you use Project Life?

OperationMAIL: Non-Marvel Things And Stuff

May 18, 2015

I did manage to see some non-Marvel stuff while in London! And see some friends! I know, it’s shocking. Instead of blabbering on about things, I’m just going to share a ton of photos! Enjoy!

And this photo is my one of my favorites from the trip. I snagged it while on a bus tour and we were crossing the bridge.

I don’t know how I managed to get this photo. I enhanced it a little bit but not too much. As you can see, it was a bit overcast that day! I did a little cropping too because a few heads were in the photo near the bottom. I might actually have to print this one out! And now some photos with friends!

The first photo is from when we were waiting in line to get in for the premiere. It might have been around 5AM? Maybe earlier? I honestly can’t remember. That was such a long day! And the second is from lunch in Manchester! And here are some photos of our room at the Titanic Liverpool Hotel!

The third photo is the hallway. I have never seen a hotel with a hallway this huge before! It was insane. We couldn’t get over it. And those cocktails were just as good as they look. The bartender was fantastic. I wish I was drinking one right now.

I honestly can’t wait to go back. I feel like there’s still tons of stuff to do and see that I didn’t get to do this time around. Isn’t it crazy how you can go somewhere for almost two weeks and still not to see everything? OK, two weeks isn’t that long but it’s the longest vacation I’ve ever taken!

Do any of you have any vacation plans in the work? Anything super fun going on this summer?

OperationMAIL: Age of Ultron Has Arrived!

May 6, 2015

To say that April 21st started as a clusterfuck and ended on a high note is a bit of an understatement. Let’s start from the top.

When you line up for a premiere, it’s similar to lining up for Hall H. It involves crazy hours and a long line. Oh, and line jumpers. We got in line bright and early at around 4AM, but we had been up since around 1AM due to messages that Katy was receiving about the line. When we finally made it to the line, we were around 130 or so in line. Not too bad actually! We were feeling good. But as the morning went on, we noticed more and more people joining their friends. You might have been “walking with purpose” random person, but I know your game. But we kept our cool. We entertained our section of the line by randomly singing “Push It” and just being weird. I mean, we were running on very little sleep. Then it’s finally “Go Time” and we’re allowed in. I took off running after Steffi since she knew what was what but by the time we got into a pen, there was no barrier space left. Katy caught up with us and we tried another pen but no luck. Since I’m short, it really isn’t worth it to stay in a pen where I’m rows back from the action. What’s worse? Knowing your favorite actor is RIGHT there and you can’t get to them? Or just not being there? After taking in the situation, Katy and I retreated to a little Starbucks stand to figure out a new game plan. PRO TIP: Always have a backup plan.

That backup plan was the press conference. Now, this was something we had been working on. I knew about it before I left for London but obviously didn’t want to jinx anything. The day before the conference (same as the premiere FYI) we received an email saying only one of us could go. Well, we weren’t going to split up. The whole point was to experience this together. Since we knew where it was taking place, we figure we could just go there and hangout. Then we got a better idea. Since we were out of fucks to give at this point, Katy emailed one of our contacts and explained how we were under the impression that both of us were supposed to be on the list. Within minutes we were told both of us had access to the press conference! PLAN B INITIATED. We returned to our hotel room and got ready. We were beside ourselves! We made our way to the hotel to check in and while doing so we actually ran into Mark Ruffalo in the hallway! He was alone! No handlers or anything Of course I was down on the ground digging around my purse for my glasses the first time he walked by. But when I looked up and saw his back, I knew right away who it was. Plus Katy was grinning like it was Christmas morning! When he turned around and came back down the hallway, that’s when I was able to give my hello! After that we checked in and grabbed our seats for the press conference. I won’t bore you with the details here but head over to When Nerds Attack for my full report. You guys do get photos though since I didn’t think they were good enough to be “press.”

After that we headed back to our hotel to get ready for the actual premiere. Katy had won tickets via a contest earlier in the week! How amazing is that? It’s like everything came together. The stars aligned. We got dolled up and then made our way over to the mall where the red carpet was taking place. Guys, I actually walked a red carpet. WHAT?! I was walking down a red carpet and then looked to my left and there was Chris Hemsworth signing autographs. I couldn’t get to him of course because we were being herded towards the escalators in order to make our way up to the theater. Plus they had tough looking security people in suits. When we got up to the 2nd level I was able to watch Jeremy Renner walk out on stage. The entire thing was awesome. I wish I had recorded it on my phone but I didn’t even think about that at the time. Obviously.

So, as you can see, the day went from “UGH, WTF ARE WE GOING TO DO NOW?!” to “OMGZ YES!” in just a few hours. And my hatred for people who cut the line is still strong. But hey, it all worked out! We got to see our faves in person, and enjoy a pretty awesome movie!

OperationMAIL: Captain America The First Avenger

May 1, 2015

Honestly, these were the locations we were most excited to check out. Our first stop was the Titanic Liverpool Hotel in well, Liverpool. While it wasn’t a hotel at the time of filming, you’ll recognize it right away! The location pops up after Skinny!Steve has turned into Super!Steve. The first part that will catch your eye is the bridge where the taxi crash takes place.

Left: My Photo Right: Captain America: First Avenger

We actually spotted this from our hotel room and started freaking out. Yes, of course we went with a dockside room. Katy pulled the movie up on Netflix and we started comparing right away. I hope our neighbors couldn’t hear us freaking out and jumping up and down. Sorry, not sorry! Once we got settled into our amazing room we headed outside to do some more investigating. Obviously we needed to find the little “alley way” where Hydra took the kid and then tossed him into the water. Oh, you mean this spot here?

I wish I could tell you we kept our cool but we totally didn’t. It was this weird and amazing feeling to be standing in the spot where they filmed. We just kept repeating “This is it” over and over. We took more photos and just smiled at each other like we just found treasure. We took photos of the docks, the bridge, the front of the hotel. We basically took photos of all the things.

We obviously stayed the night in Liverpool then headed off to Manchester to meet up with some friends and check out more filming locations. I’m kinda going backwards movie timeline wise but oh well. I’m going in the order we visited the locations. The next scenes took place right before the scenes in Liverpool. This is where Super!Steve busts out of the super secret science lab and Agent Carter is a bad ass in the middle of the street!

These scenes were a bit of a challenge since the storefronts were brought in and all that. But what helped with this building was the red line you see. Notice it? It was the only building on that block that had those markings. But when you looked around you instantly felt like you were in the movie. It was insane. I’m sure everyone walking around thought we were nuts. There was one building though that just kept screaming out at me. That would be this one.

I just kept staring at this building, like I had been there before! It was such a weird and awesome feeling! Also, I had no idea the coloring on the movie was that dark until I started going through screencap after screencap. I had to lighten this one up a bit! Here are a few more from this location.

And then we went to The Pub. You know exactly what I’m talking about don’t you? The spot where Peggy walks in wearing that stunning red dress, leaving both Steve and Bucky picking up their jaws. The pub is an actual restaurant that’s open for business. It’s a bit posh and since we’re broke, we just had a few drinks. The place is broken down into three sections and we knew we had to get through a doorway to get the real feel of the place. That’s when Katy put her S.H.I.E.L.D. training to use and asked the manager about the history of the location. Once she was done, we asked if we could have a tour when we were finished our drinks and she said of course!

As soon as we walked through the door, we knew. We knew we were in the spot where Bucky was drinking alone. Where Steve asked him to follow Captain America and where Peggy Carter made those jaws drop. We learned that the marble bar top was original which means I then rubbed myself all over it. That’s the proper reaction right? We managed to keep it together though and the manager continued on telling us the history of the building. We made no mention of the movie though. We couldn’t blow our S.H.I.E.L.D. cover after all.

The place really was beautiful. And the history was interesting. Here’s another screencap from the movie because why not.

I messed around with the photo some because it was way too dark to see anything but this was in the same area as the Bucky/Steve seen. The angle is from the back of that room. EXCITING, RIGHT?!

And that wraps up the Captain America part of the trip! But I still have plenty more to share!

OperationMAIL: Thor & Guardians of the Galaxy!

April 29, 2015

Of course I’m going to make these posts go on for as long as I can! It’s going to some time to find screen caps of everything I need screen caps of! I’m starting with the easiest, and the first spot we checked out during OperationMAIL. That would be filming locations for “Thor: The Dark World” and “Guardians of the Galaxy”. Luckily Katy actually lives in Greenwich which means we didn’t have far to go to hit the first spots. The location is the The Old Royal Naval College and it is beautiful! We lucked out and had a gorgeous day weather wise. Plenty of people were out and about enjoying the sunshine. It’s nice to see they were able to clean up the damage left by dark elves so quickly!

And here are some more without any comparisons! Seriously, I started going a little nuts while sitting here looking at my own photos and then looking at screencaps. But needless to say Chris Hemsworth ran around all over the place here and I probably stood in the same spots he did and all that jazz.

The next stop on our tour was the Millennium Bridge in London. It’s a bridge that pedestrians use for crossing the River Thames. You might recognize it though from “Guardians of the Galaxy.”

Seeing a location like this in person just makes me appreciate the SFX artists even more. I mean, they took this bridge and transplanted it into a wonderful and made up planet. How insane is that? And this is why you should sit through the credits of a movie. To applaud those who bust ass to make things like this happen. Here are a few more photos of the bridge!