Yesterday was an extremely long day, in part because I didn’t get a whole lot of sleep Monday night and rose at 4:00 am to attend the nominations announcement. It was a whole lot of build-up for what is a very brief event, five minutes at the most, but it was a fun sight to behold. Reporters from all over the world, rows of publicists waiting to hear about their clients’ films, people hunched over laptops, waiting on the cellphones, and even manning fax machines (huh?), all waiting to hear which films will gain critical steam, which will be granted new life at the box office, and which will be plucked from obscurity. We watched as the entertainment show reporters did their bits live from the floor, and then headed home…by 6:30 am. I went for a run, had another breakfast, and headed to work, after which Michael picked me up and we headed to Santa Monica for an Amherst alumni screening of Catch and Release with its director and writer, Susannah Grant ’84. After a bizarre encounter with a potential Craiglist purchase (a notepad on the outside door read “Do not knock! I will not answer if you are not expected! Leave a note!” and once were inside – we were expected, apparently – we were regaled with stories of the virtues of unlocked file cabinets and bedroom door locks), we met Aimee at Blue Plate across the street from the Aero, which was quick and delicious (tuna melt and turkey chili, mmm). We enjoyed the screening and the Q & A afterwards; poor American Cinematheque members, also in attendance that night, who had to sit through some Amherst-centric questions. Grant was eloquent and interesting, and shed a lot of light into the way a movie is made, from inspiration to editing to the unfortunately necessary Hollywood ending. At that point, it was definitely time for bed.