Wonders

Summer's here! OK, sure, it's not official till June 20, but forget what the calendar says. Open the windows. Go outside. Summer is definitely here. With all of those saved-up vacation days begging to be used, now's the perfect time to start making plans for the three-month stretch of warm weather. Tropical climes are beckoning. California, Florida, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, the Bahamas - you can already see yourself sprawled underneath an oversized parasol, sucking down your umpteenth pina colada while your eyes search desperately for the server so he can bring you another.

***1/2 (out of four) Pure and simple: See “The Imposter” and argue about it. This one's a thinker that deserves the thought. First-time feature director Bart Layton's documentary depicts a story that's bizarre at best and chilling at worst. In 1994, 13-year-old Nicholas Barclay disappeared from a park near his home in San Antonio. Forty months later, his sister, Carey Gibson, went to Spain to retrieve him after she received a call identifying a lost child as her brother.

English majors spend a large amount of their college and post-collegiate lives as the butt of jokes. When I was a sophomore at Miami University, I took a class on fairy tales, and there still are two girls whose paths I occasionally cross in the real world who do not know my name and refer to me only as "Fairy Tales" because they once saw me reading my big book of fairy tales for the class. Therefore, I was happy to see a study done by salary.com on the degrees that offer students the best return on investment.

***1/2 (out of four) Aside from “Newsies,” I don't prefer musicals. I still know a good one when I see it, and the first big-screen musical version of “Les Miserables” is a very good one. The first-time-ever nature of the musical adaptation - Victor Hugo's classic 19th century novel has been adapted as a movie and TV show about 500 times, most recently in the average 1998 edition - more than justifies its existence. Director Tom Hooper's decision to film the performers singing live, as opposed to the ultra-artificial, over-produced “Glee” style, works wonders for intimacy.

Negative five stars (out of four) An instant landmark of crap, “Upside Down” begins with an interminable voiceover as Adam (the permanently earnest Jim Sturgess of “Cloud Atlas”) utters, “The universe is so full of wonders,” and, “Gravity. They say you can't fight it. Well, I disagree. What if love was stronger than gravity?” Before you can start singing “Defying Gravity” from “Wicked,” the epically dreadful sci-fi/romance “Upside Down” becomes a black hole of pretentious self-parody.

I am single and actively dating, and I recently received some advice from male friends that I should make myself less available to the men I date and try playing hard to get. My question is, does this really work? And if so, what are some effective strategies? - Mouse Seeks Cat You know, I was all prepared to launch into militant all-caps speech about how honesty is NOT JUST A TEA BRAND, but there is research that suggests playing hard to get does work in some instances. In a study published in the European Journal of Personality, psychology researchers ran four experiments on hundreds of U.S. college students about playing hard to get and determined that everyone does it, but women do it more than men, and that it can be helpful in landing a mate.

Chris Petlak is all too familiar with preparing to Bear down when temperatures are below zero. After putting on an entire dresser full of whatever looked warm, downing a few beers and snapping up some snow pants, the 26-year-old Roscoe Village resident headed to Soldier Field for what would go down as the second-coldest game ever played on Bears turf. “Basically dress like you're going sledding and put a jersey over it,” Petlak said, recalling the Dec. 22, 2008, Bears-Green Bay matchup, played at 2 degrees above zero with a wind chill of 15 below.

At some point, everyone has taken those same-old, same-old college courses--math, philosophy, writing, maybe a little poli-sci thrown in for good measure. But what about a course on, say, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer?" Yes, that "Buffy" with Sarah Michelle Gellar, that aired on television from 1997 to 2003--as the subject for a college class. The course is part of DePaul University's Focal Point Seminar program--a required class for all freshmen that can cover a range of quirky topics in a discussion-based setting, explained Douglas Long, director of DePaul's First Year Program.

Squirrelfriends, I am sad. We're getting down to the wire, approaching the time when I will be upset no matter who goes home. Don't take my Sharon Needles! Don't take my Latrice Royale! Don't steal my Chad Michaels! Thankfully, RuPaul has anticipated my consternation this week, returning a previously-eliminated contestant for me to wish ill upon. "Bringing anyone back isn't fair, in my opinion," Sharon says of the twist. The remaining queens protest by making "Top 4, add no mo'" signs and wearing them.

It would be easy for Dwyane Wade to forecast a second straight NBA title in 2013 for his Miami Heat. After all, the ballyhooed Big Three of him, LeBron James and Chris Bosh are coming off a season that saw them advance to their second Finals in as many seasons together before knocking off Oklahoma City. However, when RedEye offered him that bait, Wade refused to take it. "I'm not a predictor because you never know what's gonna go from one day to the next," he said, shaking his head.