Christmas comes early this year!

Oh Oscar...

When I was little (as many of you also likely did), I'd always get so excited for Christmas morning that I could hardly sleep. "What could be in my stocking?!" "What is that big present?!" "Am I getting (insert awesome game/movie/toy here)?" All of those were common thoughts for me as I grew up. That feeling of course has went away quite a bit, with nothing really ever being as exciting as Christmas morning was now that I'm a quarter century old.

However, strangely, every year when the Academy Award nominations are announced I get really, really excited to the point I actually get up on time and eagerly pursue news about the nominations. I really have no idea why that is, mostly my love for movies I guess, but still, it's pretty bizarre how into it I am. This Thursday is the day in 2009, and my cup is already running over with excitement.

All in all, it's a great day for movie buffs, with the great nominations drawing a ton of excitement and the snubs feeling my ire in force, it's an emotional roller coaster and I feel like I'm going to be up at the crack of dawn, frantically refreshing MSNBC or IMDB while eating my Kashi Go Lean cereal at 5 am. Well, if we lived in a theoretical world where I'd get up at 5 am for anything. But you get the theoretical.

Before we get to it, just wanted to drop my two cents on predictions for the major awards in this years Oscars (no supporting actor/actress awards though, especially considering I feel that Heath Ledger has the actual Best Supporting Actor win locked up). See below, let's hope I'm not too off or I'm going to feel dumb!

Also, for one thing, I'm going for the upset special and am predicting Milk getting dominated outside of Sean Penn, and Wall-E sneaking in. I have no reason to believe this will happen, outside the fact I found one to be decent but not amazing and the other to be one of the best movies I've ever seen. Guess which is which.

Best Picture: Slumdog Millionaire, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, The Dark Knight, Wall-E.

Last one in: Wall-E
Last one out: Milk

Best Director: Danny Boyle, David Fincher, Ron Howard, Christopher Nolan, Darren Aronofsky.

Last one in: Darren Aronofsky
Last one out: Gus Van Sant

Best Actor: Mickey Rourke, Sean Penn, Frank Langella, Clint Eastwood, Richard Jenkins.

Last one in: Richard Jenkins
Last one out: Brad Pitt

Best Actress: Kate Winslet, Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep, Sally Hawkins, Melissa Leo.

Last one in: Melissa Leo
Last one out: Kristin Scott Thomas