six movies and a tv show
I watched a whole bunch of movies over the weekend. As in, between the movie theatre, the Braeburn Condos theatre, and the condo itself, I watched, like, six of them. Okay, five and a half. Shall I just list them out first? Why not!
Saturday:
Steel Magnolias
Fried Green Tomatoes
Four Weddings and a Funeral
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels [unfinished; we still need to watch the rest]
Sunday:
Ad Astra
The Dark Crystal
Those first two movies on Saturday, Steel Magnolias and Fried Green Tomatoes, were part of a long-planned double feature with Laney, who came over to watch them in the Braeburn Condos Theatre room. I minor miracle occurred, in which neither one of these movies had any real difficulty playing all the way through on that DVD player. I own Steel Magnolias already but had to check Fried Green Tomatoes out of the library, and the some other library DVDs I tried to play down there earlier this year (Grumpy Old Men and Grumpier Old Men) refused to play correctly and we had to bring them upstairs. I was a bit afraid of that happening again, but the movies both played surprisingly smoothly and were as eminently entertaining as ever.
When I saw Evan and Elden a couple weeks ago at the Hawaiian Cultural Festival at Seattle Center, I mentioned to her the plan I had with Laney for this double feature, and she thought she recalled already once seeing those two movies as a double feature with me. Turns out she's right -- I watched then on April 20, 2012 -- with her and Laney! Neither Laney nor I remembered that we had already done this specific double feature before. Granted, it was seven years ago, so it's been a while.
Another amusing tidbit: I had reserved Fried Green Tomatoes at the library, intended to pick it up on the last day before the hold expired -- and then spaced it. I then had a week to get it again, and with three holds on it I wasn't sure I'd get it again in time. I made a contingent plan to watch a different double feature instead of I didn't get it in time: Terms of Endearment and its sequel, The Evening Star. Well, Fried Green Tomatoes was available for pickup again by Friday so we were able to proceed with the plan as normal, but guess what? When I did a search in my Google Calendar for previous times I scheduled viewings of Steel Magnolias, it turns out I once did another double feature, on July 13, 2013, in which we watched Steel Magnolias and . . . Terms of Endearment! Laney was not there for that one, but Evan was, as were Chris and Alex, and also Shauna.
So, I can be confident, at least, that Laney has not already watched Terms of Endearment as part of a Braeburn Condos Double Feature with me before.
Anyway, Shobhit actually shifted his work shift to the morning and early afternoon on Saturday, as it had originally been afternoon through evening, so we could do our PCC shopping after the double feature instead of trying to get it done before. I texted Laney about maybe coming over early, and she actually managed to do so, although we had to wait for someone else to be done with the theatre as they had it reserved 9-10:30 a.m., I'm guessing for a live sporting event. The theatre was indeed empty by about 10:45 and I texted her it was good to go; she arrived at 11:25; we wound up chatting for a while and got the first movie started right at about noon . . . which was when we had scheduled to begin with. I guess that's better than chatting a while and not getting the movie started until 12:35, right?
We got both the movies done by 4:20, which was pretty quick considering how much time we often take due to talking before and between movies we watch in the Braeburn theatre. There was no one using the community kitchen we have to walk through to get to the theatre, either. In fact the only slight inconvenience was that the bathroom around the corner in the hall had its sink missing, with a sign posted on the mirror saying PLEASE USE KITCHEN SINK. I sure hope they replace that bathroom sink soon, but otherwise it was fine.
So I had said goodbye to Laney and was back up where Shobhit had been home for a while in the condo, probably by shortly after 4:30. And then we were off and we did our Big Shop at PCC, where the monthly 10% coupon combines with my 15% employee coupon to make 25% off, on top of any sale prices, which meant buying many extras of Zevia Soda 6pks (on sale at a 19.7% discount, so I got them all at total 44.7% off; we purchased 10 six-packs) and Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Unsweetened Vanilla half gallons (on sale at a 16.7% discount, making mine 41.7% off; we purchased six) and Tandoor Chef Naan Pizzas (on sale for all of 6% off but that still made it 30.9% off for me; we purchased eight); even ZuZu Luxe liquid eyeliner at 10% discount so mine totaled 35%, and I got two because of a one-week two-for-one Health and Body Care department coupon. I had budgeted $200 for this shopping trip, and as we shopped I was convinced we were going to go over -- and then once the coupons and discounts were all applied, the total, which came to something like $240 otherwise, came to around $195. I was thrilled.
Shobhit was pleased enough with my being just enough under budget for it, apparently, he suggested we go out for brunch yesterday morning, and we did exactly that - resulted in my projected budget balance now being in the red, but only by something like four dollars I think, so it's fine. Just no more notably extra expenses for the next couple of weeks, outside what I've already budgeted for.
He wanted to go to Portage Bay Café and get an order of pancakes to split, but he also wanted to go to the U District one instead of the slightly closer South Lake Union one, because the U District one has much higher ratings on Yelp, but by the time we got up there, the wait was a full hour, and at that point it cut things way too close for him to get back home and change and make it to his work shift which yesterday started at 1 p.m. So, we changed our minds and drove back to Capitol Hill again, at first thinking we'd just go use a Chinook Book coupon at Caffe Ladro and he'd still get his Social Review point. Then he looked up nearby brunch places after we parked the car, and we found a place called The Wandering Goose only about a block further away. So that's where we ate, even though they did not have pancakes, and the eggs they made supposedly "poached" were not runny at all, so he was notably disappointed in the food. I, on the other hand, found both the biscuits and mushroom gravy (with very big, delicious chunks of mushrooms in it) and the hash to be very well spiced and flavorful. I was quite glad to have eaten there, even though I did not get the pancakes I initially wanted.
And then Shobhit went off on this bizarre rant as we walked from the restaurant back to the car, convinced that I am "uncultured" because I cut my food with my fork instead of using a knife. He kept trying to say that if I refuse to use a knife then he should be allowed to chew with his mouth open! What the fuck? I swear to god, my husband is the King of False Equivalencies. I tried to bring up how disgusting chewing with your mouth open is -- something he likes to say is common in India, to which I reply we are not in India -- and his counter is to say that he finds my insistence on cutting food with the side of my fork just as disgusting. Which is of course preposterous on its face. My fork doesn't make disgusting loud squishy mouth noises when I use it to cut through food; it makes no noise at all different from how a knife would.
I find his insistence that not using a fork to cut food is "uncultured" or unsophisticated very annoying and off-base. If he could provide me with solid evidence of it, I would maybe change my perspective. Never mind that this is such fucking dumb thing to argue about, but I did some online searching and could find nothing to back up his claims -- the closest I could find was that, indeed, Americans are unique in this and the general reason for using a fork to cut food is simple convenience.
Shobhit was really pushing hard that I should learn the "more cultured" way to avoid embarrassment in other countries, except that a) I don’t believe for a second anyone in Australia or France (examples he actually gave) would be literally offended by my cutting my food with a fork, the way they certainly would be by someone chewing with their mouth open (certainly in nicer establishments, anyway); and b) he's trying to get me to change this behavior in my own country, where this is this established cultural norm, while literally trying to accuse me of being the one who is culturally insensitive! Conversations like this with him are crazy-making, because wherever he is coming from has no basis in reality, and he was literally accusing me of being irrational. You know what that behavior is called? It's called gaslighting.
Anyway. I did explain that I find the practice of cutting food with the knife in my right hand and then transferring the fork back to my right hand to eat it to be pointless and cumbersome, and so I cut out the middleman by just cutting with the fork. I did learn when looking this up online yesterday that apparently that practice of swapping the knife and fork between hands is indeed uniquely American -- I guess other cultures cut with their right hand, and then just feed themselves with the fork in their left, even if they are actually right handed. I suppose that's logical, at least for food that is too tough for a fork to slice through. But a soft biscuit under gravy, for example? Why the fuck do I have to be under any obligation to use a knife to cut through it, when a fork works literally just as well?
The worst part of it is that I feel any need to research and explain something this pointless and inconsequential, bordering on outright stupid. During the actual conversation, Shobhit offered an exaggerated grin a couple of times, to suggest he was just fucking with me for fun, and even stated he "wasn't mad" but was trying to challenge my perspective on the issue . . . as if it were any real issue at all. It should be noted that this is far from the first time he has complained about me not using a fork to cut my food. It legitimately irritates him, and I cannot fathom why he lets it get to him so much. It did not continue to come up once we were back home, at least, so that was a relief.
Yesterday afternoon I took myself to see Ad Astra, and in spite of the solid B I gave it, which I stand by, I found it disappointing. I want my space meditation movies to be better than just a B. Even a B+ would be good, but as always, that's the threshold: below B+ and I don't really recommend a movie to others. Why recommend a movie that's anything less than really good?
I had even thought maybe I could get Shobhit to go see it with me, but he had a perfectly valid point when I told him there is likely to be a big push for a Best Actor nomination for Brad Pitt, and since Shobhit is a SAG-AFTRA member, if he does wind up with a SAG Award nomination for Best Actor, then Shobhit will eventually get a free screener anyway. Turns out that's about all it's worth. And Brad Pitt gives possibly the best performance of his career in it, so there's that. I just found the story itself to be pretty . . . blah. I was never bored, I'll give it that, but nothing about it particularly excited me. And, I did think more than once while watching it that although it's compelling enough upon first watch, it did not strike me as a very re-watchable movie. A second watch would indeed be a duller experience.
I took the bus to the AMC Seattle 10 in the U District to see it, the earliest showing at 4:15, so I could use my AMC subscription and not have to pay anything on top of the $23 I already pay to see up to 3 AMC movies a week. Boy, am I glad I didn't pay more to see that somewhere else. I took the bus back and wrote the movie review.
I actually had a couple hours between when Shobhit left for work and when I had to leave for that movie, and so I went ahead and watched the 1982 original film version of The Dark Crystal streaming on Netflix. I had tried to re-watch it years ago and was so bored I turned it off; I still did not find it particularly exciting now, but managed to stay engaged for its full ninety minutes. It's far from the best Jim Henson production ever made, but is intriguing in how dark it is compared to the rest of his creations. And even though Ivan told me not to bother as he raved about the new The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance prequel series on Netflix, which has been getting far more rave reviews than the movie ever did, I still wanted to re-watch the movie before trying out the series, just for context. I watched the series trailer and the effects and world-building do indeed look promising -- but they also clearly feature the very same muppet-creatures as the film did. It's been 37 years since the movie's release, so a lot of advances have been made; I'll be intrigued to see the current melding of puppetry and special effects in the show.
Getting back to Saturday, once Shobhit and I got back from shopping at PCC and we put the groceries away, I suggested we watch the 1994 original film Four Weddings and a Funeral, which has also recently been remade into a series (this time on Hulu, involving Mindy Kaling), but everything I've read suggests the series is okay but nowhere near the quality of the film, which I had not watched in years. In fact, when I once tried to watch it probably 15 or 20 years ago, I couldn't even really understand its apparently mass appeal. My only guess now is that at the time I did not have as great an appreciation for precise, nuanced humor, with which that movie is packed; I can easily see now why it's widely regarded as one of the greatest romantic comedies ever made, right up there with When Harry Met Sally....
And we wound up watching Dirty Rotten Scoundrels shortly thereafter, only because once Four Weddings and a Funeral ended, Hulu had it as a suggestion for what to watch next. A Steve Martin classic? Sign me up! What followed as we watched turned out to be a bit inconsistent, but what funny parts it does have are very funny, and we only turned it off after about an hour because it was now midnight and I just could not stay awake any longer. We'll finish it at some point; we just never had time to yesterday.
So, what does that leave? Friday! Shobhit worked all evening that day, and I did not really want to go to yet another movie as I had just seen three movies the three previous nights in a row. Even an obsessive movie lover needs a break after once in a while! (And besides, I then watched three and a half movies on Saturday.)
So, I decided to see if Gabriel might want to hang out. I had texted him Thursday night to see if he might be available, and it seemed he basically said he would. I texted him early Friday evening to ask if getting there around 7 pm would work; I would eat dinner at home first before leaving. I had done the Metro Trip Planner to see what time I should leave in order to get to Columbia City Light Rail Station by 7, and when he had not texted me back, I finally called him when I had about ten minutes before my trip planner said I should leave.
He was in a whirlwind of pressing matters when I called, and also said he was going on only three hours of sleep and was very tired, and he had misplaced his wallet. So, I decided I'd let it go. Gabriel had asked if I could come down Saturday night instead, as he was wide open then. The thing was, Shobhit was not working Saturday night, and I doubted he would want to just up and go hang out with Gabriel after he was done working for the day -- the timing for me was that I had Friday evening to myself and was hoping just to go hang out for a bit. I basically stuck with the Friday evening idea for Shobhit's benefit, so he and I would have Saturday night to ourselves -- he had shifted his Saturday work schedule to make that possible, after all.
So, I told Gabriel I'd let him go and I'd just come out another time. But then he called me again in about an hour, and then said, "If you still want to come hang out, I won't argue." I was like, "I sure wish you'd told me that an hour ago" -- but, I went ahead and went anyway. It gave me something to do on Friday evening, even though I only got to hang out at their place for a couple of hours.
Less than that, even. I think the Columbia City Light Rail station is cursed. Just as happened the last time I took Light Rail there, for Lea's birthday party on the 7th, the trains were delayed because of a crash on the tracks, south of that station. So, even though this time the southbound train actually picked me up only about three minutes delayed, the train stayed stopped at each station southbound a few extra minutes, basically doubling the travel time from 21 minutes to 45 minutes. The driver got on the intercom a few times to offer apologies and explanations, the first time saying we were "slowly making our way" to Columbia City Station, where there would be bus shuttles to get passengers to other trains south of the station, while those north of it would turn around and head north again. (Where the hell they would do that on the tracks near Columbia City Station, I have no idea.) By the time we neared that station, however, the accident had been cleared of the tracks, so the train would continue on south after all.
Just, like, twenty minutes delayed. I sure felt bad for any passengers headed to the airport. Had they padded their trip time they would have been fine, but anyone already short on time before a flight was going to be fucked.
So, anyway. I got to Gabriel's apartment about 8:06, and I left at 9:45. I didn't even stay for two hours. I wanted to get back home around the time Shobhit got home from work that night. So, I visited with Gabriel and Tess for a whopping 95 minutes or so. Still worth it! Lea was out of town at a conference in Vancouver B.C., so it was just Gabriel, Tess and me, an unusually quiet visit -- which was honestly exactly what I wanted. It's not often Gabriel and I get that kind of quality time together without there being a small crowd of people around, and I enjoy it when we do. We didn’t get into any deep or challenging conversation either, which I was all good with -- it was a very relaxed, if briefer than I would have preferred, hang.
I then met Shobhit at the Broadway Market QFC so we could get our Friday Digital Coupon free products, a Chobani yogurt item and an energy drink item. He also decided to buy a cheesy loaf of bread. We went home and we maybe watched an episode of Cheers or something, I can't remember for sure. Friday was three days ago now, I can't remember everything!
[posted 12:22 pm]