How Lis and I didn't see a movie tonight.
Jul. 20th, 2003 01:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xiphiasActually, let me start with stuff that's been happening in the last couple days. First, Girl Genius 9 finally hit the comic stores . . . and IT'S GOT A MAP OF EUROPE IN THE GG WORLD!!! YAAAAY!!! Turns out that not ALL of England is underwater. But London IS underwater, and is called "The Glass City", so everything I'd worked out about England, and the PC idea that someone came up based on being British would still work.
(See, I've been working on a roleplaying game set in the GG universe, so, having a map is Nifty Keen.)
Nifty Boring Thing Number Two (see, I've decided that the interesting thing about my life is how boring it is) is that I bought a fluorescent black light at Spenser's Gifts! So I could detect cat urine! Because our cat pisses on the bed sometimes! And maybe on other stuff! And we wanted to find all the cat urine in order to clean it all!
Cat urine glows under UV light. But it apparently only works with fluorescent black lights, not incadescent. No idea why. So I went to the pet store on Rte 1 to ask them if they had fluorescent black lights with which to detect cat urine. They said no, because the ones sold specifically for that purpose were $40, and they didn't feel right charging $40 for something you could pick up at Spenser's Gifts for $15. So I went to the nearby mall, where there is a Spenser's Gifts, and bought a fluorescent black light. I went home, plugged it in, turned it on, and discovered that it doesn't work during the daytime, because our windowshades just don't block THAT much light.
Lis and I also rented The Nightmare Before Christmas, which I'd never seen before. Neat movie. The DVD also has, as bonus features, Frankenweenie, and Vincent. I may write up a critical analysis of these sometime, but, for now, I'm just going to leave it at "neat movies."
We discovered that there isn't that much cat urine we could find, which was good. We also discovered that our cat's dandruff fluoresces. And that my feet do, too. Or rather, spots all over the top of my feet fluoresce. This worries me, somewhat. Lis's toenails do, too. And, of course, detergent does.
Anyway, today, Lis and I planned to see a double feature of Finding Nemo and Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. So we drove an hour to the drive-in theater that we like, which cost us eighty cents in tolls. And, when we got there, there was like a half-mile of cars waiting to get in. We decided to wait in line, anyway, because it's a narrow road, and we'd be stuck in the same traffic jam whether we decided to wait in the line and try to get in the theater, or to just give up and go home.
We got up to the entrance gate, and asked the woman if there were still any spots available for Screen 1. She said, "Wait a minute or two; we're counting cars now, and seeing if we can squeeze anyone else in." After a couple minutes, she apologized, and told us there weren't. We asked if they were open during the week, she said yes, and we said we'd come back Tuesday (Lis goes into work late on Wednesdays).
So we were the very first car turned away because the movie was full! Go us!
As we were leaving, Lis said, "This will actually work out better. If we'd gone in here, we couldn't have gotten a good parking space because it's already full, and, on Tuesday, we will have our pick of spaces.
I said, "Yes, and those grapes are probably sour, anyway."
So, we drove back towards Boston, figuring, now we've got a Saturday night, no plans, and most of a tank of gas. What should we do now? We considered going to a furniture store to hang out. (Link doesn't work with all browsers -- surprising, Barry and Elliot are usually more considerate than that.)
That's actually not really a joke: that's a furntiture store which really has tried to make its stores into destinations, places that are just plain fun to hang out in, even if you have absolutely no intention of buying anything. When my sister was in high school, she and some of her friends used to hang out there. One Saturday night when they were hanging out there, a store clerk came up to them and asked if there was anything he could help them find. They said, no, they were just hanging out, and he said, that was cool, there were some snacks over there, and have fun. But, y'know, if they DID want to talk furniture, he was available. They laughed and said, okay, but, you know, we're all dead broke high school students, all of whom live with our parents, so we can't buy furniture anyway. They were chatting for a while, and one of them said, it would be really nice to have the perfect gaming table. The clerk laughed and said, I can help you pick one out -- if someone who's actually going to BUY something needs me, I'll go take care of them, but, if not, I'm not doing anything, anyway. It's more fun for me to be doing something, and it's good practice, anyway. So, what would the perfect gaming table look like?
They came up with a good size, and it had to have places to put your drinks, and places to keep your dice, and things to keep your character sheets and papers, and pencils. . . padded sides, so that when John (not his real name) passed out from drinking, he wouldn't get hurt from falling on the table. . .
The clerk found it for them.
The sides weren't actually padded, but they were rounded -- the whole thing was oval, rounded sides, rounded corners, no sharp bits anywhere, places to put dice, drinks, snacks, everything. They were very impressed. Obviously, nobody could actually BUY it, but they were, nonetheless, impressed. When Leila told me this story, were were in that furniture store, and she showed me the table.
Several months later, I happend to run into someone I knew when I was at that store, who was looking for a dining room table. Preferably one that would be good for gaming. . .
I don't know for sure if he bought that one, but I like to think he did.
Anyway, that was a digression. We didn't actually go to the furniture store. Lis decided that she wanted to go to a Dairy Queen to get a Peanut Buster Parfait. The closest one to where we were was reasonably close to where my parents live. So we went that way. And I missed the turnoff that would have taken us to the DQ, but did get to my parents' house.
So we went to my parents house.
Our friend Tobin was there, too -- twelve days until she has to turn in her dissertaiton . . .
A few fun bits from the evening: we were discussing Jewish identity, which led to my rant on Hebrew National hot dogs -- they don't have any outside authority certify their kashrut, and I don't trust organizations to regulate themselves. While they DO list a rabbi's name on the packaging, who has presumably certified the kashrut -- he's been dead for like thirty years.
Lis's comment was, "Hey, this would be a good sticker to stick on the packages -- 'This rabbi has been dead for thirty years. Either this hot dog has not been certified kosher or . . . '"
Later, Mom was explaining that, besides the religious reasons for it, she tends to always cover her head in public to protect her crown chakra from negative energy.
So I went into the kitchen and made her a tinfoil hat. She was very appriciative, and put it on. After a few seconds, she said, "Ouch. That hurts," and took it off.
I looked at it.
I'd accidentally made it with the DULL side out, instead of the SHINY side out. So I unfolded it, remade it correctly, and gave it back to her. She put it back on, and said that it felt much better now. I'm not making this up.
Everybody else, of course, also wanted tinfoil hats, so I had to make them for everyone.
Tobin mentioned how she'd really miss all of us guys when she moved back to California, because she'd NEVER sat around making tinfoil hats when she was living in CA. We thought that the complete lack of tinfoil hats in California probably explained a great deal about the state.
Mom mentioned that she HAD sat around making tinfoil hats before, and told us about her friend who had been abducted by aliens, and soon thereafter taught all of her friends how to make tinfoil hats to protect them from alien mind control rays.
About this time, Tobin noticed how well tinfoil hats really seal in the heat, and that her head was getting warm. "Wow!" she said, "These things are really warm! We should make a whole bunch of them and give them out to homeless people!"
"Yes," I said, "because a homeless person WITH a tinfoil hat is afforded so much more respect than a homeless person WITHOUT one."
(See, I've been working on a roleplaying game set in the GG universe, so, having a map is Nifty Keen.)
Nifty Boring Thing Number Two (see, I've decided that the interesting thing about my life is how boring it is) is that I bought a fluorescent black light at Spenser's Gifts! So I could detect cat urine! Because our cat pisses on the bed sometimes! And maybe on other stuff! And we wanted to find all the cat urine in order to clean it all!
Cat urine glows under UV light. But it apparently only works with fluorescent black lights, not incadescent. No idea why. So I went to the pet store on Rte 1 to ask them if they had fluorescent black lights with which to detect cat urine. They said no, because the ones sold specifically for that purpose were $40, and they didn't feel right charging $40 for something you could pick up at Spenser's Gifts for $15. So I went to the nearby mall, where there is a Spenser's Gifts, and bought a fluorescent black light. I went home, plugged it in, turned it on, and discovered that it doesn't work during the daytime, because our windowshades just don't block THAT much light.
Lis and I also rented The Nightmare Before Christmas, which I'd never seen before. Neat movie. The DVD also has, as bonus features, Frankenweenie, and Vincent. I may write up a critical analysis of these sometime, but, for now, I'm just going to leave it at "neat movies."
We discovered that there isn't that much cat urine we could find, which was good. We also discovered that our cat's dandruff fluoresces. And that my feet do, too. Or rather, spots all over the top of my feet fluoresce. This worries me, somewhat. Lis's toenails do, too. And, of course, detergent does.
Anyway, today, Lis and I planned to see a double feature of Finding Nemo and Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. So we drove an hour to the drive-in theater that we like, which cost us eighty cents in tolls. And, when we got there, there was like a half-mile of cars waiting to get in. We decided to wait in line, anyway, because it's a narrow road, and we'd be stuck in the same traffic jam whether we decided to wait in the line and try to get in the theater, or to just give up and go home.
We got up to the entrance gate, and asked the woman if there were still any spots available for Screen 1. She said, "Wait a minute or two; we're counting cars now, and seeing if we can squeeze anyone else in." After a couple minutes, she apologized, and told us there weren't. We asked if they were open during the week, she said yes, and we said we'd come back Tuesday (Lis goes into work late on Wednesdays).
So we were the very first car turned away because the movie was full! Go us!
As we were leaving, Lis said, "This will actually work out better. If we'd gone in here, we couldn't have gotten a good parking space because it's already full, and, on Tuesday, we will have our pick of spaces.
I said, "Yes, and those grapes are probably sour, anyway."
So, we drove back towards Boston, figuring, now we've got a Saturday night, no plans, and most of a tank of gas. What should we do now? We considered going to a furniture store to hang out. (Link doesn't work with all browsers -- surprising, Barry and Elliot are usually more considerate than that.)
That's actually not really a joke: that's a furntiture store which really has tried to make its stores into destinations, places that are just plain fun to hang out in, even if you have absolutely no intention of buying anything. When my sister was in high school, she and some of her friends used to hang out there. One Saturday night when they were hanging out there, a store clerk came up to them and asked if there was anything he could help them find. They said, no, they were just hanging out, and he said, that was cool, there were some snacks over there, and have fun. But, y'know, if they DID want to talk furniture, he was available. They laughed and said, okay, but, you know, we're all dead broke high school students, all of whom live with our parents, so we can't buy furniture anyway. They were chatting for a while, and one of them said, it would be really nice to have the perfect gaming table. The clerk laughed and said, I can help you pick one out -- if someone who's actually going to BUY something needs me, I'll go take care of them, but, if not, I'm not doing anything, anyway. It's more fun for me to be doing something, and it's good practice, anyway. So, what would the perfect gaming table look like?
They came up with a good size, and it had to have places to put your drinks, and places to keep your dice, and things to keep your character sheets and papers, and pencils. . . padded sides, so that when John (not his real name) passed out from drinking, he wouldn't get hurt from falling on the table. . .
The clerk found it for them.
The sides weren't actually padded, but they were rounded -- the whole thing was oval, rounded sides, rounded corners, no sharp bits anywhere, places to put dice, drinks, snacks, everything. They were very impressed. Obviously, nobody could actually BUY it, but they were, nonetheless, impressed. When Leila told me this story, were were in that furniture store, and she showed me the table.
Several months later, I happend to run into someone I knew when I was at that store, who was looking for a dining room table. Preferably one that would be good for gaming. . .
I don't know for sure if he bought that one, but I like to think he did.
Anyway, that was a digression. We didn't actually go to the furniture store. Lis decided that she wanted to go to a Dairy Queen to get a Peanut Buster Parfait. The closest one to where we were was reasonably close to where my parents live. So we went that way. And I missed the turnoff that would have taken us to the DQ, but did get to my parents' house.
So we went to my parents house.
Our friend Tobin was there, too -- twelve days until she has to turn in her dissertaiton . . .
A few fun bits from the evening: we were discussing Jewish identity, which led to my rant on Hebrew National hot dogs -- they don't have any outside authority certify their kashrut, and I don't trust organizations to regulate themselves. While they DO list a rabbi's name on the packaging, who has presumably certified the kashrut -- he's been dead for like thirty years.
Lis's comment was, "Hey, this would be a good sticker to stick on the packages -- 'This rabbi has been dead for thirty years. Either this hot dog has not been certified kosher or . . . '"
Later, Mom was explaining that, besides the religious reasons for it, she tends to always cover her head in public to protect her crown chakra from negative energy.
So I went into the kitchen and made her a tinfoil hat. She was very appriciative, and put it on. After a few seconds, she said, "Ouch. That hurts," and took it off.
I looked at it.
I'd accidentally made it with the DULL side out, instead of the SHINY side out. So I unfolded it, remade it correctly, and gave it back to her. She put it back on, and said that it felt much better now. I'm not making this up.
Everybody else, of course, also wanted tinfoil hats, so I had to make them for everyone.
Tobin mentioned how she'd really miss all of us guys when she moved back to California, because she'd NEVER sat around making tinfoil hats when she was living in CA. We thought that the complete lack of tinfoil hats in California probably explained a great deal about the state.
Mom mentioned that she HAD sat around making tinfoil hats before, and told us about her friend who had been abducted by aliens, and soon thereafter taught all of her friends how to make tinfoil hats to protect them from alien mind control rays.
About this time, Tobin noticed how well tinfoil hats really seal in the heat, and that her head was getting warm. "Wow!" she said, "These things are really warm! We should make a whole bunch of them and give them out to homeless people!"
"Yes," I said, "because a homeless person WITH a tinfoil hat is afforded so much more respect than a homeless person WITHOUT one."