Screen on the Green

Last week we went to see Mommie Dearest at Screen on the Green with Ian, Alex, Joe, and Trey's friend Jason and Brittney and Alejandro. Brittney liked it, Alejandro and Ian and Alex and Joe didn't understand it, despite the fact that it contained a number of fight scenes, and the kind of fight scenes that I can understand, where two people argue and then beat on each other, as opposed to the kind of fight scenes in which there are mobs of indistinguishable people clobbering each other or two people fighting for no discernable reason other than they are enemies. Well, I want to know WHY.
The other why question of the week is why do you see no gay men between 25-40? Or do they just not seem to be between those ages? All the ones I saw were either younger than 25 and young stuck-up looking things, or they were dreary old balding queens. Aren't there any nice looking men in their thirties? (Note; this is more of an Academic curiosity question than otherwise, but then again, I'm not sure how things are right now. I had to find out the hard way; Beauty fades, but dumb is forever. I would just like some problems to be resolved.)

I also saw Paige at Screen on the Green and had drunk enough- not too much, but a little Dutch courage to go and speak to her; whereupon she resolutely refused to respond. I thought that was a little tacky. It's been 3 and a half years roughly, and she's still angry. I'm probably just not seeing at all her point of view, and I've tried to get round to it, and can't. O well.

And we went to an extremely ghetto party that one of Trey's coworkers was holding. I don't exactly know how to explain exactly how it was ghetto- but it was- it was in the deep 'hood, and they had food like barbecue ribs and baked beans and potato salad, and there were 8th graders passing around Hennessey in Hootchie mama outfits. I didn't really have anyone to talk to, because I didn't know anyone except for the hostess so I talked to three very small girls- about three years old, one at a time. They were very interested in my hat, so one came up, and then another, and then one other came up and glared at me. DESE MY MOMMA'S FLIP-FLOPS, AN' DIS MY MOMMA SKIRT AND - she paused- DIS MY MOMMA HAIR! she bellowed, and grasped a chunk of her hair. Then she glared at us defiantly, as though one of us was going to contradict her on this or take it from her. This made me laugh. I can see her on some future Antiques Roadshow: In da 'hood, shouting Dis My Momma Hair! and thrusting it at the Appraiser. This is a fine piece of early 19th century weave, Ms. Pooh Bear, says the Appraiser. It must have been in your family for generations.
Uh huh, she says, my momma gave it to me.
She's preserved it remarkably well. Yes, this fine piece of early 19th century weave may fetch as much as $20, 000 at auction.

Insert Clever Title Here

I forgot that I had several other things that I wanted to talk about, or I didn't forget, I just didn't get to them.

I finally figured out what Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is about. I was puzzled for a while, because it doesn't make much sense if you interpret it at face value. The drunk couple fighting and accusing each other of various inadequacies or whatever isn't really interesting or entertaining or play worthy. What I think it's about is a young man, played by Richard Burton, his MOTHER, played by Elizabeth Taylor, and his two half-siblings, played by the other people. Think about the alcohol as symbolic of the blood that they all have that ties them together too. And then see if it doesn't make more sense, because the whole play is about the mother figure accusing him of being inadequate and not living up to her expectations and he is Oedipally jealous of her.
Daniel did not agree with this interpretation but then Daniel isn't always as smart as he likes to think he is.
Also we saw a movie called Suspect Zero, and the interesting thought occurred to me that ALL of the dialogue was entirely superfluous. You could have made the movie silent and it wouldn't have made a bit of difference. And we saw something called Blade Trinity, because it featured Parker Posey, and I did not care for it. It was something about Vampires, and Wesley Snipes plays a half Vampire and he is supposed to kill all the vampires, who have resurrected Dracula to help them.
This movie made no sense to me whatsoever, and I don't know if it was just a bad movie or if years of snobbishness has made me dislike this sort of movie, but all the people did was fight in the movie. I admit that some of the special effects were cool, as when the vampires sort of exploded and left fiery skeletons all over. But other than that, I really didn't care who won. I was more interested in how the Blade character managed to finance all the vampire-hunting technology and equipment. It was fairly clear he didn't work at, say, Starbucks during the day, so whence the $$$? I don't know, perhaps that sort of movie is wasted on me. I have no experience with vampires, half vampires, or fighting people, and I don't want to drive at 250 miles an hour through downtown Chicago. It would be much more intriguing for me to watch, for example, a documentary on the history of the turbine car or the Wankel engine.

O and something ELSE interesting happened yesterday! I ran into someone whom I haven't seen since high school, and I have thought about a lot in the intervening years, and this made me feel much better about- certain choices I have made. Wow. One expects that in 12 years that perhaps this person would be doing brilliantly and have wonderful children and so forth, and then one finds out that this person went and married someone who shares a birthday with, say, the late George Burns. This was very astonishing to me, and shocking and all that, it was like if you went to brush your teeth in the morning and then squeezed the toothpaste onto your brush and discovered it tasted like cat food. You would not know what to do. And she was riding around on a motorbike with this chap, too, which I had not expected, and I keep having to think about this and tumble it over and over and over in my head, because it was honestly the thing I have least expected from her.

Sleeping Beauties

Sleeping Beauties

For once, this is a real time post. Don't get excited; it may never happen again.

Trey was all excited this afternoon because his "friends", Jason and Bob from work were coming over to visit, and he planned a rollicking good time with them apparently. They were supposed to move some things out of Bob's house or some storage facility somewhere else and then that somehow did not happen, and I don't understand why, and don't really care. But then they came over and one of them was EXTREMELY fidgety and active- sort of like Ed at his most hyper, but turned up several notches. Like on 11. Except much, much worse. I was astonished at them. The other one reminded me a lot of Julio. They were like if the Swedish chef and one of those two old guys on the Muppets had gotten together and then went Orgy borgy borgy and drank gin. Then I cooked dinner and they ate, and I immediately bored them to death. Here is a picture of the almost immediate outcome, and the reason I am dressed so badly is because I felt like it. Now you see what happens when Trey plans Fun and Exciting events! I can STOP it ALL! Ha ha ha ha ha!

P.S. I forgot to add that Trey went on to "set the night on fire" by clipping his toenails.

Worst Hold Music EVER

If you are curious as to what the worst hold music in the world sounds like, call NAPA auto parts in Decatur on Memorial Drive at 404.288.1200. It's like one of those electronic phaser guns kids bought in the '80's only it's supposed to be musical, and it's also off key, so its uniquely excruciating.

The reason I know this is because this week we fixed Trey's transmission (Yay!) Doesn't that sound all manly and complicated and impressive? Betcha didn't think someone who gets really, really excited about making curtains and the Semi-Annual sale at Bath and Body works could do things like that. Now I'll ruin it by telling you what we did: the problem was that the transmission was leaking, and if it had just been a few drops here and there that would have been one thing but it was like a quart a day. It was leaking fluid, by the way, for those of you (Trey) who think the car magically turns petrol into Magic Pixie Dust and that's what makes the car move. So we took the wheels off, and jacked up the car, and looked underneath to see what it was, and lo and behold it looked like the gasket around the pan was leaking. Now the old Cutlass had an oil leak and then I started reading the directions and it said lift the engine out of the cradle- for that car to change the OIL you had to lift the engine out of the cradle, it was a stupid design- but this looked easy to change. Trey complained incessantly about this. He didn't want to do it, it was hot, it wasn't the right day, he didn't want to, it was hot, etc. (I am thinking a very politically incorrect thing here) Then I discovered I didn't have the right socket so I had to go to Sears to buy a socket set. Trey refused to come. When I returned, I handed the socket I thought was correct to Trey. It doesn't fit, he said. It's too small. I handed him another, different size. It doesn't fit, he said. It's too small. I tried again. It doesn't fit, he said, it's too small. So I got under the car to see- and it turned out Super Genius was putting the WRONG END OF THE SOCKET onto the bolts. He was putting the end that is supposed to go in the socket wrench ionto the bolts instead of the nut hole (I wonder if someone will google that) . So I helped him, and then we managed to put the new gasket and filter and pan back on etc. We were going to do the brakes but Super Genius Trey doesn't know how to use a wrench and bobbled it all around the head of the caliper bolt and rounded off the head.

O Trey had another Super Genius moment this weekend on Saturday, he had a flat tyre on the way to work and immediately asserted that there was no spare wheel in the back. Of course there is, I said, it's on the side underneath a plastic cover. Trey couldn't find it (because he is an airhead) and went to work, leaving me with the delights of changing his damn tyre and then going to Sam's and getting another tyre. I had to wear my special grubby outfit, which did not improve matters. Trey noted when I went to get the keys from him that I wasn't dressed very nicely, at which I gave him a Look- - - I, was On a Mission. By the way, if you want to tell if someone Really Loves you, get a flat tyre. If they help you, they love you lots. If they change it for you, they really, really love you lots. If they change it for you, and then spend their Saturday in Sam's getting another tyre put on your car, it does not get any better than that.

Other than Trey's Moments of Brilliance, we have done a few interesting things; the main thing is that I got the job I wanted at Alpharetta High School, which is a beautiful new modern building with beautiful students and I am just delighted and we are going to have to move to Alpharetta because it is like on the other side of the world literally and figuratively. God it is so far away! And I did find houses in my price range in that area on the web. So I will have to see. Trey is not enthused about moving to Alpharetta but tough for him.

We went to court vs. Ola, who showed up in court and claimed several times that Sheridan and I were "playing games with the cats" to harass her, which made me laugh. I had this mental picture of Sheridan and I trying very patiently to teach the cats how to play chess and the cats looking bored and disgusted. Ola continued to allege that we were picking mortar out of her bricks and at night we crept up to her door and bothered her. As if I don't have better things to do, like play with my theremin or play the piano. So the judge continued the restraining orders.

O we also went to the Chattanooga aquarium, which has a new part to it, an ocean part, and it was fantastic. Trey only threw a very small fit when I went to Liz Claiborne outlet store on the way back.

And we went to see the Peking Acrobats, because Saniel didn't want to go for some reason. He had been given complimentary tickets but I think they were fighting, so they didn't go, and it was fabulous.