Movie night

Several weeks ago I began seeing trailers on tv for the upcoming movie "Project Almanac".  Since I've always had a thing for time travel movies I told Spouse he had to take me to see this film when it came out.

I was hoping we could do a 'date night' where we'd go to dinner just the 2 of us (we usually eat out with friends) and then go to the movie, kind of like how a new couple goes on a date.  But for whatever reason, it didn't feel like that at all.

We went to dinner at 6:30 because we were both hungry (both on diets) so we were done by 7:45.  The movie didn't start until 9:15 and I'd already purchased the tickets online.  So after dinner, we just ended up going back home, brushing our teeth, and watching a little tv until it was time to go to the theater.

I enjoyed the movie a lot.  Its about 3 high school seniors who are science-geniuses who 'discover' that they had already created a time travel device.  Realizing they had already done this, they go about figuring out how to create it, and begin testing it on inanimate objects with success before sending themselves back in time.  They are joined by 1 of the guy's sister and a girl on whom he has a crush.  As is always the case with time travel, their very re-appearance in the past creates changes in the present which the 5 friends are not prepared for.

Blogger won't allow me to upload any videos today, so to watch the trailer CLICK HERE.

My only beef with the movie is that it was filmed using a handheld camera to make it seem like the sister had filmed the entire movie.  Since I am prone to motion sickness, movies filmed with a handheld camera tend to make me nauseous, so I had to look away (at the sconce on the wall) from time to time to keep from really getting sick.

Afterward, it was a little after 11pm so we just went home, let the dogs out for their last pee of the night, and then went to bed.  It didn't feel like a 'date night' at all, so I titled this post 'movie night' rather than 'date night'.  Maybe next time.

Weekend highlights

Sat morning while Spouse was at his personal trainer appointment I went a yard sale to benefit the Cancer Society. I found a few things I couldn't live without (picture frame, acrylic paints, candle) and was glad the money went to a good cause. I also supported them by purchasing 2 donuts!

Once Spouse returned home and showered, we went out to lunch and to the grocery store. It was bright and sunny so we had the convertible top down as we ran a few other errands. Our friends Kerry & Hugh were at their place in Ocean City so we took advantage of the nice weather and drove there to say hi to them and to deposit some checks at our bank. (Unfortunately the ATM near our house that accepts deposits was removed so we have to mail deposits or drive to Ocean City.) It was a nice surprise to be able to stop in and see them.

It was our turn to host Movie Night so at about 7:00 our movie night friends showed up for snacks and drinks. Then we watched "Precious". To our surprise, none of them had seen it! Everyone liked it except Spouse, who felt the character of Mary (Precious' mother) was "unrealistically cruel". WTF??? I thought Mo'Nique (Mary) and Paula Patton (Miss Rain) did outstanding jobs. However I felt the execution of the story could have been a lot better. Good films build emotional peaks and valleys several times throughout the film, but I found this one to be a little 'flat' in its delivery. But I thought the story itself was great and could make very a very interesting sequel.

Sun morning I painted this Mark Rothko-inspired painting for my friend Thad.
We took it with us to brunch since we knew we'd see him there, and gave it to him just before we left. I was very pleased that he liked it. I found out this morning that he hung it up as soon as he got home.

On Sun we attended Bob's birthday brunch at Saketumi. There were about 15 of us there, and we all had the Sunday Brunch Buffet which was just as fresh and delicious as the dinner entrees always are. We had a very nice time.

When we returned from brunch we found our friends Kerry & Hugh at our house. They decided to stop by on their way home so they could see our garage/bathroom/closet addition. We showed them around and visited for a few minutes. What a nice treat to see them twice this weekend! When they left Spouse & I changed clothes and went for a walk on the boardwalk. The weather was significantly cooler than Sat so we wore jackets, but the sun felt good as we walked along the boardwalk and looked out onto the ocean. We skipped dinner since our brunch was so filling, and watched some TV. I felt tired so I went to bed uncharacterically early, at 9:30.

Crush du Jour: Craig Archer

Terrific weekend

We had a terrific weekend! We just had a few things planned so much of the weekend was spontaneous.

First, the weather: Sat it was 75 degrees and sunny, and Sun it was 80 degrees and sunny; quite a change from the 26 degrees and several inches of snow we had on Mon! Needless to say, all the snow is gone now.

A month ago I'd taken Big Ella to a restoration shop to get an idea on the cost of a paint job, and was rather shocked at the $18,000. estimate. But our friend Rick told us that he had gotten very good results from Maaco, so Sat morning I drove Big Ella to the Maaco in Salisbury, about an hour away. Spouse followed me in his car. Long story short, the guy at Maaco quoted me under $5,000. for the exact same work. To be sure, I asked him to describe the process to me so I could know for sure that I was comparing the same work. Spouse & I agreed it was the place to have the work done, so I paid a deposit and left Big Ella there. In about 2 weeks she should be STUNNING!

Afterward we went over to our friends Randy & Dean's house. We met their new puppy, then went to lunch at a great little bistro where Spouse had a filet mignon tips pinini and soup and I had ahi tuna sliders and a goat cheese salad. Tres magnifique!

When we returned home we immediately changed into our workout gear and went to the gym. Since it was so pretty outside, we decided to go for a nice long walk (to the beach) when we got back from the gym. It was amazing to have such warm weather in early March, and this just added to our enjoyment of the walk.

We both showered and then headed over to our friend Ray's house for movie night. Once a month a group of guys gets together to watch a movie (the host picks the film), discuss/comment on it afterward, and enjoy some snacks. Ray picked "Flawless", starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Robert DiNiro, which we saw many years ago when it came out, but enjoyed it again.

Sun morning we took Jordan for a nice long walk, which she enjoyed immensely. It was only 9am but we could already tell it was going to be warmer than the day before. After talking for a while and enjoying a nice leisurely cup of coffee, we went shopping. Since it was already in the 70s we put the roof down on the convertible. We saw lots of people wearing shorts, including me, despite my wintry-white legs.

Nick solved the great mystery of why our camera keeps indicating "batteries exhausted". He said we needed to change the battery setting on one of the menus because it was set for a battery that has stronger voltage. Since we were using batteries with lesser voltage we needed to change the setting. I had no idea the camera even had a battery setting! Nick suggested buying a rechargeable battery station, which made a lot of sense, so our first stop on Sunday's shopping spree was to buy the rechargeable battery station. We got one that recharges AA and AAA batteries, since we use AA in the camera and AAA in the mp3 players.

Then we had burritos at Moe's.


At our next shop-stop we saw that the parsons chairs we'd been looking at for months were finally on sale. They only had 2 left, but lucky for us, we only wanted 2, so we bought them. They are dark brown (faux leather) and can be used in our dining room or living room when we need extra seating. As we walked out of the store Spouse suddenly remembered we were NOT driving the CRV, into which the chairs could have easily slid. I laughed and told him not to worry, that I'd already thought of that and knew the chairs would fit upside down in the back seat of the convertible. And they did. I also got an mp3 player for $19.99 so Spouse & I would each have our own mp3 player at the gym.

Our last shop-stop was the grocery store. Nothing exciting to report about that, unless you think getting those 'Steam Fresh' veggies that steam themselves in the microwave for $1. each is exciting.

When we returned home Spouse took a nap and I tried to load a 'workout' playlist onto my new mp3 player. Instead, I accidentally loaded our entire music library onto it, so now I have to figure out what I did wrong.

Since we had a filling lunch we weren't hungry for dinner, so we just had a light snack before going to Rick & Nick's to watch a movie. We had introduced them to the Donald Strachey gay detective film series a while back and they enjoyed "Third Man Out" and "Shock to the System". So the 4 of us watched the 3rd film in the series "On the Other Hand, Death" last night, which we liked, and look forward to the release of the 4th film in the series "Ice Blues".

It was a terrific weekend, which ended too soon. But isn't that always the case?

Crush du Jour: Nick Adams

Apple Scrapple

Apparently Father Fall won the fight against Mother Nature who seemed intent on keeping us spoiled by warm temperatures. The weather actually matches the calendar page now so there's no more denying the arrival of fall.

We didn't go for our regular Fri night dinner at the Miltonian. Rick & Nick were out of town, and Stephan & Wayne had invited us to their house for a happy hour. Wayne had made a bunch of holiday wreaths and floral centerpieces and had them out for folks to see and purchase if they felt so inclined. We enjoyed a drink and a nibble to eat, but only stayed for about an hour. We came home, ate pizza and Spouse flipped around between various crappy TV programs while I watched a Netflix DVD called 'Crutch', which I enjoyed.

Spouse made breakfast for us on Sat morning and then we putzed around the house until almost noon. Stephan & Wayne met us here at 12:30 and we headed to Bridgeville for the 14th annual Apple Scrapple Festival. It was wonderfully sunny, cool, and a little breezy; perfect festival weather. On our way to Bridgeville we stopped at a gas station where I accidentally backed into the gas pump, breaking the nozzle off the handle, and breaking the tail light on Spouse's CRV. How embarrassing. The owner of the station was not present but I talked to him on the phone. He called me back today to thank me for being honest about having broken the nozzle. Since the station was not open, I could very easily have gotten back in the car and driven away. The off-duty mechanic working on his own vehicle inside the garage did not see what happened. I had to interrupt his work to inquire about who to speak to about the pump. The owner said the nozzle will cost about $180. to replace. I told him to have it done and mail me the invoice, and I'd pay for it. He again expressed his gratitude for my honesty.

The Apple Scrapple Festival was a much bigger deal that we'd thought. Bridgeville is a very small town so we assumed the festival would be small and easily completed within an hour. Au contraire! Nearly the entire town was roped off for the festival, which consisted of live entertainment on a stage, lots of food vendors (including scrapple, of course), arts and crafts booths, products and services booths, booths selling apples, canned veggies and fruit, pickles, relish, and a rather impressive selection of classic and antique cars to peruse. We were shocked at home many people the festival attracted. Afterward we had an early dinner at Jimmy's Grill, where we ate quite possibly the best fried chicken in DE, if not the entire country.

We barely had time to feed and walk Jordan once we got home before we had to hop back in the car and go to Paul & Steve's for Movie Night. Paul & Steve converted their dining room (which they never used) into a full-fledged movie theatre, complete with a projection system, huge wall-sized screen, velvet drapes, authentic movie theatre candy counter and popcorn maker! These guys took the theme and really went with it, so watching movies with them is even better than going to the actual cinema. We watched "Victim", a 1960 British film about the blackmailing of gay men when simply being homosexual was against the law, based on a true story. It was really good.

Sun morning we slept in until 9:30, then watched "The Barefoot Contessa" and "Nigella Express" as we ate our sesame bagels and drank our blueberry flavored coffee. Unable to postpone it any longer, we started doing our 'serious' housecleaning. Spouse had suggested early in the week that we do a 'serious' housecleaning that coming weekend, and by Sun at noon we knew we'd have to get started. Surprisingly it didn't take as long as we thought, and Spouse abbreviated his portion a bit, deciding to mop the kitchen floor "another day".

Again it was bright and sunny, cool, and slightly breezy so we agreed to meet Rick & Nick at the beach at 2:30. We brought sweatshirts since its often cooler on the beach than at home, but the warmth of the sun kept us from needing to put them on. There was hardly anyone there, and the water was quite calm. Rick & Nick brought their new Sheltie puppy Zack with them. He really enjoyed the beach. We really enjoyed being able to just sit and talk with our friends on the beach for 2 hours, knowing there will very few if any more days like this until spring.

When we got home I showered and then made dinner. We had tacos and Mexican rice. Spouse watched '60 Minutes' and I watched a Netflix DVD called "Unconditional Love". Despite the star-studded cast which included Kathy Bates, the uber-yummy Rupert Everett, Vanessa Redgrave, Dan Akroyd, and Johnathan Pryce, the film was rather disappointing. The 1st half was good and engaging. I really felt for the lead character played by Kathy Bates, whose husband leaves her and whose favorite pop star dies. But the 2nd half just seemed to turn silly and insipid, falling short of even being campy. I really wanted to like this film but it just wasn't worth liking.

We both went to bed at 10:30, but were awakened several times throughout the night and early morning by our darling dog Jordan. We think she has allergies because there are times like last night where she will 'cough' for 15-20 seconds, loud enough to wake us up. Sometimes she does it during waking hours, which is far less irritating than last night when she woke us up no less than 6 times. Spouse took her into a guest bedroom and closed the door, but sometime later she began to whimper and scratch on the door, so he let her out of the guest room and back into our room. This happened 3 times. I don't fault Jordan for keeping us up all night, I fault Spouse. He should have made her stay in the guest bedroom after she'd woken us up twice. This morning when the alarm went off I felt as if I'd just taken a series of 15 minute cat naps.

Pet concern update: Pouncer and Jordan are both eating and pooping normally again. Just thought you'd want to know.

Now, I'm off to my work out.

Drag Queen name of the day: Lily Pewshun