LONG-ASS WEEKEND RECAP

There was a lot of drinking involved. Let’s see if I can remember everything.

FRIDAY
The plan was to meet B and Alex at McCormick’s but, even though we got there a little past 4, it was already full. Ashley, our receptionist, came with us. We walked down 1st for a bit but everything was pretty crowded, so we decided to hop on the bus and head to Tia Lou’s, a nice little Mexican restaurant with a rooftop deck. We got there before we opened so we thought we’d have a quick drink at a snooty place next door. Upon examination of the menu, however, we learned that the average cocktail ran $10-12. No thanks. So instead we pretended to be having trouble deciding as we killed time. After the second time the waitress came back, we decided we would do better waiting outside the door at Tia Lou’s. This whole process only took about 10 minutes, but we still felt kind of bad. Still. $12? How good can your drinks really be?

Tia Lou’s is home of the delicious, bottomless chips and salsa and the $4 happy hour quesadilla, as well as the $6 fuck your shit up margarita. They take a while to bring the bill though. Ashley took her leave of us (perhaps offended by the bad things we were saying about Forest Gump?) and the rest of us headed to the Lava Lounge to meet Sherwood.

Sherwood was killing time before seeing Sonic Youth and was sitting with his show posse. There wasn’t a lot of room at the table for us. No matter, though. We had designs on the shuffleboard table. For the first game, I miraculously beat B. Then, more true to form, Alex beat me (though it was kind of a close game). Then B beat Alex and then me again. The drinks kept coming and the music they were playing (80’s hits) only got better. The euphoria of good music combined with woe too much vodka and tequila is what undoubtedly made me believe it was a good idea to meet Ryan and the Kidd at Ozzie’s.

I never have a good time at Ozzie’s, but for some reason I keep getting convinced that it will be fun. Maybe because everyone ELSE seems to like it so much. But I don’t. I can’t explain it, really, other than to say that the vibe is all wrong. I feel like I’m crashing a frat party. Also, usually someone in my crew ends up pissing off another patron at some point in the evening. Last time I was there, I pissed off the waitress by asking for water when there was CLEARLY a poor-your-own station not 5 feet from where I was sitting. And then I spilled my drink. This time, I was just not having a good time. And I was extremely drunk which always makes ones bad time a hundred times worse. Maybe singing would have made me feel better, but I didn’t want to sing. I just wanted to leave. And eventually, we did, managing to pour ourselves into a cab and astonishingly make it home.

SATURDAY
The way to spend the day after a night of debauchery is, of course, to do nothing. And that’s what I did. B and I lounged around in the sun and read for, well, probably too long, as we got a little burned. But it was a nice day for it.

Then it was off to the Seattle Center to watch the results of the 24 Hour Play competition of which Meep, Dom and Ben were a part. We had some time to kill before the doors opened, so B convinced me that we should ride the little roller coaster they have there. It did look like fun, and I always liked the coasters at King’s Dominion back home. However, the big coasters apparently feel a LOT safer than the little ones. Our little car shook and creaked as it zipped around the sharp turns and near vertical drops on the tracks. A minute later, it was over, and I was only slightly sheepish about fearing for my life.

There were 6 plays that ran a little over 10 minutes each. They had been written, cast and rehearsed within the previous 24 hours. Meep directed one, and Dom and Ben each performed in one. Most of them weren’t terrible for having only been a day old. Meep’s piece was definitely the most solid, if you ask me. Poor Dom was in one of the more poorly scripted ones. Ben was in the best scripted, but weirdly blocked one.

After the show, we headed to Kozak’s where Brian’s birthday inebriation was already in progress. Kozak’s is a bar that seems to get worse every time we go. For a bar that usually has NO clientele, the waitress sure is inattentive. We had to get our drinks from the bar. It is also the home of the worst karaoke sound system and DJ in Seattle. The guy has no charisma, takes forever to find your song (and often gets it wrong), and plays horrible, K-Mart collection funk in between each performance. There’s no stage, just a table on top of a table that we’re meant to stand on. And you can’t hear anything. It makes good singers sound bad and bad singers sound even worse. These things become less of a problem when 5 drunk boys sing “Fat Bottom Girls” (which was dedicated to me and Meep…um…thanks…) at the top of their lungs. However, it makes me very sad that there is karaoke on a SATURDAY so close to where I live and it’s awful.

SUNDAY
The early part of the day was spent playing child’s badminton ($5 at Walgreens!) in B’s back yard. Then we got invited to join some Amazonians at Beer Fest in the Seattle Center. This was perfect, as we had plans to see Superman Returns 3D at the IMAX. Despite the world’s worst music (white-boy funk followed by cheesy, half-assed Scottish bluegrass), the Beer Fest was fun. The events proceeds went to PAWS, so there were dogs everywhere and a little PAWS booth full of kittens. Kittens and beer. Who could ask for a better way to spend a Sunday?

Apparently the IMAX show was sold out, so we rushed to the theatre to pick up our tickets and hopefully not get too shafted on seats. We were in the second row, but it wasn’t as unpleasant as I’d expected it to be.

I liked the movie. I didn’t love it. As everyone is saying, it was basically a rehashing of the plots of Superman: The Movie and Superman II, minus the glorious camp of Terrance Stamp and Gene Hackman. And while that Routh kid is indeed a spot-on Christopher Reeve, and Singer knows how to frame a shot, who really needs it? It didn’t help that the parts they chose to 3D were LLame. Ooh. Young Clark Kent is leaping through the corn field RIGHT AT US. Whatever!

I’m also a little concerned for Kal Penn’s career. I really like that kid and I don’t want to see him become either Bad Indian Stereotype Guy or Career Background Character #2. I think he had one line. And they didn’t even let him sing Wilson Phillips.

MONDAY
Though I had to work, Monday fell within the holiday weekend and shared characteristics with a Friday, so it is included in the recap.

In the evening, I joined B in Ravenna for some more child’s badminton (which is much easier to play in a park then in his back yard). Then Sherwood and crew and the Brunswicks stopped by his house for a little impromptu BBQ action.

After some REALLY good stuff that made us talk about poop and yard sales, the Sherwood crew took their leave, and B and I walked over to the Knarr with the Brunswicks.

At the Knarr, I was reminded why I never play pool. I suuuuuuck. I’m much better suited for being in charge of the juke box (which, apparently is stuck in a 1996 time warp). We finished our games, the Brunswicks headed back to the Hill, and B and I played pinball while we waited for my songs to finish. To our dismay, both South Park and Medieval Madness were possessed by evil, quarter-eating demons. An actual PIECE of the South Park game became dislodged during play and Medieval Madness kept registering tilt at the SLIGHTEST force. I hate those bastards.

TUESDAY
The day began with breakfast followed by a nap. Well rested, B and I then headed to a BBQ at his friend John’s house. There were good people, REALLY good food (must procure some of that olive and fig tapande), and deliciously evil Sangria. We played some more badminton and B challenged a few other people to some games. I’m getting quite good at child’s badminton. Perhaps I should find some children to destroy in a match.

John’s porch had a nice, only slightly obstructed view of the AT&T fireworks which, as I’m sure you local folks know, featured some sweet-ass new fireworks this year. I particularly liked the ones that looked like jellyfish. We could also see the show put on by the poor bastards that are the 4th of JulIvars. I feel kind of bad for them. Their show pales in comparison to the AT&T spectacle. I guess there’s just not that much money in chowder.

And now, a short but inspiring tale of Human Kindness: As we were leaving we realized that B’s car, which was parked facing up a rather steep hill, was stuck in the sand that lined the side of the road. He spinned the wheels for a while to no avail. Just as we began to devise alternative methods for getting home, a neighborly gentleman appeared with two wood planks and the know-how to get us loose. Apparently, this kind of thing happens all the time on that hill. He put the planks under the back wheel; B backed onto them, and was able to then pull forward to freedom. The gentleman advised us that were we to park there again, we would be wise to do so facing down the hill. Nice people like that give me the warm fuzzies.

I will never understand why we don’t have the day AFTER the 4th of July off instead. It’s as much of a drinking holiday as New Years.

NEXT WEEKEND: Meeps birthday and Johnny Depp.

July 5, 2006
Categories: Dear Diary, Filmpinions . Tags: weekend recap . Author: Baxter . Comments: Leave a comment

WEEKEND RECAP

FRIDAY
Dom and I went to see “An Improvised Christmas Carol” at Unexpected Productions. It was a pretty good show. Our friend Amanda is in the troop and she is very funny. There were a few annoying people in the audience, but that’s to be expected, really.

After the show, we met Elyse, Gene, Andrew, Brugos, Derek and a few others at the Nite Lite. Elyse had already been drunk and then back to sober. She was VERY entertaining. Andrew was recovering from knee surgery. It’s amazing how far science has come, even in the last few years. He had arthroscopic surgery, which is what I had, and his scars were SO small that they will easily be gone in a year. My scars, also from arthroscopy 5 years ago, will be with me for the rest of my life. My surgery was more invasive than Andrew’s but still, they had all kinds of instruments and a damned camera in there and it just looks like two small puncture wounds. Take that, Scientology.

I got in two powerful drinks from the WONDERFUL bartender lady and got Elyse to do a Shirley Temple impression in her adorable indie sailor outfit. I could have easily stayed at the Nite Lite for a while, but everyone else had been there for a few hours so they were ready to move on. We moseyed up the street to Shorty’s, which was full, and then to the Lava Lounge, which had a nice big table with our name on it. The Lava Lounge isn’t as bad as I remember it being. I am no longer anti-Lava.

Since everyone was many drinks ahead of me, people started to leave after about an hour at Lava, so Dom and I took off too. A nice, mellow Friday night for us.

SATURDAY
The day began with a matinee of “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”. Faye, Dom and I got there an hour early because we didn’t know what kind of crowd to expect. It wasn’t TOO crowded, but it was definitely good that we secured our seats early. We were joined by Ben, Emily and Brugos. As we sat there, waiting for the movie to start, it slowly dawned on us that we were surrounded by church groups. Faye was tipped off first by bad sweaters and the exclamations of people who were easily shocked by everything. We saw a bunch of awful trailers (including several of the ones Mark saw before Harry Potter. Oh my GOD, does ANYBODY care about M. Night Shlamamalayaman anymore?)

Then the movie began. Even if we hadn’t been surrounded by one of the most annoying audiences in history, it would have still been a fairly blah experience. Let’s get this out of the way first. I don’t really think the Chronicles are a Christian allegory inasmuch as everyone says it is. Sure, Lewis was a Christian and that would, undoubtedly, color his writing, but the whole allegory theory has gotten out of control. It was, first and foremost, a children’s story. And the best kind of children’s story too, because what kid doesn’t want to think that they can have an adventure like that while playing hide and seek? I know I did. Sure, as Borgia astutely observed, it’s kind of lame that these kids get to be kings and queens just because they’re the first humans to come to Narnia that happen to fit the ancient prophesy. But you don’t really think about it like that when you’re a kid. Instead, you think “This could happen to me” and that’s a nice, empowering notion. Especially for a lonely child.

ANYWHO, the movie: It had its good points and bad points. The good included some impressive CG, some beautiful cinematography, some excellent acting on the part of Tilda Swindon, that little hottie who played Mr. Tumnus, and the little girl who played Lucy, and, for Dom’s sake, the Griffins. As for the bad, well, Liam Neeson was far too recognizable to voice Aslan. He was boring and, in no way captured the majesty of the character in the book. His mighty, last word roar, was not really that commanding. The battle scenes were too long in the set-up without the payoff. The two elder children were kind of annoying at times. There were a lot of scenes that should have been trimmed or cut. There was no need to make the movie two-and-a -half hours long. The extra action sequences they wrote in felt gratuitous, and the kid who played Peter could not really sell the “coming of age” thing to pull off the scenes.

The Audience: You would think that at a 1:30 matinee, the biggest problem would be the children. Not so with these guys. With the exception of an occasional baby moan, the kids were silent. It was the adults we had to deal with. The row behind us (definitely church-goers) would NOT shut up. Everything shocked them and they felt they had to let us know. One of the ladies sounded an awful lot like Jennifer Coolidge, so it made it KIND of funny, but not that funny. The guy directly behind me had some food item in a paper bag that he was making AS MUCH NOISE AS POSSIBLE eating. After he ate the food, he TORE THE BAG UP. IN MY EAR. Then there was a man who smelled like beer who sat in front of us and ate Chinese take-out. At one point, he began muttering and coughing and then left the theatre for a few minutes, only to return later for more muttering. At the end of the movie he said “Wait till part 2!”. Jesus. I know church groups don’t get out much, but have none of these people ever been to a movie before?

After the movie, Ben and Emily went to Olympia real quick to get dinner. Brugos went to buy a suit and the Troika did a little shopping downtown. Brugos joined us later for dinner at Bill’s. Then we had a little time to kill before karaoke at Jai Thai. Dom went home to NOT play Warcraft and said he’d meet us later. Faye, Brugos and I got some unnecessary dessert at Charlie’s, and then headed to Jai Thai to secure a table. We were all kind of dead. Brugos had apparently been REALLY drunk the night before and Faye and I were exhausted from shopping. So it was, perhaps, fortunate, that they have now cancelled karaoke at Jai Thai. They said it was bad for business. I don’t really believe them because it was always crowded when I was there. It’s a bummer though, because now there is only ONE place left on the hill with weekend karaoke. Anyway, we stayed for one drink and tried to formulate a plan b. I got a drink called an “Adios Mother Fucker”. I didn’t understand the waitress, though, and thought I was getting an “Audio Smother Fucker”. Either way, the thing is packed with booze. It took me a while to get through it. Meanwhile, Ben, Emily, Borgia and Dom arrived. We eventually settled on going back to the Zookster Pad for a quick round of the karaoke home-version and then, perhaps, to watch “Return of the Jedi” on laser disc. Brugos was replaced by Gene. I haven’t seen Jedi in a very long time. It really IS the worst of the 3. Some parts, even with the abundance of nostalgia, are glaringly bad. But I still maintain that “Empire” is a genuinely good film. We WILL be having an Empire party in the next month or so. This I swear.

SUNDAY
I started by day by meeting my friend Ryan in Queen Anne for breakfast. The food at Ozzie’s is ok, but, under no circumstances, should anyone drink their damned coffee. HOLY SHIT! Ryan and I each had two cups and we were tweaking by the end of breakfast. My pulse raced for the next several hours, and my limbs were numb. I calmed myself down by watching the remake of “The Amityville Horror”. Now, it may have just been the coffee talking, but remake status aside, I thought the movie was actually pretty scary. It wouldn’t have been if Ryan Reynolds hadn’t TOTALLY sold the psychosis of the character. Man, he was brutal. As soon as he stops making movies like “Just Friends”, that guy has the potential to win some awards.

I crashed from my caffeine high right around the time I had to go to yoga.

After yoga, we had a Gadzook meeting about the feature. We’ve got to start getting serious about whoring ourselves if we have any hope of getting that thing made. Here we go…

December 12, 2005
Categories: Dear Diary, Filmpinions . Tags: weekend recap . Author: Baxter . Comments: Leave a comment