Week-long update
May. 17th, 2003 12:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jazzfishNote to self: 4AM + LJ --> incoherence.
Tuesday. Lunch with KT at the TGI Friday's in the Toilet Bowl Building (just south of Tyson's on 123), which was very cool. She seems happier than she has in awhile. Not exactly happier, but ... more confident, maybe? Relaxed? I'm not sure. Being out and on her own is good for her, I think. Afterwards, Compleat Strategist with K. What a great store. More RPG books than I have normal books, plus a good (not great, but pretty good) boardgame selection, plus general coolness. Then dinner and conversation with parents. Yay fun. Could have been worse. They still think that Xianity is the answer to all my problems.
Wednesday... ah. Wednesday was an excellent day. Picked up K and tried to buy Equilibrium at Best Buy. Failed, first because the Best Buy in Seven Corners had closed, and then because the one at Bailey's didn't have it. Then drove for an hour to Chantilly to hit Game Parlor. She bought an odd graphic novel whose name escapes me and I picked up War & Sheep. Then to McKay's Used Books. We spent an hour and a half in the store and didn't even make it to the fiction section. I found a play by Jules Feiffer (better known for illustrating The Phantom Tollbooth), the volume of the Plays of Jean Anouilh that I was missing, and the Live CD The Distance to Here, among others. Then back to K's to drop her off, via I-66; only took 30-40 minutes. Note to self: whenever I think "I could just go out 50 to get there," '50' can be replaced with '66' ninety percent of the time, and the trip will be shorter.
Went home, bummed around for a bit, and then picked her up to go see Reloaded in Maryland. After a bit of weirdness with the directions (for reasons known only to the direction-finding algorithm, MapQuest told us to go from 395 onto 295 south, then get on a road that was inaccessible from 295 South, and from there get on 295 north... eventually I ignored the directions and got on 295 north, and it was all good) we got to the scary Egyptian theatre with the bright lights in the floor. Got in, saw movie, came back (via the Beltway this time, instead of going through the District with the direction wonkiness and the city driving and yeah) and dropped her off, then headed home and wrote up my somewhat incoherent thoughts on the movie. (Go me for being the first person on my friends list to post a 'review.') Then sleep.
Woke up five hours later because my bedroom at my parents', like Patrick's basement, faces east. Checked a half-dozen stores for Equilibrium; only one had even heard of it (Suncoast in Springfield Mall), and they were sold out. Then drove down to Roanoke to meet E & Z to see Reoladed again. It started raining pretty hard at around Harrisonburg. At least my windshield got clean. Got to Roanoke a bit early, so went in to Best Buy on the off chance that they might have Equilibrium. (They did!) Then, movie redux.
It's still good the second time, of course. I take back some of the things I said. Link is as cool as Apoc, and Niobe is almost as cool as Switch. Basically, my complaints are that the exposition in the first half drags (things got much cooler when they were either on the hovercraft or in the Matrix; it is not a coincidence that the superior first film took place entirely in these two locations), and that the small coolnesses of the first film are less prevalent. "Hear that, Mr Anderson? That is the sound of inevitability." There just wasn't a single line as cool as that. (Although the brief dialog between Smith and another Agent during the big-ass fight scene comes close.) The fight scenes with weapons were (IMHO) superior to those without; the fight with Seraph still feels gratuitous. The setup for the 'run' at the end is bloody brilliant-- brilliantly conceived, brilliantly executed, brilliantly filmed. I still eagerly await Revolutions.
After, we went to Best Buy and picked up Equilibrium, along with a two-disc special edition of The Mission and the Director's Cut of Dune (miniseries, not hideous David Lynch movie). Then home, then crash. (Driving in the dark is okay, driving in the rain is okay. Driving in the rain in the dark sucks. On the other hand, the fog was wonderful. I'm going to like living here.) Caught part of the lunar eclipse through the clouds.
Today: futzed about with puter, work, put books on shelves. (Still got about a box that won't fit on the shelves. Grr.) Got Z's computer (including his Big-Ass Monitor) over and set up his (formerly my) desk.
Now sleep.
Tuesday. Lunch with KT at the TGI Friday's in the Toilet Bowl Building (just south of Tyson's on 123), which was very cool. She seems happier than she has in awhile. Not exactly happier, but ... more confident, maybe? Relaxed? I'm not sure. Being out and on her own is good for her, I think. Afterwards, Compleat Strategist with K. What a great store. More RPG books than I have normal books, plus a good (not great, but pretty good) boardgame selection, plus general coolness. Then dinner and conversation with parents. Yay fun. Could have been worse. They still think that Xianity is the answer to all my problems.
Wednesday... ah. Wednesday was an excellent day. Picked up K and tried to buy Equilibrium at Best Buy. Failed, first because the Best Buy in Seven Corners had closed, and then because the one at Bailey's didn't have it. Then drove for an hour to Chantilly to hit Game Parlor. She bought an odd graphic novel whose name escapes me and I picked up War & Sheep. Then to McKay's Used Books. We spent an hour and a half in the store and didn't even make it to the fiction section. I found a play by Jules Feiffer (better known for illustrating The Phantom Tollbooth), the volume of the Plays of Jean Anouilh that I was missing, and the Live CD The Distance to Here, among others. Then back to K's to drop her off, via I-66; only took 30-40 minutes. Note to self: whenever I think "I could just go out 50 to get there," '50' can be replaced with '66' ninety percent of the time, and the trip will be shorter.
Went home, bummed around for a bit, and then picked her up to go see Reloaded in Maryland. After a bit of weirdness with the directions (for reasons known only to the direction-finding algorithm, MapQuest told us to go from 395 onto 295 south, then get on a road that was inaccessible from 295 South, and from there get on 295 north... eventually I ignored the directions and got on 295 north, and it was all good) we got to the scary Egyptian theatre with the bright lights in the floor. Got in, saw movie, came back (via the Beltway this time, instead of going through the District with the direction wonkiness and the city driving and yeah) and dropped her off, then headed home and wrote up my somewhat incoherent thoughts on the movie. (Go me for being the first person on my friends list to post a 'review.') Then sleep.
Woke up five hours later because my bedroom at my parents', like Patrick's basement, faces east. Checked a half-dozen stores for Equilibrium; only one had even heard of it (Suncoast in Springfield Mall), and they were sold out. Then drove down to Roanoke to meet E & Z to see Reoladed again. It started raining pretty hard at around Harrisonburg. At least my windshield got clean. Got to Roanoke a bit early, so went in to Best Buy on the off chance that they might have Equilibrium. (They did!) Then, movie redux.
It's still good the second time, of course. I take back some of the things I said. Link is as cool as Apoc, and Niobe is almost as cool as Switch. Basically, my complaints are that the exposition in the first half drags (things got much cooler when they were either on the hovercraft or in the Matrix; it is not a coincidence that the superior first film took place entirely in these two locations), and that the small coolnesses of the first film are less prevalent. "Hear that, Mr Anderson? That is the sound of inevitability." There just wasn't a single line as cool as that. (Although the brief dialog between Smith and another Agent during the big-ass fight scene comes close.) The fight scenes with weapons were (IMHO) superior to those without; the fight with Seraph still feels gratuitous. The setup for the 'run' at the end is bloody brilliant-- brilliantly conceived, brilliantly executed, brilliantly filmed. I still eagerly await Revolutions.
After, we went to Best Buy and picked up Equilibrium, along with a two-disc special edition of The Mission and the Director's Cut of Dune (miniseries, not hideous David Lynch movie). Then home, then crash. (Driving in the dark is okay, driving in the rain is okay. Driving in the rain in the dark sucks. On the other hand, the fog was wonderful. I'm going to like living here.) Caught part of the lunar eclipse through the clouds.
Today: futzed about with puter, work, put books on shelves. (Still got about a box that won't fit on the shelves. Grr.) Got Z's computer (including his Big-Ass Monitor) over and set up his (formerly my) desk.
Now sleep.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-16 09:53 pm (UTC)And long live the big-ass CRTs!
no subject
Date: 2003-05-16 10:00 pm (UTC)Getting to the theater: Good god, man, don't go through DC--faster and easier to to to 495, then 95, to 100/arundel mills/etc.
Dune: Haven't actually seen Lynch's, but I've read the 6 books of the chronicles and seen the miniseries twice. Very good. :)
Driving in the rain in the dark: Try it on Waples Mill Road/Drive through Oakton! Then you have no lights on a hilly, winding road, in the dark and rain.
Lunar eclipse: You suck! It was totally overcast in Manassas all evening/night.
Various
Date: 2003-05-17 09:41 pm (UTC)Theatre through DC: yeah, but I'd never been and don't know MD all that well, so used MapQuest directions. Learned /my/ lesson...
Dune: I've read the first book, enjoyed it a lot. Own 2&3, will read eventually.
Waples Mill in the dark/rain: ooh, sounds fun. I love that road. It and Fox Mill... going north there's the hill where you can almost catch air at 50 mph...
Re: Various
Date: 2003-06-13 03:34 pm (UTC)MapQuest is always iffy, and you should still know better than driving through DC. ;)
Waples Mill: In the day/dry would be rather more enjoyable, esp. on a motorcycle. :)