Buying phones, the closing of more stores, TV and popcorn and beer, and...um..I guess that's it

BLOT: (07 Sep 2010 - 01:31:05 AM)

Buying phones, the closing of more stores, TV and popcorn and beer, and...um..I guess that's it

Sarah and I did what might seem to be unthinkable today, we bought accessories for our corded phones. That's right, corded. As in pre-1990s technology. Those things with the spirally bits that stretch and get caught on stuff. The phones that led to this conversation, more than once: "Dude, hold up, I need to change phones," *puts down phone, walks in another room, picks up another phone, walks back to first room, hangs up phone, returns to second room, "Ok". Might as well fire up our Nintendo Famicoms and drink chocolate milk and faux juice from foil packs, right? Put in our LPs and cassettes and our VHS tapes and rock out, huh? Maybe. And I do have a sneaking suspicion that old school telephones are going to be the next in-thing for hipsters, so suddenly it looks like Sarah and I are trend-riding, but personally, I prefer them. All the V-2000 cordless phones with their sleek exteriors and blah blah blah, and all the cellphones with their gazillion smart apps interest me about as much as a Toyota Prius interests a car lover; that guy you see cry a small tear every time someone talks about fuel efficiency and brags about some new sports car with its pretty exterior. They might be the future, but good luck clubbing an intruder to death with your micro-iPhone 7, you luckless lub. Something about a Bakelite phone (and god help us all if I can find a black rotary phone) has a sense of class that phones nowadays have no care for. That's why I bought accessories for corded phones, and am proud of it.

While in the mall to pick up some stuff from Radioshack, couldn't help but notice there had been a spot of store closings in Madison Square Mall. The bookstore that replaced Waldenbooks was gone. The store across from it was gone. Downstairs, I could see a couple of empty store fronts. I worked in the mall for about four years, and every year the closing cycle was about four or five stores down, and four or five stores back by Christmas season, though one or two of those would be temp and then maybe one of those would try a shot for permanent. This means, over my stay in the mall, that we lost a couple of store fronts for good or for all pratical purposes, because the store used to fill them were just warm butts in the seat, more or less. Parkway Place has seemed to hold steady over the years, losing a couple of national brands and replacing them with some small businesses (though the small businesses rotate often). Madison Square, though, has had a rough five or six years. I cannot remember a time since my first Christmas season at Waldenbooks that there hasn't been various gaping holes in the store map. Have they even filled up the bigger holes where the clothing stores used to be (I forget the name?) The Disney Store has actually been replaced, right?

The reason we were out was to buy the phone accessories, but we spent more time getting food at Jason's Deli and walking around the Target shopping center (is there another name for it? I mean, Target is like 20% of it at most...). The reason we were ate at Jason's Deli was because Sarah and I had a night in, last night, and it was a fun one. Kind of fun. Maybe more schlock that fun. We ate a gross of popcorn. How much popcorn is in a gross? Keep eating until you find out. We drank beer and watched horror movies: "Incident on and off a Mountain Road" and Night of the Comet. I've seen both, in that hazy yesteryear where my brain sorts all past horror movies, so it was fun getting to watch them again. Somewhat unintentionally, both were fairly pro-woman. You get that more than you would think in horror, since the 70s most have kind of favored women as the strong, survivor type over men. Bad things happen to women, but they overcome. I have theories about this, especially in light that most horror scribes and directors are male, and they deal largely with the projected fear of wives and daughters being raped and stranded and beaten but being able to overcome. Of course, less forgiving critics see a wholy different scenario: deranged men taking out spousal or fatherly frustrations by delighting in the torture and breaking of strong women. Still, though, think about this: the end result of Hostel 2 is that the supposedly pampered and egotistical rich girl turns out to be stronger than everyone else, in every way that counts. Kind of like a mirror, I guess, art is, we see what we want to see.

Rant aside, Night of the Comet is an 80s-fest of early 80-ness. Has just about every genre (including, though shallowly touched upon, dysfunctional family drama) blended in. Many hints towards a darkly comedic take on the early 80s, though kind of flips some of it away by being so generally unoffensive. There is very little actual horror. Possibly the most keen moment is when a group of [ex-]stockboys jump the main pair of sisters but where nearly every other movie would have actually developed tension, Comet instead goes for lax farce. No other movie with a hint of cannibalism could be considered this safe. I still enjoy it despite there being, what, maybe 8 or 9 "zombies" in the whole thing and the power lasts as long as they want it to? Weapons show up a scene after being mentioned? An entire secret lab can be disabled by the flip of one switch and one explosive-rigged vehicle? Watch it for the dress-up scene if nothing else. Don't know which is better, how glamorous Catherine Mary Stewart is or how energetically floppy Kelli Maroney comes across (by the way, both were in their mid-20s playing non-specifically aged teenagers, isn't Hollywood swell?). Eh, my money's on Hector. Am I right?

And that kind of sums up my Labor Day weekend. I guess I'm off to read some Eight Doctors and get some sleep. Back to the old "work" thing tomorrow. Yippee. I love a happy ending.

TAGS: Me in 2010, Huntsville

BY WEEK: 2010, Week 36
BY MONTH: September 2010