Bordering on brilliance…
There you have it!Archive for March, 2007
To bitch or not to bitch…
And no I wasn’t pms’ing either!
If you need a refresher, go back and read Keven’s blog about the small child that was in attendance at a late night movie and the irritation that ensued. Now fast forward to yesterday.
Matt & I went to a matinee of Shooter. It was well done, and honestly, how can you not like a movie with Mark Wahlberg. One of the ads prior to the movie starting covered the whole issue of noisy babies, cellphones, etc., and the golden-ness of silence during the movie. I wholeheartedly agree!
So the movie started, and lucky us, Matt & I were blessed with the guy a little further down our row that throughout the entire movie was making so much noise with his wrappers, it honestly sounded like he was wrapping Christmas presents or something (that also happens to be the exact phraseology Keven & I use). When he went on break, there was another guy a few rows back that would kick in. To top that off, about halfway through the movie, a baby roughly 1- 1/2 years old started making a great deal of noise, not crying, but more like yelling and high-pitched, not quite screaming, but close, and continued through the remainder of the movie. To add to this new delight, the dad would periodically take the kid into the walkway along the side of seating and let the kid run & do the high-pitched thing rather than remove him from the theater. Now keep in mind that this was a very violent movie and not appropriate for children of any age, let alone a baby.
I was quite distracted by all these extra annoyances and spent the last part of the movie thinking about how I wanted to approach this father. Why this one and not previous ones, you might ask? I can’t say for sure why. I wasn’t pms’ing, however I was irritated enough. Knowing that one’s approach guarantees certain responses, I played multiple conversations out in my mind. So I was contemplating offering him Squid as a babysitter if he wanted to go in the future or asking him for $25 to make up for the cost of our tickets, popcorn and drinks. In the end, he got away before I got to use either, so I went in search of the manager. Ultimately, we got 2 free passes and the insight that in the future, we should ask management to invite the offending party to leave. I think next time we’ll ask for both!
St Patrick’s Day? What St Patrick’s Day?
I have to say Friday night felt more like St. Patrick’s day than last night. Everybody and their mother was out on Friday, the mood was light and things were hopping. I’m glad now that I went then to hang out at my new regular hangout than wait for Saturday.
Keven and I got a little bit of a late start getting out of the house on Saturday, maybe 8:30ish, passed by some normally happening places, nothing looked especially jumpin’ and we were going to catch a 9:40 movie and go out afterward. The movie got out around 12:15am or so, and would you believe everything was pretty much closed! Places where we usually hang out later than that were closed, this billiards place that’s definitely a hot spot in Bellevue was very light on clients…overall very disappointing turnout. It wouldn’t have been such a big deal except that we’d left the house without dinner, planning to eat after the movie, and were starving. After trying several places, we finally tucked in our tails and went home. I had a lumpy protein drink and he had an apple.
At least the movie was good. As you can tell by my timeframe, it was a long one, 2 hours & 40 minutes. We saw Zodiac which was very well done. I didn’t nap once throughout the entire thing. That should speak volumes right there. It’s a true life crime drama and because it was based on a true story, knowing that made it creepier than anything anyone could concoct in their head…that whole truth being stranger than fiction and all.
The value of second opinions
A few weeks ago Squid went to her oral professional (snickering aside), who is solely a pediatric dentist. He was saying 3 teeth need to be pulled and referred her to an orthodontist suggesting that she needs braces, or might. Ever since she’s had teeth and had them cared for by this man, he’s always said, with the aid of x-rays, that she would most likely not need orthodontia of any kind. Keep in mind too, that if you look at her teeth, with the exception of one, the rest are pretty damn straight.
I balked at this idea and took her to see my dentist, whom I’ve been going to since I was in the 4th grade, and who also happens to be the one that Keven raved about for his crown work. He took a look, didn’t see a reason to pull the three teeth, and thinks he can straighten the one tooth by designing a retainer of sorts (he referred to it as an appliance) that will have a piece on the back side of her tooth, that in a couple months will hopefully straighten it out. The price, you ask? $150! The total of all her dental work will still add up a bit since she needs to have some cavities filled, but overall still massively cheaper than braces. He said she may possibly still be a candidate, but her teeth are so damn straight, I don’t think I could logically convince myself to commit to the time and money it would take to, what, straighten her already straight teeth! How straight do you want them?! She, of course, is disappointed because she wants braces!! She thinks they look cool. Go figure.
I was also in for cleaning and a checkup. If you haven’t looked inside my mouth recently, my teeth are naturally pretty straight and historically my dentists have always raved about how lucky I was to not need braces. While I was getting cleaned yesterday, the hygenist suggested that I could do Invisaline Express if I wanted to straighten them up! That cracked me up…I have one slightly turned tooth, the rest of them in alignment. So again I ask, how much straighter could they be…why fix what isn’t broken? It’s kind of like painting your toenails when you’ve just gotten a pedicure…
My other internal laugh…this dentist is an avid biker (as in bicycle), etc. My foot is having issues so I thought he’d be a perfect guy to ask for a referral to a podiatrist. He, of course, had someone…and the thought occurred to me how funny it would be if I had insurance that requires a referral, to have that referral written by a dentist rather than a primary care physician. 
Weather forecasters…can they really predict the weather?
Wow! Tuesday seemed to catch everyone by surprise. This again brought up the conversation about how much do the weather forecasters really know and can they predict the upcoming weather with any degree of accuracy. Everyone here assumes that they all get their information from the same source. I agree and disagree.
Funny thing was that after my discovery Tuesday that it was snowing, I went to Yahoo weather. They were quite inaccurate. The report stated that it was currently 37 degrees and clear. Predictions included light rain at some point during the day. AOL weather indicated the current temp correctly and suggested there might be some light sleet/snow.
Once again Seattleites, God bless ‘em, were caught way off guard. Since this (hopefully) last blast was unexpected, it was undiscussed on the news, therefore not a subject of conversation on the streets. If you’re from here or have ever visited, you know weather is a constant conversation piece. On I-90at the beginning of rush hour traffic there was a 50-60 car pileup involving every vehicle type imaginable, including some jacknifed semis. Glad I’m not one of the police people writing up the accident reports or the insurance adjusters…imagine trying to figure out who’s responsible for what!
Keven & I were meeting up in Kirkland for sushi a little later in the evening. It had snowed enough that even with my all wheel drive, it still took 2 tries to get up my hill (I probably neglected to mention my bald tires)! On the way home, Keven was slipping & sliding a bit up the freeway ramp. Although we were driving cautiously, others were driving like ‘normal’ which made me a bit nervous, thus slowing down and staying back from the cluster of idiots.
Things are back to normal today…raining, 47 degrees. My butt is dragging 3 feet behind me. 
