Not Hawaii
I have a lot of work to get done this week, which means it's a good thing I posted about Lea's Saturday night birthday party last night, as otherwise I would have far too much to write here today.
What I do still need to tell you about today is the annual Hawaiian Festival at Seattle Center, which I met up with Evan and Elden yesterday to attend. I caught the bus at 15th and John, getting there in time for its scheduled departure at 11:27, only to have it arrive ten minutes late. They had told me their ETA was about 11:40 and I would have arrived right about that time had the bus been on time. Oh, well. I then took several minutes just to find them at Seattle Center, both because of the crowds and because for some reason all of a sudden it took Elden a while to respond to my texts on Facebook Messenger. Also for some reason it seems to be typical now that if I send a group text to both of them, it's always only Elden who responds. If I text Evan only, she often responds but it usually takes a while, sometimes even a few days. No time for that here!
Anyway. I finally found them by the performance stage inside the Armory building. I saw Evan walking away toward the bathrooms as I arrived, so I chatted for several minutes with Elden first. When Evan returned, I noted I was pretty sure it had been since Christmastime, the Dina Martina Christmas Show, that I last saw them. I just went to my Social Review archives to make sure this was accurate (it was) -- but, I also discovered I somehow spaced including them on the Fall 2018 Social Review! So, I had to fix that, re-numbering everyone in the rankings after the mid-twenties, as I placed Evan and Elden at #26 and #27. It turns out I socialized with sixty-two people that quarter (quite a large number; my Summer 2019 Social Review is bound to have far fewer) rather than sixty. I have no idea how I managed to space that, and now I wonder how many social interactions of qualifying elements I have missed including in past reviews. Damn it! Well whatever, I can only do the best I can.
In any case, I had noted back in December that I had not seen them since the previous December, so 2019 will be, on an annual level, an uptick for hanging out with them, as it's going to be at least twice in a given year rather than just the once. Evan and I also talked about a couple of movies she may come into Seattle to see with me on a Monday or Tuesday night when she usually has it off of work, but we'll see how that pans out.
As for the Hawaiian Festival itself, in pretty sharp contrast to when Evan and I have gone in the past (I have photos from when we went in 2015), we really did not directly engage in the festival at all. When I first met up with them inside the Armory, we spent a lot of time catching up and talking a lot about movies, and once Evan finally suggested we walk around a bit, all we did was exit the Armory, walk past the stage by the Space Needle, and then stop at a path corner and . . . talk about movies some more. Finally I said I wanted to eat the lunch I had brought with me; Shobhit made puris that I could eat with the samosa potato filling leftover from Saturday. Evan and Elden were apparently not particularly hungry, so they were happy just to sit and chat while I ate my lunch -- which, amusingly, was Indian food I ate while at the Hawaiian Festival.
We all had movies we were headed to later that afternoon; Evan and Elden were going to see IT: Chapter Two at Cinerama downtown. I was also headed downtown first, but did not need to leave quite yet; I was going to see the 4:10 showing of Brittany Runs a Marathon at the AMC 10 in the U District. Also, it started to rain, quite hard, and I stayed inside the Armory for a while just to stay dry. The rain let up a bit after a few minutes, and so I put on the hoodie I had stuffed into my bag, and walked out toward the bus stop the trip planner had told me to go to first. But, I was so early, I decided I would just walk downtown first. The rain let up and got harder again several times, and I got a bit wet but not too badly.
Then I caught Light Rail to Huskey Stadium, and went to transfer to a #44 bus from there to the theatre. It was on this bus that I encountered the bad news, which at first I had a hard time believing: the AMC ticketing app said the theatre was closed for the day. What the shit? That can't be right. When I Googled the theatre it still showed listed showtimes.
I imagined myself going to get my ticket at the ticket counter and telling them the AMC app said the theatre was closed. But then, of course, it actually was: a printed-out sign, just from a regular computer onto a single sheet of white paper, was taped to the inside of the window in the front door: WE ARE CLOSED FOR THE DAY, 9/8/2019. ONLINE TICKET PURCHASES WILL BE REFUNDED. THANK YOU!
I sure would have loved an actual explanation. Did a water main break? A power outage? What the hell? I bused all that way for nothing. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise as now I had far more time after busing right back home to cook tricolor tortellini pasta for dinner and caption all the Lea's Birthday Party photos and write a blog post about it and have chai ready when Shobhit got home. In the end it's all just as well, although I would have gained another hour at least had I known there was no point in busing all the way to the U District to begin with.
I was going to go to the movie tonight instead, and as of right now the ticking app still says the theatre is temporarily closed. I wonder if this is any indication of that theatre closing permanently? I want to know what's going on! I could have just gone to see the same movie at the Egyptian but I wanted to stick with AMC so I could use my monthly pass that allows me not to have to pay extra. If the tickets don’t become available for sale again I may have to suck it up and pay the $9 just to see it at the Egyptian.
I actually did figure out the movie is playing at the Regal Thornton Cinemas in Northgate, and I found two express buses I could take up there to see the 5 pm show, and use my discounted Costco ticket, but after a lengthy text exchange Shobhit convinced me to bag that idea and just see the 6 pm. show at the Egyptian. He's right that the value of the Costco ticket, even discounted, is also $9, so even though that money is already spent, I'm not technically saving any money by doing that. I really should reserve the Regal tickets for the truly rare occurrence when a movie I want to see is playing there and nowhere else. So, right now it's looking very likely that I'll just see it on Capitol Hill, six blocks from home, which, though it will be an extra expense, will be by far the easiest to do.
Boy, I bet you're glad I got you all up to date about that!
[posted 12:23 pm]