— पांच हजार तीन सौ अट्ठाईस —
Yesterday right after work I took myself to see the new Sam Mendes movie,
Empire of Light, which I thought I really liked, and then the more I thought about it and wrote about it I downgraded it slightly. Still a solid B, but that's low enough for me not to bother telling anyone else they need to see it.
Olivia Colman had been getting a lot of awards buzz, and she is indeed incredible in it. But, it tanked at the box office and had middling reviews, so I don't see a lot of hope on that front. She may yet get nominated but she's not going to win for this one. She already won once in 2019, after all.
I left work 5 minutes early so I could get on the 4:40 pm Monorail out of Seattle Center, which really timed it perfectly for me. It was 4:46 when I got to the theater at Pacific Place, so even after using the bathroom I was all good and walked in in the middle of trailers, as always many of which I have already seen countless times.
I discovered at Pacific Place that they are once again hosting a "
Fleur de Villes NOEL" holiday floral gallery there. I thought last year's was a one-time thing! Well, I'll have to get pictures of this year's, of course. I guess it's only here for 9 days. Yet another photo album for this year's exploding collection on Flickr! Shobhit and I are seeing
Avatar: The Way of Water there on Saturday so perhaps we can go down a few minutes early and I can get my pictures then.
After the movie, I caught a #49 bus as far as Broadway on Capitol Hill, then walked the further six blocks home. Spent the next hour or so writing the review, so this movie in one way or another basically filled up my entire evening. Shobhit seemed quite content watching his news programs, particularly coverage of President Biden
signing the Respect for Marriage Act.
— पांच हजार तीन सौ अट्ठाईस —
— पांच हजार तीन सौ अट्ठाईस —
Karen had a late-breaking conflict for our planned FaceTime lunch tomorrow, so yesterday she asked if we could move it to today—hence, I just hung out with her over FaceTime for the past hour.
I spent most of the time catching her up on all the holiday season activities I've done (
nine so far), as well as some of the potential ones left to do (potentially another
seven now; we'll see whether it actually shakes out that way or not).
I also told her we now have hard dates for Shobhit's niece, Shivangi's, visit: she'll be with us December 24 through January 5. Karen was like, "Oh. That's . . . a long time." I was like, "Not if you're Indian it isn't." That hadn't even crossed my mind, because when Shobhit's mother had visited in 2006 and 2008, she stayed for seven and eight weeks respectively; when we thought she would be visiting this month, it was going to be potentially for two months. Shobhit goes to India for a minimum of 10 days usually, and that would be a short visit. I am just now realizing Shivangi will be with us nearly two weeks, but I still don't mind the idea at all. In fact I'm kind of excited about sharing some local holiday traditions with her, such as the New Year's fireworks at the Space Needle.
Turns out Karen and her family will be visiting her parents in Massachusetts between December 27 and January 1, though, or maybe it was the 2nd. So if we have any chance of doing a dinner bringing both Shivangi and Karen and Dave's daughter Anita, that will have to happen either Tuesday January 3 or Wednesday January 4. But we can make that work if we want to.
In any case, it was an all-holiday topic of discussion for the hour. Now it's done; we won't do a virtual lunch again until the 6th; now I need to get back to work.
— पांच हजार तीन सौ अट्ठाईस —
[posted 1:07 pm]
