— पञ्चसहस्राणि चतुःशतानि षट्नवतिः | —
We met our new VP of Merchandising today, a position they have been trying to fill for months, ever since Darrell left back in March. His name is Dave—same name as the Meat Merchandiser who also left maybe three months ago, but not the same guy. That's a relief. Also, there are too many people named Dave! Who do they think they are, Chrises?
Anyway. We had an all-department meeting late this morning to get introduced to him, which also included a round of introductions on the part of the rest of us. I didn't expect to say anything about how long I've worked at PCC but Steven mentioned it when he went first, and so everyone else did as well. Dave actually mentioned how impressive the tenure was of so many people here. Honestly I had kind of lost sight of how many people are still here who have been here, say, 15 years or more. Having been here 21 years now myself, it's easy to forget that even people newer than me have been here for ages.
Dave mentioned in his own introduction that in college he had majored in both English and Film. Whoa! I really perked up at that. In fact, that was how I introduced myself: "I'm Matthew, I do pricing support for Grocery, which is what I have done for the 21 years I've been here. I'm a huge movie buff, so I really perked up when you mentioned film. I was an English major, which is why I do data entry now."
That got a healthy laugh from the entire room.
There's a little bit of suspicion surrounding the knowledge that Dave was among the first interviewees, then months were spent looking at other people, only to go back to him. Is this just a "there's no better option" scenario? Time will tell, but I'm not choosing to make that an expectation. Not that it matters, Dave is two positions above me and will likely have very little direct interaction with my specific job. Besides, his vibe is
much different from Darrell's, so I'm taking that as a plus. He told us he's very open and collaborative and want to spend his first few months "just learning," which is respectable. People often turn out different from how they characterized themselves (such as Darrell) but there's no reason not to start off by giving the benefit of the doubt.
— पञ्चसहस्राणि चतुःशतानि षट्नवतिः | —
I had a very eventful weekend this weekend, and yet, it felt less eventful than usual. Probably because I technically didn't do any socializing yesterday, even though I still took myself to a movie. In fact, I watched three movies over the weekend, one in the theater and one over at Alexia's on Saturday, and one in the theater yesterday.
I already posted, on Saturday, about what happened Friday night, the year's first major Halloween event:
Virtual Pumpkin Carving Party 2023, with Mandy at her place, and then at their place, Gabriel and Lea and Tess. Tess once again had a friend join as well (of the four years we've been doing this, a friend of Tess's has joined three times).
The friend's name was Emmily. Two Ms. I forgot to mention this in my post on Saturday. I said, in reference to the two Ms: "That seems excessive. I don't approve."
I was joking, of course. Gabriel, responding to my perceived rudeness, said, "This is my friend."
There was some brief talk during the early minutes of the Zoom session about Gabriel and Lea's wedding in May. This was when I learned that there will be a wedding rehearsal out at the venue in Snoqualmie two nights prior, on Thursday May 2. I am part of the wedding party so clearly I'll have to be there. I just put that on my calendar—Gabriel can shit on my "Birth Week" all he wants, at least I'm prioritizing whatever he needs for the wedding.
— पञ्चसहस्राणि चतुःशतानि षट्नवतिः | —
— पञ्चसहस्राणि चतुःशतानि षट्नवतिः | —
Shobhit actually came with me to see
Killers of the Flower Moon on Saturday—a 10 a.m. showing that released at 2:00 in the afternoon.
I can't really get on board with the idea that it's "a masterpiece." But, it was still very well done. I clearly liked it better than Shobhit, who said maybe half an hour into it, "I don't like this movie very much."
There's no question in my mind that
Oppenheimer still has far better odds at getting the Oscars that
Killers of the Flower Moon will no doubt also get nominated for, including Best Picture.
After the movie, Shobhit wanted to go to the South Lake Union Farmers Market, so we walked north through downtown to that—except it wasn't actually there. I looked it up and Google says it's currently only on Thursdays. Oh well. We continued walking home, giving Shobhit a good amount of walking in for the day, and giving me extra time to get my review written.
Alexia returned from her trip to England on Wednesday, and we connected Saturday morning about going ahead with our tentative plan to watch the next title in the Harrison Ford-athon that night. We saw
The Devil's Own, which certainly wasn't great, but given the mixed reviews it apparently got at the time, it was still
better than I expected. It's
very "nineties movie" in presentation and tone, and I was kind of astonished by how young Brad Pitt looked, even though he was already well into huge stardom by then. Apparently he hated the experience of making that particular movie.
On Friday Alexia and I will watch Harrison Ford's next movie,
Air Force One, which, weirdly, I am looking forward to—even though when I saw it for the first time a couple of years ago, I thought it was one of the dumbest movies I had ever seen. The difference this time is that I'll go in knowing to expect that.
As for yesterday, Shobhit had both Saturday and Sunday off of work so I actually spent most of both days with him, even though he did not join Saturday night for the movie with Alexia. Yesterday we went out and did some shopping, at QFC and the at PCC to take advantage of deals before they expired. Then he asked me to help him chop vegetables for the baked potatoes & vegetable dish he made, and that alone took a solid hour. I helped him record a video audition, which he later declared unacceptable and now wants to reshoot.
I then took the bus down to SIFF Cinema at the Uptown to see the single showing of an animated musical called
My Love Affair with Marriage which I liked a lot, and at which there was a director Q&A afterward. The #8 took an eternity afterward so I caught a RapidRide D downtown, where there were no 11s anytime soon, so I took Light Rail and then walked the half mile home from Capitol Hill Station. Review writing after that, then watching
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.
I had a cumulative total of maybe ten minutes to work on calendars over the weekend. They're close to finished anyway. It'll be fine.
— पञ्चसहस्राणि चतुःशतानि षट्नवतिः | —
[posted 12:50 pm]
