three hundred

— पांच हजार पांच सौ उन्नीस — Last night was Action Movie Night at The Braeburn condos theater, and Tony's pick was really a return to form on the action front: he brought the 2006 Zach Snyder film 300. For the first time since Shobhit and I have been regularly attending, Tony's wife, Sarah, actually joined for the entirety of the movie. More typically, she shows up briefly to say something to Tony in the middle of a movie and then leave, and Jake, Tony's friend who has been part of this biweekly event since its inception eleven years ago, will jibe at her: "Interloper!" It took me a bit of time to realize this was a holdover from what they were calling this in the beginning: "Man Movie Wednesday." Thus Sarah, a woman, dropping by promoted Jake to call her an interloper. Sarah even asked Tony if it was okay for her to stay for the movie. Tony rightly noted that the signs that get posted for social events in the elevators specify it's open to anyone who lives at The Braeburn, so she qualifies. I haven't gotten this specifically clarified (yet) by Tony, but my guess is that, when Tony got on the Board some years ago, at least in part to allow him to schedule a movie every other Wednesday, not only was a deal struck that the event could not be private and had to be open to the building, but probably that was when they changed the official title from "Man Movie Wednesday" to "Action Movie Night." This way no women in the building would feel unwelcome. Sarah apparently loves this movie. She was quite openly excited about it, before any of us knew what it was. (Part of the fun of this event is the movie gets queued up and no one knows what it will be until we see the movie start.) When it ended, she let out a "Woo!" and actually started clapping. We had a good sized crowd at the movie last night—before the movie started and while we were still eating, Sarah's addition made nine. In addition to her and Tony, there were Jake, Ben, Ryan, Chris G, Derek, Shobhit, and myself. In the middle of the movie, the guy who had joined us with Gina at the last Action Movie Night, Dan, showed up without her. He just came into the theater, and sat down next to Tony (Sarah had sat in a seat in the front row). It was made fairly clear last time that he'd be welcome to keep joining us, but some of the people in the group clearly didn't recognize him, and it made a difference for him to show up in the middle of the movie rather than during the potluck beforehand. At one point, Dan got up and left briefly, maybe to use the bathroom or something, and I think it was Ryan who said, "Who was that guy?" Tony then briefly explained. So anyway, Dan made ten. — पांच हजार पांच सौ उन्नीस — — पांच हजार पांच सौ उन्नीस — We made regular pasta for our food offering this time, not macaroni and cheese. Shobhit chopped a bunch of the vegetables for me while I was walking home, and I did largely the rest, although we still did some working together. I only added salt and pepper to the vegetables while they were sauteeing before adding the pasta sauce, and I was very surprised to discover later that even I felt that more salt should have been added. It was not seasoned enough. No compliments on the pasta this time around, and that was probably why. There were no complaints either, to be fair, and well over half the pasta got eaten. Most people there had some of it. Chris G, however, brought a vegetaian MAD pizza that was truly delicious. That one packed some flavor. Shobhit had a second slice when only one slice was left, and though I really shouldn't have, I took like three or four bites of it as well. This is the difference between Shobhit and me. I don't enjoy sharing food, but he absolutely does. He always wants bites of what I'm eating, because he loves sharing food, and meanwhile I'm just thinking about how much less of it I'll be getting. It's completely selfish, I know. He is also perfectly happy to share anything he's eating—because he loves sharing food. He often gets so overzealous with it that he'll offer me another bite before I'm even clearly done chewing the last bite I took. That of course annoys me as well. To be truly honest, I get annoyed by probably too many things that it's not really all that fair for me to get annoyed about. — पांच हजार पांच सौ उन्नीस — [posted 12:36 pm]