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This year, as I usually do, I bought a six-pack of tickets, discounted as a bundle on top of my SIFF member discount, for Seattle International Film Festival films—and I watched the fourth and fifth of them over the weekend. Also, they were both shockingly well attended.

On Friday, I went to a 6:30 showing of Being Mary Tyler Moore at the Uptown Theater on Lower Queen Anne. I didn't bother going home first, as I'd have just needed to turn right around and leave again. And that would have been on my bike, which I didn't want to ride downtown and back two times over in one day.

So, I just got up there super early. I killed some time by looking in Walgreens for replacement fingernail scissors (my previous pair were confiscated at an airport in Australia—in Sydney on our way to Adelaide, I think; or maybe it was on our way back from Adelaide to Sydney again, I can't remember). I should have known they wouldn't have it; Walgreens literally never, ever has anything I'm looking for. To be fair, I've looked in some five different drug stores now and almost all of them have just cleaned out, empty shelves where the fingernail scissors usually are.

The exception I finally found was at Bartell Drugs a block east of there, located on the upper level above Metropolitan Market. There used to be a Sam Goody CD store in that same shopping complex; back when I still had inheritance money left, I went there in the late nineties to collect all the Prince albums I still didn't have. Anyway, I went into that Bartell Drugs, and for once they actually had fingernail scissors! So that was basically the highlight of my day.

As for the movie, which I gave a solid B, I found myself wishing I had done more research before selecting my six movies at the festival, because it turned out to be an HBO Documentaries film that will be streaming on HBO on Friday, May 26—all of one week after I saw it at the festival.

I clearly wasn't the only person to make this mistake, or maybe even care how soon it would be available on TV: that screening was the most well-attended yet, of all the movies I saw at the festival this year—at least, up to that point. As of Friday, I really thought I'd just be marveling at how many people went to that film, which is somewhat oddly timed: Mary Tyler Moore died six years ago. I had told Noah at work that I was going to see that, and he was sort of like, "Why is that movie being made now?" I really couldn't tell him, and I really couldn't tell you now wither.

The movie was in the large theater at the Uptown (which has three screens, the other two with much smaller capacity), and it must have been about three quarters full. I was genuinely amazed by that.

But, nothing prepared me at all for the movie I went back to see on Saturday evening, at the exact same time, in the very same theater screening room: Theater Camp, which I expected to enjoy but still it significantly exceeded my expectations, and I had no idea it had such high interest. The house in this case must have been at 95% capacity—it was the single screening I attended that genuinely felt like pre-pandemic SIFF movies used to.

Not only that, but it's apparently slated for wide release in July, distributed by Searchlight Pictures. This was the rare instance of a wide release film I got to see at the festival multiple months before its official release—and, they had like four guys in suits there in the theater, standing with the sole purpose of monitoring the audience as an anti-piracy move. We were warned that if anyone took out their phone during the screening, they would be asked to leave.

And: I found the film utterly delightful. Not exactly a work of staggering genius, which would be the biggest reason I gave it a B+ rather than anything higher, but in my world B+ is fully recommendable. I talked about it with Laney for several minutes yesterday, because I think she would really like it.

I now have only one SIFF film left to watch, and it was the sole streaming ticket I bought. Last year, I saw three of my six SIFF movies streaming (and had to miss one of the movies in-theater because I actually got covid). They still had streaming options this year, but separated them more: the main festival was 11 days, ending yesterday; streaming options are just this week, through Sunday. And, as was the case last year, only select films were available to purchase as at-home streaming options. It will be interesting to see how long they continue offering streaming options at SIFF.

In any case, I'll watch that last movie either tonight or tomorrow night. I'm not yet sure which. I'm leaning toward tonight.

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As for the rest of the weekend, I had all day Saturday before the movie, which Shobhit and I spent binge-watching the show Dead Ringers, which we had already seen the first episode of before we pivoted to binge watching The Power. Now, Dead Ringers is a "limited series" with only six, one-hour episodes; we watched episodes 2-5 all in a row, and then I needed to finish laundry; go to the movie; come back home, and then write the review. We then watched the final episode at like 10 p.m.

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So that brings us to yesterday, when I accompanied Shobhit at a campaign table by the Capitol Hill Farmers Market at Cal Anderson Park, for the third Sunday in a row.

Selfishly, I'm feeling a bit relieved that I'm not sure this Sunday thing will be continuing going forward—at least, certainly not in the same way. It wasn't even the same yesterday, as it was the first of these Sundays after Shobhit already filed his candidacy, and has actually not only met the minimum requirement of signatures and $10 contributions, but has exceeded them. And, by all accounts, Shobhit has been far more diligent about the data—looking out for duplicates, verifiying voter IDs, that kind of stuff—than some of his competitors have been.

What this has meant is, Shobhit has abandoned the focus of previous weeks, on getting potential constituents to contribute $10. Now, it's all about getting the word out about his candidacy, and getting people to allocate their Democracy vouchers to him. At first, he was just focused on getting his "talking cards" handed out, and asking people to find their vouchers and send them in allocated to him. But then, a guy Shobhit's become acquainted with who has been around the Market as a community activist of sorts himself, offered some advice Shobhit actually asked for: which was to get people to fill out voucher replacement forms, which he did have handy. This, the guy rightly pointed out, made it easier to guarantee he'd actually get those voucher numbers.

Shobhit managed to get this out of two different people, after we moved our table from the usual spot at the footpath to Cal Anderson Park, because Seattle Subway people had set up a sign of their own right across the path from us and were too easily siphoning off passers-by. We then moved the table up the block to the corner on Broadway, which is usually where Ephrain sets up his table—he arrived later than us, as usual, and he wound up setting up where we had in the past; we basically swapped positions.

So anyway, while we were on Broadway, two different people filled out the voucher replacement form, and allocated all four $25 vouchers to him. So basically, assuming these two forms are verified registered voters, Shobhit raised another $200 from just those two people.

The second person was trans, but either mid-transition or merely nonbinary: she wore a dress, but had what looked like a typical "boy haircut" and showed no signs of any physical alterations otherwise (like, for instance, facial shape). Shobhit did ask for preferred pronouns, and she confired "she/her." The awkward part was the signature on all the vouchers was what would be called her "deadname," which was the same as my first name. Shobhit probably would have done better just not to say anything about it, but he wasn't thinking and, quite naturally, was just like, "Oh that's my husband's name!" But, we then learned the person's current name, and she just noted, "The government hasn't caught up yet." She had also noted that she just bought a condo in Lynnwood, but is still registered in Seattle, so she still qualifies, for now: the Democracy vouchers will certainly still count. And, she seemed to like everything Shobhit had to say about his campaign.

The young Asian woman with her, who seemed to be a romantic partner, was much more reserved, and decligned to offer and official support. She did take a talking card and put it in her purse.

Shobhit wound up in a fairly lengthy conversation with the aforementioned acquaintance who had offered some advice, who made some very good points about our state having the most regressive tax system in the country, "with Seattle the worst offender," and how it is worsening income equality, which, according to this guy, is the very reason we can't get common sense things like public transit or police department resource reallocation funded, even though we have more wealth here than most other places in the nation.

To Shobhit's credit, he listened openly, and as he keeps telling people who come to him with information he does not yet have, he doesn't and can't know everything, and is eager to learn. He keeps doubling that by telling just about anyone who will talk to him and seems really smart that they should be his campaign manager, which I'm not sure is the most effective tactic. But, the guy said he would send Shobhit an article about this (I have no idea if it was the same as either of those I just linked to; I found those via Google), and Shobhit admitted the guy's arguments were sound. There's a lot about Shobhit's platform that won't likely get any—or much—funding without this tax structure being changed.

Anyway, we had gotten to the park at 10:30 as usual, after going to The Red Balloon Company to pick up some red and orange balloons (half as many as usual this time) as he's done every week. Laney and I had plans for an afternoon "Happy Hour" at Volunteer Park, and at first she was going to meet us at our table at 2:00. When Shobhit heard that, instead of thinking I might leave him early, he was almost immediately of the mind that he'd quit by that time. And then, because by then he was like, "I think I'm done," we actually broke down at 1:00 or so. I was then able to tell Laney she can just come directly to our place to pick me up.

Not only Efrain, but another guy named Andrew (both of them, as with Shobhit, people of color) had tables set up, and they all greeted each other warmly as usual. Shobhit chatted with Efrain more than once, actually—both before and after he approached two different small groups of people sitting on the grass in the park. This was after I had taken the table pack to the car (this table actually belongs to our building, and every week we borrow it for these Sunday stints) and then come back to join him again.

The last time he went over to Efrain's table, Efrain was also breaking down, but speaking to a potential constituent—who Shobhit also started speaking to about his own campaign. After we left I told him that campaigning himself right there in front of Efrain's table was a little bit tacky, which Shobhit then got a little paranoid about as a potential misstep. He actually texted an apology after we got home, which she shared with me before sending and I helped him edit and craft a little bit. In Shobhit's defense, this was largely out of force of habit, as he already had the talking cards in his hands, and he just didn't register that he was next to a competitor table. I don't even know precisely how necessary an apology was, but I do stand by what I said to him yesterday: it certainly couldn't hurt.

As has already been noted: this is all a new experience for Shobhit, running for office. That also makes it a constant learning experience, and I do love his absolute openness to learning.

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So, very shortly after 2:00, and maybe half an hour after we got home and I returned the table to the package room in our condo complex, Laney arrived. I had already packed a sandwich and a thermos of hot chocolate significantly spiked with peanut butter whiskey, all of which I had prepared in the morning. I grabbed my bag of stuff, went downstairs to 15th Avenue, and Laney drove us up to Volunteer Park.

Starting in March and for at least the warmer months of the foreseeable future, Laney and I have expanded our monthly "happy hours" to two a month rather than just one. She can still only afford to go out for happy hour once a month because of her limited retirement income, and so the second ones each month are, just as they have been in the past and during the pandemic, weekend afternoon hangouts at the park. I actually nearly spaced that our Birth Week happy hour at Waterworks Gardens Park in Renton actually qualifies, and so I added the photo of us with our drinks to all the relevant "Happy Hour" photo albums on my Flickr account just this morning.

In May, we went to La Cocina Oaxaqueña for our eating-out Happy Hour on the 13th, just the previous weekend. This past weekend, we went to the park. Next weekend is Memorial Day weekend and I think she may be camping or something; our next planned outing is actually to "Pride in the Park" the following Saturday, on the 3rd. We plan to get together again for the Capitol Hill Pride Festival on Saturday June 24. We also have another Double Feature movie watch planned for Sunday the 4th.

Anyway, yesterday we hung out at the park for a good three and a half hours, near the park bathrooms as we both always need that multiple times—and the biggest reason we stuck with the plan for Volunteer Park rather than Cal Anderson Park, as the bathrooms at Cal Anderson are too trashed by vagrants and are all locked up. At least the Volunteer Park bathrooms are open and functioning.

Also, the weather was quite lovely, in that it was overcast, with a high barely inching into the mid-sixties, the first day with a high that low in a solid two weeks, after that many days in the mid- to upper seventies and several days even into the mid- to upper-eighties, like twenty degrees hotter than normal. To both Laney and me, especially since it thankfully didn't rain yesterday, this was a genuine relief.

Now, we did pack up to leave at about 5:30 or so, and by that point the air was starting to fill with mist, making the perfect time to pack up. Up to that point, though, it was a quite pleasant afternoon, just chilling and chatting about all matter of things. It was great, as it always is. We took a couple of really fun photos for my socials, running with her idea of peeking out from behind some hedges. We may make this a motif of all our check-in phots from now on, peeking from around things with our drinks.

Shobhit was out door knocking when I got home, but he got home soon enough, and we then watched Succession and Barry before I went to bed.

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[posted 12:27 pm]