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I watched seven movies over the weekend. That's kind of a nuts amount, even for me—although I should note, only
one of those movies was a current theatrical release:
Friday: Laney and I went to see
The Fire Inside. Laney had suggested going to that on Friday rather than Tuesday as originally planned, because
Nickel Boys did not open locally this week as hoped, and Laney wanted to get another day over the following week to herself as she has several other plans as well. That was at Pacific Place and the showtime was later than usual, at 6:55. I walked home from work that day and then met up with Laney at her block on Pine and Broadway at 6:30 before we walked the rest of the way down. The movie therefore ended close to 9:00, and it was well past 10:00 by the time I had the review written and posted. On the upside, that was the only full review I had to write this weekend.
Saturday: Alexia came over that day, for a triple feature inspired by an Instagram reel she had forwarded me in
October 2023, but I could not even remember if I had seen when I saw it (again?) in September 2024. It was this guy theorizing that Victor from
Frankenweenie; Victor from
Corpse Bride and Jack Skellington from
The Nightmare Before Christmas are actually all the same character, at different stages of life or afterlife. I said I felt like we should do a triple feature of those movies, which Alexia was into: soon enough, we had made a plan to watch them all on Saturday, January 4. I don't think I had ever done a "triple feature" specifically with Alexia before, but the average length of those films is short enough that their combined runtime is actually four hours, and thus more like a double feature of other regular-length movies.
It did mean watching them in reverse chronological order of original release:
Frankenweenie (2012);
Corpse Bride (2005); and then
The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993). I have seen the third one many times, but had only seen the other two once before, in each case during their original theatrical release—I posted reviews of both of them in their time. I felt essentially the same now as I did about
Corpse Bride in 2005, but
Frankenweenie was a different story: I was
way more into it this time than I
apparently was in 2012. Alexia and I both laughed our asses off at that movie, it was so funny.
Frankenweenie and
The Nightmare Before Christmas are both Disney properties now, so they were available on Disney+, but
Corpse Bride was produced at Warner Brothers Studios and so I had to rent it off Prime Video. After Alexia and I watched
Frankenweenie, we walked down to Manao Street Eats and got lunch (for me, "linner") takeout, and brought it back to eat while we watched
Corpse Bride.
We did some other catching up as well, but most of the time was spent watching the movies. She said she's signing one more yearlong lease at her Issaquah apartment, as the idea of moving out this April is way too soon. So it sounds like she will likely finally move on to her house in Idaho in the spring of 2026. I figure I can use that as an excuse sometime next year to visit Boise for the first time ever; the only part of Idaho I have ever been in (many times) is the panhandle.
This also means she'll be around to have as a companio for many Christmas attractions and events for at least one more year, so that's nice. I don't remember how this came up but at one point she actually asked me if Laney celebrates Christmas, which I found odd. Granted, some people don't, but unless you know them to be specifically some non-Christian religion (which Laney clearly is not), then it's a pretty safe assumption that she celebrates Christmas, her lack of religion broadly speaking notwithstanding. I'm an avowed atheist and still lean heavily into Christmas, after all. That said, Laney did have Christmas Day to herself, which would have bummed me out significantly but for her was just quiet and lovely. She had a "Christmas" with Jessica on another day. I don't remember if Jessica actually had to work on the ferries Christmas Day or not, but I'm kind of assuming maybe she did.
Anyway. That was only three of the movies I watched on Saturday. I actually watched a fourth!
For some reason I was keen to rewatch
All of Us Strangers, which was in my top 5 last year, even though I had already seen it twice. But, I had last watched it in February. I can easily imagine watching it many more times again over the years, even though it seems to make me cry harder every time I watch it. That's part of what makes me love it though, it just touches me on such a deeply personal level. In any case, I watched that Saturday evening after Alexia left.
Oh, I also did some shopping Saturday morning before Alexia arrived. That's important for me to mention, right? I went to Costco, and then to PCC, and then to Trader Joe's. All the stuff I got I am hoping gets me through Shobhit's return from India without having to go to a grocery store again.
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— पाँच हजार सात सौ इकतीस —
Sunday: I hung out with Laney again yesterday, that time for a
double feature—of
Paddington (2014) and
Paddington 2. These ones I had the Braeburn Condos reserved for, so that's where Laney and I watched them; it's against the rules to reserve two days in a row, so when Alexia came on Saturday we watched those movies up in the condo.
Laney and I had
thought we were going to be seeing this year's new installment in the franchise,
Paddington in Peru, on Thursday next week. But, those bastards pushed the release date back a month into February! I suppose it's just as well, as we don't want the previous films to be
too fresh in our memories when we go see that one. We were sure delighted by the first two, though—although Laney and I agree that the first one is actually slightly better, and is certainly funnier. But both have buckets of whimsical charm to spare, and it made for a perfectly lovely Sunday afternoon.
So that's how and why I watched seven movies over the weekend.
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The Golden Globe Awards were also last night, and I had planned to watch them live, right after Laney went home. They started at 5:00, but I wound up watching them on DVR a couple of hours later—because I rather last-minute decided to meet up with Gabriel and Lea for dinner.
They happened to be in Seattle, to see Maria Bamford. When he texted me he was seeing her last night I was like: WHAT. Why didn't I even know she was here? I fucking love her! Later I learned that some coworkers of Lea's had tickets and they were meeting up with them. Lea apparently would have been okay skipping it under other circumstances; Gabriel is a much bigger fan like I am. He even facetiously said I could have gone with him instead of Lea, but for the fact that they were meeting up with her colleagues.
Still, he asked if I wanted to meet up with them for drinks and/or food before the show, so I said: sure! We went to The Whiskey Bar, and I decided to walk down there. I figured I might as well get some steps in. Unsurprisingly, I got there first, but I only waited about ten minutes, which was fine. I was standing on the other side of a bike rack and they clearly didn't see me; when they arrived I only noticed their backs walking in the door.
Being a Sunday evening, The Whiskey Bar was totally dead. Still, except when they were taking drinks or eating, they both wore their masks as usual. When Gabriel first suggested meeting up, though, I had said I wasn't as familiar with places that had heated outdoor seating in Belltown, and he wrote back:
Whiskey Bar was where we were thinking. It can be indoors. So even that's a change, as far as I was aware.
I never did mention this to them, but I still went ahead and took a covid test in the 20 minutes or so between deciding I was going to go, and when I needed to go. With them in particular, it was a peace of mind thing more than anything else—for me as well as for them. If and when they do get covid one of these days, I am deeply invested it it coming from some other asshole and not from me.
I think there was maybe one other customer in the joint, sitting far from us. We had the one server also in there. They were about to go to a presumably crowded venue so the masks wearing still made sense from their perspective. I only wear masks anymore in movie theaters and on public transit. I don't ever bother in restaurants, and didn't last night either. And I had just taken a covid test anyway (and tested negative, for the record—oh, I need to add that to my Zoe Health Study App I've used for tracking that since like 2021).
I opted against getting a cocktail. I found them to be too pricy there and I have too much booze available at home anyway. I just ordered a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup, both of which were delicious. Gabriel and Lea had, among other things, a side of tater tots and I was given maybe the last third of them which I also dipped into my soup. That was all I ate yesterday aside from French toast I made for brunch in the morning. I guess it must have all been insanely rich, though: I weighed in at 171.6 lbs this morning. Jesus Christ. I was below 170 two days ago! As of today, I am getting my shit together.
Even though I specifically asked for my own check, Gabriel still paid for the table. The server had brought him the check, and I was sitting there wondering about whether he would bring me mine, and Gabriel let me know he had paid for me. I just said: "Why?" And he replied: "Cause you're a bitch."
Ha! That cracked me up. I'm giggling again as I write about it now. I guess Lea still isn't used to this kind of thing, even though I've known her now for more than five years. She was clearly amused but still thought it was rude, and meanwhile I was laughing. Gabriel was like, "This is what we do!" or something to that effect.
I mean. If being a bitch gets me free meals, maybe I should lean in.
Seriously it was absolutely unnecessary, but I suspect part of it was just that he appreciated my coming down to meet up on such short notice, and while the Golden Globes were on to boot. As I noted to both them and to Shobhit over text, I recorded it. I went home after that and watched them from about 7:00 until shortly after 9. Nikki Glazer was a great host. Some of the wins were baffling, as is par for the course with the Golden Globes. Some of them made total sense. It was amazing to have the final acceptance speech of the night be from a trans woman, which I'm pretty certain had never happened before—even if it was for a movie that
was good but also bemusing to many, and reasonable people, including me, do not think it quite deserves to be heaped with film awards. But whatever. It was a great speech. As was Demi Moore's.
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[posted 12:45 pm]
