I'm back too...

But I didn't actually go anywhere. No trips to L.A. for me. Actually I got in a Delorian with a stopwatch right after my last post, and having now arrived at this point in my future, I am posting again....mere minutes (by the stopwatch) after my last post.

Mike--Great pictures, man. Some of the city-scape and ballpark shots looked absolutely professional. Wish I had a camera...and depth perception. Also wish I didn't have the shakes. But that's another story.

Chris--Hey, man. Hope your trip was good. I'm quite jealous that I never just go somewhere cool like you seem to do every year or so. Also, explain exactly what you mean by "not-simulated."

One sentence you wrote struck home with me: "As a projectionist, you are cursed by noticing flaws with everything. " You deserve the Nobel Correctness Prize For All-Encompassing Rightness for that statement. For those of you who are still getting to know me, I spent 8 years in movie theater management (Chris and I worked together for a couple years, which is where we met). I can't go to a movie anymore without seeing something in the film's presentation that could easily be fixed. And because I'm so used to being able to just run up and fix it...the problem is magnified exponentially in my brain. A small focus problem by the film's end, becomes the single fuzziest picture I've ever seen. A slight speaker buzz becomes twin jet turbines competing to see which can burst my eardrums first.

But it's not just film projection issues for me. My last two years 'in the biz' were spent as a GM, which means I had the esteemed privilege of getting squawked and cursed at by any and every customer with an itch in their craw for something free they don't deserve. I've been called racist, sexist, jerk, loser, jackass, and about a hundred other things not appropriate for community forums. And it was my job to take it all in stride with a smile. It was also my job to make sure the theater's customer service was top-notch. Employees smiling, food fresh, temperature comfortable...and everything else you can think of. I used to spend two hours every Friday night (after a 10-hour shift) sitting in movies finding and catching everything from cell-phone users to coin throwers to laser-pointer pointers to teenagers who somehow decided the sold out show of Old School was the perfect place to lose their virginity.

I was good at my job...the customer pleasing aspects of it. And even though I hated it...it wasn't ever hard. That job was easy. More sitting around than actually working. And yet theaters left and right since I've been out of the biz conintue to drop the ball. I went to see The Village at Opry Mills opening night. The manager gave a speech before the show about how "we're the highest volume theater in the state. don't talk, don't be loud, don't use your phone...because we will throw you out. we don't need your business because, as I mentioned, we're the largest grossing theater in the state." I thought....wellhere's a guy who's actually doing it right. But I was wrong. After an hour of cell-phone ringing, loud-ass joke telling apes behind me, and hey-guys-look-how-cool-I-am-for-yelling-something-loud-during-the-quiet-part-of-the-movie behavior....I walked out to the customer service desk. (Hey, I'm a paying customer again, so I can complain if I want to). The same manager was there. "Nice speech before the film. Is anyone gonna follow up on it and actually walk the auditorium?" He looked up like I had just interrupted the signing of the Kosovo Peace Accord (when in reality it was likely just his G.E.D. study-guide I had disrupted) and said, as though he was surprised..."Do you want someone to?"

"Well," I replied in my most-GM voice, "yes. But that's not the point. You're the one who made the speech about cracking down on the crap that 75% of the circus freaks in there are doing, so you should want to, no?" He called security and told them to check the auditorium. No one ever walked the auditorium. There was no end to the noise and annoyances.

That's just one example of the crap that normal moviegoers put up with. For me...those instances are like having a rash on top of a brown recluse bite on my eyeball. For me, those instances are magnified ten-fold...no--ten-hundred-fold. Had I never been spoiled by 8 years of watching any film I wanted in an auditorium by myself (or often with a friend or two like Chris) then I wouldn't even notice this crap. Had I spent the last 8 years paying too much for tix and popcorn on opening night so I could sit next to Fat Albert, Ludacris, the 'can you hear me now' guy, and Chatty Cathy...well then I'd be just as oblivious as everyone else.

I close my rant with the immortal and oh-so-apprapot lyrics of the almighty, sooth-saying gods of rock Cinderella: "Don't know what you've got, 'til it's gone." Amen, brothers...amen.

ps- (ten points to the man who can cite the origin of the Chatty Cathy reference...and an extra five points if he can finish the line)