Rushing to See August Rush

I managed to win tickets to see "August Rush," tonight, in an advanced preview. Instead of asking for two tickets as I usually do, then having the problem of not being able to find anyone to go with me, I only asked for one. I also managed to get a ticket to a cinema close by, for a change. The screening was in Slough, which is in the same county as Bracknell. However, things never work out for me with no hiccups. If I was still driving, then it would have been a simple matter to drive to Slough after work, for the 6:30PM screening. Riding the buses was a different matter.
Usually, the bus I take home gets me to the stop around the corner from my house by 5:35PM. If I stay on the same bus, it will take me to the Bracknell town centre, about ten minutes later. It would be 5:45 and I'd just be in Bracknell. There's no telling how close a connection I would manage with the bus onwards, to Slough. To make matters worse, all this would be happening in rush hour, when the traffic is bad. I could take the train, instead, but that would entail complicated connections, as Slough isn't on the same line as either Bracknell, Camberley, or Farnborough. Furthermore, buying a train ticket would entail extra expense. I can ride the buses for no extra charge, using my weekly bus ticket. I am so short of money these days, that this final consideration tipped the balance for me. I would make the epic journey by bus!
Unable to get out of work early, I departed at my usual time, starting with the 4:15 shuttle bus to Camberley. Being a Wednesday, I had managed to acquire a couple slices of pizza, left over from lunch. Having provisions with me would render it unnecessary to buy snacks from the cinema. Although the buses progressed at their normal plodding rate, I felt more anxious than usual, repeatedly checking my watch. When the 194 bus to Bracknell started pulling in to the Bracknell bus station, I looked through the windows, to see if the Slough bus was there. It was. Would I be able to make it onto the Slough bus before it pulled away? I willed the 194 driver to hurry up and open the doors.
As the doors opened, I leaped out of the bus I had arrived in. Dashing across the station, avoiding any of the mammoth buses that were in motion, I raced to the 191 to Slough. I made it! I couldn't have asked for a closer connection. However, whenever I have good news, it's usually accompanied by bad, it had started to rain. The rain would slow the traffic even more than usual. People in Britain seem to really have a tough time handling driving in the rain. Even Nando, my racist, Italian housemate, is bothered by driving in the rain. For Pete's sake! It's just a bit of water. My fate was now in the hands of the driver from First buses.
6:30PM came and went and we hadn't arrived at the Slough bus station. When we finally did arrive, I struggled to find the way to the cinema. The mall was partially closed, so instead of cutting through, I had to walk around. I kept hoping the film started late. If it was a normal showing, there would be about ten minutes of ads, followed by about ten minutes of coming attractions. These advanced previews usually don't have all that. Would they even let me in when I arrive late?
Finally, I rushed up to the box office twenty minutes after the screening was supposed to start. The man behind the counter informed me that the show had started already, but didn't object to me entering. I hate missing the beginning of a film, but I'd traveled so far, I might as well see as much as I could. After all, it was free. I don't know how much of the film I actually missed, as I have no idea if they started on time. I did manage to pick up the majority of the story.
"August Rush" is the story of a boy sent to an orphanage, as a baby. His parents are two unmarried, young musicians. The boy ends up on the streets of New York City, learning busking. He is a musical genius and his talent aids in his parents finding him, and each other. Directed by Kirsten Sheriden, the film has somewhat of a "female" feel to it. With a mother's bond with her long lost son triumphing over everything, I get the impression that this is the world the way a lot of women imagine it to be. It's Kirsten's seventh film as a director, although I haven't seen any of her other projects, nor even heard of them. The film is technically competent and the acting good, although some might feel that Robin Williams supporting role was a tad bit over-played. Freddie Highmore, who plays the starring role, is worthy of particular note. It's so hard to find good child actors, but he did an excellent job. I found it an enjoyable film that's suitable for families. It tugs at the heartstrings a bit and it may be slightly cheesy, but all in all, a nice story, well presented. The soundtrack is also quite good.

No Treat

On my way home from work, yesterday, I wondered if I should stop at the supermarket, to buy some chocolate bars to give to trick or treaters. As usual when it comes to spending money, I managed to talk myself out of it. Kids, here in England, don't do the trick or treat thing as much as they do in America. I almost made it through Halloween without any of the little monsters ringing the doorbell. I had every light in the house off, except the glow from my computer. I was sitting at it, doing something internetish, when I heard youthful voices mumbling to each other. Suddenly, the doorbell rang. Oh for Pete's sake!

I sat thinking if there was anything in the house I could give them. A bottle of beer each? Nah! I wasn't about to give up any beer. It sounded like a lot of them. I couldn't come up with anything, but as I hesitated, a solution presented itself. They gave up and went away. Thankfully, today's British youth don't show the dogged determination that I had, when I was a lad. I spent the rest of the night undisturbed.

Honeymooners: the Black Queen Story Part 5

I wasn't able to go on a honeymoon immediately after getting married, because I had to get a document stuck in my passport, granting me leave to remain in the UK. I had to acquire this document before I left the country. There was another impediment to our honeymoon: my wife's ex-husband. When she asked him to have the kids so we could go away, he refused. D---a was upset that he was being so spiteful. I decided to turn it around on him. I asked her if the kids had ever been to America. She confirmed they had not. So, I suggested that we take them with us. That way they'd remember their first trip to America as being with us. My wife agreed, so that's what we did.
After I sorted out the bureaucratic details, D---a got the boyfriend of a friend of hers, who worked for British Airways, to book us some discounted tickets, through their staff travel office. I wanted to take my bride and her two bairns to New York City and Washington, D.C. There was no discounted space available to New York, or to Washington, so I suggested trying Philadelphia, which is halfway between. Sure enough, there was space available to Philly. The four of us flew from London's Heathrow airport, about a week after our wedding.
At Philadelphia International Airport, I picked up a rental car. I selected a big, Pontiac, Grand Prix. I like a car with power and it had room for the four of us and our luggage. I headed south, towards D.C. I drove till we felt like stopping. I wanted to get us out of the Philly area, because I knew from experience that motels would be cheaper once we were out of the big city area. Somewhere in Delaware, along Interstate 95, my new family informed me they were all hungry. I saw a sign for a Holiday Inn with reasonable rates, advertised as being off the next exit. I stopped there as Holiday Inns are known to be "family friendly." The kids could stay free, sharing a room with us. A room was available, so we checked in and put our bags in the room. After that, we made a beeline to the hotel restaurant. Once the family were fed and watered, we went back to our room. The kids wanted to go swimming, but we were feeling tired. My wife and I advised them that we should have an early night. After all, it was five hours later back home.
In the morning, we had breakfast, then I indulged the children in a dip in the pool. The pool area was deserted, other than the four of us, but the kids didn't seem to mind. By lunch time, we were back on the road. Once we reached the suburbs of D. C., I looked for an inexpensive place to say. Spotting a Days Inn just outside the District, in Maryland, I stopped there. I knew prices would be cheaper there than they would be actually within D.C. After settling into our room, the kids began a familiar refrain. They wanted to go swimming again. We all got into our swimming costumes and headed for the pool. When we got there, I had a strange experience.
Another family came to use the pool. They had a boy who was about 12-14 years old. He took one look at my beautiful, eight-year-old stepdaughter and shot straight for her. If it had been a cartoon, he would have left a smoke trail. My wife found the resultant look on my face hilarious. I was not happy. I scowled at the boy, who seemed to take no notice. To make matters worse, he looked and sounded like a particularly low class type of American. His sleazy appearance and accent only added to a trailer-trash image. Without any idea where it had come from, I was suddenly flush with a feeling of, "he's not good enough for my little girl." The only problem was, she's not actually my little girl. I was just her newly crowned stepfather. I spent the rest of our poolside afternoon smouldering, much to the continued amusement of my bride. When we finally made our move to go to our room, the sleazy boy actually had the nerve to ask MY stepdaughter for our room number. The innocent little lass walked up to me and gently asked what our room number was. Thank goodness she didn't remember it! "We don't give our room number to strangers," I advised her. I felt some slight relief that we wouldn't be disturbed by horny fourteen-year-old boys calling our room in the middle of the night. As we walked into the building, I gave the boy one last, withering glance, as if to say, "she's only 8, for Pete's sake!"
Part of my trip itinerary was that we would visit Washington while the Libertarian Party National Convention was on. Formerly, I had been a member of the Party's National Committee (LNC). My political career included two terms as Vice-Chair of the Libertarian Party of New York State, 1993 Libertarian candidate for Mayor of New York City, Official Liaison from the Party to the Howard Stern Campaign, and candidate for the nomination for Governor of New York. I was quite well known amongst convention delegates and I wanted to take the opportunity of introducing my new family. As a former member of the LNC, I had received an invitation to attend a show on the first evening of the convention, performed by the Capital Steps. The opportunity of taking my family to a free show was too good to resist. It was a thrilling night out for the kids, who weren't used to being taken to such things. I was also proud of my new family and wanted to show them off.
Altogether, we spent three days in the D.C area. I took my family sightseeing, just as I had been taken sightseeing on my first ever trip, which was to Washington, when I was 10 years old. On our last night in the D.C. area, which also happened to be July 3rd, my birthday, we went to Baltimore's Inner Harbor, for dinner. On the 4th of July, we checked out of the Days Inn and began the drive to New York. We stopped in Philadelphia, halfway, around lunch time. I took the family to see Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed, back in 1776. We watched some ceremony commemorating the event, which was part of Philly's 4th of July celebrations. After a bite to eat, we got back on the road north. It was to be the children's first time seeing New York.
Speaking of firsts, I had arranged for us to stay at my family's home, on Long Island. It would be my grandmother's first time meeting the children, but my mother's first time meeting them and their mother. My mother's a bit eccentric and she has a history of avoiding meeting my girlfriends. After I got engaged, D---a pleaded with me that she wanted to meet my mother, who was to be her future mother-in-law. I told her I would try my best and passed on her request to my mother. With a stubbornness that is my mother's trademark, she refused D---a's quite reasonable request. I implored her to change her mind, for my sake, but all she would agree to is that she would speak to D---a over the phone. It was arranged for the last trip D---a made to visit me in America, before we got married. My mother left the house and then called. When I answered, she stated she was ready to speak to my fiancee. After I handed the phone to D---a, my mother proceeded to tell her that she shouldn't marry me. Gee, thanks mom! Fortunately, or unfortunately, D---a didn't heed my mother's advice. Now that we'd been married, my mother was prepared to meet my wife, face to face. In a strange about face, once my mother had met D---a, she acted very friendly. She acted like she liked D---a more than she liked me. My grandmother and mother admired the children as they played in our back garden. So far, this was the closest they had come to having great-grandchildren and grandchildren, respectively. They were quite beautiful children, so it was easy to admire them. My folks also saw me in a different light. This was their first time seeing me taking responsibility for a family of my own. They were both quite surprised at how well I took to the role. Neither of them had been aware that for all of my adult life, I had longed to be a family man.
Staying at my family's home saved us the cost of a hotel. Using it as a base of operations, we took the children to see the sights of New York, which I had previously shown their mother. This included a trip to the top of the then still standing, World Trade Center, as well as a visit to Liberty Island. On our first night, we started off by going to see the 4th of July fireworks display, over the East River. Most children love fireworks and the New York City display, sponsored by Macy's, is one of the largest in the world. I tried to expose the children to as many delightful experiences as possible. Among these were ice cream parlours, hot buttered movie popcorn, sidewalk vended pretzels and hot dogs, and F.A.O. Schwartz toy store. This was more their honeymoon than my wife's. We even managed to squeeze in a trip to Six Flags Great Adventure theme and safari park. After three nights, it was time to return to the UK. We said goodbye to my surviving biological family and the house I grew up in. I drove us back to Philadelphia, to catch our flight back to my new home.

The Ostrich or the Egg

I was so annoyed last night. When I tried to post a new blog article, Myspace blogs were down for "20 minutes." After an hour and a half of waiting, I gave up and went to bed. I can only apologize to my loyal readers. The technology that brings us together sometimes separates us.
This past weekend, I had a lovely visit from my artist friend, Jan. Because of my cold (flu, whatever), I had opted out of our scheduled Bridge game, on Saturday. I had caught this sickness while visiting Jan the weekend before. She probably picked it up from some disease ridden child at one of the schools where she worked as a "supply teacher." For my American readers, a "supply teacher" is not someone who teaches supply. It's a British term for a substitute teacher. Although Jan is retired from teaching (oh I wish I didn't have to go to work), she does a bit of temping, as a supply teacher, to bring in some extra cash. Anyway, this experience has re-confirmed my suspicion that children are mostly useless and simply act as carriers of disease (and you only thought you could re-confirm reservations).
I think Jan felt a little guilty for getting me ill, so she came over with a care package and to keep me a little company. I called her on Friday night and mentioned that Nando was working late. I think I gave her the impression that I was lonely, what with Nando not at home. Nando was working all weekend, so Jan probably concluded that I would be lonesome all on my own. The care package consisted of Lemsip, salad dressing, fresh broccoli, tartar sauce, and a box of microwave popcorn. Despite my dropping hints that I prefer Lemsip capsules, she turned up with the original powder, which one has to mix with hot water, then drink. She brought what she likes. Never mind what I like. Oh well, it's the thought that counts.
On Sunday afternoon, I showed Jan some videos on my computer. I had warned her that my bedroom was a bit untidy. She reassured me that her daughter's room is also messy, so she's used to that sort of thing. I bet her my room would outdo her daughter's. I think I won that bet. Jan decided to amuse herself by picking up some books that were piled on my bedroom floor. This was a task I had started, myself, last year, but hadn't yet managed to finish. The pile of books was left over from moving in, a year ago. Although I have wanted to finish putting the books on my bookshelf for ages, it still felt a little intrusive to have Jan doing it. I tried to talk her out of it, to no avail. She said her daughter makes the same complaints when Jan cleans her room. Jan may be only five feet, two inches tall, but she has this gentle pushiness that's so unobtrusive, it's hard to resist. It's kind of like the tide coming in. It starts out lapping at your ankles, then the next thing you know, you're up to your neck in it.
From the books, she moved on to some of my ties that were tossed on a pile of folded clothes. They were deposited there after I took them to some costume fitting or another. Defensively, I tried to help, so I could put my spin on where thinks were put. After a while, I told Jan to stop. She would agree, but as soon as I relaxed, she'd start picking up something or the other. It was all I could do to stop her from throwing away my prized supermarket carrier bags. Eventually, Jan came across my ostrich egg. It was given to me in South Africa, back in December, 2002, by a rep from a travel company. I carried the egg all the way back to England, without breaking it. I have lugged it around to three rented residences, over the past four years. I looked at the egg and I looked at Jan. Suddenly, an idea sprang into my mind. "Jan, do you want that egg? You can have it, if you want it," I said.
"Is it an ostrich egg?" Jan asked.
"Yes," I said. Did it matter? It's a big flipping egg. Either she wanted it, or she didn't.
"I could have used it when I was a full-time art teacher," she informed me. That was interesting, but mostly irrelevant. That was then, this is now. Would she take it off my hands, now? I hoped she would. Finally, I could be rid of that useless thing. She agreed, but did so unenthusiastically. I was worried she was just being polite.
"Are you sure you want it?" I asked. "As much as I want to be rid of the damned thing, I want it to go to a good home. I don't want you to take it and end up putting it in your garage." Jan thought out loud about where she could put it, in her house. She held the large egg shell in her hands. Would she bond with it? I started to feel reluctant to let it go. Maybe this is how mothers feel who put their babies up for adoption before giving birth. When push comes to shove, they have second thoughts about giving the child up. I asked her, "if you were me, would you give the egg away, or keep it?" I sat on the end of my bed, while Jan stood with the egg in her hands. We debated the egg's future. No matter how much I wanted to be rid of it, I just wasn't convinced that Jan really wanted it. We decided that I would keep the egg, for now, while Jan thought about it. If she decided she really did want it, I would give it to her in the future.
If any of you would like to have an ostrich egg and will commit to giving it a good home, let me know. It's just the egg shell. All the innards have been drained out of it, so it's never going to hatch into anything. It will forever be dependant on you for care and attention. On the plus side, it doesn't eat anything and is very quiet. All of this discussion of the egg's fate has led me to ponder that age old question: which came first the ostrich or the egg?

Nando's Ideas On Child Rearing

Nando and I were starting to watch a film tonight, at 9PM. He selected "2 Days in the Valley," because we had pretty much seen everything else. When he turned to the Sky Movies 9, the channel it was on, a prompt came on the screen asking for the PIN. Sometime last year, Sky implemented this PIN protection scheme, supposedly to prevent children from watching certain films. This film was rated "18," here in the UK, which is the equivalent of "R" in America, only more restrictive. In America, someone under 17 can watch an R rated film, so long as he's accompanied by a parent or legal guardian. In Britain, no one under 18 can see an "18" rated film, regardless if his parents okay it.
British TV has this scheme called, "the 9 o'clock watershed." It's based on the presumption that children will be in bed by 9PM, so it's okay to broadcast swearing and more adult themed programs from 9PM on. The watershed applies to terrestrial broadcast TV. As Sky Movies is a an encoded, pay subscription service, distributed by satellite, the 9PM watershed shouldn't apply. Usually, Sky announces that its channels have an 8PM watershed, not 9PM. The downside was that all the films aired during the day were kid's films. In response to complaints from subscribers that all that's ever on during the day is crap kid's films, Sky started offering films for older audiences on a couple of its film channels, but put in place this PIN protection. To me, the PIN Protection scheme was unnecessary, because Sky already offered a parental protection facility, which parents could turn on to block certain channels, unless the PIN was input. We had the parental protection switched off, because there are no children in the house. The annoying thing about the new PIN protection is that it's not optional, so even households like ours have to mess around with it. It requires that the PIN be input for any film Rated over 12. The really silly thing is that as this film was staring at 9PM, it was past the watershed anyway.
We entered the PIN and as the film was starting, Nando said, "why should they worry about kids watching? All kids in UK go to bed at 7PM." After I pointed out that some people don't send their kids to bed that early, Nando said. "one thing I don't understand...all over the world, why people send children to bed at a particular time? Children are like other humans. What's the point in making them go to bed when they are not sleepy? When a kid is sleepy, he can go to bed then. That's it!"
That's a pretty liberal view for a man who admires such authoritarian all-stars as Hitler and Mussolini. "That's a pretty enlightened perspective, Nando. I am surprised to hear you say that," I said.
"Another thing," he continued (once Nando gets started, he usually goes on for quite a bit), "why make children eat at a certain time, when they aren't hungry?"
"I think set meal times and bed times are primarily for the parent's convenience," I offered in explanation. "If a mother has to cook dinner, for example, she needs to be able to plan for having it ready at a certain time."
"Alright, I could see that might be necessary for cooking," Nando agreed, "but let them go to bed when they are tired."
"My ex-wife," in other words, the Black Queen, "used to send her kids to bed because she wanted some time alone, with me," I explained. "I think parents would worry that if they let kids stay up, the kids would not go to bed when they feel tired, but end up falling asleep on the chairs they are sitting in."
"That's okay," Nando replied, "they can pick them up and put them in bed."
"You sound like the people at TCS, which stands for 'Taking Children Seriously,' " I informed our favorite Italian. "I went to a talk given by a woman from TCS, once. She said you shouldn't force children to go to school."
"That's different," Nando objected. "Children need to go to school. It's not just about learning what is in books, or learning on this date this and this happened, or where different countries are located. They need to learn how to be with other kids their own age."
"They could be taught at home," I pointed out.
"How I'm going to do that?" objected Nando. "I know how to learn, I don't know how to teach someone." After a pause, he said, "when I was a kid, I didn't want to go to school. Now, I know school is good. The reason kids don't like to go to school isn't because of the books and learning stuff, it's because they have to get up at six in the morning to be at school at eight in the morning. No matter what time kids go to bed, they don't like to get up early. They should start school at ten o'clock and let them stay there till 5PM."
"TCS folks say you shouldn't force children to go to school, if they don't want to go," I said, calmly.
"I don't like people who are radical," Nando responded, drifting back to his authoritarian roots.
"You're radical," I said.
"No, I'm not," Nando said in rebuttal.
"Letting children go to bed when they want to is pretty radical," I said, teasing him. At that point, something strange happened on TV. The film had been running a few minutes. It seemed like this man was trying to force himself upon his ex-girlfriend. The picture went off and was replaced by a graphic which read, "Sky Movies 9." I had never seen this happen before, during a film on Sky Movies.
Nando tried changing channels. The others were working normally. We saw an advertisement for Sky's PIN protection service. The ad stresses that the service is free. I said to Nando, "if I pay extra, can we have the service turned off?"
Nando laughed. "Yes, I pay £10 per month more, you turn off this PIN crap." He turned back to Sky Movies 9, but still the film wasn't running again.
"Maybe they have a technical problem," I suggested.
"Maybe the tape broke," Nando offered.
"I don't think they would be using tape, in this day and age," I said. "Surely they must use discs now. Maybe the boss came in and said, 'don't show this film,' because it looked like a rape scene." The graphic changed, finally, and a different one came on, which informed viewers that the program following represents a change from what was scheduled. Then the Columbia pictures logo came on and a different film started. It was an old western. I had never seen such a thing happen before. It seems that, even with the PIN protection, Sky chickened out of showing the film they had started with. As the film was originally released in 1996, surely the people at Sky knew what was in it.
"I'm not watching this crap," Nando announced. He switched to "Lethal Weapon 4," which we have both seen numerous times. Nando never tires of watching "Lethal Weapon" films.