Despite the drizzly, almost-chilly conditions that we're beginning to call "Jyotika Weather" (because of the obvious delight she takes in days that approximate her beloved English clime), today was pretty darned relaxing.
After a late night of video editing (everyone seems to like the finished product, which is nice, since they've only seen the crappy web version), sleeping in would have been the order of the day, but 9 a.m. was about as far as I got. Stupid internal clock.
After lazing around a bit and a new episode of Trading Spaces (during which I decided that I like Vern Yip better than I did initially), I got dressed and hit the Mailboxes Etc to make sure nothing fun had come. It hadn't. So back to the house to meet up with Jyotika and her friend Greta for...
The Sing-Along Sound of Music
The Tampa Theater was about 3/4 full for this "international phenomenon;" we purchased tickets in mid-December and so sat third row center (the front two rows were empty, giving us a handy place to stash coats and umbrellas) – the best seats in the house, really. A stand-up comic in lederhosen gave us all the instructions on what to do when (boo at the Nazis, hiss at the Baroness) and how to use the items in our goody bags. For example, during the song "Edelweiss," we were all supposed to wave the little plastic flowers we were given.
Said stand-up-comic-in-lederhosen (I'll call him Johann, since I didn't catch his actual name) also called this event "the Rocky Horror for goody-two-shoes." He was pretty much right, given the crowd, which was mostly middle-aged women and children under the age of twelve. Both demographic sets turned out in good numbers for the costume contest. Below are the better entries in the "single adult" (as opposed to groups of adults) category:
On the left we have "tea with jam and bread" (the jam and bread appeared in baggies on her flip side), and a grown man dressed as Friedrich. For some reason, Friedrich-guy drew huge applause. He was pretty enthusiastic, jumping around and doing a little dance. Oh yeah, that's Johann in the middle.
I have more pictures, but I'll get them up in a Yahoo photo album later.
The movie itself was a lot like B-Fest, with people yelling one-liners and generally having a good time. When Maria sings that she "seeks the courage that she lacks," someone close to us piped up, "You should see the Wizard!" Much merriment was made at the expense of the Nazis and the Baroness. Depite the good-natured fun that most folks seemed to be having, I was happy that the five-year-old seated behind us and her obnoxiously brusque mother did not return for the second half of the film.
Four and a half hours later (oy!), we returned home and promptly went out again when I discovered I had precious little to cook for dinner. Not that that mattered; I ended up making Alton Brown's pancakes. But at least we're stocked for the rest of the week. Christina also lucked out; they were out of meatless sausage so she got Healthy Choice sausage patties instead. The pancakes were amazing – we ended up eating them mostly without butter or syrup. No glomming on the syrup to mask the crappy mix-made pancakes you're eating; these are, uh... good eats.
Like I said, a perfect rainy Saturday. Got a review up on Stomp Tokyo tonight; our participation in the B-Masters Roundtable showcasing Ninjas.
