Friday, May 11, 2012

The Movie Line Game

I didn't go anywhere today.  I didn't do anything.  Okay, I watched an old episode of Grey's Anatomy while I folded some clothes.  I put in some laundry.  I tried to make my elbow stop hurting where Teddy yanked on his leash the other day, using Tylenol, ice, and Advil.  I made dinner, spaghetti pie, and my niece came over and told us stories about customers at the Starbuck's where she works.

I just could not believe how some customers behave toward her.  She could write a book!  She admits that some of the people are nice, the regulars who take the time to learn her name, but lots of them talk on their cell phones and ask her to wait until a convenient moment while they're in the drive-thru.  They are rude and expect her to be able to read their minds and make a mocha in thirty seconds or less.  That amazes me.  The unmitigated gall!

I stole that last line from a movie.  Do you know which one?

'The Grinch.'

I am just too tired and sore to write a lot tonight.  Teddy has been hard on me.  On Tuesday when I walked him, he pulled on the leash so hard a couple of times, he went airborne.  That strained my elbow.  Then on Thursday, I took him to run in the Three Forks Off Leash area and, while playing with an overbearing dog, he rammed into my shin at full speed and gave me a huge bruise that keeps getting bigger when I'm on my feet too long.  All of this was in the name of exuberance, but I felt like I'd been in collision with a truck.  It didn't help that I'd gone in for a mammogram with Nurse Ratched either.

Nurse Ratched came from a movie too.  Know which one? 

'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.'  Sorry, Mike and I play that game all the time.  We don't even have to say what the movie was.  We just know.  Sometimes it's a line from an old Seinfeld episode, but I'll hear him goofing around with Nick, using some action figure that was lying around and then I hear, "You shall not pass!"

'Lord of the Rings.'

I love way Seth,the cat, stays in Nick's room until he goes to sleep and then sneaks away after he's asleep.  I hate that, even though we leave the door open a bit, Seth seems to want to bang at what's hanging from the doorknob.  Nick usually stays asleep during all the racket.  If it were me, I'd be awake by then.  I just now had to go rescue poor Nick from the noise. 

So, the weekend is going to be busy with sunny weather.  Why is it that people kept telling me to get out and enjoy the weather today?  Sometimes I resent that way of thinking, as if I'm not allowed to hang around and watch a movie when the weather is nice.  Sure, it would have been good to get out and take a walk.  God knows that Teddy could have used a walk, but I didn't go.  So shoot me.

Tomorrow, Nick and I are going to get outside.  Mike is going to be gone all day with the older Scouts on a ten mile hike. But I have to practice piano because I've been roped into playing again.  My knees can start knocking just thinking about it.  I'd really like to be able to do my trick instead, but I don't know if they'll let me.

Here it is:

You take a willing kid - it has to be a kid because adults think too much - and sit him down at the piano.  Willingness is the key.   You tell the audience that this kid can play jazz.  Then you sit down with him, whisper in his ear for him to play anything, anything at all.  You play a chord progression, something as simple as C - F - C - F - G - C, all the while adding some sevenths and ninths to the chords to fill them out.  You match the pace of chords to the kid's energy and it's jazz!  I love this trick.  You can make a four year old sound brilliant!  The kid gets great applause, feels great, and the adults are amazed by his brilliance. 

I thought that maybe another movie line would fly out by itself by now, but it hasn't.  It's so lame when I try to be smart or funny and I'm just not that person.  Sorry.  So today, I'm going to have to leave you with that thing 'that was just hanging out there.'

Thank you for listening, jb

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