On Tuesday night Rachelle and I went to The Beach Cinemas to see Toy Story 3*. It was here, while waiting in line to buy some popcorn, where I saw two preteen girls playing checkers on a table at the food court. As I like sports of all kind and have a kindly and helpful disposition, I began to watch their game and cheer them on.
“That’s a stupid move.”
“You’re not very smart for an Asian girl, are you?”
“She’s going to crown your ass if you do that, dingbat!”
“You girls are losers, you’re going to get torn to pieces in high school!”
It turns out that the girls had quite a bit of grit to them and I quickly found myself in a round robin checker tournament with them in which the winner had to pay for the others movie ticket and concession stand treats.
As I expected, it came down to a battle between Thanh and I in the finals. Although she seemed sincerely shaken when I told her how the Twilight Saga ended and that Justin Bieber was a robot, I was unable to throw her off her game. She just kept advancing on me. She was relentless, and all the while, her stupid friend Ashley—whom I crushed—kept dancing around and shouting stupid encouragements.
“My giant bag of Nibs is going to taste so fine!!”
“You should just call her King Thanh because you’re always having to King her!”
“I think it’s time you took your pet dinosaur for a walk, Old Spice!”
Witty stuff like that.
I have to say, I’ve been fighting a bad head cold all week and so I wasn’t at my best, and just as I was mounting my incredible comeback I had a horrible coughing fit that caused me to spasm and knock all the checker pieces off the table and so the game had to be canceled. As I was leaving to go see my movie, Thanh and Ashley got all G20 protesters on me, and started shrieking that I was a fascist oppressor or something and that I owed them all sorts of candy and the price of their movie tickets. (Shrek Forever After)
This was clearly not true.
The final game was a draw due to an act of God.
It was God’s Will that our game was interrupted, and if anything, Ashley owed both Thanh and myself our admission and popcorn! She was the loser! But I didn’t press that point too fiercely, as I am a leader, and as I’m not easily provoked (although I did have my hand on the Pepper Spray I keep in my pocket), and like to set a good example for the youth of today, I just walked away like the class act I am, and always will be.
* By the way, Toy Story 3 is an absolutely first rate movie. In each one of the films that I've seen by Pixar, I've been astonished and moved by the melancholy that's ever present. They have this magical capacity to always capture something essential about aging, rendering it simultaneously beautiful and sad, and I think that every adult who watches these "kids" movies is inevitably moved near to tears.
Ian:
I would say that I cried like an elderly woman. I attempted to attribute all my sniffling to my head cold, and was relieved that the 3-D glasses obscured the tears that were welling in my eyes.
HTML allowed: <a href="" title="" rel=""></a> <b></b> <blockquote cite=""></blockquote> <em></em> <i></i> <strike></strike> <strong></strong> <li></li> <ol></ol> <ul></ul>
ie: <b>bold</b>
Did you cry like a baby at the movie?