:: Countdown ::
Countdowns to various events are usually Kelsey's milieu but I thought I'd steal a page from her book this morning because it's less that two weeks until we go to Las Vegas, my all-time favourite city.
11 days, to be exact.
Vegas is always awesome, but I especially like going with people who have never been before, because - with my friends anyway - it usually exceeds expectations. For example, when we drove there from Phoenix about this time last year, Chris spent most of the drive down Las Vegas Blvd with his head almost out the window, like some kind of dog, staring up at all the gigantic casinos, before saying something like, "This buildings are so fucking huge it's almost overwhelming... and people are drinking on the street!"
Like I said, it exceeds expectations usually.
So yeah, 11 days. For those of you (Chris, Jenna, Kelsey, Scott, Katie, etc) who are not going, for very valid reasons (no time off, saving money, living 3,000 miles away, knocked up) well, that's all well and good, but you have 11 days to change your mind and make an irrational, likely financial harming decision to come with us.
Just saying.
Showing posts with label repeating a final sentence makes it more dramatic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label repeating a final sentence makes it more dramatic. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 06, 2010
Friday, March 12, 2010
:: Sitcom ending ::
Unlike Christene, who has an encyclopedic memory for all things TV (I mean, as a baby, her first word was - no joke - "Scooby-Doo") I don't remember a lot of specific television moments from my childhood, The Simpsons notwithstanding, but one I vividly recall, for whatever reason, is the series finale of Growing Pains.
In that episode, the Seaver family uproots from Long Island, NY for Washington, DC because the mom, Maggie, takes a new TV anchor job there. It's an episode filled with sap and nostalgia, not to mention the typical Family-Moves-Away plot device as a way to end the show (copied by a million shows before and since, notably Friends).
The final scene before the end credits roll sees Maggie taking one last loving glance around the now-empty living room. Conveniently, the family has forgot to pack one last family photo, which is framed and sitting on the mantle above the fire place. Maggie moves to pick it up, and behind it, carved into the brick facade, are four words: "Mike Seaver was here"
She smiles, walks back to the front door, does the slow-dramatic-one-last-glance-half-smile-turn-off-the-lights thing, and then you hear the door click shut.
/scene.
Tonight I had to drop off all my keys and garage-door openers back at the now-empty townhouse, because tomorrow the sale closes and the new people take possession. Christene had joked with me before dinner about doing a "sitcom ending" where I do the same slow turn-out-the-lights routine, or perhaps say something sappy, sad or profound as I turn the key for the last time. But I figured I'd probably just lock the door and leave.
But after I put the keys on the kitchen counter, and slowly took one last tour around the place, I suddenly felt a little sad - I honestly didn't think I would. I shoulda known better.
So I did what TV had told me to do years earlier. I took my keys, opened the accordian door to the hall closet, and on the one-inch wide edge of the door, carved a medium-sized 'N'.
I was there.
Christene, of course, was impressed that I'd finally decided to over-dramatize our exit. She carved a 'C' right below it.
"Are you gonna turn the lights out really slow and say something as we go?" she asked.
No, I wasn't. I didn't.
But I did take the welcome mat back, which at one point I figured I'd just leave for the new owners. But I took it. It was my mat, after all, and they weren't getting it.
No, they weren't getting it.
Unlike Christene, who has an encyclopedic memory for all things TV (I mean, as a baby, her first word was - no joke - "Scooby-Doo") I don't remember a lot of specific television moments from my childhood, The Simpsons notwithstanding, but one I vividly recall, for whatever reason, is the series finale of Growing Pains.
In that episode, the Seaver family uproots from Long Island, NY for Washington, DC because the mom, Maggie, takes a new TV anchor job there. It's an episode filled with sap and nostalgia, not to mention the typical Family-Moves-Away plot device as a way to end the show (copied by a million shows before and since, notably Friends).
The final scene before the end credits roll sees Maggie taking one last loving glance around the now-empty living room. Conveniently, the family has forgot to pack one last family photo, which is framed and sitting on the mantle above the fire place. Maggie moves to pick it up, and behind it, carved into the brick facade, are four words: "Mike Seaver was here"
She smiles, walks back to the front door, does the slow-dramatic-one-last-glance-half-smile-turn-off-the-lights thing, and then you hear the door click shut.
/scene.
Tonight I had to drop off all my keys and garage-door openers back at the now-empty townhouse, because tomorrow the sale closes and the new people take possession. Christene had joked with me before dinner about doing a "sitcom ending" where I do the same slow turn-out-the-lights routine, or perhaps say something sappy, sad or profound as I turn the key for the last time. But I figured I'd probably just lock the door and leave.
But after I put the keys on the kitchen counter, and slowly took one last tour around the place, I suddenly felt a little sad - I honestly didn't think I would. I shoulda known better.
So I did what TV had told me to do years earlier. I took my keys, opened the accordian door to the hall closet, and on the one-inch wide edge of the door, carved a medium-sized 'N'.
I was there.
Christene, of course, was impressed that I'd finally decided to over-dramatize our exit. She carved a 'C' right below it.
"Are you gonna turn the lights out really slow and say something as we go?" she asked.
No, I wasn't. I didn't.
But I did take the welcome mat back, which at one point I figured I'd just leave for the new owners. But I took it. It was my mat, after all, and they weren't getting it.
No, they weren't getting it.