Foggy Weekend Update
My friend Ceci lives a charmed life. She's late to everything - a 15 minute delay only means she's on time. And yet, somehow, everything always works out for her.
A case in point. Saturday night we had plans to see Syriana, showing only at 6:15 in a nearby town, about a 20-minute drive from my house. We were meeting our friend Piano Man there at 6:00. Ceci was warned to get to my house by 5:30.
"So," she said, "I should leave my house by 5?"
"Absolutely," I said. "No later."
Even though I've made it to her house in waaaaay under 30 minutes, somehow time does weird and bendy things when Cee's involved.
At 10 of 5 I thought, I should give Cee a call, make sure she's awake. (She got back from a 3-week trip to India a few days ago and is still on Indian time. Which is somehow 12-1/2 hours ahead of us. Where does that extra half hour come from? Does it explain Cee's magical disregard of the clock?)
But I didn't call. And when she hadn't shown up by 20 of 6 I thought, confidently, she'll be here any minute. But then it was 5:45 . . . and 6 . . . and now I was muttering and cursing my way through the house . . . and by 6:10, when my doorbell rang, I had small tufts of my own hair clenched in my hands . . . .
But Ceece, you can't stay mad at her, because she doesn't mean it and she feels terrible and she's so, so sorry and she had a whole bag of cool and colorful stuff from Mumbai for me. She was still jet-lagged and half an hour behind in everything. She thought the movie started at 6:45, we were meeting Piano Man at 6:30, she had to be at my house at 6, etc. Considering that extra Indian half hour, it really only makes sense. In an international dateline, this is Cee's life kind of way.
So we got in her car and raced to the theater, laughing and chattering all the way. There was no space in either of the two parking lots we tried. We drove by the theater to see if Piano Man might still be out there waiting and - Ceci's luck - we found the only empty parking space in town two doors from the theater.
The girl at the ticket office told us that, although the movie had already started, there were still 14 open seats scattered throughout the theater. Cee and I found two seats together in the front row. We hunched there, our necks at frightening angles, the screen looming up before us, everything on it huge and misshapen.
Afterwards, outside, we waited for Piano Man to emerge amidst the sea of white people. We thought he'd be easy to spot, given that he's African American (and, as Cee said, he'd be the only black person here - but he wasn't, I began to notice - he'd be one of three). We waited and waited and waited, and to make a long story just a bit shorter, we never found him.
Turns out that he'd gotten there a few minutes before 6, but by the time he'd found a place to park it was way past our scheduled meeting time. Not seeing us, he thought we'd already gone in, or left without him. (But Piano Man, really, we never, never would have left without you.). The girl at the ticket counter told him the show was sold out. So he went to the restaurant we'd talked about going to afterwards. When he didn't find us there, he went home.
Ten minutes later, Cee and I show up at the theater and waltz right in. And here is the moral of this overly long tale: whatever Cee touches, no matter how frickin' late she is, it all, always, turns golden.
Me, I'm just happy to be riding her coattails.
A case in point. Saturday night we had plans to see Syriana, showing only at 6:15 in a nearby town, about a 20-minute drive from my house. We were meeting our friend Piano Man there at 6:00. Ceci was warned to get to my house by 5:30.
"So," she said, "I should leave my house by 5?"
"Absolutely," I said. "No later."
Even though I've made it to her house in waaaaay under 30 minutes, somehow time does weird and bendy things when Cee's involved.
At 10 of 5 I thought, I should give Cee a call, make sure she's awake. (She got back from a 3-week trip to India a few days ago and is still on Indian time. Which is somehow 12-1/2 hours ahead of us. Where does that extra half hour come from? Does it explain Cee's magical disregard of the clock?)
But I didn't call. And when she hadn't shown up by 20 of 6 I thought, confidently, she'll be here any minute. But then it was 5:45 . . . and 6 . . . and now I was muttering and cursing my way through the house . . . and by 6:10, when my doorbell rang, I had small tufts of my own hair clenched in my hands . . . .
But Ceece, you can't stay mad at her, because she doesn't mean it and she feels terrible and she's so, so sorry and she had a whole bag of cool and colorful stuff from Mumbai for me. She was still jet-lagged and half an hour behind in everything. She thought the movie started at 6:45, we were meeting Piano Man at 6:30, she had to be at my house at 6, etc. Considering that extra Indian half hour, it really only makes sense. In an international dateline, this is Cee's life kind of way.
So we got in her car and raced to the theater, laughing and chattering all the way. There was no space in either of the two parking lots we tried. We drove by the theater to see if Piano Man might still be out there waiting and - Ceci's luck - we found the only empty parking space in town two doors from the theater.
The girl at the ticket office told us that, although the movie had already started, there were still 14 open seats scattered throughout the theater. Cee and I found two seats together in the front row. We hunched there, our necks at frightening angles, the screen looming up before us, everything on it huge and misshapen.
Afterwards, outside, we waited for Piano Man to emerge amidst the sea of white people. We thought he'd be easy to spot, given that he's African American (and, as Cee said, he'd be the only black person here - but he wasn't, I began to notice - he'd be one of three). We waited and waited and waited, and to make a long story just a bit shorter, we never found him.
Turns out that he'd gotten there a few minutes before 6, but by the time he'd found a place to park it was way past our scheduled meeting time. Not seeing us, he thought we'd already gone in, or left without him. (But Piano Man, really, we never, never would have left without you.). The girl at the ticket counter told him the show was sold out. So he went to the restaurant we'd talked about going to afterwards. When he didn't find us there, he went home.
Ten minutes later, Cee and I show up at the theater and waltz right in. And here is the moral of this overly long tale: whatever Cee touches, no matter how frickin' late she is, it all, always, turns golden.
Me, I'm just happy to be riding her coattails.
posted by dirty martini & tequila fog at 10:21 AM
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