Oscar who?
This weekend was a rough weekend, even by twin-parent standards, there was a lot to do. In fact, I was so busy I didn’t have much opportunity to turn on the television. Which, for me, says a lot.
So, it goes without saying that if the TV can go long periods of time with no use, then we probably don’t see too many movies either. In fact, before the twins were born, we anticipated watching movies at home rather than in the theater so we signed up for Netflix where you choose your movies on-line and they mail a couple to you every time you send one back. I think we bought this service in April or May of 2005 prior to Andrea going on maternity leave. It’s been almost a year and we have watched a total of four movies. Right now, The Notebook and Napoleon Dynamite sit in our entertainment center (guess who picked The Notebook and who picked Napoleon Dynamite – my occasional mushy posts aside, I’m not really a Notebook kind of guy) and have been there for at least four or five months.
So, with all of this information, imagine my surprise when I turned on the radio this morning in the car on the way to work and they are discussing the Oscar winners from the previous night.
I had no idea the Oscar’s were even on. I have not seen one movie that was nominated for an Oscar (not even March of the Penguins because I hear a baby penguin dies and it’s the dad’s fault. I can’t take that kind of heart wrenching). I haven’t even heard of half the movies – including the winner for Best Picture – Crash.
So, my dream is simple. My dream is that one day I will have a three hour window of time to go to a movie theatre, buy a big tub of popcorn with extra butter and a large Mr. Pibb, and watch a move with all of the previews. Hell, right now I’d settle for an hour and a half in front of the TV watching Napoleon Dynamite, eating a bag of stale microwave popcorn, drinking a diet Hansen’s soda and fast forwarding through any scenes that look like they might not be relevant to the plot.
*Sigh* Someday.
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I knew the Oscars were on because I read about them on a few blogs! My youngest is 12. Years, not months. But I think that’s just me.
The last movie, (I think, the only movie) I saw in a theatre this year was Wallace and Gromit. Last week, when Emma and I were both too sick to do anything else, we watched Fiddler on the Roof together.
Comment by Mary — March 7, 2006 @ 4:24 am
We too have wasted our Blockbuster Online account. I think we have The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (my pick) and The Thing About My Folks (wife’s pick). Every now and then we are able to watch them…
One thing I cannot live without, however, is my TiVo. Rare is the occassion when I can watch a show or game in its entirety. Sometimes I even watch an episode I missed at 2 am while feeding one of my girls!
Comment by Rob Fay — March 7, 2006 @ 4:57 am
You will have time one day, i promise. I didnt think i would ever see another movie again. My son is now about 20 months old and has a bedtime of 8pm. If we feel like staying up til 11-ish, we have a whole 3 hours to watch movies! My boyfriend has racked up quite the bill on our cable box renting them now that he has time to watch them again. i think he’s trying to play catch up for all the ones he missed!! You’ll get to one day!
Comment by kristied — March 7, 2006 @ 5:08 am
Good luck with that dream! My husband and I also had that dream. Last weekend we actually went to the movies…alone! But…be prepared! Movies are now $9.00 a ticket. And we got 2 drinks and a tub of popcorn…$14.00. Good grief! We’ll be finding another dream.
Comment by Teresa — March 7, 2006 @ 5:29 am
No loss about the Oscar. I think they’re so shitty I wouldn’t watch it if you paid me. Two kids must be tough and I’ll soon be there. But try to schedule a little time for yourself (and wife) at regular interval to avoid burnout. Probably sounds like a naive suggestion but I’ve personally found this to be a good idea to handle both work, kids, and everything else.
AD
Comment by AdventureDad — March 7, 2006 @ 5:29 am
I’m glad you said that. I hadn’t heard of “Crash” before Friday either, and that was only because I was listening to news radio on the way to the grocery store.
Comment by Sarah — March 7, 2006 @ 6:29 am
I have not seen any of the Best Picture nominees, and I actually saw THREE movies in the theater last year! Of course, none of them were huge artistic statments (Star Wars Episode III, Harry Potter, and The Chronicles of Narnia). We didn’t take the kids to any of them and managed to get a babysitter. It was a nice way to relax. However, we cannot afford a babysitter AND popcorn.
Comment by Deanna — March 7, 2006 @ 10:12 am
I haven’t been to the movies in a while but they’re over-rated IMHO. We do watch movies at home pretty frequently. When the babies were tiny, we’d sit on the couch with them sleeping on our chests and watch movies. When Andrew was away for a weekend when the babies were about three months old and sleeping a lot, I watched the entire two seasons of Dead Like Me and loved it. Now, they play on their floor pallet while we watch movies. We do miss stuff pretty frequently when someone falls and cracks their head on the floor (getting less & less frequent now)but overall, we get to see a good number of home-movie-watching.
But the Oscar films weren’t worth it… I don’t think I’ve seen any of them. March of the Penguins was overrated. It had cool elements, but went on too long and was mostly just “wow, look how great documentary filmmakers we are, we can make our cameras last through the arctic winter”.
I think I missed the baby penguin’s reason for death. I remember two incidents–one where an egg falls off the parents’ (both) feet and one where the mother penguin tries to take another mom’s baby, and the rest of the penguins chase her off. Which was probably one of the more interesting parts. But otherwise, it was sort of boring.
But lately, we’ve watched the HBO recorded show “Goodnight Moon” a whole whole lot. And Blue’s Clues. That’s what they like.
Comment by Kim Wells — March 7, 2006 @ 10:17 am
Hmmm…I’m seemingly in the minority in reference to getting to see movies while busy with young children. My parents live a mere 5 miles from us and give us a date night once a week, and we pretty much always see a movie and eat dinner. We are seeing some indie film tonight (Chris can’t even remember the name) and saw 16 Blocks w/Bruce Willis last week. Eh, at least we got out.
I DID see Crash, Walk the Line, Syriana, A History of Violence, and The Constant Gardener last year–all of which had a actors/actresses nominated. Crash was phenomenal!
Comment by Amy — March 7, 2006 @ 10:54 am
Don’t feel bad Matthew, my kids are 4 and 1 and we hadn’t seen a movie in a theather in almost a year. And while we like movies, we just never make it through it. Last weekend though we saw 16 Blocks, with Bruce Willis. And it was good, but i had never even heard of it. And Hubby had it confused with the Denzel Washington movie. Because they are real simular. We dropped the Netflix thing awhile ago, we just wern’t watching them. Now if I think I will like something, I buy it. I figure i will see it eventually.
Comment by Melissa — March 7, 2006 @ 11:15 am
I think someone else mentioned this here… forget the movies, get TiVo. The movies eventually come to tv anyway… and there are so many good tv shows lately!
Comment by mormondaddy — March 7, 2006 @ 3:18 pm
It was so the mom penguin’s fault! It wasn’t a good handoff of the egg at all. At least that’s the way I saw it.
Comment by Marty — March 8, 2006 @ 6:42 pm
See this is where we have it good. Two moms and two dads allows for a week off now & then with plenty of movie time. That being said, the only movies we see are on NetFlix… assuming you don’t count The Transporter II, which ironicly wasn’t nominated for anything.
Comment by Hygiene Dad — March 9, 2006 @ 3:36 am