Mostly Harmless

Sure, I could have blogged from the hotel, which had adequate WiFi most days — except for the two days I couldn’t connect at all — but I was more concerned with tracking down food three times a day (since I didn’t have a suite with a fridge and microwave) and watching TV without a DVR. At least I had free HBO and Showtime so I could see all those rockin’ uncensored R-rated shows.

I did find the hotel, no thanks to the directions provided by the travel agency which indicated that I should drive 1 mile past the hotel, make a U-turn, and come back 1/2 a mile. Nice. At least I was in the general vicinity and spotted the sign while driving past the hotel the second time.

I had more fun with maps trying to locate the Loews Quarry 14. If you click their “map it” link it will direct you to a residential area about 1 mile due West of the theater. Google’s map will land you on a car dealership, but it’s within sight of a sign pointing to the theater. The theater itself isn’t overly spectacular. I went there twice (Shopgirl & Derailed). The sound is just a little too loud, the non-reclining seats are a little too firm, and the screen is curved so it’s impossible to actually focus the entire image (apparently).

Slightly easier to find was Hollywood Blvd. It’s not a giant cineplex so it doesn’t stand out. It barely looks like a theater at all when you drive past it since it’s part of a strip mall and there’s no brightly lit marquee. I foolishly ate lunch just before going there for a movie, which was a mistake because they’ve got a full menu and tons of waiters buzzing about. Not the sort of place you go if you want to pay attention to the movie, which was actually in sharp focus(!). I saw Chicken Little there, and considered seeing Rocky Horror but wasn’t quite up for a midnight show where I might have toast thrown at me by a (sweet) transvestite.

Movie #4 on my two-week long trip was Zathura at the AMC theater by the Yorktown Mall. Where the wind howls through the doors in the front lobby and it takes a real man to heave the door open on the way back out. For my show I had to tell them to fix the sound. If I’m paying $11+ for the movie and a small pop I want all the freakin’ speakers turned on, not just the center channel by the screen. It took ‘em about 5 minutes but I could actually hear the rest of the movie, so that was nice. Picture focus was acceptable. Movie was good enough. I was not surprised by the identity of the astronaut, but it did take the kids quite a while to learn their valuable lesson.

In all my travels I burned a whole tank of gas in the rental car, which is impressive if you figure it takes about a gallon for the round-trip to the airport, and the hotel was about 2 miles from the office. I know the area around the hotel far too well at this point and can describe the fastest route to a number of restaurants and points of interest (OK, there are no points of interest in that part of town).

The rental was a Chevy Impala. It’s positive features include: decent engine, automatic transmission. The automatic is a plus in rental cars because, if you typically drive a manual transmission, your brain has more processing power to devote to the age-old question “Where the hell am I?” Also it frees up time for remembering little things like “green means go, red means stop” which are sometimes overlooked when you’re driving a strange car and are also trying to figure out what street you’re on. I didn’t run any red lights but I know someone who did. Cough. Bossman. Cough.

Speaking of work, I should go. I’d like to purge my knowledge of the poor state of the databases at the Chicago office from my brain but, sadly, that was why I was sent there for two weeks in the first place.