A Visitor from the City

Joseph Legaspi's coming to visit me for the weekend. He stated that he had two requests: 1) Visit Target, 2) BBQ. I hope to meet all of these requests, quite possibly in the first day. Anyway, he couldn't have picked a more perfect weekend to come visit. The weather in the Mohawk Valley has been pleasantly warm and breezy. Supposedly there'll be fireworks this evening, but I'm not sure where they'll be and I'm not sure if we'll be able to see them from Remsen.

In other news, I saw "Spiderman 2" in the new Marquee Theatre last night. Prior to that, we went to Voss's hotdog stand. Apparently Voss's is a 50-year-old hotdog stand. I ordered a Chili-dog and a Mexi-dog done "All the Way". They were REALLY good. It's a shame that hot dogs are so terrible for you. When I was about four-years-old, I went through a phase where I'd eat nothing but hot dogs and Pringles until I overheard a news report that said the franks were hazerdous to your health. After, I appropriately told my mother that I had eaten four hot dogs and asked her if I was going to die. Anyway, if you're in the Utica area and want to pay me a visit, I'll take you to Voss's.

As for the movie and the movie theatre . . . thumbs up. The interior of the theatre looks cheaply made. Cinder block and cement line all the hallways. Cheap and gaudily bright carpet adorn the floors. Some brightly painted stars skirt the cavernous opening with a brightly lit and long concession stand. As the three of us entered, we saw an overhead projector playing trailers for the up and coming shows. "Spiderman 2" was playing on four of the twelve screens. Of course, I ordered a popcorn and a soda because I can't watch movies without popcorn. In fact, the whole experience of movie-watching is banal without having some for of salty/sweet snack at your fingertips. Anyway, when we got into the appropriate theatre, we could see that it seated around two-hundred people. Our worry was that because of the size of the complex from the outside, the actual screens would be tiny. This was not the case. The screen was slightly concave and relatively large. The stadium seats reached far back towards the wall with a partition sectioning off the area right below the projection window so that no one could put on a shadow-puppet show in the middle of the film. Dark curtains draped the sides to buffer the other theatres from the very loud sound system. If you're not a fan of loud action films, go to the other cinemas because the speakers were extremely crisp. Also, given that the film playing was an action film with a lot of screeching, crashing, and banging, you're liable to leave the theatre with slight deafness or ringing in your ears. I know Marijean's teeth ached after the film. Needless to say, I'm happy with the theatre overall. I saw that they were also showing "Farenheit 9/11" on another screen, so I think there's hope that more serious film buffs will have a better selection in the upcoming months.

Now, as far as "Spiderman 2" is concerned, I enjoyed it. I thought the characters were nice and round. Part of that, I believe, is due to Michael Chabon's involvement in the screen writing process. I also thought that Doctor Octopus was a superbe villain. I won't say anymore. I'm sure you'll hear about the film for quite some time.