Thursday, May 14, 2009

DISAPPEARING GRAMPS

The dollar movie always provides great entertainment for us, sometimes from the movies and sometimes from our experiences at the movies. See, we always go to a movie that is showing at noon on Sunday after we have our amazing lunch at Sam’s Discount for $1.67 for a hotdog and unlimited pops. That makes our outing that day cost a whopping six bucks. Our last experience at the movie theater was silly, but gave us a big laugh. We were late getting to the theater because we left home late. It was dark when we walked into the theater that was showing our choice of movie for the day. We were the only ones who were interested in the particular showing that day, I guess, because we had the room to ourselves. In the darkness we felt our way down the aisle touching every end seat on our way in an effort to keep our bearings. As we came to the middle of the aisles and what seemed like the perfect row of seats I asked Gramps if that seemed to be the right distance from the screen. He said it was perfect, so I entered the row of seats and felt each seat until I figured we would be in the center of the screen. I sat down in one of the theater’s newly acquired plush secondhand seats, ready to enjoy the romantic movie (commonly called a chick flick) with my hubby. It was still unusually dark in the room but I was glad we were able to find our way down the aisle, stumbling into the center and into the right seats. The coming attractions began immediately. I commented to Gramps that I wanted to see a certain upcoming movie because it looked like it would be entertaining. Gramps remarked that he would like to see it, also, but when he said it I wondered if he had acquired a bad sore throat on the way into the theater because he commented in a very far away, weak sounding voice. It took me a minute to figure out that Gramps had entered an aisle a couple of rows behind me rather than the aisle I was seated in. He was relaxing in a seat in a different aisle, ready for the feature to begin. There we were, the only couple in the movie theater sitting several rows apart, albeit but in the perfect center of our respective aisles. Anyone entering the room at the time would have thought were mad at each other, taking seats in different rows in the theater with every other seat in the huge room empty. Now, I know that Gramps still has great eyesight because he has two new lenses in his eyes after having cataract surgery. However, I’m wondering about his hearing. The next day when I fixed dinner I put our plates on trays because we wanted to watch TV while we ate. I got the trays beautifully prepared and called Gramps and told him to come get his tray. He didn’t answer immediately so I got closer and yelled out, “Come get your tray. Dinner is ready.” Gramps immediately yelled back, “Artificial intelligence.” Where in the world did that come from? He still can’t remember what he thought I said. I do think we need to have his hearing checked. Or yet, maybe he’s trying to get a message across to me. “Artificial intelligence“? Humm, I better think a while longer on that remark.