Kung Fu Panda

The Drink:  Gold Crown Vodka and Diet Schwepps Raspberry Ginger Ale




    It was a cold, rainy day with the night coming on fast thanks to daylight savings time being over.  I walked the streets of town with my hands in my pockets staring into headlights of oncoming traffic while people beeped and yelled out of car windows at me.  At first I was annoyed, but then I realized that a person out walking these days is about as rare as seeing, say, a two-headed cat strolling down the sidewalk. Depending on what town you live in.  So beep away, fools.
     I got back to a pleasantly dark and warm apartment right when the rain started.  I filled a glass with ice and brought it up to my room where the room temp vodka and ginger ale sat peacefully on the thick carpet.  I spread out luxuriously on the floor like a fat two-headed cat and flicked on the t.v.
     Kung Fu Panda is, in my incredibly important opinion, one of the finest martial arts movies ever made.  The moves look as if they were probably choreographed by a highly paid Hollywood kung fu expert that has homemade weapons on his wall that he made in shop class in high school.
     The wise and old and adorable kung fu master is a turtle instead of a gross old man with a long white mustache.  Old men are almost never adorable in my experience, but are definitely slow and scaly.
      And most important of all, the real reason that Kung Fu Panda is superior to all other martial arts movies, is that when one of the characters is fighting in slow motion and leaping and pretty much levitating into an impossible roundhouse kick, you aren't sitting there trying not to remember that it's really just an actor with a giant white diaper loaded with cables and wires and a sweaty crew of dorks heaving on the other end.  Since the characters in Kung Fu Panda are created in the digital world, they are ACTUALLY doing those moves. They are smooth and believable. Unlike that Jaden Smith brat.

Due Date

The Drink: A flask containing super expensive Herradura tequila mixed with super cheap Gold Crown vodka.


     I was out driving around trying to find an ATM belonging to Bank of America because I just started an account with them and received my debit card in the mail and had to activate at an ATM.  But this huge and useless bank neglected to send a pin number along with the card.  So there I am standing in the cold November air at a drive through ATM poking uselessly at buttons on the touch screen with my gloves on.
     There was a Hannaford grocery right next door so I took my other card that I got in a small town bank that actually not only sat me down with a nice old lady and gave me a pin number but asked me deep and moving questions about my life and future plans, and bought a bottle of Gold Crown vodka.  There was a big tag on it saying how I was supporting local business because it was bottled in Lewiston, Maine, so I felt pretty good about the 6.99 I spent.
    I went home and got ready to see Due Date with some friends.   My roommate has a wonderful compulsive disorder that forces him to buy top shelf booze, so I was half way through filling my flask with Herradura tequila when I heard the key in the lock outside and bolted up to my room.  I fished around under my bed for the Gold Crown and topped off the flask.
    Booze in pocket and friends in car, we all drove towards the Saco Cinemagic.  We realized we would be a good half hour early, so we whipped a U turn and headed for the beach at 9 p.m.  The waves and stars almost overshadowed the fact that the beach closes at 9,  and the threat of small town bored cops looking for a thrill weighed heavy on my mind.
     On to the movie....
     It was like I had never seen comedy before.  I was sitting there sipping hot vodka-tinged tequila while these people tried to be funny on screen. They succeeded. And then I was on the verge of tears.  It was like the smoked almonds I was eating were the funny parts, and then they were coated with a searing wave of serious, yet heart-lifting booze. A perfect combination.  This movie made me realize that the bad parts of life are really the good parts, and that the strange, off-kilter oddball can be as important  to you as the responsible family man.   Just when I thought the comedy had gone too far, the action played the part of the mediator and brought the drama back to the party where it had been sulking in the corner.  We all laughed and groaned and hid our budding tears with gusto, and so did everyone else in the room.  That's why we see movies in the theater, right?   Who wants to pretend they aren't crying in a pre-fab living room with a 52 inch plasma tv and surround sound with a bunch of friends around when you are watching a comedy?
     Not me.