We actually celebrated K.T.'s birthday on Saturday. Two of the five players in K.T.'s Heroes game couldn't make it, so we scrapped the game and just concentrated on the birthday. Since we weren't gaming, the Other Matt and his friend Glen came over. After she'd opened her presents, we went to this little fair that had set up shop in a parking lot downtown. Matt O. and Glen didn't actually ride any rides - we wondered why they'd even bothered to come with us - but the rest of us had a great time.
As we were driving to the fair, K.T. was sounding me out on what kinds of rides I would get on - I'm pretty well known in our group for being a huge wimp when it comes to rides, and I explained that I don't get on rides that involve the sensation of falling. As we walked from the car toward the fair, I pointed at the kiddie-coaster on one edge and said, "Now that's my idea of a roller coaster!" It had no steep drops, just whirled around in tight circles. The whole thing was maybe twenty-five feet high. So we bought a bunch of tickets and got in line.
The fair wasn't crowded - we never got on a ride that had more than five or so other people on it with us. On the kiddie coaster with us were a bunch of, well, kids. The operator hit the button, and the cars rumbled along the track. I giggled like a madman, because that's what I do on fast-moving rides. After a single circuit of the track, we came to a stop. I felt cheated - we'd paid three tickets (which is to say, almost three dollars) for a single circuit?
But the operator went to the first car and unlocked a little girl who was crying in terror, then led her carefully over to the edge of the platform where her father was waiting. He handed the girl's three tickets back to the father, and I watched sympathetically as the father carried the little girl down the platform stairs and they turned around to watch her brothers. Poor tyke - when the ride started back up, she started to panic again, but we were moving too much for me to keep watching her. We got another six or so circuits of the track.
K.T. wanted to ride the Ferris wheel more than anything else, so after we finished the kiddie coaster, we went straight there. From our cart, we waved frenetically to Matt O. and Glen, who were eating greasy fair food and pretending they didn't know us. We continued to wave more and more enthusiastically until they finally gave us a desultory acknowledgement, and then we just watched the scenery.
We went from the Ferris wheel to a ride that was a new take on the swings - you know, the motorized swings that go around in a circle? This was set up to look sortof like a hang glider, and you laid on your stomach in a cradle instead of sitting in a swing. It was a lot of fun, but I was pretty dizzy when we got off - the way I'd had to hold my head meant I couldn't focus on Kevin in front of me and had to watch the ground sliding by the whole way.
We were running out of tickets swiftly, so we walked the rest of the way around the fair, smirking at the games and trying to decide what other rides we wanted. After some discussion, we decided on two more rides, and sent Kevin with some money to get another bunch of tickets. Both the other rides made me so dizzy I was almost sick to my stomach, but they were fun anyway. I spent most of the afternoon giggling like an idiot.
After we'd finished, we walked back over to a little patch of grass on the edge of the fair and I laid down to settle my stomach while K.T. and Kevin went to ride the merry-go-round. After they got off, I saw K.T. give our last single ticket (you couldn't do anything with only a single ticket) to a lady with a little kid who was just arriving. Then we went in search of food.
I'd actually been looking forward to the food - I like funnel cakes and corn dogs - but I was still feeling pretty wobbly, so I just bought a little cotton candy and a soda. Of course, it turned out that part of the reason I was recovering so slowly was that I hadn't eaten since breakfast, so the soda settled me considerably. But by then everyone else was mostly done, so I didn't bother. I did buy another bag of cotton candy to take home - they were making it fresh on-site, which is pretty rare.
Matt wandered over with his hot dog. "You know that basketball game right over by the cotton candy stand?" he asked.
We could see it from where we were sitting. "Yeah."
"Have you looked at it from the side?" We hadn't. "You should. It's quite educational."
So we strolled over. It was a pretty typical game - shoot baskets to win prizes. I couldn't tell what Matt was talking about untill I was all the way on the side, looking at the baskets through the mesh sides of the stall. The baskets had been squished - from the front, they were as wide as a normal basketball hoop, but were only half as deep! I'm fairly certain a normal-sized basketball wouldn't be able to drop through one of those hoops. We laughed, grateful that we'd passed on the games.
Shortly after, we left the fair and went back to K.T. and Kevin's apartment, where we had some birthday cake, and then decided to go catch Toy Story 2 at the two-dollar theater.
By that time, my stomach was recovered, so Matt and I split a popcorn while we watched the movie, which was just as much fun the second time around. (I loved all the Star Wars cracks!)
About a third of the way into the movie, there's a scene where the team of toys on the mission to rescue Woody stomps through some bushes. K.T., who was sitting next to me, leaned over and said, "Did you see that?"
"What?"
"I saw Heimlich! The caterpillar thingy from Bug's Life! He was on that leaf right before they came through!"
I hadn't seen anything, but I didn't doubt her; Disney likes to slip little things like that into their movies. I chuckled and told myself I'd have to watch for it when it came out on video.
I was especially waiting for the end of the movie, because when we'd seen the movie the first time through, it had been just before they'd released the "outtakes" for the credits, so we hadn't seen them. The outtakes were pretty funny, and included a short bit of Heimlich talking to Flik! K.T. laughed and said she was glad she'd said something to me during the movie, because if she'd waited until after we'd seen the outtakes, we'd never have believed her.
We went back to their apartment and hung out for a while. We had a drink or two, and Kevin suggested watching the Mummy, which he'd given K.T. on DVD as a birthday present. But it was already after 10, so I proposed just watching the "Making of" feature instead. That was interesting, if somewhat sloppily edited (they must have told us about forty times that they didn't just want a guy in bandages!) and after it was over, Matt and I went home.
The rest of our weekend was pretty relaxed. We ate Easter candy and read and watched TV and goofed around on the computer.
All in all, it was a pretty darn good weekend.
My week promises to be pretty quiet. Most of my section of the office is out at a trade show, and I'm waiting on some hardware before I can actually do any real work on my current project, so I made sure to bring a book to work with me today. If you catch me on IM this week (LizLBrooks) feel free to say hi!
Word of the Day: pratfall - a humiliating mishap or blunder
Comedy words are interesting, don't you think? Pratfall, spittake, double-take... None of these are uniquely reserved for comedy, but because of their exaggerated feel, we think of comedy.
Or maybe it's just me.
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