Movie Night

It was just another Tuesday night in The Lyons Din, and there was nothing on TV -- even though I get more than 900 channels through our local cable company and an infinite number of others through Netflix.

It's summer and, these days, it's all reruns and reality shows an, on this day, post-game coverage of The Trial of the Century (that didn't go the way most people thought it would.) I was tired of the screaming coming out of the talking heads. 

"Can we rent a movie?" daughter asks.

"Sure. Why not?" I reply.

"Can I make popcorn?"

"Sure. Why not?"

So she heads to the kitchen while I grab the remote and hit the "In Demand" button. Then "Movies," then "A to Z."  I start scrolling.

... and scrolling...

... and scrolling...

Finally I find one that is age appropriate that I think we all might like.  I hit the "Preview" button.  Together we watch the trailer, or, basically a 3-minute version of the movie.  It's like a video Cliff's Notes. It looks pretty good to me.

"Nah," daughter says, munching her popcorn

I scroll some more.

...and some more....

...and some more ...

A little faster past some of the titles.

I find another possibility and hit the "Preview" button again. We watch another 3-minute movie, er, preview. It's cute, but I'm hoping she says ...

"Nah."

So I scroll some more...

...and some more...

...and some more...

And hit the "Preview" button again....

We're about to watch another 3-minute movie, er, preview when the phone rings.  The Coach is being called by another coach who is asking about a player.  I hit the "Pause" button and we sit, eat popcorn and eavesdrop.  We have to Google the player's dad to find his phone number. The Coach calls The Player and then calls the coach. They've never heard of conference calling.

30 minutes later I hit, "Resume."  Three minutes later she says, "Nah."

By now, a good hour has passed and all we've seen is a whole bunch of strange movie titles and about half-a-dozen movie previews. And the popcorn has been eaten.

"Just forget it," she says.

So much for Movie Night.