Cartoon Motion

So I think I still have the mind of a seven year old.

Maybe that's why I still love Hello Kitty and I still thrill a bit and feel the need to bolt when I hear the ice cream truck coming down the street and can remember every word to the theme song from the Gummy Bear, and cry at The Goonies (every single freaking time).

"This is OUR time!! These are OUR wishes!!"

I became aware of this on Tuesday this week when I went down to Seal Beach to visit my dahling friend Molly. We had been planning birthday festivities for weeks and weeks and I finally made it down there to go see Mamma Mia and dine and all that fun stuff.

Now lemme 'asplain a bit about Seal Beach in case you haven't ever been there before:

Seal Beach is awesome. Probably my favorite beach community in Los Angeles/OC. It's this little strip of city nestled right in between Huntington Beach and Long Beach and its really really unique. It's small, quiet and unassuming. Everything closes up at about 10 and the average age of a resident is like 55. Ok - so its an unofficial retirement community, but its the beach and rents are low and Molly is brilliant for moving there. Its kind of the beach town time forgot. People actually stop and chat with each other downtown. Downtown consists of a strip of stores about 4 blocks long that dead ends into the pier and they're all little places like "O'Mally's Irish Pub" and the hippie produce store. It's wonderful and old school and I just adore it.

So Mamma Mia had been a movie Molly and I had been trying to see forever and it was playing at the singular movie theater down there along with The Maltese Falcon (Yes. This place is that cool). But this theater was still the 1920's singular screen, singular house, movie theater with a stage kind of movie house. But not all glammed up like The El Capitan or The Chinese. It showed its age. Nothing was automated about this place. Our tickets were those Costco raffle tickets sold to us from a person speaking through a hole in a window, not a speaker. Every door handle and inch of paint showed its age and, lemme tell ya, it was tired. I didn't know it was a single house theater so I walked in and there were two doors, one on either side of the singular refreshment stand and was only set back about 2' from the outside door. I asked which theater it was and the very annoyed and pierced refreshment girl just said "Take your pick."

Once we settled in the very not stadium seating I took a look around. There were these attempts at modernizing on the walls of the theater that looked somewhat like a drunk 70's housewife's vision of modernism but not enough for every panel in the house, but that gave us a fantastic view of the fabric panelling that I'm positive probably saw Eisenhower win and Kennedy get shot.

Needless to say - I was instantly in love with the place. There was a covered organ off to the side of the stage with a good amount of dust on the cover and the remains of a basketball hoop above it.

It was awesome. AND we were the only ones in the theater for a long time. It was only 8 at night and as I was looking around and drinking in this rare authentic and honest establishment my stream of consciousness went a bit like this:

Oh man!!!! OhManOhManOhManOhManOhManOhManOhManOhManOhManOhMan. This place is awesome. Lookiet that!!! andthatandthatandthatandthatandthatandthatandthatandthat. I don't know why that girl looked so annoyed to work here. We are the only ones here and that ever super cooler!!!!!! Man. This place is old. I wonder whats happened here. How many people have made out in this seat?! And in how many decades! I bet they wore 3D glasses at one time too here. I bet a lot of things have happened here.

Then my glances of the place started going from wonder to slightly paranoid suspicion...

You know - old quiet places like this have histories. Kind of like old people. But quieter. ANd without so many medical needs. What if someone was killed here?! What if it happened right there on the corner of the stage??! Like what if he hit his head on the corner mid sentence and never got to finish what he was saying and now hes still here trying to finish his thought???!!! What if he comes out in the middle of the movie and we're the only ones in here??! Its going to be dark soon and this is a big room. What would I do? I think this is how scary movies start. Old movie house, only people there....

And right then this guy comes in the door. Like, there is no noise whatsoever in the room, Molly and I are talking and stuff but there are no previews, no other people, not even the sound of traffic is drifting in. Mostly because there is no traffic, but that's not my point. My point is a door opening might as well have been an atomic bomb. He was a young fit very straight looking dude. By himself. In a leather jacket. Going to go see Mamma Mia. On a Tuesday night. In Seal Beach. And he sat in the back right by the door. So it was us and Guido in the theater. Just us 3.

Oh man. Is he lost? What on earth is a guy like that doing here. Maybe hes European. European straight guys have license to like ABBA and leather jackets at the same time. Yeah, that's it. Hes not a rapist or anything. Nope. Not at all....

So the then movie started and everything was totally fine. No scary murdering rapist, no apparitions of any kind. Just wholesome awesome ABBA wonderfulness.

So yeah - my little brain managed to turn a simple movie outing into an episode of Scooby Doo in vast expanse of - oh - about 3 seconds.

So there you have it, a snap shot into my crepe papered, My Little Pony adorned interior.

But seriously, I want to go see the Maltese Falcon there. Whose in?