The Things We Do For Our Kids

When I was 15 there was no way in the world that my mother would have (a) let me stay up until 3:00 in the morning on a school night or (b) waited in line for hours to get into a movie. Times have changed and I feel like the kids these days have so much more power over their parents and I am guilty of letting it happen!

Never the less, after reading the book 4 times (all 4 of them in the series 4 times each in fact), I knew Haley would not be able to wait until this afternoon to see Twilight - not that she gave me an option. Was it all worth it? Not sure, Haley was pretty darn disappointed last night when we got back out to the car at 2:58am.

We bought tickets back a the beginning of November. At the time we purchased them, the theater was offering 5 showings - 4 at 12:01 and because those had sold out, they opened up a 12:30 showing. That is the one we got tickets to. So Haley and her cousin Rachael decided at about 8:30 last night that we should head to the theater because they knew there would be a line. We have done this before for Pirates and Harry Potter and there are people who line up pretty early. So we go there at 8:40 or so and the line was already around the side of the building. I guess people had started lining up at 6 - CRAZY.

All 3 local news crews were there and it was quite cold and windy. The manager of the theater walked by and I was able to grab her and ask her what the plan was. She said as the previous movies ended and they emptied the individual theaters, she would begin calling out theater numbers and lining them up 1 at a time and let those people into their proper theater. Little did I know at the time, but they had opened 7 additional 12:30 showings - hence the giant lines!

So at about 9:30 the anchor lady from the Local News 8 crew came over and told Haley and Rachael the she wanted to interview them in a few minutes if they were still in line. They had been trying to get on camera all night. Of course, not 2 minutes later they called our theater number so we had to go inside.

What a waste of time that was. We were in there by 9:45 with about 30 other people, all alone with this cheesy music/news ad that was on about a 15 minute loop. We must have heard it 10 times before the previews finally started. So the theater is basically empty until 11:00 when all of the smart people (who probably waited at home and took a nap) started showing up. They, of course, would have been able to walk right into the theater (since the line did not exist any more because all 12 showings had been seated at this point) and grab a seat. It did make me a bit angry when the really late people started showing up around midnight and expected everyone to move around so they could sit together. Get there early like the rest of us and be torchured by the stupid music/news loop if you want to be able to pick your seat!

So at about 12:40 when the previews still had not started, the manager came in with a mega phone. I thought, oh crap - if there is something wrong with this movies projector and they make us move to another theater I will be so mad. We always sit in the very top row, right in the middle in every movie we go see - that way no one can kick the back of our chairs. If they were going to make us move, we would be the last ones out of the theater and would have the crappiest seats in a new theater. Luckily, that was not the announcement. She said that they were having a bit of trouble with the film. Because they had so many showings, they were having to string the film across all 8 projectors and it had broken a few times. Sure enough, if you looked up into that little projection room, you could see the film coming into our projector from across the room and heading out to another projector. I had no idea they could do that.

Finally at about 12:45 the previews started - the whole theater erupted with applause. At this point, I was really wondering how I was going to stay awake. I was more worried about how Dave was going to stay awake since he usually falls asleep during movies that start at 7. Poor Reagan was just about asleep. Haley and Rachael had both taken little cat naps and were now wide awake - much too excited to even think of sleeping.

So how was it? Well there were obviously differing opinions. I really enjoyed it. I have read the book (only once mind you), and thought they did a pretty good job with the movie. Now maybe it wasn't exact - but do movies EVER follow the books exactly? The movie Running Man comes to my mind. I was a huge Stephen King fan growing up. The Running Man was one of my favorites. Absolutely loved it. When they announced a movie for it, I was thrilled! Unfortunately, the book and the movie had almost NOTHING in common. I was so disappointed after I saw the movie, that I stopped even try to see movies based on books. I just knew they would be ruined.

Haley, on the other hand, was pretty mad. I am not sure what she did not like since she went straight into bed when we got home and woke up by herself this morning and left for school before I was awake. Rachael had mixed feelings. She said on the way home last night that there were things she liked and did not like about it. She was totally infatuated with the actor that played Edward Cullen (Haley thought they should have cast someone else) so that may be why she liked it more than Haley. Hopefully, Haley's disappointment at the movie and her huge lack of sleep (besides the fact that she is a normal, somewhat hormonal teenager) will not cause her to be completely unbearable this afternoon!

As I said, the things we as parents put ourselves through for our kids is ridiculous - when did the kids start to rule the world?