Daybreak Ain't No Time for Gullibility

Talk about your unlikely double feature after eating a musician's pie...

For those of us who've been eagerly following the dough-making journey of a certain local percussionist for months, the payoff finally arrived last Thursday when he announced to the Facebook world, "It happens tomorrow! Come and kick my ass! Please!"

"It" was the pizza-making operation at the new Galley Market and the photo he posted showed stacks and stacks of pizza boxes, so, sure, I was curious, although southside isn't exactly part of my regular rotation. Then he posted a picture of his Bianca pizza with house Mozzarella, Gorgonzola, Parmesan, garlic, black pepper and olive oil and I couldn't schedule a time to get over there soon enough.

As it happened, tonight I was headed to southside for the final installment of the International Film Series and what could be more perfect than pie to sustain me through two movies?

After ordering from the cashier, I nabbed a stool at the counter to wait for my Bianca to emerge from the oven. To kill time, I picked up the Richmond Times Disgrace laying on the counter only to see some editorial adjustments to a front page article.

A headline that read, "Should Virginia Decriminalize Marijuana in Certain Cases?" had been altered to read, "Should Virginia Decriminalize Marijuana in All Cases?" with the word "YES!" scribbled at the end of the question. No, tell us how you really feel.

I glanced at my horoscope for today - "Gemini, gullibility will be your downfall"- and decided I didn't need to to be told the obvious yet again. Fortunately, my pie arrived and I have to say, Giustino knows how to make a damn good pie: the crust was as satisfyingly chewy as a good baguette and the cheeses were portioned exactly right with just a hint of Gorgonzola on the finish.

Oh, great, now I'm going to have to drive to southside for really excellent pizza.

I only had to drive back to Westover Hills to see the black and white 1955 film, "Death of a Cyclist," which, being mid-century Spanish (and directed/written by Javier Bardem's uncle), managed to roll adultery, a hit and run, a grading scandal at university and a whole lot of metaphors about Franco and the hollowness of war - with a lot of moody Hitchcockian cinematography and a dash or two of film noir tropes - into a completely engrossing realist film about guilt and class.

Of course, in 1955, there was no getting away with misdeeds without punishment, so our adulterers and murderers paid the ultimate price (with a solid dose of Catholicism for good measure) for breaking multiple commandments.

But woman does not live by pizza and realism alone, so I wound up at the Byrd Theatre standing in line outside waiting for the theater to clear and freezing while doing it. Around me, fools in short sleeves shivered visibly.

The first distraction was the organizers of tonight's event coming by to give everyone a raffle ticket for a chance to win a free ticket to see John Waters when he comes to the Byrd to do his Christmas show.

Then there were the inane conversations I had no choice but to overhear. In front of me were two people arguing whether mushrooms counted as a veggie or a fungus, a disagreement they gave up only when she mentioned she was wearing a Dad sweater for warmth.

"It's a nice sweater, so why isn't your Dad still wearing it?" the bearded one inquired of the "Cosby" show-era relic. "Cause it's from the '80s and you don't get to wear it in the '80s and still wear it," she explained matter-of-factly. "So only 20-somethings can wear Dad sweaters now?" he wondered. "Right. He's 65, so he can't wear this," she proclaimed, ending the conversation.

You can only imagine how glad I was that the line began moving to go inside. Soon I was comfortably ensconced in one of the new seats for a black comedy crime film courtesy of Movie Club Richmond's screening of the John Waters classic, "Serial Mom."

Next to me was a young woman who recently moved here from Alabama and had come to see her second John Waters movie, "Crybaby" having been the first. I advised her to go back further in his catalog and see what John Waters' films were like before he rated Hollywood stars and bigger budgets.

When it came time to pull raffle tickets, manager Todd strolled up the aisle to get a patron to pull one out of the popcorn bucket. "I know exactly who I can ask to do it," he said, heading directly to me. It was probably a good thing that I didn't pull my own number.

I hadn't seen "Serial Mom" since it came out in 1994, so while I recalled the basic premise, I'd forgotten just how graphic and dark it was when bodies began stacking up almost from the movie's beginning. I know for sure that the quintet sitting behind me weren't prepared for such a black comedy as they continually commented on what was happening as if they couldn't quite believe their eyes.

My guess is they hadn't even seen "Crybaby."

One thing that occurred to me as the saga unfolded was how dated some of the references were, to the point that many millennials probably didn't get them at all. Richard Speck? Premiere magazine? Jason Priestly? Franklin Mint? Did they even recognize the Barry Manilow song "Daybreak?"

And you should have heard the groans when a character at the video store said how much she liked Bill Cosby's funny films. Way too soon.

But I have to admit I wasn't without knowledge myself. When I first saw the movie, I'd only just barely learned who L7 was, so I got a kick out of seeing them perform as Camel Lips during the raucous club scene.

Perhaps most interestingly of all, unlike the Spanish realism I'd enjoyed earlier, this was a movie with a psychotic central character, much use of the "pussy" word and no retribution for bad behavior whatsoever.

Sort of reminded me of our current administration. Leave it to John Waters to predict the future.

What's the Rumpus?

My Friday night immersion was immediate.

Make no mistake, I could have happily stayed on in my oceanfront room, serenaded by the sound of the waves and listening to stories of growing up on the Outer Banks from the '50s.

How else would I have heard about the "Toot & Tell It," a shabby building just after the right turn off the bridge into Manteo? Let's just say that whatever they were toting to you after you tooted may or may not have been legal.

I'd have loved a few more six-mile beach walks (nearly to the Nags Head Pier from the 15 mile post) with a man who also enjoys an enthusiastic excursion and a few more days of air-drying my bathing suits on the fat wooden dowel over the sliding door to the deck beach bum-style.

It would be greedy to wish for another Chablis-fueled dinner at Steamers, a meal that began with a course requiring an oyster fork, was followed by one necessitating a lobster fork and closed out the evening with a dessert fork.

Goodness knows I'm all about staying up 'till 1 a.m. chatting on the middle deck to candlelight about the connection between "Star Trek" and military service, about how I'll eventually fall into an art installation and not be able to get up and other nonsensical topics.

But eventually life calls, so late in the afternoon, I took one last outdoor shower, packed up and hit the road, determined to make it back for a screening of "Miller's Crossing" at Hardywood, a worthy goal, but one that got temporarily side-tracked when I stopped at Frog Island Seafood for dinner.

So between my late start, my need to feed and my refusal to speed, it turned out that I had not allowed quite enough time to make the Coen Brothers classic without going straight to Hardywood.

This is the point at which you consider that you're dressed more for leaving the beach and a road trip than for going to a screening, but it's too late to do anything but try to root through the used clothing and multiple wet bathing suits in your beach/overnight bag in an attempt to look less like you just stepped off the beach.

The good news is it was dark when I arrived, just as author Tom Dehaven began his scholarly and occasionally rambling introduction to the film and the guy at the front table checked me in, informing me I'd won one of the raffle prizes before even arriving.

My beach casual flew under the radar as I slid into a back seat, eager to take in Dehaven's wealth of film knowledge. Not so everyone. I watched as millennials some people in the audience began squirming or focusing their attention on their phones, completely uninterested in learning anything about the film before seeing it.

Or after, probably, either.

For me, the intro was fascinating because I'd never seen "Miller's Crossing" and, to tell the truth, 1990 was a good while ago and I didn't have a lot of memories of it, so when he began going over source material, scene-by-scene rip-offs, homage explanations and the like, I felt like I'd hit the nerd jackpot.

Like a good film professor, he talked about what the Coens had "swiped" from whom (the plot from one novel, the characters from another), how the entire film paid tribute to gangster films and admonished us to pay attention to sound design, as if we could have missed it when every drip or door closing sounded like it happened directly next to us.

He explained that curtains blowing in the breeze referenced earlier films and signified sex had taken place. Fittingly, when the curtains onscreen began blowing gently, so did the breeze in the Hardywood parking lot.

Following in the grand tradition of Smell-o-vision, this was Wind-o-vision, twice with train whistles to boot.

Even without his protracted explanation, it would've been tough to miss how deeply indebted to classic Hollywood it was with such telling details as a fight poster with the name "Lars Thorwald" from "Rear Window" on it, no doubt a genuflection at the foot of Hitchcock.

Sitting outdoors watching the 26-year old movie in beach clothes felt a little surreal - but hello, it's also the Coen brothers - given that I'd left the ocean and wound up at the brewery only to find myself a winner in absentia of two books from Chop Suey.

As I was just saying the other night, why shouldn't I be happy all the time? Life is good.

Mysteries of Love

Remember that day in 2010 when I went to see "Blue Velvet" at Capital Ale House and they'd canceled it in favor of National Beer Day?

Yea, neither do I, but it happened. My blog says so and it never lies.

So with Movie Club Richmond's screening of David Lynch's masterpiece in my sights again as the kickoff to the Great Southern (Richmond's second annual Twin Peaks Festival), I made a date that would eventually include the movie that inspired the oddball TV series.

So let's call it a teachable moment, shall we?

Contemplating dinner choices first, I suggested the new Peter Chang's in Scott's Addition (the space a huge improvement over that strip mall monstrosity in the West End) and to my date's surprise, it was not only open but barely occupied when we slid into bar stools at the empty bar and said hello to a familiar face behind it.

Score one for me.

Of course everything was stellar and most was Szechuan-hot - the deep-fried pork belly, the salmon-stuffed cucumber "boats," the duck rolls with barbecue sauce  - with the exception being the shrimp dumplings, which my date appropriately described as "bland and delicious" and I categorized as the ideal palate cleanser between courses for our increasingly fiery mouths.

By the time we finished all that and our Vinho Verde, the place had filled up nicely and we could fully appreciate what an opportune moment it had been that we arrived before the rush.

Stop #2 was a farewell of sorts because Secco closes in two weeks and since I'd made the drapes (and love the variety of by-the-glass wine options), I have a decided affinity for the place. In a lovely example of stranger kindness, five people at the bar immediately slid down a stool so that we could have two seats together to enjoy a glass of Austrian Rose and a cheese plate.

Seeing "Blue Velvet" at Strange Matter (who didn't let me down, unlike Capital Ale House had) couldn't have been any stranger than the film itself, none of which I remembered from having seen it 30 years ago. I mean none of it.

But it wasn't just me because my date had seen it multiple times and he didn't recall much more, so I didn't feel too bad.

What I did notice was how leisurely the film's pacing was (whether or not that was entirely intentional or a function of it being 1988, I'm not entirely certain), which had to be grueling for some of the younger members of the audience with their reduced attention spans, but also how completely strange it must have seemed for the time (not that everything about the Reagan years wasn't weird as all get out).

Post-film research yielded the fact that the movie's setting, Lumberton, USA (where it's always a sunny, woodsy day), is a real place in North Carolina.

Movie Club had even arranged for a show after the screening, so while the bands got set up, we headed up the block to Ipanema for snackage, scoring the timeless grilled Gouda sandwich and a slice of Mexican chocolate pie to fill in the cracks left by eating Chinese food earlier.

Or at least, that was my date's rationale. I just wanted dessert.

Ipanema, too, was getting set up for live music but we relocated to Strange Matter before it began, unable to be in two places at one time. The problem was, we'd dithered so long at Ipanema, we'd missed the first band, Christi, a shame because I really enjoy their sound.

We did catch Lady God's set - admiring bassist Chrissie's gorgeous instrument  - delivered to a particularly small crowd, which was hardly a surprise given that it's been a deader than usual weekend. Is everyone on vacation or at the river or does it just seem that way?

One of the few familiar faces was a fellow music-lover and his date Karen, just back from a weekend away and looking for some last minute Sunday entertainment. Chatting revealed that, unlike us, they'd caught Christi but had missed the 1986 film.

"Wow, that must have been something to see after all these years," my friend mused. "Was it still really weird?"

Well, sure, but that was the whole appeal. More importantly, it didn't get pre-empted for beer, and after six years of waiting that's enough right there.

Strange? "That's a human ear, all right." Yes, yes it was.

Not If You Were the Last Librarian on Earth

It was a night for helplessly hoping, but then aren't they all?

A friend called while I was out, his words barely audible over the Crosby, Stills and Nash box set that's booming in the background. When I return the call, he brings me halfway up to speed on the Nash/Crosby fuel I didn't even know was happening.

Google it, he says, suggesting the 21st century answer to everything.

Walking in to see the 2004 Sundance Festival Documentary Grand Jury Prize winner, the booker looks at me and says, "What're you doing here? I thought I banned you." He's kidding, of course, and we move on to movies that should be shown in public places, with him suggesting "Harold and Maude" and "Being There," two of his favorites

As a fan of strangers and the dark, I assure him I'd attend both.

A friend suggests we meet up and do something fun, something I enjoy. When I tell him I enjoy dancing on a concrete floor for three to four hours watching bands exactly like I did last night but question his interest in doing the same, he comes clean.

"I guess it would depend on the show but, yes, standing 3-4 hours would require me to make a real commitment."

To what, I wonder, having a good time?

"Happy birthday!" a friend messages me. I remind him it's Monday but allow as how he's probably too busy smooching his new squeeze to notice such details.

"I thought I put it in my calendar last year, but no," he writes. "I have missed you this week, even with my new hectic schedule of thinking about her all the time."

I would never find fault with a man who can't stop mooning over his love.

As the film is about to start, a friend tells me his story of seeing "Dig!" in Holland over a decade ago. "We watched part of the movie, then they announced it was intermission and to go get beer." Sounds like a perfectly reasonable request.

"I got curry," he said, still sounding surprised at the idea of intermission curry. "And high."

Well, it was Holland.

The best pre and post-film discussion came from a 29-year old who sat down near me and immediately asked if I'd seen the film before. I hadn't but he had years ago and he was eager to see if his impressions of it had changed since that first viewing.

What struck me about our in-depth conversation on the subject was how much he identified with the '90s ("I'm mildly obsessed with that era"), despite having been born near the end of the '80s (what he referred to as "the plastic era").

"I can't understand how a band like Matchbox 20 were ever big," he mused. None of us could, friend. I have to say, I can't recall the last time a stranger wanted to discuss Sugar Ray, Third Eye Blind and Tonic with me.

More to the heart of the movie, afterwards we discussed whether the Brian Jonestown Massacre and the Dandy Warhols truly mattered musically. When I got up to leave, another familiar face wanted to chat about the same thing. Was either band talented? On the way out, a third brought it up.

Now that's a provocative film.

Today a friend sent me a birthday present, a t-shirt which reads, "I'm a librarian. That means I live in a crazy fantasy world with unrealistic expectations. Thank you for understanding."

Not that I'm complaining about a gift, but far better if instead of "librarian," it said, "I'm a reader" or even "I'm a Gemini," so the first statement would be as true as the second.

I want to be perfectly clear on my commitment to unrealistic expectations.

Woman's Animal Nature Triumphs Again

If there was one thing I wasn't going to do tonight, it was go to the Elbys.

I'd made it known back when the 2016 announcement was made that this year's event was a no-go for me. My objections were twofold: primarily the sameness of the nominees (besides best new restaurant, who cares about the same old, same old?) and secondarily, the theme: Elbys en Blanc.

As the owner of a vintage shop put it succinctly, "I am not dressing this ass and these hips in white."

Nor was I. Sure, I'd attended the past four Elbys, but I was over it.

Happily for me, this opened me up to all kinds of Sunday night fun that did not involve restaurant worship.

With a light rain falling, I walked over to Quirk Hotel to hear actress/poet Amber Tamblyn read from her latest book of poetry, "Dark Sparkler." It was common knowledge that the only reason she was reading in Richmond was because her husband, comedian David Cross, is performing at CenterStage tonight.

Whatever the reason, I got myself to Quirk Gallery where arrivals were being told we could score a drink at Maple & Pine's bar and bring it into the reading.

At the bar, I ran into a dapperly dressed gentleman in a white linen suit who - wouldn't you know - informed me that he only looked that way because he was going to the Elbys because Maple & Pine was nominated for best new restaurant.

After we'd both gotten our drinks - my Ms. Genevieve of Aperol, elderflower liqueur and Prosecco was prettier than his julep, I thought - we adjourned to the gallery and took seats to chat.

I wanted nothing more than the scoop on the upcoming rooftop deck (got it), although we dipped into the subject of Amber, whom he also knew from "House" and "Two and a Half Men," while all I knew was her father, Russ Tamblyn, the outstanding dancer I'd first seen in "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" and later in "West Side Story."

Amber arrived, beer in hand, to applause, said, "I love doing readings where there's a bar attached," and dove right into the reading of poetry about the lives and deaths of young actresses.

The first, "Actress" read like a casting call with specific qualifications - "small bust preferred, not taller than 5'5", good teeth, lean but not gaunt, no brown eyes" - and finished with the clincher: "Not a speaking part."

All of her poems examined not just the women's lives and deaths but the commodification of women in Hollywood ("I suppose you're detecting a theme"). "I want to go down on your cliche," she writes in "Jane Doe, along with, "And wrestle the Ayn Rand impersonator for her flask," noting in an aside, "I did that once."

How can you not want to hear from a woman who wrestled an Ayn Rand impersonator for anything? Who writes, "I will never have the knees of Bardot?"

Midway through the reading, a white-suited man, clad exactly like the one next to me, walked past the window down Broad Street, undoubtedly on his way to the Elbys.

Wordplay was a constant - serial kisser and serial cereal eater - as in her list of fake actress names such as Ivory Sopra and Iwanna Oscar.

Toward the end, she surprised us with a love poem which included my favorite line of the evening, "Someone who needs the way you kiss, the way you graze on a lip." Lovely.

During the Q & A, someone teased her about drinking a Heineken instead of one of our local craft brews and then asked about the poem, "Marilyn Monroe," which is titled, but has no words. As Amber flipped through the book to find the poem, the woman said, "Page 27."

Amber beamed. "You know we're definitely making out after this." I liked her quick wit.

It wasn't just that I'd finished my cocktail, I was sorry when the reading ended because it had been too long since I'd had poetry read to me. But I was on to another adventure so I wished my seatmate an Elbys win and left for Strange Matter.

Because last month was the 50th anniversary, Movie Club Richmond was showing the 1966 Bond spoof, "Our Man Flint," and I hoped to eat before the action started. My Blastoff, a BLT with avocado on rye, and mountain of fries was history by the time the lights went down.

I'm happy to say it was everything I adore about a '60s movie: overly saturated colors (Cinemascope, no doubt), a girl with a blond bouffant and a giant daisy in her hair, go-go dancers, computers the size of a gymnasium with zillions of punch cards and, of course, sexism galore ("How often woman's animal nature triumphs!").

The recurring joke is that Flint's secret code is based on a mathematical progression, 40-26-36. He also excels at everything he does - judo, fencing, cooking, saving lives, saving the world. He even teaches ballet classes...to the Russians, no less.

It was a Cold War classic with everything from anti-American eagles who only attack Americans ("It's diabolical!") to bad acronyms (ZOWIE) and a red hotline phone to the commander-in-chief (who sounded a lot like LBJ).

There was so much to laugh out loud about.

Flint plays both sides of the fence, taking the time to de-program women who have been brainwashed by the bad guys to be nothing but "pleasure units," but also with a staff of four pretty women to shave him, choose his clothes, manage his finances and dance with him when they all go to the club together.

Sounds pretty pleasurable to me, sort of like tonight's choice of movie.

Conveniently for me, there was a synth-pop show following the screening, so I could have parked once and partied twice, except I'd walked over. As a friend and I discussed between sets, synthpop is hard to find in Richmond, a shame for those of us devoted to the genre.

First up was Dazeases, the one-woman project that I'd come to see. Singer London came onstage in a cream sweater and plaid skirt to do her soundcheck and then removed the skirt to do a set so mind-blowing no one could have been prepared for it.

With a big voice, incredibly personal and emotional lyrics and a way of dancing/prowling the stage that ensured no one took their eyes off her, she hit play on an unseen laptop and music she'd recorded accompanied her as she sang in the dark room with only a few spotlights on her.

It was mesmerizing.

From "Possession" to "S'mores on the Hellfire," where she sang, "I will keep you warm when no one else will," her big voice made every song sound as if her life depended on it.

And yet, it was all very dancey and the small crowd obliged, moving constantly, although maybe not as sinuously or emotively as she did. So young, so raw and yet obviously so much potential.

Given that she was singing to her own prerecorded tracks, it could have come off like karaoke, but it didn't. Between the low lights and how completely she sold herself and her music, it was like watching the birth of something that's only going to get better.

Next came Raleigh's Band and the Beat, a husband and wife duo layering her vocals over lush synths and drum machines for a dreamgaze sound that would have been at home in '80s clubs (and my heart).

I especially enjoyed how he would get things going and start dancing enthusiastically in place as she sang before going back to knob-turning. If they weren't having a good time, they were giving a terrific approximation of it onstage.

Mine was better than a good time and best of all, didn't involve wearing white. The funny part is, I got home to a message from a friend: "Elbys weren't the same without you."

Oh, I bet they were.

Drinking It All In

There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. ~ Hamlet

I feel bad as I'm leaving the grocery store and a man approaches me smiling, pleased to run into me again, he says. I don't really recognize him but I don't not recognize him, either, if you know what I mean. Pausing to talk for a few minutes, we cover a lot of ground, ending with laughter.

As we're parting, a woman walking by says, "You two look well together," and he grins with pleasure.

But I'm feeling good when I get an e-mail from a friend with a night off and I invite her to join me in my plans for the evening. Not only is she willing, she offers to pick me up, a rare treat for me.

I'd chosen the new red-striped Boulevard Burgers and Brews, not for any other reason than I'm thrilled with the renovation of that long-ago hamburger stand. I was pretty much certain it would be mobbed (it was) and that we'd have to wait, not a problem since it had been months since we'd gotten together and there was lots to share.

While the music was plenty loud in the parking lot, the cacophony inside made hearing even a snippet of a song difficult and we had to repeat our name to the hostess several times before she heard it and put us on the list (wait time: 45 minutes).

As luck would have it, a single stool opened up at the bar, so we took it as our base of operation during the interim. She's just back from Isla Holbox in Mexico, full of stories (and photos) of the freshest of ceviche lunches, roads paved with sand rather than concrete, and nothing else to do but eat, drink and read.

My heathen ism aside, it sounds a little like heaven to me.

Jammed in as we were, it was inevitable that our neighbors would chat us up at some point. The couple to our left overheard us discussing movies and jumped in to highly recommend Tarantino's "The Hateful Eight" (at the same time warning us about the huge amount of violence) while her date nodded his agreement.

I have to admit, we were the ones who engaged the woman to our right (whose seat I was coveting) when she ordered one of the "adult" milkshakes, the Muddy Beaver, a long, tall glass of Kahlua, Frangelico and chocolate soft serve ice cream with a dark chocolate rim, a concoction she was having for dessert.

The boozy shake took me right back to my 20s in Washington, when I frequented Armand's in Tenleytown, partly for their fabulous deep dish pizza, but just as much for the obscenely alcoholic ice cream drinks they served. It had been decades since I'd thought about them.

Once she left, all was good as I commandeered her stool and we could finally order, in my case, an order of B3s (a recurring theme for the night) and a side of onion rings. My sliders came on sweet Hawaiian bread with sauteed onions, cheddar and secret sauce, while her Cali was festooned with kale, Granny Smith apples, avocado, tomato and apple preserves.

Watching the chaos in the room as we ate, I inquired of the bartender if it had been such a madhouse every moment since opening. Affirmative. "I'm just glad I'm not working the milkshake station," she said with real feeling. "I have nightmares about that." No doubt given the scores of both kid-friendly and adult shakes we saw go by.

It seemed like a bad idea to linger when people were still poring through the doors, so we settled up.

Fed and mostly up to date on each other's lives, we left for Hardywood and Movie Club Richmond's screening of "Strange Brew," a movie, I admit, I completely ignored in 1983 when it came out. In all likelihood, I was too busy drinking strawberry orgasms at Armand's.

I can also say with certainty that I have absolutely no recollection of it being a riff on "Hamlet."

We arrived in time to catch the end of Dirty Bourbon River Show's set, with my friend commenting that the lead singer looked like the strong man at the circus with his mustache and red tank top. "How often do you see a tuba in a band?" she asked of me. Let's see, every time I see No BS Brass band?

Looking around, she mentioned what a small town Richmond is, pointing out a couple her sister knows (and dislikes) and a woman wearing a sweater by an artisan she knows. It's tough to be sneaky in this town, that's for sure.

Once they cleared out and chairs were set up, we nabbed two in the front row, being short and all, and awaited the hilarity of a movie so intentionally bad it was good.

Movie Club's Andrew introduced "Strange Brew," a movie supposedly shot in 3B (that's 3 beers) as "a Canadian cult comic classic and my favorite adaptation of 'Hamlet," while its 1983 production ensured bad facial hair, jeans and glasses.

The setting? Elsinore Brewery, of course, where something is rotten.

Just as good were references to the era, such as, "The brewery business has become very competitive" and "Sounds like a British new wave band" about some odd screeching on a disc.

There was even a Star Wars joke - "He saw 'Jedi' 17 times" - and an intermission, or at least the words "intermission" on the screen briefly, causing some guys in the crowd, to yell, "What the hell? F*ck you!" in response to an intermission in a 90-minute film. That's just Canadian humor, kids.

And because it was SCTV, well Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas anyway, the film was rife with fart jokes, pee humor, steamrolling and hockey references, but their best may have been, "If I didn't have puke breath, I'd kiss you."

After Bob McKenzie puts out the fire at the insane asylum by peeing on it (he has, after all, drunk all the beer in a tank to save him and our heroine from drowning in it), my friend leans over and observes, "My nephews would have loved this. They're 8 and 10."

You don't have to like beer to like "Hamlet" in 3B.

When we get up to leave after the brothers have saved the world, a couple of guys approach us. "How'd you like your burgers?' they ask as casually as if they knew us. No recognition on my part. Turns out they were sitting at a nearby table at Boulevard Burgers, reason enough to chat.

Bad as my memory can be, the good news is, I'm memorable. Or at least thinking makes it so.

Thrill Me

You know how sometimes you get a feeling like someone is going to spring big news on you?

Apparently that was the friend I invited to lunch at Lucy's, who came convinced I was going to announce I was getting married. She was wrong, but the lunch was mighty good.

So was the dinner, but that was solo and at Bistro 27 where the new chef, an alum of Heritage, Rogue Gentlemen and Six Burner, has revamped the menu most appealingly.

This is very good news for me since it's within spitting distance of my apartment a neighborhood joint and I'm a big fan of eating.

I could have hit repeat on pan-seared fresh artichokes and pancetta with olive oil and baguette, or an even more unique starter, baguette slices spread with chocolate, orange liqueur, sea salt, orange zest and tarragon, both savored while observing costumed revelers shambling down Broad Street.

The bartender tried to impress me with his Halloween costume - the briefest of gym shorts, tube socks, a white boy 'fro wig and striped headband - which sounded suspiciously like a '70s basketball player. He seemed to expect me to be appalled, but I let him know I actually preferred shorter shorts on basketball players back in the day.

Michael Jordan ruined that for everyone, male and female, who likes men's legs.

You know how sometimes you need to appeal to your mind and not just your mouth?

My high culture came courtesy of the VMFA where they were showing "Enough to Live On: The Arts of the WPA" to a sold out crowd that was just a little long in the tooth.

And I'm not being judgmental. People who were alive when FDR was president were asked to raise their hands and it was a decent number of people.

They were the ones who'd had a president cool enough - never mind the cocktail and cigarette holder in hand in so many of his photographs - to say things like, "My administration will be remembered not for its relief but for its art."

Because I'm fascinated by that era when the government took on the responsibility of keeping artists employed during the worst depression in our country's history, this documentary was right up my alley.

Fact: Sometimes jobs for the sake of jobs is exactly what this country needs. Hello 2008.

Or, as someone dead said, how can a finished citizen be made in an artless world? It's stirring to learn that we were once a culture who though that the way to rebuild society after widespread financial ruin was through sharing the experience of art.

Forget amber waves of grain, I'm talking murals in post offices and libraries.

But of course, it wasn't just muralists. There was the Federal Theater Project and the Federal Music Project and my personal favorite, the Federal Writers' Project. Even when times are good, there's never any shortage of unemployed actors, musicians and writers, no?

I would have loved to have been part of the America Eats Project, chronicling regional cuisine. Or part of the oral history project that transcribed the memories of slaves and their children, who were rapidly dying out at that point.

The brilliance of the government sending out photographers to document the misery of subsistence farmers and the rural poor during the Dust Bowl years in order to determine how to best address the problem seems inconceivable now.

And you know what else does? The poster division of the Federal Art Project, all those nameless graphic artists who created the posters that conveyed messages to the American people and inspired them to action, to a collective purpose.

That kind of cultural uplifting is unthinkable in the 21st century, when we don't want our government telling us what to think or do.

By the time I walked out of there, I was inspired to learn more about the many facets of that era, to read more about the intricacies of how a creative class was kept afloat through a period that could have ended our country's artistic output.

So naturally I had to follow that with schlock, and not just any schlock, but an '80s homage to B movies, slasher films, zombie flicks and science fiction, all rolled into one big-haired, campy package.

And because Movie Club Richmond was showing it at Hardywood, I'd be watching it to the unappealing stench of hops.

The trade off was I ran into a favorite Beer Betty and thoroughly enjoyed commiserating over the gross incompetence of a shared idiot.

You know how sometimes you get a feeling that something you would have passed by at one time might be far more appealing at another? "Night of the Creeps," which I obviously ignored in 1986, was calling my name tonight.

What began on sorority row in 1959 ("I'll even let you fondle my dress!") quickly moved to pledge week 1986 ("What is this, a homicide or a bad B-movie?"), a time apparently just as politically incorrect as it was corny.

Need proof? A hardened cop who repeatedly answers the phone and greets people with, "Thrill me." An Asian character made to appear like a simple-minded twit. Humor at the expense of a handicapped student. Bathroom wall graffiti reading, "Stryper Rules." Gratuitous female nudity with distinct tan lines and decidedly un-augmented breasts. A "PARTY" sign in a dorm room, because college boys need reminders to party.

So. Much. Bad. '80s. Music.

Also, surprisingly funny, often suspenseful, disgustingly gory and a veritable fashion show of hideous formal dresses of the era. I'd just about blocked them out until being reminded tonight. Impossible for the audience not to talk back to ("Wait, did the dog call the police?").

Let's put it this way: I can see why "Night of the Creeps" has become a cult classic. Not sure I could have seen that in '86, but there it was tonight.

So deliberately bad that it was good. Or, as the late, great FDR said, "It is fun to be in the same decade with you."

All except the Stryper part.

Burning Bush

All movies, all the time, that was today.

After this morning's flick, I had a late afternoon meeting about the new Bijou Film Center project. As a devoted fan of movies shown in public settings, I'd been asked to join the group that's steering the effort to create a small repertory arthouse theater in Richmond.

At Anchor Studios, a handsome, high-ceilinged space with massive gold-trimmed columns in the arts district, I admired the artsy clutter - the piles of old 45s (Curtis Mayfield, Little Stevie Wonder, the Delphonics), the 7-Up rack intended to house green-bottled soda but instead a storage place for art supplies, a sewing machine and dress mannequin, before the brainstorming session began.

I'm new to this group, although I'd been asked to join some time back. It's just that meetings usually fall on Sundays, a day I almost always have plans. Over PBR and snacks, we discussed the next screening, how to get people excited about it and, by the end, whether Neil Young was the most important member of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young or not.

From that cultural debate I went on to Strange Matter for more film, albeit of a slightly trashier vein. With John Waters coming to town in a few weeks, the screening of his oeuvre was beginning tonight, and truly, where better than at a gritty venue like SM?

Truth be told, I was a little bummed when I walked in because usually when Movie Club Richmond shows a film there, the front row is lined with old recliners. Not so tonight, it was nothing but the usual sturdy tables and chairs, so I made do with a front row table.

The bartender tried to regale me with the pasta special with vegan meatballs (vegballs?) but all I wanted was a cheeseburger with carrot/radish/apple slaw to accompany 1981's "Polyester," which I wasn't entirely sure I'd seen before.

"Pink Flamingos"? Living in Maryland, so naturally I saw it when it opened. "Female Trouble"? I think so. "Hairspray" and "Serial Mom"? Definitely.

So I definitely knew Divine, the cross-dressing male actor who pretty much defined Waters' early films. Just wasn't certain about "Polyester."

Part of the movie's place in cinematic history is that it used "Odorama" cards to enhance the experience. Wouldn't you just know that the Movie Club contingent had brought a sole Odorama card for us to experience the smells of the movie?

To my great regret, it was sniffed by one person, passed on to another and the rest of us never saw it. Not that I don't know what a rose or passing gas smell like, but it's been too long since I scratched and sniffed.

The movie even began with a fake scientist explaining smell and how the nose works - "You may experience some odors that are repulsive" - in case we weren't sure. Numbers flashed onscreen throughout, alerting the cardholder which number to sniff.

1980 was stamped all over this classic with relics such as Gaines burgers dog food (the ones that looked like hamburgers), aerosol deodorants and blue refrigerators with crocheted happy face ornaments on them, proof this wasn't long after the smiley face "have a nice day" era.

Slutty daughter (who aspires to be a go-go girl at the Flaming Cave Lounge when she's not reading "Farrah's World") wears skintight satin Lycra pants and Dad (whose secretary and mistress sports Bo Derek-like braids) yells at punk-looking son, "Why don't you let that hair grow? You look like a fruit!"

That's right, 1980, when we scolded teenaged boys for not growing their hair long and shows like "Family Ties" portrayed ex-hippie parents having to put up with Republican spawn. The times, they were a-changin'.

Of course, that's all besides the typical John Waters' staples: alcoholism, divorce, abortion, masturbation, fetishes, you know, the usual occupations of suburban Baltimore.

When son Dexter returns rehabilitated after a stint in jail, he's upset at his mother's alcoholism since Dad's departure. "Are you still drinking? Mom, you could stop it. I got off the angel dust."

And when she does dry out and finds love with a handsome, Corvette driving stranger, he's the kind who romantically tells her, "Let me kiss away your DTs, honey." A girl (or even a girdle and bra-wearing man like Divine) couldn't ask for a much better boyfriend.

You see, children? It's not hard to be normal.

That lasts for about a hot minute in "Polyester." In a John Waters movie, you always know that normalcy is illusory. See one of his films young enough and you stop seeking it altogether.

Not sure, but I think that may have also been the overarching theme of "Farrah's World."

Good Sense, Innocence, Cripplin' Mankind

There could be no groovier, cornier or more nonsensical movie than the one I just saw. Even better, outdoors.

Seeing 1970 California through the lens of director Russ "King Leer" Meyer and screenwriter (!) Roger Ebert was the gift that just kept giving.

Mind you, when I set up my chair in the field across from Lamplighter, all I knew was the name of the movie: "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls." Since I'd only seen the original "Valley of the Dolls (wherein I'd learned that "dolls" were drugs) for the first time in 2011, I naturally assumed it was a sequel, expecting it to be as campy as the original.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no.

This was a movie that began by disavowing any connection to the original (author Jacqueline Susann must have had a great legal team) in the opening credits and then went on to prove why it had been given an X rating back in 1970. So. Much. Sex and violence.

And so much self-consciously hip vernacular.

Don't bogart the joint.
This is my happening and it freaks me out.
Cause I'm the ballsiest cat you ever did meet.
I dig, man. You're on an ego trip.

It was one of those movies that tried to show that it "got" the youth movement except it completely didn't.

The evil financial manager refers to the three girls in the band as hippie freaks, except he's referring to girls who wear evening gowns and have big, teased hair and lots of make-up. So not hippie chick-like at all.

In true '70s fashion, it was off-the-charts politically incorrect. Z-Man's manservant is a uniformed Nazi. A guy rapes a girl after she passes out on drugs. A lesbian couple is referred to as "not evil but evil comes of their relationship."

Ouch.

And don't get me started on the three girl band that is the focus of the story. During the many shots of them performing on guitar, bass and drums, we repeatedly hear horns and keyboards and more background vocals than could be possible with three girls.

With so many freaky parties and clubs depicted, there was no shortage of awkward, off-beat dancing, either.

What was fun, though, was seeing a real band, the Strawberry Alarm Clock, perform at Z-Man's party. I remember seeing them play that same song - "Incense and Peppermints" - on "Laugh-In" as a child and how far out the musicians seemed.

Then there was the whole hilariously-rendered sexual revolution aspect to the movie.

A porn star tells the innocent young man, "You're a groovy boy. I'd like to strap you on sometime." When he gets tired of having sex with her in so many odd places - a Rolls Royce, a canoe, the beach, a closet - he begs to do it in a bed and she calls him a fag.

Pet, the black girl in the band, meets a nice (black, of course) law student and falls for him. On a date out in the country, she chides him for kissing her instead of hitting the books. "I'll study tomorrow. Now I feel like making love," he says and then they run through dappled sunlit fields in slow motion.

Just like on shampoo commercials except to her band's corny song.

There was so much to laugh at, especially with an audience with no idea of 1970 cultural mores. "I want it, I need it, I love it when a beautiful woman licks between my toes." Yes, kids, this would have been risque back then.

When our heroine Kelly wants to convince the financial guy to give her more money, she gets him high and then takes him to bed. Reaching under the blanket, she inquires sweetly, "Porter, really, you wear your underwear to bed?" Inconceivable for 1970.

And, of course, since we're beyond the valley, drugs are rampant.

You want a downer?
The principal's supposed to hit me with a coupla caps of acid.
What you need is grass or a downer or something.
I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to learn that all four of them habitually smoke marijuana cigarettes...reefers!

That's right, it was still grass in 1970.

I guess liquor's considered pretty square.
Same as grass. Depends on how you use it.

Meyer and Ebert left no hot button stone unturned in this flick: lesbianism, abortion, decapitation, Nazism, generation gap, cross-dressing, disability humor, open relationships, suicide attempts, fetishes, drug dependency. It was pretty wonderful.

Not gonna lie. I totally dug it. No ego trip. Thanks for the groovy trip, Movie Club Richmond.

Explain It All with a SIgh

Just today, I was wished all the patience and strength I need to see me through. Through what?

I was so excited and not because it was Sister #5's birthday. Sister #6 was combining a visit to see Dad at the hospital with an overnight visit with me and no sister is as well suited to having fun with me as she is.

Plans change when Dad is unexpectedly released from the hospital and she has to fetch him and return the parents to the northern neck.

Oh, the fun we could have had.

For the second time this month, my gas service was cut off. It's been one long saga after another with the department of public utilities and me trying to figure out who thinks they live in apartment 2 (the answer should be me for six years plus now) and keeps terminating service. Once again, I can cook. Once again, I don't trust it to last.

Good thing I don't need my stove very often.

I've been looking at looming deadlines all week, which is just part of my life. The pain in the ass part is that one of the stories requires me to contact and deal with multiple "modern busy" women. Just to be clear, these are like the women I read about in magazine articles and book reviews, women with demanding jobs, expensive haircuts and a dedication to having it all.

Good luck with all that, ladies.

But despite disappointments, DPU runaround and high-maintenance women, I had plans tonight to go to Hardywood to see "The Astrologer," a psychedelic film made in 1975 by an astrologer about an astrologer who decides to make a movie about his life. How meta is that?

The hook? The film had been lost for 40 years so practically no one has seen it.

The walk over to Hardywood was notable for its contrasting celestial bodies, the enormous nearly full moon on one side of the street and the setting sun on the other. A gorgeous walk on a night that most definitely had the dry air and crisp temperatures of autumn to it.

I want to cry thinking summer is coming to an end.

DJ Sister Goldenhaze took the 1975 cake with enormous bell bottoms and a shirt tied at the waist. It had been so long since I'd seen her that I hadn't known she'd cut bangs again, leading to an entire dissertation on why some of us are bang devotees.

"If you've got bangs, you don't even have to do anything else and you've got a hairstyle," she said, echoing something I've known for decades.

With the most positive couple I know I talked about how - given Richmond's accelerated cool quotient -challenging it's become to choose between competing events on any one given night.

Like tonight (see: Daniel Bachman at Black Iris). Also, like next Sunday when the Bijou fundraiser "The Third Man" shows at the Byrd and Movie Club was showing "Beyond Valley of the Dolls" outside under the stars.

A cinephile shouldn't have to choose one or the other..

I took my case to Andrew, who organizes Movie Club, and was rewarded with him moving the date of "Dolls" so he too could catch the restored version of "The Third Man." Yep, that's me, affecting change at a brewery.

The movie was fascinating in that it's so terrible it's good kind of way. Nobody had any acting chops and there was no reason to care about a two-bit carnie who winds up being the most talented astrologer in the world. He also pronounces Libra as "lie-bra."

Judging by the audience's reactions, nobody was prepared for a movie made by someone who didn't hesitate to set an entire scene to one song. That's how you end up with a scene of a couple on a date, chewing, smiling, talking, arguing and drinking in slow motion and silent pantomime while a corny song plays over it for three agonizing minutes.

Although I did admire the slo-mo hair shaking and glass throwing.

The Moody Blues' classic "Tuesday Afternoon" was also played in its entirety over ponderously long shots in a scene of our hero on a sailboat, the pages of a calendar (three months' worth), peeling off in silent testimony to the passing of time as people tittered, laughed and looked away uncomfortably.

Okay, we get the point, their discomfort seemed to imply, as if prolonged attention was a sign of weakness or inferiority. So just watch the damn scene and stop expecting a quick cut, kids.

Later a 30-year old said that he'd assumed the director was trying to be funny and obvious with these shots. Not so, grasshopper. This was just self-indulgent '70s filmmaking.

Favorite line of dialog: "You're not an astrologer, you're an asshole." Best of all, it was said in the most heartfelt way. No irony. Just pure '70s sincerity (insert smiley face).

I left after the movie, missing hearing the band Manzara play, to hoof it back to J-Ward and catch Richmond Comedy Coalition's monthly "Richmond Famous" show with Ed Edge as the locally famous muse for the improv troupe.

I knew of Ed from Cafe Verde, his vegan taco joint, but also from Secretly Y'All when he'd shared a monumental secret, possibly the biggest secret someone could have. So, sure, I was curious to hear more stories from Ed.

A few minutes late, I walked in as Ed, a paramedic and organizer of several local non-profits, was in the middle of a tale about being kicked out of Canada. The story involved a black man (Ed) with his arms full of something - "Whether cash or cashews, they didn't know" - running from a convenience store.

That was all RCC needed to riff on two cops interrogating a woman for eating nuts ("Seventy percent of the population here is allergic to nuts!") and another about a guy who had caffeine blackouts that turned him into a southern gentleman ("I have great respect for the Negro") with a mustache, played by another comedian's finger as he followed along behind him.

Off to the side of the stage, Ed was cracking up louder than anyone.

In one piece, kids kept showing up in the principal's office because they were inappropriately dressed - a bikini, an evening gown, a cock sock and pasties made from pages of the bible.

"This one is Genesis, this is Revelations," he said twirling his fingers in front of his breasts.

Ed's next stories involved always being asked the worst thing he's ever seen as a paramedic. For him, that was childbirth. Once he fainted and once he projectile vomited. "This slimy Smurf thing - a baby- comes out," he said to hysterics.

Naturally, the troupe followed that with a pissing contest of each person's worst thing ever, namely things such as hangnails, blisters and ripping a Band-aid off. Next came two smurfs commiserating with a house owner about gentrification and bad city schools

For his last shared bit, Ed talked about the years when he was so busy with two jobs and multiple non-profits that he moved into a warehouse space to sleep and save money, effectively killing his dating life.

Naturally, he reverted to online dating, resulting in 47 first dates in 2011 and three second dates. Because he's vegan and a creature of habit, he took all his lunch dates to Harrison Street Cafe and all his dinner dates to Ipanema.

Humor followed with bits about trying to pretend it was a guy's first time at Ipanema on a date (everyone recognizes him and says hello) and a butler named Jeffrey who serenades him with "Major Tom" ("He may have a good voice but he isn't very good at reading social cues").

No one laughed harder than Ed, although the guy with the horse laugh behind me and I came close.

Patience and strength are overrated. Maybe all I needed to get through this day was a '70s flashback and some good laughs.

Cue August 28 page being ripped from calendar, my bangs fluttering in slow motion in the breeze...

A View to the Fab Four

Sooner or later, I was bound to see my first Beatles movie.

As it happened, when it finally happened, it was in a grassy lot and on the 50th anniversary of its premiere in New York. What are the chances?

Movie Club Richmond was screening "Help" tonight and after missing the Bijou's screening of "A Hard Day's Night" last year, there was no way I was missing another chance to finally see a Beatles movie.

I can only be this culturally illiterate for so long.

Once my hired mouth had taken care of business, I joined the group forming in the lot across from Lamplighter, chair and Milk Duds in hand. When I admitted to several friends that I'd yet to see "Help," they made jokes. "Well, there's a lot of movies out there."

True, although half a century is generally long enough to catch one you want to see.

Waiting for the movie to start, it was hard to miss the scent of dog poop occasionally wafting my way. Before long, the blanket of people sitting to my right started checking around, also looking for the smell's source. It wasn't constant, but when it wafted by, it had a certain nose hair-singing quality.

Ah, but such is the price we pay for a movie under the stars...and on a perfectly gorgeous evening, too.

Tonight's bill began with a trailer of the cult classic "Big Trouble in Little China" because it's the next film Movie Club will be showing. I'll be out of town or I'd be front and center for what looks like a pretty funny '80s John Carpenter film. And can you ever really have too much Kurt Russell?

When "Help" started, I realized from the opening scene that I had almost no idea what this film was about. And since I hadn't seen "A Hard Day's Night," I didn't even know what a typical Beatles film was like.

Let's see, it took no time at all to recognize its zaniness (the entire "Monkees" TV show must have been directly inspired by it), its droll British humor ("He's an idiot. Degree in woodwork! I ask you!) and tons of slapstick and physical humor (trying to walk up a ladder with rungs cut so every rung breaks when stepped on).

What surprised me was how much the crowd laughed at what by today's standards is corny humor, obvious stuff and physical comedy. Have millennials traded their trademark irony and aloof detachment for the pleasure of 1965 humor? Be still my heart.

Technical difficulties showed up not far into the film and our A/V squad decided to switch projectors. I used the time to pull out my Milk Duds and offer everyone within arm's length a handful while several groups around me produced popcorn from their bags.

No, we didn't have pour your own butter like at the Criterion, but other than that, it was a regular movie night behind the chain link fence.

Rolling again, we jumped back into 1965, when there was zero political correctness ("They approach an Oriental") and plenty of very British-sounding phrases ("There's a certain amount of hurry up involved").

The only problem was that projector #2 was dim. Dim like Jethro Bodine, to use a '60s reference. So we paused for another projector switch.

I was surprised by all the James Bond references (and music) used in the movie, an obvious nod to what was popular at the time. And talk about your product placement: the bad guys used the Goodyear blimp to chase the Beatles.

It was definitely cool to see the band playing songs in between scenes from the convoluted plot. Paul "playing" a girl in place of his usual bass seemed pretty risque for 1965. But my favorite part was just hearing the guys speak and rib each other.

George, supposedly the "quiet Beatle" was unexpectedly amusing with his off the cuff comments ("I'm always getting winked at these days. Used to be you, didn't it, Paul?") and background scene-stealing antics (shoplifting at the jewelry store while Ringo is trying to have the sacrificial ring removed from his finger).

If I'd been a Beatles fan in 1965, I think I would have been in the George fan club. He was dreamy.

When the movie ended, there was trivia with prizes for the best and brightest. Despite having lived my life without seeing "Help" until tonight, when the question, "Why was this filmed in the Alps and the Bahamas?" was asked, I knew the answer.

Those were the places the Beatles wanted to go on vacation.

Bingo. My prize was a book but not just any book: bassist John Taylor's "In the Pleasure Groove: Love, Death and Duran Duran," incidentally a New York Times bestseller. No, really.

Was I a Duran Duran fan back in the '80s? Not really. Will I wind up one after reading the book?

If I can finally see my first Beatles movie at my age, anything's possible.

Sheena is a Punk Rocker

It was my first outdoor movie of the summer and hopefully not my last.

After a three course dinner with a favorite musician discussing a May Dweezil Zappa show at the National where middle aged men smoked pot openly, why "Hazards of Love" may be the greatest Decemberists record of all time, the appeal of the new "Mad Max" movie and why an omelet is better for you for breakfast than a salad, it was on the the great outdoors.

Okay, maybe not the greatest of outdoors, but the grassy lot across from Lamplighter and behind Yesterday's Heroes Vintage. While surrounded by buildings, street and cars, there were clouds overhead in a deep blue sky and recently cut grass underfoot. And lightening bugs, lots of them, twinkling all around us as I set up my lowest beach chair by the fence with a great view of the movie screen.

People brought blankets and snacks, chairs and beer and a few sat on the wooden picnic tables near the back. Clouds scuttled overhead and the organizers delayed starting until the sky morphed from blue to dusky before beginning.

Before long a couple of guys set up camp next to me, one described as having a good heart and the other nicknamed Cowboy. It was he with the hat and vest (which he'd sewn himself, making him a most unusual but talented cowboy) who turned to me just as the movie was beginning, holding a beer and raising an eyebrow to see if I'd like one.

Thank you, no. Besides, from the first frames, I was too enchanted with the 1979 gem "Rock 'n' Roll High School," a Roger Corman-produced film that had to have been an instant cult classic by 1980, to do anything else.

As probably the only person in the crowd who remembers 1979, the first thing I noticed was that the star of the football team wore a tie to school. Listen, children, and you shall learn: no guys were wearing ties to public school in 1979. And no freshmen were wearing beanies, either.

Hollywood, pure Hollywood.

The corny film had every cliche firmly in place: a principal who looked more like a prison warden with lipstick and fitted uniforms, a character named Coach Steroid and teen aged girls in the shortest of '70s gym shorts (oh, we all had them) and the brightest of fitted tank tops (or possibly body suits, just as popular at the time).

During a scene in the gym where a student successfully climbs the rope only to fear coming down (she slides, which if she'd done in real life would have removed the skin from her palms), a fate I recall clearly from 7th or 8th grade. I wonder if kids even have to climb the rope anymore in gym class.

In a scene that surely was seen by the makers of "Spinal Tap," the principal demonstrates the destructive powers of rock and roll by cranking the music in her office. What's hysterical is the settings on the volume control, which begin with Pat Boone, go up to Donny and Marie and continue through Kansas, Foreigner, Led Zeppelin and the Who.

At the top of the volume meter is the Ramones, the source of all the trouble at Vince Lombardi High, motto: "Winning is better than losing." So naturally, the student body's favorite band is the Ramones.

Our heroine is Riff Randell, a girl with enormous, long hair tied up in pigtails with yellow yarn (soooo '70s), who defies authority and plays the Ramones on school grounds. Scandalous!

While the movie used plenty of Ramones music, much of it played by the band as they join the plot, there were also other bands of that era. "Smoking in the Boys' Room" accompanied a scene in, where else, the boys' bathroom, where clouds of pot smoke masked a line that snaked to one stall where a savvy student helped others with their dating woes.

Just so we didn't forget it was set in a time long, long ago, there was a shot of a teenager reading Crawdaddy magazine and another where glass bottles of milk were delivered by a milkman. No, really.

But the essence of '70s-era cliches was the football star's tricked out van, a place he hoped would get him laid.  At one point, he used the red, push button phone in the van to call up a girl and tell her he was in his van, on the water bed, listening to his expensive stereo. "Wanna go out and get drunk?" he proposes suavely.

Some men are masters of the romantic approach.

The movie was funny, both intentionally - "My daughter Kate? I thought she was in the basement splitting photons." - and unintentionally, as in when the Ramones pull up in their car (license plate: Gabba Gabba Hey) singing a fully electric version of "Come on Let's Go," except their instruments aren't plugged in and there are no drums to be seen.

Mostly, it was a cliched rehash of youth versus authority with enough bad '70s hair and clothing (in one scene Riff wears a striped bodysuit with alternately striped tights and a scarf, causing one guy to comment, "She looks like Grimes." Actually, that would be Grimes aping the '70s, but no matter) to keep the crowd agog constantly.

During the scene where the Ramones played a concert in their town, the words to "Teenage Lobotomy" scrolled underneath the footage of them singing, like some bizarre punk singalong.

Now I guess I'll have to tell 'em
That I got no cerebellum

One of the coolest parts of the entire film was the ending where the photon-splitting smart girl (nice touch for 1979 for it not to be a guy) sets off a bomb to blow up the school and thus prove to the principal who's in charge. Turns out it was the actual demolition of that L.A. school they used in the filming.

The only thing that could top that was the scene of the Ramones and Riff singing "Do You Want to Dance," a song, I admit, I hadn't even known they'd recorded.

Movie Club is always a learning experience. And if I'm learning things from it, god knows the Grimes contingent is.

Afterwards, there were trivia questions with prizes for those who knew the answers, but if you ask me, the real prize was watching the Ramones, hair hanging in their eyes, awkwardly sing and act their way through "Rock 'n' Roll High School" under a canopy of stars.

Vans with waterbeds, tube socks up to your kneecaps and black marks on your permanent record. Good times.

Did I Happen to Mention?

You know it's a good day when it ends with listening to a) Julia Fordham's "Porcelain" and b) the Luther Vandross Pandora station.

First stop was the Richmond Jewish Food Festival at the Jewish Community Center, where the line for food spanned the building and into the heated tent. Fortunately, the line moved quickly and there were plenty of volunteers, so before we knew it, there were people asking us what we wanted to eat.

Never mind that they were navigating mud puddles and sloppy patches of trodden lawn, every volunteer had a smile and a good attitude for the hungry masses. Our order, matzo ball soup, brisket, broccoli kugel, potato latkes, stuffed cabbage and Israeli beer made for a laden tray.

We found seating at a table in the cafe with three women who complimented us for our wisdom in only choosing one dinner and four sides. "We were little piggies," the woman in a fur coat and muddy boots said. "You did it the right way."

At the very least, we did it the way that allowed us to have an afternoon once we left the JCC. Others seemed destined for naps.

The next stop was the VMFA to see the Impressionist paintings finally released from the Mellon estate after Paul Mellon's wife Bunny died last year. Although we were only able to locate three of the five pieces recently added to the collection, they were worth seeing.

Come on, when are a new Seraut, Gaugin and Pissaro not worth checking out?

Naturally, we ended up at Amuse for happy hour, where I took in a Double Happiness (lychee liqueur and champagne with coconut jelles) while discussing current events: Charlie Hebdo, Elizabeth Warren and John Kerry.

Once the dining room had emptied out a bit and the soundtrack mellowed to "Chim Chim Cheree," we moved on to Nautilus Sauvignon Blanc, a wine I'd first tasted at the Australian embassy last year. The sky provided a scenic panorama over the Pauley Center as we sipped and talked about mariachi bands, low-tech accounting and women who drink wine.

Leaving the museum after it had closed, we filled the gap until movie time at Secco, noticing a guy who arrived with a beverage in hand. Who in the world has the nerve to show up at a wine bar with a beverage? As our server observed, if the owner had been there, he'd have been thrown out on his ear.

Over glasses of Chinon and bites of pork rilletes with cornichons, we watched as the mostly empty bar became crowded with new arrivals and pleasantly intoxicated couples. At one point, a couple became rowdy, causing the server to observe, "That's okay for Saturday night, but not on Sunday evening." The couple soon left.

As did we because Movie Club was happening tonight at Strange Matter and we wanted to score recliners in the front row. The crowd was small but mighty for the Coen Brothers' second feature, "Raising Arizona."

I don't know about you, but I hadn't seen this movie since it was in theaters, so it was a delight to revisit the story of a couple desperate to have a child of their own. Nicolas Cage looked so young while all the usual suspects - John Goodman, Frances McDormand - were there.

It's impossible not to enjoy an evening of vintage film punctuated with trivia questions and prize giveaways (imagine winning a copy of "Lord of War" for mumbling the correct answer). Be still my heart, next month is the Patrick Swayze classic "Road House."

By the time the day was winding down, it was time for Lallier champagne and some vintage soul. I may not recognize Brian McKnight when I hear his name, but his dulcet tones are unmistakable. And don't get me started on Stevie Wonder's "That Girl." Pure heaven.

It's the kind of thing that's not only okay for Saturday night but also Sunday evening. And then some.

The Swayziest Christmas of Them All

Sometimes you make sacrifices for the right people.

Among those I made this weekend were sawing off the sappy base of my parents' Christmas tree until my arm went numb. Twenty eight trips up and down three flights of stairs to dig out obscure holiday decorations from the storage floor, where dust mites are outnumbered only by the minutiae of a half century of marriage.

My parents had asked me to come down yesterday and help them get ready for Christmas, yet by early evening, they were suggesting I spend the night in order to provide more assistance today.

Putting aside plans to watch the boat parade of lights, catch "Holiday Inn" at Movieland, see musicologist Christopher King deejay gospel at Steady Sounds and attend a friend's Christmas party, I stayed.

If I can't be a good daughter at the holidays, then when?

After my final effort of the weekend - making a pound cake - I made a beeline for the great outdoors, determined to enjoy a riverside walk in the 60-degree late afternoon sunshine, returning to the house lomg enough to remove the cake from the oven and kiss my parents goodbye.

Much as I love them, I was more than ready for some outside contact beyond the man who'd greeted Dad and me at the dump this morning.

I needed Movie Club.

Tonight's installment was looking to be just the holiday boost I craved: "Mystery Science Theater 3000: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians." You better believe I was cleaned up, dressed for the city and walking over to Strange Matter within an hour of getting home from the country.

My parents would never understand.

I walked into the venue I've been to so many times to find a row of recliners lined up in front of a screen set on the stage. Behind them were small tables and chairs for a cafe-like cinebistro setting. I was right where I needed to be..

Ordering a bowl of vegan chili with Twin Oaks "chorizo", the only answer the bartender needed from me was whether I wanted real cheese or vegan cheese. Excuse me, but if it's vegan it technically isn't cheese (just like those vile individually wrapped American cheese food product slices, which are made with vegetable oil and no actual dairy. Blech!), although some would say I'm arguing semantics here.

Drink in hand, I found myself a table and chair directly behind the recliners and waited for the movie to begin. When my chili was delivered, I found it jalapeno-spicy and chock full of beans. Considering the massive cheeseburgers Mom had made for dinner last night, I could forego meat tonight.

While "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians" had been made in 1964, the "Mystery Science Theater 3000" version had been made in 1991, meaning we were going to get cultural references from two entirely different periods. I was in heaven.

Host Andrew warned us that the original movie has consistently been listed as one of the 100 worst of all time and it didn't take long to see why.

For starters, they obviously didn't have budget for so much as a copy editor since the credits read "custume designer" not "costume." Yeesh. There was also a credit for "Martian furniture."  Somebody's mother must have been very proud.

And, given that it was 1964, Santa still smoked  a pipe. I guess he hadn't seen the surgeon general's warning yet. And speaking of, his elves all liked like miniature C. Everett Koops (for those who remmeber who he was).

I was glad we were seeing the MST version because all the best lines came from the exiled spaceman and his robots. "You know, elf tastes just like chicken." When a Martian asks what Christmas is, the MST robot says, "A Christian holiday ruined by commercialism." Bingo.

On the other hand, it didn't take long for me to begin wondering how many people in the room were getting the 1991 references.

Walking into the Martian spaceship control room, a cliched '60s idea of a high tech center with reel to reel tape machines lining the walls, the MST robot says, "But first a tour of Paisley Park." I laughed out loud at the Prince reference, but no one else did.

Ditto allusions to the book "Alive," the movie "Ice Station Zebra" and actor Larry Storch. References to Jimmy Durante and McGyver. Or when the robot sang in a whiny voice, "Old man, take a look at your elf, I'm a lot like you are."

I'm just saying that I seriously doubt many people in the room knew that the "whipped cream and other delights" reference was the name of an iconic Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass album. Or what "The Long Goodbye" was.

Some humor is timeless, though, such as, "And now for your enjoyment, some suggestive scenes of jets refueling."

There was no forgetting that the original film was from the '60s and had a finite budget because of things like an actor in a polar bear costume, the headpiece clearly separate from the body or a robot that looked like a tin foil box with a coffee can on top.

When Santa said, "Falderal and fiddle dee dee," the robots chided him, saying, "Language, Santa, language!" Hysterical.

For those who don't know, the premise of the movie is that the Martian children are quiet, remote and very unhappy because they are fed information but never allowed to be children with freedom. Once the Martians kidnap two earth children who tell them where to find Santa, they nab him too. Then they're all taken to Mars, where the fat man makes everybody laugh because he's such a jolly fellow.

"It's the little signs of drug abuse," one of the MST robots observes about the corny laughter.

Patrick Swayze and the movie "Roadhouse" were a recurring theme throughout the commentary, probably because the movie was barely two years old at that point. Lines from it were repeatedly quoted and worked into the Martian story to hilarious results. You know, "my way or the highway" and "You're gonna be my regular Saturday night thing, baby" kind of stuff.

In Santa's Martian workshop, he had a machine instead of elves to help him make toys. When a load of baseball bats came out, the robot quipped, "Okay, those are marked for the L.A.P.D." Some black humor still resonates.

Eventually, the earth children get homesick, and the mother Martian explains to others that the kids miss their friends and family. "And Nintendo and sugar," an MST robot cracks.

By the time the movie ended with a singalong, I was pretty clear on why it had been so firmly entrenched in the worst of lists for 50 years. Which is not to say it hadn't been great fun, a real time capsule of two completely different eras. One of the robots even sang a violent Christmas carol about "Road House" to close out the MST part of the movie.

What's also notable is that Movie Club doesn't make a habit of showing perfectly awful movies. This had been a holiday selection (yet, in part chosen for its awfulness) while next month's will be something far superior, namely "Raising Arizona." I'll be there.

The funny part was that after the last of the trivia questions and prizes handed out after Santa conquered the Martians, host Andrew announced that, "Inspired by tonight, we're planning to show "Road House" in the future."

I. Can. Not. Wait.

We're talking about a film with the line, "That gal's got entirely too many brains to have an ass like that." It'll be a night of '80s splendor, I feel sure of it.

Should Mom and Dad ask me to stay over that night, I'm afraid their needs will have to be sacrificed on the altar of Patrick Swayze.

Oh, yea, Movie Club's gonna be my monthly Sunday night thing, baby.