Alice and Cheyrl

Jason and I trekked to Columbia this weekend to meet our friend Cheyrl, who is heading back to Taiwan very soon. Since we were going so far, we decided to make a day of it and stopped in at Hollywood Theaters to experience the much-anticipated Alice in Wonderland...in 3D! We really should be considered adventurous because we went to see it on opening weekend. Gasp! Practically unheard of in our household these days. We got to the theater a little early, but not soon enough as the que had already reached the street in front of the theater. They opened up another window, and the manager informed everyone that they could skip the wait and order their tickets with the machine at the side. Sounded good to us! We're pretty savvy with these do-it-yourself types at the Wal-Mart, the grocery store, the airport. No problem. And so, Jason set about pushing buttons on the touchscreen. Yes, we would like to purchase tickets. For Alice in Wonderland in 3D. For this matinee showing. We got all the way to the card processing part before we had problems. By this time, the people next to us had gotten their tickets and left.

"Try it again," I offered. And so he did. We got to the end again, swiped the card and the hourglass came up to say the machine was deciding between giving us our tickets and making us late for our movie. I got the manager as Jason started working through it again (third time's a charm, right?), and we showed her the issue. She said she was pretty sure it wasn't charging us all those times, and she would let us in. So, either the movie cost us $60 or it was free. We grabbed our 3D glasses (that unfortunately looked semi-normal, no red and blue lenses) and found some seats. After the show, Jason talked about what he thought of the film.




Later, we met Cheyrl at her going-away party at Heidelberg. Cheyrl was mostly the center of attention, that is until Sam's baby, Max, started mugging for the crowd. (Hey, we all know that babies are little rockstars.) Anyway, we're going to miss you Cheyrl! Have a safe trip and stay in touch!

Friday

Jason got home a little bit early from his office's holiday party. They exchanged gag gifts, but he got a surprisingly fitting one. He is a spreadsheet wizard and loves his coffee. Kudos to the person who picked it out!





For dinner, I was craving some homecooked goodness, so I whipped up some potato casserole and meatloaf. Then Jason and I settled in to watch The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

Sigh. My mom's meatloaf recipe is the best. Check it out:

• 1 lb. ground beef
• 1/2 c. rolled oats
• 2 tsp. minced onion flakes
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/4 tsp. pepper
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1/2 c. tomato juice/sauce

Preheat oven to 350. Mix well and place in loaf pan. Mix 1/4 c. ketchup and 1/4 c. brown sugar to form topping. Cover top of meatloaf with topping and bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let stand for 5 minutes before slicing.

Mmm...definitely my go-to for comfort food. What's your favorite comfort food?

Ragtag premiere of LIT

My friend and bowling buddy, Brian Maurer, is a budding film director. He recently wrote, directed and produced his first full-length feature film. The premiere was at the Ragtag in Columbia, Mo. He was hoping that there would be a large enough crowd that he wouldn't be embarrassed. In fact, the movie sold out, and they had to turn people away!

The movie, LIT, was produced on a "Velcro" budget, as Brian likes to say, which is apparently smaller than a shoestring budget. Everything was done on the cheap. Actors and crew came from the local community theatre and students at the university. The music in the film was created by Jake Oakes.

I enjoyed the movie and I'm proud to say I got the first autographed DVD.