Spoilers ahead, be warned…

The day we came back from our honeymoon, Monstro and I made a sacred vow to each other, never again to fly into LAX if avoidance of such was at all possible.

The eponymous airliner of “Snakes on a Plane”'s destination? LAX. This is no mere coincidence, people. Chop chop!

Our downstairs neighbor said she'd watch the baby after yesterday's ill-fated and premature trip, so at 8:30 I plied the babysitter info-sheet into her hands and we beat feet to the theater. I'd made reservations and everything. Totally unneccessary. We were the only people there until five minutes before the show, at which point another couple joined us. Three more kids slunk in during the second preview. It was just as well the crowd was small, because if a full theater's worth of people were doing all the yelling we were doing, we'd not have heard a word.

After reading that it was originally shooting for a PG-13 rating, I'm very glad that they scrapped that dumb-ass idea and went for the full-throated “R”. I tried counting the bodies and made it to seven people and one cat before snakey mayhem erupted and the screenplay had 40 pages of “a bunch of snakes bite the fuck out of a slew of airline passengers.” And when I say “bite the fuck out of,” I'm being literal. The sight of Snake on a Nipple gave me a breastfeeding flashback, but it passed.

Speaking of sucking… lots of snakebites but very little nookie, with the exception of the heavy-breasted blonde and her hot-body boyfriend in the airplane bathroom (biggest airplane bathroom I've ever seen). Not even the great Samuel L. Jackson, as the mighty Agent Neville Flynn, gets as much as a peck from Nurse Hathaway. Has SLJ EVER been kissed in a movie? Maybe “The Red Violin.” I notice from IMDB that his next movie has “Snake” in the title, too, though it's not the “More Fucking Snakes on More Motherfucking Planes” sequel he promised the world at the end of this year's MTV Movie Awards.

So, truly? Worst movie ever. But sooooo worth it, if only for the scene where it's crazy madness and a guy in the back of the plane screams, “Snakes!”

And for the cautionary tale that stands to this day and beyond: Don't. Fucking. Fly. Into. Motherfucking. L.A.X.

Here's what it was worth on April 11th, 2006

Yeah, so our sitter shows up and we make the drive out to Mt. Holyoke, and climb the 14 flights of stairs to the Tower Theater box office, and tell the guy behind the counter “Two for Snakes on a Plane, please,” and he looks at me and says, “you're kidding, right?” and I say “nooooo…” and he says, “Snakes on a Plane doesn't open until tomorrow.” And our sitter is going out of town tomorrow and is unable to watch the baby, and Massachusetts sucks, and it's a crap summer, and BLAH. Hatin' life.

A bunch of Hitchcock movies are playing On Demand for FREE this month, so we checked one out tonight. “The Trouble with Harry.” The film opens on beautiful New England, bucolically leaves-turning-in-autumn, hills ceding to tiny townland. And although the town was laughably small, its four residents were unacquainted.

“Oh sure, like they've never talked to each other before,” Monstro sniffed.

“Honey, it's plausible,” I replied. “They live in New England.”

Here in New England, usually the problem is the humidity. Our outdoor thermometers don't even go up past 95. Until this week. UGH! Three days of dogs-breath-hot weather, one cranky baby, a housebound mama — total drag. Too hot to read Gravity's Rainbow, or to do anything besides bathe the baby AGAIN. It's supposed to cool down this weekend. Pray for us…

Our little guy is a baby model! Our downstairs neighbor designs baby shirts and gave one to our baby when she moved in. He wore it to a luau when we were on Maui and I e-mailed the picture to Jen. She's used it for marketing postcards! So today was the start of the Northampton Sidewalk Sales and I dressed baby in Jen's shirt and took him downtown, where I roamed up and down Main Street, baby in one arm, baby's postcards in the other. We got a lot of double-takes from people trying to determine whether the real-life baby was the one in the postcard (he's two months older now and has more hair). It was great fun, and baby LOVED the attention. Yeah, like he doesn't get enough of that at home. There are three more days to the sidewalk sale and we might do it again if it's not too crowded. Good times!!! And the shirts are adorable. You should buy one for your favorite baby. Right after you buy yourself a Rhythmball set! 🙂

Went to bed at 11:30 after reading 10 pages of _Gravity's Rainbow_. Did I tell you that Monstro and I are reading Pynchon's epic this summer? Third time for him, first time for me. So far, it's funny, though the alliteration is a bit strong for my taste. But I like the songs, and want to set them all to 'ukulele. We'll see. Anyway, asleep at 11:30, awake at 2:00 when Monstro got home, sans keys, from Warhammer, awake again at 3:40, with baby screaming bloody murder, and awake again at 6:20, when baby was awake for good. This is some tough stuff, especially considering baby's been sleeping through the night for months now. Ugh. Is it naptime yet???

It was announced today that Syd Barrett, founder of Pink Floyd, died in his hometown of Cambridge, where he'd lived reclusively since leaving the band. This news has profoundly saddened me. I first heard Pink Floyd on a buddy's Walkman, while riding a bus to Denver with my high-school youth group. My friend Julie, amazed I'd never heard them, commandeered Steve's cassette player and plugged two headsets into it. We lied down in the aisle and closed our eyes. By the end of the song — something from Dark Side — I was a convert. Julie later became fanatical about Zep but I was always a Floyd girl. It was something I shared in common with my best friend, who is half a world away in New Zealand now, and all I want is for it to finally be 5:00 in the afternoon so I can call him and not wake him up tomorrow morning.

I didn't hear the group until loooooong after he'd already left it, but Syd was the progenitor of my high-school awakening, and for that I will always be grateful.

Rest in Peace, Syd. Have a cigar.

Yeah, you probably think I'm going to announce that I'm pregnant again. You could not be more high, uh, I mean wrong. In fact, it's almost the opposite: I'm on a quest to LOSE THIS FREAKIN' BABY WEIGHT. Seven months is long enough, and though I think I'm down around 30 pounds, I've got many, many more to go.

So I'm introducing (drum roll, please) my new blog: Exercise like Olympians, where I shall chronicle my new fitness plan of eating right and Rhythmballing. I'm off to a good start and would really appreciate your support!

Love and plankton,
Shamu

“Born today, you derive a great deal of strength and motivation from those things that do not seem to be going well in your life. While others may find themselves succumbing to frustration and depression when the going gets tough, you prefer to strengthen your resolve and face difficulties with renewed vigor and determination. This is a skill that will serve you well throughout your life — and enable you, upon occasion, to do great things for others as well as yourself, for you're not the only one to benefit from the strength you display under fire.

“You have a great deal of staying power, which will serve you well in both your personal life and your professional endeavors. Once you taste success, you're sure to make a steady diet of it — and all your rivals should beware your ability to turn one success into another, and another…”

Born today: President George W. Bush. Surprised? Yeah, me neither.