What a difference six years makes.

Sick at home and whacked out on painkillers I left a rambling message on a dear friend's answering machine regarding

1. how much I missed her and was so excited that she would soon be visiting my fair city over Christmas and
2. that I was watching TV and "The Mummy" was on (it's Saturday afternoon...the pickings are slim) and how it reminded me of her.

Why should a big-budget, second-rate special effects onslaught remind me of one of my very closest friends? Because I saw it with her at the United Artists Mondo-Plex at Union Square in our usual state--and by state I don't mean New York. I mean the state we were usually in while spending quality time together, which is known by most as "loaded".

It was the fourth of July and we weren't much for fireworks that year, I guess. I don't remember why we went to the movies in the first place. I recall it was quite late, and I think we went out for sushi and a bottle (or two) of plum wine at our favorite raw-fish joint, and I'm sure we chose "The Mummy" because there were no other movies showing at that exact moment...at least that's what I'd like to think. I'm no movie snob, but I have to draw the line someplace and that place is wherever there are bad camel jokes and demonic armies composed of computer-generated sand.

What I remember best about that evening was that after buying our tickets and finding seats my friend and I realized that we no longer had any booze, and that sitting through a movie like this would most certainly require some. In truth, our appetite for cocktails wasn't restricted to movie houses. We could have been anyplace-- going for a swim in Columbus Circle, for example**-- and we still would have rather had some hootch handy. My pal actually left the theater and ran to a deli to get some and amazingly was allowed back in (no small feat in New York) to resume her rightful place in the dark by my side, bearing not one but two paper bags containing big bottles of Corona; and since the deli had no lemons or limes, smartypants had also procured an orange. I guess she figured 'citrus is citrus'. I was thankful it wasn't a grapefruit. Every try to shove orange sections down the neck of a beer bottle? I thought not.

Later in the day, she returned my call and it went something like this:

MKC: I remember that night! What were we thinking?
Me: I have no idea. We were crazy kids!
MKC: We were pretty wild, weren't we! How'd I get back into the theater? 4th of July? Man, we knew how to drink.
Me: I know! We were all over the place! We were so young and nutty and carefree! What were we, like, 23, 24?
MKC: Yeah! Wow!

(...long pause...)

MKC: Actually, I think we were 30.
Me: Not so much kids, then.
MKC: Nope. Not so much.

A fine example of what a late-bloomer I was.

I've searched my photo library and in every picture at least one of us looks like a nincompoop, so I'll take the fall on this one. When we paint the town red on her upcoming visit, though, it'll be her turn.



**true story.