HOME ALONE WEEKEND

Drew had to work all weekend, which meant I reverted back to my swinging bachelor days of several months ago. Our usual Saturday morning breakfast at our second-favorite breakfast restaurant would be just about the only time all weekend we’d spend together. As I ate my chocolate chip pancakes, I had a melody stuck in my head, and I couldn’t place it. I knew it was from a movie, and I suspected it was from a Christmas-themed movie, which meant I probably started thinking of it after seeing “Elf” the previous night. (One-word review: “Delightful!”)

So I hummed it for Drew. “Do you know what this is from? Dum-dum dah-dah DUM-dum! Dum-de-dum-diddy-duuuuum!” Drew placed it immediately. The song I couldn’t get out of my head turned out to be the theme to “Home Alone”. Eerily appropriate.

As much as I’d like to say that I used my Jerry Time to throw some wild swinging party with all my boytoys, toyboys and homeboys (okay, I don’t really have any homeboys), I mostly stayed at my apartment and cleaned and packed, getting ready to move at the end of the month. On Saturday afternoon, I made a trip to Office Max to buy boxes, which of course, also meant browsing and impulse buying. It’s not easy to impulse shop at an office supply store, but I’m gifted that way. I quickly found a display of cheapo Christmas CDs that looked like it had been set up about ten minutes ago, and I was immediately tempted to buy “The LaFace Family Christmas”. But that wasn’t the only CD that caught my eye. Among the knockoff Nat King Cole and Christmas Samba! compilations, I spotted the face of Kevin McCallister slapping his cheeks and wailing.

It was the “Home Alone” Christmas CD.

Just another lame compilation of songs everyone owns on a thousand other Christmas CDs (including TLC’s “Sleigh Ride”, which was also on the LaFace album), but it included that John Williams theme music that I had stuck in my head.

I bought the CD. I listened to it. It wasn’t enough. On Sunday, I bought a “Home Alone” DVD, too, and I sat and watched it while I did some more packing.

For all the serendipity involved, and because — let’s be honest — “Home Alone” is one of the best movies ever made — ever, ever, EVER — I’m calling this “Home Alone Weekend”.

Also this weekend:

I talked some more to my friend Greg, the one who recently came out to me. The recap: before he came out to me two weeks ago, he had come out to no one. The update: by now, he has come out to just about everyone. His mother, his sister. On Saturday night, a bunch of his friends were taking him out for his birthday, and he planned to tell them all at dinner. He didn’t think he should tell his father at the Nets game, so the next time he sees him at a non-sporting event, he’s going to tell him, too. I couldn’t be happier for him, though it makes my twelve-year-plus coming out process seem a bit stretched out. I previously avoided mentioning his name in this blog out of respect for his closetedness, but now, who cares. Greg is gay everyone! Well, whatever. You probably already knew that.

On Saturday night, I saw “Love, Actually” with my film school friends at Century City mall. I had long ago vowed never again to see a movie at Century City because it’s way too crowded, and it’s too difficult to park there. But I figured with the all the newer, nicer theaters like the Grove and Arclight sucking away all the customers, Century City was probably a ghost town. Wrong! Everything was sold out, the theater was jammed, and worst of all, the audience roared at the “Along Came Polly trailer”, which I can say objectively is simply not funny. That’s another thing I hate about Century City: lousy audiences.

Afterwards, we hung around outside the theater yakking about the movie like the film school geeks we are, and a security guard came up to us and asked us to move and keep the area clear. “If you need somewhere you can sit down and talk,” she said, “you can go see Guest Relations.” Oh, it was so tempting to go to Guest Relations and ask them to seat us, but we just left. I didn’t have much to say about the movie anyway.

Getting out of the garage at Century City was a nightmare. Every exit was closed except one. (It was after midnight, but when every movie is selling out, it stands to reason that multiple exits might be necessary. I’m talking to you, Century City Management!) I sat in my car and waited and waited. It took 37 minutes from the time I first got angry until I finally got to the cashier, and there’s nothing to make you feel more powerless than trying to get out of a garage when only one exit is open. All you can do is stay in line and wait. And plan what you’re going to say to the cashier when you finally get there. And then not say it because you know he’s only making about five dollars an hour and doesn’t need the aggravation, and besides, he doesn’t make the policy and everyone else has been yelling at him all night long and at this moment, he’s either pondering his other career options anyway or plotting to come back tomorrow with a semi-automatic and try to become the evening’s top news story. So I just went home and vowed to write a really angry letter to the jerks in Guest Relations.

And I didn’t do that either. Screw them.