It was a GREAT birthday. One of the best ever actually. Birthdays have been a growing and learning experience for us as a couple. There have been some hits and some misses. Chris has come a LONG way in the last 10 years. This year he completely out-did himself. So as not to embarrass him, I'll just say that breakfast, gifts, flowers, and written words (my love language!) were involved. It was wonderful.
The grand finale for my birthday was a date. I always have the same request for my birthday date...sushi and a movie. These two things are hard to come by these days, mostly because my husband isn't a fan of sushi and, well, we have children.
So we had a lovely sushi dinner (well I did, he had Korean BBQ), complete with a view of the sun setting over the ocean, and after dinner we went to a quirky theater, which is also a historical landmark in North County San Diego.
The theater looked something like this back in 1928 when it was first opened...
I doubt that the interior has changed much since then. Seriously.
Here is how the movie theater experience went. I'm not making any of this up.
- Arrive at theater at 6:10pm for 6:30pm movie. No one is there (except for a few confused patrons like ourselves), the box office is dark and clearly closed. But then we notice a sign that says, "Be back at 6:20pm". Ok.
- 6:25pm a borderline homeless looking man wearing a backpack, army boots, and accompanied by two small white dogs unlocks the theater door and disappears for a few minutes. The man reappears and flips on a light in the box office booth to take our payment (cash only) for the show.
- We enter the FREEZING cold theater lobby and check out the concession stand. I see hot tea on the menu. Interesting. We pay for candy, a soda, and hot tea. A rugged looking man takes a tea pot off of a hot plate and pours steaming hot water into a Styrofoam cup for me and then points to a stack of 5 boxes of herbal tea for me to choose from. Alright. I help myself to Pomegranate Pizazz, thank you.
- We enter the huge FREEZING cold theater and look for seats without large holes No kidding.
- It's 6:40pm. It's 6:50pm. People have trickled in and at 6:55pm they decide to start the 6:30pm showing of The Descendants.
- Oh, did I forget to mention that the two small white dogs from earlier are wandering around the theater darting down various rows and startling unsuspecting movie-goers? Yep, they sure were.
- We FREEZE while watching the movie, but at least I had my hot tea and the film took place in Hawaii, which both helped...a little bit.
It was a hilarious and very entertaining movie experience thanks to the theater, and it made my 33rd birthday even more memorable.
I love that in this time and place dominated by money, the clock, and the allure of all things new, shiny, and beautiful, places like La Paloma Theater still exist. It was rustic and grungy and homemade and TOTALLY charming. We'll be back to this theater for sure, maybe when I'm 34...and we'll dress warmer.
