where: CENTURY SAN FRANCISCO CENTRE 9 AND X-D in San Francisco, CA
when: Monday, December 23rd, 2013
show: 6:15 p.m.
costs: $11.50 + $5.25 large Pink Lemonade + $1.75 upgrade-to-a-large on a Free Small Popcorn ( w/ my Cinemark Movie Watcher E-Mail Discount Coupon as shown on my Samsung Galaxy Mega ) + $8.40 roundtrip BART Train ticket + $5.00 Carquinez Bridge Toll ( on my way back to Vallejo, CA ) = $31.90
auditorium: 5, 5th floor
seat: 5th row ( counting from the front ), 10th column ( counting from the left )
synopsis/overview: Mr. Walt Disney ( Tom Hanks ) made a promise to his daughters that he would make their beloved children's books, whose title character is Mary Poppins, into a movie. Easier said than done. Mr. Disney pesters the book's author, P. L. Travers ( Emma Thompson ), every year for 20 years, into selling him the movie adaptation rights to her Mary Poppins book series. By which time, Mrs. Travers' faltering book sales and insecure financial situation force her to at least consider Mr. Disney's offer. But disagreements soon ensue, putting the Mary Poppins project in limbo. Until Walt connects with Pamela in a personal way.
noteworthy scenes: 1.) "There's no more money, Pamela"; 2.) "I have final say"; 3.) "Will the child be a nuisance"; 4.) "Walking bus"; 5.) "It smells like chlorine and sweat"; 6.) "May I suggest you take employment in a laundromat"; 7.) "Absolutely no pears"; 8.) "We're all on a first-name basis"; 9.) "A man can't break a promise he made to his kid"; 10.) "I love Mary Poppins"; 11.) EXT.; 12.) Dick Van Dyke; 13.) "Unmake it up"; 14.) "You called Mrs. Banks neglectful"; 15.) "Does it matter"; 16.) "Swish ... swoosh"; 17.) "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"; 18.) "We can't make the picture without the color red"; 19.) "I will endure for the girls"; 20.) "Spoonful of sugar"; 21.) "This script is flim-flam"; 22.) "You said today is ice cream day"; 23.) "A mouse is family"; 24.) "I want to be just like you"; 25.) Allora Fair incident; 26.) Poem; 27.) Liquor bottle; 28.) "It's blasphemy to drink tea from a paper cup"; 29.) "That's why I concern myself with the weather so much"; 30.) "I know you gave it to him"; 31.) "It's time to go home"; 32.) "Dollar-printing machine"; 33.) The Magic Kingdom; 34.) "I just won 20 bucks"; 35.) "Let's go fly a kite"; 36.) "Proper English would be, 'Let's go and fly a kite'"; 37.) "They're animated"; 38.) Autograph; 39.) "Who is Travers"; 40.) "I dropped the pears. I'm sorry, daddy"; 41.) "I think I'll have whiskey"; 42.) "Give me your precious Mary Poppins"; 43.) "We restore order with imagination"; 44.) "Invitation list for the premier"; 45.) "I don't know. She reminds me of me"; 46.) "Mary Poppins wouldn't stand for that"; 47.) "As I recall"; 48.) "How could I forget you"; 49.) "This is your night"; 50.) Hollywood premier; and 51.) Sketches and Bonus Scene during the Ending Credits.
audience reaction: The audience of about two dozen people liked this movie.
recommendation: I liked this movie, too--it brought back pleasant childhood memories. Go see this movie if you saw and liked MARY POPPINS ( 1964 ), and are curious about the "behind-the-scenes" events which led to the delayed production of the movie, itself.
spoiler alert! Shouldn't Mrs. Travers have specified exactly what kind of tea she wanted? According to on-line reports, this movie is not an accurate depiction of what really happened in real life---Bummer .... 'Way to ruin my enthusiasm for this movie, Disney!
fyi: Why is it that overhead storage bins on passenger planes are not strictly reserved for seats that they are numbered correspondingly to?
My father loved to break his promises to us, his children. I had been disappointed more times than I care to remember.
In the scene wherein the mother waded into the lake late at night, I felt like shouting, Get out of that water, woman! It's Australia. They've got crocodiles there.
I had a childhood crush on Julie Andrews.
I wanted to save this movie for Christmas Day. But, despite the "sign in the sky" which I saw eight days ago, I still forsook better judgment and watched this today, instead.
word of advice: Cherish the precious moments that you spend with your loved ones.
Learn to forgive yourself then do.
tidbits: I started-off my day with a 9:00 a.m. appointment with my Chiropractor. Lady Doctor Kenny was putting-up Christmas decorations on the storefront window, then laying-out plates of cookies and fudge brownies on a table in the waiting room---Great! I knew there was a reason why I skipped breakfast this morning.
After my spinal adjustment, I went to the MacDonald's Restaurant across the street to have a light snack and to check on my E-mails. Then, I went home to shower and rest for a while before I had to leave for San Francisco.
As soon as I found a parking spot ( # 533 ) in the parking garage at the El Cerrito Del Norte BART Train Station, the 3:31 p.m. Daly City/Millbrae-bound train ( my San Francisco train ) left. I should have left my place about 10 minutes earlier.
A black man approached me as I was adding money to my ticket at the ticket vending machine. He wanted to sell me a $40.oo ticket for just $30.oo. That brought to mind a BART Train advisory: Don't buy tickets from strangers. I declined his offer.
I asked the station agent when the next San Francisco-bound train would arrive. He said that it would get "here in about four minutes." I went up to the train platform and noticed the electronic message board display an arrival time three minutes later than what the station agent told me. So, I went downstairs because I needed to empty my bladder first before boarding the train. The station agent looked at me as if to ask, "Don't you remember the time that I told you?" There was a man waiting in line outside the men's room. That's okay, I said to myself, I still got time. Wrong! The San Francisco-bound train came and left while I was still in the men's room. I got on-board the 4:01 p.m. train. I should have listened to the station agent. Well, at least, I got to do more of my Zhunti Mantra. But, I really was falling behind on my schedule for the day.
While en-route to San Francisco, I got a call on my cellphone from my Puerto Rican friend, Hector. I waited until I got off at the Montgomery BART Train Station to return his call. I talked to Hector as I walked toward Chinatown. He told me that his eldest son has reason to believe that his youngest son is not the father of the illegitimate baby girl recently brought into this world through a "union" with a black woman of "ill-repute." His eldest son wants to have a DNA test done because of the dubiety of his youngest son's supposed paternity. I told Hector to tell his eldest son to save his money and just observe the baby girl: If it sprouts wings, flies off then bites a goat in the neck then it's a Puerto Rican, i.e. a Chupacabra ( it's a running inside joke between Hector [ Yeti, the Abominable Snowman ] and I [ Sasquatch, a.k.a. Big-Foot ] )!
I went to Chinatown because I still had the $60.oo that I wanted to donate to the Buddhist nun ( or a Buddhist monk ). I did my Namo Amitabha Buddha Mantra as I walked up and down Grant Avenue in Chinatown, in the hope that I would run into either the nun or a monk. But I was out of luck. So, I went to Gold Mountain Sagely Monastery on Sacramento Street. But the Buddhist monastery was already closed for the day. The monastery's Winter hours are from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. I wasn't meant to donate the money today. That's three strikes in a row. I will have to come back--earlier--some other day.
After watching the movie, I walked down to the Powell Street BART Train Station to catch the Pittsburgh/Baypoint-bound train at 8:57 p.m. and transfer to the Richmond-bound train at the 19th Street Oakland BART Train Station. My train ticket somehow got demagnetized. I had the female station agent issue me another ticket. In the train, I sat in the window seat near the doors. Between my seat and the doors is the designated area where bicyclists lean their bikes against.
At the Montgomery BART Train Station, a white male cyclist wearing a jacket and a pair of brown shorts came and sat in the aisle seat next to me. His bike's rear rack had a case of Anchor Steam Beer bungee-corded to it. He held his bike diagonally as the train continued on its way. I just sat there minding my own business as I quietly did my Zhunti Mantra.
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| Don't drink this beer or you'll end-up with a false sense of bravery and toughness. And find yourself waking-up with broken bones, bloodied, and with a throbbing headache the next day in the gutter, smelling of urine, feeling pain in your butt with your pants and underwear pulled all the way down to your ankles, and tasting something unpleasant in your mouth! |
At 9:07 p.m., after some passengers got off the train at the West Oakland BART Train Station, the white man seated beside me got up and rammed his bike back at me! He had an opened beer bottle in his case because some of its contents spilled on my left thigh. He didn't even apologize to me. Instead, he told me to go and sit somewhere else. I had never been more blatantly disrespected in my whole life as I was at that instance!
I got up and said, You could at least ask me nicely. Then I proceeded to sit in the aisle seat. This obviously irritated him as he told me, "Go sit somewhere else! There are plenty of seats around."
I said, No! I was here first. You move!
He moved, begrudgingly. He sat, facing me, in the window seat at the opposite side of the aisle from where I sat. He was angry because he didn't get what he wanted from me. He called me names just to "save face".
I responded in kind. My Zhunti Mantra recitation was ruined by then and I just had to stop reciting it and put my tally counter in my right jacket pocket. ( I resumed my Zhunti Mantra recitation at approximately 8:20 p.m. [ between MacArthur and Ashby BART Train Stations ] after I cooled-down a bit. The asshole f-cking idiot stayed on the Pittsburgh/Baypoint-bound train. )
Because my long-dormant kill-mode trained mindset resurfaced. I had never been more sharply focused, more clear and so singular in thought on an objective of utter evil intent as I was at that moment! I was like a coiled spring ready to unleash my lethal moves on an unsuspecting adversary. Yes, I wanted to kill him--not just punish him--for totally disrespecting me!
And I didn't want to use any one of the four quick-kill moves that I know how to execute. Instead, I wanted to use two destabilizing strikes on him first. Then, follow them up with three stun strikes, four maiming strikes and, finally, finish him off with five different death blows--all delivered within a 10-second span; if only to let him, and the rest of the passengers, know that I could totally dominate him and totally humiliate him before I proceed to totally annihilate him! Overkill, yes. But I'm a very generous person ( my friends and co-workers can attest to this ); and generous to a fault.
Besides, in a street-fight where you could get killed with one lucky punch, there really is no such thing as "use of excessive force." Unless you want to get killed--luckily or intentionally--by the other guy then, by all means, pull back on your punches!
But for all of his macho posturing and bluster, he was clearly intimidated by the calm and collected composure evident in my face as I accurately assessed his threat level. Deep inside of me, though, I sincerely hoped and prayed that he would assault me so that I would have the excuse that I needed to teach him his last and final lesson in life. I probably intimidated him by the way that I was dressed in a hat, jacket, shoulder bag and loose pants which reminded the f-cking idiot of Kwai Chang Caine ( David Carradine ) of the early '70s TV show, KUNG FU, whose famous line was, "I have no wish to fight."
Every time Kwai Chang Caine, a fugitive Shaolin Monk, said those words, you knew he was getting ready to kick some "serious butt"!!! Maybe, I should have used the same line on the f-cking idiot, if only to get him to start a fight with me so that I could proceed to kick his butt "six feet under"!
It is said that an unarmed Shaolin Monk knows how to kill a man a hundred different ways! But I, a Kriyaban ( i.e. Kriya Yogi ) householder monk, knows of only thirteen ways from my prior training in combat martial arts. The next time that I go visit Gold Mountain Sagely Monastery, I'm gonna ask them if they are Shaolin Monks/Nuns and, if so, if they would be willing to teach me their--ahem--"hundred ways".
Anyway ....
I would have easily won a fight against the f-cking idiot. But it would have amounted to nothing more than just a Pyrrhic victory. For I would have lost everything else: My house and personal property, my job, my savings accounts, my reputation, and the forty plus year's worth of spiritual cultivation that I devoted myself to! As I would just languish in jail on a manslaughter, homicide or murder charge over a fleeting moment of spiritual indiscretion. I was willing to sacrifice my whole future for a quick "ten-second" sense of personal satisfaction! Imagine that ....
Do you remember what I said in my blog on INSIDIOUS: CHAPTER 2 ( Tuesday, September 24th, 2013 )? If evil spirits and demons cannot defeat you in the "Wilderness of Sin," they will try to do so in the Physical World by possessing a nonspiritual person and have that person do their evil work for them. This is why those on the spiritual path, such as myself, are advised to be HUMBLE ( "turn the other cheek," "love your enemies," "do no harm," "forgive and forget," etc. ) or our PRIDE will get the better of us. But it's so hard to be humble and contain one's swollen/hurt pride if one knows he is a better fighter than the foolhardy idiot who is provoking him at the moment!
And it's also the reason why some of us spiritual cultivators become reclusive and go live in a cave, away from the cares of the world, until the last vestiges of self-identity and pride are sloughed-off through Karmic cleansing. ( The reason why Jesus Christ "disappeared" for 18 years! )
Unfortunately for me, I'm not an "insulated" monastic monk but, rather, am a "householder monk," which makes it harder for me to clean my karma. But, if I win the lottery big-time then I'll be able to afford to live in a cave ( the irony of it all )! So, my dear readers, pray that I win the lottery big-time. Ha, ha, ha.
My Yogi ( also a householder monk, himself, by the way ) did ask me, shortly after my 1st Stage Kriya Yoga Initiation, if I would like to undergo the 2nd Stage of Kriya Yoga Initiation. But my honest evaluation of my self made me decline his generous spiritual offer. Spiritual cultivation cannot be rushed. And I shall take my time until I am certain that I am spiritually advanced enough to handle the next level of spiritual responsibility.
The goal of spiritual cultivation is to activate all of the Seven Chakras, one by one. But, in doing so, you are also faced by three gauntlets in the guise of your 2nd ( sex ) Chakra, 4th ( heart ) Chakra and 6th ( third-eye ) Chakra that will all try to keep you from opening your 7th ( top-of-the-head ) Chakra. Your 2nd Chakra will try to hold you down sexually ( the reason why sex scandals seem rampant among "men-of-the-cloth" ). Your 4th Chakra will try to fill you with pride, jealousy, envy and covetousness. And your 6th Chakra will cloud your mind with psychosis, bigotry, prejudice, misanthropy, and everything else considered anti-social ). It's simply your physical body's ( the "Matrix" in self-preservation mode ) insecure way of telling you that you are safe and sound in the confines of the 1st ( base-of-spine/non-spiritual ) Chakra. You know well too well what happens when you deny yourself food ( governed by the 3rd [ stomach/solar plexus ] Chakra ): You get hungry. In the same sense, when you activate your 2nd, 4th and 6th Chakras, through celibacy and personal and social isolation ( i.e. sexual, physical and material denials ), you will experience an overwhelming sense of "HUNGER" in its various forms! And many spiritual cultivators cannot handle these kinds of "hunger" ( "... (M)any are called, but few are chosen." New Testament of The Bible, Matthew 22:14 )!
Well, nine days have come and gone and I can state unequivocally that the vision in the sky ( that I mentioned in the previous blog ) was meant for me, personally, as a warning! The above incident in the train happened on the 8th day. And in Bible tradition, the number 8 is the symbol of the Blood Covenant, of a sacrifice, and of blood-letting/killing. And I was willing to sacrifice everything that I have just to kill the f-cking idiot.
In the intervening time between December 24th, 2013, and the previous post's events, I also went to see ...
BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR, NC-17, on Tuesday, December 17th, 2013, at 8:00 p.m., in Emeryville, CA, at the UA Emery Bay Stadium 10.
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| I found this on the Internet. 'Remember how I told you that I could only watch a few minutes of a porn movie before I would doze-off? Well, I was wide awake throughout this movie's entire length! The English subtitles forced me to stay awake. And, to think, I've been blogging about Hollywood movies all along. I should watch more French movies, instead! Heh, heh, heh. |
ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES, PG-13, on Saturday, December 21st, 2013, at 7:45 p.m., here in Vallejo, CA, at the CENTURY 14 VALLEJO.
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| I found this on the Internet. I like stupid-funny movies. But this movie isn't. It's just plain stupid! |
THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY ( 2013 ), on Tuesday, December 24th, 2013, at 5:00 p.m., here in Vallejo, CA, at the CENTURY 14 VALLEJO.
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| I found this on the Internet. I liked this movie. Character wise, I liked the affable on-line matchmaker character played by Patton Oswalt. |
47 RONIN, PG-13, on Tuesday, December 24th, 2013, at 8:15 p.m., here in Vallejo, CA, at the CENTURY 14 VALLEJO.
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| I found this on the Internet. I liked it, except for the ending. I imagined a different ending for it. |
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On Wednesday, Christmas Day, 2013, I went to the CENTURY 14 VALLEJO to see the 1:30 p.m. show of GRUDGE MATCH, PG-13.
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| I found this on the Internet. I liked this movie. It was entertaining enough. But the love-triangle kinda creeped me out. |
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| What a strange coincidence this is! Especially right after my self-imposed spiritual 9-day holiday moratorium. Does this mean to say that I will soon win the lottery big-time and can finally go live in a cave ( after I go on a 6-month world-wide cruise )? |
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And speaking of Big-Foot, 'remember how a few months ago I mentioned that I used to wear size 8 shoes in high school but had to switch to size 8 and 1/2 shoes a few years later, and that I switched to size 9 shoes a few months ago? Well, lately, my size 9 shoes had been feeling uncomfortable to wear. So, I went to the Big Five Sporting Goods Store here in Vallejo, CA, today, Monday, January 6th, 2014, to buy a pair of work shoes. Out of a nagging sense of curiosity, I measured the size of my feet against their shoe-size chart. And, guess what? I'm actually a size 9 and 1/2!!! Oh, boy! I can't wait for the rest of my body to lengthen---Hey! I'm talkin' about my height; I want to be a basketball player. Yeah, right ....
If the rest of my body doesn't lengthen, I'll just end-up with feet the size of flippers! How fitting: A Flip ( derogatory term for Filipino/Pilipino ) with flippers. Ha, ha. ha.
HAPPY NEW YEAR
To One And All!!!
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