My Sookie Valentine

Tyranist and I have made something of a little tradition the last three weeks of getting together on a Saturday morning and going to a movie after hitting lunch. First, we saw THE UNBORN, which we both quite enjoyed. Then we saw GRAN TORINO, which we liked even more. Then, today, we went to see (or rather, I dragged my friend to see) MY BLOODY VALENTINE in 3-D.

Tyranist has always complained that he hates 3-D movies, and remakes, and movies with "Dawson's Creek" alumni in them, and . . . well, he hates a lot of stuff, probably half of everything in existence. I should know, since I hate the other half.

Well, I absolutely loved MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3-D, laughing and cheering and yelping and chortling and enjoying being one of only four people in the audience. To me, it was as though we had been transported to my favourite era of horror movies--the Early Eighties Slasher Era. Except for the copious amounts of nudity and computer-generated blood, this flick probably could have been made in 1982, and I appreciated the hell out of it.

Unfortunately, tyranist didn't enjoy it at all. I know he only went to see it with me because I went to the Clint Eastwood flick with him the week before, but wow, he was putting out bad vibes the whole way through.

I think he liked the nudity, though.

It's too bad that he didn't dig it, 'cause we used to go see a whole lot of horror movies together, and I had missed that. It probably didn't help that I told him I liked MBV a lot more than QUANTUM OF SOLACE*, but hey, the circumstances under which we saw that were less than ideal.

Afterward, he and I went to a bookstore, where he pointed out Charlaine Harris's Sookie Stackhouse novels. We went back to lunch, since he's always hungry, and talked about vampire lore and slashers and religious differences and people making him shave and how amused I am by the name Sookie Stackhouse, and then he proclaimed that we were going to start up a book club, like a group of bored housewives, or The Others on "Lost."

He drove us all the way back to the bookstore and bought two copies of "Dead Until Dark," the first Sookie Stackhouse vampire book, intending for us to both read it and discuss.

I used to read quite a bit, and while I own several books, they collect more dust than even my treadmill. But I'd like to read the book (and more books in general, if it's not too late to make a New Year's resolution), if only to have an excuse to say "Sookie Stackhouse" in conversation.

Or perhaps thrice in a bathroom mirror sometime.

Rish Stackfield Outhouse

*And hey, I stand by the statement. The last Bond film didn't satisfy me or please me in any way. Maybe that was my own fault, but I prefer to lay the blame on those gorram Jason Bourne movies.