Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Fed Up
Ooooh, my brain hurts. In addition to my pathetic attempts at home improvement, we had set a goal this week to watch the Up series. Basically, back in 1964 a program called "Seven Up" was broadcast on British television. It was a look at various seven year old schoolchildren in Britain--a peek at the future executives, shopkeepers, et al of the year 2000. Seven years later, someone got the idea to interview the featured children to see how they changed. Seven years after that they tried again and so now there have been six films peeking into the lives of these people. I've found it a fascinating series, having first caught the 28 Up installment back in the 80s. I got Noodles hooked on the films with 35 Up. A few weeks back I discovered that the entire series had been released on DVD and so was eager to see the older films.
This is where the headache comes in. The series was released in one collection. To watch the half hour "Seven Up" I'd have to give $11 of my hard earned money to Scarecrow Video and take home all five discs. I know, $11 isn't really all that much--Noodles and I probably paid more than that to watch 42 Up in the theater. But frugal lad that I am, I feel compelled to get my money's worth. So if I take home 5 DVDs, I'll want to watch each and every one of them. Anyway, I thought I had figured out a plan to rent the vids, watch the vids, and not spend a sleepless weekend in the process. Since I would have the week off, I figured I'd rent the collection at the start of vacation and we could watch the whole shebang at our leisure. Heh. Such a dreamer I am. I neglected to take Noodles' schedule into account. I rented the vids on Friday night, but the first time we could finagle TV time was Monday night. That left three more evenings to squeeze in five films--in addition to the home improvements, regular schooling, etc. So last night we stayed up past two am, running a double feature. Haven't done something like that for years. Today, I'm paying for it. And tonight I'll once again be watching the Up people--enthralled by their development and sniggering at their fashions. (Should be the 80s this time round.) Why can't I ever obsess about something that's good for me?
This is where the headache comes in. The series was released in one collection. To watch the half hour "Seven Up" I'd have to give $11 of my hard earned money to Scarecrow Video and take home all five discs. I know, $11 isn't really all that much--Noodles and I probably paid more than that to watch 42 Up in the theater. But frugal lad that I am, I feel compelled to get my money's worth. So if I take home 5 DVDs, I'll want to watch each and every one of them. Anyway, I thought I had figured out a plan to rent the vids, watch the vids, and not spend a sleepless weekend in the process. Since I would have the week off, I figured I'd rent the collection at the start of vacation and we could watch the whole shebang at our leisure. Heh. Such a dreamer I am. I neglected to take Noodles' schedule into account. I rented the vids on Friday night, but the first time we could finagle TV time was Monday night. That left three more evenings to squeeze in five films--in addition to the home improvements, regular schooling, etc. So last night we stayed up past two am, running a double feature. Haven't done something like that for years. Today, I'm paying for it. And tonight I'll once again be watching the Up people--enthralled by their development and sniggering at their fashions. (Should be the 80s this time round.) Why can't I ever obsess about something that's good for me?
