vue facts

ok, so those free cinema tickets have now run out... i may yet get some more where they came from but i don't know...

just to recap, they only work with films that have been out for more than 2 weeks and that is why yesterday i used one to get a ticket for the break-up (over 2 weeks out already) but actually saw harsh times (newer than 2 weeks)...

but once i was passed the guy collecting tickets i realised that there was no indication anywhere saying which film was showing at which screen... my ticket told me the break-up was in screen one...

there are 8 screens at the westend vue...

so i started wandering around and opening doors surreptitiously... it wasn't on in screen's 1 - 4 on the ground floor...

it wasn't on in 5 or 6...

at this point an attendant saw me and asked if i was lost and i told him i was trying to find harsh times and he checked my ticket... whereupon i said oh - i mean the break-up and he sent me downstairs again eyeing me suspiciously...

so i waited for a few minutes before braving the upper floors and met someone heading all the way to the top... i asked her which film she was going to see and she said harsh times, telling me it was on @ screen 8... so i followed her into the screen and sat, a little nervous but happy to have fooled the system...

the pre-trailer adverts were on & a few minutes after i entered there was an alarm sounding, although they hadn't shut off the adverts so it was really hard to hear it... eventually it became clear that we had to leave the building and i had paranoid thoughts that it was a trap that the suspicious attendant had set for me...

we all filed outside and i got chatting with a couple of women who were halfway through monster house... some guy was wandering around with several glasses of both red & white wine on a tray and i half-persuaded myself that the cinema had laid on drinks for the inconvenience but stopped just short of reaching out for one...

in time it all settled down and i smuggled my way back to the top of the building again and watched the film... which was very good and truly harsh... christian bale visibly disintegrating into gulf-war syndrome...

once out of the film i didn't really have time to go home and come back out again to pick up dinah so i went and sat by the river, thinking about my vocal monologue for the film... a few good thoughts did pop into my head, even though i was still in a fairly dark post-harsh times space... ideas which have flowered today and i've found a way forward with the words now... very welcome...

i met dinah and we cycled back home, she cycling faster than usual so that i could get back in time for the soprano's which started last night, i missed the opening 5 minutes but caught the rest and it was great... shocking end...

so an end to the free cinema for now but the welcome return of the soprano's... a fair swap if you ask me...

x