Weekend
On the whole, a nice weekend. I had a great lunch with Kathy at the local Indian establishment and managed to get leave work at a decent hour. Saturday, I drove Steve to the STC judging out in the east end, and then went downtown and hit the bookstore for a present for my grandmother. The crowds were horrid in the malls, people everywhere getting in the way, walking in front of you and stopping, and taking up the space with S.U.V.-sized strollers. Saturday night we went over to Terence and Irene's for Geek night, where we watched old serials and episodes of Police Squad until around midnight. Sunday we were supposed to head up to the townies to visit my grandmother, but the folks called and said that the weather was blizzardous there, so we postponed. What do you do with a day you thought you wouldn't have? Go and watch the new Harry Potter movie and go grocery shopping of course!
The second Harry Potter movie isn't bad, definitely not for small children though. The adaptation wasn't as good as the first movie, they left out many details that would have really helped develop Harry's character and really botched the end where they had a perfect chance to really flesh out Voldemort, and failed miserably. The special effects were great, but it seems that while the makers didn't mind showing scary made-up monsters, they did have a problem with showing prejudice, bullying, children being ostracized, and a villain being mean and murderous and cruel. In Rowling's books, human beings are way more monstrous than any monster, from Harry's aunt and uncle, to the Malfoys, to Voldemort, and to ignore that theme makes the film vacuous.