Yeah, I live 5 minutes from an AMC and often don’t even bother leaving my apt until showtime (unless it’s an opening night showing with new trailers I want to see. Seeing the same ones multiple times per week gets old.)
In Japan they list when the movie ends, so you can deduce when it actually starts by subtracting the running time and therefore know when the trailers (and miscellany) will be over. It would be nice if they would add something like “ad time” in the listing itself, but it is an improvement over the US where they only provide the start time and you have to guess depending on the theater or location.
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Ugh, corporate workshop “productivity stream” this week. Brainstorming, breakout sessions, post-it scrums. All led, of course, by a consultant administrator who knows nothing about our work or regulations who’s clearly in the job only as a short gap-fill between real work and retirement and has zero stake in our “shiny things” report outs. If there aren’t donuts, I’m flipping tables.
You go to the movies multiple times per week?
My wife’s friend does that. @Eyebrows_0f_Doom said they live near an AMC, and you can sign up for an AMC Stubs membership, where at the top tier it includes being able to watch up to 4 movies a week and no additional cost. That’s what my wife’s friend does; she goes to the movies multiple times a week.
If you really love seeing movies, and you are close to a theater, it’s not a bad deal.
Me, I might watch 3-4 movies a year in the theater. Maybe.
Sure. I’ve seen 13 movies so far in June. I saw 20 in May. I live in NYC which has a huge indie and arthouse film scene as well as getting larger releases earlier than other markets. Mostly I go to AMC but also IFC Center, MoMa, Film at Lincoln Center, etc. There are tons of movie theaters here.
Around here there is an Alamo Drafthouse and you can get a season pass for $19 a month which allows you to watch one movie per day if you want. Although it pays for itself if you just watch two movies, they serve you food and drink at your seat, so you have to be disciplined enough to just order water and not a beer and fries, or whatever.
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Aside from my own personal litany of what ifs, I often wonder what it would be like to live in different time eras. The sounds, the smells, the songs. What artifacts of their daily lives are irretrievably lost?
Did you mean this for the Things You Wonder About thread? (I also wonder about living in different time eras.)
I went to Alamo Drafthouse once and found their practice of serving food throughout the movie so distracting that I never went back. I assumed they would stop once the feature started, but no.
Interesting, I can’t remember the last time I watched a movie in a theater. Actually I can’t remember the last time I watched a new-to-me movie anywhere.
Wait, I do remember the last time I went to a movie: in 2017 to see The Zookeeper’s Wife with a friend who really wanted to see it. NOT my idea of a good time, and I don’t care if it was historically true. Utterly traumatizing.
I find I don’t have the patience anymore to sit still for an hour or two and be talked at, essentially, I guess is what it is.
Somewhat covered, but they show advertisements prior to the advertised start time, usually wrapped around entertainment news and trivia quizzes (unsurprisingly movie based). The complaint is the raw advertisements encroaching into the movie trailer time.
Yes! My computer broke and it is difficult to navigate on a phone or tablet.
Mea culpa, mea culpa mea maxima culpa 
Maybe it depends on the location? I hardly notice the servers during the movie since the rows are further apart. Maybe if the movie isn’t interesting enough I might notice, but usually I only do when they deliver my food. They also have moved to using qr codes for the tables so you can get your bill electronically instead of having it given to you which makes them even less intrusive than they used to be.
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I sent my son a Father’s Day card last week. I put it in the mail on Tuesday, plus a gift card and all the cash I had on me, because they’re going through some stuff right now. Of course, he didn’t get it.
It was a really nice card too. 
I think I’ve complained about this before but it still annoys me so here I go again.
In my far-off youth I was a waitress at a couple of different chain restaurants - fast-foodish, not fancy. When I approached a table and the occupants were talking, I always waited a breath for them to finish or said “Excuse me” if I had to interrupt. This is now a thing of the distant past. Whenever I have been out to eat in the last, I dunno, ten years, whether fast-food or fancy, wait staff walking up to the table just start talking over whoever is speaking. No “excuse me”, no pausing for just a second for someone to finish a sentence. Nope, they just roll up and start speaking over you. Good waiters, bad ones, they all do it. I have a feeling no one ever told them not to, that it’s rude to interrupt; or perhaps they feel time pressure and can’t wait for the patron to finish their sentence. I cannot tell you how many times the conversation has been derailed because in the middle of a story or discussion, a waiter walks up and just “How is everything?” over the speaker; maybe even in an attempt to be friendly, initiates a short conversation before walking away. But whatever we were saying is now forgotten.
I realize most of them probably don’t realize what they are doing. I know most of them are not trying to be rude. But dammit, it’s extremely irritating and carries an unconscious “what I’m saying is important; what you are is not” attitude. Can’t you wait ten seconds for me to finish my sentence before you talk over me? Fuck’s sake. It’s getting to the point where I don’t want to go out to eat anymore.
I don’t think I’ve noticed that behavior myself, but I can see how it would be irritating. The whole reason why you go out to eat in a sit-down restaurant is so that you can spend time with people in a nice environment. If you were just hungry and wanted food, you’d either fix something yourself or grab fast food/delivery. You go to a restaurant so you can have those conversations and spend time with people. If they come around and ruin the conversations, then there isn’t any point in going to a place like that.
And what immediate negative but polite feedback did you deliver the the waiterstaffer? If they truly don’t know, they sure won’t learn by you reinforcing that they’re doing the wrong thing.
Agreed. Also, whipping one diner’s plate away the second they lift their last forkful of food. They think (and are probably trained to think) that they are being efficient, but it’s different kinds of rude to the person eating (they might like to set that fork down somewhere) and the others at the table who are still eating and don’t need to feel rushed.
I don’t think it’s the customer’s responsibility to train the staff.