Anne and I set off on our usual Saturday afternoon bike ride.  We headed towards Webster, to run some errands.  I deposited some checks at the bank and we exchanged our Rep tickets for a show next week.  I’m looking forward to seeing Kathleen Turner in High.  I checked out her bio on IMDb, her birth date is between Anne’s and mine.  That makes her a little bit younger than Anne and me a little bit younger than her.  I don’t want to go any further than that.  I don’t want to create a Meryl Streep like situation, if you know what I mean.

We had lunch at CJ Muggs in old town Webster.  Anne and I shared their Greek salad.  We also shared an over apologetic waitress, it was her first day, week or something on the job.  We had sidewalk seating, so there were yellow jackets flying about. They made the little girl at the neighboring table literally “scream like a little girl”.  I don’t think that the screaming really helped her, but it sounded therapeutic.  We also, had a great view of Webster’s Saturday afternoon traffic. 

Anne and I rode two bike paths together, the Deer Creek trail and Grant’s trail and I rode a third trail by myself, the River Des Pere trail, but I am getting ahead of myself.  After lunch, we saw the pumpkins, Clydesdales and Red-tailed hawk, pictured with this post.  Anne caught the interaction between the hawk and a passing mockingbird pictured in this header.  After we had finished riding Grant’s trail, Anne’s problematic knee started to trouble her.  She made it another couple of miles, to a Jo Ann’s fabric store, where she decided to call it a day.  I left her there and rode home to get the car.  I left her at the fabric store and she promised to be good and she was until she wasn’t.  Anne got 22 miles plus two yards of fabric and I got 29 miles, still a good day’s ride.

Our Saturday night’s entertainment was Temple Grandin, which I checked out from Red Box.  I’d seen the movie once already on HBO, but I loved it and just knew that Anne would like it too.  On the way over to the grocery store, where I rented the DVD, I heard an interesting NPR article on the business of Hollywood.  The guy being interviewed, who was also touting his book explained why it seemed that most motion pictures were getting worse, while at the same time television was getting better.

For the big box movie theaters the only reliable audience are kids, that is why most of the movies that are being produced today are about comic books, like Spiderman.  If kids are driving your revenues then you make kid’s movies.  Don’t get me wrong, there is still the indie movie scene, but these productions only rarely drive the box office.  Conversely cable television revenue is all subscription based, an individual product doesn’t as clearly impact the bottom line like a 4^th of July blockbuster movie does.  Cable television subscriptions are controlled by the head of household, i.e. an adult.  A rave review in the New York Times is more likely to impress the bill payer than Spiderman cups at McDonalds.  This leads to more mature, more thoughtful and all around superior products like The Sopranos, Mad Men and Temple Grandin.  As they were growing up, I always told the boys that we were too poor for cable television.  Maybe now though, we are not?  😉