If you know me well, or even if you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know that I’m a Star Trek fan. And while my heart will always belong to James Kirk and his original crew, I don’t discriminate much and I enjoy all the incarnations of the show.
So, when I heard a while back that one of the iconic episodes of The Next Generation was scheduled for a theatrical showing, I was pretty sure I needed to be there. Of course, it would mean missing class that night, but Thursdays are my easiest night to miss. Still, I had to be sure there wouldn’t be anything critical happening that I’d be missing just to go watch a movie—especially a movie that was really just a couple of episodes of a television show that originally aired over twenty years ago. But, when one of my two instructors (he of the more important Thursday night class) announced we would not be meeting this week, I knew it was destiny. The only thing that remained was to convince Brian to be out past his bedtime on a work night.
Thankfully, my husband will usually indulge my whims as long as they aren’t too outlandish, or too expensive, and a movie at 7 o’clock on a Thursday night is really neither of those, so we were good to go. And that’s how it came to be that we met about four this afternoon, after my class and his work, to head out for a date night.
First on the agenda was a meal, and since the theater is in a part of the city neither of us frequents, we didn’t really know what our choices might be. So we were heading toward a fairly populated area off the highway—mall, restaurants, that sort of place. We were looking for something simple and had seen a Chili’s from the elevated portion of the highway, so we were making our way through the roads to get there, when I spied a Cheesecake Factory looming ahead. I mentioned it not so much as a suggestion but just because I hadn’t known it was there, but Brian decided we should go there. Turns out he didn’t know such places actually existed; he always assumed it was a made up restaurant on Big Bang Theory. He’s adorably out of touch sometimes.
So we had a nice meal (huge portions) and talked about our day—that’s something we don’t get to do all that often since he heads off to work before I’m out of bed and then he’s already asleep by the time I get home from school. Then we still had a little time to kill, so we walked over to the mall and strolled around there for a while. We even browsed around the Apple store for a while because I do so covet an iPad Mini, though Brian doesn’t see the point. Really, he doesn’t see the point in a lot of technology, and that sort of out of touch doesn’t seem nearly so adorable to me.
Finally it was time to head over to the theater. The movie/episode was “The Best of Both Worlds”—all about Captain Picard being kidnapped and turned into a Borg. Really, it was a pretty good show; even twenty some odd years later I can still remember the first time I saw it. Now, as I’ve mentioned before, I’m not a great fan of the season finale cliffhanger, but I have to admit this one was pretty darn good. Brian was surprised that the theater was almost completely sold out, but that’s another thing he still can’t wrap his mind around, even after 25+ years with me: we Trek fans can be a diehard bunch. If it’s a one night only event, and only two theaters in the entire metro area are showing it, you can pretty much count on a crowd. And, in addition to showing the movie itself, there were a few behind the scenes interviews with the cast, and even some bloopers. Awesome.
The only downside of the whole night was that we got a little bit lost on the way home. I made the mistake of thinking Brian knew where he was going and was looking at my phone to check a grade that had been posted. Unfortunately, he forgot we had to go get my car and ended up headed in the opposite direction of where we needed to be. Even in a smallish metropolitan area, turning around on a major interstate can be a bit of a hassle, so we went a few miles out of our way before ending up back at my car, but it’s not the end of the world, and it certainly didn’t ruin a good night.
So that’s the story of our date night, made all the more special because with our schedules they just don’t happen that much these days. I’m glad we made this one work.
Where have you been on a date recently?
