Last night, when we were riding up the escalator to the movie theater, Sam suggested that I was just the type of bizarre person who could do well running my own little movie theater. And I said that I'd be the the Soup Nazi of the movies, and for a while we toyed around with renaming the blog MovieNazi.

But seriously, if I owned a movie theater,
A) Nobody would come in late. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I left the theater last week to get a Diet Coke. But that was so I could stay awake, and it was unintended. While I understand peoples' desires to miss "The 20," if I have to suffer through it in order to get a decent seat, so do you.

B) There will be no babies allowed in my movie theater. Babies cannot appreciate movies, and I cannot appreciate crying babies. Get a sitter. Stay home. Go to one of those "Mommy and Me at The Movies" things I see advertised. But not in my theater, Buddy. No way. And you're not desensitizing your 3-year-old to the violence of bloody slasher films in there, either. You may not bring your child to any movie at my theater featuring graphic violence and adult situations. . . unless you're punishing them. Then, you may bring the child. . . as long as you muzzle his cries.

C)There will be none of this pretentious popcorn without butter or Fizzy Lizzy soft drinks or $5 Jacques Torres candy bars. Just because I'm showing decent movies doesn't mean you're getting fancy vittles. I want you to have access to the same crap you can get at the Loew'sAMCUAMagicJohnsonClearview cinemas. And I'm not going to charge you $7 for popcorn that's been sitting in a garbage bag for 3 days. The popcorn will be only 2 days old, and I'm going to charge $6.50. . . but you can upgrade to a larger size for $.50 more.

D) Anyone whose cell phone rings during the movie will be tied up in the projector room and forced to watch Gremlins 2 until they admit it's the most underrated sequel ever.

E) If there's a couple sitting in front of you, though, and their cuddling gets in the way of your being able to see the screen very well, you may use the illuminated screen from your cell phone to shine an uncomfortable glaring light in their faces. It's only fair.

ON ANOTHER NOTE

I'm kind of fascinated by the whole college admissions game. It's probably a combination of my growing interest in business and marketing, and my own miserable college experience.

One college recruitment ploy picking up steam has a perfect cross-selection of students at a given college maintaining blogs that touch on all the reasons why a potential applicant should choose a school like Norwich University or University of Richmond. (The food is great! You'll learn about strengths you never thought you had! We sell Champion sweatshirts with our school's name written across the front!)

I believe MIT was the first college to employ student bloggers, and their blogs offer fabulous insight into what it's like to be super-intelligent and attend a really fascinating school. (Bum around on the MIT site for a while to see what I mean--especially the news section. They have their own wind tunnel. Their students turned classroom buildings into a giant Super Mario Bros. game. And you get the idea that these young people may eventually save us all.)
One of my favorite books is Absolutely American by David Lipsky. It follows cadets through four years at West Point. I'd love it if someone would write a similar book about MIT.

Check out Sam M.'s blog, which would be entertaining and relevant even if it were not on MIT's page. Sam is a chemical engineering major who, among other things, is traipsing around Europe, has a unique obsession with Freddie Mercury, and has a campus research job where he turns turkey carcasses into oil.

This is not the same Sam from the first part of the post. It's just a really popular name.