Where I Reveal My Crappy Tastes in Film

Note: none of these images are the same size and I could go back and fix them, but I have crappy movies to start watching, SORRY!

I don’t know as I mentioned it here, but after CABLEONE sent us a cable bill for over $700 (FOR ONE MONTH. NO PPV MOVIES. NO EXPLANATIONS.) we dropped the option of cable/satellite television altogether.

And then, in November-ish, we realized we could use Steve’s Xbox to stream movies from Netflix onto our television. And almost overnight, we discovered what the fuss about The Office was all about. We spent New Years snuggled on the couch with a bottle of champagne and watched the entire first season of Ghost Adventures. I watched a bunch of Dirty Jobs episodes and basked in the glory that is delectable Mike Rowe and watched the entire Harpers Island series. Having Netflix stream through the Xbox made us realize how much we don’t need cable. What isn’t available on Instant Play, I can always rent directly from the website, the “old-fashioned,” way (mailed), as we have the 5 movies at a time plan.

In our search for more series we were ignorant of, but needed to be addicted to like the rest of the world, we came across several other unknown shows (to us) and embarrassingly enough, I may have sent a 2 AM High Priority email to my mom that went something like this:

MOM. I HOPE YOU’RE AWARE THAT OUR FAVORITE SHOW EVAAAAAAA IS ON INSTANT PLAY WITH NETFLIX! MUR-SHE-WOTE!


I wish I could claim sarcasm for that, but growing up that show ruled my life. Yes, my mom watched it with toddler me and I was TOTES down with the Angela Lansbury amateur detective awesomeness! Investigating the millions of peeps dying all over her tiny Maine town! How can you NOT like that?!

And so my trip back in time reminded me of a billion other movies I grew up loving and wanted to see again. Two nights ago, I asked Steve, “Do you remember that movie where this pre-teen rebel kidnaps his mom’s gorilla and drives his mom’s van across the country, attempting the improve the gorilla’s quality of life and then the boy and gorilla have a fight on a beach or something?”

Normally, Steve knows EXACTLY where I am going with that sort of description, but he looked at me after that and said (CONDESCENDINGLY), “Uh, NO.” But guess what?! I FOUND IT!

Movie magic, I tell you. And you can bet your ass I not only added it to our Instant Play Queue, but that I moved it TO THE TOP.

Other movies from my past, available on Instant Play?

(SHUT UP.)

(What is up with the cartooned faces? Data looks like a little girl, poor Chunk looks like someone threw a shovel at his face and that blonde girl looks decidedly unfeminine.)

(Annnnnnnnnnnnnd here’s where my tastes go down the toilet.)

(Honestly, I don’t really remember what this is about. I remember watching it enough that I broke the VHS of it – VHS! Flashback!)

(And I just realized that in ten years or so, I’ll be telling Dublin, “Back when I was YOUR AGE, we had VHS tapes to watch movies. Only the rich people had DVDs. SO BE GRATEFUL.”)

(YES.)

(Okay, this movie is amazing. Not only does it portray my late amour, Heath, it also showcases Joseph Gordon-Levitt – who, to me, resembles my Heath a bit nowadays – along with a pretty stellar supporting cast. Enough can’t be said about this movie.)

(Remember what I said about my crappy taste in movies? Yeah.)

(OH, I bet I got you excited about this one, right? Well, sorry, I’m just as bummed as you will be when I tell you this is not yet available on Instant Play.)

(Before Macaulay lost his damn mind and became a total creepster.)

(Welcome to the Space Jam! Here’s your chance, do your dance at the Space Jam!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Okay, I could go on and on and link you to a billion Mary-Kate and Ashley videos (pretty sure I counted about 20 in a ten-second span of time), but I’ll stop here. If you don’t have Netflix, I HIGHLY recommend it. I’ve been a member with them for five years. When I was too cheap to buy The Shred, I rented it from Netflix. When Steve goes out of town for his Army business, I rent a handful of sappy movies and have myself a good cry. Cheaper than therapy!

And no, Netflix didn’t compensate me for this, but they damn well should, after the (GULP) thousand or two I’ve sunk into their awesomeness these five years.