Top Gun High

Last week Scotty and I went with Timber to a pre-screening of Top Gun: Maverick. In short - we LOVED it, and we all ended up on a Top Gun high for several days. It was the perfect balance of action, romance, humor, and nostalgia. After thirty years, I can't believe they pulled it off! 

On Memorial Day, Scotty and I went to see it again with some friends, which reignited our Top Gun high. In honor of such an epic movie, here are 20 facts about my history with movies:

Fact #1: When I watched The Sixth Sense for the first time, I didn't figure it out. I was totally taken by surprise. Enough so that I went and saw it again the next day because I had to watch it with the knowing. 

Fact #2: I didn't watch Star Wars until I was in my thirties. I've only seen the original three and The Force Awakens. 

Fact #3: I watched Pretty Woman and Dirty Dancing all the time when I was little. There was a lot I didn't understand. I wanted my name to be Vivian or Baby soooo bad! I had to settle for naming my cat Baby.

Fact #4: The first movie Scotty and I went to together was Tarzan.

Fact #5: Marty McFly was my first crush. 

Fact #6: I can pretty much quote all three Austin Powers movies word for word. Don't judge me. This skill stems from before I was a mother. 

Fact #7: I sat on the front row to see Twister when I was 12. 

Fact #8: I've only gone to a midnight screening of a movie once, and it was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II, and I was only able to survive it because (finally) the theaters started doing reserved seating. It ended up being one of the highlights of my life!

(Are midnight screenings even a thing anymore? It doesn't seem like it).

Fact #9: I took Nicky to see Wall-E when he was little, and the power at the movie theater went out. We waited for half an hour, and then they had to give us vouchers to come back another time. 

Fact #10: I remember being completely blown away by the CGI in Titanic. It looked so real at the time! And now... it looks so fake! 

Fact #11: In 2010, Scotty and I watched the remake of True Grit, and it was the weirdest thing we'd ever seen. Turns out, we had the audio description on for the visually impaired. We had no idea the dubbing wasn't part of the movie, and we sat through the whole thing like that. 

Fact #12: One of the most disappointing movies I've seen in the theater was Jim Carrey's A Christmas Carol. Wait, no. It might actually be The Haunting with Owen Wilson. Wait, no. King Kong with Jack Black.

Okay, it's a three-way tie.

Fact #13: Speaking of Christmas movies, Scotty works his way through the same Christmas movies every year. I, apparently, have very little tolerance for Christmas movies because I don't want to repeat a movie until it's been ten years. I watched Home Alone in 2017. I don't need to see it again until I'm 43. 

Fact #14: For some reason, at movie theaters, I have to have Sprite. In any other situation, I opt for Coke or Dr. Pepper, but any time I get those at the movie theater, I regret it and wish I'd gone for Sprite. 

Fact #15: The first time I took Daisy to a movie was when she was three months old, and we went to see The Princess and the Frog. I was so happy to snuggle my baby girl through her first princess movie.

Fact #16: If I had it my way, the closed captioning would be on for every movie always and forever!

Fact #17: I never got sick of the Frozen II soundtrack.

Fact #18: Jurassic Park came out when I was nine years old, and I was deathly afraid to see it. My siblings bullied me into watching it, and I LOVED IT! For several years, I was told that I looked like "the girl from Jurassic Park," and I hated that because Lex was really annoying. Now, looking back, I really did look like Lex as a child.

Fact #19: I enjoy watching the previews in the theater. It's part of the movie-going experience! 

Fact #20: I've always had a crush on Disney's Robin Hood, which is weird... because he's a fox. "Marian, my love, will you marry me?" is the most romantic movie line of all time.