Been seeing movies lately, haven't I? No, haven't gotten to the theater. Home video. The Candidate starring Robert Redford, Traffic for which director Stephen Soderbergh won an academy award, Reefer Madness the prequel to Pleasantville though neither movie is worth seeing really, Sudden Fear a surprisingly effective thriller considering that the damsel in distress (Joan Crawford) is as creepy as the villains who threaten her, and finally last night we saw our first DVD movie, The Count of Monte Cristo. Kent recently finished the original novel, reading it during his lunch breaks. So he was dying to see the latest movie version, the one starring that Memento guy. Was rather surprised to find he was the baddie. The movie was good with popcorn. But K was shaking his head about how little the movie was like the book. We had to watch those DVD extras, you know. The deleted scenes, including the main love interest's best acting. Kinda funny how the pieces were themselves incomplete -- no sound when a metal dish gets knocked to the ground, dialog swallowed. But was the movie the worse for having been so unkindly cut? No! God no. Never knew how glad I was that so much ends up on the cutting room floor. The interview with the screenwriter was weird; after admitting much of the movie he'd invented out of whole cloth he described watching a 16-year-old girl at a screening, his eyes sparkling like pins, as he described her perched on the seat, leaning rapt toward the flickering light -- "That's Dumas!" the screenwriter cried.

We rented The Count of Monte Cristo at a video store on the way to our friends' house in San Francisco. Surprised at the smooth ride over the Bay Bridge. Since when is the Bay Bridge passable? Especially in the early evening. Had a nice dinner with Neil and Jeff. They have a home theater set up. Tiny living space. But even that place has a bigger kitchen that our house.

At work the Technical Services Dept has been moved out of its room into the Electronic Classroom. The storms we had over the last months had snuck water in, which led to mildew. Seems mildew is the new sick building villain. Big money's being paid out to workers claiming incapacitating illnesses brought on by exposure to the stuff. So the admin folks wanted us out of there while the wall was torn open, the mildew dug from its lair, sprayed in the face, and dumped twitching in the dumpster. Two weeks it'll take? Maybe. The Electronic Classroom was intended as a place for teaching computer skills. Big windows. So there's lots of nice light. Very stuffy. We prop the door open. One patron peaks hopefully in at the door, "Are the computers for staff only?"