last night, j and i headed over to K&T’s place, for what has quickly become a weekend tradition of dinner and rental movies. sometimes it’s held at our place, more often it’s at theirs (what can I say – they have far more sofa space and a big telly!) sometimes it’s takeaway, sometimes it’s a home-cooked meal. wine and beer are consumed, and two videos are rented. and i take a serious ribbing for what i have come to call my “pavlovian movie response”. no, i don’t salivate to the sound of a bell – instead i fall asleep during movies.

now, oftentimes j and k have been in charge of procuring the movies, and given that they have the emotional mean age of 12 between them, this usually results in film selections from one of the following genres:

teen spoof movies with only the thinnest thread of a plot as a device for bathroom humour, slapstick comedy, and more bathroom humour. there are whole series of sequels involved with names like “i-know-what-you-did-last-summer-on-another-teen-date-while- meeting-the-parents-and-eating-american-pie-part-2″.

horror movies (and associated sequels) with only the thinnest thread of a plot as a device for gore, psychological tricks and gruesome special effects. screaming weak girls running around in skimpy outfits and bloody torture. none of which puts us off our dinner, of course.

hollywood comic-book action hero blockbusters, and associated sequels/prequels. Superman, spiderman, batman, X men, etc. movies 1 through 12. superpowers and villians interchangable as the principle protagonist has to save the world from destruction.

none of these kinds of movies are my particular cup of tea, so to be perfectly honest, i generally don’t mind sleeping right through them. after a big meal and several glasses of wine, i’m happy to curl up on the couch with my head in jonno’s lap and drift off as i lose interest. i awake just in time to head home.

the problem is, however, that it has become such an ingrained response, such a habitual pattern, that i now find myself unable to stay awake *even during movies i want to watch*. last week i finally got a chance to pick a movie, so i was excited to see the latest coen brothers flick “romance and cigarettes” out on dvd. i was enjoying the usual offbeat dialogue and musical tangents of ethan and joel’s wacky film for only 10 minutes before i found my chin hitting my chest. the previous week we’d rented the “inside man”, a denzel-icious bank caper film which looked reasonably well done, and i again fell asleep in spite of myself. i mean, if denzel can’t keep my eyes open, there’s something wrong, right?

it’s become immensely frustrating because not only do i have to suffer the jokes and ribbing about my movie narcolepsy, but also because i can’t seem to stay awake even through force of will. i drowsed my way through film after film, and i was beginning to despair of ever seeing a whole movie again.

this weekend, however i managed to lick it. using various techniques (sitting away from jonno’s comfortable cuddle, limiting myself to only one glass of wine, keeping good posture) i managed to maintain alert attention through not only one, but two halves of the double feature. inordinately proud of myself, i knew i’d accomplished something special when even k joked that i’d managed to stay up with the rest of the grown-ups.

so i’m hopeful that my rem reflex is now a thing of the past. that i can be sure of seeing how the movie ends, and not just begins. that i can follow a story from start to finish without involuntarily leaving for la-la-land.

now if only i could do something about j and k’s puerile cinematic taste.

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