Tuesday the agenda was to take in a matinee at the nearby AMC with HEATED SEATS, where matinee movies are 25% off, but are supposed to be 50% off if you sign up for their membership package (and yes, one version of that membership package is free, which is the one I signed up for!) 

So, I picked the AMC that was downtown – because HEATED RECLINER SEATS, of course.  But – downtown. 

We made it downtown right on time, found on-street parking not too far from the theatre,  followed the signs to where the PAY machine… used to be.  It was gone.  There was some construction equipment parked there, so maybe they removed it.  We walked the other way for the next one, and it was… gone.  Ugh.  So my husand is following the directions on the sign to download the app (he is the one with the data plan for the US.), and when he hits the download button, puts in the info, it takes him … somewhere else.  Turns out they have the DOWNLOAD buttons for advertisements disguised as the parking app.  So, he gets back to the app, can’t get it to download.  Walks down the street, still won’t work.  Cancels out of it, goes through Google Play, it installs just fine.  We put in all the info, it doesn’t like it.  Won’t let us pay.  So we move the car to the private lot across the street where you can pay…  by a different app!  QRC code, better, right?  Nope.  Won’t download.  So now we are 25 minutes late, I say – how about you drive to the front of the theatre, and I will go in and get a refund, so we can go another time?  That was the winner.  (TIP - you can get a full refund within the first 30 minutes of a movie, even if you arrived on time, if you hate it, or there is a problem, or whatever.)

In I go, ask for a refund because we can’t get parking.  Then she tells us there is free parking behind the building, on the other street.  We would have to drive around the block, try to find the free parking, then have to try to get someone to let us in the locked security door at the back, which has no windows.  She did try hard to convince us – after all, with 20 minutes of promos, we will have only missed 10 minutes of the actual movie.  Do I really want to have missed the first 10 minutes of the movie?  No I do not. In words inspired by the pirate Barbossa (for all you Pirates of the Caribbean fans), I was disinclined to acquiesce to her request.  So she had to talk to the manager to find out what to do, came back, and presented me with – drumroll please – FOUR guest passes, good at any AMC, any day.  Excellent!  We don’t have to come back to this location at all.  Expiry date  2027.  Even we should be able to manage to use them up by then.

FYI, we did drive around the back of the building to find out that the parking there – was also NOT free.  They did, however, actually have the machines to pay for the fees.

At the end of the day (technically the next day) – we did use two of our "free" movie passes, at the OTHER AMC, which had plenty of free parking.

After that,  we spent our days doing the usual – Playing with the cat, watching some Netflix, reading, playing with the cat, walking around, playing with the cat, etc.