OBJECT OF MY AFFECTION

Monday, May 11, 1998

I went to a MS singles group outing tonight. I went to dinner first, and grabbed some Korean beef bulgogi at a new food stand in Crossroads Mall. As I was standing in line, Peter Donnelly, a former coworker from MSDN in 1996, came by and recognized me, so we ate together. He is what they call a programmer/writer, and now works writing docs for the DirectX team. He seems to be having a good time there! I told him I'd be mentioning him here. Hi, Peter!

I walked across the parking lot (and we are back to normal Seattle spring weather: cold and damp) and met Sara, organizer of the event, and David whom I had met before. As we chatted about work and other singles pf folks, Matt came and joined us, then Leonardo. Finally it was time to go to the theater. As we were buying tickets I ran into one of my dance buddies, an English guy who must work on the East side. But he was going to "Deep Impact," and we were going to a movie designed to appeal more to women, "Object of My Affection."

As we were waiting in our seats for the film to start, I pulled out the chocolate that I had smuggled into the theater: Lindor dark. Delicious! and very suitable for sharing, since it comes already divided into little squares.

The movie was pretty good! But I felt sorry for Jennifer Anniston, with a leading man who was prettier than she was. The scene that struck home the most was Anniston talking with him about how you can't make someone love you. Nigel Hawthorne is in it too, and I always enjoy his work!

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I was thinking about my mother yesterday, because of Mother's Day, of course. At first I was trying to imagine what she'd think of me now. But then I realized that of course, she always thought very highly of her children! I'm so glad that she lived long enough that we related for a long time on an adult level. Reading about some journalers' problems with teenage daughters, or teenage journalers with their mothers, takes me back to those few years starting in sixth or seventh grade, when I just couldn't forgive my parents for being human and flawed. I disapproved of them so much! Of course, even now I can see problems there, but at that age I really took this to heart!