The Butler

Last weekend had all the ingredients for a great weekend… decent weather, the start of college football, fantasy football draft and Monday was a holiday.  It was all going well until Saturday night, when my Dawgs choked on their #5 preseason ranking and lost to Clemson by 3.  It was a very disappointing beginning to the season.  The silver lining is that it was a non-conference game so it doesn’t count against their chance to win the SEC Championship.  This coming weekend they play South Carolina, let the nail biting begin.

The CFO and I picked up some super sweet corn at the farmer’s market and I’ve been grilling them up perfectly.  I’ve found what I think is the best and easiest way to prepare corn on the cob… no more big pots of boiling water on the stove or trying to grill them in their husks.  Here is how I’ve been cooking corn on the cob this year:

1.  Shuck the corn and place each ear on its own sheet of aluminum foil. 
2.  Drizzle olive oil over each ear of corn and then sprinkle with fresh cracked pepper, kosher salt and garlic powder. 
3.  Roll each ear up in the sheet of foil and close one end of the foil.
4.  Pour in a couple tablespoons of water (to create some steam) into the open end and then seal up that end. 
5.  Throw them on a hot grill (350-400) for around 12 minutes, rolling them once or twice during that time. 

That’s it.  Very easy, yet quite tasty.

Sunday was the fantasy football draft, so I spent the better part of 3 hours on a conference call with the rest of the group (a total of 14 people).  Most of the group gathered at a house in northern VA, but a few of us called in and did it remotely.  I think I built a pretty good team; hopefully I can win some money again this year.

On Monday afternoon the CFO and I went to see the movie “The Butler.”  We walked into the theater and quickly realized that all the other people in the room were at least 2x our age…  Kind of funny.  About halfway through the movie, a beeping/buzzer sound started going off and it took a few beats for me to figure out that it wasn’t part of the movie.  It was definitely a more modern sound than the time frame being portrayed in the film.  When the projector turned off, we all finally realized that the fire alarm was going off.  Everyone in the theater kind of looked at each other for a few seconds, seeming to wonder how we should respond.  “I guess we should leave” seemed to be the unspoken consensus, so we all headed out the side exit and gathered outside of the theater.

Evidently someone pulled the fire alarm and, after about 40 minutes, the fire department gave the all clear.  We eventually found an employee who said he thought that they might restart the movies, so we headed back into the theater.  I was pretty happy that they restarted it; I would have not enjoyed being “left hanging” and not knowing how the film ended.   We were also given a pair of movie passes for a future visit for the interruption, so that was a bonus. 

Considering the subject matter of the film, I thought the movie was well executed and entertaining.  On our way to the car, the CFO and I both wondered aloud about how “true” all the connecting pieces were.  The movie clearly states at the beginning that it is based on a true story, but how much of it was really true?  

Unfortunately, after a little bit of lunch time inter-web research, it turns out that a lot of it was not factual.  In case you haven’t seen it yet, I won’t go into a lot of detail on what isn’t true, but a large amount of the 2 hour movie’s subject matter was ad libbed by the director.  This also helps to explain why I was also a little disappointed with the ending…  I thought that the film got a little political/preachy at the end when the subject became our current president’s election. 

After doing my research on the accuracy of the film, I am now somewhat disappointed by the movie. I’m pretty sure that the true story would have been entertaining enough on its own; I don’t understand why all the falsehoods were included.  I guess that was just Hollywood taking any opportunity that they could to make the movie more racially charged and to throw in their political opinion.  Oh well, I guess I should just stick to comedies, sci-fi and James Bond movies. 

And just like that, a “long” three day weekend was over.  It is amazing how quickly that extra day passes by…