A Good Popcorn Movie

I am not sure how anyone can go to the movie theater and not get popcorn.  You might have to mortgage the house or sell your car these days but popcorn is an essential part of the movie going experience.  Popcorn can make a bad movie worth the trip.  And a good movie can be the icing on the cake or perhaps the butter on the corn.

For some reason, movie theater popcorn is just better than at home.  I suppose it is because at home I am cooking up a bag of low-fat, reduced calorie, 100 calorie pop in the microwave and inevitably am going to end up with a bag that is at least one third scorched and one third kernels.  I think it was a little better back in the days before I was concerned about calories and used to pop up an unmeasured amount of corn in the air popper with a half a stick of butter in the little melting pan on top.  There is, of course, no counting calories when you are at the movie theater.  In front of the theater we prepare ourselves to enter another world, a world created by each director and cast of characters, a world that does not have to follow our rules, a world without calories or consequences.

For me, there is one major drawback to the movie and popcorn combination.  The popcorn is salty.  I like salt but that means I will be thirsty.  Soda is thirst quenching.  As soon as I sell off a few more major assets, I am all set with a diet Coke to go along with my popcorn.  I sit down in the theater and start munching away before the credits even roll.  I might not have much left by the time the actual movie starts but that is okay.  An hour or so later, I am well into the movie and most likely reaching some major story climax when I realize that I am going to have to go get up and go to the bathroom.  I am going to miss some part of this movie that I just paid a whole bunch of money to see.  I am going to have to disturb a number of people between me and the aisle.  I am going to look crazy out in the hall of the theater trying to locate the closest bathroom.  And I am going to have to do it all in reverse in just a couple of minutes to get back to my seat. 

And I will do it all again the next time I come to the movies.