Sex, Trunks and Boiling Hot Dogs

We recently went to see a movie at something called a "Drive-In." For those of you who were born after 1985, a drive-in is a giant parking lot with a massive, poorly maintained white screen at one end. The theater then shows a movie on that screen that you can watch from the comfort of your vehicle, which is fine if you drive a Cadillac Escalade, less fine if you drive a 1978 Dodge Aspen with a bench seat. You listen to the sound through your scratchy FM radio, all the while praying that, by the time the triple feature is over at 3 a.m. you still have battery life to start your car and head home.

They were popular in the 1950s and 60s when everybody was so thrilled about the automobile that they wanted to spend as much time as humanly possible in one. They declined over time as people who owned the drive-ins realized that they'd make a lot more money by subdividing the land and selling it to developers. And they wouldn't have to employ people to stop people from having sex in their cars.

A funny thing has happened more recently: people realized that they preferred spending time outdoors in the summer while the weather was still decent, and thus outdoor movies have become in vogue again. So now we can watch movies in parks or in parking lots, if you know where to look, and the few drive-ins that remain have become more popular. So now you can say you're spending time outdoors, when in reality you're still sitting on your butt eating too much food.

One more bonus, at least for us parents: they're cheap. You generally don't have to take out a second mortgage on your house to take your family to a drive-in--provided, of course, there is a decent, kid-friendly movie available rather than something titled "Naked Ax Murderers 3." Actually, it's usually my luck that whenever I think of a drive-in movie, "Naked Ax Murderers 3" is the opening movie, followed by something like Bambi. Uh, can't you reverse those so I can get my nudity and violence after my kids have fallen asleep (or been given a heavy dose of Benedryl?).

We have two whole drive-ins in the general vicinity of my house, meaning that I can get to them without having to stop and use the restroom (by the way, as we age, that distance shrinks, I've found). They are the two I remember most from when I went to drive-ins during my youth. And, from the looks of it, they haven't updated either of them since. Or cleaned the bathrooms. Here's a sign that the public bathroom is in a nasty state: people wait in a long line to use the portapotty that they have as an apparent backup.

One more thing they didn't change: the between-movie advertisements for the snack bar, in which they showed film of popcorn being popped and pop being poured into a cup and hot dogs being boiled in water. It was the same thing they showed back in the 1970s, and as I recall, boiling hot dogs weren't appetizing back then. They sure as hell aren't appetizing now.

But at least they fenced off what was used for a playground, which in my day were usually made of metal. If at least one kid didn't get sent to the hospital from a severe cut, laceration or impalement, we just weren't playing hard enough. What? No injuries? SLACKERS! Anyway, most of the kids at the movie we attended played on a grassy knoll on one side of the theater. And they had a blast, proving that most playgrounds are almost totally worthless. Kids will always fill the playground void with whatever is available -- hill, steps, cars, other people, etc.

I saw E.T. in a drive-in theater, and the second feature that day was Airplane, the best single movie ever made, making it the most valuable drive-in visit in history. I also saw a Bruce Lee film at a drive-in theater. And this was the theater where I noticed that a van parked in the row in front of our vehicle was bouncing up and down vigorously during the film. The bouncing stopped after it was surrounded by a group of employees carrying flashlights. It would take me a while before I figured out why the van was bouncing.

In later years, I went on a double date at a drive-in, and the movies were so good all four of us fell asleep. We were woken up at 3 a.m. by some Grinch with a flashlight, probably the same one stopping the action in that van years before. My high school girlfriend and I went on a date with the same couple a few weeks later, only that time we tried hiding two of us in the trunk. You know, to avoid paying the extra ticket costs.

Being chivalrous folk, we men decided to hide. The girls were to let us out after finding a spot in back. So we hid, and got hot. My fellow male date and I baked in that trunk as the girls drove and paid for their tickets. We could not hear them well, so we just heard "mumble mumble mumble mumble." They drove around a while. "Mumble mumble mumble." And then they drove some more. "Mumble mumble mumble." Then they sped up! HEY! What's going on!

Next thing we knew they opened the trunk, we got out at the same parking lot where we got into the trunk. This was the 1980s, and they'd been replacing the old speakers with the newfangled FM broadcast of the audio. The problem: the car we were driving was a beater with only an AM radio, and all of the speakers were up in front. Nice of them girls not to keep us in the trunk the entire movie.

I'm glad to say we didn't resort to that during our recent visit, when we saw a 90-minute Disney toy advertisement called "Cars 2" and then something called "The Green Lantern" (I think it was a movie, though it sure didn't seem like it), making it the exact opposite of that awesome E.T.-Airplane double feature in that both movies sucked badly.

But the kids enjoyed it. They fell asleep in the back of the van after the first movie, and then The Wife and I got to "enjoy" the second, less kid-friendly second movie on our own. And then she fell asleep and it was just me watching a badly made superhero flick. Just like at home.

The Inevitable Black Hills 'Vacay'

I went on vacation last week, or "vacay," in modern cubicle parlance. We went to South Dakota. The Black Hills. I live in the Midwest. A Black Hills vacation is inevitable, like death, only you would prefer to get it over with sooner, rather than later. We got it over with sooner.

The Black Hills is exactly like every other vacation destination on the planet, meaning that somebody once came across its beautiful scenery and unique environment and thought to himself, "You know what we need to get people to come here and visit? Tacky, expensive destinations, and lots of them." You know, because nothing compliments God's creation quite like obnoxious billboards, expensive trinkets and ugly t-shirts.

Truth be told, it works out for people such as myself, a father of two boys. My wife and I got to see the area's awesome beauty, even if our drives through the forested hills of Custer State Park or the moonscapes of the Badlands were interrupted by periodic screams and cries and shouts of "I'M BORED" or "I GOTTA PEE RIGHT NOW!" Or, in my toddler's case, "I WANT A HUG!" My kids, meanwhile, get to pan for gold or have a blacksmith pound their names into a railroad spike or look at the same five, cheap toy spears or guns that every retailer keeps on hand, regardless of whether they sell tourist trinkets or expensive jewelry.

Indeed, the boys spent a lot of time in the car, because we drove the 10 hours to get there. Then we spent a lot of time driving once we got there, and to escape we had to drive 10 hours more. My kids, despite the periodic incidents such as the time The Boy decided to play, "Bite My Finger" with his chomp-prone younger brother, actually handle the car pretty well. That's what happens when you take your children on numerous cross-country drives. Eventually they get numb to the whole experience.

That, and kids on road trips have it easy these days. The Wife and I usually take enough electronic gadgetry on road trips to power NASA. And by the way, we went camping on our trip to South Dakota -- in a campground with wifi, of course, which is probably your first indication that we weren't exactly "roughing it." That said, we were staying in a tiny cabin, and it contained little more than beds. Meaning no table! We had to eat OUTSIDE! With the bugs and the bats and the creepy people from Nebraska in the next cabin! It was awful, I tell you! And the Internet connection was WEAK! I sometimes had to wait MINUTES for sites to load properly! It was horrible. Just horrible! And it RAINED a lot (because we were on vacation; it generally rained wherever we were at the moment), so sometimes we had to go to a restaurant instead of eating by the campfire!

Anyway, we usually take a computer, a DVD player, a Nintendo DS and various products produced by Apple. Once, on a trip to Chicago in which we took my youngest niece, we had three of those products going at once in the car: two iPods and one iPhone playing music. Steve Jobs' takeover of our lives is nearly complete.

So on a trip, my boys can watched movies and play games and listen to music and generally ignore the presence of their parents until they have some sort of need. (Preferably before they have that need all over their pants, that is.)

They certainly didn't have to resort to the things we did as kids, mostly bugging our fellow passengers or counting the billboards along the way -- and, incidentally, those billboards in South Dakota are the only things that lie between you, the traveler, and hypnosis. For much of the trip, you're looking at nothing but grasslands as far as the eye can see. Thank God for the western part of the state and its hills. And occasional herds of cows. Thank you, cows, for breaking up the monotony.

Most people will tell you that, back in the day, they played games or sang songs like "99 Bottles of Beer," which is ridiculous, because nobody ever finishes that song. Nobody. The Wife and I on one of our road trips tried to get through it, and failed. It is physically impossible for a person to have enough of an attention span to get through all 99 of them damn bottles. At some point, you realize that it's time to get on with your life. Even if that life involves staring at cornfields or grasslands while leaning against the car window and trying not to drool on the upholstery.

As a result, all car trips were long and painful and usually involved too many overnight stops because the driver, sick of hearing a regular chorus of either, "I'm hungry!" Don't hit me!" or "I've gotta pee!" pulls over to spend a night preserving the limited remains of his or her sanity. I made it 10 hours with two stops on our way back. Kids these days are travel wimps.

So we made it through our annual road trip, though being cramped in a cabin and/or a minivan with a pair of young boys made me appreciate the comparatively spacious expanse of our home. At least here I can run away without leaving the car driverless.