Four for the Fourth

Usually, on Independence Day, the folks at Casa Del Slave Driver go to a local PRA sanctioned  rodeo, eat overpriced goodies, watch fireworks, and then return home. But being that this year 1) the holiday is in the middle of the week, 2) The Kid is away at Army basic training, and 3) the holiday is in the middle of the week, we decided to stay home and flop around in front of the TV.

You know, something we almost never do.

Except we did pretty much all of it outside. You see, over time we've collected a number of electronics. Occasionally they break down. Sometimes, we drag them over to a repair shop and get them fixed. Such is the case with a 27 inch Daewoo television we've had since 1999. And mostly we took it to get fixed because we were having people in from out of town and needed the space. Now, I don't mind stepping around a big ass TV in the middle of the kitchen floor, but others are not to used to our, um, unique lifestyle. And by unique I mean lazy. And cluttered.

We also have several DVD players that, for one reason or another, do not operate properly. I keep them for a number of reasons, the main one being that I always hope they will perform a miracle I call, "Spontaneous Self Healing", and there by relieve me of having to either throw it out or get it fixed.  One such broken item has a surround sound do-hickey, while the other DVD player will decided, for no particular reason, not to play a randomly selected DVD. Maybe it's tired, or unhappy with our choices in film, I don't know. But at some point, after viewing several movies, it will, upon insertion of another, simply not acknowledge the presence of the disc. Just up and quits.

The Daewoo TV is, by electronic standards, ancient. It was manufactured in a cave out of bones and rocks. It has inputs, but no outputs. And the speakers are seriously weak. And that's being nice.

I guess I need to explain the purpose of all of this nonsense: Occasionally we do an activity outside we call "Teeny-tiny Drive-in". In the past we have hooked up a laptop to computer speakers, gather around the screen and watch a movie under the stars. Being that we got the ginormous Daewoo finally fixed, and really have no earthly place in the house to put it, short of the hallway where we rarely stand around and watch television, we decided to put it on a cart we use to haul crap out onto the patio where we spend a lot of time in the summer, working up a good case of skin cancer.

So out comes the Daewoo. I hooked up the Digix DVD player which has surround sound but no longer plays DVDs. Then I had to hook up an Entivo DVD player to the Digix DVD player because that one actually plays DVDs, on occasion, when it feels like it. Then I somehow, through trial and error and dumb luck, managed to get the entire thing to work. And by "work" I mean play the DVD and have sound loud enough that we can hear the actors over the helicopters, fireworks, barking dogs and the little neighbor girl who enjoys belting out Justin Bieber at a volume previously only achieved by the faux band, Spinal Tap.

I know what you're thinking right about now... "Slave Driver, what in the Sam Hill does any of this have to do with your "Four for the Forth" title?"

I'm getting to that.

"The Four" are the four movies we watched, and the "Fourth" part was their theme.

The Patriot
Independence Day
Captain America
and Jaws

Now, I know that right about now you;re singing that Sesame Street tune about how "One of these things is not like the other, one of these things just doesn't belong..."

But really, it does. The time frame of the movie Jaws is the Fourth of July holiday weekend.

I hope your holiday was a good one, and thanks to all of the members of the armed forces that help us keep our liberties and freedoms which allows us to watch movies like Jaws and write drivel like my blog.