Movie Theater

Whether you’re a critter, bird, or human one thing never changes: income taxes! I started filling out my 1040 on the computer program. Everything was going along nice and easy. I put in my W-2 info, listed my children (and human pets) as dependents, and then it asked if I had a business. Hmmm, I could write off a bunch of stuff as “business expenses”, like for example that outdoor theater I bought last summer. I did handout tickets to all my guests, that must count as a business! Right?

Oh, I got so busy telling everyone about my other adventures, I never told you the story of the movie theater? I was reading the Woodpile Historic Society’s newsletter and it had an article about a 1950s outdoor movie theater. ‘Munks would come from all the surrounding communities for miles to watch the great stars of silver screen. Sadly, when the areas human got cable TV and we secretly tapped their lines, the place went out of business. The Woodpile building inspector was threatening to condemn this historic landmark and have it blown up. I emptied my savings account and offered to restore it. I bought the property for 512 seeds (all of my savings!) How am I going to pay the restoration staff? Lets think, what would Mark Twain do. His character Tom Sawyer got folks to pay for the “privilege” of helping with the fence “restoration” project. I let folks know that I was offering a once in a lifetime opportunity to work on a nostalgic movie theater for 25 seeds. As a bonus I threw in lifetime free tickets. I couldn’t believe it when it actually worked. It got finished in record time.

On opening day, there was a lively debate over what our first movie should be. Citizen Kane, Gone with the Wind, and Casablanca were popular suggestions with the seniors. The youngsters all wanted a Marvel Super Heroes movie marathon. Things started to get out hand. The youngsters let the spitballs fly and the seniors returned fire with their sugar free cupcakes. What a mess! I must admit it was hilarious. Then my cell phone beeped, and I checked my email. Our movie rental account was being held up pending a credit check which would take two weeks to process. Oh boy, I had a rowdy crowd on my paws and no access to any movies.

Merry saved the day. He was sweeping out the old film vault and came across two film canisters that had fallen behind the shelves and never returned to the studios. I announced to the feuding crowd that he were going to show a double “mystery” feature. The mystery part being we had no idea what films we had, the ink had faded long ago on the labels. (I prayed we didn’t have a couple of naughty films – this was a family event.) Turns out we had the only surviving copies of two classic films (a) Chipmunk, Jedi Master (b) Invasion of the Chipmunk Snatchers. I know my human fans will be disappointed, but, George Lucas licensed the whole “Star Wars” idea from us chipmunks. It was all hush-hush.

I was trying to adjust the angle of the projector but it wasn’t working.

That’s better we needed a rock under it to raise the angle

I yelled up to the Ralph, the projectionist, “lets get the film rolling. What’s the hold up? You wouldn’t be eating snacks in the projector booth would you?”

“I would never do anything like that, Mr. Chippy, I know the rules.”

Wow, we have quite the crowd in the VIP seating

“Anyone need any snacks? They are only $5 each.” (Hey, price gouging is part of movie theater experience.)

I was whispering to Merry a funny story about the lead actress.

Merry thought it was so funny he was rolling around in the aisle and got shushed from the peanut gallery. Ah, the perfect movie experience getting shushed.

The film stopped at a pivotal moment in the plot. The young Jedi was about to learn who his father was. Talk about a cliff hanger. I climbed up on the projector to assess the problem. I found a sunflower seed shell jammed in the gears and our projectionist was nowhere to be found.

Security camera footage of the projectionists stuffing his face just before the projector jammed.