If you were wondering about my radio silence over these past few weeks, it was not a result of alien abduction, or any other suspect activity, but simply a consequence of a weather induced lockdown, a.k.a. a slow couple of weeks. With the insanely high winds that followed the infamous Mars Day dust storm, and a week and a half of rain and otherwise unreliable skies, my activities have been limited at best. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty of fun to be had in the great indoors.
Even though I have already been won over by the classy experience offered at the Hayden Orpheum theater, I couldn’t refuse an opportunity for promotionaly priced Gold Class movie tickets at another theater. What is Gold Class, you ask? I think it’s probably best described like this, as close as you’ll ever get to watching a movie in Spielberg’s private screening room, plus waiter service. For the wallet thinning price of $32, a Gold Class ticket lets you wait for the theater to open in a lounge instead of a line, gets you a lazy boy style seat in the theater, complete with adjustable back and leg rests, offers a menu that includes more than just hot dogs and plastic cheese covered nachos, and waiter service that can time food deliveries with the beginning, middle and dramatic conclusion of the movie you’re watching. Awesome!
Even though you have to pay extra for the food and drinks, they actually come at reasonable price, a decent (for Sydney) $7 per cocktail and $11 per dessert or entree (which we would call an appetizer, but they call them entrees here. Which one of us is right about that?) My malteser covered sunday was delicious, even if a little hard to eat while leaning back in a lazy boy, in a darkened theater. Despite the hefty price, it’s an experience well worth repeating.
The other safe indoor activity we decided to participate in was getting ourselves cultured. This was done at a combination of the Art Gallery of New South Whales, and the Powerhouse Museum. The Art Gallery of New South Whales, is an interesting combination of the Met and MOMA, housed in a lovely landmark building in the heart of the Royal Botanic Gardens. In addition to a large collection of historic paintings from all over the world, that included a fair number of Australian landscapes (makes sense) the gallery also displays the works of many contemporary artists. Did you know that Christo once wrapped up a piece of the Australian coast line? What hasn’t that man covered in fabric?
The Powerhouse Museum is more a kin to the Smithsonian, with a dash of the Exploratorium and a design museum, all rolled into one. Located inside an actual old powerhouse, this massive structure houses an interesting collection of furniture, clothing, planes, trains, automobiles, satellites, spaceships and I saw more than one kitchen sink on display. The lower level of the museum includes an area full of interactive displays, where you can experiment with electricity, magnets, chemistry, sound waves, gravity, and all other things that are only cool when learned about outside of the classroom. I’m sure that had I been the primary target age for the displays, that I would have had a blast, but my mature Sunday morning gin haze was a bit overstimulated by the noise. Personally, I wanted to play with the art nouveau era dressing table, but that’s just me.
It still gets a bit windy in the afternoons these days, but I can’t complain about the temperature. I’ve enjoyed my cultural excursions around Sydney, but hope that this weekend will bring with it the opportunity to add to my steadily increasing number of freckles with a little sunshine.