ask grandma j

FRIDAY MATINEE
.....on Friday

Yesterday, OK, so it wasn't Friday, I took the kids to see Hotel For Dogs. The theatre is on the sixth level of a center that has three levels of parking below it. It's escalator hell heaven for some of us. Of course, that would only hold true if the escalators are all working because they are outdoors.

I know this sounds confusing to some of you, but picture a big multi-level donut with all the activity accessed from the hole....

If you could see all six levels it looks like a kaleidoscope...which is what the center is called...which is why some tenants are leaving with complaints of terminal vertigo.

The kiddos settled in with drinks, popcorn and M&Ms....with the exception being Little One who insisted on bringing her sippy cup.

Let's review the movie, shall we?

Sixteen year old Andi and her eleven year old brother Bruce live with dysfunctional stepparents who live for nothing other than their defunct rock n roll lifestyle. This is the fourth set of stepparents for Andi and Bruce, so they don't have too many options at their ages to be placed together.

They have a dog named Friday who's been with them for three years. Friday isn't a welcome member of the family, so he sneaks up and down the side of the building in a basket that leads to the window in Andi and Bruce's shared room. After getting captured by animal control, and taken to the pound, clever Friday escapes and happens upon a deserted condemned hotel where two stray dogs live. He leads Andi and Bruce to his new hideaway, which prompts them to adopt the other two dogs.....

Georgia and Lenny. This hotel becomes a safe haven for other strays, and with the help of two teenagers who work at the pet store, they start bringing more and more strays in.

Eleven year old Bruce is a whiz kid at rigging up different devices for the dogs' entertainment, games, exercise, feeding and....

Yep..potty going.

The movie of course wouldn't be complete without a love connection, and this movie won't disappoint you because it has two!

Andi and David. David works at the pet store and drives a van similar to the one Grandma J will be driving to Virginia in July your local pet store lets their teenage workers drive.

Not to be out done...we have Romeo and Juliette.

Hotel for Dogs is predictable with run-ins with the law, social workers, and animal control....but it's cute and the dogs are adorable and funny. Little One squealed throughout the who movie...especially when the dogs pooped or pee'd barked and howled.

I give this movie five out of five doggie treats if you are under 15 or over 30, like Grandma J.

Oh and let me tell you how much fun we had leaving the Kaleidoscope Center! It was raining cats and dogs... so the escalators were turned off, and the one elevator was out of order. My deep and sincere apologies to the woman with her two children behind me on the very narrow escalator. I couldn't go down any faster with a two year old who was having a hard time on those escalator steps with her short little legs. Crying didn't speed up the process any, and you were so understanding when you explained to your own kids that you would reward them for the drenching torture they had to endure.