America, where even a bad robot movie can grow up to be box office gold

We weren’t sure what we were going to do for the 4th of July, but considering that last year we spent the holiday looking for buckets to hold the water leaking from our roof, we figured any activity at all could only be an improvement.

Caroline spent Thursday night with Mimi and Bops, which meant that P and I had a night to ourselves. We went to eat Mexican food and then stopped at Hollywood Video to see if we could find a movie to rent.

Of course we discussed actually going to the theater to see a movie, but the only movies we agree on are the Jason Bourne movies and since the “Bourne Penultimatum” isn’t an actual movie, that ruled out a theater movie. And really that was fine with me because I had just gone to the cinema a few days earlier. (Am I British all of a sudden? The cinema?)

Gulley and I took the kids to see “Wall-E” on Tuesday of last week. I don’t want to ruin it if you haven’t seen it, but here’s what I got out of it.

Someday the Earth will be completely covered in trash and the only thing that will survive is a semi-cute trash compactor and his pet roach. All the remaining humans will live on some sort of spaceship and have practically no skeletal tissue left. They will just be big blobs of fat floating around on some sort of chairs drinking all their meals out of a big Sonic Route 44 cup.

IT’S THE FEEL GOOD MOVIE OF THE YEAR!

In all fairness, with the exception of E.T., I have never been a fan of any sort of Sci-Fi. I just don’t get the point. Darth Vader? FAKE. Frodo Baggins? FAKE. Captain Kirk? Possibly real, but most likely FAKE.

Oh wait. I just remembered that I was a big fan of “Land of the Lost” when I was little. But who wouldn’t like a show that involved Sleestaks and incredibly unrealistic dinosaurs?

Anyway, P and I left Hollywood Video with two movies. He picked “Rambo XII: When Stallone Needs More Money”, which is sure to be a future Academy Award Winner, and I picked “27 Dresses” because I like Katherine Heigl and I’m always interested in seeing how she wears her hair. If the movie turns out to be good, then that’s even better.

Friday morning I slept until 9:00 a.m.

Let freedom ring.

I finally stumbled out of bed and headed to the couch, where I remained for the next three hours. I felt like I was a young girl of twenty-six again. A couch, a television, Cheez-It’s for breakfast, and no one requesting multiple viewings of “The Jungle Book II”.

Leisurely, I flipped through the channels in the hopes that there might be some good holiday movie viewing. Not that I really know a lot of classic 4th of July movies but, you know, something upbeat and summery…like Jaws.

And, sure enough, AMC was running an all-day Jaws marathon. Too bad we weren’t at the beach.

I changed the channel to Lifetime because I do adore a good Lifetime movie every now and then, particularly when they are BASED ON A TRUE STORY, but Lifetime let me down because apparently they wanted to celebrate our nation’s independence with “Mother, May I Sleep with Danger?” and “My Daughter’s Secret Life”.

First of all, I’ve already seen both of those movies several times.

Secondly, they are so depressing that I might as well go back to the theater for a repeat viewing of “Wall-E”.

Oh, but then my luck changed. I happened upon a Food Network marathon of “The Next Food Network Star”.

God bless America. It is my new favorite show! Well, at least until next week when an all-new season of “Project Runway” starts and then fashion will have to take precedence just as God intended.

After I got all caught up on back episodes of my new favorite show, I went to pick up Caroline. I called my dad earlier in the day and asked, “Is she ready to come home?” He said, “I seriously doubt it.” I mean, why would she?

But since we had plans to meet friends at the pool, I went and retrieved my child from her miniature version of Disneyworld.

And then the rain started.

Our friends called and we decided our back up plan would be to open up their basement, order some Chinese take out (what else would be open?), and let the kids run wild for a few hours. Fortunately, the rain stopped and we all met at the pool as planned.

We were the only ones there. Three families. Six kids. An entire pool to ourselves.

Part of the originally scheduled 4th of July pool festivities involved a 7:00 p.m. beer scramble, at which time the pool staff was going to throw a bunch of beer into the pool and let the adults dive for it.

If that scenario doesn’t scream potential trip to the E.R., I don’t know what does.

However, the beer scramble was cancelled because there’s not much entertainment value in three wives watching their husbands dive for beer.

If possible, it might be more boring than a Sci-Fi movie.

We came home, watched some fireworks through the marvel of television, and went to bed.

It was seriously one of my favorite 4th of July’s ever.

Clearly, I am easy to please.