Yesterday I met Gretchen at noon at this tea house in Burlington. We thought about going to see "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," but didn't get around to it - thought we couldn't stay all that long, didn't want to rush through tea/shopping, etc.
So we just did some shopping and had lunch. I got a new wallet which, unlike my old one, actually fits in my pocket. At mom's advice I went out and bought a roast chicken from Shaw's for dinner.

A little bit later I drove down to Rutland and Jo and I went to see the new, the final Star Wars movie, "Revenge of the Sith." My God, it was great. Why - why why why why - couldn't the last two have been like that? "The Phantom Menace" was a great movie, iff you're younger than ten. From the made-for-Playstation podrace scene that had nothing to do with the rest of the plot to the epic battle between the Frogstafarians and the Lego-Bots to the final conflict being decided by an eight-year-old who accidentally stumbles onto the battlefield, I couldn't believe it was supposed to be related to the movies that gave us "When I last left you I was but the learner. Now I am the master," and "Do or do not. There is no try." And "Attack of the Clones" would have been a very good movie if they had cut it in half and taken out all the sappy, saccharine scenes between Anakin and Padme. Since when do mystical monks/knights and women who have been diplomats for decades start acting like "Dawson's Creek" rejects?

SPOILER ALERT (OF COURSE, IT MATTERS ABOUT AS MUCH AS SPOILERS FOR "TITANIC" - SORRY TO TELL YOU, BUT OBI-WAN AND YODA LIVE, MOST OTHER JEDIS DON'T, PADME HAS TWINS AND ANAKIN BECOMES DARTH VADER.)

But "Revenge of the Sith" - wow. Hayden Christensen's Anakin Skywalker being incredibly evil and scary and menacing, before he even puts the Vader mask on. Palpatine becoming the emperor. (And it's pretty cool that he was played by the same guy in all the movies. Even Yoda can't say that - same voice I think, but going from a Muppet to CGI is a pretty big change. I think the guys inside C-3PO and Chewbacca might be the only other ones who can make that claim, and it's not like you ever actually see their faces.) Anakin getting named Darth Vader by his new master. A scene that parallels the saber battle between Luke and Vader at the end of "Return of the Jedi," only Anakin makes the wrong choice that his son would later get right.

And finally, and probably most importantly... Vader breathing.