Naptime Horrorfest

One of my most favorite things about being a stay at home kind of mom is, of course, naptime. I don’t think any mother of two enthusiastic little bundles of tantrums and neediness doesn’t appreciate locking the babes up for an hour or two of peace and quiet. And let’s not pretend like the kids don’t need it, no matter how much they may protest. Naptime at my house has turned into a kind of ritual, one where I make myself a lunch of whatever in the whole world I feel like—sometimes it’s nachos, sometimes I eat four cupcakes, every once in a while I have a ham sandwich, depends on the day. After lunch is assembled I watch free horror movies On Demand. That’s what I do, almost every day, eat crap and watch horror movies.

Since my husband started working at Canlis, he works later than he used to. I think I finally let my secret out because for the past three days I just turned on whatever I wanted and he was forced to participate in naptime horrorfest. I can’t help it. The movies aren’t supposed to be good, and I’ve always been attracted to that thriller/apocalyptic nonsense (which is why I can’t even begin to discuss 2012 with anyone, ever). My horror repertoire is so extensive these days that I play the guess the ending game, which I know annoys everyone in the world, but I it makes me feel like I have a special talent because 95% of the time I am spot on. What is funny about my husband showing up for the naptime horror, is that he always has to leave right before the end. When he comes home at midnight I sometimes give him the elongated, drawn out, and mind numbing synopsis of the last 10 minutes of the movie. I try to make it go at actual pace, so this usually takes me ten minutes. I’m certain he is listening the whole time, riveted. (I am happy he humors me on all these fronts).

Today we watched an exciting apocalyptic slasher film called Tooth and Nail, staring Rider Strong (yes, the friend from Boy Meets World, and yes, he does look exactly the same age as he did then) and a bunch of other people I recognized, but whose names were not on the On Demand info button. I wasn’t paying really close attention because I was filling out my daughter’s registration for kindergarten, but it was very similar to Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, last people left on Earth eating each other sort of thing. That was not the interesting part, the part that got me was that this cast of weirdos was nearly identical to a movie I watched on Monday called Borderland, a film I chose because I recognized not only Rider Strong’s name, but who doesn’t know Sean Astin? He plays a psychotic American in Mexico following a cannibalistic cult—supposedly based on true events. . . It was like having a week long party with all the same people. In between these two surprisingly OK films, I chose an eerie British thriller called Creep, staring Franka Potente, one of my favorite Deutsch actresses. This one had the potential to be really scary, except nothing is really scary at naptime because it’s one in the afternoon.

I have no idea what I’ll feel like watching tomorrow. The On Demand descriptions of each film make them all sound ridiculous. Like some 14-year-old wrote a tiny report about the film and they cut out the best paragraph for the synopsis. Usually there isn’t much accuracy, but lean towards humorous so I keep on reading them. I won’t lie, I have turned off more movies than I have finished. The fact that I just had three days in a row of moderately watchable horror was very satisfying. If there are any suggestions from anyone, I will pretty much watch anything.