Sometimes it's hard to be an old-school horror girl.

Why not just order it from Amazon?

Something I've realized - yes, instant gratification would be nice. But realistically, it's usually most of a week before I make it out to the store... the vast majority of the time, standard shipping will arrive before I'd get out to pick something up.

The clerk he sent proceeded to spend the next twenty minutes—as we went through the entire horror section, on the off-chance that it had been shelved wrong—trying to convince me that I wanted something else. Something nicer. From a different part of the store.
Are you kidding me? PUNCH HIM IN THE FACE.

In this day and age, instant gratification doesn't take very long if your Google-fu skills are good. No comment here on the advisability of doing this, just the link. http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5097288/The.Thaw.2009.DVDRip.XviD-CiTRiN

As the only woman in the movie theatre for showings of the last Godzilla and Gamera films, I feel your pain.

I got tired of being looked at funny

I have to wonder if I'm going to start getting this at movies. I like cel animation, CGI, and digital effects. Sometimes enough so that things like plot or characters are incidental. Sometimes enough so that I will deliberately head out of the house to go see movies theoretically aimed at the prepubescent market (for example, I recently saw G-Force).

So the ticket clerk and anyone in line sees a thirtysomething male buying a single adult ticket to a kiddie show.

- No, I'm not here with a child of my own. Or multiples thereof.
- Yes, I do want a ticket for Happy Little Unicorns and not Bloodthunder IV: More Blood.
- Yes, an adult ticket.
- No I am not a kiddie-stalking perv, and in fact I would be more than happy to catch a nice quiet kid-free session at nine in the evening after all the usual audience is tucked into bed, except that you and every other movie theater in the city have decided not to show it at any time after 10am, so just gimmee my goddamn ticket.

I know, I should wait for the DVD and rent it. But sometimes I'm just bored enough to want to go do something - anything - to take a break from the house for a couple of hours, and occasionally there's a movie showing which fits the bill.

Maybe I should start taking walks in parks or something instead, now that the weather's clearing up. Cheaper, healthier, less chance of being evil-eyed by a suspicious soccer mom.

I've sometimes called myself a professional uncle, and I fofer this as a solution: Make friends with a couple who has children. Offer to take them to the movies so their parents can have a couple of hours peace and quiet.

This gets you:

a) the movie you want to see
b) no funny looks from the people in line
c) the endless adoration of the child's parents.

(This assumes you actually like kids and don't mind their company. If you don't, none of this really works.)

I got tired of being looked at funny, and I went grumbling off to do something that didn't make me want to punch people

One wonders if now is the time you should start working on your 'Do you know who I am? I'm an internationally celebrated (insert appropriate genre here) author, that's who!' speech.

If you ever try it, please make sure someone gets it recorded and posted on YouTube for us all to enjoy :D

Oh god yeah. I can't wait until the NewsFlesh books are out and selling. I wanna be in on that shopping trip.

In fact I kind of wanna be the one giving the speech, because it sounds less arrogant to have someone else do it than if you do it yourself.

Clerk: "Miss, surely you don't want horror! Wouldn't you prefer a nice romantic comedy? Look, here's the new Meg Ryan movie!"
Vixy: "Dude... this is Mira Grant."
Seanan: [smiles very sweetly at clerk]
Clerk: [gulps]

If a clerk spent twenty minutes trying to convince me I wanted something else, he'd be spending the last nineteen talking to himself.

Oh, fer...

*sigh*

Best Buy might have it...

Net Flicks seems to have about anything these days and if you have an X box 360 like the kids here have, you can see it instantly. And they do have some dire movies...

EDIT: Here you are - http://www.netflix.com/Movie/The_Thaw/70123747 Free trial and downloadable rentals. You can at least watch it today! And on the PC too.

Ever seen "Zoltan, Hound of Dracula", or "I Rode A Vampire Motor Cycle"? I used to keep copies for our re-enactor parties (get a bunch of Viking re-enactors partying down with the ale, leave it till about midnight when the battlefield stories are growing thin, then show one of these. :) Great recipe for a cilled out party.

there should be a Straight To Video section in stores... make life simpler.

Yes, when you want something and the clerk decides to sell you something else...that is beyond annoying. Most people just have to walk away and be annoyed. But, you have a writer's power. May I suggest that Mira Grant write what happens at a particular video store... You have such a lovely imagination, I'm sure you can alleviate your annoyance. But I agree it's a real pity that you don't get to see Val Kilmer gets eaten today.

The closest I've come to relating to your story is the time my friends and I tried to order at a Korean restaurant, and the waitress kept insisting we wouldn't like it because Americans don't like those things. After we thought we'd convinced her that we knew what we were ordering, and yes, we do want that, she brought us the most Americanized items on the menu. I don't have the DVD problem because I do most of my shopping online. Too bad I can't order Korean food online.

Ah, the benefits of living in a small town. C-- at our local video palace, has said, when asked if she thought we'd like a movie, "I doubt it, no one dies violently."

(otoh, we confused the heck out of her when we rented O'Brother Where Art Thou)