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Posted by Matthew McQuilkin

https://www.fruitcakeenterprises.com/blog/2026/2/2/droning-on

It's very true that, most years, I could not possibly care less about the Super Bowl. But, when the Seahawks go—and this year is their fourth time—my interest perks up a notch. I might even watch the game next weekend. This has no bearing on my ability to understand the game at all, mind you. But, I do love anything that ignites any kind of civic pride, and this is something that boosts people's love of Seattle. I'm always for that, and it doesn't really matter to me what road people take to get there.

Even more importantly this year, or at least this past weekend, something I do care about is drone shows at Seattle Center. They've been happening on New Year's Eve at the Space Needled for a few years now, and I always love them. I was therefore quite disappointed when the thick fog this year forced the cancellation of the drone show.

So for me, the Seahawks drone show that was presented at Seattle Center on Friday evening was a bit of a consolation prize. It was deeply football focused, as you can plainly see from the video above, but I didn't care. It's still a drone show! And I would be able to get footage of drone formations from early in the year that I was unable to capture on New Year's Eve.

I was planning to see a movie at SIFF Film Center anyway, which was right by the International Fountain. This made it easier to just get down there a bit earlier than I would otherwise, and catch the show. And since Shobhit needed to get more steps in, he decided to come with me to the drone show—and we both walked down there from home on Friday evening, not long after I got home from work, but long enough for us to have pasta for dinner first.

We walked into Seattle Center from the Space Needle side, and then went to "Mural Amphitheater," which the Seattle Center notice I got said the drones would be launched from. This was how I got a couple of pretty cool shots of the 500 drones lined in straight, diagonal rows across the grass in front of the mural and stage. We were kind of surprised by how few people there seemed to be around, but then things made a little more sense when we were directed to go over by the fountain because this area would be closed off to the public. For a few minutes we thought we'd be able to watch the drones from directly below them, which would have been awesome. But, maybe would have been dangerous.

It was fascinating to see, though, that when the drone show started, we saw them raise into the air in the formation of stacked plates (as they typically do), and then fly much closer to us. The crowd was much smaller than on New Year's Eve, which anyone could have predicted—New Year's Eve is simply a bigger deal and an annual event everyone knows about; it's difficult to say how many people Seattle Center reached just to let people know this bonus event was happening—but Shobhit was still kind of surprised there weren't more people. I'd say there was a few hundred at least; depending on where you stood, it still might have seemed crowded.

In any case, it was very cool, and I'm happy to have some drone footage I can still insert into the beginning of my "2026 in Ten Minutes" video I'll make at the end of the year.

The show didn't actually start until 6:40, which was kind of annoying. I'd say it lasted around ten minutes. Then, Shobhit and I parted ways so he could walk back home, and I walked the short distance over to SIFF Film Center, where I saw The Chronology of Water—which was well made, but I couldn't fully connect to.

It was also an odd experience just going there to see it. SIFF listed it on their website so naturally I assumed it was a SIFF showing. But when I asked for a member ticket and the cashier started to just charge $6 without question, I was like: "Six dollars? When did that happen?" Then we realized that I did not know this was a "pop-up screening" organized by The Grand Illusion Cinema, which lost their building location in the U District and are actively looking for a new location—SIFF was just hosting this. I knew nothing about any of this. So, not even any SIFF discount for me, but Grand Illusion tickets are cheaper anyway: I got a non-member ticket for $11, which is a dollar cheaper than I get regular tickets at SIFF Cinemas at a $4 member discount!

It was also packed. The showing was sold out, but when I arrived there were forty "unredeemed" tickets, so I got on the standby list. I went in and sat in the front row at first, where there were the only obviously available seats, but then the staff guy came in and pointed out an empty seat three seats in from the right in the fourth row, so I moved up there. Thankfully I never had to use the bathroom in the middle of the movie because these rows have very little leg room and passing the others would have been a giant pain in the ass.

— पांच हजार नौ सौ तिरसठ —

I took myself to a movie on Saturday as well, the third movie I saw in a theater in as many days. This time I took Light Rail to Lynnwood where I then took the RapidRide "Orange" bus one stop away to Alderwood Mall, to see the new Jason Statham action thriller Shelter. It was fine. Was it worth a cumulative amount of time on public transit that was just as long as the movie itself? That's debatable. But, it gave me something to do, and I do like having this easy (if long) transit option to another AMC when it's showing a movie that's inexplicably not showing at Pacific Place. I've now done it a few times, and it works out. I get some time to read my library book without distraction.

In the end I watched three movies on Saturday. I got home and wrote my review, and then I watched two Actor Awards screeners with Shobhit: Weapons, which is still delightful; and If I Had Legs I'd Kick You, which holds up on rewatch thanks to Rose Byrne's extraordinary performance. Shobhit was more impressed with her than he had been with Jessie Buckley in Hamnet and basically decided he'd be voting for Rose Byrne—which I would do too if I were a voting member of SAG-AFTRA (which I am not).

Shobhit went with these two movies mostly because they are both currently available on HBO Max, so we didn't have to bother with logging into his screener portal and screenshare to the TV.

— पांच हजार नौ सौ तिरसठ —

After the movies were over, I called Gabriel back, to talk about a few things, including the voicemail he had left me about an hour before, about seeing Bugonia—a screener Shobhit also still needs to watch. Even Ivan recently messaged me about having watched and loved that one. Gabriel loved it to, though it all hinged on the absurdity of the ending. With movies like this, I never know if he's going to find it stupid or delightful. I was mixed on that ending myself, but whatever.

More importantly, we settled on the dates and the location for our Lummi Island weekend getaway in May. It'll be May 22-24, a Friday through Sunday, and I now plan to take that Friday off, easier done now that I know I don't need to take the entire week off for the trip to Albuquerque (which will be four nights but starting on a Saturday). I have now booked our AirBnB for the weekend. And this, as of the end of January, means that all trips this year to be two nights or more are booked and planned—five of them!

Lummi Island, WA (Friday-Sunday, May 22-24)
Whistler, B.C. (Saturday-Monday, June 13-15)
Amsterdam, The Netherlands and Brussels, Belgium (July 25 - August 11)
Tokeland, WA Family Vacation (Thursday-Saturday, August 27-29)*
Albuquerque, NM (Friday-Tuesday, October 2-6)

(*This is the only one not yet paid for but is booked)

I have varying degrees of excitement depending on the trip, but I am genuinely excited about all of these—and, more importantly, thrilled to have the year's travels fully mapped out by this time already. There's also the idea of a holiday season visit to Vancouver, B.C., which is unlikely to happen this year but is within the realm of possibility.

That said, assuming we do push the Australia trip out another year due to it being too close to when World Pride Cape Town will happen in February 2028, that leaves no major trip planned within the calendar year 2027. I've been banging the drum for a few days about coming up with something cool to do at least for our anniversary next year, and to my surprise, Shobhit's first suggestion was Singapore. I'd love to go there, but with Shobhit's argument being that I still have not visited Asia, my first choice would be Hong Kong, for no other reason than it being the skyscraper capitol of the world. No other city has more of them. And so far he's surprisingly open to the idea. "We can go to Hong Kong," he said, after thinking about it for like a minute. I threw out the idea of going to both, but he thinks that might be too much. A flight between Hong Kong and Singapore is four hours, and even domestic flights we did between cities in Australia weren't quite that long—Sydney to Adelaide was two hours. But, I feel like it's still something to consider.

Shobhit was thinking Singapore might be the most cosmopolitan city in Asia—but nope, that's Hong Kong. But! "Followed closely" by Singapore. Based on preliminary searches, it sounds like we'll be pretty safe even traveling as a gay couple. I learned just now that the most prevalent religion is Buddhism, and even that is only 31% of the population—"no religion" is 2nd with 20%, followed by Christianity (18.9%) and Islam (15.6%). I had assumed it would be more Muslim than that, which would always concern me as a gay person, but the strictness of their laws notwithstanding, I'd love to visit. I won't have to worry about, say, getting caned for tagging public property with graffiti. Mostly because I don't do graffiti. Apparently Singapore decriminalized gay sex in 2023, though it does not recognize same-sex marriage. I still wouldn't have expected that anyway.

If we go ahead with that plan, though, then by February 2028 I will have visited five continents: North America, Australia, Europe, Asia, and Africa. It never in a million years occurred to me even a year ago that I could achieve this by the time I was 51. After that, I'd only have South America to go—kind of ironic given it's the only other continent in my hemisphere—assuming we don't count Antarctica. I don't really think I need to go to Antarctica.

— पांच हजार नौ सौ तिरसठ —

And that brings us to yesterday, when Danielle came over to hang out for a few hours. This all happened because Danielle said we should celebrate the anniversary of her move to Seattle more—even though we've only done it once before: we snuck into the apartment building we lived in together (I was there for six years; she was there for four months, February to June, in 2000) for the 20th anniversary in 2020, but that was it. If we were going to do another milestone, we should have gotten together last year, when it was the 25th anniversary. But I don't think either of us even thought about it last year.

I tried to come up with ideas, but Danielle says she's broke right now, so that limited our options. I'd have loved to go to the Pacific Science Center, especially the Kpop Demon Hunters laser show they're doing—Danielle and I were there on New Year's Day in 2000, barely more than a month before she moved over. She said she couldn't afford it, so in the end I suggested she just come over and hang out. We could feed her dinner.

She thought for a while that she'd have other dinner plans. But, she basically came over for lunch. Shobhit had pani puris prepared, and we all finished off an entire box of them. It was delicious. Danielle also brought us hot cocoa packets, and tortilla chips and hummus. Shortly before Danielle left in the evening, we used the last third or so of the tortilla chips to make nachos for dinner. This was all much more food than I should have consumed in a day, and as of this morning I have once again broken 170 lbs. Not great. I'd really love to lose some weight before we go to World Pride in Amsterdam. I did manage to lose some before we went to World Pride Sydney in 2023, but this time I keep having weekends like this last one. Even on Sunday, Shobhit kept making himself food, eggs and bread and such, and he loves sharing food and I find it hard to resist, so you know how that went. I was doing so well over the previous week. Self-control is difficult when you're with someone who also has difficulty with self-control.

But, whatever! It was a lovely time with Danielle yesterday. Shobhit is still obsessed with meeting steps goals (which make no difference to his weight as long as he's not controling his food intake), and Danielle was totally open to walking to the Capitol Hill Farmers Market with us before going up the stairs to our condo (because our elevator is down yet again; it's been repaired like three times just in the past couple of weeks). It was off-and-on rainy, but in the end it was fine. We didn't get soaked, and we got a nice, short walk out of it.

Shobhit and Danielle chatted by far the most, because she was totally open to financial planning advice, and Shobhit loves that shit. I made Danielle and I our hot cocoa, and they talked about money. Later, as was long my intention, I played the several video clips I have from the time we lived together in 2000, which I had not watched in years and I don't know that Danielle had ever watched. Two of the clips are from Easter Weekend in April 2000, when we had a rental car and Danielle was allowing me to practice driving—I got my driver's license in Olympia that year. The whole time, Danielle is recording me driving through the night in Olympia, and she's laughing her ass off for some reason. She wasn't drunk or high or anything, but anyone else might reasonably wonder if she were.

Shobhit got bored of the home videos pretty quickly, and that combined with a full stomach had him snoozing on the couch. There's a moment in one of the videos where I am moving the camera from one to the other of paper planets I had hanging from my apartment ceiling, and when I say on the video, "This is gonna be really boring," Danielle (now, watching) chuckled and said, "Facts!" But, most of the time she was actually pretty locked in, and laughed several times at things we said to each other—particularly the multiple times she called me "Bitch Boy" and I called her "Pig Slut."

And then there was Deane, the straight guy working as the Receptionist for the Seattle Gay News at the time. They met and started dating within two weeks of Danielle's move—I had forgotten it happened that quickly. I was looking for something else in my archived letters to Barbara at the time (she did not move to Seattle until September of the same year; she also lived with me briefly, but nowhere near as long), and I spent a fair amount of time writing about how I liked Deane but was frustrated by his constant presence in the apartment. The basic gist was: one roommate is enough.

There's one video in which Deane is standing behind Danielle, his arms around her, and they just stand like that the whole time while Danielle and I are talking. Danielle commented last night on how she'd never be able to handle anyone being that "clingy" now, and then made wretching sounds. It cracked me up.

Overall, it was a fun visit. I wish we could have come up with something to do out and about somewhere, something with a connection to our experience of Seattle in 2000, but whatever. It was fun just revisiting the home videos.

The actual anniversary of her move is February 7, which would have been perfect for next weekend except she's working then. That's why we got together yesterday instead. I did find an event that would have been perfect, as it's free and fun and even tends to include snacks and sometimes even wine: the Belltown Art Walk happens on the second Friday of the month. Shobhit and I have not done that yet, byt we have done the Pioneer Square Art Walk a couple of times. Danielle is working on the 13th too, though. But! She's off on March 13, so we're tentatively planning for that. I'm looking forward to it.

[posted 12:32pm]

https://www.fruitcakeenterprises.com/blog/2026/2/2/droning-on