Broke Hoedown

Following up on their previous post on the best Disneyland attraction ever, SF Gate now has an article on the three worst. And whaddya know? I’m not the only one who can’t stand The Country Bears!

2. Country Bear Jamboree: I’m sorry, but these bears (especially this one) always creeped me out, even when I was 7 years old. I hate the way they sing. I hate the way they move. I hate that they have no pants. They made a horrible film based on this ride, which thankfully I didn’t have to review. Even Christopher Walken couldn’t make the Country Bear Jamboree look cool.

Can I get an amen, somebody?

How cool is this? CarDomain has pictures from a muscle car show last weekend at Downtown Disney in Anaheim.

Good lord, I am lazy!

Well, that’s not entirely true. The truth is more like this: I spent the weekend on a little getaway with my husband and our newly adopted seven-year-old pug, and after one night at home to re-pack my suitcase I’m now off on business travel in Austin, Texas. I promise you I am trying to do my part to keep Austin weird.

Having discovered the 531 unread items in my blogreader, I thought I’d give you all a random sampling of what catches my eye as I work my way through it. Kinda random, but isn’t that just what you love about me anyway?

• Hochberg et al have posted lots of great information about Star Wars Weekends over at StudiosCentral.com, but what post do you think caught my eye first? Merch, of course! I’m kinda liking the shirt with the Stormtrooper eating a Mickey Bar.
• ThemePark Insider has a poll about beer in theme parks. I do believe those who enjoy “drinking around the world” at Epcot should get over there pronto.
• This new WALL-E video clip (Hat tip: Disney Blog) is almost as cute as my sweet little pug dog. Not quite, though.
  
• BoingBoing always has cool Star Wars stuff, which is why I wasn’t surprised to find a steampunk R2D2 shirt there. Damn. Oh, and this funny picture of Stormtroopers and London cops.
• While we’re talking Star Wars, the Main Street Gazette has great scans of The Star Wars Portfolio.
• Davelandblog has 1967 pictures of Twiggy at Disneyland. How absolutely mod! I wanna ride the Skyway with Twiggy!

Oh man, I still have 287 unread items . . . but I’m toast. Good night everybody!

Mr Broke Hoedown (aka Collateral Damage) is fond of pointing out that Rhode Island has become a standard measurement of land mass. A few examples, courtesy of Quahog.org:

Space-derived materials that survive entry into the Earth’s atmosphere are called bolides. The largest known bolide impact occurred 32.5 million years ago at the present-day Chesapeake Bay. It made a crater twice the size of Rhode Island and deep as the Grand Canyon.
Virginia Museum of Natural History, “Virginia trivia: Have any large comets ever hit Virginia?,” May 18, 2000.

[...]

[Hong Kong] is Earth’s most crowded place, a territory one-third the size of Rhode Island, with seven times the population.
The Commercial Appeal, “Ruling Likely To Stuff More Humanity Into Hong Kong,” May 2, 1999.

[...]

[Iraq's] southern fields are spread across an area about the size of New Jersey, while the northern fields are smaller, about the size of Rhode Island, Pentagon officials say.
Associated Press, “Reviving Iraq’s oil empire a top U.S. goal for post-Saddam period,” by H. Josef Hebert, January 31, 2003.

Well, as a Google news alert subscriber, I’m always amused at the various contexts in which Disneyland is used as a standard measurement as well: A standard of cleanliness, beauty, and entertainment, either held up as a goal (”it’s gonna be just like Disneyland!”) or a contrast (”this isn’t gonna be Disneyland, kiddo”). This usage shows up in headlines a bit more frequently than in the body of the story. A few example from Google news alerts I’ve received:

[headline:} It's not Disneyland, but tourists are coming
At contaminated Hanford site, nuclear history is the draw
[from SFGate.com]

[headline:] Peaks in the valley: mogul’s dream, ‘Alpine Disneyland’
[from the Otago Daily Times]

“Another shocking thing I hear from one official is that ‘[the funeral parlor] going to look like it’s Disneyland’. Come on, death is something that should be dignified, not a Disneyland concept. So that was another disappointment for the residents.”
[from the Singapore News]

Interestingly enough, the term “Disney World” doesn’t seem to have attained this sort of status, perhaps because Disneyland is of course the original, and because its image still retains a bit more of that 1950’s idealistic vibe.

Reuters reported yesterday that a man jumped from the 14th floor of the Disneyland hotel, in an apparent suicide.

The man, who was in town on business and not immediately identified by authorities, was killed in the 14-story fall from his hotel room balcony. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

“Right now it is certainly looking like a suicide,” Anaheim Police Sgt. Rick Martinez told Reuters. “He was seen leaping off the balcony.”

Martinez said the man, who was in Anaheim on business and appears to be in his 30s or 40s, also left evidence in the room that suggested it was a suicide.

My thoughts and prayers are with the man’s family.

Well, the official title of the event is Bats Day at the Fun Park . . . but plenty of us call it Goth Day at Disneyland. It’s the Year of a Million Screams! A thoughtful blog reader left me a comment yesterday to let me know that this year’s dates are November 8 and 9. That’s good news for those who prefer not to be wearing heavy black clothing in the August sun, as they did when I was there for the festivities in 2006, but bad news for those (like me!) whose travel schedules are dictated by our kids’ school vacations as well as our own business commitments.

It was great fun to see all the goths in the parks, especially those in the Gothic & Lolita fashions I love so much (they’re also a staple at anime conventions, since they grew out of Harajuku street fashion). There’s also a great shopping venue, the Black Market, where goth attire and tschotkes are available from independent and corporate vendors. It was really cool to meet one of the artists behind the Haunted Mansion comic books, I picked up a few odds and ends, and I deferred explaining some of the merchandise to my then-10-year-old son (I’m not sure he wanted his mom telling him why they were selling whips anyway). I’ll confess that I felt a bit out of place . . . I didn’t have the appropriate wardrobe as I’m not a goth myself, though given the circles I run in I definitely consider myself a spiritual kin. It was sweet and amusing how some of the vendors spoke to me, in the gentle tones of a kind soul explaining an alien culture . . . I’m sure they didn’t realize I was throwing up at CBGBs and dying my hair blue when they were but a twinkle in their mom’s eye.

If you’re going to be anywhere near Disneyland when Goth Days are in session, I really recommend heading over to check it out. If you have any goth or metal aesthetic at all, the Black Market is a great place to support independent vendors and pick up awesome stuff at decent prices. And, of course, the people-watching on the main day at Disneyland is phenomenal. And even if this isn’t your cultural thing . . . it’s still a great day to be in the park, as I commented on last year after reading a Disneyland Cast Member’s comments at Progressive U. I wish I could be there myself!

How cool is this? Not only did somebody at The Disney Experience build a Skyway bucket out of paper, but they put the instructions online so you too can make one! (Hat tip: BoingBoing.)

The LA Times reports that Disneyland is casting for a new Indiana Jones stunt show, timed of course to complement the upcoming Indy movie, “Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” The article reads, in part:

The Anaheim theme park is casting actors with combat experience for the Indy role, a duplicitous female archaeologist and a physically imposing bad guy for “The Summer of Hidden Mysteries,” a staged show to be performed on the balconies, rooftops and streets of Adventureland, according to the Disneyland auditions website. Park visitors would be enlisted to help solve mysteries and uncover ancient artifacts during the performance.

But here’s the odd thing:  the Times links to the Disneyland News Today site, which in turn links to the Disneyland Auditions site, which gives a 404 error for the specific page in question. A quick perusal of the Disneyland Auditions site didn’t find me the relevant information . . . so now I’ve gotta wonder.