The Adventure Concludes... Where Faquowe?

Immediately upon exiting the underground parking structure we were faced with a decision: Should we turn right and go back the way we came or go left? The highway sign pointing to the left indicated that highway 90 was that way and that was the first number on our directions. George chose left.

Later on, this moment would be referred to as mistake number one.

We drove through some unattractive city streets and George immediately began second guessing his decision. We were still seeing 90 signs and considered this a good thing. A few blocks later we were directed onto the skyway for 90. There were no direction options at this point; we could either get on the skyway or not. We did.

Turned around as I was, I wasn’t sure which direction we were now headed in. It didn’t feel right but I put it down to the tollway structure that I’d long found confusing in Illinois. We soon paid the $3 skyway toll (robbery!) and were off.

It didn’t take long before we passed a sign that read ‘Welcome to Indiana’. Wha?

Evidently Indiana has a tollway as well as we were soon encouraged to pay fifty cents for the privilege of using their roads. At that booth we double checked our math. ‘This may be a dumb question but is this Indiana?’ It was. We were heading East instead of West. Easily fixed, we’d just turn around at the next exit and head back.

One of the problems that I have with the Illinois tollway is that it doesn’t like to have ‘matching’ ramps. By that I mean that the ratio between entrance and exit ramps is not 1:1. Through most of Wisconsin it is a 1:1 ratio so you know that, if you exit the freeway, you can easily get back on it, even in the opposite direction if you like. Illinois is not like that. Neither is the chunk of Indiana that we got to see. All exit ramps but no on ramps to be seen. We kept driving.

George was now noticeably uncomfortable. Part of this was us being turned around but most of it was because Amy was now very late for her fun. We’d stayed at the museum longer than expected and now we were lost in Indiana. Amy should already be there relaxing!

After another aborted attempt to exit the highway, George pulled onto the shoulder, eyeing a gap in the barrier between the Eastbound and Westbound lanes. ‘What are you going to do?’ Amy asked, concern in her voice. I knew that tone, polite as it was delivered. It is not an actual request for information. Amy knew exactly what he planned to do, as I did. That tone is meant to question the action that everybody knows is to be taken.

‘Let’s not question it,’ I noted as George grumbled a ‘Nevermind’. ‘The worst thing that can happen is that we get caught and, at this point, I’ll help pay the ticket.’ One illegal U-turn later and we were finally Westbound and down. Of course, that also meant we had to pay the tolls again so our getting turned around cost us $7 in funds and about a half-hour of time.

The boys were distracted with the movie playing through the DVD player and the toys they’d gotten in the gift shop. They expressed their concerns briefly over the situation but left us alone when we said everything would be okay. Kara had fallen asleep before we’d even made the skyway, a fact made known to us after George had quoted Simpsons with a loud ‘So long stink town!’ as we got on the skyway and gotten yelled at for it. Kara had been far over tired and needed the sleep. Good for her.

90 took us through Downtown Chicago and the idiots that drive there. George grumbled at many of them and I joined his quiet chorus. Halfway through downtown, Kara awoke screaming, evidently from a bad dream. She refused to be calmed down but did stop screaming. Eventually. She would cry for a half-hour before she completely calmed down. George’s visible tension grew.

By the time she relaxed, we’d already followed the split of the highway to continue on 90. We could have still taken 94 and headed directly home but George was still expecting to deliver Amy to her fun. With Kara now out of sorts, Amy no longer had an interest in leaving us, considering it abandoning her daughter. We reasoned that (1), we’d already made the split and (2) we had lots of time yet before we reached that area. Kara should be asleep again by that time and we could make a final decision then. I don’t believe Amy had any intention of taking the opportunity if it did present itself but, since we were already on that road, there was no point in arguing.

90 was taking us to Rockford, a city that I’m unfortunately familiar with to a slight degree. I find it an unpleasant place but it was a familiar landmark. Of course, our directions had us intersecting with a highway 23 before we’d reach Rockford. The problem was that we didn’t know when that would happen. So onward we drove.

Another thing I dislike about the Illinesian tollway is the lack of quality signage. If you are on a major highway in Wisconsin, you get regular updates as to where you are and what’s near you. For instance, if you are on 94 heading west to Madison, every few miles will be a sign with an update listing the next couple exits, the distance to them and the distance remaining to Madison. It gives you a feeling of accomplishment and progress. You know you’re on the right road. Beyond knowing this was 90 to Rockford, we knew nothing. There were no ‘Rockford – so many miles left’ signs to give us a hint. There would be ‘highway whatever – 5 miles’ hints but that was the extent of it. On we drove.

Two issues started to present themselves. The van was getting low on gas. Not impossibly low on gas, not ‘about to run out’ low on gas, just ‘getting uncomfortable’ low on gas. It was also well after 19:00 and the children politely began to ask when dinner would be. Not clear on how far we had to drive before we reached the junction for 23, we tried to delay dinner until we were back in Wisconsin, or at least on 23. A number of the exits we passed weren’t promising on ramps to reenter the tollway anyway. On we drove.

We reached the junction to 20 and decided enough was enough. It was closing in on 20:00, we needed a break and food. George took the dare and pulled off the tollway. Thankfully, a gas station and a McDonalds were less than a block away, sitting right next to each other. I’m not a fan of McDonalds but, as I was suddenly very hungry, I decided to not care.

While George added gas to the tank, I visited the bathroom. Before I could leave, George met me at the door, noting it would be wise to check on our current location. Duh. We asked the very nice lady for some information in that regard and she was only too helpful, pointing at a map of Illinois to note where we were and where 23 was in relation. According to her, it was about ten minutes down the road. We discussed a few other routes to Wisconsin but all were back roads and that way led to truly being lost. We fueled up at the McDonalds and were off again.

Knowing we didn’t have far to go, George and I kept our eyes peeled for the sign to 23 but it was not forthcoming. We had to stop at yet another tollbooth which noted there was one more tollbooth between us at the state line. This seemed ominous to me. Amy began to question where 23 was but it had to be ahead of us yet as we’d seen no signs. Still, something didn’t feel right. On we drove.

We came to a city and passed through it. Something triggered in my head and I began scanning for landmarks. ‘I know where we are,’ I noted. ‘This is Rockford. I think we missed it.’ George argued against this; we’d both been searching and seen nothing for 23 so we couldn’t have missed it. Somehow, I knew we had. In fifteen minutes we’d be at the last tollbooth and about ten minutes after that we’d finally be back in Wisconsin.

And I was right.

I cheered gently as we returned to the ‘Motherland’ at 20:30ish. George quickly hopped onto 41 which would take us past Delavan and Lake Geneva. ‘How much longer until home?’ asked the boys. When I noted we had about an hour left, George grunted and muttered an expression that indicated he would be taking action to reduce that time significantly.

That’s when the fog rolled in. Deep thick heavy fog that forced George to slow down. A lesser man may have been forced to tears. George grumbled further and kept driving.

At this point, George was ever more focused on delivering Amy to her fun night out. Amy had been texting her friends, updating them with our situation, and had already told them not to expect her. George is not the sort to give up on a quest, especially when he feels like it owes someone but Kara was still awake. When asked if she’d be upset if mommy left, she replied in the affirmative. Grudgingly, George kept on driving.

We made it back to Compound 1.5 at 21:30. The ride had been three and a half hours, not really longer than the ride down to Chicago that morning when you think of it, but it felt longer. We stopped for longer periods of time on the way down so it didn’t feel like we were just in the van like we did on the way back.

It should be noted that Kara was still not tired. I made the mistake of stretching out on the floor and she starting climbing onto my chest and jumping off, landing far too close to my head for my own comfort. She giggled the whole time. She’s like that.

Anyway, the adventure was finally over, thirteen and a half hours after it began.

The Adventure Continues... Jump to Lightspeed

After a bit of investigating we found out that the ride lasted six minutes and that the area could hold seven people at a time. Seeing the length of the line in front of us, it didn’t seem that this would take all that long.

Ah, but just because they could fit seven people in there, it didn’t mean that every group ahead of us was made up of seven people. Afterall, we were only six. Once again, we were waiting in line.

It was late, we had been at the museum for hours now and the children’s ability to wait was now extremely curtailed. While they did their best not to complain, they were honest about not really wanting to be in line. They wanted to do the Ride; they just didn’t want to line up for it. Kara kept wandering around outside the line and, eventually, we stopped fighting her over this so long as she stayed near us.

Finally we were next. We entered the ride at 17:28. The museum was scheduled to close two minutes later. Overtime!

Again, I’m not a Star Wars fan, but I had been looking forward to being ‘on’ the spaceship. The cockpit of the Falcon did not disappoint in this regard. We were encouraged to flip any and all the switches we could find, bar one that would shut the ride off. George and Jason took one front row seat and Niko and myself crammed into the other. Amy and Kara sat behind us but just to the side so they too could see. The little room darkened as we fiddled with the switches and, suddenly, the ‘windscreen’ in front of us lit up. We were in space!

X-Wings and Tie Fighters flew past us in a dog fight!

It was a beautiful thing.

Rather quickly they started whipping the education on us again. Anthony Daniels came over the ship’s com system (identifying himself as the voice of C3PO and then doing the voice, Niko did not react to this moment of ‘reality’) and took us to lightspeed to our real universe. In the Falcon, we flew past Earth and our Moon, visited the reaches of the solar system, observed the radiosphere and saw what the edge of the universe might look like before returning, again via lightspeed, to the Star Wars universe and X-Wings. The situation was totally immersive, not unlike the reaction my brain has to an IMAX movie but on a much smaller scale.

As we exited the ride we expressed our glee for it. There was no question that it had been worth the wait. George felt ten again.

The lights were being turned off. The museum was closing. Finally it was time to go. By the time we collected our coats, visited the bathroom one last time and I paid for the parking it was 17:47. We had been at the museum for seven hours. No wonder we were all so tired!

Still, George is an expert driver and we had directions that would take us more directly to the Delavan/Lake Geneva area that Amy was headed for so this wouldn’t take long.

Right?

The Adventure Continues... Spinning Our Wheels

As we passed through the ‘Yesterday’s Main Street’ exhibit earlier in the day, we saw the ice cream parlour within. Now became the time to visit it. I got a sundae that turned out to be larger than I expected. I’ve grown a bit lactoic intolerant as I’ve gotten older so this was not the wisest choice I could have made.

(It’s also possible that after the ice cream is when we visited the balcony but I don’t think so. My memory is fuzzy on this set of events for some reason. Normally it’s just fuzzy.)

We returned to the main rotunda with far too much time yet to spare. While George started hunting for the Christmas tree decorated for Greece, Kara decided it was time to play with me. We directed each other into a National Geographic exhibit just down the hall. After meddling in there for a few minutes, it occurred to me that the rest of the gang had yet to follow us. Before my concern could turn into something more, in they came.

Either due to the placement of this exhibit (just off the main aisles) or due to the increasing lateness of the hour, this exhibit was pretty empty. This gave us a chance to relax and play a bit. Once Kara was distracted with map related blocks, George started watching her again, mostly so he could sit down. I tagged over to Jason and we caused some trouble.

There was a display set up like a meteorological map with a camera pointed at it and everything. Perhaps proving that the lad believes in climate change, he found every hurricane symbol in the set and spread them across the US. Then again, he could be into whole-sale destruction as well.

There was a raft that you could fit half a dozen kids on that you were supposed to point towards the North Star. Or, if you pulled on the rudder fast enough, it would slam back and forth on its moorings. This was more entertaining to Jason thereby feeding into my ‘destruction’ theory of before. We visited a nearby tropical jungle tent where he grabbed all the toy food he could, especially the soda. I quickly grabbed a fruit medley and was happy with that. We built a pyramid out of foam and then he climbed it. There was a cutaway of a plane cockpit and we joined up with the others as we played with that. Again, no real learning on my part but it was relaxing after everything else.

Finally it was closing in on 17:00 and we returned to the transportation exhibit and the Falcon ride. We were only five minutes early (or so) but they wouldn’t let us enter the line until 17:00. This led to me following Kara into the back parts of the exhibit, watching her climb onto a cable car and trying to keep her from escaping the building through the massive doors on this side of the building. I succeeded in this at least.

Then it was 17:00 and we could get in line. It wasn’t a long line so this should go pretty quickly, right?

The Adventure Continues... In a Galaxy far, far away...

After some more waiting in line, our tickets were checked and we were waved inside. The first item of business was a picture taken in front of a Star Wars backdrop. This was an official type museum picture as opposed to a ‘pause with the digital camera’ type picture. George was handed a ticket to identify which picture was ours and we were off.

It was cool.

While the exhibit did bother to try to make things educational, such as comparing the ‘science’ of a landspeeder to the science of a hovercraft, it was too much fun to be bogged down by the educational experience. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that to decry the educational experience in general as the whole concept of this museum is to distract you with the entertainment while you learn something. I’m all for that. There are just certain circumstances where the educational part of the process can feel very deliberately grafted on and this one walked that line on a lot of occasions. It was also the exhibit that I could most easily see the educational part of the process ignored the easiest. ‘Do I look at the costumes or read this panel about ‘real’ spaceships? Hello costumes!’

I spent a lot of time with the spaceship models as I like that sort of thing. I even looked at the educational real spaceships part. They were all theoretical designs for future ships. Oddly enough the ‘reel’ spaceships look more real than these did. Give it time.

Next door to this was the droid theatre. In a small stage was a mock-up of the interior of the Jawa Sandcrawler. Referencing that moment early in the original movie, C3PO laments all the trouble his buddy R2D2 gets him into. The ‘story’ then breaks away to a discussion between the slightly animatronic droid on stage and a video screen just off of it with a real robot designer. They go back and forth, we get introduced to the other real robots on stage (despite the fact that these are probably animatronic versions of the real things as well) and learn how far actual robot designs have gotten. Very interesting. Even if I hadn’t wanted to stay and watch, I had to as Jason wanted to stay and someone needed to stay with him. So I did. We arrived just at the start of the show and stayed the ten minutes or so through the whole thing.

While that happened, the rest of our group pretty much saw the rest of the exhibit! The theatre was the third of four sections of the room. George had taken his pictures and we were about ready to go. I looked at a few costumes, we walked past Vader and exited into the gift shop.

This is also where our pictures had printed out. I thought it odd that they printed all the pictures. Surely a lot of them went to waste as not everyone would want their picture. If memory serves, the package was 3 ‘big’ pictures, 4 wallet sized, a cardboard frame and a key chain for $20. Not a bad deal. It didn’t hurt that the picture turned out looking nice, even with my bald fat self in it. I almost look human! ;)

As it was the second to last day of the exhibit, the merchandise in the gift shop was on sale. George got himself a t-shirt and the children picked out toys. Even after all this, it still wasn’t even 16:00. We had chosen later tickets to the Falcon since we expected to be in there for awhile. Now what would we do?

The Adventure Continues... Post Lunch Disappointments

As we were on the ground floor and we still had a couple hours to spend before it was our turn for the Star Wars glee, we wandered around that floor for awhile.

The Colleen Moore Fairy House is the finest doll house perhaps in the history of everything. It’s a highly detailed castle that’s about as big as a person, certainly as big as a child that might have played with it. Sections are cut away to reveal the decorated interior. It was much more interesting than I expected. With that said, I wasn’t quite sure how it fit into the museum. It wasn’t scientific and hadn’t been mass produced so I’m not sure where the industry might have been for it. There was an entry room with information regarding the house so I suppose I missed it there.

We briefly passed through ‘Yesterday’s Firefighters’ which had old fire engines in it. Unfortunately there wasn’t much to look at as the room was under construction.

Next door was a large room with all sorts of exhibits about energy. Lots of buttons to push, things to spin and levers to fiddle with to be found here. Can’t say I learned much of anything but it was a fun room to play in. The children seemed to agree.

We then gravitated to a room with a pair of covered wagons in it. Interesting and the comic style artwork on the walls was nice but that’s all the room had in it.

As mentioned there was a Circus room. It was rubbish. The entryway held the worse big cat sculptures I’ve yet seen. The model circus was okay but what was the point of it? How does it fit into the concept of the museum? It didn’t. Oh, there were some fun house mirrors along the one wall in a failing attempt to add a little education to the room but it didn’t work. There was also a video screen near them that functioned similarly to a display I’ve seen in the mall. The one in the mall works better.

We also visited the ‘Eye Spy’ exhibit which felt like less of an exhibit and more of a hallway with windows. I understand that really that’s all most museum exhibits are but most of them tend to hide this better than ‘Eye Spy’ did. There was more foot traffic flowing through the exhibit than stopping in it so maybe that’s why it seemed more like a hallway than anything else? The window displays were evidently meant to be little puzzlers and be politely clever. The hallway was too crowded to really examine them. Half of the exhibit was missing anyway, removed for reasons not provided in the display.

We abandoned this section to head for a section I vaguely remembered from my youth that read ‘Racing Cars’ on the map. We passed through ‘Ships Through the Ages’ to get there. This was mostly models of ships in cases, very nice, and a mock ship’s deck which we had to climb onto. While we didn’t linger, this was on of the nicer rooms we’d been in since lunch and it was relaxing in that regard. The design of the room was pleasant, the room was clean, the exhibit was intact and it didn’t take effort to understand how it fit into the motif of the museum.

The Racing Cars were a bit of a disappointment again. Behind the glass, some were wrapped in plastic. Many were very dusty; inches thick dust. By this time I’d started to wonder if the museum had experienced a water leak but the rooms we were in that were ‘incomplete’ were spread out enough that this seemed unlikely. It’s possible that they were just remodeling a number of things at once but, you know, it really didn’t look good.

Growing slightly annoyed with all this, we headed back upstairs and then visited the balcony where we could walk through one of the planes hanging from the ceiling. The balcony ended up being less busy than anywhere else we’d been in awhile so we could let Kara run around a little, hopefully to burn off some energy. It kinda worked.

Finally, it was almost ‘that’ time. We headed back downstairs, some of us visited the bathroom one more time and we were in line. ‘Star Wars’ here we come!

The Adventure Continues... Lunchie Munchies

When the museum was designed, those designers seem to have understood that they would have crowds. The walkways are large and easy to traverse. There is plenty of seating spread out for the Food Court. The Food Court itself… well, there’s a Circus exhibit down the hall that must have been based on the Food Court.

There’s plenty of variety, which is nice, at prices that are not unexpected for a location like this (my sandwich, bag of chips, brownie and juice ran me almost $11) but it’s all about standing in lines again. We scouted the location, found tables at which to sit, George took orders from his family and scurried off to stand in line.

Now, the first problem was that we grabbed two smaller tables next to each other as there were no large tables available. Amy was set to take Kara to the bathroom so I would stay behind with the boys. In order to hold both tables we needed to have someone sitting at both. Since there were three of us, one of us would be ‘alone’. From the way we happened to sit down, Jason took on this duty and immediately wanted to dismiss it. I couldn’t blame him as all he wanted to do was sit with us and not be stranded off to the side. Before I could suggest he just sit at the other table but closer to myself and Niko, there was some yelling and tears. We survived.

Soon enough Amy and Kara were back. Somehow we sort of distracted the children while we waited for George. And waited. And waited. It wasn’t his fault as the place was busy but it felt like he was gone forever. Niko entertained us with Pretzel Wars, naming his miniature pretzel as if they were wrestlers, having them fight and then eating the loser.

George appeared with most of the lunch and went back to get into different lines to wait some more. I dove in with him. I walked around for a moment, found that there was an area in the center of the room with pre-made sandwiches and thought ‘to heck with these lines’. The down side to all this was that I didn’t grab the sandwich I wanted. Somehow I must have picked from the wrong pile. The upside was that I saved George from standing in one line as they had the sandwich Jason wanted available in pre-made form. The sandwich wasn’t bad. Actually, for not being what I wanted, it was quite good. Not sure if it was worth $6 though.

After all the fighting to get lunch, actually eating it was anti-climatic in comparison.

The Adventure Starts to Stand Around...

The main lobby that we’d seen primarily existed to hold three things: the Burlington Zephyr (a train, a huge real train!), the gift shop and the ticket counter. Since we already had tickets for the museum, we didn’t need to stand in any of these lines. We could line up for the entrance to the museum proper, an entrance that was two floors up. So, we dropped two floors exiting the parking structure and climbed them back up again to get inside. Weird but, what are you going to do?

After riding the elevator up, we lined up briefly to have our tickets looked at to prove we’d paid. To prove we’d been checked, one employee ripped my printed ticket ever so slightly. I thought this weird, especially since I then had to stop at a nearby desk to have it date stamped. I think this was due to our entry into the special exhibit but the reasons weren’t explained and it just seemed confused. Luckily the process didn’t take long and we were finally inside!

We headed up yet another level and were in the large rotunda area on the main floor. It was decorated with Christmas trees of the world and was all bright and shiny. As we wandered into the centre of the area the Star Wars exhibit quickly came into view on the right. To our left was the transportation area with another real train, model trains and real planes hanging from the ceiling. This was also the location of the ‘Millennium Falcon’ ride. We lined up for this. I quickly decided that sitting for the better part of three hours and then standing for a prolonged period of time was not a good choice. Luckily I was asked to check on the length of the line and any cost associated with the ride so I got to take a little stroll. As it turns out, the ride was free but we were lining up to get tickets for the ride, not actually ride it. We scheduled our trip for 17:00, far later than we expected to stay but, as we didn’t know how long it would take us to go through the exhibit, we scheduled it to give us as much time as possible.

Finally we were freed from the lines and only had to deal with the crowds. The transportation exhibit was investigated before heading through Enterprise, ToyMaker 3000 and Petroleum Planet. Finally freed of all the sitting and standing, the children started to run wild. I couldn’t blame them really as I wanted to stretch my legs a bit as well but this meant we really didn’t look at anything. We looked and chased and played a bit.

Exiting Petroleum Planet we passed the Coal Mine ride. The boys were instantly interested. Even after a visit to Yesterday’s Main Street they were interested in the Coal Mine. The announced wait for the Coal Mine was a half-hour. This didn’t dismiss their interest. While it felt like we’d barely started walking, we were apparently ready to line up again.

Another half-hour or so of waiting was not easy on the children. They grew itchy. Kara especially grew bored by this standing around. Once we reached the ride, she was well and truly bored and wanted to play. None of us had ever been on the Coal Mine ride before so we no clue what to expect. As it turns out, it was less of a ride than a guided tour of an exhibit with some riding involved. Keeping Kara quiet proved impossible and keeping her contained slightly less impossible. Somehow, between us, she managed to entertain herself and stay somewhat non-disruptive.

The ride exited down on the Ground Floor, right by the Food Court. 13:00: time for lunch.

Unfortunately, we were not the only ones with that idea.

The Adventure Continues... Arrival

Things started out well on Saturday morning. George wanted to get started at 8 in the morning. Like a fool I stayed up late knowing I had to get up early but made it to the Compound 1.5 right on time. A couple minutes later we were on the road, all the way up to the Krispy Kreme a couple blocks away. After fueling up on coffee and donuts, we were on our way.

Once we made it to Gurnee Mills (not all that far inside Illinois comparatively speaking), we stopped at the Toys ‘R Us. We needed pullups for the youngest, Kara, as well as needing a stretch of the legs and a trip to the bathroom. We had a look at the toys as well but nothing caught our eye. After this break stop, we were on our way again.

We didn’t stop again until we got to the museum. We didn’t get lost or anything. Our parking ticket stated that we arrived at 10:47. It was a long trip but it could have been worse. The traffic hadn’t been awful and the children had remained distracted. We were there!

The parking structure was three underground levels. We parked in-between the first and second levels. We walked up towards the entryway on the first level. When we entered the museum, we realized this was backwards. The primary entry area was on level three. So, by walking upstairs, we only made ourselves need to take an elevator downstairs again. As we figured this out, we saw Star Wars characters walking through the lobby.

Excitedly we hurried the elevator into getting us downstairs before they got away. George got the camera out and the boys lined up for pictures. C3PO was there and Darth Vadar, Boba Fett, Stormtroopers and Rebel Pilots. It was a nice turn-out of ‘professional’ fans; the sort of people that regularly dress up like this at conventions and such so that they have the costumes and experience to volunteer for things like this. They did a good job of staying in character, especially C3PO.

After getting to meet C3PO, Niko imparted a great truth to me. “They are real robots you know, C3PO and R2D2,” he said, his face completely serious. “I could really tell when I was standing next to him.” Now Niko is 8. He seems to have almost figured out the truth behind Santa Claus this recent Christmas and yet he believes in the droids. I couldn’t tell him otherwise. I started talking to him about droid maintenance. That seemed to work.

The Adventure Begins...

Every good adventure has a background. This is the background of Saturday’s adventure.

On the last Friday at work before Christmas, my phone buzzed with a text message. It was Amy, George’s wife. This was a rare but not impossible occasion so I was curious indeed. She wrote to mention that she’d just ordered tickets to go to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. They had a Star Wars exhibit that was running until early January and she’d gotten tickets for the last Saturday that the exhibit was open. A moment too late she’d considered that I might want to go along as well. Did I?

Despite the fact that I’m not a Star Wars fan, I wanted to go. Watching George’s reaction inside would be worth the trip. Besides, I hadn’t been to that Museum in… far too long. In general, the Museum would be fun.

It is not uncommon for me to go on otherwise family trips with the Gentekis clan. This is especially true now that there are three children. This way the children don’t outnumber the adults. That helps more than you’d think. It’s not a deliberate part of the decision making process when I’m invited to come along but it’s a good reason all the same.

One problem with this situation is that Amy had accidentally double-booked herself. She had plans to go to Delavan (a small town about an hour west of Milwaukee) that night. Since our tickets for the Star Wars exhibit were for 15:00, we would have to run from the Museum right to Delavan in order to get her there in time. George’s excellent driving skills would easily get her there.

Of course, the biggest problem with the whole concept of going to the Museum of Science and Industry is that it would involve going to Chicago. Nothing good comes from Illinois. Not literally of course but, you know, they suck. It’s a good-natured distaste of our Mid-West ‘brothers’. It’s good-natured until you go there anyway.

There’s nothing quite like going to Illinois to make you never want to go there again.

RIP TTT

Last week I found out about a loss 'in the family'. While at the Milwaukee Public Museum I found out that they closed down the 'Temples, Tells and Tombs' exhibit. Permanently. Poor Djed-hor; homeless again.

Perhaps a side note before I continue: I usually go to the MPM at least a couple times a year. I have a membership. I can tell when things have been moved or changed. I'm a fan. It annoys me that there doesn't appear to be a website dedicated to documenting the general phases and changes of the museum; the sort of thing that would help me better recall my childhood memories of the place. I'd do it but I haven't the documentation. I do have a fuzzy memory but that's not much to go on.

For instance, I remember Djed-hor, our resident mummy (man I hope I'm spelling his name correctly) first residing on the first floor in an area that I believe was called 'The Rise of Civilization'. It was a thin, narrow area that covered thousands of years of history in maybe 100 yards. You started with mummies and by the back of it you were playing with a telephone display. As I recall, it didn't link to anything so, once you reached the end, you had to turn around and walk back the way you came. The area is now the Rain Forest exhibit and connects to the Third World exhibit (pre-history, dinosaurs and glaciers, that sort of thing) so you don't have to turn around like before.

The Third World was assembled in the middle 80's as I recall. The Rain Forest was set-up after that, opening in the early 90's I believe. As construction started on the Rain Forest, the 'Rise' exhibit was reassembled in a generic way on the second floor. I have a distinct memory of being in that area and seeing the humpbacked whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling (the skeleton that currently hangs in the entryway on the first floor, it was covered with lights for the holiday season) so it was being used as a catch-all area at the time. Since nothing else has been changed recently on the second floor, I have to believe that this was the exhibit area that would become 'Temples, Tells and Tombs' as well as an area for touring exhibits.

This would have opened in the early 90's. I have a video tape from a trip to the Museum from December 1992. As I walk into the area, I can clearly hear myself react in surprise, which tells me the exhibit was new to me then. It covered the periods when Egypt, Greece, Rome were world powers as well as having some stuff on the Middle East in general. The exhibit stayed largely unchanged during it's existence so that old tape is still a reasonably accurate document of the exhibit. In October 2007 when I visited the MPM, the exhibit was still open. Last week it was gone to provide more space for the touring exhibits.

Worse yet is that some of the cases from the exhibit are waiting to find permanent homes. The Roman Soldier is in the main entry area on the first floor. Our friend the mummy is sitting in the entryway to the Africa exhibit on the third floor now. There was an empty corner and he was crammed into it. It looks temporary so I can only hope it is. The fellow looks sad and homeless now. He's a squatter.

Tune in next time to more memories of the Milwaukee Public Museum. ;)

When Did I Get All Old?

Today's during-the-Packer-game lunch had some spicy food. Chief amongst these were some buffalo wings that were not immediately hot but warmed up nicely after a few moments. I'm not a big fan of hot that's hot for the sake of being hot as I prefer flavour to heat but these were good. I only had a couple or three. Ate too much, drank too much, went home and took a little nap.

Now my tummy is not so comfy. Worse yet, I'm not good company, even for myself. I don't remember this being a standard reaction to hot food so when did I get all old?

Ow.

Deep in the Tape Archive

Been digging extra deep in the tape archives of late in an attempt to convert as much of the old footage to DVD before it disintegrates. Some of it is close and barely plays back. Some of it doesn't play back. Some of it looks shockingly good for 15 year old tapes in SLP mode.

I ran across a couple tapes today that made me think 'Why am I bothering with this tape?' I mean, if I haven't watched 'The Stand' since the original broadcast, why bother keeping the tape? I'm not very interested in Stephen King's work anyway. I've also got a copy of 'Braveheart' from laserdisc. If I decide to watch that movie again, would I do it from tape? Nope. I'd probably spend the $7 to buy it or, better yet, borrow it from someone that has it.

You could probably make an argument against most of the tapes in the archive. I can't watch most of this stuff regularly and there's so much of it. Why bother with any of it? To that I answer with the 120 Minutes I'm currently watching/dubbing from 1995. I just got to see the Mighty Mighty Bosstones play live. Forgot I had that. That was nice.

Moments like that are why the archive exists and needs preserving. Most of it does anyway.

All Tied Up

I'm not sure who created the tie as an article of dress clothing but I'm going to guess it was a woman. As it's not a functional item, merely decorative, and uncomfortable, it strikes me as the sort of thing that would be created by a female out of revenge for all the frills and uncomfortable garments that they've often worn to look fancy. "The men look too comfortable," I'm sure one said. "Let's find them something so they'll squirm more."

"Why should I wear this extra piece of cloth?" that first man wondered aloud. "It's not covering up anything that's uncovered. It's just gives me an extra item to try matching the rest of my outfit and I'm already not good at that. What's the point?"

"It looks nice. It's pretty," he was reassured. "You want to look nice don't you?"

"I'm already married; I don't need to look any nicer than I do."

"You'll be a trendsetter. You'll become more important. It's important to me that you do well."

He grumbled, feeling his position quickly erode away. "Well, can I just loop it around my neck, kinda like a scarf?"

"Ye...No. No that won't do. You must knot it properly so it looks organized. You learned all those knots while in the Navy; isn't there one of those you could use to make it look nice?"

He choked. "This is really uncomfortable."

She smiled. "That's how you can tell it looks nice. It's like medicine; you can only tell it's working when it tastes horrible."

"I guess."

"Let's go. You'll be the talk of the town!"

I think the thing I hate most about ties is that I can't tie them. I like to think I'm a reasonably intelligent man but the method to make this work still eludes me. Even with pictures and instructions.

Stupid ties!

My Quest is (nearly) at an End

I cannot remember a time in my life without Godzilla. I have interests that I remember vaguely starting at one point or another and some interests that I remember starting with a certain point (like when I first saw the cover to ‘Doctor Who and the Cybermen’ and I became very curious about what it was) but, like the Muppets, I only remember the Godzilla switch being in the ‘on’ position.

I don’t know why this would be. The Muppets make sense as I know I watched Sesame Street so having early memories of them makes sense. My parents have no real fondness for Godzilla so it’s not like they’d have the movies on constantly. Is it just that I don’t remember the trigger point? That I don’t recall the moment when the normal childlike fascination with dinosaurs turned into a fascination with their fictional descendant? I suppose it’s not important when or why it started, the important thing is that the interest is still there.

When I was younger, I’d read about movies, knowing that I’d never have a chance to see most of them as I didn’t have cable or a VCR. Once I got a VCR, I started collecting tapes of things but knew I’d never get to see the Japanese versions of the Godzilla movies. When I started finding fansubbed bootlegs of the Japanese movies, I figured there was a chance I might be able to see them eventually. In the early days of DVD, there were only a handful of quality Godzilla DVDs amongst all the public domain junk. Now there are legitimate versions of most of the Godzilla films available on DVD that feature both the original Japanese versions of the film as well as the American edits. Wow.

After picking up the recently released Godzilla Collection (Classic Media’s box set of their previously released DVDs as well as two disks currently exclusive to the set) I looked at my shelf of Godzilla films and was shocked to realize that I have nearly all of them. There are a couple of the later films that I don’t have in the versions I’d like and a few I don’t have at all but I’m seriously close to having a copy of every Toho Godzilla film (yes I’m being very specific with that statement in order to indicate the fact that a certain film isn’t in the listing).

This is weird. My quest is almost at an end. I didn’t expect that would happen. Ever. Now, if they’d only release a quality widescreen version of ‘Godzilla vs. Megalon’ I’d be all set.

They've got what now?

I just saw an ad for McDonalds offering their new sweet tea.

McDonalds is offering tea.

This... this creeps me out.

Puttering around

A couple weeks ago I was helping my buddy George move his family. He’d borrowed a big truck with a lift gate on it and his young sons absolutely loved the fact that this thing went up and down. Any time we needed to move it, they wanted to ride on it. They would have been happy if we’d done nothing but raise and lower the gate while they were on it. They stayed camped out on the edge of the gate so that they wouldn’t miss the opportunity for a ride.

This all made George nervous as they were always near one edge or the other. If not that, they were in the way. He worked to communicate this to them but received the innocent confused “Why?” in response. Recalling similar events from my childhood, I replied something to the effect of “When you’re younger, all you can see is the fun in a situation. As you grow up, you tend to see all the bad things that could happen.” It was strange to have words come out of my mouth that sounded intelligent, patient and lacked sarcasm. I didn’t know I had it in me.

Anyway, that’s how I feel about traveling. I like being other places but traveling by myself to other places makes me nervous. I tend to focus on all the bad things that could happen. Last weekend I drove up to Stevens Point to visit my friends that live there. It’s not that long a drive; only about two and a half hours. Preparing for it, all I can think of is flat tires and engine trouble. I chew gum with speed and agitation the whole way there. In all the times I’ve driven up there, I’ve never had a problem. I figure I’m due.

Making the situation more nerve wracking for me is the fact that I tend to go up to Point in late Fall early Winter. It’s generally cold. It becomes a tension modifier. It’s one thing to have the car break down; it’s another thing to anticipate a breakdown in freezing temperatures.

A few years ago, I flew to Japan to visit friends. Due to the length of the trip, I made my peace with myself before departing, just in case I didn’t come back. I decided that I could ‘live’ with the idea of not surviving the trip (hey, planes crash, it happens) but I hoping I would because I didn’t want my friends to feel guilty, as if I was dead because I came to visit them and it was their fault. Everything went well.

When I travel with people, I don’t have the same concerns. I think it’s because the weight’s not just on me. If the car breaks down, I’m there with someone. We can distract each other while waiting for help or work together to fix the problem. It’s not all on me anymore.

So, long story short, I had a good time in Stevens Point with my friends. Even with the snowstorm on Saturday that made driving interesting as we went to dinner. No snow on Friday and we got pizza. Saturday it snows and we go out. Aren’t we dumb? Wait, don’t answer that.

It was almost an 'urge to kill rising' moment

A true test of one’s patience is to be in a busy grocery store, standing in the self-checkout lane and watching people try to interface with the technology in front of them. They keep these things very simple so you’d think that someone that was apparently able to successfully dress themselves and drive to the store could figure it out without a great deal of coaching. That is not always the case.

Part of the problem is that some of the people who try to do this don’t appear to be comfortable with technology in general. If you can’t program your VCR yourself, don’t bother trying the self check-out line. I refer to the older woman that was in front of me yesterday. She looked very confused the whole time and had no real idea what she was looking at on the machine. I felt bad and tried to help her out a little. It’s entirely likely that she couldn’t read the screen clearly or had issues following the voice prompts but, if that’s the case, why get in that line? That’s the decision that confused me. It really wasn’t that much shorter than the other lines.

That was the unfortunate part of the process. I gravitate to the self check-out lines because they are shorter. I took a chance on them once when the store wasn’t busy and learned what I had to learn then. A crowded store is not the time to line up to take a chance like that. Especially when then slows down the rest of the line. That’s just not nice to the rest of the group.

I mean, I got English Muffins to buy…

Loved to Hate that Phone

The mobile phone that I’ve had for the past couple years has never worked very well. The research I’d done, both online and with people I knew that owned said phone, indicated that it was a solid model phone. I always had issues with mine. The original phone I received got stuck in a loop rebooting about nine months after I bought it. The warranty replaced it and the replacement worked okay for a month or two until it started to flake out in the same way the first phone had done. As it continued to function well enough to use, I decided to put off replacing it until my service contract ran out. I’m also willing to be nice and argue that the model phone may have been good at one point and I lucked into getting a few crummy items from near the end of the production run. It could happen.

Sunday night the screen went dead on the phone. This was nice as it prevented me from seeing text messages or my phone book or seeing what buttons I’d hit on the phone, you know, all those things that make a phone really functional. Had I received a call, I could still answer it but I didn’t receive any. Monday night I stopped in the AT&T store nearest the house and picked out a new phone. As part of the swap-over, they were able to transfer my contacts from the old phone to the new phone. This pleased me.

When I got home I realized that they had only been able to swap my numbers from the SIM of my old phone. All the numbers I called the most were saved on my actual phone, you know, the one with the broken display. This was a problem.

A-ha! In the months soon after getting the now-broken phone, I’d gotten a copy of the mobile tools application from an intern friend of mine. While cleaning up the night before, I’d seen the cable I’d need to connect the phone to my computer. After a few minutes of searching, I found the cable, found the application, reinstalled it to a computer, attached the phone, downloaded the drivers for the modem in the mobile device and opened my phonebook. Bam! There everything was laid out before me. There may have been an easier way to do it but, since the phonebook in the new phone is laid out slightly differently than the old phone, I just reentered all the data by hand.

There’s a moment of panic when you lose your phonebook. Events years in the past had conspired to save me in a moment of crisis. Hooray the past!

Just something twisted in my brain I guess

Why have I been treating old bootleg tapes with the respect due a prerecorded tape? Is it the bulky plastic case that makes them feel special? They're not. They're just a dub of an old tv broadcast or converted PAL tape. Mostly worthless.

Now that it looks like I've fixed my DVD recorder, they're not even that.

It's not every man that can pull off a Decorative Vegetable

Busy, busy, busy.

Helping my buddy move his family out to Brookfield. Trying to get my back in shape again. Working to clean up the homestead (aka, reducing the piles that grow). And writing, let's not forget the writing.

I got to the end of yesterday and was unclear as to why I was in such a good mood (who said whiskey! I heard you, whoever you were, you'll get nothing past me). I was sore, not so much from helping the Gentekis' move but more from wrestling with the three children for a couple hours. I forget sometimes how children don't run out of energy. I do. Best workout you can get. While sore, my back didn't hurt as it has for the past month or so. That brightened my day. The Children in Need Doctor Who special helped as well.

I guess it's all in the attitude. I was starting to feel very down late last week but a day or so without hurting (in that way) and I can feel more like myself. Good times...

TV is dead and Movies are on life support

A possibility due to the writer's strike:

The writers win the advances they are seeking. (Considering there are reports indicating that the union is the most united they've ever been, it's quite possible that they'll get what they want.) However, the delay in the television season due to the length of the strike negatively impacts ratings. Popular shows return with weak ratings. New shows that networks had reasons to hope would become franchises wither and die upon their return. The younger demographics are the hardest hit as 'the kids' have found other things to do. Network television as we've know it dies quickly rather than slowly (as expected) as the former powerhouses become havens of 'reality' programming, repeats and rebroadcasting programmes originally found on the internet.

Movie producers, now having less money to gamble with, gravitate further towards remakes of older movies and televisions shows, pumping out less creative product by the moment. The bubbling independent movie scene (aka non-union workers) becomes more visible again. The more commercially creative of these are soon courted by the surviving studios to become union and join them. Some do but many chose to remain independent, releasing their new works on-line for donations from their viewers.

It's not impossible. It's largely what I believe is coming with or without the strike. The strike may just speed up the process. Not unlike Radiohead's influence on the breakdown of the influence of the music labels.

It may not be that bad a thing.

Bad driving

You'd think with me being on vacation this week I'd have more time to blog. But I don't.

I think every driver on the road occasionally does something stupid on occasion. It stands to reason that at some point you'll be in an unfamiliar area, misread a sign and make a left turn where you shouldn't. That's my excuse for what happened Monday morning and I'm sticking to it. Luckily there was no oncoming traffic and I was able to fix the situation promptly. I'd feel worse about it except when I was leaving a half-hour later I saw someone else making the same mistake.

Some people can get away with a sight amount of interference when they drive. I'm not an expert driver (not like George or my buddy Nate that I haven't seen in forever; those fellows can drive!) but occasionally I'll take a phone call or eat while I'm driving. It's not a good choice but I've done it. The other day I saw a woman driving on the freeway while on the phone. She was also apparently in a hurry cause she was going far too fast and having issues staying in her lane. These are bad choices.

I don't really have a moral to this story or anything. I just think Americans take driving as a right and not a privilege sometimes. That's a problem.

I'd think about this harder but 'Kenan and Kel' is on Noggin right now. I've never seen the show before but it's very good and is distracting me. It has remnants of the 50's comedies I love so. Later.

Smasher grabs the stick

The other day I went to the public museum for this thing. I knew that I could walk around in the hood without having to show my wrestling license every few minutes and there aren't many times I can do that so I take advantage of them when I can. I grabbed a bag from the stash of pretzel rods and headed off.

I got addicted to pretzel rods when I went to work for Junior in the 80s. He told me that the cigars I usedta smoke weren't kid friendly enough and suggested I switch to pretzel rods in public since I had a habit of gesturing with the cigar during a promo and I needed something for that. It worked out well. I stopped smoking altogether which was good. No matter what else he and I may have had happen between us, I haveta thank him for that.

I wore my 'LWO' shirt instead of my normal one. I worked for WCW for a year, appeared on television a whole, what, five times maybe, and have this shirt to show for it. They hired me for the nostalgia effect and wanted me to not have the pretzel rod in my mouth when I talked. Idiots. I did get a year to do little else but recuperate so that was nice.

Anyway, I went to the museum to walk around, have some fun, entertain the kids a little, nothing fancy. Occasionally a kid would see me and his eyes would light up with excitement. It made me happy to know that I was brightening someone's day; that someone saw the faded star that I am and was still happy to see me.

Every single onea them kids called me Rey Mysterio.

Now, I know we both wear hoods but they look totally different. Besides, he's a little guy and I'm a big outta shape bruiser from the old days. We aint twins.

I suppose I should be happy they thought I was someone who's a big name. It could be worse. Still, it stung a little to be forgotten. I aint wrestled in a long time and I'm aint in any shape to start again but, for a moment last night, I wanted to get back in the ring and show them who the Smasher is and what I can do.

But I shouldn't.

Chivalry is dead

The following story is true. Some of the names have been changed to protect the ignorant.

As I stumbled free from the embrace of the weird inflated trap, I realized that I was also free of the house, the house of fear and horror. Despite the fact that I was heading down a dirt ramp, I did nothing to slow my pace. It seemed logical to me that, while I had escaped the house, I may not have yet escaped the inhabitants of that house. I didn’t slacken my speed until I’d caught up with George and Amy. There, some distance away from the house, we could safely giggle and discuss the creepy joy we’d experienced while waiting for the rest of our group.

I watched as the next group emerged from the house and was confused slightly when that group was not the remainder of our friends. I was also confused by the lack of attack upon exit. It was such a perfect location for a surprise that I could not understand using it.

A few moments later, another group emerged and this was our friends. They loudly laughed and giggled the remainder of their fear away. Then, suddenly, my theories were proved correct. From the shadows of the exit sprang a masked individual with a loud running chainsaw. Relaxation was replaced by one last blast of fright. With a burst of ‘feet don’t fail me now’, young Larry ran, instinctively abandoning the young lady that he had accompanied through the house in order to protect her. In the moment of truth, he had failed in his task, leaving her to the madman’s whims.

Chivalry is dead.

What If?

We all play the 'What If?' game at some point. 'What If I'd lived in this city instead of that one?' 'What If I'd gone to this school?''What If I'd moved out sooner/later/not broken up with/etc?' It can be a useful tool to see where you want to move forward with your life.

The weird part about it is that we're not very good at the game. Certain changes aren't accounted for and other variables cannot be calculated. For instance, I've been typing up a story I wrote in middle school. It was set in the future which is now the past. It's interesting to see what I predicted, how little understanding I had of certain things (like technology) and that all my friends in the story are people I knew at the time in middle school. It was as if I expected to know those people the rest of my life. That said, I do still have contact with people I knew in middle school. In the past couple weeks I realized that I'd bumped into someone I was pals with in middle school. Neither of us realized we knew each other at the time. Weird how that works sometimes.

I guess my point is that we (or at least I guess I do) generally expect certain things to remain constant. Certain good things in our lives shouldn't go away so we don't, or can't, picture those changes. Friends moving away, buildings burning down, businesses closing; these things shouldn't happen to the good things in our lives but sometimes they do. It's not the change we want but sometimes it's the change that happens.

Last night we played 'What If?' a few times. 'What If we all move to Colorado?' 'What If George had played high school football?' 'What If Katy and Eric's son marries George and Amy's daughter?' Looking forward and looking back. What would change? What would be the same?

I have the feeling of great change yet ahead of me. Change in and of itself doesn't bother me like it once did. I hate change for the sake of change, changes made in an effort to 'look busy'. At least one big something is going to change for me soon, perhaps a couple somethings. There's rumblings afoot and I've no clue to what level it will alter things. That's the problem with rumblings. They are indistinct by nature.

One thing I have no interest in letting change is my writing and by that I mean that I have no interest in stopping. It would be too fundamental a change and I don't like what I 'see' of that me. If that means this blogging thing stays weekly for the time being while I work on everything else, that's not a problem for me.

I wonder what's going to happen. What Then?

Change and not a Moment Too Soon

Within the past couple weeks, Radiohead announced plans to release their new album under a 'pay what you want' plan, Nine Inch Nails announced freedom from their music label and Madonna signed with a concert promoter rather than a traditional music label. The music industry is seeing some big changes and the traditional music labels are on the outside of the process for a change.

The interesting thing to see out of this 'pay what you want' concept is how much money will these bands state they've made off this model. How will it compare to what they made under the music companies? In a store like Best Buy, a big new release might be $11 -$12 bucks but the average CD is $13-15. In the mall (why would you go to the mall to shop for music?) they tended to be $17-18.

How much of that went to the artist? I remember reading the breakdown at one point but can't recall what it was anymore. I know it's not much. Maybe $2 a CD? If I download an album from the artist and kick them $5 via Paypal, it's still cheaper than iTunes to me. I feel happy, the artist feels happy (technically they just made a $3 profit). Win-win. Most of that money went back to the label to pay for the recording studio time, video shoots and any other money the label advanced them so it's likely that, in most cases, the band never saw any money from CD sales. It sounds like a modern day form of indentured servitude.

Every year I go to Irish Fest with the goal of buying at least one CD while I'm there as the artists come with disks. I know they'll be $15-18 but I do it anyway. Why? These bands tend to be on smaller labels. I always feel I'm helping that band directly as opposed to feeding some big corporate machine that will use my cash to promote the winner of some reality show as a performer. Given the chance to easily download the tracks directly from the artist and know that my money is going right to them... how could I not want that?

I have the feeling this is going to turn around faster than people think. There will still be CDs in stores for awhile now (most people aren't that technologically comfortable yet) but the power of the recording industry will disappear quicker than they expect. Look at the Catholic Church one hundred years ago and compare it to today. They're still around but it's not the respected powerhouse it once was.

I also think it will create more jobs than it displaces. A big corporation has to keep things streamlined for their stockholders. A band will need a tech guy or two to run their website and make sure the downloads happen cleanly and the money comes in safety. Some bands might team up to do this but they'll have the option of doing it on their own terms. Whatever they pay that tech guy or team won't even come close to the amount of money one CEO that hasn't liked music since 1957 makes in a year.

On the whole, I think that's a good thing. Viva la revolucion!

Something to do tonight

Took a day of vacation Friday. Got busy as right away as possible (object in motion tends to stay in motion) and managed to look through a good chunk of the video tape portion of the archive, looking for tapes that could be removed as they had been upgraded to DVD versions. Didn't pull out too many but found a few that were close. There's a lot of interesting stuff in there that I tend to forget about. Converting the stuff that will 'never' see a DVD release (or stuff I don't mind having but won't pay for) is a project I'm already testing. I'm curious to see if I can encode them as files for storage rather than burn them as video DVDs. Well, most of the stuff anyway. Most of it was recorded in SLP anyway so it's not great quality items.

Took a walk and Friday night activities were called off. Watched a movie that's been waiting to be seen for a few years. It ('She-Devils on Wheels') was okay.

Ended up sitting around most of Saturday. Friday's walk had tightened up my back. Not enough stretching. Managed to loosen it up enough to be comfortable again. Saturday night's plans were also called off. Finally left the homestead to get some snacks that I still haven't touched, got some Wendy's and then curled up at home with another movie ('The Astro-Zombies') which was less than okay. Very padded. I got some typing done during it so that was okay. I've got 25 pages on the long version of the 'Fresh Fiction for Friday' tale and it's nowhere near done.

Now it's Sunday. Did some outlining for the long 'FFfF'. Batman's on the TV and the Packers play the Bears tonight. Just waiting for the fun to start. 'Quiet' weekends aren't always a bad thing. I've got next Friday off as well. I'm looking forward to that weekend and hoping it's not overbooked...

Too many comics?

The past few weeks have been a combination of being sick and busy. Once my time and energy started to come together again, I returned to some of my less taxing projects in an effort to keep things moving. I started sorting and bagging my comics to put them away into storage. I soon realized that this was a stupid project to pick up for being ‘non-taxing’ as comic book long boxes are heavy when they’re near full. Geeks don’t need dumbbells when they have long boxes to move back and forth.

Negotiating around the stuff in the archive to get to my comics, a thought occurred to me that I never thought I would have: I may have too many comics.

To a comics fan the reason why I never expected to think that thought is obvious: there is no such thing as too many comics. From simply a space perspective, I seem to have hit a limit. Realistically, I probably hit that limit and passed it a couple years ago. There are two basic solutions to this situation: get more room to store my books or get rid of some of my books.

Indeed, the situation is more complicated than those simple options. There are specific issues or stories that I possess in multiple editions. I made a comment along those lines to my buddy Al the other day. Discussing the storyline ‘Doctor Who – The Iron Legion’, I know I have at least three copies of it: the original ‘Doctor Who Weekly’ issues, the colorized American reprints of the eighties as well as a high quality reprint from just a couple years ago. It’s being recolorized and reprinted again. Since its Doctor Who, I’ll probably buy it again.

Do I ‘need’ multiple editions of a story, as good as it may be? No, probably not. This is the sort of thing that seems to hit more often with DVDs; having multiple special editions that contain sufficient different content so the temptation is to possess both versions.

To the non-collector mentality, all this sounds foolish I’m sure. Why own a DVD that you can rent and return? Why worry about multiple editions when it the story that’s important? Have it once, if at all. Just understand that I am a collector, it’s a sickness and I know it. It’s all stuff that generates happy chemical reactions in my brain.

Lumped into all this is the rise of digital comics, scanned copies of books that are available in legal and illegal versions. I could replace most of my collection with digital copies. Would I rid myself of the physical copies of my books if I did? Honestly, in most cases I’m sure I wouldn’t. There’s a special feeling to having some of these originals that doesn’t come with having a nice reprint or a digital copy. I have legal digital copies of the first 500 issues of the Amazing Spider-Man. Does that compare to having issue #60 from the sixties in my hand to read? No. There’s a feeling, a history, a scent even that comes from that physical item.

At the same time, there are a number of books that I could comfortably replace with digital scans, a nice reprint or only having one copy. The big question is: Does that situation already exist with some books? Is there anything I could clear out for space? Hopefully.

A brief note to the city of Boston

Twice now people have gotten arrested in Boston for having bomb related equipment but no bomb. Essentially anyone walking around with wires has been arrested for having a bomb.

What do I know about Boston? Tea party, interesting accent, crummy beer, setting of an overrated 80's sitcom that spun off an even more overrated 90's sitcom.

Boston, just because you're on the East Coast it doesn't mean you're a target. You come across like a little brother trying to please an older sibling, hoping to 'do good'.

There's a difference between vigilance and paranoia. This comes across like paranoia.

There's nothing wrong with not being tier one. Milwaukee's not tier one. We're tier two at best, maybe three. At least our beer is better than Boston's. Any day. Dunno about our tv shows. 'Cheers' may be overrated but I don't know that it was 'worse' than 'Happy Days'.

Whatever.

Another flashback DVD review written...2002 again?

'Doctor Jekyll and Sister Hyde' – 1971

Story in Brief: Our story is told primarily in flashback, reviewing the situation so that we may learn from Doctor Jekyll's experiments into prolonging life. The potion he develops to extend his existence uses female hormones and has the unfortunate side effect of turning the individual who takes the potion into a female because of it. His 'sister' Hyde is significantly less restrained than he is, which leads into all sorts of trouble and confusion, especially when Jekyll starts to fall in love with a young lady and Hyde begins to pursue her brother.

Thoughts:

I really had low expectations going into this movie. The title, while grandly clever, does conjure up thoughts of a rather cheap exploitation flick. What I watched was a surprisingly clever construction of a film. While the title points you rather accurately towards 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' the movie also weaves in the tales of Burke and Hare as well as Jack the Ripper. The resulting mix was probably years ahead of it's time. The movie also progresses surprisingly logically, the tension and action building as the film moves along. In all fairness, if I woke up tomorrow morning to find I was suddenly a female one of my first acts would likely be to give my new naked form a look-see.

Ralph Bates is a great Jekyll and I've getting the feeling he's been a very underrated actor for years. Offhand I only recollect him in this, 'Horror of Frankenstein' and 'Lust for a Vampire' and he was excellent in all of them. Martine Bestwick is equally excellent as Hyde. Creepily enough the two leads do look like they could be related, perhaps brother and sister so the casting is excellent, inspired even.

The film looks excellent with minimal flaws to distract the eye. The sound wasn't anything special, but didn't sound tinny or faded either.

This film is part of Anchor Bay's Hammer Collection. They snuck three films into the collection in late 2001 and these films were at a lower price point than the majority of the films in the Hammer Collection. I'm not sure if this was due to these films having fewer extras that the earlier films or if Anchor Bay simply revised their pricing structure. Eitherway the decreased price of this film led me to scoop it up more quickly than most of its fellow collection mates. I was not disappointed.

Highly recommended.

Letter - p.s.

I don't normally do this sort of thing, but I thought it was interesting that this sort of thing should explode during the release of my letter last week:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/30/AR2007083001834.html

Updated information points to at least 13 wrestlers getting suspended due to violations of the WWE Wellness Policy and one former performer, now a member of the backstage management, has already been fired.

Mr. McMahon, I think this only proves the point further that something radical might be called for to adjust things.

-Steve

Letter completion

Of course, I’m no business major. I admit I’m just a fan and this is just a thought. It’s a way to help new performers before putting them on live TV. It’s a way to reduce travel time for the performers so that they can spend more time at home. It’s a way for performers to rest themselves and heal up. At the same time, I believe there is an opportunity to make money while doing this.

This is an opportunity to really have a division between the brands. This is an opportunity to tell some different stories. This is an opportunity to do something visible for the wellness of the performers. This is an opportunity to get some attention, a buzz, around the business by doing something radical, something different. Obviously it doesn’t need to permanent and in five, ten or twenty years, maybe it’ll be time to be different again and reform the big touring groups again.

Eitherway, it’s just a thought.

Thank you for your time sir,

-Stephen M. Wolterstorff

Letter continued

I’ve watched a number of ‘shoot’ interviews with older wrestlers, many of which worked in the territory system. Many of them expressed the same thought; that they learned more about the business during the car ride to the next town than they did in the ring. In these days of iPods and Gameboys and such, I wouldn’t expect that a car ride with a mix of veterans and new guys would necessarily lead to an educational conversation. My hope would be that each territory would act as a smaller classroom. I am sure that this sort of guidance is occurring in the current set up. In the relatively smaller ‘classroom’ of the territory, a new performer could receive more one on one training, receive less conflicting advice and work on that council. Once a newer performer has had a chance to learn in one area, he or she can be moved to another region, gain guidance from another set of veterans and add the one set of advice to the next, rather than get all the differing views at once, building up their own style based on all their training.

This may work towards repairing one of the primary problems I’ve personally had with your current product. I’ve seen a number of young men in recent years receive pushes that their skill level cannot match; young men that often have talent but aren’t clear how to use it. On the other side of the equation are a number of battered veterans, men who have had exceptional careers, men who no doubt have a love for the business, men who can still entertain a crowd, men who can get a pop just from their entrance music but are also men that probably shouldn’t be working the schedules they are working. How much longer until the majority of the upper card retires? One year? Two? How many will survive another five? How many of the new guys will be ready to fill those gaps when the time comes? I’m not saying that things can’t work out in their current configuration but I think they’d work better in this suggested configuration.

Restoring the territories should also reduce the amount of travel. I don’t know if the ‘E’ pays for all the plane tickets or if the wrestlers pay for their own transport. From a purely monetary standpoint, the territories should reduce costs. Increased car travel and gas expenses, yes but less plane travel and fewer hotel stays due to more time spent at home should more than balance that. With teleconferencing being so easy and relatively inexpensive, you could check in with every territory on a daily basis and never leave your office.

Letter continued

This would require some changes to the presentation of the shows. My thought was to have RAW live from one region in its league each week, rotating between the three regions in the RAW league. Footage would be presented from the other two regions during the show to keep viewers up-to-date on their storylines. As Smackdown is currently a taped show, it could just become a digest of its three regions, perhaps giving it an ESPN Sportscenter type feel.

This may result in an overflow of recorded matches in each region. This could be utilized in syndicated programming available only in that region. In an effort to defray the cost of syndication, these shows could be made available for sale on DVD or, better yet, available for download for a fee. Hardcore wrestling fans will be keen to check out detailed events from other regions or to follow their favourite wrestler. This would be a good way to get into iTunes or something similar.

This process would also allow for more dark matches, more opportunities for newer wrestlers to solidify their abilities in front of a crowd without having to worry about television or ratings. It would further mingle the house show and the televised programming. Since the regions wouldn’t generally be in direct competition with each other, it could mean recording Smackdown’s programming over a weekend and airing them during the week. Currently, news of what will be aired on Smackdown is available on the Internet as soon as the show is recorded on Tuesday. With this new plan, the results of those shows would no doubt still appear on-line but no one would know what matches would make air.

The question pf Pay Per Views is an important one as I know this is a great source of cash. Two paths show promise in my eyes. One gamble is to cut the PPVs to the big four: Wrestlemania, Summerslam, Survivor Series and the Royal Rumble. These are the PPVs with history and are the ones that the more casual fans will gravitate towards, feeling these are the important ones. If these are the only opportunity to see the entire roster together, they’ll attract further attention and, hopefully, an increased buyrate just from that. Also, with only four shows to purchase in a year, the average fan may be more inclined to purchase them all.

On the other hand, that is putting all the eggs in one basket. As there are six regions, each could have their own PPV in between the big four. If the big four are evenly spaced three months apart there could be a single region based PPV every other week. If this option is preferable, I would recommend making them two hours long and $20-$25. This differentiates them from the big four and may encourage more buys.

It also seems clear to me that each individual region will have a smaller crowd than the average RAW or Smackdown taping attracts. Yet, each region could certainly draw part of that expectation. In this way, if one region becomes weak or burned out, it can be balanced by the others. Performers that may have worn out their welcome in one region can be ‘fired’ or ‘traded’ to another region, building storylines from the movement, similar to what occurs now.

In specific area, this will result in ‘smaller’ numbers, but, due to the increased number of possibilities, to the increased number of shows every night, it could increase business overall.

Letter continued

I said it was a big idea but let’s think about it before dismissing it as too big.

By ‘break up’ I don’t mean ‘shut down’ or ‘dismantle’ but I do mean breaking up the massive touring groups that RAW and Smackdown have become and turning them into smaller groups covering specific area of the country; in other words: territories. I recommend breaking both RAW and Smackdown into 3 groups each, making six regions in all. Speaking very generally, this would probably break down into the NorthEast, Mid-Atlantic and Midwest for RAW and the Pacific Northwest, Texas (Southwest) and Mid South for Smackdown. What about ECW? I would suggest moving it to Canada. Since you now own many of the old territory names, perhaps some of those could be reused. Texas could be WCCW, perhaps the Midwest referred to as the AWA, maybe Canada as Stampede and so on. While this would not be necessary, it would be a nice nod to the past and could stimulate DVD sales for footage of the original territories.

I would recommend a separate booking committee for each territory that would be based in that area. You have many individuals on your payroll that used to work these territories when they last existed and have some understanding of the variations of interest in each area. Place Dusty Rhodes and Ric Flair in charge of the Mid-Atlantic region, Roddy Piper in the Pacific Northwest and so on. All these groups would report back to the main offices in Connecticut and would get their general guidance from there. Picture the challenge: trying to keep six (or seven) territories running separate storylines while still building them all to a common storyline.

Common storyline? Of course we can’t dismiss the big four Pay Per Views as they are there for a reason and they rake in the biggest buy rates. The storylines begin to build themselves for some of these shows: tournaments challenging to qualify for the few spots each region gets to send to the Royal Rumble, qualifying to send a team to the Survivor Series and so on.

Let’s follow this concept through a year. Let’s say Mr. X is a mid carder in the Midwest region. He wins a tournament to qualify for the King of the Ring tournament to be held at Summerslam. He doesn’t win but does make it to the finals. He returns to his region elevated enough to challenge for belts and is encouraged to assemble a team for the Survivor Series. He is seen observing many matches he doesn’t participate in before selecting a five man team which includes Gran Kuma, a man that defeated him the week before. One of Mr. X’s friends, Rappin’ Red Smith, is offended that he wasn’t selected for Mr. X’s team so he assembles a team of his own, jockeying to take the Survivor Series position. Battles between the teams culminate in a Survivor Series preview match, which Mr. X’s team wins. At the Survivor Series, Mr. X survives to the Final Survival Match. He doesn’t win but Gran Kuma does. This provides the region with an advantage in the Royal Rumble, guaranteeing that one of the Rumble qualifiers from that region will receive a low number entry (somewhere between 25-30, if we specify 30 it would shutdown storytelling in the other regions). Struggling to qualify for the Rumble begins almost immediately, highlighted by Mr. X and Gran Kuma battling. Both qualify for the Rumble. In a ceremony at the PPV, Mr. X pulls number four whereas Gran Kuma receives twenty-eight. As normal, the Rumble is a long battle. Mr. X and Gran Kuma are in the final four. Mr. X eliminated Gran Kuma and goes on to win, earning a shot at the WWE World Title at Wrestlemania. Gran Kuma accuses Mr. X of cheating to win and manipulates events so that Mr. X is willing to put his title shot on the line in a match. Mr. X wins, finally decisively defeating Gran Kuma and earning his respect. Mr. X goes onto Wrestlemania knowing that winning the title will mean touring the world, defending the belt in region after region until he is defeated.

Obviously every region would have different main storylines and each region would probably have a number of smaller storylines running through them. This is just A general storyline path idea.

Continuing the Letter

Mr. Vincent Kennedy McMahon Jr.

Sir,

Allow me a few moments of introduction so that you can grasp my perspective on this matter. I’m in my thirties and have been interested in wrestling for about twenty years. My first real exposure to the sport was your syndicated ‘Superstars of Wrestling’ programme. For a few years I fed my interest with that, ‘Saturday Night’s Main Event’ and the reading of your magazine. I grew weary of the formula of the program and jumped to WCW where I found the wrestling to be more technically inclined. Over the years I bounced back and forth, often returning to your product. I own over 250 wrestling related DVDs, many of which are your product and that doesn’t touch on the magazines, books, figures, etc that I own or the cards I’ve attended. I think it’s safe to refer to me as a fan that makes a modest but regular ‘donation’ to your coffers.

With that said, the last couple months have been especially rough, haven’t they sir? The bad publicity, the increased scrutiny, the whole circus around the Benoit situation has been a problem. Public opinion is including the industry as part of the problem leading to the tragedy, blaming all sorts of things whether or not they were an influence.

Before we continue, let me make one thing perfectly clear: this letter is not meant to try to understand or blame anyone for the situation or any other wrestler that has gotten ill or died. I am NOT here to blame you for everything or anything that has ever gone wrong in wrestling. There’s no point in that blame game.

However, we must face facts. Ratings have been down. This may well be the summer lull or it could be a sign that even the hardcore fans are starting to abandon the product. The government has already been pestering you regarding the wellness policy. Business is weak at the moment and, it could be argued, has been weak for some time.

You need something to stir things up, to challenge your creativity. Historically you’ve done your best work when you’ve been challenged. Additionally you need to do something for the benefit for the workers’ health or, at the very least, something that looks good. For it to work, it needs to be something big, as anything less will be treated as ‘nothing’, a token effort. Isn’t that what some critics have called the current wellness program?

With all that in mind, I do have a suggestion.

I think you should break up the WWE.

An Open Letter

An Open Letter to Vincent Kennedy McMahon Jr.

Dear Vince,

Oh, that sounds far too familiar; let me try that again.

Dear Mr. McMahon,

No, wait, that’s the name of your character and your character is dead. Was dead? Pretended to be dead. Whatever.

Dear Junior,

Definitely can’t start like that; it’s so disrespectful.

Starting over tomorrow.

Sunday was a new day and almost as wet as the old day had been. Considering that it wasn't raining constantly and that I had $20 in beer tickets, I had to go back. So I did, despite the fact that my feet had gotten badly blistered from the first two days and walking had grown painful.

Once inside I made a beeline for the Sprecher Beer booth, the nearest beer to the entrance I'd used. Instinctively, the accent kicked in and I asked for beer. "Could I have a Stout please?" The lady on the other side of the counter asked me to repeat myself so I did, a bit louder the second time, figuring she couldn't hear me. She smiled as she reached for a glass. She expressed her amusement for the way I'd expressed myself and asked to hear it one more time. I obliged. She had an accent as well. "Where are you from?" she asked as she pulled my beer. "Here," I responded simply. She seemed rather disappointed at that.

Wandering around by myself at Irish Fest is fun but I often find it hard to get settled, even with my feet bothering me. I visited the Rock Stage for an acoustic set that turned out to be the final performance at that stage. After listening to Scythian for a few songs, I went and bought one of their CDs. Under the circumstances, they were working hard to get the crowd to enjoy themselves and I wanted to reward that however I could. The CD is quite good as well.

Eric's clan was still all wet from the night before and weren't coming. As that news came during a spattering of rain, I didn't blame them. I hobbled around and finished my quests for the year: bought a CD (as already noted), had a baked potato, had my tea and shamrock cookie and listened to a few more bands for a bit.

As I wandered and listened, I had a moment. Irish music is so full of passion, full of life, even for the bad things in life, that it can't help but raise the spirits. Even in the rain, there was joy. It's as if the music asks "What's your problem? Ah, that's not so bad. Have a bit of a drink and realize that life will go on. Until it doesn't anymore. No point in worrying about anything too much. You'll just hurt yourself. Relax, have a bit of fun and enjoy yourself. Trouble will catch up with you soon enough and you'll have something new that's not worth worrying about."

Well, the longer songs ask that anyway.

After a few hours and the spending of the majority of my drink tickets, the rain started to come back. I took it as a hint and headed for home.

It had been a good time.

     Saturday started off rainy. This was a problem as a lot of Irish Fest is outside and my other plans for earlier in the day involved being mostly outside as well. The rain didn't stop but had slowed by the time I headed for the Summerfest Grounds at about 3:30. When I arrived at 4, the rain had stopped, just in time for my arrival. As a result, I felt a little smug. As I was expecting the rain to stop (why? I don't know) I didn't dress for the weather, being in my normal thin overshirt and no jacket or anything.

     I arranged to bump into Callie and her friends for a bit. We did our best to catch up with one another, drink a bit and be silly, all about normal. They'd been at the Fest since open and were therefore a little tired and wet already. They left around 5, promising to return later and hoping I'd since be around. As they left, the rain returned. This time, it wouldn't leave.

     This was a problem as the rain influenced the beer within me to want to left me on a speedier basis than normal. While I hid in the Irish Entertainers test and watched a video about Irish rock bands, I kept having to dash into the rain in order to visit the bathroom. This quickly got annoying. I also nipped out for food once. In the midst of all this, Eric, Katy and Colin were on their way. The weather was slowing their progress and I'd get text messages detailing the reasons behind the slowdown. Just before 7 I got the 'arrived' text and headed out of my hidey-hole.

     The problem here was that I was on the South end of the grounds and they were up at the Rock Stage on the North end. I walked the length of the grounds in the rain and started getting really wet. I found them (including Eric's sisters and one of the friends of said sisters) quickly enough and stood talking to them with my back to the lake, the direction that the wind and rain was coming from. It didn't take long before I was nicely soaked.

     Finally, teeth chattering, I noted that, before this, my mother could at least say I had enough sense to get out of the rain. I needed to get out of the open, expressed this and started moving. We visited a nearby merchants tent where I seriously concerned buying any sweatshirt or sweater I saw. From there we headed to the large 'Tea Room' and used Colin's stroller to carve out a spot for us. After drying out slightly, we returned to the rain to get food. While I got shepherd's pies for myself and Eric, he went and got coffee. This was a brilliant idea. Between the two, I shook off the cold.

     This also allowed us to bump into Eric's friend Mike, his wife Emily and their friend Kurt (Curt?). A spirited, moderately inebriated conversation sprang up from this meeting as we got caught up and chatted with each other.

     Seven Nations were scheduled to start at 8 and we were keen to see them play. We tried heading back to the Rock stage but the rain persisted. We made it to the Sprecher Beer booth and refueled. The Celtic Roots tent was nearby and we ducked in there as the rain was too intense. Once there, our energetic conversation resumed. Eric's sisters ducked out to check on the concert and returned wet a few moments later to inform us that they'd cancelled the show due to the rain. We just kept talking.

     By the time Colin had finished eating, it was a bit after 9. The rain was still falling and we took that as a sign. It was time to go home and we did.

     It was miserable weather and should have been a rotten time. It wasn't. It was still fun. Even an unpleasant day at Irish Fest with your friends is still a surprisingly good time.