Prayers and white light.

Sending prayers and white light to all those affected by the earthquake and tsunami. Heard on the news that the West Coast will be affected, as far north as Oregon. Sending some extra prayers and light to all my pals at Santa Cruz Boardwalk, Santa Monica Pier's Pacfiic Park, and San Diego's Belmont Park.

Peace.

I love this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0hNDaY78lA&feature=fvwrel

I love it more than any video I've seen in eons. I love it more than cheese. I love it more than a good caberlot.

But I don't love it more than Disneyland. But darned near. Because it's about Disneyland, the Happiest Place on Earth. In fact, I'll go as far as calling it a love letter to the place. If you're a Walt fan, if you remember Disneyland from the 60s or 70s, you'll flip over the footage.

Enjoy.

Sunday on the Blog with Photos!

Lakemont Park's Choo Choo train, which winds around a peaceful pond, taking you back in time to a gentler place. The park got quieter, the colors seemed more vibrant. Truly one of the more magical mometns on my Roadtrip.

The Girl and the Mouse.

From the beginning of my Southern California chapter: Red felt pants with yellow patch buttons, stiff with age but fragile and barely able to hold themselves up. They stay in place because they formed around the tiny body they cover over the four decades. A robin’s egg blue bowtie stays shakily in place by a stretched out black band of elastic. Mickey Mouse, a vinyl doll version, bought on Main Street USA some forty years ago – he begged to join us on this leg of the Roadtrip and I almost acquiesced. But the fact that our clothing was packed tightly (one bag checked, one carried on, in an effort to save money i.e. That Elusive Thing) made the decision an easy one. It’s better to leave Mouse behind than to have Mouse get mangled by the baggage retrieval system at Orange County Airport (although I rarely worry about this particular airport, but you never know when the proverbial gorilla will kick the case across the floor and rap it against his cage bars). I can picture M. Mouse at my computer, watching for updates on Facebook, sipping from a little mug of black tea with milk.

Vintage Fortune Teller Machines: Face Time with Zoltar.

My hubby is 43 years old. Going on about 11. And he's the absolute best partner to have with me on my Roadtrips.

Whenever we come across the mechanical fortune tellers at vintage parks, I always have my picture taken with them, plunking in my quarter to receive my reading for the day. A few times the machine greedily eats up my coin and I never receive the fortune, even after shaking the aforementioned fortune teller, which probably doesn't set up the very best vintage amusement park karma. I picture a secret society of mechanical fortune tellers, with an annual fortune teller ball where they all meet up and swap stories. A throng of Estrellas, Esmereldas and Grandma Fortune Tellers converge on some seaside amusement park, settling into tight little groups, and chat about which tarot cards show up in their never-changing displays, how their mechanical parts need oiling and maintenance (but seldom get it), and compare notes on that peculiar woman with the cat eyeglasses and vintage sweaters who is at once thoroughly respectful of their history and supremely irritable when she doesn't receive her fortune card, shaking the whole fortune teller booth before walking away with a scowl.

Santa Monica's Pacific Park has an actual Zoltar machine.Although it was a slickery cold day, I made sure Ben had some alone time with the mystical seer, much like Tom Hanks' character in "Big" - a film which is not only one of Ben's favorites, but one Ben can often relate to, being a Very Tall Boy. For those of you who are curious, the amusement aprk used for the film is New York's Rye Playland, a park which will be visited later on for my Cotton Candy Roadtrip.

Oh -- I'm fortysomething going on 12 or so. A Very Tall Girl.

Happy Oscar Sunday!

Well, nothing really connected with vintage parks was nominated this year, but "Toy Story 3" is a lock to win Best Animated Feature! And as we just came back from Disneyland, I feel it's appropriate for me to post this picture from the only film I know that's made more guys cry than women (my "Toy Story"-related crying jag was taken care of with "Toy Story 2" and Jesse and you know exactly what scene I'm talking about).



You'll never have a truer friend than Woody.

Back from relatively sunny but ridiculously cool Southern California!

Five more parks down. That includes the holy triumvirate and two boardwalk parks. One was closed. One was rained out. More about that later.

If we had our druthers, I think Ben and I would move to SoCal. But we have various commitments here and a move would be a Very Complicated Event. So we savor our Cali trips, looking forward especially to wearing sandals in February.

This trip was different on many levels, including the inability to wear sandals in February, because the highest the thermometer got was around 60. And the evenings required flannel-lined jeans -- which I did not have with me.

Still, all that being said, the trip was magical. Very spiritually connected. I'll go into that in greater detail in the days ahead. Let's just say that when you revisit the three parks you visited forty years ago with your Mom on your only mother-daughter trip ever, she finds ways of making herself known. A whiff of nicotine, a perfectly made cocktail, free upgrades: the lady kept busy.

We drove from the John Wayne Orange County Airport down to San Diego and Belmont Park, then looped up to Palm Springs, west to Santa Monica Pier's Pacific Park (in a downpour), up to Universal Studios, down to Buena Park (Knott's Berry Farm) and then down the highway to Anaheim and our Happiest Home Away From Home, Disneyland.

As I said, more to come in the days ahead.. Lots to document,. But today I'll be transcribing my audio notes into actual notes in my laptop. I'm a terrible typist, so that should take about five hours. For about an hour's worth of jabbering.

For now, there's a pile of laundry that's as high as the Matterhorn (might even have an abominable snowman somewhere hidden inside...)


(Walt with model of the Matterhorn Bobsleds. My laundry pile is much larger)