“Since Walt wanted the Matterhorn Bobsleds to open in just over a year later, along with a Submarine Voyage, a larger Autopia, and a Monorail, he asked if it could be built faster. He asked me to design a bobsled and two track layouts. He asked Arrow Development, Walt’s favorite outside manufacturer, to find a way. Arrow said bent up pipe would be the quickest way, thus it turned out to be the world’s first steel pipe coaster. See, Walt would know all about the various manufacturing possibilities and wound up inventing something new, just to get the attraction he wanted.”
Blog
10 failed movies and TV shows redeemed by later success
At the time? Embarrassing. Now? Fun! Strange how a few years makes you see the joy that was intended.
You hate songs in the second person
Second person isn’t just a way of announcing, I’m a musical! I’m talking metaphorically about abstract concepts! It’s also a way for writers to distance themselves from the toughest feelings their creations have. As if to apologize for the absurdity of breaking into song, lyricists use You to provide some intellectual breathing room. It’s the hot mitt of musical emotion.
There’s a plaque for everything
Jimmy Carter spent two nights here in 1994. Steinhatchee, Florida.
Revisiting Rosewood, Florida, today [WATCH]
We pass desultory intersections like Rosewood’s every day. And we will never know how many of them were once the settings for brutal events, in which Americans, believing they were right and on the side of God, were in fact the instruments of something sinister and evil.
A little of my recent work
I round up a few links to a selection of the coolest things I’ve been up to in the past few months.
Movie musicals: Stuck in Renée Zellweger’s head for a decade
Something happened at the very start of Chicago that marked a pivot in musical theatre. In fact, what happened in the first five minutes of Chicago the movie could be said to have set the filmed musical on a new course forever, and few people even noticed it had happened.
The Amazing Plague
Just turn on the TV right now and count how many times people say it on the news, reality shows, and interviews. Whenever someone runs out of an ability to properly explain something with specificity, they run to the adjectival filler ‘amazing.’ It’s cheap, industrial-grade description — the corn syrup of self-expression.
Implosion video of Amway Arena in Orlando, shot up close
I shot this video early this morning in downtown Orlando from the VIP viewing area as the not-so-old Amway Arena (once the TD Waterhouse Centre, opened 1989) was demolished. Ka-boom! Instant 9/11 flashbacks for me, and lots of dust.
Travel and the baby brain
Travel regresses us to our “baby consciousness.” Is it any wonder that so many of us travel in our 20s, when we’ve just left that larval childhood stage but have not yet grown into the ill-fitting uniform of full adulthood? Is it any wonder so many travelers put a high priority on intensely sensory experiences such as drinking, sex, panoramic views, and extreme sports — pursuits that please our primal natures?