“Have you thought of an ending?”
“Yes, several, and all are dark and unpleasant.”

— J.R.R. Tolkien

After a week of clear skies and unseasonable heat, we woke up to rain on the morning of Saturday, October 20 – our last day in the park. We did a quick mental inventory of our previous trips and arrived at the conclusion that neither of us had ever been rained on before at the Disneyland Resort. We were breaking new ground, even at the end of eight straight days at the parks.

The crowd was light at the familiar intersection on Harbor, with locals and tourists holding off, we guessed due to the precipitation. The rain itself was light enough that we were not bothered, and it had broken the heat, which was welcome. It may have taken a week of unseasonable heat, but the cool weather we hoped for had arrived.

We had late morning reservations for Storytellers Café in the Grand Californian Hotel, a character meal that had turned into a tradition for our little two-person family. With over an hour before our assigned time, we thought it might be fun to go by way of Disney California Adventure and use the connected hotel entrance from the park.

We ambled down Buena Vista Street, chattering about the novelty of the sprinkling rain and the scant guest population. Our walking loop took us around Paradise Bay, and past non-existent lines for California Screamin’, King Triton’s Carousel, and Toy Story Midway Mania. Further around, we passed Goofy’s Sky School, a side-salad of an attraction tucked into the space between the Corn Dog Castle and the restrooms. Continue reading “Adios, Pancakes – Disneyland October 2012 Days Nine and Ten” →

“The greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time.”

– Bill Bryson

One of the most underrated pleasures of being on a vacation is the happy reconciliation of waking up in a strange place, your head still blank with sleep, and then at once remembering where you are. The day is stretched out ahead of you, brimming with potential, and you can either surge out of bed to start your adventure, or you can shut off the alarm clock and roll over to catch more sleep, depending on your tastes.

Amy and I are both prodigious sleepers, so it was a little surprising to find us with the Subaru re-packed and ready to continue down the road by 7:45. Morning people or parents of young children would not find that remarkable, but for us, on vacation, it was an accomplishment. We chalked it up to the proximity of our goal destination. It was Saturday, October 13th, and the Disneyland Resort was a scant 80 miles away.

The road-drunkenness of the previous night had dissipated with the new day. The Subaru took us over the Cajon Summit, past the Mormon Rocks, and began descending into the Los Angeles area, the miles ticking off behind us faster than expected. In no time at all we exited from the freeway, found Harbor Boulevard, saw the tall structures of the resort, and arrived at our home base for this trip: The Anaheim Desert Inn and Suites.

Continue reading “New Experiences in Familiar Places – Disneyland October 2012 Day Two” →

Everybody is overwhelmed at CES. That is the only genuine emotion of the show.

It is true that the attendees of the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show would often display curiosity, happiness, irritation, frustration, flirtatiousness, thoughtfulness, disdain, or disgust, but those were affectations. They were simply overwhelmed, and how could they not have been? Either they were there to meet people — and there were too many to count, or they were there to see the tech products — and there were too many to count.

CES is, in all ways, a sensory invasion. Visiting CES is a little like dropping by the Smithsonian Institution in that it is far too vast for a person to see all in a day. I spent most of my time in the Central Hall, which held most of the larger, more elaborate booths and bigger name exhibitors. Although I was a working stiff for ZAGG Inc. at the show, my responsibilities were such that I was able to look around and take in some of the other areas. Even so, CES is large enough that I still saw just a modest fraction of the show.

There is no dress code at CES, which is very fortunate for some people, and creates an unusual situation where businesspeople in expensive suits rub shoulders with television producers in wrinkled khaki, and shove past hipsters with ironic t-shirts and women in impossibly short skirts. My CES dress consisted of company golf shirts and slacks, which was not uncommon, although by far I saw more people in what could be termed “trade show business casual.” It was the same for men and women: slacks, loafers, a button up shirt, a sports coat, no tie for the men, no heeled shoes for the women, and both carrying a sensible bag. Black was the shade of choice. Women might substitute a t-shirt for the button up, and men might substitute expensive jeans for the slacks, but if there were 400,000 visitors to CES, at least 50,000 of them were dressed like they shopped out of the same catalog.

Continue reading “CES: Crazy Times, Great Candy” →

Hello, my name is Nate/The Lumbering Bear, and I make lists. In fact, I have an almost overwhelming compulsion to make lists. I categorize practically every trivial interest in my life, from my favorite make and model of car to my order of preference when eating Skittles. I would worry about this being a possible mental disorder, but I think it is one of those things that almost everyone does, but few people admit. I may take it to a little higher level than most, but we all have our preferences. Anyway, that’s me.

I have wondered before about my source for this compulsion to categorize, hoping, again, that it is not a rare problem. Is it our (my?) attempt to bring some sort of order to the chaos of impulses that assault us from every direction? I doubt my grandfather (and his generation) spent much time wondering which person to put at the top of his “celebrity girlfriend” list, or which was his favorite sports team of any league at the moment. Maybe he did, but I doubt it. It could be a question of spare hours and idle minds, but I don’t consider myself a lazy person with an overabundance of time. I am certain I would be by my grandfather’s standards, though, so perhaps that explains it.

If anyone cared to know which are my favorite movies, actresses, actors, songs, bands, snacks, vacation destinations, cars, cities, animals, video games, television shows, and brands of milk, I could tell them. I have already considered it. Furthermore, within most of those lists are further lists, like the movie category: action, rom-com, drama, and so on. I can pontificate about any of my personal likes and dislikes (I have lists for those, too) ad nauseam. I swear, it is much more reflexive than deliberate. I try hard to keep these to myself, for the most part. Or, at least I think I do. I’m sure the poor Wandering Moose has heard about them more than she cares, though.

Continue reading “Notes from the Duckburg Geographical Society or, Is It Ever Too Late For a Trip Report?” →