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I went to Disneyland for two days last Monday to use the last few days of my southern California annual pass. It being September, school back in session and so on, I naively thought it might be less crowded
That was not to be the case and I unfortunately discovered that Disneyland is now preschool/stroller hell at most anytime during the year.
In fact, it’s become more than ever a nightmare of apparently mindless fecundity. Not that it hasn’t always been but with economic and environmental chaos on the not-distant horizon people always seem to inexplicably retreat into The Family Mode for whatever reassurance and false security that may provide.
On Monday I was also kept wondering what the point is of taking weeks - sometimes seemingly days-old infants on the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters?
Do they nurse the kid with one hand and wield a blaster with the other?
And what will be the eventual effect of this barrage of noise and psychedelia on these newborns, some of who literally look like they just popped out of the womb?
One shutters to think…..
Across from Disneyland, in the aptly named new Toy Story Mania that now certified white elephant, California Adventure, finally has a major draw. The lines there even on a Monday almost rivaled those of the recently opened Finding Nemo remake of the old 20,000 Leagues submarine ride in Tomorrowland.
TS Mania is a sort of a high-tech fusion of video game and old-fashioned shooting gallery. Except you’re seated in a moving car and what you shoot at is an assortment of 3-D projections in which plates shatter and assorted other targets explode and fly in your face if you hit the mark.
It’s a fun experience and guaranteed to bring out the NRA in the most confirmed peacenik.
It’s pretty much conceded now that California Adventure, aka Michael Eisner’s folly, is a major dud and has already been scheduled for an embarrassing and majorly expensive makeover. And from the look of the gargantuan crane over Paradise Pier it is already in progress.
IMHO they might as well call it Pixar Land and get it over with, as, aside from putting a few unobtrusive Jack Sparrow automatons in Pirates of the Caribbean, there has not been a major new purely Disney attraction in any of the parks for years.
Well, at least the beloved Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride survives in California, which is more than it did in Florida.
Happily so, as we’re now more than ever merrily merrily on our way to nowhere at all…….
PS: Actually I still love Disneyland. It’s just that like seemingly every other appealing place on the planet it’s just become too popular for it's own good.
And the good of its “guests….”