A few weeks ago, it was announced that Coke Corner pianist extrodinaire Rod Miller, and his protoge Alan were going to perform in Old Sacramento at the opening of Stage Nine (which used to be called the The Great Movie and Animation Store) I sent out a message saying that I wanted to go on Sunday, so I could watch San Francisco's Chinese New Years parade. I specifically said "I need a Mulan parade-like fix." Little did I know how true my words would be, when a week later, it was announced that the Mulan parade would be a part of San Francsico's Chinese New Years Parade.
Of course, wouldn't you know it, but on Thursday, I had a cold. I would have organized a meet to watch the Chinese New Years parade, except that I wasn't sure how well I would be, and was not sure what the weather would be like. It almost always rains on the Chinese New Years parade. Fortunately, it didn't rain. Unfortunately, I still had my cold. I decided to stay home and rest because I knew that not only did I want to see Rod and Alan perform the next day, but I also wanted to see the ba-adders who I knew were going to Stage Nine -- Ashley, Lisa, Masselin, Paul, and Paul's son CJ.
I watched the parade on television, and enjoyed it. One of the parade reporters interviewed Mulan and from what I could see, many of the parade performers made the trip north. When we had heard the story about the parade coming north, we thought that most of the floats would come up here as well, but after some thought -- there are low overhead power lines along the parade route -- it seemed silly. What they did bring were the sword dancers (including one female), lantern dancers, pot balencers (who really impressed one of the commentators), yoyo tossers, and finally, a "new" float upon which Mushu rode. Actually the float was originally the Hydra float from the Hercules Victory Parade; The Hydra was replaced with fireworks, and the float was labeled "Mushu's Fireworks." Even though I did not see the Lion dancers or the dragon from the Mulan parade, there were several troupes of Lion dancers and of course the finale of the parade includes a dragon.
I got up at 10 o'clock the next morning, and felt well enough to drive up to Sacramento. Even though I had offered to drive other ba-adders up to Sacramento, nobody accepted my offer, which suggested that it would be a lightly attended meet. After checking my e-mail one liast time, and confirming with Ashley that we were going to meet at the Railroad Museum, I hopped into the car. As I left Berkeley, KFOG was playing "Veronica", which didn't have any significance at the time, but would turn out to be prophetic.
I completed the drive to Sacramento in about an hour and a half, and arrived early enough to look for on-street parking. Fortunately I was lucky and found a spot one block from the railroad museum. I arrived at the museum just before noon. Appropriately enough, the museum had an Alice in Wonderland display in its windows. I didn't have to wait too long before Paul Barrie and his son CJ arrived. They had taken the train up the day before and were spending two nights at the Holiday Inn. Paul told me how things were the night before and that it should be a fun meet. Next to arrive were Ashley and Lisa. After chatting while waiting for Masselin, we decided to walk over to Stage Nine.
When we arrived, Rod and Alan were taking a break for lunch. We decided to look around the store. Like its predecessor (The Great Movie and Animation Store), Stage Nine sells movie and animation memorabelia ranging from artwork, photos, posters, and tee-shirts. They also sell quite a bit of Disneyana items, including copies of blue prints, old Disneyland guidebooks, and a mounted piece of track from Walt Disney's Carolwood Pacific Railroad. Unlike its predecessor, Stage Nine has a much larger floor space, and has a backstory. The story goes that it was an old sound stage used for a gold rush movie which was directed by "Max von Carlo". "Max" was on hand for the store's opening weekend.
The first thing Ashley and Lisa noticed was "Jumbo" which was hanging from the ceiling. A stage production of Jumbo was held in Sacramento; For the production they needed an "elephant" and thus a two man costume was created. It was quite a surprise for Ashley and Lisa to see the costume hanging from the ceiling.
After the initial surprise, we noticed a few similarities between the store and Disneyland shops. The section with Jumbo, contained TV cartoon merchandise and reminded all of us of The Gag Factory in Toon Town. Another section was decked out in a western motif and reminded us of the Pioneer Mercantile shop in Frontierland. The third section was a little darker, and had a porch (though not like the one on Main Street, USA). What evoked Disneyland similarities was the background noise -- chirping crickets and other bugs -- which reminded us of Pirates of the Caribbean.
As part of the opening weekend's festivities, Michael Broggie was on hand selling autographed copies of his book "Walt Disney's Railroad Story" (which I highly recommend), and former Disney artist Walt Sorensen was on hand making sketches of Disney characters. (You had your choice between Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, Pluto, or Tigger.) Paul was kind enough to give Ashley and me coupons good for a free sketch.
After we then joined the line at the "Pirates" porch, Masselin managed to find us. It turned out he went to Stage Nine first and then walked to the museum. (We figure that he walked to the museum as we walked to Stage Nine, and just missed each other.) We started chatting with Mr. and Mrs. Sorensen. After asking a few questions, we talked about how the porch reminded us of something from Disney; either the house from 101 Dalmations, or something else. Masselin thought of Oklahoma, since he was rehearsing for that musical. At that point, Mrs. Sorenson agreed with Masselin, and the conversation turned to musical theatre.
With our sketches in hand, we decided to go to lunch. Since several had parked at the downtown mall, we went to the mall's food court for lunch so that some could get their parking validated. The food court had the typical selections so I opted for a veggie burrito. I guess in a way I was thinking "Where would the a.d.ders in the park be eating today?" It turns out that I was correct -- a.d.d had lunch at Casa Mexicana that day.
During lunch, we chatted about a few of the newsgroup threads. One was Six Degrees of Disneyland (a game similar to Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon). We went through a couple of examples. One was: Tommy Lee Jones played Howard Hughes (in the made for TV movie "The Amazing Howard Hughes") who was a character in the Disney film "The Rocketeer", the theme of which plays on The Obersvatron at Disneyland.
Another was the supposed last day of the Swiss Family Treehouse. (I let folks know that one ba-adder and her family left home at 3 in the morning to drive to the park for the meet.) We talked about the details of the retheming of the attraction to Tarzan. The funny thing is that retheming was cancelled a few days later.
Finally, we talked about Monte Cristo sandwiches. I mentioned that several folks on the newsgroup had asked if you could get Monte Cristos from the Blue Bayou "to go". Little did we know that as we were talking about this, one a.d.der was putting this to the ultimate test. "Verbal" was in the park getting several Monte Cristos to go to ship (via counter-to-counter-air express) to Beverly (a.k.a Dsny 1 Mom) in Chicago. Beverly started the Monte Cristo thread. (Both wrote trip reports about the shipment. I've included the links here: Read Verbal's Trip Report or Read Bev's Trip Report.)
After lunch, we wandered through the Disney Store and then made our way back towards Old Sacramento. During our walk, I stopped when I heard someone ask "Sean?!?" Right in front of me was a fellow Cal alum and former Bay Area Young Blue -- Veronica. It turns out that she was up in Sacramento for a conference. When I said that I was up for a Disney realated event, she wasn't surprised and even commented "it's a small world". Unfortunately, we were heading in different directions and we didn't have too much time to chat. Still, it was a nice surprise to see her.
When we got back to Stage Nine, we heard Rod and Alan playing to a fairly large crowd (large enough that we listened from outside). As soon as they finished their number, the crowd applauded and then dispersed. It turned out that the piano needed some work done -- one of the keys was sticking. While the repairs were going on, the walk-around Max von Carlo walked up to us. Masselin then played the star struck fan and said "Oh my GOD! It's Max von Carlo!" They both improvised a little routine for a little while which kept us entertained. I later found out that Ashley and Lisa knew the guy was playing Max von Carlo.
Eventually, the piano was repaired and we had the chance to listen again. Rod and Alan performed many of the same duets which I've heard them perform in the park. They did a wonderful job entertaining everyone. During the performance, two people showed up. First, RJ, who had said that he was thinking about coming up, but wasn't surew if he had sufficiently recovered from his eye surgery. Then, Lisa's sister arrived (and we didn't even know she was going to be there). We decided to take a break and get some ice cream from a nearby shop. Even though it was raining (but not too cold), the ice cream hit the spot.
After the ice cream we went back to Stage Nine only to find that Rod and Alan had gone out to dinner. So, we decided to look around the store and wait. While we ended up longer than expected, it was worth it. Rod and Alan went back into a series of terrific duets. Paul also got Rod and Alan to play "Happy Birthday" for his son CJ, who celebrated his birthday a few days later. Then a nice elderly couple asked Rod and Alan if they would play "When You Wish Upon a Star" Theyt hadn't learned that song as a duet, so Alan stepped aside and let Rod go solo. When Rod encouraged us, we sang along to the castle medly ("When You Wish Upon a Star", "Once Upon a Dream", and "Someday My Prince Will Come"). Since Rod was playing solo we asked him if he would do a tap number. After we showed places where we could tap without damaging the store, he obliged. The folks at Stage Nine got several photos of a.d.ders tapping quarters along a metal rack. After the tap number, Rod noticed that it was almost time to leave, so he launched into "The Stars and Stripes Forever". With the rain that day, I had a golf umbrella for spinning along. RJ brought along his "Mickey Money" as well, so we could have just as well been at Disneyland. After the closing number, Rod moved over and brought Alan back to the piano. They conlcuded with a duet of "it's a small world" to which we all sang along.
At this point for everyone to go home. We said goodbye and thanks to Rod and Alan, and then said we all said goodbye to each other. The trip was alot of fun, and I hope that Rod and Alan can perform up here again sometime soon. I'm sure more a.d.ders would make the trip next time.
Thanks go to:
Rod and Alan, for putting on a great performance,
Stage Nine, for bringing Rod and Alan up here,
Ashley, Lisa, Masselin, Paul, CJ, and RJ, for attending and making this a fun meet,
Walt Sorensen, for the sketch of Mickey, and lastly,
All of you, for allowing me to share this with you.