Driving through a theme park

Normally when you visit a theme park, you park your car in the parking lot, then walk or take a tram to the front gate where you buy your ticket and enter the park. You'll be on your feet all day walking miles going from one ride to the next. One thing you won't encounter while walking along the midway is vehicle traffic. The occasional park maintenance or security vehicle may go by, but they are gone in no time. Guests aren't allowed to bring their vehicles into the park and drive them while inside. The idea of doing so is pure fantasy and folly.

But that changed at one park—and a local one at that. This year, in light of COVID-19, Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) in Valencia CA came up with an idea even noveler than the coronavirus. Instead of holding their annual Holiday in the Park event packed with people wandering around looking at the displays and lights—and possibly infecting others with the virus—SFMM devised a drive-through-the-park event where guests could drive their own cars through the park along the walkways normally packed with guests. The trip around the park is about a mile-and-a-half and takes 40 minutes to an hour depending on the crowd. Guests drive under six different coasters and one water ride during the trip. CraZanity and the Grand Carousel are in motion with no riders aboard, but lit up and decorated. There are food and snack packages available, but must be purchased in advance when reservations are made. You can do that here. Six Flags members and season passholders are free. 

If you'd like a preview of this event, you can watch a complete ride-through video from ParkJourney (aka my friend Gregg Condon) by clicking here. I went out to SFMM last Sunday evening to see this for myself and was amazed. If there are any more spots open, I may go and see it again.

A week to give thanks

The year is winding down, and many are saying that they can't wait to see 2020 in their rear view mirror, far behind them and getting farther behind as time goes on. The pandumbic, the politics—everything associated with this year. At this writing, we only have about five weeks left till 2021 kicks off. Let's hope that 2021 doesn't tick us off.

We can't imagine what's ahead, but Thanksgiving is this Thursday. But it's going to be a Thanksgiving unlike anything in recent memory. Large family gatherings are being discouraged to help slow the spread of COVID-19. But isn't Thanksgiving about spending time with family? Of course people can connect over Skype, Zoom, or even just the regular phone. But in-person visits are best and will be missed this year. I'm sure the same will be true for Christmas next month. And for next year, we don't know yet.

Social media is full of complaining and whining about the disaster that 2020 has been. Is there anything that any of us can be thankful for? Anyone who didn't contract COVID can be thankful for that. Despite the many job losses, anyone who kept their job can be thankful. People who didn't lose family and friends can be thankful for that.

Here in California, the number of COVID-19 cases is on the rise. Our esteemed Gavinor Newsense is cranking up the restrictions like we had last spring. But in many ways it's our own fault. If everyone would at least wear their face covering, keep their hands clean, maintain a safe distance from others and avoid large gatherings of people, maybe this virus would stop spreading so fast and COVID-19 would be nothing but a bad memory a lot sooner.

I don't have any idea as to what my own Thanksgiving plans are going to be. My guess is that Diana will be out with friends and my other half will be with her mother, at least one brother, and who knows who else. I will likely whip up something here at the estate. May or may not include turkey. Enchiladas sound good. You never know.

Remember that we're all in this together. Whenever we can, wherever we can and if ever we can, let's be thankful for everything we've been blessed to have. And if possible, reach out to someone who might need a friend or a meal to share. They'll be thankful. And that's what this day is all about.

A good night's sleep is a foreign concept as of late

Sleep has not been coming easy for me these days, and it's starting to catch up with me. Between some health issues, financial issues, and a new-but-challenging friend having come into my life last year (more on that later if I remember), I can't seem to put my head on my pillow and allow my body to relax and catch that train to Dreamland. I toss and turn and eventually notice that it's starting to get light outside. THEN I fall asleep and wake up at 2:45pm. Despite the difficulties of getting to sleep, however, one night I did manage to have a dream about a favorite family restaurant having changed its name from "Little Toni's" to some random Italian word that made no sense. The restaurant had moved next door to its location (which is a garage in real life) with a completely rearranged layout, and the aforementioned new friend was there with me.

It's after 2am as I write this. Tonight isn't as cold as it's been the last few nights. It's quiet, and I just downed a cup of broccoli cheddar soup. Diana is who-knows-where, but she's 30 and doesn't have to tell Dad where she is or what she's doing anymore. Chimi is in his cage. The skylight is dark. And here I am writing a blog post.

Oh, how I'd like to jump into bed right about now. But not being sleepy leaves me the choice of tossing and turning or being at least a little productive by writing something. After all, I did threaten to write more in my blog in a recent Facebook post. I noticed that everyone cringed at the mere thought of that (and, worse, the reality of it), but I'm going to make good on it.

So now it's a new day. I made it to just past 3am before falling asleep in my chair. By some luck, I was up at 9:30. With a mediocre night's sleep behind me, breakfast, and a reading of today's paper, I'm back at this now. The weather has warmed up, and I may be able to leave the heater off. I'm rambling away here like I haven't rambled before. This may end up being the most random and wonkiest post I've ever made. As such, it's a perfect example of the perils of not getting enough good sleep. And I'd better fix that.

The election is behind us at long last

Everyone knows that I normally wouldn't write about anything even remotely political, but this has been one cuckoopants crazy year in so many ways. Election years are long and tough, and 2020 was one of the toughest. The COVID-19 pandumbic certainly didn't help things, either. Normally by now (five days after the election), we would know all of the results and proceed with our celebrating or sulking.

However, COVID-19 changed things this time around. In order to help slow the spread of the virus, our normal voting method was changed so that we could fill out our ballots at home and mail them in or deposit them into special locked containers that were set out at several locations in each community.

Ballots returned by mail normally take longer to count, so we don't have our final results as of yet. At the time of writing this post, however, Joe Biden has been declared the unofficial winner of the race for U.S. President, having clinched more electoral votes than Donald Trump with only a few states to declare one way or another.

There are a couple of noteworthy things about this election. Biden, at age 78, is the oldest person to be elected as President of the United States. He chose 56-year-old, former California Attorney General and U.S. Senator Kamala Harris as his running mate. Having won the election, this makes Harris the first woman to serve in the office of Vice President, as well as being a woman of color. (Harris has roots in Africa, Southeast Asia and India.) Should Biden have to step down for health or other reasons, that would put Harris into the top spot, making her the first female U.S. President. Some people "in the know" claim that this is a real likelihood. A few have even said that Biden has planned for such an occurrence all along. But we'll see.

Perhaps we've turned a corner here. For the last four years we've seemed to be at war with...ourselves. I can't remember a time when we've been so divided as a country. Maybe now things can settle down and we can get back to normal.