crossover_chick | Lazy Sundays

Didn't do much today besides hang out and watch some special features. We watched "Surf's Up" last night -- fun enough movie, if a little weird in spots. Tank was a fricking funny character. Talk about an ego! And the featurettes on making the movie were interesting. They actually put the actors into the recording studios together and even let them ad-lib. Not to mention the cool way they made it look like a real documentary -- they made an entire virtual world, then wired up a camcorder to it and actually made it move around inside of it. Like a real camera! It was neat!
-TD: Ahhh, the wonders of technology.-
-RPD: Nice when it works right, isn't it?-
Heh, exactly. I also got my cast photo into a frame, so now it's sitting on my nightstand all protected, yayz. Speaking of which, here's the next part of the Trip Log.

Day Five: April 19th, 2008
Another 6:00 wake-up. I swear, I sleep later most workdays than I did most of this vacation. We got ready – I got on my special shirt and hat, of course. I also caught the end of “Deep Impact” – someone explain how the end of a rather silly disaster movie made me cry. (Though I’m glad the teenage couple made it.)
-M: *hugs Jennifer* Yeah, us too.-
Since I’m out of muffins and not expecting much of a lunch, I convince Mom that we should go out for breakfast. We end up at a place called Perkins – Mom says we liked another one of these, so why not?
Yeah, why not indeed – our shitty restaurant luck holds up again. The food is fine – Mom’s sticky bun perhaps a bit too sweet, and my chocolate chip pancakes being pancakes with chocolate chips sprinkled OVER them, but still – but the service? YECH! The waitress serving us FIRST forgot that I had ordered chocolate chip pancakes and tried to serve me plain ones, THEN didn’t bring my chocolate milk. I had to ask for it THREE TIMES before I got it! Not a pleasant way to start the day.
Once our breakfast is finished, we abandon Perkins and head back to the hotel for a cab search. After chatting with the available drivers, we get a guy named Henry. He’s a nice fellow – thick accent, but understandable and congenial. We head down to Celebration, looking at the provided booklets in the cab and getting excited when we see a DeLorean on the road. Of course, once we arrive at the golf course, we see a BUNCH of DeLoreans lining up to be in the car show. Awesome, if not a little weird.
-D: Weird? The DeLorean is a sports car, and there was a BTTF event going on at the show. Why shouldn’t they have come?-
No, not like that. I’m just not used to seeing DeLoreans without the big vents on the back. *blush*
-D: *amused* Oh. You think they look better all ready for time travel?-
Yeah! Who wouldn’t?
Anyway, it’s crowded down in the country club – Henry eventually drops us off in front of a building and gives us his cell so we can call him when we’re ready to be picked up. We’re very early, luckily, so we head off down the street to find the AMC Celebration 2 Theater.
It’s basically right behind the building we were dropped off at. :p Outside is the Time Car of BTTF.com, a nice little poster, a packaged DST Flux Capacitor, and Oliver and Terry Holler and Stephen Clark. We go over to talk and introduce ourselves. Everyone’s very nice – Oliver and I have a bit of a laugh about some of the things I’ve gotten off eBay from him. Oliver admitted to me that he’d initially tried to wear the Doc-plush-Kleenex cover thingy from the Japanese ride as a HAT, much to the amusement and consternation of the natives. He also mentioned having dinner with Bob, Claudia, Jeffery, and Christopher, the lucky bastard.
With time to kill, we took a few pictures, both of the theater set-up:

Me with the Time Car in my BTTF production jacket (personalized with Doc's Girl on the front ;)).

Me posing by the BTTF poster outside the theater.

The Marquee. Yay for BTTF!
And of the car show:

Naturally, all the DeLoreans in the show parked by the theater. I think there were at least 15!

Seriously, look at them all!

The rest of the car show. It seemed to be mostly Ferarris and Lamborghinis, which all looked very nice.

I took a picture of this pretty red number for my pal

anonymoose_au. :D As she's stated, she loves red Ferarris.
Then we got in line, presented our ticket e-mail, and waited with the rest of the eager Backies. I saw a lot of interesting T-shirts there, and at least one Marty costume. :D And two Ride shirts!! *wants!*
Finally, around 10:15, they start letting us into the theater. I snag a bag of popcorn, and Mom and I both get drinks. Then it’s into the theater to see THE BIGGEST FRICKING MOVIE SCREEN WE’VE EVER SEEN. It was HUGE! At least TWICE the size of our own movie theater!
-TD: It was spectacular!-
-OD: It was incredible!-
-HD: It was perfect for screening Godzilla movies!-
*laugh* Exactly! They were showing some interesting stuff – some George, Lorraine, and Biff screen tests we hadn’t seen before, as well as some cut scene stuff from the DVD. I tried taking a picture – it didn’t come out very well, but you can faintly see a 1955!George Crispin with a 1985!Biff Tom.

Seriously. Screen the size of a small country.
We waited for quite a while – me nibbling on my popcorn and drinking my soda. The event ended up starting late because nobody could find parking. Kind of frustrating, but what are you going to do? Finally, about a half-hour past the start time, out they came! And my fears were relieved, because:
A) Christopher Lloyd was THERE (I was terrified he was going to have to cancel last-minute)
B) THE BEARD WASN’T!
-VD2: I find this hatred of any facial hair on us fascinating.-
You just don’t look right!
-VD: What about glasses? He wears them.-
Glasses are okay, you can take those off, and the frames he was wearing looked pretty good. Anyway, I took a few snaps as they got themselves settled and started talking:

Darn lights. And get out of the way, balding head!

Eeeee, it's CHRISTOPHER LLOYD!

Bob and Chris talk about Chris getting cast for the role of Doc.

Jeffery, Bob, and Chris. Sorry for cropping you out, Claudia!
And then, guess who’s beloved digital camera suddenly says, “Oh, hey, your battery’s running low,” and shuts down?
-VDM: *wince* Tough break.-
Yeah. :( Probably all those photos we took on Thursday. Still, I got a couple of okay shots, and I knew I could rely on others to fill in the blanks. Hell, there was a (really amusing) guy in the back TAPING it, so I’m good.
The sharing/Q&A session was pretty good. Mostly they talked about how Chris, Claudia, and Jeffery were cast – I’d heard a bit about how Chris and Claudia came into their roles, but Jeffery’s was brand new. They also reiterated the famous, “too raunchy for Disney, too sweet for anyone else” story. They answered questions on the closing of the BTTF ride (Chris Lloyd confirming that he voices Doc Brown in a brief video before the ride), BTTF coming to Blu-Ray, Chris’s inspirations for his Doc Brown role, and the idea of another Marty McFly being in the beginning scene at Twin Pines Mall because of a shadow that crosses a spotlight in the background (shot down, Bob says it was probably a filming mistake). There were also a couple of amusing mike glitches where the mikes would make weird noises and the actors would pretend they'd made them.
Then, at 12:30, they started the movie. Now, they warned us that there was going to be a break – they were showing a new remastered High-Def copy, but said copy wouldn’t fit on one disc, so they had to break it into two. They said it might be a couple of minutes. It actually turned out to be a couple of seconds. Good, right?
. . .
You know how, when I saw “Spider-Man 3,” I had to go to the bathroom REALLY bad in the middle of the movie?
*shamefaced* Yeah, happened again. I thought there was going to be a break and I’d miss at most a few minutes! I managed to hold on until the cafeteria sequence, then I had to make a run for it.
-VD: *patpat* At least you’ve seen this one.-
Yeah, but never on the big screen. I was embarrassed!
-RPD: Why? If you didn’t notice, people were getting up and leaving all the time! A lot of people actually skipped the ending to get in line for autographs!-
-VD2: We don’t want you to burst your bladder over us.-
Heh, thanks. I’m just glad I didn’t miss any of the big events. Let me tell you, it was one hell of a screening. Lovely big screen, people laughing – terrific. Though I thought the remastering wasn’t all that great – it appeared a little – fuzzy.
-DW: I thought it was just me – my sight’s not quite human-equivalent.-
Nope, not just you. I’ve since learned that it was probably the projector – they had to bring one in for the screening and apparently had some problems with the sound earlier, so perhaps the picture wasn’t coming through like it should.
After the movie, it was time to line up for autographing. I had my jacket and my BTTF Part I novel and a blue Sharpie at the ready. Since my camera was low on batteries, we also opted to donate some more cash and get a picture from the professionals. It was a long wait, and let me tell you, I was very nervous.
Finally, we got to the front of the line. Everyone’s just so nice! Bob Gale happily signs my jacket and my book, and Christopher Lloyd, Claudia Wells, and Jeffery Weissman all sign my jacket as well. I’m a tongue-tied squeeing fangirl around Chris, but I manage to tell him that Doc’s my favorite character and get a smile. Chris is quiet, as is his wont, but Claudia and Jeffery both compliment me on my fan-made movie-reel T-shirt. I also admit to Jeffery I’ve talked to him on the BTTF.com board as Hot_For_Doc. Once the photographer gets back, we all get our picture taken together, as you’ve seen but which I shall reproduce here, because BEST DAY OF MY LIFE HELLO:

*squee*
Once we’re through the line, it’s outside to wait for the picture to be printed. After a few technical difficulties, it’s out, and we’re off, catching a snack before calling up Henry and meeting him at our drop-off point.
Interesting postscript – as I said, I brought a blue Sharpie with me for everyone to sign my stuff with, just to be prepared. First Christopher Lloyd attempted to keep it, then Jeffery Weissman must have succeeded with absconding with it, cause we sure don’t have it now! *amused* So if anyone got any blue autographs after us, that was because of my pen.
We made it back to the hotel room and packed up most of our stuff, wrapping the jacket in plastic and making sure everything was in place. Then it was off to Subway for supper, then Wonderworks for sciencey fun!

Outside the Wonderworks building. Yes, we took this the first day we got here, but I wanted to show it now.
Wonderworks turned out to be very, very cool. They carried the upside-down theme into the lobby – it was cool to see a second floor with artwork and everything on the ceiling. There were hurricane exhibits, various quizzes about natural disasters and theme songs and what else, a wall where you could press yourself up against a bunch of pegs and see a very need impression on the other side, robot arms that you manipulated to move foam bricks, a “water flowing up” optical illusion, an area where you could make giant bubbles, a gallery of art all about optical illusions – and a bed of nails, which, while not dangerous, is rather prickly!

Owies. Not a lot, but still.
My favorite part of the tour was actually the very first room after exiting the lobby – there’s an immersion tunnel you go through that supposedly turns you upside down. I don’t know the trick behind it, but once you get on the walkway, THE HALLWAY ACTUALLY SEEMS TO START SPINNING UPSIDE DOWN. It’s WILD.
-TTV: And faintly nauseating.-
You lived.
-TTV: By closing my eyes!-
Anyway, we spent about an hour, hour and a half there before finding our way to the gift shop and out again. I couldn’t resist picking up a purple shirt stating “Property of Wonderworks” with a picture of the building on front.
After that, the search for dessert was on. Mom had pointed out Perkins sold pies earlier, so I was in the mood now. We were reluctant to go back to Perkins, though, because of the bad service.
I don’t know why, but we could not find a SINGLE dessert place on our way back, other than Friendly’s, which had a line out the DOOR. Not even a trip to the local supermarket yielded anything we could take back with us. So we bit the bullet and headed back to Perkins for some pies to go – a slice of French Chocolate Silk for me, a slice of Strawberry Cheesecake for Mom. Luckily, in this, Perkins did not disappoint – de-lic-ious.
-VM: So if you find yourself near a Perkins, skip the restaurant and just get some pie to go.-
Exactly. After that was an all night marathon of watching TV before we headed onto the plane, but I’ll save that for tomorrow if you don’t mind.
-D: Why didn't you try to take a nap?-
I have no idea. *shakes head sadly*

Ael's apparently joining one of the LJ roleplaying games, Beyond the Rift. I'm tempted again to join.
-RPD: *puppy dog eyes* Please? It would actually make more sense than Sims.-
Heh, I know, and I'd like to play a Doc again. The problem is a snowball effect.
-RPD: Pardon?-
I don't want to separate Doc from Marty forever. And then I don't want to separate Marty from Jennifer. And then I wonder if I shouldn't bring in Clara if I'm doing girlfriends. And then -- well, you see how it goes.
-RPD: Hmm, yes.-
-HD: Magical tornado transplants Hill Valley?-
I thought those things only showed up Kansas.
-HD: *shrug* I'd have to ask Dorothy.-
-VuM: *confused* How do you know --
-WRM: Oz is a neighbor to Wonderland on the chessland side. Neverland's below both of us, near the beach.-
-M2: Yeah, you guys mentioned vacationing there before, didn't you? Weird how they're all so close.-
Not really -- I just thought it would be neat.
Anyway, I ought to write something so the muses won't have my head. Later!