A Day at the Museum

Caroline has asking to go to the American Museum for Natural History for a while now. Recently at the end of an episode of Cyberchase, the real world application was set up in the museum. Then there was this weeks episode of “How I met Your Mother” that took place mostly in the museum kind of sort of.

The school system was closed for veterans day and the weather looked good just a little windy so at the last minute we decided that I should take Caroline in to the museum while Peter got some work done at home. We got on the train and made the trek into the city.

We started with lunch at John’s Pizza. While getting there we directed a family from Montreal, a family from Ohio, and a group of Korean tourists to the same place. We were seated really quickly and settling in for a good lunch. My father had e-mailed me earlier that there was ap for the museum for the iPhone which should work on the iPad. I downloaded it at the restaurant and checked out the functions. Turned out to be one the best aps I could have downloaded for that day.

When we got to the museum, we decided that we wanted to see the one prop that they created for the movie which is the Easter Island Moai. I found it in the catalogue and told my iPad we wanted to see that item. It asked if I wanted to use Stairs or the elevator and I opted for stairs. It found out where we were in the Museum and directed us to the statue in real time. Along the way we stopped and looked at a lot of other things. Caroline could spend days there looking at various things they have on display. We made it and she got to see DumDum.

Then she wanted to see the dinosaurs so we inputted the T-Rex into the iPad ap and off we went. It actually showed me a short cut I didn’t know about. We browsed the skeletons and watched as art students sketched the bones. Caroline watched as various artists worked in various forms of pencil, pastels, and charcoal.

The next thing she wanted to see was the mineral and gem room. Input that into the iPad and we ambled our way to see the gems including the new blue diamond they have on display. It is very pretty. Caroline touched things she was allowed to touch. She really enjoyed the thought that she was touching things that had been floating in space. We ambled back towards the planetarium and she looked at various exhibits along the way she found interesting and we visited the blue whale.

After a couple of hours we decided that we were done for the day but we would be coming back for another visit. We headed to Time Square for some looking around and caught the train home.

Overall it was a very good day.

I am grateful that I can take my daughter to a museum for a day of fun and learning.

LJ Idol Season 7 Week 2 Deconstruction

Side note: this topic was a rather difficult one for me to do partially because I was reading other entries that were showing up on my friends list and a number of people said what I was going to say much better. It came down to two. Both involved a lot of back story which I am fine with. I went with this one with a flip of a coin and checking to see if I have written about either topic in my previous entries

There is a place at Disney World that I use to call home. I would walk in and be greeted by the denizens within. A lot happened in my life at that place and it still is our favorite place anywhere on any Disney property. Unfortunately no one has been able to go there in over two years. It was the Adventurers Club.

The empty building still stands on Disney property but not for long according to various permits that have been filed with both the local and state governments. The props are scattered through out Disney properties from Orlando to Hong Kong to France. A couple have been repurposed in shops on the Island. They have slowly been removing the insides so that they can knock the building down.

I went this past January to Disney World to see Ariel sing with her choir and to say goodbye to the Adventurers Club. I went by and took a lot of photos of everything that was still there. Since then they have removed a bunch of pieces including the banner. I sat on the steps and remembered all that came out of that club in my life.

It was there that Peter and I had our first formal date. It was there that we got engaged. It was there that we made some life long friends who have been there for us in thick and thin. It was there that we learned the secrets of the club including the tunnels that allowed the cast members to get from one room to another without having to deal with the crowd. It was there we spent our entire evenings going from show to show. We knew where to be when for everything. And we would stay in the library post show to talk to the actors behind the characters that we had friended.

I think that is one of the things I miss the most. Sitting around discussing all kinds of topics while someone was on their break. Seeing them snap into character if someone opened the door that they shouldn’t and then relax back into themselves. The library has been stripped and the stage we sat on has been dismantled. The scrim that “Fingers” use to hid behind so he could be the ghost playing the organ has been rolled up carefully and is in storage or maybe in Hong Kong where most of that room went.

It was our touchstone. Now we really don’t know what to do with ourselves in the evening after the parks are closed. Well that’s not so true. We tend to get together with our Adventurer’s Club friends and reminisce about the club and talk liked we use to in the library with the topic floating from one subject to another.

Soon not even the building will be standing and with that we will say a fond final Kungaloosh to a club where you would come in as a stranger and leave a little stranger.

Behind the cut are a few photos I took the last time I visited my beloved club this past January.

( Kungaloosh )