The 100th Indy 500 ; What a Race!!!

Just over a few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending the 100th Indy 500, a classic American race that I have been attending since 1988.

This year, as usual, I was joined by my friend Brion, and this year, he brought his fiance, Shannon Feinstein.

This year, we met up as usual at the Plainsfield Steak&Shake, though a bit earlier than usual due to the fact that this year's race was sold out. Despite the warnings of massive crowds early on, our usual, very secret, back door way into the north end of the complex worked like a charm. Even once we made our way to the north gates, the crowds weren't that bad, though we would discover later that they got worse fairly soon after we got in.

Once we got in, we made our way to the back nine for some quiet time before the madness began.

We then did some walking and got a fine look at the Pagoda across the infield.

We then made our way to the Fan Zone for some pre-race fun.

As usual, there are photo ops around various autos from the past and present.

 

 We also ran into a rather large bear and I felt compelled to perform a prostate exam, for his health of course.

Soon, we made our way to our seats, which were about halfway up on the outside of Turn 2. Best seats ever!!!

There were the usual pre-race rituals, including the Balloon Launch and the biggest flag I've seen in some time.

 

 And then it was Racetime!

 

As usual, the start was amazing and after about 50 laps or so, we did our usual ritual of walking about to see the cars up close.

Fortunately for us, we watched Juan-Pablo Montoya crash out on the backstretch, which seemed to amaze Shannon.

And of course, we love to stand beneath the track for a restart.

Finally, we made our way back to our seats for the last 75 laps or so and were not disappointed as the racing was awesome!

Overall, it was an awesome day and one for the records. I have never seen so many people in one place... ever.

Looks like I had a great time. Thanks Brion for 16 years of the Indy 500, and for bring your fine lady to enjoy what we have enjoyed for so long.

God bless America!!!

SpaceQuest Planetarium : End Of An Era!

Today, I confirmed some really bad rumors and the truth of it has hit me hard.

SpaceQuest Planetarium at The Children's Museum of Indianapolis is being torn down to make way for something that is not a planetarium. This is an ongoing trend nationwide that disturbs me deeply.

Let's start out with a bit of background about my involvement with SpaceQuest Planetarium.

In early 1997, I was a grad student at Indiana State University where, as part of my duties, I served as the Student Director of the Hook Memorial Observatory. It was a position I excelled at and I loved being an astronomer.

By chance and circumstance, I applied for an internship at SpaceQuest Planetarium and soon found myself offered a job as the Planetarium Educator instead, owing to the fact that the previous educator had died a few weeks earlier.

Walking into The Children's Museum of Indianapolis on March 3, 1997, I was overwhelmed and thrilled to have found what would almost immediately become my dream job. To this day, I have never had a better job, nor will I ever... It was that good.

For the next nearly 4 years, I did the coolest, funnest stuff anyone could ever do... and get paid for it as well. Every morning, I would get up and I couldn't wait to get to work. At the end of the day, I regretted having to leave.

During that time, I wrote and produced 8 planetarium shows, including working with Jim Davis of Paws Inc., Lorenzo Music and John Huge (voices of Garfield the Cat and his owner Jon respectfully), Alan Bean (Apollo 12 moonwalker), and Harrison Schmidt (Apollo 17 moonwalker).  I also worked with Bob Ballard and the JASON Project, NASA (I got to fly on the Vomit Comet twice), and countless others doing some very unique things.

For example, I worked with Jeff Ward of Eli Lily and tracked his dogsled team as they explored the North Magnetic Pole. They would phone back to the dome every Saturday/Sunday during showtimes so kids could talk to them about their adventures. We also tracked their progress on a webpage devoted to their mission. No museum had ever done anything like before.

I designed an award-winning International Space Station web-based game for the museum's website which was, up until a few weeks ago, the most visited website for the museum's homepage.

I built a 1/3rd scale replica of a Stonehenge Trilathon, complete with a Heelstone, which I used to teach simple Physics, history, religion and even how to better complete tasks through teamwork.

Also, I produced in-house video programs called "Dr. What?" for Riley Children's Hospital as part of the museum's outreach program. As part of that work, I got to ride on the Goodyear Blimp "Spirit of Akron." What a hoot!

I webcasted the 1999 Mercury Transit live and was the first museum to ever do anything like that.

The highlight of my career was the acquisition of the Liberty Bell 7 Spacecraft exhibit in 2000. We were the first museum to display this unique artifact of the early days of NASA. I created numerous exhibits and activities related to the science of rockets, as well as a stunning show (pardon my bragging) entitled: SpaceQuest; The Early History of NASA.

I even got to handle and display Moonrocks, as well as introducing kids to the geology of the Moon. In fact, my fondest memories were working with the Museum Apprentice Program (MAPs) kids as a Mentor. Their enthusiasm inspired me and I still keep in contact with many of them.

For nearly 4 years, I enjoyed the support of President Peter Sterling and Director of Education David Cassady until both decided to retire in 2000. It was then that the Board of Directors committed a most grievous act of sheer and complete stupidity when they hired Jeff Patchen to replace Peter Sterling.

Jeff Patchen had absolutely no background in education and he proved his ignorance right away when he promoted a minion of Satan named Karol Bartlett to succeed David Cassady.

Now, fools were in charge and over the next 2 years, the entire education department was forced to abandon the greatest museum on Earth in order to escape the stupidity of Patches the Clown and Karol the Ignoramus! I left soon after she was promoted in order to avoid her evilness.

Here's a fine example of their ignorance at work.

Somehow, they thought that installing a giant glass dildo in the middle of the museum was a good idea.

My only regret was that I was forced to leave, but Time has proven my decision was the correct one, even though not a week passes by that I don't think about that museum and the greatest job I will ever have.

15 years later and now the planetarium is being torn down to make room for something that will not include a planetarium. It is a sad day indeed when science education suffers at the hands of morons who see no value in inspiring kids to view science, space exploration and such as a thing to aspire to, not one to avoid at all cost.

A Day in Oz with the Tails of Oz

Last Saturday, the Royal Liaison of Oz (that's me) and his lovely and charming wife, The Royal Liaison to Princess Ozma, had the pleasure of attending A Day in Oz over in Clarksville, Missouri. It turned out to be a lovely day and a wonderful festival.

Located on the banks of the Mississippi River, Clarksville is a lovely little hamlet south of Mark Twain's birthplace and a wonderful place to celebrate the Land of Oz.

The day started out great with clear skies and great temperatures, especially for the end of August. Naturally, the Gang from Oz showed up and wowed the kids with song, dance and plenty of smiles.

We set up our table and soon, Tails of Oz, The Emerald Slippers of Oz and the Royal Magician of Oz Trilogy. including Magician of Oz, Shadow Demon of Oz and Family of Oz, were flying off the table and into the loving arms of eager readers. We were very pleased with the love and support shown to us throughout the day.

I was pleased to see that the festival organizers had also invited Bob Walls and his wonderful marionette show, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. As you can see, the kids were captivated by his offbeat and quirky performance. Every show was packed and I have always felt that this kind of show is needed more and more as kids drift away from live performances in favor of whatever shows up on their smartphones.

Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!!!

The town itself is a fairly small and rural community, but it acquitted itself quite nicely in putting together its first ever Wizard of Oz festival. In all, I would say that about a thousand people attended through the course of the day.

Of course, kids dressed up in Oz costumes were in great abundance as the festival held numerous costume contests, witch cackling contests and the like.

 

The highlight of the day for me personally was a guest appearance at the Clarksville Library for a reading from Tails of Oz. In addition, as a habit begun at my first Wizard of Oz festival, I donated a set of our books, Tails of Oz, The Emerald Slippers of Oz and my own book, The Ozian Adventure of Pickleless & Blu to the library in support of promoting Youth Literacy.

I couldn't help but notice that Glinda's Palace had been transformed into a nice bounce house. I'm certain she would approve.

 

In fact, the whole town really got into the Spirit of Oz.

Oddly enough, this festival reminded me of the old Chesterton Wizard of Oz festival in one very unique way. 

If you ever attended the old Chesterton Wizard of Oz festival, you'll get this joke.

One really pleasant surprise was finding a winged sock monkey in one of the Oz booths. It reminded me of one of the short stories in Tails of Oz entitled, The Terrible Two's, which includes a wonderful Winged Sock Monkey.

Overall, both Amanda and I were very pleased with the day overall and very pleased with how well the festival went, especially considering that this was Clarksville's first ever Wizard of Oz festival. We hope to attend next year and introduce our next book, Nomes of Oz, as well as possibly having Even More Tails of Oz ready for the fun of Oz. Until then, we're off to Oz... to Oz!!!

Mapleton Wizard of Oz Festival and Tails of Oz

Last weekend, Amanda and I had the pleasure of attending the Mapleton Wizard of Oz Festival in Illinois, about 3 hours drive from our house.

Now last year, I attended what was their 2nd year doing this and about 500 people showed up. This year, about 5000 showed up and it was quite an adventure, both for us and the folks who run the event.

Like last year, it started with a song, a gathering of old familiar freinds and a balloon release.

It should be noted that the temperatures for this day were into the upper 90's with high humidity, so it was quite a challenge dealing with the heat and meeting with people, talking about our books. I give my wife much credit as she endured the heat far better than I expected her to. Fortunately, the festival volunteers furnished us with water when we asked for it.

There were, of course, many people in costume, sharing their love for the Wizard of Oz, though all were related to characters from the MGM 1939 movie, The Wizard of Oz.

Loads of Dorothy's running about, nearly as many Glinda's, but very few witches. I'll wager the guy in the Winged Monkey outfit was regretting wearing a wool outfit in the heat. The replica of Dorothy's House was unique and I have never seen someone do that one before. Once again, all movie characters. I wish more people would dress up as Scraps, the Patchwork Girl, or Polychrome, Daughter of the Great Rainbow, or even Princess Ozma.

The big draw of the festival was the Oz characters (Glinda, Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tinman and Cowardly Lion) hanging out along the Yellow Brick Road and entertaining the kids. The one issue there was that not enough people could get through quickly enough, causing long lines that irritated numerous people.

I know how hard the festival people work at making this festival flow smoothly and they are already looking at ways to insure a better experience next year. After all, no one, and I mean NO ONE, expected 5000 people to attend this gathering of Oz. Such is the power of Facebook and social media in general.

It was nice to see that Steven's Puppets were part of the festivities. He was there last year and it was a huge success. I hope they bring him back again and again as the children absolutely LOVE the live performance of the puppets Wizard of Oz.

Overall, I considered the festival to be a huge success for the two of us and we certainly hope to return next year with our newest books, Even More Tails of Oz and Nomes of Oz, which we are currently working on.