Southern California Adventures, Part 2: Universal Studios

Writing again... I guess the road makes good blog fodder!

Today being Sunday, I decided to stop using the "road" as an excuse to miss church. So I fired up the old laptop here and found a church to my liking, St Paul's Lutheran of North Hollywood. Now, in my mind, there are no two groups so diametrically opposed as Lutherans and Hollywood "types". I'm always in the mood to have my world rocked by contradictions to my perceptions, so I gave it a try. Well, now I know where all the Lutheran women are hiding! In all seriousness though, the church was stunning and the message was great. They aren't really into singing (or anyone who can sing is way up front in the choir) so I was kinda left winging it myself. Really nice folks though...

After church I happened to notice Universal Studios was on the way back to my hotel. Seeing as I had nothing to do all day, I decided to swing on by. Now Universal Studios has a sweet place in my heart because I remember being a kid and visiting So Cal for the first time. Universal was one of our stops. I liked it WAY more than Disneyland, Knotts or the boring drive to San Diego just to see some Koalas (which for some bizzare reason I liked as a kid... little did I know they they are essentially ugly Australian Tree Badgers). Anyway, back in the 80's Universal had everything I loved as a kid. They had Kit from Knight Rider, where you could sit in his seat and talk to him... like Santa only Kit is real! (or at least I thought so when I did it) On the tram tour, you got to see the A-team guys (animatronic I came to find out later) blowing stuff up and shooting guns (of course no one got hit by anything... just like the show). But the COOLEST was driving into the hanger of Battlestar Galatica when Apollo and Starbuck (back when he was a GUY) took out a whole bunch of robotronic Silons! How awesome!

Alas, those days are long gone... but Universal is still for the 8 year old kid inside of me... I know that if that version of me could visit today, he'd have just as much fun and believe every cheesy bit of it. Today they now have a lot of 3D theater shows ala "Captian E0" (video commerical here... a blog entry all of its own) The two best I saw were Terminator 2: 3D and Shrek 4D... fun stuff but a bit on the campy side, especially T2:3D. I remember visiting back in college when it was just on the edge of being outdated... now it's more funny than cool. I went on the Back to the Future ride too. I'm convinced this ride is sponsored by the American Chiropractors Union or something because it's essentially a whiplash machine. I will say that the Mummy ride was quite a treat. Its nothing compared to the big rides at Six Flags, but I was surprised to say the least. The "plot" of the ride was about as flimsy as a wet tissue, but it was very dark and very twisty. Its strange when I'm faced with being hurled in the dark, out of control... I relax... it's the best feeling in the world to me. Everyone is screaming and I'm as sober as a preacher on Sunday. Anyway... I wrapped up my day by going on the campy tram tour. Now you have to understand I know it's going to be bad, but something draws me to it everytime... the cheesy "flash flood" to the animatronic "Jaws" shark. Two things that have been changed however were no more bridge fall apart under the tram and no more "parting of the pond" ala "The Ten Commandments". For those of you who like "Serenity" and the TV show "Firefly" (so basically not Dan and Ada) there was the "mule" vehicle from the show on the tram tour too... the highlight for me. I was still hoping the tour would drive through a Galatica hangar again... maybe another time.