shepp

At the end of last season, I renewed my season pass at SFMW/DK, and got a generic '07 pass, complete with my photo and a picture of Bugs. I plan on visiting SFNE and GAdv before DK, though. So (and I'm thinking I already know the answer, but I couldn't get a live person on the phone at SFDK) my '07 pass is all processed and valid, right? I don't have to go to SFDK to activate it or something before using it at another park?

Well, that's encouraging. Oddly though, last time I rode Xcelerator, nine months before you did, the ops insisted I take mine off, despite my nice, tight Croakies. So maybe the policy has officially changed? I know the first time I rode Speed:The Ride, it was No Glasses, but a couple of years later, there was no problem wearing mine for multiple rerides. Contacts aren't a bad idea - my partner wears 'em on coasters and, except for an occasional lost-under-the-eyelid moment, never has problems. But my vision is fairly well screwed up, making getting used to contacts a chore, and frankly, if I'm going 70, 80, or 128 mph, I'd rather have shatter-resistant plastic protecting my eyeballs, anyway.

^ Yeah, if i know that I'll have to ditch the glasses (as at KBF), I'll take a case and have a secure pocket to put it in. But I was (no pun intended) blindsided at Tatsu, when I was already locked in restraints when the op told me to take off my glasses and put them in a pocket - not physically easy in those restraints, lemme tell you - or leave them with him on the platform (I don't think so). It would seem a simple matter to post a sign at the beginning of a queue, say were height restrictions are, stating that even Croakied glasses were banned. But hell, I've never been on a ride where someone's glasses went flying. Unlike cell phones.

Um...maybe once you make it all the way through puberty, you'll have a better idea.

Are well-strapped eyeglasses allowed on Storm Runner (yay, TTD and KK) or banned (boo, XCelerator)? I'd love to mentally prepare myself if I'm going to have to ride blind. There were few things more irritating than finally making it onto Tatsu and being required to take off my securely attached glasses and ride with them precariously stuck in an open pocket instead. I mean: no eye protection, possibility of specs being damaged, mega-greatly increased likelihood of them falling...what's up with that?

C'mon out to the Left Coast and find out. Yes, better. Though I'm not sure way I'd say way better.

1. IOA 2. SFGAdv 3. Cedar Point 4. Busch Africa 5. Disneyland 6. Uni Orlando 7. SFMM 8. DCA 9. Busch Europe 10. Disney MGM and honorable mention to SFDK 'cos it's home. (My list may well change soon, since I'm headed for first visits to Hershey, Knoebels, and SFNE in a few weeks, but what the hell...)

OK...nosh it is. Thanks for the suggestions.

Another vote for a full day at SFDK. If all you wanted was to ride the coasters, you could polish them off in the first hour or so after opening - assuming that Roar is running more than one train, that V2 is running at all, and that Medusa opens on time. But if you want to hit all the animal attractions, remember that most of them take place only a couple of times per day, and besides the big stadium shows, there are the Tiger Island show and the walrus training session, both of which I recommend. So it will take some planning and running around to hit them all. (Oh, and if you're into wee beasties and have never bene to a butterfly house before, the little-noticed one at SFDK is worth a visit, too.)

Knoebels' food is famous, of course, but since I'll be there for just one meal (I think), I'm wondering what you think is the Very Best of the Best...

Last night I saw Taylor Effin' Hicks. Pity me. (Well, don't pity me too much. Since I work at a music venue, in the past coupla weeks, I've been paid to see The Decemberists, Kaiser Chiefs, Regina Spektor, Arctic Monkeys, Against Me, Elvis Costello, and Velvet Revolver...)

Effin' Wow! I just started posting on TPR after a lonnnng absence (long story) and not only is this thread still going strong after 2+ years, but the percentage of gay guys is exactly where it was when I left! Nifty.

Really? It regularly places in the top 10 or 15 in the Steel Coaster Poll...

Wellll..."human trafficking" usually refers to prostitutes and the like, not ride ops. And most of the loss in American jobs doesn't have to do with Six Flags or imported "slave labor," but with the movement of international capital, outsourcing, and NAFTA, CAFTA, and the like. For evidence of that, just leave SFMM and head for the nearest WalMart (where the employees, by the by, are treated no better than at most theme parks) and see what proportion of goods are now made in China...often, in fact, by prisoners of a totalitarian system. Happy shopping!

OK, so does anyone know whether SPs from other SF parks will be good for early admission? An hour early Mon-Thurs, right?

Interesting TR. SFDK/MW has been my home park for years (though I haven't been there since the makeover), so it's cool to see how enthusiastic you are. Honestly, the ops have always seemed like a mixed bag to me - usually friendly, but without much hustle. Nice if there's been a concerted effort to pare down dispatch times. And though Medusa and Roar are very good, and I find V2 fun but queasy-making, there hasn't been a new coaster (or any major new ride, for that matter) since the Zonga fiasco. Gee, wouldn't it be swell if the newest coaster weren't 6 whole years old? Whatever you might think of SFMM, at least you can't finish off all their major rides in the first half-hour the park is open. On the other hand, your TR didn't cover the animal/marine part of the park, which is equally well done and well-themed...and one of the big reasons I keep renewing my SP.

^ Well, like Woody Allen said, it doubles your chances of a date on Saturday night.

^ Y'know, dude, the person I was accused of being condescending toward already stated that he didn't feel I was doing that. But hey, for some reason you and your pal Jew have decided that it's time to flame me wherever possible. And you know what? I could care less. But back on topic - since, as I recall, you're a Bush Republican, how do you feel things in Iraq are going? Great, huh?

I'm sorry if I sounded condescending...didn't mean to do that. You're right, I simply should have said, "You stated that someone had to militarily overthrow the government of Iraq. Can you please explain why that was necessary?" I also wish I'd pointed out that the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan was rationalized in some of the same terms as the Iraq War: Defeating an Islamofascist insurgency and maintaining a stable secular government. (Though the Soviets, unlike the Americans, were actually invited in by a legal - if unsavory - government.) The Afghan war and its aftermath was a major factor in the destabilization of the USSR, and a contributing factor to its dissolution. That war lasted over 9 years. I'm certainly hoping that 6 years from now we're not still having this debate.

Just won't let it go, will ya? I love how cute you get when you're angry...all pouty and self-righteous...

Um, just what situation was that? The ostensible reason for the war, lest we forget, was the non-existant WMDs, though the U.N. inspection team stated - before our invasion - that despite Saddam's recalcitrance, they could find no weapons and no active arms programs, and said that they could, in a matter of months, determine once and for all whether any existed. So what situation? That there was an unpleasant, murderous dictator in power? Gee, why don't we go invade Burma? Or the Sudan? Then what situation? The always-dubious links to Al Qaeda? The yellowcake bull, which Bush had been warned not to include in his speech because the whole thing was so shaky? The trumped-up aluminum tube "evidence?" There was no, repeat, no compelling reason to invade a sovereign nation in a highly unstable area of the world. And having done so, what we're now facing in our continuing presence is not the liberation that followed WWII, but the same damn kind of quagmire the Soviets found when they tried to play imperial power in Afghanistan. But we have accomplished one thing. We've turned a sworn enemy of Iran into its ally.

^ I think, with all due respect, that using your personal experience as a basis for generalizing about the entire human race doesn't quite cut it. In matters of orientation, IMO everybody is allowed to define themselves however they want, as long as they don't use that to oppress or insult others. In my case, I've had (unexciting) sexual contact with women, as well as what might be viewed mechanically as (exciting) "vaginal" sex with a couple of female-to-male guys I know. Regardless, I view myself as a Kinsey 6...well, maybe 5.8...and likewise, if someone tells me he's totally straight, I don't immediately think "He's just too uptight to admit his own queerness."

Yet another vote for the B&M roar. Gorgeous...

OK, I'll respond in a thoughtful manner. I think today's column by Robert Scheer said it rather well: "For more than three years, the United States has micromanaged everything from turning the American taxpayer-financed occupation into a grab fest for U.S. corporate war profiteers to the failed training of the country's new security appartus now dominated by Shiite fanatics. Unfortunately for the great imperial Pax Americana scheme of builiding a pliable, secular government in Baghdad...the Iraqi voters soundly rejected the candidates favored by the Pentagon and the CIA. They chose instead the instead the militant Shiites nurtured in the rogue nation of Iran... "Self-proclaimed "moderate" Democrats, who defend staying in Iraq...have closed their ears to avoid hearing an uncomfortable truth: The longer we've stayed, the worse things have gotten, and that will continue to be the case."

Huh? I'm curious as to why you chose to flame me ad hominem, actually. And bringing Wes and Jewishness into this? Um, er, gee, I hardly know what to say. (Just for the record, I was bar mitzvahed, and playing the Kosher card in this instance seems either a puzzling, failed attempt at humor or going totally off the deep end.) As far as whining...well, thanks for the analysis, Miss Dr. Freud. I suppose the no-glasses thread might be construed as that, though I'd say that most other posters agreed with me. And as far as this thread goes...yeah, I'd say that a poll that compares two dissimilar rides, excluding rides that are in fact similar, and tallies votes from people who say "I never rode X, so I'll vote for Y" is pretty much meaningless. What, I'm not allowed to point that out? Sure, polling's all meant in fun, though, and you may note that my criticism was not made in a vicious or personal manner. So, boychik, to quote an old Yiddish saying, "Hit yourself in the head and pretend it's mine."