O Paramount, Where Art Thou?

The year is 1993.  And in the heart of Cincinnati, Ohio, a suspended roller coaster is opened at Paramount’s Kings Island.  The name?…

Top Gun

The coaster itself is somewhat simple in design; total height of only 78 feet with a 70 feet drop and a top speed of 51 mph.  The initial lift hill provides all the energy needed for the jet-striker circuitous path over the 2,300 feet of track.  Total ride time: 1 min, 52 seconds.

I can only imagine back in ’93, when the crowds would be lined up in the queue for hours at a time to experience 110 seconds of excitement.  So what’s a theme park company to do to help people pass the time?  What could possibly serve as the “opiate for the masses”?

Enter: The First Church of Kenny Loggins

(Press Play to get pumped up…)

Kenny Loggins was the king of 80′s movie soundtrack anthems, providing tracks for Caddyshack, Footloose, Over The Top, and Top Gun.  And nothing quite says 80′s cool like rockin’ the aviator shades indoors, sporting the 3-day stubble, and having a spiked starter mullet.  But regardless of Mr. Loggins fashion style, the song itself is infectious with synthesized beats and a driving rhythm.

So the muckity-mucks of Paramount’s Kings Island were wise to maintain the business strategy of turning roller coaster into movie experience.  There was the Drop Zone free-fall tower, the Face/Off roller coaster which places riders face-to-face, the Days of Thunder go-kart track, the Congo Falls boat flume ride, the Italian Job: Stunt Track coaster, and Tomb Raider: The Ride.  All these theme-based rides helped create a unique experience and a common identity amongst the rides within the park.  But all paled in comparison to Top Gun.

The Top Gun ride successfully piggybacked on the acclaim and popularity of one of the better movies of our time.  The loading station was designed by John DeCuir, the movie’s production designer, to resemble an aircraft carrier and was adorned with patriotic and military symbology.  The ride is colored military gray and the cars replicate some of the F-14 Tomcat stylings.  If that were not enough to accelerate your pulse and send your adrenaline levels to new heights, the above “Danger Zone” video is played on a continous loop over the closed-feed monitors at every 50 feet within the ride’s line.  Following the ride’s conclusion, the instrumental “Top Gun Anthem” blares victoriously over loudspeakers as riders triumphantly exit the ramp.

That was then.  This is now.

The year is 2008.  And the younger brothers joined me earlier this summer for a weekend back at Kings Island.  But the park has taken a turn for the worse…at least in outward appearance.

You see, readers, it had been several years since I last experienced that which is known as the Paramount’s Kings Island.  And between this previous visit and this summer’s trek, the park underwent ownership changes.  Cedar Fair, owners and operators of Cedar Point and several other amusement ventures, purchased the Paramount Parks franchise (which included multiple parks) for $1.24 billion in 2006.  And with the sale from Paramount to Cedar Fair went the naming rights and privileges for the movie-themed names and references.

So as we entered Kings Island on that Saturday, the names on the park map didn’t exactly match those named above.  The Face/Off ride had been renamed Invertigo, the Drop Zone had been generalized to Drop Tower, and the Italian Job: Stunt Track had become Backlot Stunt Coaster.  All rides were essentially the same, but with the less creative, non-descript brands.  My only salvation was that someone had the foresight to originally name The Beast after nothing tied to Corporate America.

And then we got to the Top Gun (TM) ride.  Cedar Fair’s version? –> Flight Deck

Flight Deck?  Are you kidding me?  You go from the bad-ass excitement of Top Gun to the lame and uninspiring Flight Deck.  It’s the equivalent of calling the Egyptian Pyramids by the name polyhedra or the Washington Monument by the moniker ‘obelisk’.  These are things that are just too big or too great to be limited by generalization.

But, before giving up all hope, I had to actually ride it.  Perhaps the rename would only take away from the allure and not the actual experience.

If only this world weren’t so cruel.  My friends, Kings Island has completely destroyed any and all remaining intrigue for this ride.  I mean they have literally just shit all over it.

No longer due to soothing tones of the Loggins greet eager entrants to the ride gate.  Instead it’s a veritable hodgepodge of random music videos.  Scott, Eric, and I were instead met by the sultry saxophone of the bikini-clad babe from Wreckz-N-Effect’s “Rumpshaker”.  Not exactly the tune to make you feel like Maverick (unless Mav’rick is preparing to “take flight” in his Chevy Impala lowrider with hydraulic suspension, that is).

So with my anger reaching Subway-esque levels, I turned my attention towards technology.  By downloading a “Danger Zone” ringtone, perhaps the day would not be lost.  Only I hadn’t factored in the Loggins to Wreckz-N-Effect ratio (currently estimated by scientists to be 10,000:1).  Without the cult-like following to Kenny’s rock anthem, we were at the front of the line and ready to ride before anything could be successfully downloaded.

So there I sat, harness over shoulders, with what had to be the greatest look of disdain ever to grace my face.  Both brothers are amused at this point with my fanatical love for all things Top Gun and with how quickly my interest has turned to disgust.  Stoic, my face remained an expressionless mask for the next 1 minute and 52 seconds.

Listen up, Hoonies.  I normally have nothing but contempt for the Corporate America naming rights game.  It has turned too many famed sports stadiums into giant-sized billboards (Comiskey to US Cellular, Astrodome to Enron Field and Minute Maid Park, and Jacob’s Field to Progressive Field).  But perhaps there is a time and place for it.  It’s paramount (pun intended) for King’s Island to maintain naming rights and to preserve the staple that once was the Top Gun ride.

So starting today, I am proud to announce the founding of the Loggins Foundation, aimed at raising enough money to buy permission back from Paramount Pictures to keep part of the past alive in Cincinnati.

I thank you for your support.

Does All That Logging Make Me A Lumberjack?

Ladies and Gentlemen, in the interests of not being entirely outdone by my compatriot, I present you with an utterly inferior and vastly more useless post than the preceding three. 

That said, please don’t underestimate the gravity of this post. I am, Hoonie faithful, humbly trying to protect the souls of our entire Hoonie cult following from Big Brother.

I’ll give that a second to sink in. 

I have discovered the way in which Big Brother will one day overtake our world. At work, of course, I expect my internet usage to be monitored and my outgoing email attachments to be scrutinized. The Jocular Man has recently begun filtering certain emails by subject and sending automatic cc’s to the two layers of management above me.

I have a dream, though entirely unrelated to Dr. MLK’s, that our company president receives dozens of cc’s from his underling executives, telling their wives not to wait up. It’s all that keeps me going sometimes.

Anyway, back on topic… I have discovered the way in which the devil shall soon collect our souls. Or Ray Bradbury will burn our books. Or some Board of Shadowy Figures will do Big Important Evil Deeds. Or whatever your favorite conspiracy is. 

And I believe that sci-fi Day of Reckoning is coming fast. 

How will it happen, you ask? Someone will make a simple offer that will irrevocably make everyone’s life easier. They will offer to replace every single one of my fucking logins with biometrics. A quick thumb-scan and you’ve got access to everything.

They will steal my life, soul, and the Jocular Automaking benefits that my soon-to-be spouse so longingly covets. They will pillage my home and rape my unborn children. And I will thank them profusely for it. 

I have twelve logins that relate directly to everyday tasks at my job. Twelve, Bob. I seriously can’t make this shit up. I have four logins and two different packaging utilities that I must use to transfer a single file from our design center to the computer sitting on my desk. And I have to cheat the file through a server transfer. I’m waiting for the day they’ll give me the two suitcases and the hexadecimal nuke passkeys in those little breakable vials. I think that would be simpler, honestly.

I have three different logins for three different types of computer system (my main computer, special computer, and any other computer). I’ve got THREE FUCKING SPAMFILTER UTILITIES at work. They all have different logins and randomly generated passwords that are at least twelve characters long. I have at least two additional logins I can think of offhand for other special programs I use approximately once a month. 

I’ve got logins for my bank accounts (two), my mortgages (two), my utilities (two), my retirement plans (two), my credit cards (three), my master’s program (two – one for billing/grades and one for registration), my frequent flier programs (two), my Marriott Points account (my precioussss), and my student loans. I’ve even got two different logins to get my W-2s (try using a fucking login once per year) and my pay stubs! My expense reports and purchase orders require me to RE-enter my login information (same as the pay stubs one, however).

I’ve got logins for an indeterminable number of forums, logins for Facebook, LinkedIn, AIM, Yahoo!, and three other email addresses. I can access my work email in two ways: using my work PC and usual login, or from any other computer using a DIFFERENT LOGIN AND RANDOMLY GENERATED PASSWORD. I’ve even got to log in to post this drivel!

And it would all be okay if I could change all of my logins to the same name and all of my passwords to the same eight-character-with-a-special-character-and-a-number string. 

Except many of my passwords have to be rotated. I have to use ten different passwords before I can repeat, and I have to remake the passwords every three months. 

But here is the true sign of the apocalypse, my friends.

I shit you not, I have an Excel spreadsheet on my desktop at work called “Passwords”. It is password protected. I pray every night that Ray Bradbury will never hack it.