Why I Oughta...

Back in March, the folks at Disney announced they were closing some of their stores as their business continues to transition to e-commerce.  That has only surely accelerated due to the pandemic.  One of those stores that was on the list of closures was near us - up in Rosemont.  Turns out, it is an outlet store.  And, I didn't know this, but Nat did (because she's been there a few times), they carry quite a bit of Disney Parks merchandise.  In particular, they carry Disneyland Park merchandise that has cycled through the park and ends up here - at the outlet with discounted prices.  Kinda neat.   With outlet prices coupled with the store closing, Nat went up there and picked up a bunch of clothes for the kids.  And, she came home with two things for me.  2020 Disneyland Park pins.  Disneyland was closed for nine of the twelve months of 2020, so it is no surprise that 2020 merchandise ended up at the outlet, right? The pins were marked $3.99 and - as you can see below - one ha

Just to make things simple here for the record keeper at the 'official' coaster collection archives, I'm calling this just one coaster.  You can see a bunch of coasters in the photos of this post and one side of them are all different, but just to keep things simple here, let's call this one coaster. And that coaster is pretty neat:  it is from the new (at least kinda new) Lamplight Lounge at Disney California Adventure. As I've posted over time, we're lounge people when it comes to Disney parks and dining.  After taking some advice from Pam at the BoG Podcast, we've sought out more and more lounges.  They don't require ADRs and you can get pretty good food in an atmosphere that we can enjoy and the kids can tolerate. This place - the Lamplight Lounge - is called a 'lounge', but it also takes ADRs.  Or at least reservations via the Disneyland mobile app - which is a bit different than WDW ADRs.  But, you get it, right?  Also, the food is

The Babe found and traded for this 8 year old pin from Disneyland that marks the 'opening day' of Toy Story Midway Mania from 2008.  Traded for it. That means that *someone* bought this pin eight years ago.  Held on to it for eight years.  Brought it all the way to Disney World and then decided that one of the ratty pins on the typical pin board was 'better' than this one and decided to trade for it. I can't find a lot about this pin online, but there is this eBay listing  and PinPics has a listing showing the pin, too. The Babe snatched it and this one will go on her pin board right next to her Minnie as Mary Poppins and this Christmas pin from 2009 from the Polynesian that she traded for on a previous trip.

Well, at least the University of Illinois one was turned to December.  The Pixar one was already in December by accident!   Check out last months post where the photo shows December already showing .  Whoops. I don't seem to have posted in December of 2015, so there's no ranking to compare against, so we'll just have to close out this year with a push.  If I don't get any wall calendars for Christmas, this monthly diary will come to a close.  And that's just fine with me. For those keeping track like I am (Which, we all know is nobody!): January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Days better) March took 8 days this year. In 2015, I turned them on the 10th . Posted on the 11th. So...that makes it -2 days better. April took just 7 days. I didn't post last April. So..no ne

On the left in the Pixar calendar is Wall-E and on the right is 'passing the time' as a student waits for a bus on the UIUC campus.  Today is the 6th and in looking at last year, I flipped them on the 8th , so that's a -2 addition to the tally.   For those keeping track like I am (Which, we all know is nobody!): January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Days better) March took 8 days this year. In 2015, I turned them on the 10th . Posted on the 11th. So...that makes it -2 days better. April took just 7 days. I didn't post last April. So..no new net days. May took 12 days. Net + 5 days over last year. Wowsa.  June took 6 days. Net +5 days over last year. Another Wowsa.  July took 8 days. Net -14 days over last year. Huge swing. Leaving a -7 day advantage over last year. August

This month's wall calendars feature Toy Story 3 on the left in the Pixar calendar and the one and only Memorial Stadium on the right in the University of Illinois wall calendar.  October is - maybe - the best time on campus, so I love seeing the football team featured in the month. Last year, I turned the calendars over on the 8th of October , so that means I've gained another four days in the annual contest.  At the end of September, I was up -21 days .  So, this thing might just be over before December even starts. For those keeping track like I am (Which, we all know is nobody!): January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Days better) March took 8 days this year. In 2015, I turned them on the 10th . Posted on the 11th. So...that makes it -2 days better. April took just 7 days. I did

Although this post is going up on September 12th, I turned these calendars over on the 7th.  I took the photo above then.  And here's proof - if you go to this Google Photos link all the data is there with the photo.  Not that anyone but me really cares, right? On the left is Ratatouille from 2009 on the Pixar calendar and on the right is the Grainger Engineering Library on the UIUC calendar.  And a kinda fall-ish day.  Not quite fall.  Not quite summer, either.  I think the photo works for September. Last year, I turned the calendars on September 18th.  This year, I posted on the 12th, but turned them on the 7th.  Hmmm...let's be fair here and call it on the day I posted.  I don't want this lead to be too insurmountable.  So that's a net of -6 days.  Add it to the pile below. As for the movie Ratatouille, I really liked it, but have only watched it one or two times.  I think we own it?  We should break it out again.  It made more than $600M at the box office

This month's wall calendar update comes on the 2nd of the month, which is a very fast turn around time if history serves as any indication.  On the left in the Pixar calendar, we have Toy Story 2 - yep!  - #2.  And on the right is the University of Illinois Hallene Gateway.  This thing was put up in 1998 during my time on campus and has a nice little archive page that the University has put up here .  Someone, had the foresight to preserve this when they were taking down one of the original buildings and after sixty years, someone 'discovered' it and brought it back to life as a bit of a gateway to the campus on the Urbana side.   From the UIUC archive page : Dedicated October 8, 1998, on the 63rd annual meeting of University of Illinois Foundation, the Hallene Gateway Plaza was funded through the generosity of Alan M. and Phyllis Welsh Hallene, graduates of the class of 1951. As its centerpiece, the Plaza features the original sandstone portal of the New Main Universi

Another month, another turn of the wall calendars at my office.  On the right, the University of Illinois calendar features the ACES Library (which, I think was built after my time) and on the right, one of the best animated movies of all time yet this list has at #11 ?!?!).  Looking at my Google Photos auto-upload library, I see that I took this photo above on the 8th of July, so even though today is the 20th of July, let's call this one turned on the 8th. And a big swing here!   Last year, it was July 22nd that I turned the calendars a net of -14 days. For those keeping track like I am: January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Days better) March took 8 days this year. In 2015, I turned them on the 10th . Posted on the 11th. So...that makes it -2 days better. April took just 7 days. I did

June in my wall calendar world means The Incredibles on the Pixar calendar on the left and the Stock Pavillon at the University of Illinois on the right.  Unfortunately, last year, I posted about the June calendars on the first day of the month.  Gasp!  That's bad for the tally.  I flipped the calendars and took this photo above at my office earlier this week on the 6th, so that's a +5 day increase. For those keeping track like I am: January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Days better) March took 8 days this year. In 2015, I turned them on the 10th . Posted on the 11th. So...that makes it -2 days better. April took just 7 days. I didn't post last April. So..no new net days. May took 12 days. Net + 5 days over last year. Wowsa.  June took 6 days.  Net +5 days over last year.  Anot

For those of you keeping track of these things at home, today is Friday, May 13th.  I actually turned these over to May yesterday, so let's call it the 12th of May. On the left is Monsters, Inc.  On the right is Illini Hall.  Which....is a total mystery to me.  Having spent four years there (including the summers), I'm not sure I ever stepped foot into this place.   Looking it up on the UIUC map , it shows Illini Hall right on Wright Street, just south of Green.  Kinda across Wright from Altgeld.  The "Department of Statistics" is in there.  That *might* explain why I didn't go there... The full archives of the enthralling wall calendar tracking project (you just can't get enough, can you?!?!?) can be found here . May took 12 days in 2016.    Last year it was the 7th.  That's a +5 day jump. January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 day

Took this photo last week on April 7th, where I turned over the Pixar calendar to Ratatouille and the Illini one to a photo of students lounging on the Quad. 7 days is pretty good.  Here's a reminder of what happened with these calendars so far this year: January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Days better) March took 8 days this year. In 2015, I turned them on the 10th . Posted on the 11th. So...that makes it -2 days better. April took just 7 days.  I didn't post last April.  So..no new net days. -3 days net in terms of improvement , meaning I've shaved off *at least* 3 days from last year's turns. 

 These were turned over earlier this week, but I'm just posting about them on the 10th of the month.  So...let's call it Tuesday the 8th for March. On the right is the University of Illinois Wall Calendar with a beautiful photo of Altgeld Hal l and the spring flowers blooming.  On the right, the Pixar calendar is featuring the movie 'Up'.  On the top is a drawing of a dog in the tree that I *think* is supposed to be Dug.  And on the bottom is a stylized drawing of the house tied up with balloons heading towards Paradise Falls.  On the bottom is a black/white drawing of the house in the mist right up on top of Paradise Falls.  No Russell or Carl Fredrickson or even Kevin anywhere in them. 3 months in, here is where we are for 2016. January took 8 days to put up the calendar . I don't think I was tracking January last year. So let's call it a wash. (+0 Days) February took 16 days to put up the calendar. In 2015, I turned it over on the 17th . (-1 Day

I turned these new calendars over from January to February early last week in the office on the 16th.  On the left is some art inspired by the 'Finding Nemo' movie.  And on the right, is the Electrical and Computer Engineering building that is pretty fancy.  And new!   Construction started in 2011 and the building was dedicated in October of 2014. From the ECE site : The ECE Building, located at 306 N. Wright St ., Urbana, is nearly twice the size of the department‘s former home, Everitt Laboratory. At 230,000 square feet, the new building is full of more than 20 lab spaces intended for student instruction and learning. These labs continue ECE ILLINOIS‘ tradition of hands-on learning, especially on cutting-edge topics like nanofabrication, optics, control, and robotics. Sounds like a pretty neat place. Here's a neat YouTube video that takes you inside the building. One thing that jumped out to me: while there are amazing labs of different sorts, there's still

Thanks to my mate Russell, I'm now the proud owner a a Pixar wall calendar that goes right along with my annual University of Illinois calendar.  I got in the office on Monday and I think these went up on Wednesday, so let's mark it as the sixth. Here's all the posts showing the epic wall calendar updates from last year . On the left is A Bug's Life art and on the right is a snow scene showing Green and Sixth Streets.  Here's a close-look of the title of the page below.  What is most interesting to me is that this 'place' is so foreign to me.  I've been gone 15 years (with mostly annual visits for Football games), but the amount of development that has taken place on Campus along Green Street is pretty amazing.

We were in the Toys r Us over the weekend trying to get our hands on some Shopkins when I saw a whole aisle of these white-boxed Pixar-branded toys.  If you know your Pixar movies, you'll know that there are guys from Nemo and Incredibles in this photo.  There were also the robots from Wall-E, Monsters from Monsters Inc and even some guys from Up and Bugs Life. What struck me as odd, however...is that these things are branded and packaged in all white packaging with just the Disney Pixar branding on them.  Further down the aisle, there were ToyStory toys like Buzz packaged up in Toy Story-ish boxes.  But...not these guys. Seems strange, right?

Each year the Library of Congress preserves films and footage for, I guess 'posterity's sake'. They've been doing it since 1989 and to date have 'saved' 425 films. This years list includes 'Toy Story' and 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High  among others. It's an interesting mix: "Baby Face" (1933) "The Buffalo Creek Flood: An Act of Man" (1975) "The Cameraman" (1928) Commandment Keeper Church, Beaufort, S.C., May 1940 (1940) "Cool Hand Luke" (1967) "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" (1982) "The French Connection" (1971) "Giant" (1956) "H2O" (1929) "Hands Up!" (1926) "Hoop Dreams" (1994) "House of Usher" (1960) "Imitation of Life" (1934) Jeffries-Johnson world championship fight (1910) "The Making of an American" (1920) "Miracle on 34th Street" (1947) "Mom and Dad" (1945) "The Music