29 Going on 79

I went to Long Beach for Jeff's birthday in January. I left Columbus and its below zero temperatures and arrived at LAX where it was sunny and 70! I won't bother to mention how old he turned, but it's obvious that age is simply a state of mind - he's got the heart and energy of someone in their early 30s! :o)

Both of us love to plan trips and vacations, but oddly enough we sort of played this one by ear. On Thursday we checked out the Getty Villa - one of my favorite places in California - because Jeff had never visited before. You can see pictures from a previous visit here. Jeff suggested we take the Pacific Coast Highway from Long Beach up to Malibu and it was an awesome drive! We had an ipod, one of my favorite mix cd's and plenty of time to kill. We saw lots of coastal vistas, homes of the rich, and funky little beach towns along the way. I of course neglected to bring car pills, so am even more excited to report that I didn't get sick on all of the winding, hilly portions of the PCH! As evening drew closer we headed south again and found a theater playing Slumdog Millionaire. I had already seen it but loved it so much I would still see it a third time! Jeff seemed to like it and the bathroom door had a great sign to add to my collection.

Friday was Jeff's actual birthday and he had planned for us to go to Disneyland since the 2009 promotion for all Disney parks is free admission on your birthday. I'm not a giant Disney fan so I wasn't sure how fun the day would be, but it turned out to be really great - even in the rain! It rained off and on for most of the day, but there were few lines and we enjoyed the homey comforts of Disney. A rainy amusement park isn't so bad when there are employees all over the place "sweeping" the puddles into storm drains. A place without puddles in the rain really is the happiest place on earth! We both laughed at our neglect to take a camera anywhere, so we stood in line to have our picture taken with Mickey so we could at least have proof of our activities! Our picture was with Steamboat Willie - perfect for me the historian! For the rest of my visit we were both grateful for cell phone cameras!

Jeff indulged me on Saturday and we went to Santee Alley to pick up a few bargains. While I bartered throughout the little stalls and alleys, Jeff patiently followed along in the rain. Afterwards we checked out the most bizarre museum I have ever visited - the Museum of Jurassic Technology. A tiny little museum with a primary collection focusing on earlier beliefs and scientific theories. We presumed we would be the first to enter the almost invisible entrance in Culver City at noon on Saturday - right when it opened. We parked the car a few minutes before 12 and arrived to find 6 or 8 more people standing in line, waiting to visit the museum!

The museum was devoid of natural lighting and all windows and skylights were blacked out. The only lighting was from inside some of the display cases and a few tiny pendant lights hanging here and there. I was a little creeped out immediately by the noises you could hear inside the galleries while we were waiting to "donate" the suggested $5 per person. As we entered, there was a glass case with the head of a fox bolted to the wall of the glass case and the sound of high-pitched barking. Two lenses were affixed to the front of the case and when you looked through them, there was a holograph of a man sitting in a chair and barking, projected onto the fox. No explanatory label was provided!

Moving into the next room I heard rhythmic chimes, like windchimes that a kid keeps playing with at regular intervals. Inside this space were photographs and pieces of manuscript from the writiings of Athanasius Kircher. Hanging from the ceiling was a brass wheel covered in bells that was rotating intermittently - thus the chimes I heard from the other room.

One of their current temporary exhibits discusses the evolution of trailer parks in California - starting after WWI and the household collection of a woman. Two other rooms had Mosaics made from the scales of butterfly wings viewed through microscopes and microminiature sculptures in the eyes of needles or on the cross sections of a human hair.

The weirdest and creepiest display comes from their permanent collection that interprets the beliefts that people once held that pertain to natural history. The a hand wrapped in hair demonstrates the belief that if bitten by a dog, the wound will heal faster if wrapped in the hair of the biting dog. I want to know whose job it is to collect the hair and if the dog is still living when said hair is harvested! Human teeth perched on top of fabricated plexi explains the belief that when a child's tooth falls out it should be burned to avoid being eaten by scavenging animals. Should a scavenging animal find the child's tooth and eat it, the hole in the child's mouth will be filled by a tooth not unlike that of the animal. Two dead mice on a piece of toast and a mouse pie next to that are explained by the writings of Pliny (a Roman who wrote in the time of Christ). To paraphrase, "Two dead mice, fur and all, served on toast will cure bedwetting, and mice served in pie will cure the stammer of a child." Across from that was a clay vessel and bristle brush used by women around the 16th Century. On New Year's Day it was considered good luck for the oldest woman of the household to sprinkle both the animals and the family members with her urine using the small brush.

After such an enlightening afternoon at the Museum of Jurassic Technology we headed to Santa Monica to pick up Jeff's birthday cake at Carvel Ice Cream. The tradition began when I visited Jeff and Pan for my birthday in 2007 and they arranged to get a "Fudgie The Whale" from a Carvel store nearby. They celebrated Pan's birthday in 2008 that way and now we celebrated Jeff's birthday that way! Not a bad tradition considering Fudgie The Whale is perhaps the most delicious ice cream cake you will ever try!!!

My plane took off bright and early on Sunday and I was disappointed to leave the pleasant temps of California - but so glad I parked in the covered lot at the airport since I would arrive home to several inches of snow and a pending snow and ice storm later in the week! I was glad to celebrate Jeff's birthday with him - it's a pain to live thousands of miles away but planes sure make the commute a bit easier. Especially when you fly Air Korea and have Direct TV available in every seat!!