Somewhere around Pier 39 in San Francisco is the Musée Mécanique, one of the world’s largest collections of antique coin-operated arcade machines. Within those machines lurks a veritable army of the most horrifying miniature creatures I have ever encountered.
I have previously written about my fear of clowns, which some might term “irrational” but which I know to be both well-grounded and justifiable (as a textbook ENTP, I don’t do irrational, dammit!)
Along those same lines, but to a less acute degree, is my fear of mechanized creatures.
Perhaps this stems from the scene in Blade Runner in which Harrison Ford searches through J. F. Sebastian’s menagerie of automatons and eventually finds Daryl Hannah, who kicks his ass.
Wandering through this arcade of horrors I felt very much like Ford/Deckard and wondered to myself “Which one of these is going to be the one to try to break my neck?” Will it be the terrifying “Laffing Sal”? Or maybe the entire team of miniature baseball players? I can see the headlines now: “Tourist Slain by Tiny Honus Wagner.”
I bravely documented my journey just so you can see what I’m talking about. Bone-chillingly freaky, right?
| www.flickr.com |
Let’s cleanse the palate with a relevant tune by the Dresden Dolls.
Comments
That museum used to be located on the other side of town, adjacent to the Cliff House restaurant. One day, Susie and I took a stroll through the museum. If that wasn't strange enough, we proceeded across the way to look at the camera obscura that projected the surroundings onto a large table inside a small building. The ticket taker was a rather bizarre-looking guy with long stringy hair and a wild look in his eyes. While we were looking at the projection of the seashore, the ticket taker started moaning ominously and threatening to commit suicide right there on the spot! We were the only people in there, and we hightailed it out ASAP. The outdoor area was also empty! WHAAAH! So we scurried off to the car and found someplace to have a beer. Whew!
Posted by: arrmac | April 4, 2008 4:28 PM
Nice blog! Holly recommended it. As you are a fan of Blade Runner, you might want to visit my site, as I am a huge admirer of the movie. I'm going to read through some of the other entries today.
Posted by: Mr. Nighttime | April 8, 2008 3:56 AM