QUARANTINE BLOG # 381

April 15, 2021

Our third roller coaster ride, and the last one in this series that I have ridden, is the Great American Scream Machine at Six Flags Over Georgia.  

The 105-foot-tall ride reaches a top speed of 57 miles per hour.  When it opened on March 31, 1973, it was the tallest, longest and fastest roller coaster in the world, and riders were given a “Red Badge of Courage” button for riding the coaster.  In the spring of 1993, Great American Scream Machine ran backwards for its 20th anniversary.  The same thing would occur for its 45th anniversary in 2018.  The ride has been awarded a “Golden Ticket” by Amusement Today magazine, noting its place in the top 25 wooden roller coasters every year since 1998.  You rode it backwards, now turn around and face forward.

👉  Correction from QB 379, the Cyclone we rode 9 straight times was at Palisades Park, NJ, and not Coney Island (although they both have a ride with the same name, and I have ridden both).  The Bro, although traumatized by the experienced, is the authority on where the episode took place, so I yield the correction to him.

Palisades Amusement Park was located across the Hudson River from New York City.  It operated from 1898 until 1971, when it was sold for $12.5 million, and a high-rise luxury apartment complex was built on its site.  

There was a hole in the fence behind the amusement park’s music stage, which was used by local children to sneak into the park without paying admission.  Irving Rosenthal, one of the owners, knew about the hole, but did not repair it.  He allowed this “secret” entrance to remain and instructed security personnel to ignore anyone sneaking through it.  Palisades Amusement Park charged individual fees for each ride and attraction inside the park, and Rosenthal felt that children, who had little money to start with, would be more willing to spend their limited funds inside the park if they got in for free.  

DC comics ran ads for Palisades with appropriate coupons – I wonder how many valuable comic books we cut up to get the free rides when we were visiting in NJ.

👉  One more bit about Palisades Park, and we’ll need to drop a nickle in the jukebox for this one.  “Palisades Park” is a song written by Chuck Barris and recorded by Freddy Cannon.  One night Barris was in Manhattan when he looked toward the New Jersey Palisades Cliffs, on which the amusement park sat.  That was when inspiration hit.  The song incorporates amusement park sound effects, including the sounds of screaming riders on the roller coasters, an organ imitating a calliope, and a list of rides and attractions.

👉  Written by Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim, “Maria,” today’s girl’s name song, appeared in the Broadway musical West Side Story in 1961, but it began several years earlier.  Leonard Bernstein had written a musical tentatively called East Side Story in 1949.  Maria was the Jewish girl who captures the heart of Tony, a Catholic boy from Greenwich Village.  Bernstein had trouble drumming up interest in his musical and when Sondheim did a rewrite several years later Maria had become the sister of the Puerto Rican gang leader, Bernardo.  Sondheim felt that since Tony had just met Maria the song should not be about her, but about how her name sounds –  like the most beautiful word on Earth. Instead of singing about the girl, Tony sings, “the most beautiful sound I ever heard, all the beautiful sounds of the world in a single word.”

👉  In an ordinary year, this would be Tax Day, but alas this isn’t an ordinary year.  Tax Day has been pushed back to May 17.  But there are many other observations and celebrations for April 15.  Consider these:

“McDonald’s Day” – the day Ray Kroc opened his first franchise restaurant.  

“National Glazed Spiral Ham Day” – I prefer non-spiral, i.e., the old fashioned hunk of dead pig, baked for hours in an oven and sliced thick.

Make no mistake, today is also “National Rubber Eraser Day.”

Today is “World Art Day,” which gives us another opportunity for another girl’s name song, “Mona Lisa,” sung by Nat King Cole.

“Titanic Remembrance Day,” recalls April 15, 1912, when the great White Star passenger liner hit an iceberg on her maiden voyage and sank with the loss of more than 1,500 lives.

And today is “Jackie Robinson Day,” commemorating the day in 1947 when Robinson made his major league debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers, breaking baseball’s color line.

👉  Today’s close is “A Prayer for Hard Days” by Christina Fox.

“Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you” (James 4:8).

We all have hard days. Challenging days. Days that stretch us, sometimes beyond what we can bear. Sometimes these days appear as a series of little irritating events that build up to one terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. Other days we wake up to find one huge unexpected event that lands like a bomb in our life.

Hard days are opportunities for us to draw near to God. They are opportunities for us to rely on him, depend on him, and receive more of his grace. Such days remind us how desperate we are and how much we need our Savior.

A Prayer for Hard Days

Father in Heaven,

Help me! I am so weary and worn down by this day. So many things are happening all at once and I don’t know what to do. I am overwhelmed. It feels like I am standing in a fierce wind that is whipping and swirling around me. I can barely lift my eyes to you. It’s all I can do to cry out for help. 

Please extend your grace to me this day. Help me to see that you are in this and that you are with me. Help me to remember that you are not surprised or taken off guard by the events of this day.

Forgive me for my fears about this day. Forgive me for how I have complained and muttered about how hard this day has been. Forgive me for forgetting that you are with me. Forgive me for forgetting who I am in your Son, Jesus Christ. 

Father, hear my prayer. Grant me hope in the midst of this hard day. Help me to cling to your grace, your wisdom, and your strength.

Through Jesus and because of Jesus and in His name I pray, Amen.

-30-