I used to write about Disney a lot when I worked at Travelocity. I enjoyed that for the most part, especially since I got to travel to the parks sometimes. I went to Disney World twice, Disneyland once, and Even Disneyland Paris on one surreal occasion.
Because of this relationship, Disney kept me on their mailing list even after I started freelancing. So I’m used to getting press releases, photos, and, every Christmas, a calendar in the mail from them.
None of this prepared me for this afternoon when I opened up a cardboard box about the size of a desk calendar, mailed from Orlando. (In April? Funny.) What was inside, though, wasn’t a calendar. It was a press release about a Toy Story-themed ride that will be opening soon at one of the parks….and a pair of disembodied Mr. Potato Head ears.
This really disturbed me. It looked like something the Mafia would do, or a serial-killer trophy. Why just the ears? Is there a deaf little Mr. Potato Head somewhere being tortured for my benefit? (“And if you don’t pay up, lady, we’ll stick his mouth on upside down!”) It doesn’t make sense and I want it to stop. I don’t want any trouble. I just want Mr. Potato Head to come home safely.
It’s the kind of story that’s too good to spoil with verification--or even attribution: It’s said that an interviewer once asked Mick Jagger what he’d do if the rock ‘n’ roll thing ever fizzled out. “Well,” he supposedly said, “I guess it would be pretty cool to be a travel writer.”
2 comments:
Nicole:
Back when I worked as an editor at The Business Journal in Milwaukee, somebody sent me a balloon bouquet with instructions to pop the yellow balloon.
I HATE popping balloons but I popped it anyway. A small piece of paper folded about a hundred times flew out of the balloon, hit the wall and ended up under my credenza. I had to get down on my hands and knees and hunt for it.
After finding it, getting back onto my feet, unfolding it and reading it, guess what I did with it when I discovered it was a press release?
Ooh, I bet it involved a loud noise. And a recycling bin.
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