Ferris Wheels and... the Zipper.

So there's this Michael Jackson jury deliberation thing going on, right? Well, as I was stumbling around the Wikipedia last night in a 3am haze, I did come across a rather amusing find - a seemingly authentic map of Neverland Ranch.

We find first an image of Mr Jackson on the top left; apparently his handlers got a lucky Santa Maria artist to produce an acrylic-on-canvas rendering of Michael as a pajama-clad 7-year-old. Now I recall seeing some old tapes of the Jackson 5 back in the day. I've seen the Jackson 5 Saturday morning cartoon. (Or maybe it was the Brady Kids. Weren't they all supposed to be ghosts, and didn't they hang out with giant talking Chinese pandas?) Yet I don't recall Michael Jackson (the youth) resembling Webster with a Captain EO haircut.

But I guess everyone is entitled to their own idyllicized vision of their youth. For example, back when I was 8, I had a crush on Punky Brewster, so I fantasized that I was George Gaynes, just because those two had such a great rapport onscreen. I was a stupid kid.

Anyway, another thing that caught my eye was just the sheer diversity of attractions. How can he introduce some of these to these parents that are chaperoning their kids, with a straight face? "Want to head over to Club KISS? Or how about we mosey on over to the Red Bull Lounge? Okay, it's not so much a lounge per se, as it actually is a... tent. Um. (nervous giggling)"

And come on, he had to point out Swings (#33)? He was on a roll with the serpentariums and massage therapy centers. Kind of a letdown, if you ask me.

Lastly, I'd pay $10 to find out just what the lone bear (#46) is thinking right now. "Dammit, I'm the friggin state animal here. They put my ass on the state quarter. I'm friggin going extinct here. Of the hundreds of bears they had toss into this pit with a goddamn bunch of orangutans, they had my ass. If those lil bastards come a petting, I'll be biting chunks off them. FFS."