"Play, Don..."



Here we are again. This makes four in this pretty, pretty town right, Senator? Yep, yep.

As is always the case with these things, I like to turn things over to Capitan Barbapoca.

He arrives at my place on the eve of the Journey.

"Capitan Barbapoca will be posting here for part of tomorrow night."


"Right now, he's on my balcony practicing his dueling form."



He takes notes as best as he can while operating his checkpoint. I lent him use of my phone this year so he could make notes and keep me updated.

But that's in a little while. Heatherlynn, lefthandedsnail, and I arriving at the strating line, Pan Pacific Park; to enjoy the atmosphere and check in with Lincoln. 



This is going to be a great night no matter what happens. Anna1 is here to document! Loki is a Staff Chaser! I love those guys! Over a hill comes my cousin EdwinMejia to document. That guy's great. 

My cousin brings news of my sisters Chaser strategy for this year. It goes like this: A little 8-years-old girl will appear in front of Runners throughout the night. Alone, and looking scared, she'll need help because she's lost her mom. This is when my sister will appear behind them like the Raptor that Muldoon didn't know was there. Hey, did you know that my sister got the Best Chaser trophy last year? It's true.

Groups of strangers meet and have the event explained to them. The crowd just keeps on getting bigger. Delicious.



This part's always great, and I tend to get giddy. I like flapping around listening to the different groups discuss strategy and size up the competition.

"Look at you guys!", I'll say to a group, "You guys are pals, right? Came in to this thing together. Look around at the rest of your group.

"Look at your pals," I'll say to one of them, "If you needed to, could you outrun them?". There's nothing nice about this, it does nothing but make them uncomfortable, but I find that I have to do this every year to at least one group.



One kid, with long, bushy hair sits back and looks at his friend. He says to me, Outrun him? No question.". His friend's eyes get big. Yup. That is what I do.

Lincoln's now gathered the Runners around himself, he's going to be releasing them soon so it's time to get Heatherlynn and lefthandedsnail to their respective checkpoints.

Also, the Captain's just made the scene:

"Barbapoca is here."
6:54 7/23

and is antsy to get to his checkpoint.


He's stationed at the La Brea Tar Pits this year. The Captain arrives around 7:30 P.M., I leave him with a tuna salad sandwich, a root beer, and,


"The scent of fresh tar is heavy here. I am ready for the Runners." approx. 8pm

Right.


Having nourished his body, the Captain turns to surveying his surroundings.

"The tar pit does not stop bubbling. Big percolations."t 8:15

A man walking past remarks that it makes a sound like a person splashing around in a swimming pool.


It's getting dark though, and left to himself, I suspect the Captain is starting to get impatient.


"That scent is inescapable. I sit and brood like a guy from Chile in his tent." 8:24

That's true though. Barbapoca has wandered the grounds for a while and the smell really is everywhere. It's in the trees, the grass, and the dirt. Me, I came here one Summer many years ago to meet a young lady. Wandered off the path and found a perfectly respectable looking patch of grass that hid fresh tar. That stuff bubbled up everywhere, man. Looking for safe ground just found me more fresh tar and wrecked a good pair of boots. Maaan.



"Someone called Medusa is hosting a screening of Jurassic Park at these same tar pits." 8:35
What?

The crowds of people with picnic lunches that have been walking in now make sense. And visible across the tar lake is a big, white, squared off bubble. This is the movie screen.


Good news:
"The first Runner now makes his was to me. I will practice my form." 8:36
Word has been sent from M.E. at the previous checkpoint. The first Runner has left her check point.

The Captain is excited of course:
"Where shall I wait for him? Perhaps this bridge that spans the tar pit." 8:38

That would be pretty great, breaking it off all Dougie Fairbanks style. Clashing steel on a bridge over a lake of bubbling tar would be fantastic. Great way to create a choke point too.


Still, he needs a place to set up.

"I do hesitate to approach the film audience." 8:46

"They do not need the sound of clashing steel to distract them." 8:46 Right.


(And that is doubtless where the Security are.) 8:47 Exactly.

Probably the best place would be is the clearing near the front of the park. Just because the Captain's made himself easy to find doesn't mean it will be any easier for the Runners.

It's coming on to 9, and he needs to set up.

Then:

"I see Chasers. I see Chasers! Yes I do." 8:55

Shadows with red armbands are starting to flash on the other side of the fence and High Drama has decided it is time to make her appearance.
"John Williams is providing the score; now I need for the duellists to arrive." 8:59

It's actually pretty great timing for this event. Jurassic Park is one of my favorite Spielber/Williams joint. Fantastic music like that booming in the park as a privateer captain duels strangers.


Soon , Anna1 and Edwin arrive. They're excited to see the goings on, we just need them to go on.
"Nine Bells and no Runners." 9:00

Ah!
"First Runner just left." text to McIntyre 9:15

The first Runner has just come and left. Not only has their manifest been signed, but they went off with a small prize.

Meeting Captain Barbapoca, Runners are told that they will now duel him. Victory for them, means that they leave with a prize. Victory for the Captain, no prize for the Runner. Either way, the manifest gets signed. That prize, is a handwritten certificate granting the Runner five minutes of immunity from all Runners.

After this first Runner, there will be no more updates from the Captain. That text, sent to the next checkpoint will be the last opportunity to send an update.

See the time:
"Tired? Yes. Took on easily 30 challengers in sword duels." 11:01

A few minutes after that one Runner left, came the first wave of Runners. Well, more it was one continuous wave.

Thirty might have been a conservative estimate of how many Runners appeared. Either way, nearly two hours were spent continuously dueling.

Leaping, yelling, parrying, and dodging. Almost all of it barefoot.

The Captain would pause only to explain the situation to the Runners.

For the most part, the duels were pretty straightforward. Rules explained, the Captain would make sure the Runner was ready and then either he or the Runner would win. First to three strikes made a victory. Sure, maybe once or twice the Captain boomeranged his sword at the Runner to make the last strike, maybe, sure.

One duel was memorable because there it almost went unseen. This was the great big parkour fella that Lincoln's father had picked to win that night. As soon as both duelists were ready, Barbapoca had time to almost finish getting in position. I mean fast. All left, right, left, right ya toothless. Then you say GAWDAMN he ruthless. The first one wasn't even felt until the third one had landed. The Captain was so impressed he gave the Runner an additional prize. Leftover from last year's Journey was the red bandit mask the Captain had worn while facing duelists outside of Chinatown.

"Take this.", said the Barbapoca, "If you are caught, and are Runner no more. Wear this, it is your new Chaser's ribbon.". He was very grateful for this, but ended up never needing to use it.

Most of the Runners traveled in groups. Strangely, they would wait until all in their group had dueled before lighting out for the next check point. Strange, but almost sensible enough when it was pairs or trios. There was a group of seven that would see their immunity tick down to nothing rather than leave as individuals. Very strange.

One or two were upset that they had to duel at all, what with their friends' immunity wasting away while waiting for the group to finish.

One woman accidentally figured out how to get out of dueling. She arranged her friends together for a group portrait while the Captain and one of her friends fought in the background.

"Come on, it'll be a great shot. We'll all be here in the foreground with the pirate in the background.".

Oh dear.

At this Barbapoca held up his hand to stop the duel.

"HALT.", he barked.

He turned to the group of pals, "Who was it says this of me? Who? Who says Pirate?"

Her friends edged away from her. The Captain held out his hand and asked for her manifest. This he signed, adding a frowny face next to it. There would be no duel for her, he explained.



Now:
"Will wait 5 more minutes for stragglers, and to catch breath." 11:02 P.M.


"Basta. No more are coming to challenge my steel. Let's see what happens at the finish line." 11:13




As fun as this is, like Lincoln, one of of my favorite parts always comes before. Testing out the route is great. I love this city so very much, and exploring it with a good friend is always great.

We have a good time being two-fourths of the Abbey Road cover at intersections as we inspect the check points and test out the route.

It's on our way to the first checkpoint that we find a horrible pink and black checkered building so terrible that I love it to bits. It's the sort of clean tile, and chrome mess that reminds me of the gaudier parts of the 80's. It's pretty gross.

It's a good night, early Summer. It's the perfect sort of thing for wandering around in the night with a good pal.

It's on our way from checkpoint two to three that we decide that if you need to explain in a hurry to a passing stranger that you might be nuts, a good word to repeat as loud as you can is, "SIR.". So for a while we go on saying, "Sir! Sir.". Feels good to make loud noises.

It's after we're walking tightrope-styles along a fence enclosing an empty lot that we come across two healthy young dudes trying to hail a cab. Lincoln might have mentioned these guys.

You could call them Bros, I suppose. You know the type, close cropped hair, expensive t-shirts, and a cloud of cologne as thick as their biceps. Yeah, and doing a terrible job of hailing a cab.

They seemed to wait for the cab to be perpendicular to them before putting up a hand and lightly wiggling it. That's no way to win a war. Of course we decide we should help them. We bound up to them, and honestly, they look terrified.

"Hey, fellas! Looks like you're having a rough time getting a cab.". This is of course when Lincoln and I start demonstrating a good technique. Me, I get my hand high up in the air as soon as I see one, then swinging my arm down to point at it. Either, way, it doesn't take long. This whole time, I start to notice that these two fellas that could've easily torn us to pieces if they'd had a mind to, are slowly backing away from us. They scramble into the cab and take off.

"SIR. SIR!".

It's as we're leaving the La Brea Tar Pits that we remark that the Park La Brea apartment towers are in the way. Pretty easy for a Runner or Chaser to get in to, but if security nabs them in there, and they will, that's a pretty easy way for them to meet the cops. We figure that it would be a good idea to make sure we tell them to stay out of there. This is remarkable because we end the evening by managing to get cited by the cops ourselves.

Did you know that city parks had closing times? I didn't. I can tell you this, it pays to be polite and friendly with police officers with police officers if one of them decides to handcuff you. Of course, that's a pretty good way to deal with anyone.