3400 mile trek, Capt. Kirk & 007 Jaws, Pinball HOF, atomic museum and crackhouse raid

FullThrottle

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3400 mile trek, Capt. Kirk & 007 Jaws, Pinball HOF, atomic museum and crackhouse raid

Guys and gals, I just got back from a very crazy and fun filled 3432 mile roadtrip and thought I'd share my adventures. Capt. Kirk & 007 Jaws, Pinball HOF, atomic museum and crackhouse raid doesn't even cover half of the story.

I'll break the posting into days and places as to have a little seperation between visits and where I was and what I did...

I had agreed last year to move a cabinet from California for a fellow klover, I had no clue I be phasing down on the hobby and not able to make the trip to the CAX arcade game show. I needed another excuse quick to make a drive down to pickup a game for someone else and somehow turn it into a vacation with the time and money spent to make it happen.

I started out on a Thursday last week for a banzai run down to Las Vegas to meet William Shatner and have him sign my Star Trek pinball machine next to where I currently have Leonard Nimoy's John Handcock on my backglass!

The first night I didn't LEAVE until 5pm and was pissed I was departing my house 8 hours past when I wanted to!! I had to pull an all nighter and drove 800 miles into Placerville for my first stop and to drop off a cabinet I brought down for Arcade Junkie... I took a nap in his driveway before he woke up and came outside... Funny as hell, I had driven down there and stopped at the wrong house a few down from ArcadeJunkies! So here I knock on the wrong door at 7am and can see that a VERY VERY FAT GUY IN HIS UNDERWEAR is trying to remain still on the other side of the window as I knock away! AHH!!! Wrong house I got a fat naked guy not ArcadeJunky!!!!
 
Second morning after about a half hour nap I was awakened by Arcade Junky and we unloaded his cabinet and took off for some breakfast. It was a quickie stop and I was on the road again heading from Placerville, CA to Las Vegas Friday morning. I blew through a town called KYBURZ which made me laugh out loud the sign as you come through this little tiny town!
 

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So I continue through the Sierra Nevada mountains and get to Carson City, then turn South towards sin city... I decide to take a nap a few hours down the road and end up sleeping all afternoon in the truck until 10pm at night still 7 hours from Las Vegas and I need to be there in the morning, DOH!!!

So I hit the pedal to the metal! Its the middle of the night, empty load in my truck, I'm hauling ass 105mph in the desert for what seems like hours!! WHAM!!! I hit a damn bunny rabbit going 100+mph!!! I saw it but remembered what happened last time I made an emergency maneuver at 100 so I just floated right over the top of the poor guy, WHAM!!! THUD CLUNK CLUCK! After that ass puckering experience I slowed down to a more reasonable 85mph or so...

Decided to stop out in the middle of the desert with not a light or a car to be seen for dozens of miles! I turned off all the lights on my truck and layed in the bed gazing at the stars and Milky Way as it was amazingly beautiful with no light pollution and very clean and crisp warm sky! This was an awe inspiring moment as I could see so deep into the galaxy! I spent about 20 minutes watching the meteorites come down every few minutes and the hazy blue fog up in outer space.

I make it to Las Vegas at about 3AM knocking almost 3 hours off my drive time during that night's drive!! I decide that I had better scope out this Star Trek convention and figure out where I need to be in the morning.

I stumbled on these cool Star Trek slot machines just outside of the Star Trek convention area!!!
 

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So I didn't actually get many / if any pictures of the Star Trek convention! I was so busy and actually having fun that the moment slipped my mind!

I also was unable to get any pictures of KIRK / Shatner signing my pinball machine and arcade machine since pictures were not allowed. Here's some pictures of the ONLY pinball machine that Nimoy has signed and the ONLY PINBALL MACHINE SIGNED BY BOTH Captain Kirk AND Leonard Nimoy!!!

I had gotten the Nimoy signatures back in March when he was in Seattle... Getting the matching KIRK's on both my machines was priceless to me and well worth the drive and story!

I didn't want to pay the fee for the playfield plastic to be signed but I was able to sneak it into William Shatners presence and he took it from me and signed without questioning it!! :)
 

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For both the pinball machine and arcade parts I used a silver metallic paint pen. These things work wonderful and way more heavy duty, durable and thick than a standard sharpee!

Here's pictures of the only arcade cockpit control panel to be signed by both Leonard Nimoy and Kirk... Spock signed "Welcome Aboard Captain" on the arcade control panel and the conversion marquee... Kirk signed only his name and wouldn't personalize items!! :p
 

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Then I happened to stumble upon Richard Kiel, who played JAWS in the 007 Bond movies Spy who loved me & Moonraker. He was also the big giant guy in happy Gillmore who bends the golf club!

Mr. Jaws was a very nice and friendly guy! I loved the chance to sit down with him and hear stories of producing the Bond movies and the other work he's done through the years! He was very genuine and it was a pleasure to meet the man himself, shake his hand and then have him proceed to put me into a full headlock!

He signed a few pictures for me, the cartoon one of Jaws says "Die Mr. Bond - Las Vegas 2010" and the actual picture of Jaws says "Well, here's to us - Las Vegas 2010" which I had him put on there since that was his ONLY 4 words he ever said in both of the 007 movies he was in!!
 

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AHH, GOTTA GO AND START UNLOADING THE TRUCK, MY HELP IS HERE!

Tonight the story continues with the Pinball hall of fame museum, a persistant hooker who just wanted some damn beef jerky, atomic bombs, hoover damn and then a swoop to the Southern klov command center and the trip through Yosemite area to raid the crackhouse for a trip into the Sundance story of the year!
 
The Richard Kiel thing was so random I would've called BS if not for pictures. What a great story and trip!

Edit: George Takei does some of the Star Trek events. He's doing something in NY this weekend and he's been sitting in on the Howard Stern show. He seems like a great dude, you should try to get him to sign it as well.
 
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I'd love to get Sulu, Chekov and Uhura sometime to sign my arcade machine and pinball. I just need to find them and have it be somewhere on the West coast preferably Oregon or Washington at another geeky Trek convention.

You know Josie, it was an awesome trip... Just not sure I really want to post about it at this time or share anymore of my pictures. They'd say I'm full of crap anyways and couldn't identify a Star Trek convention if I was standing in the middle of it.

Kinda sad, I hadn't even gotten to the hooker I bartered with for $3 and some beef jerky and the Pinball HOF in Las Vegas, or the actual arcade related part of the trip!
 
I'll post the Pinball Hall of Fame Museum pictures since they are not controversial and I don't need to type out a huge explanation of whats going on...

I highly recommend anyone in the Las Vegas area to go checkout the Pinball HOF! It is a great mix of a little over 200 machines, mostly pinballs, with a nice warehouse type feeling at the new location.

I met Tim Arnold the curator... very interesting guy! He didn't seem very talkative, but was very helpful when I got a ball stuck and didn't want to shake the machine too hard. He was very busy running around trying to make repairs and keep up on emptying machines out of quarters.

I loved the CIRCUS prototype Williams pinball machine, nothing else quite like it!
 

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Here's the CIRCUS which is worth the trip by itself, another row of machines and a cool popcorn machine that I'd love to see something just like it in my gameroom!! :)
 

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The main purpose of the trip was to pickup machines for a klov brotha' who's in Afghanastan right now... I would not have gone if it hadn't been for his crazy spending and agreeing 8 months ahead of time I would move a machine for him. As the time got closer I cared less and less about video games and a long drive and really didn't need the stress or financial burden. BUT, I agreed and didn't want to bitch out on him so I found a reason to go and went.

I'm going to skip through all the rest of the crap and story and post the picture of Iron J's load of games, and conclude that I made it back in one piece.

I also wanted to give a shoutout to the Afghani klov brotha's, wish them my best and hope they all make it back safe and sound!! Thanks for standing up for freedom around the world!
 

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Here's the CIRCUS which is worth the trip by itself, another row of machines and a cool popcorn machine that I'd love to see something just like it in my gameroom!! :)

Yeah... I checked out the Pinball HOF a few weeks ago when I was in Vegas, and that Circus pin caught my eye as well. Then I read the story on it and realized why I had never seen one. I was a little disappointed that it was $1 per play, but I still dropped a few bucks on it ;) .

DogP
 
Sarge didn't go, he stayed at home with my mother... He would have done Cali fine but Vegas was 110 degrees and thats just too much. I've never seen him half as excited as he was when I finally got home! He wouldn't leave me alone through the night.

Circus sucked that it was $1 to play, I tried it twice... Very sweet concept! I can't believe they spent all that money to prototype 2 of them but then never get around to building it, when the hardpart is done and its fun and playable!!
 
Yeah, but as the card said... that game cost $1000 more than a regular pinball, and only earned the same as the other pins (though it was compared to ST:TNG and some other good one). So, they were unlikely to sell many. But yes, it was very fun. When I first saw it, I thought it was a Dino Score ;) .

DogP
 
I gotta give Tim Arnold some more credit for all his efforts at putting together the PBHOF...

@ the PBHOF I played easily 30 different games. Every single one of them played absolutely great! Sure, I bet there are a few with problems... but it was actually like playing nice, new and shopped out machines instead of the crap you typically see on route! Flippers were strong, playfields rolled clean, all the targets worked like butter!

One thing I'd like to see would be more information other than the little printout/story on only some of the machines.

I will be going again whenever in or near Vegas and would recommend the same to anyone thats been thinking about PBHOF!
 
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