Some thoughts on Planet Hollywood

Do you remember when Planet Hollywood was the shit? Circa 1990-ish when you were 8 or 10 or14 or 15 and you were to young and naive to know better? Back in the day everyone was temporarily obsessed with Planet Hollywood and it was the goal to eat there. This was partly because they were not everywhere you had to eat there while on vacation in somewhere exotic like Orlando or if you had a local one you had to go all the way into “the city.”

For planet Hollywood’ brief reign it seemed like everyone was transfixed. It was a restaurant with a gift shop where for way too much money you could buy a fake letterman style jacket with leather sleeves, it had memorabilia on the walls, the place mats had pictures of celebrities in high school, and everyone said the captain crunch chicken was awesome. Of course you ordered said chicken and soon discovered that it was ok-ish it just tasted like tough chicken with cereal on it but hey whatever didn’t matter because you were at Planet Hollywood the most awesome coolest most exclusive totally worth the 2 hour wait restaurant ever!

Everyone remembers the main appeal was that it was owned by celebrities and supposedly they ate there all the time. Suddenly in the next booth would be sitting Arnold, and Bruce, and Sly!, and they would totally be eating the exact same Captain Crunch Chicken as you because it was like totally awesome, and they would totally give you autographs and take their picture with you because you were eating at their restaurant. This happened all the time supposedly, but of course it didn’t really. The only time they showed up was when they were opening a new restaurant and you had to wait hours.

Planet Hollywood flamed out fast as everyone knows. There are probably plenty of people who got their Harvard MBA by writing a thesis all about how Planet Hollywood collapsed because all of a sudden they expanded way too fast and were opening restaurants everywhere and there just wasn’t enough interest in Planet Hollywood Yuba City. The thing is this isn’t really what killed them.

What happened was one day circa 1992 or 93 everyone in the world pretty much simultaneously collectively decided that Planet Hollywood was lame and they were so embarrassed that they used to want to eat there. After all the chicken was tough and Captain Crunch doesn’t really taste that good on it. Also the placemats never changed. Everyone knows what Julia Roberts looked like in high school in Smyrna Georgia and we no longer care, because that Pretty Woman movie was like years ago, and sure the memorabilia was interesting but not worth waiting in line to see when you had seen it already and the last time the line you went the line was like 2 hours long. Also you were no longer 13 or 14 you were 16 now and into cooler things and cooler movies. Who wanted to see some lame action flick with a bunch of 80s stars like Arnold, and Bruce, and Sly, when you could see an artsy action flick with John Travolta and Uma Thurman.

Suddenly overnight the Goodwill store seemed to be filled with those Planet Hollywood jackets that people had originally paid 300 dollars for along with Planet Hollywood shot glasses, pins and t-shirts. Later pop culture would start taking potshots at Planet Hollywood. There is the episode of the Simpsons where the Retirement home gang wears Planet Hollywood jackets and in the deleted scenes of the movie About a Boy one of the characters wants to eat at Planet Hollywood in London because he is sure the actors eat there all the time.

It’s been years since I have even seen a Planet Hollywood. Are their any left? It’s not the whole concept of theme restaurants has vanished. Pier 39 has a Hard Rock café and it’s not very old. They also have a Bubba Gump Shrimp Co, and there is a Rainforest Café not too far away. Nor has the public’s thirst for waiting in line to eat mediocre food has vanished. There is always a line at the Cheesecake factory in Union Square even though there is now a cheesecake factory in pretty much every mall in America, Its an overpriced Denny’s but people just love to take a day off from their boring suburban existence go into the city wait in line for hours to eat something just ok and feel special. I am not mocking this by the way I was totally that suburban kid back in the day who couldn’t wait to experience Planet Hollywood the most awesome restaurant ever, and so were you probably, I say don’t mock your suburban experience embrace it!

Anyway it’s been at least 20 years since I last ate at Planet Hollywood and I am ready to try it again. Maybe the chicken really is good and anyway I forgot what Julia Roberts’ high school photo looks like. To those who think Planet Hollywood exemplifies all that is cheesy and bad about America I say that’s weak, bring Planet Hollywood back, even the suburban ones. I would much rather eat at a Planet Hollywood that a Hooters. Why can’t that chain just die already!

The Ghost In National Geographic Magazine

Is there a ghost in the February 1953 issue of National Geographic?

Everyone in my Grandparents’ generation followed one unspoken rule. Subscribe to National Geographic for over fifty years and never ever throw any of them out or dare to give them away. My Grandparents had every copy since the 1930s, the one exception was the 1964 copy featuring Disneyland. I “borrowed” that one as a kid and accidentally lost it somewhere down the line. Ironic since that is the copy I now still actually want.

Anyway my family inherited all of these magazines and we probably should have given them away ages ago but we didn’t. No one will take them and it seems like such a waste to recycle them when they have such cool pictures and Mad Men era ads. So they ended up in the Garage.

Last weekend we were try to clean out the Garage and sort stuff. Every other box or bin was filled with National Geographics. Acres and acres of ancient magazines all sharing that yellow border. You would think we would have thrown them away after moving a couple of times but the thing about National Geographics are they tend to suck you in. Who knows when I might want to read a 52 year old article about bird migration and I have to keep this because it features Sacramento in 1947 and I have totally been there, and Oh My God!, look at this ad is that the first copier ever?

For once my resolve didn’t crumble. The boxes with the magazines are heavy and it’s not like we ever read them so I decided to go through them and at least get rid of some. Of course getting rid means trying to sneak them in to the bags for Goodwill under stuff they want like clothes. I don’t know if this plan will work. I have a sneaking suspicion there is going to be a pile of yellow magazines left on our driveway featuring a note attached that says Do Not Want!, but oh well at least I tried.

Which brings me to the subject of the National Geographic Ghost. Last night I was having trouble getting to sleep so I grabbed a pile of National Geographics to look at. One of them was the February 1953 issue featuring an article about New Orleans. New Orleans has of course been in the news a lot because of the Anniversary of Katrina so I decided to see what it looked like back in good ole 1953. I was too tired to actually read the articles (does anyone ever actually read the whole article anyway?) so I was lazily flopping through the pictures.

That’s when I saw this.



Take a look at the guy eating a donut. At first glance it seems like there is just a cup of steamy coffee nearby but look closer.



Doesn’t that look like a face in the smoke or at least a nose and eye and part of a furrowed brow?

Also how come the mirror isn’t at all fogged up?

Look closer he doesn’t have a cup in his hand only a donut. The steam could be from that cup on the table but how come it’s the only one that steamy? The guy under him might have a cup that’s obscured by someone’s head but again how come only that one is steamy?

It also occurred to me that maybe the guy who’s hand is hidden was having a smoke because it was the 50’s and according to shows like Mad Men everyone smoked approximately 90 packs of day back then, but still wouldn’t it be a little bit rude to blow smoke in the face of guy who is just trying to mind his own beeswax and eat a donut all while being photographed for National Geographic? Also nobody else seems to be smoking in this picture.

Finally I thought it could simply be a photographic error like a double exposure or something, but isn’t working for National Geographic every professional photographers dream? I find it hard to believe an obvious mistake would slip through and end up in the magazine unless it somehow didn’t show up in the negatives because it was paranormal.

Or it could be photographic trickery but I don’t quite get what the motive for that would be. Plus they didn’t have Photoshop back then so trickery was a lot harder, and again I fail to see a motive since it wasn’t presented as a ghost just people drinking coffee. Also I did nothing to this picture other than scanning it and cropping it.

So is there an accidental ghost photo in the February 1953 issue of National Geographic? I am mostly a skeptic so I think it’s just a coincidence but still this picture intrigued me enough to post it here. Is it a ghost or just a coincidence? You decide.

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