Ho Ho Ho And A Lesson In Physics

One of the gigs Image International had going was the decoration of Disney resorts and other public areas for Christmas. This project took a couple of weeks and was accomplished between 10:00pm and 6:30am during the latter days of November. Eddie and I never had to be on that crew - we were much more valuable in the shop during the day.

Then one year we also got the job of decorating Universal Studios, Florida. Eddie and I were essential to that project. For one thing, there was a plethora of new construction, including a 24' x 36' "ice" skating rink covered with a layer of Teflon sheets. We'll come back to that. The first monster project was the erection and decoration of the 45' tall tree. We had probably twenty guys, two snorkel lifts and two scissor lifts, miles if rope and a truckload of decorations. It took us about four hours to stand it up and secure it in an upright position. That done, while Otto and his decorators were hanging decorations, Eddie and I were taking the pile of extra branches and securing them to some of the sparse areas around the bottom. We drilled holes in the tree, jammed the branches into the holes, and knitted them in place with three inch screws. Then we arranged the huge plywood "gift" boxes around the base and screwed them together.

Next we helped Al to invent a Christmas tree lot in an alley of the New York City street scene part of the park. After that it was on to the skating rink. We assembled, legged up and leveled nine of our standard 8' x 12' deck frames and sheeted them with twenty seven sheets of 3/4" plywood. Then we assembled the railing around the perimeter and put down twelve sheets of 5' x 10' tongue-in-groove Teflon, tapped them together and put blocks around to keep them from separating. That done, Otto and the boys covered the edges with fake snow, while we went home for a few hours to shower and sleep a little before returning to the shop in the morning.

About an hour after sunrise there was an emergency call from Universal. The skating rink was all messed up! Somebody has to come fix it before the park opens! Eddie and I (of course) were sent out to assess the problem and deal with it. What we found was the Teflon, now bathed in sunshine, buckled at every seam. We removed the blocks around the edges to let the whole thing expand out to its new size, tapped it all back together again and reset the blocks. Problem solved - until sundown. Suddenly, there were two-inch gaps between the sheets of Teflon. We arrived with a crew of goofies and showed them how to tap it back together again for the evening "ice" shows.

From then on, for the duration of the season, there was a new detail that removed the blocks first thing in the morning, reset them after the expansion, pushed the Teflon back together after sundown and blocked it at the nightly size.

I don't know who ended up paying for all of that extra labor. What I do know is, we never set up that skating rink again.