But my eyes are fixed upon the door, upon the door

Behind the counter where the hall used to have its kitchen and bar the (volunteer) staff had put machines for repair; I was fascinated with the repair operations, particularly the whiteboards with the urgency of various repairs listed --- machines that needed something now, versus, things like a power strip shared by a couple machines taking out a set of machines when one of them had a glitch --- and whether they were being worked on, being diagnosed, being held for overnight or after the weekend. The logistics of that were just compelling.

They were also selling pinball component parts --- lights, plungers, even select backglasses --- and I bought four pinballs, the actual silver balls, the first ones I've owned. For that matter, they're the first ones I've held for more than a minute or so while watching someone repairing a machine. bunny_hugger asked why I'd gotten four of them, when surely one would do to have a trophy ball. Obviously, it's because you need at least four balls to define the span of a three-dimensional space. And I'm hoping to plant a couple in the yard and see if a FunHouse will grow.

On the way out we took one of the posters they were giving away, advertising the museum, and that weekend particularly. This turned out to be a trophy: it was apparently given away only to the people who attended opening day. It's got miniature representations of the backglasses for a couple dozen machines, showing off some of the better artwork and games. bunny_hugger got a frame for it and mounted it. The idea floating about is to hang it in the breakfast nook, beside the pinball machine we grow.

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And some miscellaneous pinball pictures that bunny_hugger took:

• Dragonette made reference to the popular radio show, and I guess possibly the Stan Freberg parody. We played a lot of these 50s woodrail games; they had many of them, in quite good order.
• Freefall is there for you fans of bird-women.
• Queen of Hearts, an older woodrail game, gets played by some ageing hipster.
• Time Machine was the game that could have gotten bunny_hugger into pinball, back in college had things happened a little differently.
• This is what the place looked like overall. In the right corner you can see a box of backglass art for sale.

Trivia: About six thousand men assembled into a rebel army by the first of August, 1794, at Braddock's Field near Pittsburgh; by the third, the Whisky Rebellion army had dispersed. Source: America's Wars, Alan Axelrod.

Currently Reading: Pedestrianism: When Watching People Walk Was America's Favorite Spectator Sport, Matthew Algeo.

PS: Looking At Things Four-Dimensionally, on the mathematics blog: help in visualizing what can often be a challenge.