Thorvald Ripley:  

After high school, I moved to the Los Angeles area, specifically North Hollywood in the San Fernando Valley. It was three weeks after the first Northridge earthquake. They were still having a lot of little aftershocks for weeks. It's really not the same as living through a tornado. Going into the basement is NOT a good idea in an earthquake. I think that I survived about five major quakes in my years in LA. The second Northridge quake, the Long Beach quake(which was the only one that happened while I was at work), the Chino Hills quake, and a couple more east of LA. Add to that the dozens of quakes smaller than 5.5, and it made for adventurous living. It got to be that I could sleep through anything less than a 3.5. You never realize how fast you can react until the windows at work start shaking, and you're out the door before your feet even touch the ground! I do kind of miss them though. How else can you look a woman in the eyes and say, 'Did the earth move for you too?' The first place I lived at was in the North Hollywood area because Judi needed a roommate. She had moved to California with Janet, but they had had a falling out, and Janet moved out. The apartment building was on Corteen Place, and in the three weeks I lived there, they filmed either Emergency or Adam 12 on the street a couple of times. My old Maverick was on TV before I was. There was a Producer-Director for Universal Studio living in the same complex (because his wife got the Beverly Hills house in the divorce) and Judy & Janet used to baby sit his kids because he worked most weekends. We ended up moving to another apartment soon. After we had moved up to a place on Whitsett and Oxnard, the oldest boy used to show up with these AMAZING looking high school girls, and 'borrow' one of our bedrooms in order to help her with her 'homework'. Having a dad in show business DID have it's perks. It turned out that Walter Koenig lived around the corner, and I used to run into him a lot at the Dale's Jr. Market(a kind of 7-11). He wasn't that happy because he couldn't find TV work after Star Trek ended. By the time that the movies started, we had both moved out of the area. Judi seemed to love moving every time someone would tell her about a better place. And Disneyland. I went there seven times in the first two years that I lived in LA. Then I was there at least twice a year since. I've never been to Disney World yet though. Maybe someone can tell me, after standing in line for Star Tours for 1 1/2 hours with my niece and nephew, was it awful of me to get mad at another group trying to push their way in line in front of me? The whole line was usually a 2 1/2 hour wait. We would get to Disneyland pretty much just as they opened, and stayed until the park shut down. it was a LOT easier to do that after they got rid of the ticket books. Somewhere in my 'stuff' I have dozens of old Disneyland ticket books. Mostly A and B tickets. There is nothing like Disneyland after dark. The whole nature of the park changes when the sun goes down. mainly, it's because most of the little kids leave after the Main Street Electrical Parade. This is usually when we had supper, as it gets so quiet, and all the lights EVERYWHERE are magical. And the last hour the park is open is the best time to go on the big rides. We got so good at it, that we would get off one train of Big Thunder Mountain, and make it back through the entrance line and make the next train. Now Star Tours was never that easy, but you could get five,maybe six more turns on it in the last hour. I remember being at Disneyland the week that the first Iraq War started. Our group was walking by the Matterhorn when this huge roar filled the air, and a C-5A Galaxy rose up behind the mountain and flew overhead. The damn thing was so huge that it seemed to span the whole park. Christmas at Disneyland is another magical time of the year.They really dress up the Park, and the special shows are unforgettable. The first Christmas I was there, Cary Grant did The Christmas Story. Also, in the first few months that I was in LA, I decided to check out a hockey game, and I got hooked. I ended up actually having season tickets to the LA King's for many years. Most of the people at these games were either Mid-westerners or Canadians. I used to sit in the same section as Alan Thicke, and then Michael J. Fox, and that girl who played the Teatime Lady with Johnny Carson. Her boyfriend was a big hockey fan. I got to know a few of the players at the Forum Club. Mostly the players from the late 70's and early 80's teams. I was at the party that introduced Luc Robitaille to the fans. Several of us used to go to the clubs on Sunset. There was a Sizzlers across the street from the Great Western Forum, and we'd meet there a few times before a game. Mike and Allen would show up if they weren't busy at the studio. 1976 was a good year. We had moved to Redondo Beach, just six blocks from the Pacific Ocean. They opened this new comedy club (The Comedy And Magic Club) up the beach in Hermosa Beach, and Leonard Barr was the first main act. We had seen him in The Sting, and wanted so much to hear the end of his duck joke, so we went up there. It turned out that Jay Leno was his opening act, and he was really funny. So when he would come back to perform, we'd take our friends up to see him. He got so used to seeing Judi and I at the club, that he would come down and sit at our table until he had to go on. The entertainment in LA was so great. It was not just the people playing at the clubs on the Sunset Strip, but all the concerts all over town. We had the Greek Theater, The Universal Amphitheater, Irvine Meadows, etc. I was at Neil Diamond's Hot August Night concert in 1971 at the Greek. I sat in front of Barry Williams, who showed up in full makeup, from a Brady Bunch taping, and absolutely glowed. I sat behind Diana Ross at Neil Diamond's Love At The Greek concert. I went to the Eagle's 'Hell Freezes Over' Tour at Irvine Meadows on the second night. It was memorable mostly for the fact that these two guys RIGHT NEXT TO THE STAGE got into a fistfight five minutes before the concert started. They were unceremoniously escorted out of the facility. I saw so many great concerts living there; The 5th Dimension, the Carpenters, Chicago, John Denver, Three Dog Night, and so many more. I got to see Olivia Newton-John in her first American concert. She opened for the Smothers Brothers at the Greek. We went to Las Vegas in 1976 to see Neil Diamond open the Aladdin. It was 4th of July weekend, 1976..the Bicentennial. Our concert was on the night of the 3rd. While we were standing outside the Aladdin, waiting for a bus, it hit midnight and the WHOLE strip exploded in fireworks. Caesar's Palace was right across the street, and when their fireworks started, THOUSANDS of bats started pouring out of their sign. Vegas is fun, though. I like watching people gamble more than I actually like gambling. It's true what they say about 'little old ladies' and a bank of slot machines. And watching a bunch of Japanese business men play craps is a riot. They DO yell 'Bonzie' every time they throw. Later on, a woman I used to work with started a bus transportation service to Laughlin. For $60, you got transportation and a butt load of chits. There were tequila shots all during the ride, both ways. I was there one July when it hit 118 outside. Going between casinos was like getting a hot frying pan in the face. I worked with this one ex-Marine for several years, and we used to go to all the pro wrestling and Roller Games that came to the Great Western Forum. We both were absolutely amazed at the number of people who actually thought that it was real. It was funnier to watch the crowd than what was happening on the stage area. We would sit so close to the wrestling rink that we would go home wet from all the spit flying around. Before they had Comic Con, they used to have these monthly Comic Book And Sci Fi Conventions at the Shrine Auditorium by USC. They would promote all the new Sci Fi and Horror movies coming out soon. I got to meet the guy who played the Creeper in Jeepers Creepers, plus Justin Long and the girl who played his sister. When House of A Thousand Corpses came out, I was watching the people on stage and ended up standing next to Rob Zombie. He's a short guy. At another one of these in Pasadena, I ended up spending a half hour talking with Richard Lynch (America's bad guy). The very first James Bond Fan Convention was held near LAX. I was looking at some cards I bought, and I ended up next to 'Jaws' and 'Mr. Kid'. I seemed to always have an easy time talking with 'celebrities'. They can get a little tired of all these people who grab them and just can't stop gushing. Once, I was at a swap meet in Long Beach, and while talking to myself at one stall, I heard someone behind me laugh. Daryl Hannah had come up behind me. We ended up walking around and just talking for about forty-five minutes before she had to leave. Another time, I was at an Albertson's Market in Downey, and I ran into Karen Carpenter in the produce department. We ended up talking together for about twenty minutes until I had to leave for a Union meeting. It was devastating three months later when I heard that she had died. Once we took mom to a celebrity golf tournament , and Monty Hall was trying very hard to be pleasant to a group of 'old ladies' who were being very physical. So he comes up, puts his arm around my mom, and they go walking off to the next greens. We also got to meet Johnny Carson. It seems that my mom went to high school with him and his brothers in Nebraska. Judi used to work at an eye, ear, nose, and throat clinic in Los Angeles, and she would come home and talk about the people she took care of. Bonnie Raitt and Annette Funicello were two of her re...Expand for more