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Doo Dah Parade Moves East this Saturday
Arcadia Weekly Apr 30, 2010
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After 33 years in the Old Pasadena retail and entertainment district, the Doo Dah Parade will bring its notorious brand of wackiness across town on Saturday, May 1st, stepping off at 11:00am. The relocation to East Colorado Boulevard places the parade in an older, retro neighborhood reminiscent of its long-ago ‘Old Town’ roots. In fact, this year’s Grand Marshal is Corky Peterson, former proprietor of Chromo’s Tavern where the Doo Dah Parade was actually born. This year the ever-present element of surprise and hilarity will again run full throttle when inventive, if zany, art cars and floats accompany a legion of frolickers past the mom-n-pop shops along their shady tree-lined streets.
Comprising this year’s visual fare will be such wildly diverse entries as a fleet of motorized “Kinetic Pastry Science Mobile Muffins,” “Ocarina’s Winged Dancing Creatures,” a humungous robotic spitting cat named “Boo-Boo Kitty,” oddly-attired sound inventors known as “The Highland Park Thursday Evening Gentlemen’s Society Circuit Bending Marching Band & Ladies’ Auxiliary,” and the “Pasadena Zombies,” who execute a move-for-move true zombie send-up of Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Yes, another Doo Dah is here to help you forget your humdrum existence.
Known as the twisted sister of its counterpart Rose Parade, the Occasional Pasadena Doo Dah Parade begun as a grassroots event in 1978 to gain national attention for its eccentric and, often, irreverent satire. The parade which has spawned numerous off-beat replicants across the country was named by Readers Digest as “America’s Best Parade,” and was recently featured in the book 50 Places You Must Visit Before You Die!
Also featured among the 1,000 marchers at this year’s Doo Dah will be a REAL Doo Dah wedding, Dr. Steel’s Army of Toy Soldiers, Her Royal Highness Queen Erica Valentine, Captain McHogwash’s Amazing Chundra, Cheap Sax Addicted to Love, The Martini Kings & Swing-o-matic, Linoleum Bonaparte, the World Champion Whistling Diva, Goddess of Democracy, The Pink Slipped Pissed off Teachers, Friends and their Pissed-off Kids, Million Marijuana March, FireBrain, Evotrope, Clown Doctors from Outer Space, ArtStorm, Thwop!, What happened in Vegas Should Have Stayed, Gallery at the End of the World, Girls Who Draw Girls on Roller Skates, Yum Sauce Lounge, Classic and scary clowns, and such perennial favorites as the Men of Leisure, BBQ & Hibachi Marching Grill Team, the Bastard Sons of Lee Marvin, the immortal Doo Dah house band Snotty Scotty & the Hankies, and many more!
The 34th Occasional Pasadena Doo Dah Parade will take place this Saturday, May 1st on Colorado Boulevard (between Altadena and San Gabriel Boulevards) in East Pasadena. The parade starting point will be at the intersection of Nina St. and Vinedo St. It will then move South on Vinedo and west on Colorado before circling back up Vinedo. The parade, as always, is free-of-charge.
For more information go to: www.pasadenadoodahparade.info.
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