The Pez Museum

True to my word, last Friday I visited the Pez Museum, pinnacle of all that is Burlingame. The facade of the building was small and unassuming, and I wondered at first if I'd reached the right place. As I walked through the door I quickly found myself surrounded by a firing squad of pastel candies and oversized plastic heads. I had little chance to plan an escape before the door jingled traitorously, signaling a tall middle-aged man from the shadows. I would later come to wonder if he'd been lying in wait, like a child staking out the fireplace on Christmas Eve night with a nerf gun and toy cuffs in hand, giddy with anticipation, mind swimming with dreams of an everlasting fount of toys.

Before I could think better of it I found myself pressing several creased bills into the man's dry, faintly sugar dusted hand. He then motioned me to follow him to the back room. For some reason a part of my mind flashed to a special report I watched years ago on the 'trade' in Thailand, and I found myself eager to turn around -- but the frugal part of me won out. I had paid my way into this, and I was going to get my money's worth, even if that came in the form of a wrinkled, toothless old asian woman crowing sweet nothings into my ear.

The room ended up being uncomfortably small, but comfortably vacant. Rows and columns of disembodied heads perched on their plastic pedestals, their coarsely painted eyes staring knowingly into me from all directions. I felt for a moment on trial, brought before the accusing glares of a plastic jury for my crimes against candy. And instead of dispensing sugary treats, the necks of this jury would open up to spit out the ultimate judgement of my very soul.

The curator began his speech, a tale of Pez from its humble Austrian beginnings to its rise to confectionary empire. There were heads of all kinds. Cartoon heads, Star Wars heads, famous people heads.. it was all there, laid out in painstakingly organized detail. Several minutes of this passed, and then - as quick as it had begun - it was over. The man ushered me out of his sacred chamber and left me to ponder the pinnacle of Burlingame, California on my own.