Looking For The Black Cat (Christmas 2011)
A very impressive Walt Disney World, Orlando Christmas celebration activity is viewing a most impressive light and sound presentation in Hollywood Studios area called the Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights. The story is that the Osborne family decorated their home with lights, the display growing each year. Finally the display got so big, and the traffic driving by got so bad and the neighbors complained so much that Jennings Osborne, the patriarch of the family, donated the whole display to Walt Disney World.
At Disney World the display is shown on the Avenue of the Americas, a movie set of streets from New York, San Francisco and the imagination. The entire surface of each building is covered with lights, and the Osborne family pieces are added. But the lights don’t just look nice. They are coordinated with music, mostly some Christmas carols, but most dramatically with some pieces by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. The lights go on and off and form patterns in time to the music. And there is fake snow blowing down at times.
A little known aspect of this show is trying to find the black cat. (The black cat when viewed is actually purple). It seems that when the lights were shipped to the park, a Halloween decoration, a black cat, was included by error. The Disney people, sometimes known for adding hidden objects (like Mickey), decided to have some fun and include the black cat to the light presentation. Finding the black cat each year has become an interesting aspect of this light show.
