Or, as I call him, "Jungle Ned, the Shrunken Head." For the uninitiated, Shrunken Ned is a arcade element designed in the vein of the old fortune teller machines. But instead of fortunes, Shrunken Ned, the Jungle Witch Doctor, diagnoses you with an appropriate jungle ailment, mocks you, and then dispenses a prescription. I first discovered the joy of Ned when Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Eye opened in Adventureland. The first few months after Indy opened, the line for the attraction was so overwhelming that it stretched out into the hub and started down Main Street. Adventureland Cast Members had to act as crossing guards to keep from making the bottleneck that is Adventureland even worse than it usually is.
So there we were, standing in a long line snaking through Adventureland, eating Dole Whip purchased as we meandered by the Tiki Room, when my cousin, who'd ditched the line-standing for wandering, came up and told us we simply had to "see this." He led his sister and I into the Adventureland Bazaar, whipped out some quarters, and shoved them into Ned's slot. And then Ned started talking. He made us stand on one leg. He insulted us. And then he dispensed a prescription. Smitten, we insisted on bringing the rest of the family in to see Ned in shifts as we slowly progressed towards the Indy entrance (the attraction was excessively buggy in those days). I think we contributed $5.00 to the Disneyland coffers during that wait, just trying to see how many different cards Ned would pop out. All of this leads, of course, to one of the cards I still have. Please enjoy: a prescription from Shrunken Ned:
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