...Fentons Ice Cream in Oakland, California

It was a lot of fun. Fentons has more than just ice cream, which I was surprised to discover. They also have hamburgers, hot dogs, fries, and things like that. There was a cardboard replica of Carl's house out front (complete with baloons) that you could have your picture taken by. There was also a spotlight pointed at the sky. Inside, it was crowded. At a certain point, they had to stop letting people in it was so full. I'm sure Fentons has never experienced that kind of traffic before! (Just a side note, Pixar visted Fentons a few months ago and gave them a Dug plush and a framed copy of the scene as a gift, complete with a placard from Pete Docter next to it.)

They also had a radio station visiting - STAR 101.3 FM (KKDV or something like that). They were playing music throughout the night and having raffle draws for winning prizes like Up DVDs and T-Shirts. (My ticket number didn't get called, though.) There was even a special one-night-only "Spirit of Adventure" sundae, which my friend ordered. After we ate our meal, we waited in line to meet some Pixar animators (as the /Film article says). We got there late, though, and only one guy was left drawing pictures for people. He identified himself as Albert Lozano, art director on Up. There was another female Pixar employee (in her 30s) sitting next to him, but I forgot her name. Albert drew requests for my friend and I; For me he drew Charles F. Muntz and Carl Fredricksen fighting with a sword and a cane, for my friend he drew Carl and Ellie sitting on their chairs together. But you know what's weird? Despite what his name card (on the table) said, and despite at least two confirmations of his name in his presence, I couldn't easily find his name on IMDb. The one or two results for that name aren't him, and his name isn't in the IMDb credits for this film. However, I did find this: [link]

Anyway, it's still cool, because he drew an AWESOME picture of Carl and Muntz. It's in the official secondary art style of the film, so I have no doubt that it's legit. While he was drawing it, I told him that I had also considered asking him to draw Russell's dad or Phyllis. (That would've been bad - it'd be shipping a illegitimate, unseen relationship in the film.) He hinted that Russell's unofficial last name is "Kim", because that's what they called his mom during production. (Who knows? Maybe the Art of Up book has her name in it.)

And of course, while I was there I took a number of pictures. Most of them are of the things I described in this post. I also scanned the drawing Albert did. (Let me know if you're curious to see any of this.) Man, am I lucky I live in the Bay Area! Fentons isn't too far from Pixar in Emeryville, either.