One-Day-Late Bloomer : Jan. 2 Shapes Up as Perfect Time for Rose Parade

At the Tournament of Roses headquarters in Pasadena, the New Year began with phone calls from panicky parade fans.

“You told me it had been changed to the second” of January, they howled--and yet there was the parade, right there on TV, on January First .

“We had to calm them down,” spokeswoman Kristin Mabry said, “and tell them, ‘No, it’s a rerun of last year’s parade.’ ”

Confusion is understandable: Whenever New Year’s Day falls on a Sunday, the Rose Parade is deferred for a day.

But this year, only the calendar is off schedule. Everything else is ready to go. Or will be, at the stroke of 8 this morning, when one of the “white suiters” who orchestrate the event gives the signal and the Los Angeles Unified School District’s band steps out to start up the two-hour festival--the centennial edition of the Tournament of Roses.

As each year strives to top the previous superlatives, this “Celebration 100” parade, with 60 floats, 22 bands and 250 equestrians, is going for the bold, with a real waterfall (fueled by a stop at a fire hydrant), a 70-foot-high roller-skating giraffe, an actual float-top wedding and a Japanese high school band that excels at Sousa marches.

And even the weather, the one factor that precision-manic parade officials can’t control, looks cooperative.

The National Weather Service predicts Chamber of Commerce weather, with lows in the 40s and highs in the upper 60s. Forecaster Bill Hoffer said a sizable storm was expected, “but all at once it just picked up and took off.”

A few thousand people were happy to hear that: the hardy souls camped out overnight along the 5.5-mile parade route.

People began settling down with sleeping bags and picnic chests Sunday, after a few obligatory rounds of “tournament tango,” the trick of not being seen to alight in one place before noon, when Pasadena police allow campers to set up. “They say, ‘I’m not camping here, officer, I’m moving’--and they move about 2 feet,” said Pasadena Police Lt. Gregg Henderson. Over the two-day span, about 1,100 city police, California Highway Patrol officers and sheriff’s deputies are on patrol, and they made 28 arrests, all alcohol- or drug-related, as of 10 p.m. Sunday.

By afternoon, curb sides resembled sidewalk furniture sales with odd arrays of beach and dining room chairs, and campers lumbered through town like some conga line of RVs.

Bob Earley, 54, of Simi Valley, wove an electric extension cord through half a dozen lawn chairs. “If someone not in our group sits in them,” he said with mock sternness, “we’ll reinstate the California capital punishment law.”

One of his guests is Sandra Charry, 18, a Panamanian exchange student. “It’s a good way to start a new year--with flowers,” she said.

But Mark Vanderhoof, a local, shrugged. “If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all,” he said. “People don’t come here to see the parade. They come here to see other people.”

There was plenty to see:

Seven men studied the NFL playoffs on a color TV plugged into the cigarette lighter of a truck.

A family had spread bright artificial turf on its stretch of Colorado Boulevard next to a fire hydrant, before setting up their chairs. One family member watched warily until a middle-aged woman walking a black poodle had passed safely by the hydrant.

Below one section of the 109,000 sold-out grandstand seats, huge boxes holding promotional seat cushions were being scavenged by parade “sooners.” “Everybody said they’re free--I don’t know,” said one woman defensively, as she walked off with six in each hand.

By about 10 a.m., when the first band has followed that pink line down Colorado Boulevard to Victory Park, where floats will be displayed, the last float will just be rolling out of the staging area.

The “caboose” this time is South Pasadena’s float, the curious theme of which might send shudders through Southern Californians: “Celebrating the Big One.” It does not depict the long-dreaded epic quake. It is an unwieldy fish and a bewildered fisherman.

Times staff writer Howard Blume contributed to this report.

TOURNAMENT OF ROSES PARADE ROUTE Pasadena’s annual Tournament of Roses Parade, held on Jan. 2, draws hundreds of thousands of spectators. The two-hour parade begins at 8 a.m., followed by the Rose Bowl game at 2 p.m. The 5 1/2-mile parade route begins on South Orange Grove Boulevard, turning east on Colorado Boulevard and north on Sierra Madre Boulevard. It ends at Washington Boulevard, where post-parade viewing opens at 1:30 p.m. Monday. Grandstand seats can be reserved for the parade, but most viewers choose to claim a spot on the sidewalk. Police say those wishing to park within easy walking distance should arrive about 6:30 a.m.