The unbearable lightness of being random

Just random observations and happenings for you today:

• I think the grocery stores are employing some kind of aversion therapy (aside from rising prices... youch!). At the commissary the other day, every single time I reached for an item, I got shocked. Too bad it didn't stop me from buying the stuff... I guess the aversion therapy didn't work. Just annoyed the heck outta me.
  
• It was a crazy busy week of running back and forth and here and there last week. This week promises to be more of the same. Between baseball practices, Emily's play rehearsals, AWANA, and music lessons, there is always somewhere to be and go.
  
• Tonight we have the chance to see Trout Fishing in America here on base (FREE!). Just have to get Noah away from his baseball practice early enough.
• Major spring cleaning around here this past weekend. Brian and I worked on the garage together and it is SPIFFY. Our back porch/patio area is rockin', too. Still need to take a backhoe to the boys' room, but not sure how to get it in the house and up the stairs. I don't even want to think about a certain teenager's room.
  
• Trying to plan a major road trip back east (Missouri/Alabama) for June... experienced RVers tell us we won't be able to drive as many miles in a day as we would like to. They say no more than 3-400 miles a day. That will mean almost 6 days of driving each way with no time for sightseeing. :( Oh well, perhaps later on in the year we will be able to do a sightseeing kind of trip.
• Halle and I went to see Nim's Island yesterday. It was a pretty good movie. I'd like to read the book now and see how it compares. I have heard the movie was fairly true to it. Jodie Foster was fun to watch as an agoraphobic adventure novelist, and Gerard Butler was quite endearing as a widowed marine biologist raising his 11yo daughter (played by the always-adorable Abigail Breslin) on a remote island in the South Pacific.
• I wish someone would invent a dust-repellent I could spray over my entire house. I cannot get rid of the stuff. It is back 10 seconds after I wipe it away.

Time sure flies

Wow... we're over halfway done with the trip, and this is the first time when the spirit and flesh were willing to sit and post at the same time! Christmas Day was quite rainy here, but it didn't stop us from riding a bit at the Magic Kingdom.

The next day, we gave ourselves permission to sleep in and recover from the redeye flight of the previous morning. Once we were up and about, we headed for Animal Kingdom. Unfortunately, the new ride my thrill-seekers were hoping to ride (Expedition Everest) was having mechanical difficulties, so they didn't get to try it out. But we did all ride Dinosaur together and the 2 youngest and I were able to catch the new musical show about Finding Nemo. Because we got to the park rather late, the crowds were already picking up and making navigating difficult (not to mention making the lines longer), so we switched parks and went back to the Magic Kingdom again. We were meeting friends there for dinner later, anyway, so needed to go there eventually. After dinner, we rode rides together and then watched the 9pm fireworks show.

Wednesday morning saw us up bright and early and off to Epcot. We were able to meet up with our friends again and ride Soarin' and Test Track together. We did a bit more touring together until they had to leave for their dinner reservations. Here's a picture of us our friends took that day. Note the sweatshirts; we didn't need them too badly afer that day!



The crowds once again were getting thick and heavy by the afternoon and we left there to come back to the room for a bit. My feet were in agony and I was limping along pretty slowly; Brian threatened to get me a scooter for the next day. We wound up staying at the hotel for the rest of the night. I spent the better part of the evening in bed; Brian took the younger kids to the arcade, where they had a blast. They came back loaded down with whoopee cushions and stuffed animals.

Thursday was a much better day. My feet were feeling almost back to normal and walking was no longer a torturous procedure. We went to MGM-Studios and were there for the rope drop shortly before 8am. The crowds were very light. Brian and the big kids headed for the thrill rides (Tower of Terror and Rock 'n Roller Coaster) while I went to Muppetvision 3-D with Halle and Joel. There were about 30 people in the theater for our show. Afterwards, the 3 of us were able to reunite with our friends for a few more rides. Then we split up for a bit and met back at Prime Time Cafe for lunch. It was there that I learned that Emily lost her cell phone on the rollercoaster (never fear... a phone call to Lost and Found today revealed that it was recovered and we can pick it up at our convenience). Shortly after lunch, we decided to head back here for a rest and then off to Downtown Disney for dinner and shopping. While we were there, Emily discovered her room key/charge card was missing. Thankfully, all it took was a phone call to the front desk to get the card deactivated so that no one could make fraudulent charges to our account.

Today we were back at the Magic Kingdom. We got up early and went to the early opening for Disney hotel guests... 7am. Again, we split up; the little'uns and I went to Fantasyland and rode Snow White's Scary Adventures, Peter Pan's Flight, the carousel (twice), Dumbo, and saw Mickey's Philharmagic show. We had all that accomplished before the park opened to regular guests. We met up with the others and rode Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin and then went to Frontierland for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. After that, the boys and I went back to Mickey's Philharmagic, since Noah had never seen it. It was still a walk-on; other rides in other parts of the park were gathering long lines. After meeting up with Brian and the others again, we split up in the usual way. The kids and I rode a couple more rides and then were able to see a Captain Jack Sparrow impersonator, who did a really good job. Joel was conscripted into his service by taking an oath and received a nice little scroll souvenir. After this was over, we had some lunch and then met up with the others to watch the 12:30 parade. Then Halle and I came back to the room while the boys got haircuts at the barber shop on Main Street.

Tonight we are having dinner with friends at Chef Mickey's. We may head into the park again afterwards... or not. Tomorrow is Noah's and Emily's birthday (11 and 15). We'll probably be doing Animal Kingdom again in the morning. We have dinner reservations at Epcot at Le Cellier in the Canada pavilion, then a midnight fireworks cruise on Bay Lake. I'm guessing we'll try to rest up a bit between dinner and fireworks.

I'll try to get some pictures uploaded soon.