Tink *~*~*
Cast Member
Posts: 1066
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 08-30-02 02:25 AM
Cast of characters: Erin, closing in on middle age,
stressed out Wall Street type from Long Island
Friday 03/15/2002
I wake up hearing what I initially think is music. It
sounds familiar but I just can't place it. It stops and I go back to sleep. I am awakened yet again, same music. I realize it is my pager. I have my pager set up to page me when someone leaves me a voice mail at work. It will page me between the hours of 8 am and 5 pm Monday through Friday.
I forgot to disable it when I left for Orlando. As I am busy trying to put a large deposit into the sleep bank, which had been severely overdrawn, the damned thing is ruining my life. I shut it down, but cannot get back to sleep. It is now 8:30 am. Oh well.
I make coffee. I ground my own and took it down with
me in my suitcase, Starbuck's Breakfast Blend. I hate the in-room pseudo coffee, and I don't care who thinks I am a snob for this. I sit and think an IV would be more efficient, but drink it and am grateful for it. I also make a mental note to pick up some sugar down at Downtown
Disney, but that is not in the schedule until Saturday, so I have to raid the in-room coffee packages for sugar.
I shower and discover that the blow dryer is not working. I take it off the wall and push the ON button, and it starts, but stops as soon as I take my finger off the button, making it impossible to style it with a brush. If I had a third hand, that would be helpful, but since I don't, I get it dry, pony tail it, pin the bangs to my head,
and bundle the whole thing under a baseball cap. I slather on sunscreen, and prepare to leave, gleefully sans-makeup. This ain't Wall Street and I don't have to be perfect. Thank God. I open the door, and housekeeping is there. I tell her about the blow dryer, and she says I have to call. I go back in and call, and they say they will fix it. Now I can leave.
I go to the convenience store and pick up breakfast, a
sticky cinnamon roll, apple, bottle of water. I sit by the lake and watch a mommy with her baby ducks. I talk to a guy who has a thick southern drawl. Everyone who hears that I am from NY remarks about 9-11. Profound
conversations ensue, between strangers who don't know
each other's names. I finish my breakfast, and head inside.
I pick up my MGM purchases from Panchitos and sit outside again to address and stamp my postcards. I return to the
lobby, post them, and then bring the CD back to my room. I head to the bus stop and my cell phone rings. Penny says that they are now leaving to catch a cab for the Animal Kingdom. Conveniently, an Animal Kingdom bus pulls up and I
board it.
First stop, the little shop right outside the park, where I purchase another pair of sunglasses and another string to hold them around my neck. Second time in 24 hours! I tighten up the little rubber things but good. I meet up with Penny, Hal and the girls at the stroller rental. I had no idea that strollers were $15 per day! No wonder
people drag strollers on the plane with them. The girls are 6 and 4 and fit side by side perfectly. By this time it is about 12:30 and no one wants lunch because we had breakfast so late, so we get ice cream instead. Penny informs me that she called around to a bunch of places
for Priority Seating and managed to snag Boma. I am
thrilled, as I've read that the food is beyond excellent, and we will get to see the Animal Kingdom Lodge too. We look at the map while we are devouring the ice cream (we got the chocolate covered things with the caramel), and
decide that we want to do the Safari, the Pangani trail and Kali River Rapids before the parade starts at 4PM.
There were TONS of animals out for our safari. The girls were in heaven, especially when the giraffes showed up. Our
driver kind of rushed through his spiel, and seemed sort of
disconnected from it. Pangani was awesome; the Cast Members were really informative and helpful. The kids loved getting the cards and identifying all the birds, and were especially pleased to meet "Timon" and his family! We
were a bit hungry by this time. Penny and the girls ducked into Tusker House, Hal went into a shop to buy a couple of shirts, and I took all our park passes over to Asia to score some fast passes for Kali. When I got back to Tusker House, Hal was just bringing the food to the table. I had the grilled chicken salad, which was delicious, but that big roll was just too much food for me, and I wanted to save
room for our Boma excursion in the evening. Refortified, we headed over to Asia.
Friends, we got absolutely soaked, and loved every minute of it! Downside, there was something absolutely disgusting in the bottom of one half of the "dry" bin in the center of the raft, and the other half was wet. Everyone in the boat crammed their sneakers in the wet side and hoped for the best. We were fortunate to get into a raft with some
friendly folks who were screamers like us, and we had
a blast. When we exited the ride, we pushed some of the buttons on the bridge to soak those who came after us. We found a bench and put our sneakers back on, then found some shade for the parade. The parade was WAY too loud, especially Minnie's float. Hal ended up taking one of the girls off in the distance, as she is highly sensitive to loud noises. (I have a vague memory of studying in pysiology last semester why it is that some people find loud sounds unbearable, but I cannot rightly recall it just
now...). After the parade, we shopped our way out of the park, and saw lots of people coming INTO the park, which was
supposed to be closing at 5PM. They were all wearing identification badges, and I wonder who they were and why they got to be in the park after 5PM???
Penny and I decided to shop a bit longer (I bought the
new Tink mug, and yup, I had it sent back to the hotel), and Hal took the girls back to the stroller place. When we met up with him, he was doing a survey, and the talking tree came by. The girls thought it was a hoot. We went to
the bus stop and waited. And waited. And waited. There were about 15 people waiting for an AKL bus along with us, but the only bus that wasn't there waiting for people to board it was the AKL bus! Finally, one of the other buses changed their sign and pulled up to us. I think this is what they mean when they say that if a CM sees something wrong, they are empowered to fix it for the guests.
We arrived in the lobby of the AKL and collapsed on a couch. The smell of all the wonderful food was awesome. We were totally thrashed, but still impressed by the theming and majesty of the lodge. Finally, I went toward the back to scope it out and saw the savanna out there. We
temporarily moved the party outside and the kids were once again gluttons for the animals. Again, the CMs that were
posted there were helpful and informative. Finally, we made our way to the bar above the restaurant, to wait for Penny's brother to meet us for dinner. We found another couch and parked it. We ordered Mt. Kilimaritas and boy did
they go down sweet! Finally, Glenn arrived and we checked in for our Priority Seating. Soon we were seated, and Michael, our server, started telling us about all the wonderful food there at the buffet. We totally pigged
out, most of us getting the nut encrusted salmon, the
sweet potatoes with cinnamon, the cous cous with some spicy red sauce and veggies, oh boy oh boy oh boy! If anyone is in doubt and has nver been to Boma, run do not walk the next time you are in the World.
After dinner, we toured the pool and some of the facilities, and Penny and I agreed that next time, we will book a couple of nights at AKL. It is so fabulously themed, and the food is so phenomenal, it would be well
worth the price.
At some point, we realized that I hadn't had a Magical
Moment all day. I know the pin still works, because when I touch it, it lights up. But I had no spontaneous Magical Moments today. Hmmmm, maybe I wore the thing out at Epcot last night? Maybe you only get so many Magical Moments per pin, and mine is spent?
Finally, we all loaded into Glenn's SUV and they drove
me back to CS. We said our good-byes - they are going back to California on Saturday and my conference starts on sunday.
When I got to my room, the card would not work. I kept dipping it into the slot, and kept coming up with the red light. Exasperated, I start back toward El Centro. The way back from Casitas 2 is convoluted, and I wind up in the Plaza elevator. When I get to the bottom there is a
courtesy phone. Thankfully, I dial the front desk. I
tell the woman my problem, and she puts me on hold for a few minutes. Finally , she comes back and says that someone will be by in 5 minutes and to wait outside the room. I go back up and sit on the concrete outside the
room, dog tired. Finally, a pleasant man approaches
and he has a new room key for me. He puts it in the door and it opens, and then he hands it to me. I ask him if my Park Hopper was transferred to the new key, and he says he doesn't know, so I should keep the old one...I'm thinking
I should go to the front desk and check it out, but I'm too tired. I thank him and go inside.
And then it hits me. No one asked me for ID. The woman on the phone from the front desk did not ask my name, and the guy who brought the new key didn't ask me for identification. I am floored by this. In every park, they check your bags, but no one asked me for ID for this key.
Hey maybe I can just go to any old room tomorrow. Maybe I can get me a room with a really good view, if I just call
up and say my key doesn't work...
Sleepy now, tomorrow's menu will include a trip to the
MK to see if they can change the batteries in some of my Tink watches, and a trip to Downtown Disney to get all those Amex and Disney Club discounts on presents for the folks back home. Also, a trip to the front desk to
speak to the hotel manager and bawl him out for the
stupidity that I've had to endure since I checked in yesterday.
Tink *~*~*
[Edited by Tink *~*~*]
Tink *~*~*
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