So What the Hell Happened to WG?

Dude, what’s up with that? She goes off on vacation, comes back, posts ONLY ABOUT THE BAD STUFF and then doesn’t say a word.

Yeah, sorry about that. I came home, wrote that letter, and then got good and sick. I’ll spare you the details, but did you know that if you stop eating for a week you lose a whole bunch of weight? Of course, your digestive system also shuts down completely, so that when you do begin eating again, it all just kind of… sits there. Waiting. And making you worry.

Anyway.

So! Disney! We totally rocked the World, dudes. The girls were fantastically excited when we told them, and I had put a somewhat ridiculous amount of time into planning our precise itinerary so as to minimize waiting and maximize fun, and it was pretty cool.

Here we go….

Wednesday, we arrived in Orlando and had the pleasure of seeing the man waiting with a card with our name on it. He helped us with our bags and stopped off at the grocery store so that we could pick up some stuff before we hit the hotel. So when we arrived, we were properly supplied with water bottles and other essentials, like tortilla chips and salsa. And Fig Newtons.

We had connecting rooms, and you already know about the hotel, so let’s move on to the afternoon swimming, which was lovely. And relaxing, and a WAY better idea that rushing to the park in the heat of the day. We had early dinner reservations – I thought a character dinner in our hotel would be a nice way to ease D. into the world of GIANT FREAKY OVERSIZE CHARACTERS, and that was pretty true.
Baby J. liked waving at Goofy, but when dawg got too close (see? See how I did that there?), Baby J. told him, “No!” Classic. D. was cool with it all, and so on the whole, the evening was not a total wash, although the food was CRAZY OVERPRICED. But we already talked about that.

So Thursday morning, we hit Animal Kingdom. We were at the park ahead of rope drop – did you know they actually do little ceremonies at each of the parks before they drop the ropes? Very cute. – and I used the extra time to go visit the Guest Relations window.

Thanks to my insane preparation and research, I knew to have D. with me, and I said to the man, “My son has some special needs.” I gestured towards D and was about to plunge into my presentation (I didn’t have charts and graphs, but it was pretty close) when the man held up his hand and said, “Say no more.” He filled out our Guest Assistance Card and gave me a stroller as wheelchair tag, and the whole thing took under three minutes.

Now, a normal person would probably have been relieved. Well! That was MUCH easier than anticipated. I, however, spent the whole week looking closely at D. and trying to figure out if his needs are so visible that they could be assessed instantly.

But anyway. We got in the park, rented the double stroller, and Mr. WG took the kids over to Dinoland USA while I ran to get Fastpasses for the safari. We had walkie talkies with us, so we did the whole Jack Bauer thing: “Approaching Dinoland USA. What’s your 20?” “Three clicks from the giant dinosaur. I’ll send the visual to your screen.” Heh.


The kids had free run of Dinoland for a while; after we’d done a bunch of rides, we headed for the safari and walked right on with the Fastpasses. By 1 p.m. we’d done the vast majority of what the park had to offer, and it was hot, and we were tired. So we headed back to the hotel, the boys napped, and then we went swimming. That evening, Mr. WG took the girls to MGM to do a quick run on Star Tours and see Fantasia, and Friday morning, we hit the Magic Kingdom bright and early.



As soon as the ropes were dropped, we headed for Fantasyland and did about 6 rides with no waiting. That took an hour. From there, we headed to Toontown, then made our way to Adventureland. We had kosher lunch reservations for 11:30 – the park uses a different caterer from the hotel – so we got to the restaurant, only to find they had somehow messed up the reservation. They were very nice about it, though, and gave us a fastpass to anything we wanted to make up for it. So, I figured we’d use that for something that didn’t have a real fastpass, namely, the Tomorrowland Indy Speedway. Of course, we still had to eat, so we went to try the kosher counter service at Cosmic Rays and found it pretty good, if a little preservative-laden. Then we walked right on to the Speedway, andif you’ve ever stood in that line in the hot sun, you know how valuable that fastpass was. It was incredible! And not only because Z. insisted on driving alone and then found she was too weak to keep the gas pressed down and I spent the entire ride bumping her along from behind and terrified that someroad rage driver behind me would kill us all until a Cast Member hopped in and pressed the gas for her for the rest of the ride.

Heh.


We had fastpasses and rider swaps for Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain and we were still out of there by about 2, having done everything on our list, and even a few extras. But we couldn’t go back to the hotel yet, because we had to hit the central lost and found and retrieve Mr. WG’s lost cell phone. And then we for some reason went to Epcot and looked at a couple of things on the way to the boat that would take us back to the hotel. Eventually, we made it back, collapsed, and then got up to meet up with friends from home who brought us food and took Mr. WG shopping for more. He made it back sometime after candlelighting, if you ask me, but I don’t think God pays too much attention at hotels. Or something.

Thankfully, we did not have to get up early on Shabbat, and so we slept. And ate. And it was good.