3 reports + links to more- 8 days since May + conversations galore

[BillyFan]

Molly, I've been enjoying yiour report, but I've just been toon busy/lazy to reply!
Have fun with your guy tomorrow!

[bumbershoot]

Originally Posted by BillyFan

Molly, I've been enjoying yiour report, but I've just been toon busy/lazy to reply!
Have fun with your guy tomorrow!

Thank you! Maybe I'll be able to convince E to see your fave guys in Frontierland tomorrow.

Originally Posted by Sherry E

That is interesting to know the exact distances from the Tropicana vs. the PPH! I was trying to convince my out of town friends (IF they end up coming out here in the Fall) to stay off-site for a variety of reasons (even though I would be staying onsite!), and my Idaho friend was iffy about the idea because of distance. So now I have actual stats I can give her about how close the Trop is and how close the PPH is to support my point!!

So back to the PPH it is for you! Gee, Molly, you are becoming a seasoned on-site guest!! Pretty soon you will have stayed onsite more than off-site, despite best laid plans!

I remember that friend thing...I think.

Best laid plans, ayep. Oh well.

Speaking of plans I should get my list of "things to bring" going.

Originally Posted by kaoden39

And the CM's will be greeting you by name when they see you!!

Originally Posted by Sherry E

Those fries at TPG are good - so were the onion rings, for that matter. Generous portion sizes too! The TPG menu was a tad limited, but I think I recall a veggie burger on there somewhere. I know my BBQ chicken sandwich was very messy. And all the songs that play at TPG are aviation/space-related songs. I heard Elton John's "Rocket Man," David Bowie's "Space Oddity" and Steve Miller's "Fly Like an Eagle" while I was there. Gotta love the classics!!

I think we all really enjoy your reports here! I am just happy that you are getting to go to DLR so often to have something to report ON! But I think there is probably always something new or different to be discovered on the property somewhere; always more pictures to be taken.

I'm looking forward to that music!

I just can't believe how generous they're being...but they've always been like that, to all of their family members. Well, stepdad doesn't allow it, but SIL's parents LOVE it, and SIL's sister accepts it. We're a lucky group that's for sure, but really, they'd be wonderful people even if they were absolutely poor. We just adore them. And I seriously won the sister in law lottery.

[bumbershoot]

I do have some pictures....







Sherry, I finally really 100% noticed the sounds in the bushes in bug's land. And realized I've always heard them, it just didn't really occur to me that it was something to be noticed, if that makes any sense.




Love it:

Contortion-Bar Suspension
Tremble-Torque Transmission
Anti-Lochness Brakes
Energy-Efficient Scare Conditioner
Dual Cup Holders



I mean...ending with the cup holder thing...hilarious!



Jumping ahead a bit...

This is the back of the sign for the Animation Academy, taken while we were waiting to draw...oh, I'm not going to tell you, but it was the easiest one to draw so far! (then again we've taken a few of these classes, so maybe we're just getting better...hard to tell...though one of the CMs did call it an easier character to do)





The Academy was the only thing E and I did in that building (oh, we did show them the zoetrope). Brother and SIL sat in the main room, watching things on their iphones and/or blackberries.


These are pix taken from the Academy line-up.









I've just realized that since this was after TOT, going to the Animation building was indeed next, so I can talk about it.

I mentioned that SIL and I went on it first while brother and son hung out. Then SIL and brother went on it while E and I were supposed to go straight to the Animation building.

However, I was really really tired of carrying around two bags (yes, two bags), and I wanted to get some money so I could have some sort of autonomy or a chance at buying something for them. So E and I "ran" over to the lockers and ATM area. First went to the ATMs to try to get money...alas, no dice. Why? It's a long story involving a strong magnet in the front of my purse, cards that either don't work or have difficulty working, and two TWO banks that don't want to reissue cards for some bizarre reason, b/c they *sometimes* work...after this trip I'm demanding all new cards NOW b/c it's ridiculous. So they didn't work in the Chase ATMs with their particular slot... However, same card DID work in the slot for the lockers. So there, ATMs. I was very frustrated, and still wanted something to use as currency, so I went to Greetings from CA (all the while dodging people waiting for HSM3 to come by) and bought a giftcard. He had a harder time activating the giftcard than getting my card to work, which is really amazing, b/c my card gives me a very hard time!

So now, happy b/c I have, at least, Disney fundage, we went to the building. I strollered E in, and as he was getting out...he spilled crackers all over the floor. Drat! So I'm trying to pick them up while uncaring patrons practically walk over me (I exaggerate, but they didn't seem to care what I was doing on the floor), and I'm keeping E away (he was stressed that he'd just lost a bunch of crackers) and blah blah blah...I'm just standing up with brother and SIL join us.

That's when they sat down and we went off to our art lesson, having already determined that it was going to be....Jack Skellington!

OK, OK, until a few months ago I was a devout Nightmare Before Christmas disliker. Yeah yeah yeah. Recently I kept flipping through a showing of Titanic, too, and maybe someday I'll decide to watch that, as well (never saw it...neither has hubby...it was a big point of similarity that took us far in our early relationship). Never say never and all that.

But now I've seen the flick a few times, and most recently I saw it on a HUGE screen TV where I could really see more detail, and, whatever, I was excited about drawing him. But what was better was E's reaction. I think he did some fist pumps, along with a bunch of "YES"s and "oh yeah"s. He said that he would try to draw Jack, unlike during our May trip, when his pictures involved aliens and monsters surrounding the initial attempt of the circle or oval or whatever the characters started off with.

So we went on in!

For those who haven't been, it's an auditorium/amphitheater style room, or as I describe it, it's like a Biology classroom freshman year of college...with the rows of seats starting high in the room and coming on down.

There are cushioned seats, the room is warmly lit, and there's a stage in front with a big overhead projected screen up above the animator's area. Obviously Bio classes aren't that cushy.

They don't cram you in. Everyone gets a drawing board thing and a pencil, and they pass out papers. Then the animator (who has a helper, also a working animator) leads you through drawing a character's face. Right now they've been doing little ads for Up, which isn't a bad thing, but I'd prefer they just get to the drawing.

A view of seats, the boards, and E.





E did ask me to help him with, oh, perhaps somewhere between 1/4 and 1/3 of his picture. All I really needed to do was part of one side of the elements he had problems with, then he'd do the other side and fill in the rest... His aunt and uncle were very impressed (though they don't know that I helped), said that it was very scary, and even scarier than mine.

I don't have a pic of it, sorry! Maybe someday I'll get on that.


And on that note I have to end, b/c SIL is home and the rest of the evening must begin.

[Sherry E]

I think you said that last time E drew something involving monsters, aliens and Donald Duck, right?

Ahhh...so you finally 'noticed' the bug sounds from the foliage? I think because they are ambient noise-types of sounds, they almost blend into the surroundings and seem 'normal.' I know there are all kinds of sounds in other areas of DL (the dentist office sounds; the voodoo woman) that I have missed because I think they just blend in and I am not listening hard enough. The one ambient sound I always used to hear was the bear snoring in what used to be Bear Country. I liked that one and I like the various bug noises in A Bug's Land.

[QueenDoOver]

oh yeah Molly. Have fun! Tracey

[auntiegem]

Who knew when you started this TR that you'd have 2, 3, 4 . . . TRs in one?! I'm having fun following along. Please post even if you think it's repetitive -- I always glean new stuff (or just enjoy your adventures).

[BillyFan]

I do hope you get to see the Billys, Molly! Get there a half hour early, have a snack, put your feet up, cool off in the AC, and enjoy a bow in the nose! So fun!

[BillyFan]

Molly?

Are you there?

Did you decide to stay in DLR permanently?

[Sherry E]

Originally Posted by BillyFan

Molly?

Are you there?

Did you decide to stay in DLR permanently?

I was wondering the same thing! Maybe PPH has become your new home? Actually, if I recall, you were supposed to be at DLR on the day the Michael Jackson news broke, and I was wondering if there was any buzz about it in the parks or if you didn't find out until you got back to the room that night. I mean, the airwaves were so saturated with the news that day, ALL day, that I assumed people would catch on while in the parks and it would spread around fast.

[bumbershoot]

Originally Posted by BillyFan

Molly?

Are you there?

Did you decide to stay in DLR permanently?

Oh wouldn't that have been great? I just love being there. Actually, my new plan is for hubby to work his way into a Disney job at the building up off the highway, and I will snag a part time summer job on the canoes. Dang those people have some arms, and I already have naturally strong (well, right now they're just big with little strength, LOL) arms, so I'm one up on it.

Originally Posted by Sherry E

I was wondering the same thing! Maybe PPH has become your new home? Actually, if I recall, you were supposed to be at DLR on the day the Michael Jackson news broke, and I was wondering if there was any buzz about it in the parks or if you didn't find out until you got back to the room that night. I mean, the airwaves were so saturated with the news that day, ALL day, that I assumed people would catch on while in the parks and it would spread around fast.

Sigh. I just agreed 100% with you in the Eo thread...I found out shortly after we got to our room around 3 or 4. Left the parks, called from the esplanade, got room assignment. Got to PPH, called the front desk b/c the a/c was making horrid noises, waited around for engineering...they took too long so I jumped in the shower (giving DS specific instructions to say "just a minute, she'll be right out" if someone should knock), and of course they got there as I rinsed my hair... Got decent, they fixed the slightly open a/c cover that was rattling, they left, as we got ready to head back to the parks I put the TV on...and there it was. I burst into tears.

I did look around to see if there were any other sad people, or if there were whispers, but I heard nothing from anyone. But the next morning there was of course the full cover newspaper blaring it in front of everyone's door, so if you were staying onsite there was no escaping it. (OK I can think of a few ways that you'd miss the headline in the paper but for the most part I imagine most people couldn't escape finding out about it)


It was a REALLY good little trip, it felt like a very long trip while we were in it. I took scads of notes! I'm still trying to remember more of the earlier DCA day.

But our trip to SD is coming to a close...DS finally hit the wall yesterday, and we're traveling on SW vouchers so it was easy to find a flight out, and we're going home tomorrow. This is a nice, lazy day, but I'm sure that if I started to write it all up I'd get interrupted, so it might be a little bit before I get it all written out!

Questions are fine, of course, and I'll just put it out there that...no, still no Billys for us. Though I SAW a Billy, on Main Street, chatting with another CM.

[Sherry E]

I just saw the Eo thread and read your post!

I am still rattled by the Michael Jackson thing. And I wasn't even a diehard fan of the music (though I have realized I liked more songs than I thought I did), nor could I make up my mind definitively about whether or not I felt he was guilty of the things he was accused of. I do think he was very troubled, but to what degree I have never been certain, though certain things didn't look really good for him when details were coming out years ago. I guess my friends and I were so stunned the other day when we heard he had just collapsed and died because that MTV golden age of 24-hour videos was largely based on MJ. He was so much of the whole music culture of the '70s and '80s. Watching the "Thriller" video debut was a big event for us.

But you know what really gets to me every time I watch the coverage on any of the news channels now? They always juxtapose the old Jackson 5 footage with the more recent incarnation of Michael, and that makes me tremendously sad. Seeing that little boy in the Jackson 5, so bouncy and full of life, fresh-faced and seemingly having so much fun performing, and yet knowing the stories of what happened to him as a child, and then looking at what he became in his final years - it just depresses me to no end! Whether or not he did what he was accused of, it is a sad story with a terrible ending. Either way, it turned out badly. If he didn't do those things, it is still tragic that this person - probably the most famous person in the world for a time, with the whole world at his fingertips - ended up surrounded by what I feel were people who were not good for him, that enabled him, took advantage of him and encouraged him to stay out of touch with reality, and meanwhile he was clearly suffering inside. I hate to think of someone leaving the Earth in such a bad state of mind or with their lilfe in such disarray. The whole thing just bums me out!

I was not happy about Ed McMahon, either, because his life took a nosedive as well in the last few years. He broke his neck, he fell on hard financial times - just not the way you want to see someone go out, you know? .....And Farrah's story was just agonizing.

Anyway, on a much lighter note, I am glad to hear you guys had yet another successful DLR trip!! I hope the heat didn't get to you too much this time??

I can't wait for the next installment of the Trip Report - and to find out if you were able to fulfill your quest to find something different to do on this trip that you have not previously done!

[daisy_77]

Molly---

I am so glad you are back! I cannot wait to read alllll about it! I am glad you took notes.

[godalejunior]

Molly,

We have considered buying DVC and have gone at least as much as you have to DL if not more. One of the reasons I am hesitant is that if we wanted to use our points outside of Disney property it does not appear to be as beneficial from what I have learned. Do you mind sharing how you came to your decision to purchase? Thanks.

[bumbershoot]

Originally Posted by godalejunior

Molly,

We have considered buying DVC and have gone at least as much as you have to DL if not more. One of the reasons I am hesitant is that if we wanted to use our points outside of Disney property it does not appear to be as beneficial from what I have learned. Do you mind sharing how you came to your decision to purchase? Thanks.

It was a pretty heavily emotional purchase, but also one where we looked at what we had been spending on lodging, and what we would be spending on lodging in the future, both at DLR and at WDW once we finally get our feet wet there. We know we'll love it there, and know that once we start visiting my family out there (disney fans) we'll want to go often.

Once we added that up, knowing that despite blips where prices would be discounted, it was likely to go up up up for lodging.

We'd been introduced to DVC in Sept '07, when we got a giftcard for having a presentation during our first "package" stay. Well I knew about it from the dis, of course, but it was new to hubby. We've mulled it over since then, watched the price on it go up (and the incentives go down...our guide reminded us what the incentives were when we passed on it in '07, ouch!).

A big reason why we kept coming back to it is b/c our guide is such a softsell, but he gets into your head. He was absolutely 100% fine with us taking that time, about 1.5 years, b/c he knew he still planned to be there. We absolutely despise hard sells, we will walk away from a hard sell person, one who uses lies to get you to stay...we could have cash in hand and we will leave a situation like that, so his way of doing things, and really, most of the guides I've read about at DVC are like that, made us happy.

Some on the DVC pages will tell you that it only makes sense if you pay cash, and if you're already used to staying at deluxe places. Eh, for us, it was what we WANT to be used to. And frankly, some of the recent descriptions don't sound so deluxe, so I'm glad I'm not used to staying at the Poly, or even the Grand Cal, b/c it doesn't sound like all DVC lodging experiences are all that deluxe. But we know that and are fine with that.

We have family members with traditional timeshares, and by comparing and contrasting, we know that this is not your average timeshare. The relative flexibility, for one thing, is good. My mom tried over a year out to get a friend and I one room at a timeshare in Ireland through her RCI membership in the mid-90s, and was denied. Because she'd offered the lodging, she bought us a B&B package through Aer Lingus, and the RCI week went to waste that year. That does NOT sound like fun to me.

And the fact that DVC is now working with RCI just brings that memory right back up!

When we stay in other areas, we're camping, we're staying at more local places, so we can't imagine a time when we'd trade the points for a timeshare...it just doesn't appeal to us. Now, if I could remember the name of the timeshare condo place I stayed at in Myrtle Beach in '95 (my classmates and I rented it for graduation celebration from chiro school and I don't know how we came across it) I might change my mind for that place, but otherwise it just doesn't appeal.

So we bought it for Disney, and actually, mainly WDW...we know we'd want to stay onsite at WDW, while we're really happy anywhere at DLR, so I don't want to get in the habit of using points at Grand Cal Villas (it's what my guide calls it...I can't get into the GCV abbreviation LOL), instead saving those points for having family trips even though my family out there is local.

[bumbershoot]

Oh, another thing. If you mainly use the points inside Disney, and every so often trade out, I don't see anything horrible, financially, with that. If you wanted to buy in and almost always trade out, then that doesn't make sense, b/c you can get those other timeshares for so much cheaper (ebay, I've heard, is a big clearinghouse...and we actually almost used ebay to sell FIL's RV timeshare after he died). But the occasional trade? Can't see much wrong with that...