A week of Disney…
Just spent a week in Orlando with the family, hitting the sites. Pretty much did it all: Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Disney-MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom, and Universal Studios and Universal Islands of Adventure.
Got sick for the latter half of the trip, not sure exactly why, although I’m still getting better. I tend to always get a sinus thing when I’m in an air-conditioned setting for more than 3-4 days. Then again, there was also the whole repeating cycle of: you just got wet on a ride, you’re in an air conditioned line, you’re in the humidity and sun again. The good part was it was mainly just a sinus thing and I didn’t feel all that run-down, so it didn’t make the parks too bad, just a bit more somber and quiet as a result.
Today, I went to see a matinee movie and from not doing all that much, I did get pretty sweaty, so there’s definitely still something going on in my system. I’ve not started back up at the gym yet, but we’ll see about trying it one of these days.
The trip was good, but I think I’m getting too used to down time. The vacation didn’t have much. I had seniors waking up in time to nudge the roosters, infants crying for fake powdered chemical nourishment at all hours, 4 year-olds demanding attention, and trying to hit the parks around all of this. So not much sleep, no reading, no writing… I don’t think I have many of those vacations in me anymore. I like my quiet. I like reading before bed.
Taking nine people ranging from 7 months to 85 years to an amusement park is its own magic. I went in with no expectations, aside from eating a lot of veggie burgers, and that was a pretty good plan. The whole vacation was sort of a bonus, so I was just along for the ride. When the occasion presented itself to peel off of something boring (parade) and hit a ride (Haunted Mansion, which wasn’t much more exciting), I tried, but largely stuck with the group.
I tried to keep quiet when relatives said I should have been able to write four books by now, let alone not have finished one, or someone else passed off some South Beach cheese thing as “healthy” dessert. Of course, having gained weight as a vegan doesn’t help in that regard, if they lost weight eating their junk food, hehe. I mean, sure, I’d win a blood test, but we’re working on a superficial level here.
Of course, this vacation is unlikely to repeat ever, so no point dissecting it too much for what I would do differently in the future.
As I stated earlier, the point was mainly to see Disney through the eyes of the young kids in our party. My niece was a bit too young to go on anything, or know she was on a ride when she was. She did do well with at the character breakfast, though, taking great pictures with Mickey, Lilo and Stitch. My nephew on the other hand got shy and a bit freaked out around them. I think it’s partially because he’s the size of a five year old, but is only three and a half, so you have to keep adjusting for age, even when kids his size are doing the same things.
As expected, I was most intrigued with EPCOT, but bought no souvenirs there, using it primarily as a precursor to seeing proper all of the various countries on display. I’ll get my future Japanese trinkets in Japan, my French stuff in France, etc. My only purchase on the whole trip was a classic old-school Mickey ringer-T.
It was hard adjusting to time on vacation. I never got to the gym, because I would hear people say we needed to get ready to go soon. In the first half of the week, I would often be ready and then realize that “soon” for nine people is 90 minutes, enough time for me to have worked out for 45 minutes, come back, showered, and still not held things up. Once I realized the system, I was sinusy and not in the mood to work out.
But just the ability of getting nine family members on vacation in one suite together, and everyone is still talking afterward, that’s accomplishment enough.
