The flight to Orlando was normal and non eventful. It consisted of the standard Grammy and Grampy itinerary. Which means the second the plane is level I needed to break Grampy’s crossword puzzle book and pencil out. Also, answer questions like “What is a 5 letter word for ship from Valdez that ends in R?” and “Would you hold my crackers?” Then the pilot announced we would be arriving 20 minutes early and that it was partly sunny and 59 degrees in Orlando. Yeah, we had arrived and were early except we sat on the tarmac for 25 minutes waiting to unload. So much for the tail wind.
Jkay was like a 5 year old in a penny candy store. She literally skipped off the plane and was cheesing from ear to ear. We hopped on the express over to baggage claim and I told Jkay this was the 1st of many rides. She was thrilled.
Secretly, I was a tad nervous about the car service. My inner self was whispering “Don’t let them see you sweat” so when we started the descent down the escalator and my little eye spotted a huge sign saying “Welcome Grammy, Grampy, Jkay and R” I broke into a huge cheesy smile myself. I also raised the arms in victory and did a jig.
Now, I realize that Magical Express is free, and I am all about the free, but I just like having a car service and for someone else to do the driving. I am on vacation and don’t want to be Onstar, which is one of my many part time jobs IRL. So, I skipped over to Romeo and he was like “Where you been, the plane landed 40 minutes ago?” Yep, I know but they wouldn’t let us off. So we grabbed all the bags and ran outside to soak up the Florida rays, which were the 1st of many days that I thought, its freaking cold.
Grampy got to ride shotgun, because he called it. No lie, we are all 12 deep down. Romeo was very social and we had lots of conversation. He did tell us that we had chosen a great time and that the week before had been crazy with Pop Warner and we would have hated All Stars. Since I wasn’t there, I can’t comment, but we heard this a lot from CM’s after our arrival. Before we knew it we had passed through the gates welcoming us and pulled up to our home away from home for the next 9 days, All Star Sports. Romeo promised to pick us up the following Sunday at 9:30 and told us to have a wonderful time.
We walked into the lobby to another giant score; there was 1 person in line. Jkay and I went over to check in and the guys walked out to the pool to collect the Florida sunshine. The CM got us all set up, what turned out to be a perfect spot, close but on the back side so it was quiet and serene. The rooms were even adjoining, which I hadn’t requested but turned out to be nice. We high tailed it over to the rooms, which BTW were fine & most importantly clean, and there was a towel animal waiting on the bed. Unpacked and moved the suitcases out of sight, slid them right under the beds.
The lobby of the ASSports
Grampy and my home away from home
R thought the day was complete and he was going to do this
He was very wrong. We had things to do and places to go. Get up. We are hitting the buses. Jkay has a list and we need to attack it. I have plans for the evening. We may be staying at ASSports but we are heading over to one of my favorite places, the Poly. We have ADR’s at 8:00 for Kona and a pressed pot is calling me right now. So we hop on the bus to the Magic Kingdom and hit the monorail to the Poly. Jkay can start crossing off because we rode on WDW transportation.
The Poly – I adore the Poly.
Grampy has grown very fond of the Poly. When you exit the monorail and the doors open to the hotel, you are hit with the smell. Everyone breathe in, now. Smell it. The most wonderful smell. The smile on my face was about 40 feet wide. Life is GOOD! I think we floated down the staircase to the tree. Picture taking opportunity
I scanned the lobby for the Christmas display. The one I had seen at least 39 times on the WDW Holiday special. No display! I was sad. A CM told me that the display wasn’t up this year but to be sure to let someone “higher up” to know we were disappointed. Noted and checked in the TR notebook, that was secure in my pocketbook and provided by another Disser,
YAK, from infamous goodie bags she had provided from the October trip.
It was only 6:30. I had overestimated the time we would need to land, transport, check in, unpack, and travel over to the Poly. I decided to see if I indeed had mad skillz and could get into Kona early. There were a ton of people upstairs, between the Kona and Ohana’s. I waited patiently and then with the sweetest of voices and the biggest smile asked if we could be seated early. The CM was as pleasant as can be and handed me the magic lighty up thingy and promised to see what she could do. We walked over to the bar outside of Ohana’s to order drinks and whalla woop, the lighty up thingy started lighting up before we even had a chance to order drinks.
Up next - How much can I cross off the list in one day and a surprise from the Poly beach!
I hope that one day, I too, will be the proud owner of an AP and a Minnie Mouse wallet to carry it in....
I am pretty sure that was just the voices in my head
and having a ton of unflatterring pictures with the mouth wide open and my eyes squinted shut. 
I failed photo posing 101
I'm sure I won't have to turn pages here.
