rsauer
Visitor to Every Disney Park but Shanghai
- Joined
- Jul 19, 2006
- Messages
- 79
PART I can be found at http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=3083494&page=3
PART II can be found at http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?p=47921601#post47921601
BURYING GRANDPA IN WALT DISNEY WORLD
PART III: The Final Resting Place
More for secrecy than mood we chose to do the deed in the evening during an event called "Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party." This activity during the Fall required a separate admission and those guests participating were allowed to stay in the park very late and go Trick or Treating for candy in various lands. Those who were day guests in the park were corralled by Disney employees with rope barricades and crucial bottleneck spots and creatively denied access to attractions in the deeper recesses of the Magic Kingdom. There were special shows and a nifty parade with catchy music and characters. We just had to wait for dark.
Like all the other guests to the party we arrived when the early October sun had not yet set. The park was glowing with oranges and yellows of autumn pumpkins and corn stalks illuminated by the setting sun. The rides offered relatively short wait times and we strolled from attraction to attraction leisurely carrying our two popcorn buckets; one with Buzz Lightyear had popcorn, the other had Pop. The security guards at the front gate paid no attention to either container.
I had crossed the park east to west and back a couple of times eyeing the flower beds in the center court of the hub, the point from which the other themed lands radiated. Here in front of the pale blue castle and just to the west of the Walt and Mickey bronze statue titled "Partners" Grandpa would find his resting place. As crowds were building in expectation of the evening parade, we thought it best to get a seat next to a garden spot while there was still room. We had just picked up a soda from a vendor and carrying our container briskly into the hub found pretty good seats.
Container? There was only one. The Buzz one. Where was the Aladdin bucket? All five quarts of blood rushed from my head into my shoes. I was faint, then fainter as I jumped up jerking my head back and forth looking for the container. Donna looked up in shock at my move, then noticed that she was carrying the soda and one container and I had nothing.
"Wh...whe...where is he? N...n..no where is it!?" she stuttered.
"Gotta be here.....I'll go back to where we were."
I spun around to sprint back west across the hub to the soda vendor but immediately ran headlong into the heaving breast of a towering figure in mauve. Startled, I stepped back and beheld Lady Tremayne, the wicked step-mother from the Cinderella story. She was one of the myriad Disney villains strolling the park and populating the parade on these evenings. Her hair was piled high and obscured the disk of the sun leaving its corona to blaze around her obscenely elongated head....like a cartoon figure of God. Only this God was female and Victorian and purple.
"Sorry, ma'am," I choked.
She said nothing at first, but simply raised her arm to reveal a gold and blue popcorn bucket. "Your popcorn," said a voice coming from somewhere inside the motionless Tremayne mask. Don't forget your...," she paused ever so briefly, "popcorn. It's not good to lose it....here." She paused again then waved her free arm at the crowd. "They don't want to lose their...popcorn....either."
With that comment I sheepishly fingered the handle of the bucket which immediately felt far too heavy for anyone to think it was simply popcorn. Lady Tremayne backed up and was quickly absorbed by the masses of people in the hub. And all of the people I saw seemed to be carrying popcorn buckets, all sorts of buckets. But many of them were gold and blue popcorn buckets. And their owners appeared to be looking for seats in anticipation of the parade.
Seats near flower beds.
So, as the street lights turned on in the October dusk with thousands of people milling in the center of this, the world's most visited tourist attraction, I lifted my popcorn bucket of Grandpa in one hand and held my wife's hand in the other and walked southward toward the exits of the Magic Kingdom.
And a couple of weeks later Grandma and Grandpa were united again on a closet shelf next to Christmas card boxes and photo albums and about a dozen Disney refillable mugs that we decided not to use again.
I like to think he would have liked this better after all.
PART II can be found at http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?p=47921601#post47921601
BURYING GRANDPA IN WALT DISNEY WORLD
PART III: The Final Resting Place
More for secrecy than mood we chose to do the deed in the evening during an event called "Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party." This activity during the Fall required a separate admission and those guests participating were allowed to stay in the park very late and go Trick or Treating for candy in various lands. Those who were day guests in the park were corralled by Disney employees with rope barricades and crucial bottleneck spots and creatively denied access to attractions in the deeper recesses of the Magic Kingdom. There were special shows and a nifty parade with catchy music and characters. We just had to wait for dark.
Like all the other guests to the party we arrived when the early October sun had not yet set. The park was glowing with oranges and yellows of autumn pumpkins and corn stalks illuminated by the setting sun. The rides offered relatively short wait times and we strolled from attraction to attraction leisurely carrying our two popcorn buckets; one with Buzz Lightyear had popcorn, the other had Pop. The security guards at the front gate paid no attention to either container.
I had crossed the park east to west and back a couple of times eyeing the flower beds in the center court of the hub, the point from which the other themed lands radiated. Here in front of the pale blue castle and just to the west of the Walt and Mickey bronze statue titled "Partners" Grandpa would find his resting place. As crowds were building in expectation of the evening parade, we thought it best to get a seat next to a garden spot while there was still room. We had just picked up a soda from a vendor and carrying our container briskly into the hub found pretty good seats.
Container? There was only one. The Buzz one. Where was the Aladdin bucket? All five quarts of blood rushed from my head into my shoes. I was faint, then fainter as I jumped up jerking my head back and forth looking for the container. Donna looked up in shock at my move, then noticed that she was carrying the soda and one container and I had nothing.
"Wh...whe...where is he? N...n..no where is it!?" she stuttered.
"Gotta be here.....I'll go back to where we were."
I spun around to sprint back west across the hub to the soda vendor but immediately ran headlong into the heaving breast of a towering figure in mauve. Startled, I stepped back and beheld Lady Tremayne, the wicked step-mother from the Cinderella story. She was one of the myriad Disney villains strolling the park and populating the parade on these evenings. Her hair was piled high and obscured the disk of the sun leaving its corona to blaze around her obscenely elongated head....like a cartoon figure of God. Only this God was female and Victorian and purple.
"Sorry, ma'am," I choked.
She said nothing at first, but simply raised her arm to reveal a gold and blue popcorn bucket. "Your popcorn," said a voice coming from somewhere inside the motionless Tremayne mask. Don't forget your...," she paused ever so briefly, "popcorn. It's not good to lose it....here." She paused again then waved her free arm at the crowd. "They don't want to lose their...popcorn....either."
With that comment I sheepishly fingered the handle of the bucket which immediately felt far too heavy for anyone to think it was simply popcorn. Lady Tremayne backed up and was quickly absorbed by the masses of people in the hub. And all of the people I saw seemed to be carrying popcorn buckets, all sorts of buckets. But many of them were gold and blue popcorn buckets. And their owners appeared to be looking for seats in anticipation of the parade.
Seats near flower beds.
So, as the street lights turned on in the October dusk with thousands of people milling in the center of this, the world's most visited tourist attraction, I lifted my popcorn bucket of Grandpa in one hand and held my wife's hand in the other and walked southward toward the exits of the Magic Kingdom.
And a couple of weeks later Grandma and Grandpa were united again on a closet shelf next to Christmas card boxes and photo albums and about a dozen Disney refillable mugs that we decided not to use again.
I like to think he would have liked this better after all.
