NWOhioAngela
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jan 16, 2005
- Messages
- 1,071
Hi Everybody! We're back from our "priceless" trip a couple days now, so I guess its time to begin a TR. I'm been pretty nervous to start because so many of you are such great writers and I am no match, but here goes!
Background and Cast:
Me, 43. My first trip to the world was as a pre-teen with my parents. I don't remember much of it because it was Christmas and it was crazy. My parents had no clue. They just decided on Christmas day to throw us all in the car and drive from Ohio to Disneyworld. They had no hotel reservations, no plans.
It was a disaster! I went on a couple other trips including one with my kids and my former DH which was just magical. On my first trip with my current DH, I got sick and he ended up being pushed around in a wheelchair for a few days. It was bad, and I ended up being hospitalized when I got back home. BAD trip, and especially bad for my DH's first trip.
In an effort to make it up to my DH we went in January 2008 and had a great time. He felt like it was his first trip, since he wasnt watching me get sick all week. I was a little leary about planning this trip since the last was such a good one--I didn't want another bad trip to cloud a good one. Not to worry this was the best yet!
DH, 47. A total Disney convert thanks to yours truly. He's really a great travel companion. He lets me plan just about everything, which works for me, and pretty much follows the plan I set up. "Pretty much". That will come in to play later. Stay tuned. He never went to Disney as a child. He had a happy childhood, but vacations were out of the question. This family didn't even have an indoor toilet, until he was a junior in high school, okay?! Disney wasn't in the cards. He cries when we leave Disney. It's really a dream come true for him. He grew up watching Disney on Sunday nights and wondering what it was like and it really is a dream come true for him.
So what's up with the TR title
It has been one heck of a year for us. It started out great, but its kind of gone downhill. We had scheduled a trip for Sept 08 for free dining but thing got yucky and we cancelled.
On April 1st, DH called me at work to tell me that the store he worked at would be closing. I didn't think it was a very funny April Fools joke, but it turned out to be true. It wasn't a great paying job, but it really knocked the wind out of us. At least we had notice. We had a few months. Then we discovered that he would need surgery to repair a hernia. He saw a doctor and discovered not 1 but 2 that needed to be repaired. GREEEEAT! He is covered by insurance so no problem there. It was a pretty extreme case so we could not wait until his job ended, so he took medical leave to get this taken care of. He is fine now, but it was pretty extensive and the surgeon said it was the most difficult case he has ever seen. WOW.
That kind of shook us up.
The week before his surgery, I saw my doctor for a problem as well. Guess what! Turns out I needed a hernia repair as well (related to a previous surgery 4 years ago) How much luck can we have! Luckily I would be out of work for only 3 weeks vs the 8 weeks my hubby was down and out. Mine wasn't as emergent so I scheduled it after his 8 weeks was up, and at a very slow time for my work. His job ended at the end of August. We are both fine now.
So that slow time at work. It was just the beginning. We supply the automotive industry, and go figure, thing ain't so great for that kind of business these days. The week before I went out for medical leave my boss came to my office to inform me that the company is having trouble. As a cost-saving measure we were all getting a 10% paycut. GREEEEATT. Its supposed to be temporary. This was the end of July. We still havent gotten it back yet.
So 2008-we survived 2 surgeries, a job loss, and a 10% paycut. While I was recovering, I had an ephiphany of sorts. Life is short kids. Eat dessert first. Go to Disney. I checked my calendar and found I still had a week of vacation left. Work wouldn't pay me that out while I was on medical leave since I was pulling short-term disability at the same time. Kinda stupid if you ask me. Now they're going to have to pay me for my vacay time, AND pay somebody to cover me when I actually go on vacation. No wonder we're not doing so well
The only person who can really cover me is a college kid in my department. Usually when I go "on vacation" I end up working from vacation because there is no one else to do my stuff. I have kind of put my foot down on this because I'm working 10 hours a week more lately, for 10% less pay, and thats just not going to fly anymore. Anyway, College Kid had fall break and was available, so we scheduled our trip for October 16-21. We were bummed we were missing free dining, but excited to hit Food and Wine. Lots of pictures to follow. We booked at Pop and took the dining plan, but when a great code was released we bumped up to Caribbean Beach Resort and grabbed the deluxe dining. Was this a good plan? Would it be too much food? Would something else go wrong in our really crummy year? Stay tuned?!
Background and Cast:
Me, 43. My first trip to the world was as a pre-teen with my parents. I don't remember much of it because it was Christmas and it was crazy. My parents had no clue. They just decided on Christmas day to throw us all in the car and drive from Ohio to Disneyworld. They had no hotel reservations, no plans.
It was a disaster! I went on a couple other trips including one with my kids and my former DH which was just magical. On my first trip with my current DH, I got sick and he ended up being pushed around in a wheelchair for a few days. It was bad, and I ended up being hospitalized when I got back home. BAD trip, and especially bad for my DH's first trip.In an effort to make it up to my DH we went in January 2008 and had a great time. He felt like it was his first trip, since he wasnt watching me get sick all week. I was a little leary about planning this trip since the last was such a good one--I didn't want another bad trip to cloud a good one. Not to worry this was the best yet!
DH, 47. A total Disney convert thanks to yours truly. He's really a great travel companion. He lets me plan just about everything, which works for me, and pretty much follows the plan I set up. "Pretty much". That will come in to play later. Stay tuned. He never went to Disney as a child. He had a happy childhood, but vacations were out of the question. This family didn't even have an indoor toilet, until he was a junior in high school, okay?! Disney wasn't in the cards. He cries when we leave Disney. It's really a dream come true for him. He grew up watching Disney on Sunday nights and wondering what it was like and it really is a dream come true for him.
So what's up with the TR title
It has been one heck of a year for us. It started out great, but its kind of gone downhill. We had scheduled a trip for Sept 08 for free dining but thing got yucky and we cancelled.
On April 1st, DH called me at work to tell me that the store he worked at would be closing. I didn't think it was a very funny April Fools joke, but it turned out to be true. It wasn't a great paying job, but it really knocked the wind out of us. At least we had notice. We had a few months. Then we discovered that he would need surgery to repair a hernia. He saw a doctor and discovered not 1 but 2 that needed to be repaired. GREEEEAT! He is covered by insurance so no problem there. It was a pretty extreme case so we could not wait until his job ended, so he took medical leave to get this taken care of. He is fine now, but it was pretty extensive and the surgeon said it was the most difficult case he has ever seen. WOW.
That kind of shook us up.The week before his surgery, I saw my doctor for a problem as well. Guess what! Turns out I needed a hernia repair as well (related to a previous surgery 4 years ago) How much luck can we have! Luckily I would be out of work for only 3 weeks vs the 8 weeks my hubby was down and out. Mine wasn't as emergent so I scheduled it after his 8 weeks was up, and at a very slow time for my work. His job ended at the end of August. We are both fine now.
So that slow time at work. It was just the beginning. We supply the automotive industry, and go figure, thing ain't so great for that kind of business these days. The week before I went out for medical leave my boss came to my office to inform me that the company is having trouble. As a cost-saving measure we were all getting a 10% paycut. GREEEEATT. Its supposed to be temporary. This was the end of July. We still havent gotten it back yet.
So 2008-we survived 2 surgeries, a job loss, and a 10% paycut. While I was recovering, I had an ephiphany of sorts. Life is short kids. Eat dessert first. Go to Disney. I checked my calendar and found I still had a week of vacation left. Work wouldn't pay me that out while I was on medical leave since I was pulling short-term disability at the same time. Kinda stupid if you ask me. Now they're going to have to pay me for my vacay time, AND pay somebody to cover me when I actually go on vacation. No wonder we're not doing so well
The only person who can really cover me is a college kid in my department. Usually when I go "on vacation" I end up working from vacation because there is no one else to do my stuff. I have kind of put my foot down on this because I'm working 10 hours a week more lately, for 10% less pay, and thats just not going to fly anymore. Anyway, College Kid had fall break and was available, so we scheduled our trip for October 16-21. We were bummed we were missing free dining, but excited to hit Food and Wine. Lots of pictures to follow. We booked at Pop and took the dining plan, but when a great code was released we bumped up to Caribbean Beach Resort and grabbed the deluxe dining. Was this a good plan? Would it be too much food? Would something else go wrong in our really crummy year? Stay tuned?!
Score! We booked a standard room and that's exactly what we got. I was hoping for a little magic here, but no dice. They put us all the way back in Trinidad South, building 37. We got one of the rooms that has NOT been renovated yet, so no Nemo or Pirate theme, but it was in really good shape. Being all the way in Trinidad South didn't end up being a real problem since we had the rental car. We prefer a car to taking the Disney buses most of the time (cough, control freak cough) We did end up using them once during the week and it worked out just fine. There was a bus stop very close to our building so it was no big deal.
