Disneyween 2007 - Part 1- Oct 25, 2007-Leaving Town!
In case you’re just joining us, or your memory isn’t the sharpest, let’s start out by reviewing our cast!
Me: Your faithful trip reporter! This is my 9th trip to the World, all of which have been since 2000. Nerd, photographer, belly dancer, resort hopper, very poor speaker of very many languages.
Katie: Lives near Disney, and has thus made cameos in many trip reports over the years! Slowest text-messager you’ll ever meet (or not meet.) Not a botanist.
Sherice: Katie’s friend from LA, who is joining us for the first few days of the trip!
Kellylou- if this was Monty Python, and she were a man, we would call her “Sir Not Appearing In This Trip Report!” If you read the pre-trip, you know Kelly was supposed to come, but had to cancel. She was very missed, so I’m leaving her in the cast, anyway! (Plus, I’ll probably refer to her now and then!)
Capt Jack, Stitch, and Crocky- small stuffed trip mascots
Felecia Von Focker Crocker- Small stuffed crocodile from the Team Focker Watch croc exchange thread. In other words, she gets passed from DISer to DISer, and I get to crocsit her for part of the trip!
It’s always hard to believe a trip is really here, but this one was especially odd because not only had I been planning it for nine entire months, but I also started a brand new job just a week before leaving, so I spent the week before my trip totally exhausted, and getting very little done! I could not WAIT for the 25th, when I would finally be on the road!
Since I’ve been having problems with my Eustachian tubes all year, I made sure to book a non-stop flight, in case my ears caused problems. This mean flying Southwest out of Kansas City, MO, instead of flying from Springfield, which is much closer to where I live!
Since my flight was just after noon on Oct 26, and it takes more than 4 hours to get to KC, I decided it would be a much better idea to take the 25th off as well, and drive up that day! Let me tell you guys, I am SO glad I did!
Working 8am-4:30pm makes it IMPOSSIBLE to schedule in a doctors appointment! So before I could hit the road on the 25th, I had TWO doctors to visit! Yeep!
My first stop was the ear doctor- again! You may remember that I got shots in my nose (OUCH!) several weeks ago, which are the first thing that have actually helped! If I wasn’t doing better, I was going to have to get a hole cut in my ear drum (again, OUCH!), but luckily I didn’t have to! I did, however, get another round of needles up the nose! (Say it with me now… ouch!)
My second doctor appointment is kind of funny if you know me. See, the thing is- I LOVE to fly. I love heights. I get giddy at takeoff.
But this trip, it was suggested that I pick up some Xanax. To fly with.
See, the whole ear thing? It seems that stress somehow makes it worse. So if I’m nervous about something, my ears are more likely to hurt than if I’m relaxed. And of course, wondering how my ears were going to react to flying when *driving* sometimes makes it where I can’t breathe was making me nervous. Thus, Xanax!
My regular doctor couldn’t get me in today until 3:30pm, though, and the walk-in clinic I used to go to on weekends has since closed! Luckily, I found another walk-in clinic near my ear doctor who could see me immediately! Score!!! It was kind of embarrassing to go in to a doctor I’ve never seen and ask for drugs, but I had a flight to catch, so I said goodbye to what was left of my pride, and before I knew it, I was picking up my two pills (two whole pills!) at the pharmacy on the way back home. Yay!
This is getting long for a pre-disney Day! But not half as long as the day FELT! I wanted to get going already!
A funny (but not at the time!) story about driving to Kansas City- - My mom had to drive there earlier in the month to fly to Vegas (lucky!), so I asked her to pay attention to the drive to see how hilly it is (My ears do NOT dig heels these days!). She came back and reported that it was totally flat. AWESOME!
Guess what? MY MOTHER IS INSANE! The drive was SUPER DUPER hilly! I had to stop for a break at least once an hour, despite continuously taking decongestant. NOT a fun drive! Eventually I started amusing myself by nagging her about her bad judgement- every time we went up/down a particularly hilly section, I’d ask “And just WHICH part of this drive is supposed to be flat, again?”
After what seemed like FOREVER, but was actually about 5 hours, we made it to Kansas City!!! At last!
Very blurry Capt Jack on the road!
I’ve mentioned that my mom loves slot machines, so as a result, we had a FREE hotel room at a casino waiting for us tonight! Nothing is better than free! But even better, I was thrilled to find out when we checked in that we had been upgraded to a suite-- SCORE!
My mom was off to the slot machines about thirty-five seconds after dropping off her suitcases, but I just wanted to *relax*! Also, I was starving, but way too tired and road-weary to go down to one of the restaurants, so instead, I hit the vending machines:
Mmmm, nutrition!
My eyes were bigger than my stomach, as usual, though, and I only ended up eating the Ruffles while watching the last 15 minutes of Grey’s Anatomy (Oooh, I need to catch up on it!), before falling asleep!
Tomorrow, we get to the good part!