Lost and Found with the Sillies - updated 9/11

[HaleyB]

I was going to say something here but I changed my mind.

 

[PrincessV]

Oh my - The Sillies are back!!!

It's pretty self explanatory - you put your finger up the Hitchhiking Ghost's nose. This particular time was uniquely awesome, because we noted that a rider in the Doom Buggy following us also began Hitchhiking Ghost Nose Picking. And even more awesome, the same thing happened with the Doom Buggy after that. It was like we'd finally hit Hitchhiking Ghost Nose Picking Critical Mass.

Would you say, then, that the tipping point occurred with Buggy #2? In any case, this is a legacy to which I'd certainly like to add. I'll let you know how it goes next time we're there.

Disneymath can make your head spin a bit when first adjusting to the Disneyconomy. It take getting some accustomed to, kind of like getting used to the August heat in Orlando, but similarly, one never can really get totally comfortable with it.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but indeed, one CAN become accustomed to it! We live near The Mouse and in another part of Tourism Central, FL. I've been pricing out next summer's vacation to the Southwest US... and never batted an eyelash at the prices of food and lodging within Grand Canyon National Park. Upon seeing said prices, my friend who lives in a distinctly non-touristy locale, imploded.

We were getting kind of amazed at the lines at this point, since we were expecting crowds.

When was your trip? I was stunned by how low crowds were most days on our summer trip, late June/early July!

Dad: Okay, now it's time to go poopie.
Kid: No, I don't want to go poopie.
Dad: But we're in the bathroom now, so you should try to go. Please just a little poopie?
Kid: No, I don't have to go.
Dad: Maybe you could just push a little and try?
Kid: Okay, I'll push a little.
Me: (Muffled giggle as much as possible).
(small splash)
Dad: Okay, good job, but that's not very much, could you push some more.

Okay, that just made me laugh uproariously - at work!


It's good to see a Silly TR again guys!

 

[Mr. Silly]

Hi mmeb144, yeah the mega-drive eats a ton of time, and sort of eats into your brain after a while. Happily our car stereo reads MP3 data discs so we had 145 tracks on a disc, which helped some.

 

[Mr. Silly]

H. is getting ready to do a vacation with her parents soon, so we are trying to push forward a bit. I am hoping we can get through the tea before she is on vacation.

I conferred a bit with Sophie on the dampened shorts and more details emerged. While we were riding the monorail I completely accidentally and inadvertently splashed a tiny amount of water from a water bottle onto Sophie. It's hard to say how this could have happened, but for whatever reasons Sophie assumes it was a direct attack. She then responded by pouring water on me. I responded by explaining that she would regret water splashing on me as it could turn out badly, which she shrugged off. At this point I pored more water on myself to illustrate how badly such things could turn out, as well as teaching a valuable lesson on why children should not be mortified by our parents. Or at least that's the current version. Perhaps other things will be remembered later.

Picking up on the narrative, we drove back to the Parc Soleil to relax for a while. On the drive back we got lost. At this point any time we drive, you could just roll a die, and if it's a 5 of 6, assume we got lost. After eventually making our way back, we hung out, ate some lunch, and did something or other. It's hard to remember exactly since it was pretty much uninteresting. But the Parc Soleil is really nice, just FYI. While there, Sophie decided to put on a pair of Mom's crocs since she found them more comfortable than the Converse she had been wearing, I applied a bit of Gold Bond in prep., and we also ate some sort of food.

Eventually we decided to return, so we drove back to the park. Getting to the park was pretty easy, so we did not get lost. As we drive I noticed a strange kind of trickling sound coming from the back of the car. I wondered about it, but didn't really worry. We parked, opened the tailgate to better obscure the air rifle in the back, wrote down the section we parked in (after various past unpleasant parking episodes, we've learned to do this very consistently now), and then we took another tram, then took the Monorail in. The Monorail still smelled a little like farm animals. I worry about this every time. It might just be me, it might be that they store the trains in a petting zoo when they're not in use, or it might be like Soylent Green, where the smell is people. I am not sure. I should really remember to take an air mask with me, though, just for the monorail part, since the farm animal smell is a little de-magic-izing.

We strolled down main street and hit the bakery for a snack/lunch. After mowing through a cinnamon roll and a big ice cream cookie sandwich we meandered toward Tomorrowland. As we meandered along, Tour Guide Mom had to pee.

TGM: I like to think of it as going wee.*

More TGM: Well, actually we were still finishing up the Ice Cream Sammie and Cinnamon Roll when I declared I needed a room of rest. *First Silly slowed me down, because I told them just to meet me outside of them and he acted like he had never been on Main Street before. *"Which ones?" Um, the ones on the way to Tomorrowland. And then I had to give a more detailed description of the location. * Are there any others? *Well, there are in the other direction but seriously. Then Sophia wanted to go with me only she wasn't moving. *In fact she was still eating. *I sort of needed to go. *Now. *So I told her she could catch up with me and left. *As I left I was not convinced Silly actually knew where the bathrooms were and Sophia was with me. *So I was a tad worried. *But I trusted that Max would have enough sense to check a map or ask someone if need be, so I was only a little worried.

Even more TGM: Sophia must have exited the room of rest first. *This makes sense because I had decided that maybe if I washed my face it would cool me down. *It was. Let's say, warm. *Triple digit warm. OK, fine. *It was hot. *I was melting. *The cool water was nice, I may have lingered.

We were taking the noodle-house cut through (even when it's quiet we still use the bypass out of habit), where there are bathrooms.

H.: Ah ha, he does know where they are. *I like to think of this as the Wishes dessert terrace now, although I am not entirely sure I have that right. * I guess I'll have to book it sometime. *For myself. Since my dear family doesn't really like parades and only watches Wishes to humor me. *They actually left me to watch it myself one year, except Max and Sophia felt badly enough about deserting me they stayed. *Silly still ditched me. *I no longer give him options like that. *In fact I had to put my foot down on this very day and make everyone suffer through the parade. *
More H.:Come to think of it, though, I guess I will let them ditch me next time. *The dessert buffet would be a lot more affordable if it were only me going.

So Max, Sophie, and I hung out waiting for Tour Guide Mom who was taking aeons. While we waited we made up robot jokes in recognition of the fact that we were in Tomorrowland. It's important to tell the punchline in a robotic voice for full effect.

How many robots does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Foolish humans, you will slave in the dark now.

How many humans does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
The minimum it takes for the task to be accomplished. The rest of you will toil in the mines.

An Englishman, an American, and a robot go into a bar. Only the robot exits.

A robot walks into a bar, and orders a glass of water. The bartender says, "We don't serve robots." The robot says, "Someday you will."

They all kind of have a similar theme.

As we were waiting I got a sip of the water from the water fountain and immediately spit it out. The water was fundamentally existentially distressing. I am not sure why the water in WDW really is incredibly vile. We have our guesses - maybe they use so much water they have to do some mass treatment that's cheap but horrible. Maybe they have to drill really deep wells and so the water is tinted with a bit of fire and brimstone. Maybe Orlando was built over sulfur mines and it bubbles up. Perhaps they had a problem with rotten eggs in the aquifers that they have yet to work out. It's a mystery. But whatever the reason, it's so bad the water would probably would make a good Disney villain, or at least a villain that Captain Planet could take on. It's interesting, because sometimes it seems like the parks do filter their water, other times not. Also when you first arrive the water is the most utterly foul revolting stuff that you might consider a chaser of Beverly to clear your palate (if you were in your right mind, you wouldn't really do that, but instead would pound four of them in a row). As time goes by, you slowly stop noticing just how horrible the water is as it moves along into the gross phase, then the very unpleasant, and eventually just notably un-delicious.

Since this was our first day in the parks, we were still in the initial "most utterly foul revolting stuff" phase. A plan hatched. A test of manhood. "Hey you guys, if I could keep water flowing into my north from the drinking fountain while breathing through my nose for a full 60 seconds would you give me an Altoid?" I figured an Altoid would surely be sufficient to cover up the awfulness... They agreed, and so I began my feat of strength. I was counting to 60 in my head, while Hell-water poured into my mouth. As this was going on, Tour Guide Mom returned, and joined Sophie and Max in spectating. After I hit 60 I demanded the mint ASAP, but Sophie said it had only been 40 seconds. It is entirely possible that my experience of time had slowed down as the Mordor juice infused my senses, so I worried for a second. Happily Tour Guide Mom stepped in as arbiter and told Sophie to give me the mint even if it wasn't a full minute.

At that point, the idea of contests of daring and strength in Theme Parks kind of implanted itself. At this point, the notebook contains the phrase, "I'm such a stereotype of myself." I am not sure what the context was, but it's seems all too true.

Mom, the exaggerator: Yes it does. *If you have ever watched "How I met Your Mother" you might recall the episode where they explain that Ted is a "Dad" type. *Silly is Ted. Seriously. *He jokes around with servers, tells corny jokes, and usually has a moral to the story. *If you have not seen that show you should. *

So then some other things happened. I guess we worked out way through Tomorrowland or something and went elsewhere. After our water episode, my mind was kind of reeling a bit, so I can't really recall the full details, and I took few notes. Somehow we were in Fantasyland, with H. and Sophia going into some princess-related store. While they were in there, Max and I checked out a Saxophone quartet was playing to quell the Peter Pan line that had a 60 minute standby. They were really very good, and I was pleased.

One of our little hobbies while we go through the park is trying to spot the least appropriate footwear. We have in the past tried to take photos surreptitiously, but since we had lost the good camera's battery charger, and only had a crap camera, we did not do so on this trip. But casually scanning the line of people suffering in standby, I did see the Mother Of All Utterly Inappropriate Footwear. There were actually two women who were together who seemed to be competing for this distinction. They had a lot in common. Both were kind of dressed like strippers. Like a stripper going for a more casual look. Both clearly had a huge amount of cosmetic surgery done. They were in line with two guido-looking guys, and no kids. Both had platform sandals on, but one took things to the next level. The shoe straps were made of something that looked just like strings of chain mail. Chain mail platform sandals. Whoah. It was awesome. Happily Max was there to share this with, though, alas, H. and Sophia missed out on this amazing discovery, which has revolutionized bad-shoeology.

I went back to the store with Max, and we met up with the womenfolk.

We did Peter Pan. Max and Sophie took one boat, while H. and I took a separate one. Before we boarded, we proposed a little contest to see who could find more hidden Mickeys on the ride. H. and I spotted 45, which was more than Max and Sophie spotted, though some may have been questionable.

After this, I am pretty sure we did Big Thunder again. I know we did Haunted Mansion again, since the ride broke down and we were stuck in an interim point for a while. The line outside should have been a flag to bail out, but they were still moving people through, so we got into the elevator, and then were dumped into a big old line downstairs. This was still interesting since we got to look at the paintings and things in the loading area with greater scrutiny than normal. It turns out that the loading area holds up well to careful scrutiny and is awesome, so the wait was not pure awful. Though there were some smelly people near us that smelled kind of like a monorail.

Eventually we wound up in Tomorrowland for the last time. We headed to Space Mountain to use our FPs. Or maybe our GAD passes. I kind of lost track of which rides were done with GAD passes and which were mere plebian fast passes, but the GAD pass thing was so totally rad it caused me occasionally revert to my 80s self. They were that gnarly, dude. Whoah.

H., the Repetitious: They were, wait for it, legend, I hope your not lactose intolerant because the next word is, dairy. *Legendary. You'll need to watch "How I met Your Mother" for that to make any sense. You could just say "They are all that and a bag of chips." * We are spoiled for life. *I think I may have already said that. *It is worth repeating, they are that awesome. *Dude.

On our second time though Space Mountain we had a chance to look at the revamp a bit more closely. The "Check Invisible Oxygen Dome" sign was a nice touch. I'd kind of wondered how the open top rockets were cruising around in space and not causing all passengers to die, though I'd never quite put my finger on why that was. Now it was obvious - it was the lack of air...

We then did Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters again. Once again, my Buzz Lightyear technique was unstoppable, though in the interest of not making you all feel bad, I will not relate my awesome score. Also I forgot to write it down.

We went from there to the Laugh Floor. Unfortunately the joke that popped into my mind was very inappropriate, and blocked out other jokes. The few that trickled in were not up to par, according to Max and Sophie, who had formed a Committee on Joke Acceptability (CJA), so we did not text any in.

As I recall, rejected jokes included:

Why was the beach wet?
Because the sea weed.

Why did the chicken cross the playground?
To get to the other slide.

What did the dog say when he ran into the tree?
Ruff Bark!!!

What’s green and smells like red paint?
Green paint.

This is because these are among the standard ones I rattle off when pressed. But the inappropriate one just kept pressing in, so I didn't remember any ones that were relatively new to me, and the kids have become more discerning in their joke tastes as time has rolled on and they've heard certain selections form the same set for a decade+ now. I wish I'd remembered:

What's a foot long and slippery?
A slipper.

I also ran a few robot jokes through, but they were all quickly rejected by the CJA.

The Laugh Floor show's been revamped a bit, and was fairly solid. My favorite point was when they asked a kid in the audience for a joke and he said:

Why was 6 afraid of 7?
Because he ate 9.

At this point it was pretty late, I think. It was late enough that the Dance Party had started. I pitied the poor young person in the Goofy costume on stage dancing in the heat. They couldn't even go out and tell people about their awesome job, since they dressed up as Goofy and danced. As we passed, the M. C. guy started singing a peculiar tune with a chorus that in part, "Pizza, McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken". That song, it wandered its way into my head, forcing me to sing my own version to the kids. "Corporate Sponsor, Corporate Sponsor, Corporate Sponsors." Soon Max and Sophie had joined in, so we walked along singing about Corporate Sponsors.

From there we found a camping spot, and eventually watched the new fireworks thing. I liked it more than Wishes, but apparently not all do. I did sometimes root for Hook when watching Peter Pan, though, and kind of thought it would have been better if Tinker Bell went out in a blaze of glory rather than sticking around after she betrayed everyone, so that might be related. I should probably just wear ear plugs, since the narrative doesn't really do it for me. Interestingly, one might note that in this section we've had almost solid narrative up to this point. This might be related to the fact that H. is leaving for a vacation to Hawaii in a week, so if we don't pump these out there will be enough delays that I might forget quite a lot of the trip and then need to just make everything up. As it is things are a little hazy, though the memory of the 40-60 seconds of sulfur water remains clear.

We'd intended to see the Electric Light Parade earlier in the day, but had missed it while we were in Tomorrowland. The parade wasn't for a bit, so Max, Sophie, and I went into the Emporium and looked at things. There were some nice blank books, but the new green Mead notebook was fine, though I'd left it in the room and was still wasting pages of the precious blue notebook. There was some grumbling from some members of the party about being tired and wanting to leave, but I explained that we had to stay to watch the lame parade that was all 70s and low tech and had a lame soundtrack, and we should look forward to it. Also Tour Guide Mom was not about to let us miss it since this was our single Magic Kingdom day. So we hung out, and eventually went out, sitting at a prime point where the parade was just beginning so we could bail right after it ended. The parade was cheesy, very 70s, very low-tech, and it has a kind of lame soundtrack. All the same there was the nostalgia factor, so now perhaps one day our kids can drag their kids to WDW many years from now, and make our grandkids watch the parade for the sake of nostalgia.

After the parade had ended, we jammed on along to the Monorail to do the drive back. We jammed along and boarded the train. I took a deep breath before entering. Then as we got in, Sophie said, "Daddy, I lost my shoe!" She seemed distraught. "You what?" "I lost my shoe." I looked at her feet to make sure this was not some kind of metaphor. She had actually lost her shoe. I went back out onto the platform to look and see if it was sitting there. It was not sitting there. Sophie was annoyed. "No, it fell in the hole." Oh, of course. She dropped her shoe in the small gap between the monorail and the platform. They should really have a "Mind the gap" announcement. We went to the conductor guy, and explained that the shoe had fallen in the hole. He explained that there was no way to fish it out since if you tried you'd be fried, this thing runs (some huge number I can't remember) watts down there." I' was more telling him in case a stray shoe would cause the train to crash, but it was useful to know that it was irretrievable.

Mom was displeased. She had brought two pairs of shoes, and now had one.

Sophie was displeased at these circumstances as well. She had to ride on the monorail with only one shoe. It was at this point that Max pointed out that Sophie was our Cinderella. Sophie was oddly perturbed at this. Because of the shoe situation, I didn't notice the smell as much, but it was still there.

Once the ride was over, Sophie had to walk to the tram wearing one shoe. I thought about solutions to this problem, but non of them really seemed like they would work. She then had to walk to the car from the tram, a fact that we heard about regularly as we made the trek. I considered going ahead and picking her up, in part so I could stop hearing about her shoe being there, and in part to make things better for her, but the walk was pretty short, and she didn't really want to stand in a parking lot with no shoe either, so there seemed little point.

As we drove back we did not get lost, though the odd rattling sound was a little louder.

Now that we have finished this day, I note something that kind of bothers me. I'd meant to add a lot more content that was unrelated to the boring details of walking around Disney, and more digressions on other stuff. But I really wanted to get through this day, so I maintained pretty much as laser-focused as I am likely to get so I could finish. Sorry about that.

 

[Mr. Silly]

People who talk about movies, literature, etc. use the concept of an "unreliable narrator," to describe a narrator relating the story who not telling the story reliably, sometimes the narrator is deliberately misleading the reader, sometimes they misunderstand the situation they are narrating due to a limited perspective. Often this is so that the author can throw in a twist ending, though it can be used to show different how perspectives are open to different interpretations, or whatever. As it turns out I am an accidental unreliable narrator, not due to deliberate misleading, nor specifically due to limited perspective (though that's there too), but rather due to limited memory . In previous segments I mentioned that we got the green Mead notebook on the day we went to the Magic Kingdom, that I poured water no my lap prior to boarding the monorail, and told the, "an Englishman, an American, and a robot go into a bar. Only the robot exits," joke. As it turns out, after careful analysis of the notebook, and discussion with others who were present for this vacation, some of those things might not have happened. When a literary author uses the unreliable narrator, it's usually for some reason, but I am no literary author. I'm unreliable for no good reason.

So anyway, it turns out that it was the next day that we went to the store to get a few things we'd forgotten, and found a nice green Mead notebook that we then filled in. We also got a thing of Tiger Balm because my shins were killing me. Between the Gold Bond powder and the Tiger Balm, I reeked of old folks home, but I didn't really care. I like smelling like an old person, it's way better than smelling like a monorail. When I got the notebook, I put right on the first page, "The Notebook of Record," to indicate its total reliability, so while that didn't make the person writing in it at all reliable, it did mean we could trust the notebook's contents anyway.

TGM: The trip to the store was in part to get Gel inserts for Sophia and Max' shoes. *Converse are not that comfortable after walking around for 5 or 6 hours and Sophia could no longer switch into my shoes midday. *Unless she wanted to hop.

In the interest of full disclosure to help improve reliability, we were at my parents' house we discovered that in Alabama they call Jello Salad (which my Mom pretty much always makes when we visit) is called Congealed Salad. We discovered a valuable fact from this. In the same way that my Mom reacts to the word "scab," so Sophie reacts to the word "congealed."

On the second proper day of our WDW vacation (the little jaunt in Downtown Disney barely counted, so this day 2 by my accounting) we didn't actually go into any parks. But we did go to the Grand Floridian to get tea.

As we were driving out there, the Grand Floridian was christened by us (me) with a new name, the Gland Freudian. We got there, and discovered that the parking situation there is really annoying. Also there was this odd rattling sound in the car, but it was a gentle rattle, so it was not so much annoying as pleasant, like an African rain stick. The parking situation was not pleasant like a rain stick. If you pay around $15 you can park Valet, but for self parking you have to drive off the Freudian property onto a lot across the street, and then walk for an aeon. Which we did. Since my shins were sore, I limped for an aeon. As we walked/limped, we saw a trash can, with a deeply shocking and kind of distressing phrase pained on it: "Waste Please." I realize that Disney is not totally eco-friendly, but actually encouraging people to waste is pretty darn bad. Probably not as bad as burning megatons of propane every night in Epcot to illustrate how awesome the planet is, but still bad.

As we walked we debated whether adding "blahblah" to words that started with the letter B and had two syllables was automatically funny. For instance is the transformation of Buchinghham to Blahblah-ham automatically funny? The world may never know with certainty, but I am in the "absolutely" camp. H. is in the "not so much" camp.

I also explained to the kids that tea was something special for Mom. I told them to ask me for two adjectives. Reluctantly, they eventually gave in. Those two adjectives were "subtle" and "refined." We were to be subtle and refined. I repeated this several times. I then worried about the fact that I'd gotten Tiger Balm on my shorts which made me a little less refined, but it was kind of a subtle stain, so I was still running 50%.

TGM: I am bringing this same man to Victoria and Albert's in a few months. *I hope our servers have a sense of humor.*

Silly: I figure I can open with a few robot jokes, and we can work things out from there.

It took a while to walk/limp to the Freudian from the parking lot far across the street. I was slightly worried that we would be late, but figured that we'd only be a little late and that's fashionable, so it was okay. Not that we were fashionable, we were very casual, really, and I am pretty sure I was kind of disheveled because that's pretty much the norm. Also, I think Tiger Balm stains are out this year.

We wandered into the Freudian and actually got seated very quickly for tea with no mention of us being three minutes late. Our server was Crystal was was a very kind and patient person.

We looked at the menu and I noted that the Darjeeling was descried as "musky," which when combined with the name "Gland Freudian" made me very jolly indeed. And so it was that we set the setting for a jolly tea. Sophie, H., and I got the Blahblah-ham Palace with tea sandwiches, scones with clotted cream, those really good little onion pie things, and a dessert, while Max got Sally Lunn bread. H. and I got the Black Currant (Cassis) tea, which is our favorite. Max got the Jade Green Tea, Sophie Russian Earl Grey. We also got a side of Blue Stilton.

TGM: Since then Silly has repeatedly wondered out loud if we can acquire some Blue Stilton in Austin. *I am sure we can wonder that a self professed cheese lover is unaware of the rather new trend of fancy cheese shops in kitschy little store sections of town. *It may be best to keep this knowledge to myself. *Also I am pretty sure they would have it at the big Whole Foods, since they have everything there. *

Silly: I am really just a self-professed cheese liker. For what it's worth, I am really just waiting until she's out of town before I get the Stilton, that way it will last longer.

TGM:Hey!

As we waited for the tea and food, we sat and talked quietly, and were dignified. I was determined that this time we were not going to go overboard, like every other time, but that we'd make sure that Tour Guide Mom was pleased with tea for once.

TGM: Actually I believe the goal was to save shenanigans for the end of tea. *Last year we had a grumpy server and I believe she avoided our table as much as possible due to the shenanigans. *We had trouble getting the milk and sugar we needed for our tea. It was slightly more fun to goof off when we knew the grumpy server was displeased about it. *I wonder what that says about the collective maturity level of our family?

Silly: I actually snagged sugar from another unoccupied table at one point, forgot to mention that.

On a side note, in Texas the main grocery store chain is HEB. The stores are named after their founder Howard Edward Butt. I am not kidding. As it turns out the hippy-drippy Whole Foods chain also was founded in Austin.

At some point in a trip long ago, I told the kids this joke:

Hey did you hear that Whole Foods and HEB are merging? They are calling the new chain Butt Whole Foods.

This one caught on, and so it was that the joke that was the chagrin of Tour Guide Mom, but a regular Disney favorite came to be fold in all theme parks. It was useful as a pre-photo form of saying "cheese."

And so, since we were in a classy place, a classy joke was called for, but I didn't know any. So I told the HEB Whole Foods joke. Sadly, I did not expect Crystal, our server, to know what HEB was, so it was just an in-table thing, but at least it was good for our table. And it was kind of subtle, since you had to know what HEB stood for. I considered trying the interrupting starfish joke:
Knock Knock
Who's there?
Interrupting Starfish.
Interrup (put hand over other person's face.)

but I thought this might not go over well.

We have a few traditions with tea at the Floridian. Historically when we get tea, one of us will wear the tea cozy as hat. This was because the tea cozies make very subtle and refined hats. Sadly, this time there were no hat/tea cozies given with our tea pots. I actually worried inside that perhaps they didn't give them to us because of me. But I have heard of other people misusing tea cozies in much more inappropriate ways where pairs of cozies with tassels behave as though they are worn by people with chain mail shoes... This comforts me, as it really probably is not my fault that they are gone. I blame Kimmie.

The tea came, and I showed Sophie how the sugar tongs should be used as a kind of tuning fork. As time went by, they also transformed into insect mandibles to pick up sugar cubes, and a spoonbill beak, since those are interesting birds.

Max super-saturated his tea with sugar. I tried some. It kind of tasted like the Ten-Ren Tea Candies you can get in the China World Showcase, which we always get because they are awesome. More about those later. Eventually the food came, and as usual, was absolutely fantastic. The pear gorgonzola sandwiches were excellent (we made them a the house now), as were the other little sandwiches. The Blue Stilton was so good as to boggle the mind. I still dream about the little onion tarts (which are one of the few things you can't order as a side), and the rest of the food was awesome.

Max didn't want his jam, so I asked for it.
Mom: What are you going to eat that with?
Me: A spoon.
Mom: (glaring).

As we ate, we listened to the band playing outside. They were playing an old Sinatra tune, "Witchcraft," which made my teeth hurt a little. When I was getting braces, my Orthodontist, Mr. Moromisato, always played Frank Sinatra in his office. So now, despite liking Swing tunes, I am forever reminded of Orthodontal work. I related a little story of how several times I broke my retainer and then fixed it with Superglue.

Then Sophie had to go pushing the envelope. She hung a spoon off her nose. This required outdoing, so somehow food wound up smeared on people's faces, I can't remember how.

And then Crystal returned in the middle of this to give us some more milk for the tea. Our past servers had not always been tolerant of mayhem in their little sanctum, some could even be downright grumpy about it, and we had been caught in the middle of unquestionable mayhem - there was whipped cream on my nose. There was no good account of how it got there, but there it was. She smiled, and said, "having fun?" Apparently people misbehaving slightly at tea was nothing new to her. She placed the milk on the table and left. Af that point we realized that there were no rules, but somehow the lack of rules actually subdued us. We had a great point of turning, where we realized that the only right thing to do was to return to a subtle and refined approach. So we did for several minutes

Mom went to the restroom. While she was there, I noticed that the little statues of the guys on the walls were missing some of their equipment. I guessed that the emasculated little guys were Italian Opera singers, but it's hard to say for sure. We discussed this briefly, but them Tour Guide Mom returned. I asked her if the bathroom trip all worked out in the end.

I paid the check, but happily there was so little blood in my brain that my reaction to the Disneymath was a little muted, it was simply shock and horror, rather than anything extreme. After we gave up a hunk of our life savings, we headed out. We were all stuffed, so we really kind of waddled out. I really waddle-limped, since my shins were still bothered. The women-folk went to look in some stores, while I watched the band play to let my legs rest a bit more. The band was quite good, I am a big fan of swing tunes.

Eventually we were ready to go. We plodded out to the parking lot. On the way we stopped to look at the gorgeous '29 Cadillac in the front. Max wondered how much it was worth, and I said it was worth a mint. Sophie said that I was probably wrong, as it likely worth more than the value of a single Tic Tac. We got a guy to take a picture of us in front of it.

From there we got back into our car and drove for our next destination, Downtown Disney, about which we will write more later.

TGM: Possibly much later since I am leaving for Hawaii in a few days and I am not sure what kind of email access I will have while there since Silly still hasn't bought me an iPad. *I know!

 

[mmeb144]

Maybe Mr. Silly is spending the ipad money on another trip to WDW?

I enjoyed your description of tea at the Grand Floridian. I'm thinking of booking tea while we are down there celebrating my DD's 16th b-day. It sounds like mayhem would be the order of the day. Heeheehee.

 

[javamom]

But I have heard of other people misusing tea cozies in much more inappropriate ways where pairs of cozies with tassels behave as though they are worn by people with chain mail shoes... This comforts me, as it really probably is not my fault that they are gone. I blame Kimmie.

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DED!!

Nevah to be forgotten!! I ♥ Kimmie!


Oh yes, and perhaps Crashdad will share his God Bond powder wisdom... if he comes out of lurkdom..?