When last I left you, we were exiting POTC after a VERY exciting morning. We had only had to stand in the standby line for 5 minutes on a 10 day (according to Touring Plans) because it was still only 11:45 am, shockingly. And Adventureland never fills up early in the morning.
And we had spent time playing with swords and hooks and hats in the store. And we had had a little snack. And we had continued on our quest to acquire as many FP's as possible in any given day.
Our next stop was the Magic Carpet Rides. I'm a bit embarassed to tell this story as Suzy doesn't know it. But it was a pretty big part of MY day so I'm gonna tell you and hopefully she is OK in any part I had in this:
Yes, that is McQueen glowering from his stroller.
So, as Suzy was checking out of the POTC store McQueen was still bugging her about, what I am to assume, her not buying him the pictures and whatever else he had decided to be annoyed about. And then she yelled at him, you know in a Mom way (not a scene cause we don't really "yell" but you know what I mean. Verbal discipline. Cause he deserved it. This made him cranky.
Well, I ended up in line with him at the Magic Carpets. It was maybe a 10 minute wait. And he complained about EVERYTHING! I mean seriously, pick a topic, he told me how horrible we all were, and life in general. Whatever. As he talked I made a calculated decision. Because McQueen and I have a VERY different relationship than his mom and him. She and he butt heads often and he fights with her like you cannot believe. She is not allowed to say one thing without him going off.
But I am allowed to tell him stuff and he takes it from me. It could be the exact same wording and everything. To her, no listening. To me, some respect.
So I decided I was gonna let him have it. I put my hand out to stop him from moving forward with our crowd (so they wouldn't hear) and I bent down low so I could have good eye contact and no one else would really know what had gone on. And I said,
"You need to shut up. You are being an unappreciative child that no one wants to be with. Your father works two jobs and your mom works day and night so that you can have a nice house and clean clothes and food in your belly and get to go to Disney World 3 times in one year. How many kids do you know that have even ever BEEN to Disney World? They just spent tons of money doing something absolutely NOT necessary just because they thought you might like it. Because they happen to love you and want to make you happy. And are you happy? NO! You are never happy unless everything goes your way all the time. And I am SICK of it. It breaks my heart to see your parents work so hard for a kid that doesn't appreciate it. And unless I see a BIG change in your attitude. Unless my ears HEAR you say, "Thanks Mom, Thanks Dad, I love you guys," then I am going to glare at you for the rest of the day. Every time you look at me, I'll be glaring, and you will know EXACTLY why."
And I said it in my very best, really mean, mom whisper.
Now, had this been Suzy, McQueen would have had a royal fit and the day would have been ruined for sure. So I was taking a pretty big risk and relying on the fact that normally McQueen won't talk back to me.
And fortunately for me, or I would have been the one being glared at by Suzy , McQueen started to say something back and thought better of it. And was silent.
A few minutes later we were in our little area and I took my favorite picture of the day:
Mulan, who had been aware of what was going on behind her, asked McQueen to ride with her:
And Ariel rode with Buzz:
We also had a Photopass photographer taking pictures of us. I can only assume to use in the Magic, Memories, and me show. And we were very photogenic this day. But sadly, Boo and I were fighting over going up and down as she is always allowed to be in control and wasn't appreciative of me trying to get us in a position so we were visible to the Photopass lady, plus Ariel and Buzz only wanted to get squirted by the camel:
When we got off Donald chased Boo around with this plastic snake. Between the snake and the camel Boo was having the time of her life.
I wanted to get an awesome picture of my family walking hand in hand from behind. Boo's little dress was so short and cute that I loved her from behind. But sadly there were simply too many people to stage a good picture:
After this it was time for LUNCH! We headed out towards Cosmic Ray's. It was just about noon-thirty and it was a hoppin'. There is something for everyone here, but you do have to split up to order what you really want. Then wait with your whole party to get seated by a CM at the seating area. With a group our size, in three different lines, this seemed impossible.
But there is a little area to the left (near the bathrooms) of where you order that you don't need a CM to seat you. There isn't Sonny Eclipse, but it is nice and quiet. Donald found a large family leaving just as I was finishing getting the food and helped them clean up and we had enough seats for all. But then we couldn't find Suzy and Milo. I did find Charming but he didn't know where they all were. So after about 2 minutes, we let another family sit at Suzy and Milo's table next to us and left them to their own devices. They had easily gotten a table in view of Sonny. So all was good.
I couldn't remember which dessert we liked here so I got both. Turns out with one bite we all remembered. We liked the carrot cake. The chocolate cake was RICH. But Boo thoroughly enjoyed the chocolate one all by herself:
When I had walked in here I had been sure it would be a hectic lunch, but instead I had walked right up to Bay 1 with no line at all, easily found a table, and had a peaceful lunch. Because of getting the 2nd breakfast I just got 2 chicken tender meals and we all shared. It was plenty.
What was left of the beard post-lunch:
Suzy & Milo were finishing up eating so we just played in the Merchant of Venus store. I like to take stuffed animals and make plays for my kids so we did that for awhile and a CM thought it was hilarious and came to help us out. But just as the storyline was taking shape Ariel came back over in a PANIC! She could NOT find her pins. We ripped apart the stroller and discussed where she had had them last. Turns out, they were in her BBB bag hanging on the stroller handle.
Discussing our plans outside Merchant of Venus:
While we were all discussing, Donald had wandered off to ride the TTA with Boo. Evidently he had texted me this instead of discussing. Donald isn't much for standing about discussing things. He's an action man. That's why, among other reasons, we rarely stand about discussing things and instead have a planned out step by step itinerary. Burning daylight is frowned on in these parts.
We quickly got him back under control though and he met the Suzy clan at the Buzz FP machines so they could all ride the TTA.
Only Mulan and I volunteered to go with Buzz to ride Stitch. It's on his must do list. But Stitch is stupid. Thus, everyone else went on the TTC.
There is never a line for either of these things, making them a perfect early afternoon thing to do.
Because this ride is so dark and relatively stupid I never have any pictures of the inside. So I vowed to take at least one picture of Stitch this go round. I succeeded, though how usable it is in print form is another matter:
As we walked to the CoP to meet our family Push followed us hollering at the "hairy pirate." Buzz completely ignored him. I thought it was really funny.
After the TTC, I believe everyone other than me, Buzz, and Mulan danced with Chip & Dale at the dance party for a second. On EMH evening nights the party starts early in Tomorrowland and they have dj's playing modern dance music. This truly makes a fun atmosphere. And as we stood in line (for barely 2 minutes) for Carousel of Progress we danced to tunes.
Because of the party atmosphere and because we know all the words, we decided to sing along at the CoP. The audience probably had 30 people, of which we were 11. 29 sang along. CoP fans are loyal, loyal fans. One lady, however, who more than likely started the "No talking of rides and attractions" thread did not join in and did not appreciate the 29 of us who did sing. I never was really sure why she wanted it silent. We certainly didn't drown out the show. And by our singing we showed our obvious respect for it. But I now know that not everyone feels this way. There are at least 5 people in the world who would have hated it. One was in there with us. Whoops.
After the CoP we split again. Suzy and group took the boat back for some much needed rest time:
Buzz, Charming, and my family stayed behind to do the Laugh Floor. I was SOOOO glad we did as I got to be on the show, and Boo got to be BOO! Plus Donald and Buzz both got jokes on.
Buzz's joke, if you'd like to steal it and submit it yourselves to 2319 (you, know text your jokes to "23" "19" like the one monster yells and the George gets shaven?) was: "What kind of phone does Mike use? And eye-phone."
You aren't supposed to take any photos in here but I snuck and took a terrible blurry photo of Boo as Boo for this TR but I can't find it. When I do, I'll put it on. I was so excited it was ridiculous.
We also got a few coins:
And evidently Boo had seen Push too because this entire afternoon she kept pushing every trash can she saw to see if they talked. I know this is gross and germy but it was HILARIOUS!
On our way out we were about 15 minutes ahead of the parade. So there was an empty Main Street, if you don't mind people staring at you. Guess what? We don't mind at all. In fact, Charming turned to me and said, "Pre-Show!!!" And he and I promptly started dancing and singing loudly as we marched down the middle. A band started playing behind us (on it's own, not cause we were cool) and people kept calling out to Mulan and the other girls saying, "You are gorgeous!!" They BEAMED yet again.
At the end of Main Street we paused (not sure why) and a CM came up to Mulan and asked her where she got her costume and who she was. She proudly explained at the Halloween 50% off clearance at Wal-Mart for under $10.00 and that she wasn't playing a character or pretending to be a Disney princess, but was a princess in her own right. The CM was thrilled with this answer and they chatted away about being your own person and doing Disney on a budget.
The parade was about to cut off our exit so we boot scooted quickly across the street. Just as we were exiting, Charming decided he needed popcorn. So we stopped and used 2 snack credits for our ride back.
As we walked toward the boat dock, a purple boat was just pulling up. We decided to hop on and it happened to stop at the Fort first. SCORE!
Just FYI, we took the bus from the boat. Only had to wait 2 minutes for a purple bus to come. It's a VERY easy walk to our campsite from the bus station.
Also, Suzy told me that McQueen had thanked her profusely and charmingly.
He did a much better job than what I had demanded and I actually heard him say thank you to her a few times this day.
Coming up? Andy pictures of this that I've left out. And, just how many FP's had we collected this morning anyway?
).
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. He looked freakishly cool, but if you are interested in getting this look for your kids be forewarned.
. After Perla left with the aps, she continued to talk about the fright of having someone come in that door.
But they had none that would fit a 3 yr old. So he settled for a little POC play set with 6 figures that he played with for the remainder of the trip.
Hey, everybody, my honey is on board! Guess I better be careful about any whining I was planning on doing about us getting lost tomorrow 
