Tara's Calculus for a Cause Tour! (a Graduation trip of epic porportions!)New Pg 1x2

[TaraLee4]

Hola!


Welcome to the party. Well, the pre-party anyway. Because the real party doesn’t begin for another 21 days. Not that I’ve been counting since January or anything like that. Because I haven’t.

No, really.

It was December, I swear.

Because in November, my newly un-engaged self decided that I needed to go on vacation. But not just any regular vacation. No. this was to be a trip of epic proportions.

Huge.

Mini Detour: And for my upstate New York readers not to be confused with Billy Fuccillo’s HUGGGGGGGE commercials. My huge isn’t nearly as obnoxious.

But it’s huge.


And there’s also one huge catch:


I have to pass Calculus first.


Close your eyes. Blink twice and read that again. It still says Calculus doesn’t it?


Darn. I was hoping it would say English or something simple. I need to pass Calculus first because when I pass this god-forsaken class that no one should have ever invented in their ever-lovin’ life, I get to graduate. Diploma. For me. SOUP FOR ME!

I’ve been working for this 2 year degree. For about 3 years now. And don’t ever talk to me about financial aid unless you want me to yell about the injustices of this country. Loudly. Because when you’re twenty, you live on your own, work full time and get good grades, you don’t get financial aid.

Didn’t you know? Write to a senator. Please.

Anyway. I have 2 weeks of school left. Then I’m leaving for the Calculus for a Cause Trip! Which will be the best trip ever! (and the best reason ever to pass a class)

I’M GOING TO DISNEYWORLD!

Chapter 1: So, what is the plan? (below!)

 

[TaraLee4]

Chapter 1: So, what IS the plan?



What is THE plan Tara? When are you going? What are you doing? Where are you staying? Who are you staying with?

These are excellent questions. All of which have at least one answer, many of them 2 or more. There’s no other way to explain to you how this trip is working unless I break out the chart and give you the PHASES of TRIP (PoT)

The PoT is as follows:

Phase I: May 22nd – May 26th (Days 1 – 5) This Phase will be carried out with my Best Friend (often referred to as my ‘wife’)/roommate extraordinaire. Her name is Jill and she is amazing. We are flying from our former place of employment (Albany International Airport) to the oh-so-amazing Orlando International Airport. We are staying at the Pop Century resort.

Phase II: May 25th – June 1st (Days 4 – 11) This Phase shares a day with Phase I. This is because on Friday 5/25 my mother, sister and grandmother will be flying down to continue the Calculus for a Cause tour of Central Florida with me. I will be joining them in their 2 bedroom condo just outside of Disney Property. Naturally I will bring Jill with me for the overnight before she flies back to Albany on Saturday.

Phase III: May 31st – June 4th (Days 10 – 14) This part of the trip is about me. Me. Me. Me. Everyone else is going home except me. And it will be super amazing and fabulous. I’ll be staying at the All Star Music resort. Unless I change it to movies in the next 10 days. Which I might. Because I can do that. Because it’s just me!

The “loose” plan:

Somewhere, my mother got the bright idea of going to Sea world and Busch Garden. Whatever. I didn’t buy the ticket, so sure I’ll go! So that zaps up some days. I’ll be hitting all of the parks at least twice (TWICE. That’s INSANE!) and both of the water parks. Plus have two days to do nothing. I kind of have my spreadsheets ready, but we haven’t gotten to know each other that well yet.

So we’ll get to that when I feel comfortable talking about my dork-ness.

But I will let you know this: I love to color code things.

And also: We have reservations for Cinderella’s Royal Table on Saturday may 26th!

So, off I go to do some math. When we meet again:

Chapter 2: Stand in line to meet the Characters!

Topic of Reply: What was your least favorite class ever?

 

[TaraLee4]

Chapter 2: Stand in line to meet the Characters!

Okay, now that you know the where and when, we should probably go over the who, yes? Here we go:


Jill: 23, best friend/wife/roommate Jill is my other half. I’m not quite sure how I managed in life until I met her. We live in an apartment in Watervilet, NY. She’s a cook to my waitress (she’s a pizza maker!) she loves loves loves animals. So Animal Kingdom with her is going to be a trip and a half. She’s only staying for 4 days because “she’s broke” she’s been to Disney once. With school. They did nothing but stand in a circle and said “what do you want to do?” “I dunno, what do you want to do” so this is her true FIRST TRIP

Victoria: 10, best sister on the planet. She is spunky and loveable and insanely tiny. I’ve never been on a vacation with her that she’s old enough to remember. She wants to be just like me when she grows up which scares the begeebies out of me. And my mom. She turns 11 shortly after we get home, so in honor of her birthday I’m bringing her to the castle for a birthday breakfast. (Trip count: 3)

Diana: 61, Best grandma on the planet. She just got home from a 3 week cruise and is going to Florida with us for a week. I’m her oldest grandbaby and she loves me best! (hehe. Just kidding) my grandma is seriously cool. She’s a administrator at a nursing home. Loves to read. Doesn’t do coasters or anything underwater (Trip count: umpteen)

Cindy: 38, Best MOM on the planet. She is paying for me the week that she, my grandmother and sister are there. This is her graduation present to me. When I booked my original 4 days with Jill she decided that she wanted to go too. She and my sister live about 30 minutes from me. She also loves to read. She is my coaster buddy this trip. (trip count: 4)

This trip would not be possible without the sponsorship of these 2 individuals:
My Dad and Step mom. THEIR graduation present to me was a 7 day park hopper pass. So they MUST be mentioned.

And then there’s me: I’m Tara, 20. Finally a college graduate! Hurrah! I like to read and obsessively plan Disney trips. I’m a waitress and I try really hard to make your dining experience pleasant. I live with the aforementioned Jill and my favorite color is pink. I’m going to apply to be a flight attendant in the fall. (trip count: 6)

There are just five days left! I’m so excited! Maybe one more update on Sunday, stay tuned!

Chapter 3: How many suitcases is that? Exactly HOW LONG do you think your staying?

 

[nsalz]

Tara,wonderful start. I think all the moms on the Green Club want to adopt you....you have a wonderful-super time in the world. You deserve such an extended vacation after havinf to endure the pains of calculus!. JILL SOUNDS AWESOME AND YOUR FAMILY TOO

BTW...My daughter turns 11 in June. When's your ds's bday.

 

[crossfamily]

Oh go ahead and tease us then quit.. We want more.. And like Nsalz said we all want to adopt you. Since I am only 11 years older than you I will adopt you as my little sis... Now how about my souvineer? I hope you have a great time you so deserve it..

 

[prncssmel]

I love your pre-trippie. I am sad i didn't find it before you left. Hope you're having a wonderful time and taking a lot of notes to report to us when you get back. Yeah, even with school over, the note taking isn't. Congrats on graduation!

 

[nsalz]

Oh go ahead and tease us then quit.. We want more.. And like Nsalz said we all want to adopt you. Since I am only 11 years older than you I will adopt you as my little sis... Now how about my souvineer? I hope you have a great time you so deserve it..

Sure rub it in ...Youngin'

 

[TaraLee4]

Chapter 3: How many suitcases is that? Exactly HOW LONG do you think your staying?

Okay, so I will stand up and admit it:

Hello, my name is Tara, I am an over-packer of them there suitcases.

As in, the three suitcases and giant pink tote that sat on my living room floor Sunday evening. I had so much stuff in my living room that Jill had to do her “fashion show” (otherwise known as: put on everything you haven’t worn since last summer to see if it fits so you can throw it in your suitcase) in the kitchen and dining room.

But really, let’s be honest: I AM going for two weeks. This requires (A) a lot of clothes and (B) extra room to bring home “stuff” (otherwise known as: Crap that I have no room for but HAVE TO HAVE)

Otherwise known as will henceforth be referred to as the OKA. I don’t want to type it out every time.

I don’t believe in doing laundry on vacation. Ever. Laundry is for non-vacationing folk. People in the ‘real world’. It’s not the least bit magical. It’s work. I don’t work on vacation.

But considering my vacation had technically started two days earlier, I did do laundry on vacation. Sunday evening, with Jill. Then we came home to pack, because she was officially on vacation too.

We had it all planned out, we were going to demolish the house with our uber-packing on Sunday, then clean it Monday, so when we left Tuesday it was clean and when Jill came home without me she wouldn’t have to clean the whole house.

Yeah. About that.

Let’s not talk about the house being clean again, mmmkay? That was silly. It was a far-fetched plan to begin with. And we both knew it.

Other plans: Monday, we each needed to go to the bank. Jill had to visit her grandmother who was in the hospital and we needed to go to target. So I could buy a new digital camera. Yeahhh. Opened the case to my beautiful camera Sunday night and the face was cracked. I was not happy and not-so magical words came out of my mouth.

So all the happy crap was done Monday. Including these captured by my new (HOT PINK) digital camera:

All that remained now was one more sleep. Just one. In the early morning hours of May 22nd 2007 our adventure would begin….

Up Next: Chapter 4: ARE WE THERE YET?!


EDITED TO ADD: Final grade in Calculus: C. F to C in four and a half weeks isn't bad!

 

[AGPrincess]

Yeah...I don't really like Calculus right now...In fact, I'm reading your TR instead of studying for my Calculus final tomorrow. Oh yeah.

AND I'm so jealous you got to stay at WDW sooo super long...

Can't wait for more!

 

[TaraLee4]

Chapter 4: ARE WE THERE YET?!

Sometime around 1:30 I fell asleep. I was just too darn excited. And then at 4:45 when my alarm went off I said, jeez, this sucks I’m awake already?

Then I remembered.

Uh, duh. DISNEYWORLD!!

And if that doesn’t motivate you to get up and in the shower, well, you’re on the wrong message boards.

So up I got, and the shower was taken. I was walking to Jill’s room to wake her up and I lifted up my hand to knock on her door and…

…her alarm went off!

I figured that was a perfect excuse to pop my head in the door.

“Hey Jill”

“uggggggggggggg” (that’s Jill)

“no, really Jill”

“What?”

“Wanna go to Disneyworld today?”

“sure. Can I brush my teeth first?”

Well, she could brush her teeth because we had to call our ride, Jill’s friend Dawn to make sure she was up. She was. And appeared at our house 10 minutes later. Dressed, teeth brushed, hair combed and the last of the items packed, we loaded our suitcases into the car.

Wait.

That implies that jill had more than one suitcase.

She didn’t. She had 1. I had 3.

Two weeks. Keep telling yourself that.

After we were packed away we left food on the porch for the Stray cat that doesn’t belong to us but keeps showing up because Jill had to NAME him.

Cat Rule #1: you name a cat, chances are, you’re not getting rid of him.

And then we were on our way. To the airport. But first this:

(that would be me on the Right)

Okay, now we’re going to the airport! Hurrah!
Once arrived at the airport and we checked our luggage we went upstairs to go through checkpoint and visit some friends!!

OKA: the people we used to work with.

Amazingly the only three people who work at the Coffee Beanery that we worked with were all working that morning! WAY COOL!

After we ordered some chai lattes, we chatted with CJ, Doug and Kyle before proceeding down to the gate where we met Sandy, another former co-worker, except she went and got her self hired as TSA!

(side note: there’s a realllllly realllly cute TSA guy that works at Albany. I had a huge crush on him while I worked there. ‘cept I was engaged at the time. No longer engaged I told sandy to hit on him for me, because it was almost time to board!)

So, Jill decided that she needed one more cigarette before we board. We decided that there was time, but she needed to hurry her butt up! So she leaves, promising to be back in 8 minutes.

I watched her walk down the hall and turn the corner and from behind me I hear…

“okay guys we’re going to start boarding now….”


…does jill make it back in time to use our A boarding passes? Will I get that ever elusive window seat, or be stuck to sit by myself on an aisle because Jill HAD to have that cigarette?

Find out next time: Chapter 5: I AM IN FLORIDA!

 

[crossfamily]

I have to agree laundry on vacations is an NO NO unless its the fun My mom does that last minute smoking thing to me all the time and it drives me crazy. Can't they smoke 10 minutes earlier? Guess its a smokers thing.. Can't wait to read more so get typing Missy...

 

[nsalz]

Tara...this is great so far....OK Tell us did she make the flight?....

I would rather pack light and do laundry once while we are at the pool one day. Although, I don't think packing light is in my daughters vocabulary....They pack pin books, three stuffed animals each...I usually have to be the bad guy and make them take out two or thre things.

OK Tara

 

[prncssmel]

Hmmm, I tend to end up packing a TON and still doing laundry.

So, did she make it on the plane, or did you end up in the World solo?

Side note: I love both your guys' sunglasses.

 

[OhMari]

Hmmm,
Did you guys not make the plane?