The "Why I didn't speak to my sister for a week" trip report *** Now Complete :)

[marivaid]

Why, hello there Thank you for clicking on that trip report !
For a while I didn't think I would ever be able to talk about that trip. Then I decided I needed to take it out of my system. And who better to vent to than my fellow DISers ????

Okay, let me tell you a wittle bit about us.

My mother (Grumpy, 59) and myself (The Turkey,29) have been to Disney World four times. You can read our previous adventures here :

Flabbergasted in WDW - First Trip Report! (December 2006)

Grumpy & The Turkey's July 2007 Trip Report (July 2007)

The Double-and-a-half Trippie (October 2007 and December 2007)

It was love at first sight and we had not expected it. Ever since our first trip, we had planned to taking my sister Jessica (31) and her girlfriend Alex (36) with us one day. We were sure as can be that they would enjoy it, especially Jessica who's a kid at heart.

One problem with that was that Jessi and Alex don't work. At all. They haven't in years. Worse, they don't want to. They survive on about $700 a month from unemployment and whatever extra my mom & Grandma sends them. So not only could they not afford to pay their own way, we weren't sure we wanted to "reward" them with an expensive trip when they were basically doing nothing to earn it.

But eventually we decided to do it. And boy did we PLAN that trip !!!! Jessi has no internet, so I made folders of everything I could think of to help me plan the perfect trip for them. I sent them my Unofficial Guide and Passporter. I must have printed the entire content of the DIS and AllEars. Jessi & Alex picked restaurants they wanted to try and attractions they HAD to do. Our trip was set for April 18th til April 30th.

You can read more about our planning here if you feel like it
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1726493

On top of going to Disney, we were also going to spend five days in Fort Lauderdale so Jessi could go to the beach and visit the Everglades. She's been talking my ears off about wanting to go see the Glades ever since I first went in 2002.

I'd been working two jobs to help pay for the trip and I was exhausted by mid-April, but also more excited than I had been in ages. Grumpy was the same way. We were going to have SO MUCH FUN !!!!
I mean, we had a blast at WDW even just the two of us. So it would be double the fun !!!

Right....


Don't sweat the small stuff

Speaking of sweat...

The first fight

You're going to get out of bed now and HAVE FUN !!!

'Ohana means no soup for you.

We need a drink, Part 1 and Part 2

Seaword, where apparently I'm such an annoying b....

Seaworld,and I try not to be an annoying b.....

Pop it and lose it.

Drama, drama, and more drama.

Chef Creepy.

The Escape.

Karma is a butterfly.

Three, two, one,.. ditch!

Playing the game.

Just the two of us.

Jess in AK with an ECV.

Hannah Hunt and the beast is out.

Mickey's Not So Grumpy Pirate & Princess Party - Part 1

The "party" continues...

From Cruise to Coach

New at Boma : Soupe à la grimace.

The End.

 

[TammySB]

Okay, you got me, now lets hear the rest!

 

[OhMari]

I"m in.

 

[Hedy]

 

[irky416]

I'm in. Can't wait to hear more!

 

[jjk]

cant wait for more

 

[marivaid]

April 17th !!! I was pulling an all-day at work (8.45am to 7.45pm, with an hour lunch break). All I could think of for those eleven hours was that at 7.45pm, my dad was going to pick me up on the store's parking lot and take me to Paris where I'd meet my mom and sister. And that 24 hours later, we'd be in FLORIDA !!!!

Jessi & Alex had arrived that morning. They live in the middle of nowhere, and the only way we'd found to get them to Paris was to put them on a cab to the train station and then a night train. They made it on time, and went over to my grandmother's apartment around 7 that morning.

They slept on the train all night, then when they got to Granny's, they had breakfast... and went to bed. Now when I say they live in the middle of nowhere I am NOT exagerating. Closest store is something like 40mns away. No internet, no landline phone. No movie theater. Nothing but fields and sheeps.
Later, Granny told us that Alex had been wanting to go do some shopping when they got to Paris, but Jessi had refused to go. I wish Granny would have told me sooner, I would have known what to expect.

Anyway. I was psyched !!! My dad picked me up at work, with my luggage in the trunk of the car, and we drove to Paris. Jon Bon Jovi sang Hallelujah all the way there.. Yes I recently managed to turn my dad into a Bon Jovi fan. Unfortunately he only likes one song, their cover of Hallelujah. Hey, I'll take what I can get. Livin' on a prayer, baby.

Grumpy spends the week in Paris because of work, so she was already there.

My sis & I hadn't seen each other for two years, I couldn't wait !!!

So we get to Granny's apartment, and start yelling and screaming and jumping around and Granny is very very relieved that she decided not to go with us on this trip.

We gave Jessi & Alex the Pirates of the Caribbean stuff we'd gotten for them, and the matching shirts we'd made. They thought everything was cute. Alex is a complete Johnny Depp fanatic. I swear, I never met a gay girl who was so much into a guy.

Since we were leaving early the next morning we didn't say very long and Grumpy & I went to our apartment to catch some sleep. AS IF.

I can never sleep before a trip. So I spent a good part of the night reading the UG and Passporter, and reviewing our itinerary to make sure I hadn't forgotten anything. I was dying to DIS but my laptop was at Granny's.

At 4am, a knock on my door. Grumpy wasn't sleeping either. We spent the next couple hours chatting about WDW, then got ready. Our cab was picking us up at 7.30am, in front of Granny's apartment. Jessi & Alex were supposed to meet us downstairs.

At 7.25, they called us and told us to go upstairs because they weren't "quite ready" yet.

Jessi was still in the shower. Alex was half dressed and combing her hair.

I went back downstairs, with our luggage, and waited for the cab. When it got there I explained to the driver that two of us were late but would come down any minute. He said fine, but he would charge us for the wait time.

Finally a few minutes before 8, we were on our way to the airport. It's in the cab that I noticed something gross. Jessi was wearing the same shirt she had on the day before.
"But... you showered and put a dirty shirt back on???"
"It's not dirty. I only wore it yesterday."
"But you spent 9 hours on a train in it.....and it's LONG SLEEVED. Do you realize how hot it is in Miami???"
Shrug.

Okay. Let's not sweat the small things. If she wants to be uncomfortable so be it.

American Airlines, flight 63 to Miami, please !!!!

Grumpy & I are Gold Members for AAdvantage so we get to check in with the First Class customers. And we also get to board in Group 1 (which is great when you have carry-ons). Jessi & Alex aren't members, they were allowed to check with us since we were all together but they didn't get Group 1. The guy told me to just tell the attendant at the gate that we were together so we could all board in the first group.

You know, there are many rumors about French people. Most of them are untrue. But one that is very, very true, is their complete inability to wait in line. The boarding area was a mess with a ton of people waiting in front of the gate when they had only called group 1. We couldn't get through.

Jessi decided that the attendants were not going to make people board in group order and didn't want to wait. Grumpy agreed. I said no way was I going to wait in a huge line when I was holding a Group 1 boarding pass in my hand. Besides, American Airlines ALWAYS boards by group. Even in Paris.

Grumpy & Jessi went to the back of the line but Alex stayed with me.
A few minutes later the attendants cleared the area of people who didn't belong there. Alex and I were the first ones on the plane, found our seats, stowed our carry ons and waited. I swear, Grumpy & Jessi must have been the last ones in.
The reason why I like being on the plane before others is because Grumpy always has her big Kipling carry-on. It's the maximum size allowed on board and if someone puts something in "our" overhead bin, it won't fit. Of course by the time they got there, the bin was full of other people's stuff. A flight attendant took Grumpy's suitcase and stored it elsewhere for her.

Okay. It's no big deal. We made it, we have our seats like we're supposed to, I don't need a seatbelt extension this time (yay!!!!), and we're on our way to FLORIDA !!!!

That is one Happy Grumpy !

Huh ???

Note to self... eyeliner is not recommended for 9 1/2 hours flights.

Are we there yet ???

 

[GiGiJoeysMom]

You are a saint of a sister.

 

[marivaid]

You are a saint of a sister.

NOT ANYMORE !!!!!

 

[Hedy]

The shirt thing has me giggling.

 

[babytrees]

Holey Shmoley....love it already

 

[marivaid]

We get to Miami and I can barely contain my excitement. We have quite a bit of wait here, five hours if I remember well, but since we spent 3 hours waiting in line at Immigration we didn't have that much time at all between our flights.

When it was finally our time to go through Immigrations I wasn't sure if they'd let us all go together, since Alex, technically, isn't family. Not on paper, at least. We went together anyway and gave the guy all of our passports. He looked at them and said something like, okay, your are the mother and you two are the daughters but who is the fourth one ?
Alex had just had a drink of water and started to choke right then.
I said "The choking one ? It's her partner."

It made Alex choke harder but at least it broke the ice and soon enough we were allowed in the United States ! It was Alex's first time ever in the US. She said that she had been worried all the way that she wouldn't be let in - for what reason, I don't know. And that now she could start to relax. She was there.

We found our luggage, went through Customs, gave our luggage to the transfer guys, and went to find our next flight.
Grumpy & I have transfered in Miami several times. The airport is HUGE and they're constantly doing construction there which makes it harder to get around. So we knew that although we had a couple hours before the flight, if we wanted to get a drink or a bite to eat, we didn't have time to waste. So we walked rather fast.

"Slow DOWWWWWWWNNNNNNNN"

That's Jessi. Way, way behind us. Fine, we sit and wait for her to catch up.
We do that for the next 10mns until we reach Security.

For some reason when you transfer in Miami you have to leave the terminal, and therefore go through Security all over again. Security in Charles de Gaulle is a joke, two minutes, most of the time they don't even make you take your laptop out. Whole other story in Miami.

Jessi complained that she had to dump the bottle of water she'd just bought (Grumpy, Alex and I had told her to wait until we were at the gate, but she didn't listen.)
Alex started sighing because she had to take her shoes off. She was wearing - get that - hiking boots.

Grumpy & I shrugged, kicked off our flip flops, and she helped me empty my backpack (laptop, dvd player, camera... all of these have to be scanned separately now).

We got to our gate about 20mns later, after waiting for Jessi & Alex to put their shoes back on and then walking veryyyyyyy slowly to our gate.

Jessi sat next to me and suddenly I was invaded by a nasty smell.
Oh, man. That smell is coming from my sister.
What do I do ??? Do I pretend not to notice or do I tell her discreetly to go wash up in the restroom ?
What the heck am I talking about.. it's my sister !!! Let's go with the Friendy Family Approach :

"What crawled under your armpit and DIED??????"

 

[Jakesmom1]

Ok, you got me, love your report so far.

 

[jordanyosh]

This is sounding interesting to say the least.......i'm in

 

[marivaid]

Thanks everyone for reading !!! Have to go to bed since it's almost midnight here & I work in the morning... but I'll try to at least get us to WDW tomorrow night If you think we're slow getting there, imagine how long it took us to walk around World Showcase... oh, I forgot. We didn't.

 

[irky416]

I would have killed my sister if she wasn't ready to leave and made me wait extra time and have to pay the cab extra!

So, I guess that shirt your sister had on wasn't clean after all?

 

[jordanyosh]

Thanks everyone for reading !!! Have to go to bed since it's almost midnight here & I work in the morning... but I'll try to at least get us to WDW tomorrow night If you think we're slow getting there, imagine how long it took us to walk around World Showcase... oh, I forgot. We didn't.

Get out. you didn't go to World Showcase?

 

[angela3676]

Oh My God!!!

 

[pixiewings71]

Ok, I've never posted on a trip report before but you have me hooked......waiting until tomorrow....

 

[ididitrn]

All I can say is WOW. Your sister sounds like a piece of work and you haven't even arrived at WDW yet. I can't wait to read how the rest of the trip went.