PrincessV
DIS Legend
- Joined
- Jul 6, 2006
- Messages
- 14,316
App of the Day – Messages!
I had to borrow an image for this – it’s not mine. Liability taken care of.
I had to borrow an image for this – it’s not mine. Liability taken care of.
See that green and white square in the upper left corner? The one that says “SMS”? That’s my iPhone’s text messaging app. It’s not the most exciting app available, but it got quite the workout at WDW, so I’m including it here. I don’t know about anyone else, but I can’t hear a darned thing on a phone in the middle of a theme park. I relied on texts between T, LL and myself all day to keep track of who was where and what was going on. Here are some highlights from the trip…
>Just on the flipping bus.
<Next year rent a car. LY!
>Did T text U – she chgd AIS to 7:45!!!
<CRAP!! NO!
>RUN! Bus is coming!
>How goes Meatfest?!
<Delish and non-stop.
>DOH! We never drunk dialed Kate! Or did we?!
<We didn’t – crap! BTW this day sux so far.
>LL is MIA?
<She’s right behind you on Splash!
>Lol! Duh!
>will laptop die if left in trunk?!
<I don’t know.
>Aaaaarrrggg Mommy needs a drink STAT!
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Back to the story. Let’s see… we’d finished our MK morning, had lunch, headed back to the hotel…
Ah, yes – it was Pool-Thirty time!
LL and I made the executive decision to bypass the main CBR pool and stick to the “quiet” pool near our rooms in the interest of time. We all had a big dinner to get to and didn’t want to be running late. You’ll understand why in a bit.
Naturally, there was some grumbling by a couple of 7 year-olds about skipping the pirate pool, but that quickly changed to shouts of glee. Because Tony was in the house!
I’m pretty sure Tony is a saint. If he isn’t, I’d like to nominate him. He played with those boys the way only a dad can – he threw them high into the air, he dragged them around the pool, he let them climb all over him. They had a wonderful time!
Such fun would be pretty cool under any circumstances. But it was especially noteworthy in Leo’s case. See, only a week prior to our trip, Leo’s dad moved across the country. ALL the way across. We’ve been divorced since Leo was a baby, but up until this summer, Leo’d been seeing his dad regularly. He was, and still is, having a hard time with the idea that Daddy wasn’t going to be around any more.
Tony brought to Leo a much-needed dose of male adult-child bonding. Let’s face it ladies, no matter how much effort we put in, it’s just not the same as guy-time, right? As Leo reminded me when he asked me to try throwing him like Tony… and he basically just tipped forward into the water.
Later in the trip, when we all were at SSR, Andy, too, spent some quality pool time with Leo. Thank you both so very much for being the kind, caring men you are; you really, really made things better for my sad boy.
The pool fun lasted just long enough, and then we all had to get cleaned up for our dinner date. I was happily showering away when Leo knocked on the door.
“What do you need Leo?”
“There’s a lady at our door. She wants to clean up our room. I told her you’re in the shower.”
And he walked out.
Wait a sec…
“LEO! Come back here!”
“What Mommy?”
“Did you open the door?”
“Yep! I can reach the locks.”
We had a little chat right there about NOT opening the door to strangers. But I also learned something during that talk – Leo had asked who was there and then looked out the window to see who it was before opening the door. While I’d still prefer that he not open it at all, I had to admit that he did everything right and took appropriate safety measures. He later told me that the housekeeping lady came back two more times while I was in the shower, but he did NOT open the door. He sat there in the window shaking his head “no.”
You’ll note that Pool-Thirty did not intersect Beer-Thirty that day; I needed to keep my wits about me. I was about to enter what could potentially become the nightmare of all Disney nightmares.
The Chef Mickey’s Saga, According to V
My first night at WDW was one day ahead of T’s. Knowing that she wanted to score an ADR at Chef Mickey’s (CM’s) for Evan’s birthday dinner, I volunteered to call when my ADR window opened, giving us an extra day to grab the perfect time.
At 6:58am on my 90+10 window, I called and made my first ADR: CM's for a party of 12. No problem, got our reservation for 12.
A week or so later, LL confirmed that she’d be at WDW, too, making our group a party of 15. So I called and had them look... nope. Nothing for a party of 15. Okay, what about making a second reservation for three around the same time? Nope, no availability for three until way late. “Okay,” I said, “I’ll keep my reservation for 12 and keep trying.”
So a few days later, I called to try again. And asked to add three to my existing CM reservation. And "Kareen" said, "So, it'll be a total of six." Um, NO, 12 plus 3 is 15. Apparently when CM #1 had been checking for availability for an extra three, she accidentally changed our party of 12 to a party of three. Think they could turn it back into 12? Not a chance; nothing left as of that morning.
I nicely freaked out, explaining that I'd called when my window opened, yada-yada-blah-blah-it's a little boy's Bday, etc. and "Kareen" said she'd go get a manager and see how they could fix it. She put me on hold... and then my phone dropped the call. D'OH!
So I called back, knowing full well that there are at least two different call centers and I'd have to start all over. Amazingly, "Angie" knew exactly who I was and with whom who'd I'd been speaking - hooray! They have no way to transfer a call, so "Angie" played go-between relaying information between me and "Kareen," who got "Steph" from Dining Help involved. After holding for about 30 minutes, "Angie" said "Steph" was going straight to the Contemporary manager to figure out a solution, but it would take some time so she'd call me back.
I carried my stupid iPhone around all day waiting, but no call. That night, I went to plug my phone in and BEHOLD! - I had voicemail from WDW. Crap, I thought, I missed the call. But I wound up being glad it went to voicemail... "Steph" reported that she cleared our party of 15 with both the Contemporary’s and CM’s management, though the Dining people would continue to see it as an ADR for three. So, I saved that voicemail and was ready to start playing it on speaker phone if we encountered any problems at the CM podium.
Meanwhile, T found out her SIL was scheduled to be at WDW that day, too. And her family wanted to join the dinner party. Apparently, T’s SIL called the Dining line and asked to be added to “the big party” at CM’s that night... and was! Neither T nor I had any idea if they’d actually been added, and secretly wondered if the reservation was actually still for three – with three more added by the SIL for a total of six!
So, when I found T and we walked up to the CM’s podium, it was game time. I was ready for all-out war.
We approached the podium, I with iPhone in hand. And asked politely to check in for the PrincessV party.
“Yes, party of three?” asked the cast member.
Inwardly, I yelled “AAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGG!!!!!!!” Outwardly, I explained as concisely as possible what had gone on and offered to replay Steph’s voice mail to me. (Which I found to be MISSING! Apparently iPhone’s don’t hold old messages forever. Gah.)
Amazingly, there was no need; the cast member did indeed see Steph’s notes in the system and assured us that they were able to seat our party of 15.
Oh. About that…
T explained about the SIL’s additional party of three and… they quickly turned our party of 15 into a party of 18.
I'm still rather stunned by how responsive Disney was and how much effort they put into fixing their mistake. If I can ever track "Steph" down, I want to send a written thanks and commendation to her superior. THIS is the Disney with which I fell in love but haven't seen in a very long time.
We wound being sat at a bunch of 4-person tables in a row. We were all close enough to feel like we were dining together, but had room enough between tables to get in and out easily for food and photos.
Food and photos. Let’s talk about those.
I’m sorry to say that I wasn’t impressed with the food. It was fine, but not exceptional; nothing stood out as being particularly great. It was just “meh.”
As for photos… I’ve already expressed in my PTR just how much I loath character interaction. But I’m willing to take Leo to character meals and play photographer for his sake.
Yeah. He wanted nothing to do with characters that night! He refused to sit in an outside seat, and I got stuck in it. Don’t I look thrilled?
Sure, to the untrained eye, I look happy. Anyone who knows me knows that this look says, “I’m going to stick forks in your eyes if you touch me again.”
Leo flat-out refused to play. At. All. Only Goofy was brave enough to try him. He came over and sat next to Leo, who was fully focused on his plate of mac n’ cheese and attempted to ignore Goofy entirely. But Goofy wasn’t giving up easily – he put an arm around Leo and tapped his nose…
…and Leo said, with an edge to his voice, “NOT NOW Goofy – can’t you see I’m busy?!”
Nice.
No other characters tried to interact with Leo.
I managed to get out of any further touching by playing Official-ish Photographer of Evan’s Birthday Dinner.
More below...
LY!!
