A Fantabalous Cinderellabration

Five Best Things About My Recent Vacation To Disney/Orlando

1. Going to Disney after Labor day is a must! Lines were short, 20 minutes was the longest wait for any ride (except for Peter Pan?!? which was 40 minutes). Space Mountain 3 times in 45 minutes, the Aerosmith coaster 5 times in an hour. Sweet.
2. Dueling Dragons coaster at Islands of Adventure. A 'fire' and 'ice' dragon hanging coaster pass within inches of each other a couple of times during the ride. Ice side is better, goes upside down one extra time.
3. ESPN Zone resturant on Disney boardwalk. I watched a football game, 4 baseball games and a documentary on the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders and never had to swivel my head more than 15 degrees. Food was good too.
4. Shrek 4D. The best of the 3D stage/video shows. The fourth D was smell. Remember ogres are like onions.
5. Raleigh to the Georgia border in 4 hours. My new car can reach speeds exceeding 100 mph.

Five Most Disappointing Things About My Recent Vacation To Disney/Orlando

1. DisneyQuest. Its a 5 level playground with some interesting interactive/multiplayer games and banks of video games that you play for free. But the majority of the old time video games (Asteriods, Galaga, Donkey Kong) were not functioning properly. I played two seperate games where I could not go up. Not one of the pinball games had every flipper functional, and the air hockey game puck was too dirty and didn't slide properly.
2. The inability of Disney to get a believable live 'Ariel'. None of them looked right, it was the hair. Although the 4 or 5 Belle's that I saw were all smokin', and legal!
3. The Jurassic Park ride at Univeral Islands of Adventure. One of the longest lines we waited in 20, minutes, and the big drop at the end of water ride sucked. Did not get wet at all.
4. Everything at Disney that said 2006 had Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, Pluto and Stitch on it. Stitch? What the fuck? Some of the cast members felt my pain. We even asked for a damaged picture frame that Stitch had fallen off of, no luck.
5. Completely fucking up my sleep pattern. Used to be up till 3, awake at 10 or so, later on my days off. During the vacation in bed by midnight, up before 8. Still having trouble getting back to the old schedule.

Listening to - Ella Fitzgerald Sings Sweet Songs For Swingers

Airplanes

Everytime I fly home I enjoy it. There is something about seeing the world from 25000 feet that makes me want to play SimCity. Everything is so simple from the air. Everything is divided and clean. The nice sharp lines of property boundries. The meandering way a river makes it way across the ground. The way hills look like folds in a bed sheet from high above. Hell, even junk yards look nice from above.
The best height is somewhere around ten to fifteen thousand feet. You can spot the specks of cars making their way along roads. Structures become distinguishable. Look for the small oval (high school track), normally in proximity to a green wedge or two (baseball fields). Malls become rectangles stacked on each other sitting on a larger black rectangle of parking spaces. Golf courses are large green swaths with numerous different green dots across it.

When I fly into Raleigh I try to find my house, and now it should be easier, since the normal flightplan takes you over the North Raleigh Borders, which I can usually spot. Find 540 to the north of the store, then find the water tower to the south, in between is the store. Unfortunately some old hag had the window, so I didnt get to spot anything but her blue head.

Now I have to find my copy of SIMCity3.