JC Butterfly
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Oct 8, 1999
Hello all, I would like to welcome you all to my life as it was experienced from July 25-July 30 2002. The cast includes myself, Brenda (age 27) and my best friend, Janet, (also 27)
July 25th
4:00 a.m. Oh, it can't really be time to get up can it? It's still dark! The birds are definitely not chirping. I guess it doesn't matter since I couldn't sleep all night anyway. The bags have been packed for a week.
4:30 hop in the shower
5:00 pack bags in car
5:10 unpack bags from car, forgot to pack my pillow, can't sleep without it.
5:15 re-pack bags in car, think . . . boy they sure are heavy
5:20 un pack bags again. Decide to not bring the 12-packs of soda will buy when we get to Orlando.
5:30 re-pack bags in car. I'm due to meet Janet at the airport in 30 minutes. Decide to call her and see how things are going.
"What time is it?" She asks sleepily.
"WHAT?!?!?!?! You're not UP yet?!?!?!?!"
"Our flight doesn't leave until 9:00" she complains
"Yes, but we agreed to try to go standby for the earlier flight" I scream.
"Oh, did we agree to that?" she wonders, "I guess I'll get up then."
Much foot-stomping later I wait 5 minutes before leaving for airport.
I arrive at 6:00 a.m. Janet is there waiting. We proceed to the Northwest counter and learn that yes there are seats available for the 7:00 flight, YEAH! Unfortunately, there is some kind of "problem" with the plane and they can't confirm exactly when it will take off. They suggest we stick with our original 9:00 flight.
"Is there room on the 7:30?" I ask
"No"
"How about the 8:15 a.m."
"No"
So I try to get an earlier connecting flight from Minneapolis.
"Miss," the Northwest employee begins - - I HATE being called Miss-- "I'm sorry but your flight was booked with frequent flyer miles and is not eligible to be changed at this time."
"Are you sure?" I inquire, knowing I had just done this about a month ago.
"Yes, I'm sorry."
"Oh well," I think I'll just hang around the Madison airport for a couple hours. There is NOTHING to do at the Madison airport and Janet is peeved at being there so early.
However, as we wait in line at the security check I discover the merits of arriving early. As I send my backpack through the security person monitoring the x-ray calls over another individual.
They send it through again and look together. Whisper to each other and then escort me over to a table where I must remove everything from the back-pack (I stuff this puppy).
So I'm laying out my cd player, which they inspected. My tubes of lipstick that they tested on paper, batteries, granola bars, travel pillow, feminine products. Piece by piece they are laying it out on the table (hey, it's my carry on & purse). Then they send the backpack through again. More talking to one another. They send it through again. They take my completely empty backback over to *another* security person and have them run it through the x-ray machine.
Finally, I ask them , "What seems to be the trouble?"
"There is an unusually shaped object that we can't seem to find in your backpack."
They allow me to look at the x-ray screen. I see a familiar pair of ears making that funny shape.
Attached to the bottom of my backpack is a plush keychain of Mickey in his cruiser wear. I tell them that I believe he is the mystery object.
So they lay out the backpack so that Mickey doesn't get tucked underneath and sure enough, security issue solved! Just for good measure they have me remove my shoes and send them trough and run a portable metal-detection device over my body. When they decide I am "clear" (after holding up the line for about 20 minutes) they let me re-pack my backpack.
Now its about 7:00 a.m. Janet smiles at me, "Well, you helped us pass the time."
So we sat around the airport for about 1 1/2 hours before we could board our flight to Minneapolis.
While there I call Florida Tours to confirm our town car pick up. Spoke with Andy who was to be our driver. He said he was looking forward to meeting us and would definitely be there as planned
So we ate lunch at Fridays at the airport and sat there quite a while since we arrived at 10:00 a.m. and our flight to Orlando didn't leave until 3:30. We mused that we could have driven there in about this amount of time. The Minneapolis airport is COLD!! I had a sweatshirt but wished I had my jacket too.
When standing in line to board the plane, I was selected at random to have my bag searched. Janet just started cracking up, "Well, Brenda, not everyone in Minneapolis has seen everything in your bag yet" So she boards the plane while every single compartment is searched in my bag again (there are 3 main compartments and about 10 "hidden" ones) I think they were sorry that I was the "random" candidate. This time they seemed much more satisfied and I was allowed to board.
We were 20 minutes late in taking off but luckily we arrived in Orlando in time. There is a Disney Store right on the corner of the Northwest section and I almost started crying as I saw the Sorcerer Mickey and realized we weren't going to visit him at all! But oh, well, onto new adventures.
Andy was in baggage claim waiting for us with a bright sign and an even brighter smile. He greeted us warmly and told us he was looking forward to being our driver for the week. He walked us over to wear our luggage was to be picked up and then explained he had to go get the car. He told us exactly where to meet him and that it would be a white town car.
I didn't know they came in white! Luckily our bags arrived in short time and we headed out to find Andy.
The car was beautiful! It was a late-model white towncar that was impeccably clean. We carried our luggage over to Andy (2 large uprights each) and he insisted that we wait in the air conditioned car while he loaded our bags.
We asked if we could stop at a grocery store to get some pop. He said he would be happy to take us wherever we wanted to go and did we have a particular place in mind. We did not so he elected to take us to Publix.
We only bought chips & soda but the line we were in had the register break down when it was our turn so it took at least 15 minutes to straighten out.
We apologized profusely to Andy when we returned to the car but he said "You're on vacation, don't worry about anything."
I felt so special as we pulled into the Hard Rock Hotel. The gated entrance made me feel just like a rock star might. As we arrived at the hotel one of the valets, Gavin opened the door took my hand and helped me out of the vehicle. Gavin and Andy loaded our bags onto a rolling cart.
I kept thinking to myself, "You are not at the All Stars anymore!"
There was a huge event taking place in the lobby with loud music and lots of food. We were given complimentary tickets to attend.
Rich, helped us take our things up to the 5th floor. We had been upgraded to a pool side room (hadn't even asked) but unfortunately it had a king bed -- we wanted 2 queens. Our reaction let Rich know that we expected something different. He called down to guest services and got us a new room. Wasn't able to get the pool view as the hotel was quite full.
We were taken up to the 6th floor. In the elevator corridor was a display of 2 NSYNC members clothes. We let out an audible scream since we were soooooo excited to finally be there and our whole purpose in coming was to see NSYNC.
Rich laughed and told us to visit the Royal Pacific since the guys were staying over there. We were so bummed because we thought for sure they would be at Hard Rock, but oh well.
We were taken to our room, #6033 and had a view of the back of a building and a parking lot. Not the best view but since we were only paying $165 a night compared to what it could have been, I guess it wasn't so bad. Rich said, wait until tonight, then you'll be glad about the view!
Rich went downstairs and got us new keys to the room. We unpacked and headed out to the pool. As soon as we stepped outside my glasses fogged up and I couldn't see anything, this was a sensation I was to get used to for the remainder of our time there.
The pool was busy but not overly crowded at 8:00 p.m. We decided to walk over to Universal to get a "taste" of it. It started lightly drizzling rain on our way over but we were grateful that it made it seem a little cooler. The walk over is very pleasant along the garden walkway. We saw boats passing by and in less than 5 minutes we were at the entrance to Universal.
The entrance was pretty impressive, we felt like we were on the set of "Gladiator" or something. Once inside we wanted to go straight to Jaws. Of course, there were so many distractions along the way. We HAD to go on E.T. and was disappointed that the Express pass line was closed, hey we wanted to try out our new status. We waited about 20 minutes.
It was worth it, what a sweet ride. Totally had me believing that we were there to help E.T. get back to his home planet. The atmosphere of the ride was incredible. I loved the sensation of "flying" over the town. At the very end E.T. thanked us by name, it was so cool . . . we really should have gone on this again!
Jaws was closed, so we headed over to Earthquake. I had tried to rent the movie before going but that didn't work out. The first room was OK but it was the experience on the subway that really got us. It was awesome to be up close and personal to an 18 wheeler catching on fire and beams "falling" on our head.
We did some light shopping and decided we were really pretty tired so we headed back to our room. It really is quite a hike from the elevators to our room. And the hallways are FREEZING (never noticed any music).
At about 9:50 we heard something that sounded like gunfire outside. So we pulled back the curtain to see the most amazing fireworks show happening right in front of us. It went on for about 10 minutes and right afterwards the other park started up theirs. What a perfect end to the day.
We arranged for a wake-up call by James Brown and settled into the MOST comfortable bed in the whole world.
Tune in for Day 2 coming soon
Brenda
July 25th
4:00 a.m. Oh, it can't really be time to get up can it? It's still dark! The birds are definitely not chirping. I guess it doesn't matter since I couldn't sleep all night anyway. The bags have been packed for a week.
4:30 hop in the shower
5:00 pack bags in car
5:10 unpack bags from car, forgot to pack my pillow, can't sleep without it.
5:15 re-pack bags in car, think . . . boy they sure are heavy
5:20 un pack bags again. Decide to not bring the 12-packs of soda will buy when we get to Orlando.
5:30 re-pack bags in car. I'm due to meet Janet at the airport in 30 minutes. Decide to call her and see how things are going.
"What time is it?" She asks sleepily.
"WHAT?!?!?!?! You're not UP yet?!?!?!?!"
"Our flight doesn't leave until 9:00" she complains
"Yes, but we agreed to try to go standby for the earlier flight" I scream.
"Oh, did we agree to that?" she wonders, "I guess I'll get up then."
Much foot-stomping later I wait 5 minutes before leaving for airport.
I arrive at 6:00 a.m. Janet is there waiting. We proceed to the Northwest counter and learn that yes there are seats available for the 7:00 flight, YEAH! Unfortunately, there is some kind of "problem" with the plane and they can't confirm exactly when it will take off. They suggest we stick with our original 9:00 flight.
"Is there room on the 7:30?" I ask
"No"
"How about the 8:15 a.m."
"No"
So I try to get an earlier connecting flight from Minneapolis.
"Miss," the Northwest employee begins - - I HATE being called Miss-- "I'm sorry but your flight was booked with frequent flyer miles and is not eligible to be changed at this time."
"Are you sure?" I inquire, knowing I had just done this about a month ago.
"Yes, I'm sorry."
"Oh well," I think I'll just hang around the Madison airport for a couple hours. There is NOTHING to do at the Madison airport and Janet is peeved at being there so early.
However, as we wait in line at the security check I discover the merits of arriving early. As I send my backpack through the security person monitoring the x-ray calls over another individual.
They send it through again and look together. Whisper to each other and then escort me over to a table where I must remove everything from the back-pack (I stuff this puppy).
So I'm laying out my cd player, which they inspected. My tubes of lipstick that they tested on paper, batteries, granola bars, travel pillow, feminine products. Piece by piece they are laying it out on the table (hey, it's my carry on & purse). Then they send the backpack through again. More talking to one another. They send it through again. They take my completely empty backback over to *another* security person and have them run it through the x-ray machine.
Finally, I ask them , "What seems to be the trouble?"
"There is an unusually shaped object that we can't seem to find in your backpack."
They allow me to look at the x-ray screen. I see a familiar pair of ears making that funny shape.
Attached to the bottom of my backpack is a plush keychain of Mickey in his cruiser wear. I tell them that I believe he is the mystery object.
So they lay out the backpack so that Mickey doesn't get tucked underneath and sure enough, security issue solved! Just for good measure they have me remove my shoes and send them trough and run a portable metal-detection device over my body. When they decide I am "clear" (after holding up the line for about 20 minutes) they let me re-pack my backpack.
Now its about 7:00 a.m. Janet smiles at me, "Well, you helped us pass the time."
So we sat around the airport for about 1 1/2 hours before we could board our flight to Minneapolis.
While there I call Florida Tours to confirm our town car pick up. Spoke with Andy who was to be our driver. He said he was looking forward to meeting us and would definitely be there as planned
So we ate lunch at Fridays at the airport and sat there quite a while since we arrived at 10:00 a.m. and our flight to Orlando didn't leave until 3:30. We mused that we could have driven there in about this amount of time. The Minneapolis airport is COLD!! I had a sweatshirt but wished I had my jacket too.
When standing in line to board the plane, I was selected at random to have my bag searched. Janet just started cracking up, "Well, Brenda, not everyone in Minneapolis has seen everything in your bag yet" So she boards the plane while every single compartment is searched in my bag again (there are 3 main compartments and about 10 "hidden" ones) I think they were sorry that I was the "random" candidate. This time they seemed much more satisfied and I was allowed to board.
We were 20 minutes late in taking off but luckily we arrived in Orlando in time. There is a Disney Store right on the corner of the Northwest section and I almost started crying as I saw the Sorcerer Mickey and realized we weren't going to visit him at all! But oh, well, onto new adventures.
Andy was in baggage claim waiting for us with a bright sign and an even brighter smile. He greeted us warmly and told us he was looking forward to being our driver for the week. He walked us over to wear our luggage was to be picked up and then explained he had to go get the car. He told us exactly where to meet him and that it would be a white town car.
I didn't know they came in white! Luckily our bags arrived in short time and we headed out to find Andy.
The car was beautiful! It was a late-model white towncar that was impeccably clean. We carried our luggage over to Andy (2 large uprights each) and he insisted that we wait in the air conditioned car while he loaded our bags.
We asked if we could stop at a grocery store to get some pop. He said he would be happy to take us wherever we wanted to go and did we have a particular place in mind. We did not so he elected to take us to Publix.
We only bought chips & soda but the line we were in had the register break down when it was our turn so it took at least 15 minutes to straighten out.
We apologized profusely to Andy when we returned to the car but he said "You're on vacation, don't worry about anything."
I felt so special as we pulled into the Hard Rock Hotel. The gated entrance made me feel just like a rock star might. As we arrived at the hotel one of the valets, Gavin opened the door took my hand and helped me out of the vehicle. Gavin and Andy loaded our bags onto a rolling cart.
I kept thinking to myself, "You are not at the All Stars anymore!"
There was a huge event taking place in the lobby with loud music and lots of food. We were given complimentary tickets to attend.
Rich, helped us take our things up to the 5th floor. We had been upgraded to a pool side room (hadn't even asked) but unfortunately it had a king bed -- we wanted 2 queens. Our reaction let Rich know that we expected something different. He called down to guest services and got us a new room. Wasn't able to get the pool view as the hotel was quite full.
We were taken up to the 6th floor. In the elevator corridor was a display of 2 NSYNC members clothes. We let out an audible scream since we were soooooo excited to finally be there and our whole purpose in coming was to see NSYNC.
Rich laughed and told us to visit the Royal Pacific since the guys were staying over there. We were so bummed because we thought for sure they would be at Hard Rock, but oh well.
We were taken to our room, #6033 and had a view of the back of a building and a parking lot. Not the best view but since we were only paying $165 a night compared to what it could have been, I guess it wasn't so bad. Rich said, wait until tonight, then you'll be glad about the view!
Rich went downstairs and got us new keys to the room. We unpacked and headed out to the pool. As soon as we stepped outside my glasses fogged up and I couldn't see anything, this was a sensation I was to get used to for the remainder of our time there.
The pool was busy but not overly crowded at 8:00 p.m. We decided to walk over to Universal to get a "taste" of it. It started lightly drizzling rain on our way over but we were grateful that it made it seem a little cooler. The walk over is very pleasant along the garden walkway. We saw boats passing by and in less than 5 minutes we were at the entrance to Universal.
The entrance was pretty impressive, we felt like we were on the set of "Gladiator" or something. Once inside we wanted to go straight to Jaws. Of course, there were so many distractions along the way. We HAD to go on E.T. and was disappointed that the Express pass line was closed, hey we wanted to try out our new status. We waited about 20 minutes.
It was worth it, what a sweet ride. Totally had me believing that we were there to help E.T. get back to his home planet. The atmosphere of the ride was incredible. I loved the sensation of "flying" over the town. At the very end E.T. thanked us by name, it was so cool . . . we really should have gone on this again!
Jaws was closed, so we headed over to Earthquake. I had tried to rent the movie before going but that didn't work out. The first room was OK but it was the experience on the subway that really got us. It was awesome to be up close and personal to an 18 wheeler catching on fire and beams "falling" on our head.
We did some light shopping and decided we were really pretty tired so we headed back to our room. It really is quite a hike from the elevators to our room. And the hallways are FREEZING (never noticed any music).
At about 9:50 we heard something that sounded like gunfire outside. So we pulled back the curtain to see the most amazing fireworks show happening right in front of us. It went on for about 10 minutes and right afterwards the other park started up theirs. What a perfect end to the day.
We arranged for a wake-up call by James Brown and settled into the MOST comfortable bed in the whole world.
Tune in for Day 2 coming soon
Brenda
