100 Days of Wonder – #85
Happy 4th Sunday in Advent! Here’s Christmas tree number 4 added to the other 3 – this time from the Animal Kingdom. Again not my photo, a Disney stock photo that came with one of our downloads. I hope you are having a lovely Sunday. Mine has been lush so far. I slept late, had coffee in bed with Odin-cat keeping me company. I started to sort out my running gear for our Disney trip so I don’t end up in a last minute having to wash stuff panic in just over 2 weeks’ time. Then I had more coffee and a mince pie with Kath and her mum who dropped by. And I watched a flurry of snow flakes fall from the sky but not settle and then the temporary darkness turn back into glorious blue sky and sunshine. It’s a day with no plans. That’s made me think about how we plan Disney. I have said several times before that planning is part of the fun – and it really is – but I also see so many social media posts about extreme planning. We don’t plan Disney down to the last second like some do. When we had the Deluxe dining plan previously a lot of the planning simply revolved around where we were going to eat – that determined which park we would need to be in when. That dining plan doesn’t exist anymore and the general plan requires less planning because there are fewer sit down meals available. We have park hopper tickets so we can move between parks as we want and therefore our itinerary is far less fixed. We won’t spend money on Lightning Lanes (or whatever we are calling paid for access to skipping queues for popular rides this month), we’ll just roll with it. That might mean long wait times for some things and we might decide to queue for things, or we might not bother but the one thing we won’t do is rush from ride to ride. I don’t really understand people who try and rush round and do all 4 parks in 1 day. It just doesn’t sound like fun. But each to their own.
It seems to me there can be a fine line between planning so as to avoid stress – I have a plan for making Christmas dinner for example, with timings and instructions to myself – and over planning which just causes stress. Disney seems to bring out the latter in people. Although maybe that’s coming from a particular perspective of having the privilege of having been lots and the luxury of time. We are not trying to ‘do’ Disney World as a once in a lifetime holiday and nor do we have to cram in all our must dos into a weekend. And in addition, our must dos are not necessarily rides. My main must dos are to walk up Main Street USA and breathe, to sit watching the gibbons and stand watching the manatees, to listen to the Japanese drummers and get a popcorn bucket with maple popcorn. I think the only ride I would be really disappointed to miss is the Winnie the Pooh ride and that’s not because the ride is brilliant but because it’s the centre of my Hundred Acre Wood where I recharge ready to head out to explore some more.
100 Days of Wonder – #56
As I sit at home curled up under a ‘Nightmare Before Christmas’ themed blanket feeling grumpy that the current snow means I can’t make it to the work Open Day and therefore put extra pressure on colleagues who have been able to make it to cover for Law, I am trying to turn my focus on to happier things. But it’s cold and I have spent as much time worrying about logistics and whether/how I might be able to get into Leeds and then how we can still cover the day for potential applicants who have been able to get there as I would have done actually working the day. And I haven’t had the fun of talking to all the fabulous prospective students. So, Meh!
Meh also applies to cold days in Florida. As I have mentioned a few times, the first time I went, I was just in it for the winter sun and warm. And that’s what I got. The early mornings could be chilly but after that it was always very comfortable shorts and t-shirt temperature and sometimes it was actually too hot. The first time I experienced anything different was in 2009 where, for a couple of days, it was colder in Florida than in Alaska and there was a very fine sprinkling of sleety snow one early morning. Disney brought in big warm air blowers/fans to keep the little reptiles from dying and falling out of trees and I went and bought a hoodie and some thicker socks. Since then, I have been conscious that there is the possibility of a cold day or two but in 2013 and 2016 we had only warm days. In 2019 and in 2023 we did got a cold day or two. I particularly remember at the 2019 marathon weekend, on 10k day being huddled together to try and keep warm and using black bin liners over our running gear to help. Still, it was just a day or two. Today’s photo is from one of the coldest Florida days I remember. It was in 2023. We must have had a few cold days from what I remember because I was seriously considering having to buy another pair of long pants. So here we are, on Main Street USA waiting for the fireworks, feeling the cold even in our proper jackets. But we’re smiling and it was a fun evening and sometimes it really is just about deciding that you are going to enjoy it or make the most of something. So looking at this photo is making me think about what I can be happy about and enjoy right now:
- I had extra cuddles with Storm cat
- Odin and Einstein cats are curled up with us and their snoring is really funny
- The snow looked really pretty earlier
- We are safe and my team is safe
- I have coffee
- I can catch up on some life admin
- There’s a new lego set with my name on that I might start but even the anticipation of doing it is kinda fun
- I have been scrolling through Disney photos and am beginning to settle on the Christmas countdown selection – you have been warned!
- I can make a proper yummy lunch rather than relying on what is available on campus
- …there’s lots more once you start thinking about it – give it a try!
100 Days of Wonder – #43
As we are pretty much in the run-eat-sleep-eat-repeat phase of Dopey Challenge Training, let’s stick with the restaurant and food theme from yesterday. As I said, it was Disney Dining reservation day for us yesterday. The only restaurant we had on our list that was tricky to get was Chef Mickey’s. Chef Mickey’s a a character restaurant in the Contemporary Resort. I think it is popular for 3 main reasons: 1. It is where people can meet Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto – quintessential Disney. 2. It’s easy to get to and from the Magic Kingdom and 3. It is one of the few restaurants that opens really early for breakfast. Every time we have been we have had our first meal there – breakfast at Chef Mickey’s on Day 1 has become something of a tradition.
So Chef Mickey’s is where I first met characters in 2006. Remember, I wasn’t ‘fun’. It took me a minute to embrace humans in costumes as part of the magic. But I just decided I was all in. I bought an autograph book, I had fun with the photos. But anyway food. Chef Mickey’s is great because it is a buffet that has everything (probably including gadgets and gizmos a-plenty, whozits and whatzits galore…You want thingamabobs? [They’ve] got twenty!) which means yummy food, at our pace and the odd sweet treat or banana in the bag for later. Getting a cuddle with Minnie is just a bonus really.
This time though we are breaking with tradition. We were thinking about this anyway as on Day 1 it is sort of nice not to have to work with a rigid time frame and we will have to go to the Expo to pick up our running stuff. But then we couldn’t get a reservation for breakfast on Day 1 anyway nor for any of the days we had originally thought might be good. We did get a reservation – the day after marathon day which is great because we won’t have to walk far!
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