Tag: Disney CRP

A Gig With Midges….Ure.

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon, Walt Disney World

I sit here with another gig under my belt. This might explain the unsightly bulge, but with each one, I feel I’m getting somewhere closer to the standard required. We played a charity gig last night, and despite it being a little chaotic in the early parts, once we got set up and playing it was good fun. It’s always nice to get a good reaction and we did. The fact that most of the audience had been drinking all day had nothing to do with it I’m sure.

charity gig grapes 13-6-15By the time we got on it was bloody cold and we made a lovely meal for the entire midge population of Bolton too. It was good fun though and I was home at a much more reasonable half twelve as well.

The only other bit of news this week is one that we’ve been sitting on for a while. You may remember my hysterical over emotional rant back in April when Emily came home from the Cultural Representative Programme? It seems half the internet got involved and some of the nastiness and abuse I got, both publicly and privately was truly a bit scary. I didn’t share any of that on here as I didn’t want to fan the flames, but trust me, it was vitriolic and worrying. This meant that when I posted an update to that rant a few days later I was suitably vague about how Disney had redeemed themselves.

This was mainly because I felt that had I shared what had happened, certain parts of the internet may have exploded in disbelief and outrage and with our emotions still all over the place it was the last thing anyone needed, especially Emily.

With considerable water under the bridge now and my blog visitor levels back to the usual readers (mainly) hopefully I can share the news with you without having to check under my car each morning before turning it on. Crucially, this week Emily decided to blog about this so I feel it’s OK now for me to mention it here. It would always be her call.

So when I said that Disney had been in touch, they had. The Head of Recruitment called Emily about three days after she got home and said that they had found her a role in Merchandise (where the offending tattoo can be covered) and gave her a range of dates to consider. Surprisingly, they even offered to fund her flight back to the States. So after a lot of thought she chose to start this August and finish next June. We are hopeful that she can fly out with us when leave for our holiday. We’re just waiting for confirmation from Disney that this will be OK and that they have booked it for her.

I really, really, don’t want to open up any more debate about the rights and wrongs of what happened. I’ll say now that I won’t publish any comments (nasty or nice) about the rights and wrongs if they go any further than wishing Emily well.  It is likely those so intent on abuse last time will come across this update and want to continue to call me anything from a liar to much, much worse. My blog, my rules. Only Emily and to some extent us know everything about what happened and nobody was without blame. Hopefully, this news can just be taken for what it is, which in my view is just a good end to a not very good situation.

I have another request. If you are connected to Emily and want to send her a message, please avoid doing so publicly on her Facebook. Her current managers, who were kind enough to immediately take her back on when she returned would see that.

So for those who have asked recently if Emily was coming on holiday with us etc, this is why I have avoided answering you. Sorry!

Obviously we are very pleased that Emily has a second chance at this experience and I thank those at Disney who were gracious enough to make it happen. We are also very proud of Emily who handled the issue better than I did at the time and has had the courage to go back and try this again despite the experience she had last time.

It certainly feels good to have shared that at last!

Till the next time….

Dear Emily…..

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon, Walt Disney World

It’s not long now until you will be leaving home. We’ve always known it would happen one day, but so soon? When you and Rebecca were growing up, it felt like you’d be children forever, and here we are with both of you young women already. Time has snuck up on us again and just like the blink of an eye from you arriving into our lives to today, what felt like an eternity until you were leaving is now just a few short hours. Everything we thought we had so much time to do is now a rush before you go and if that’s not a metaphor for life I don’t know what is.

I know at the back of your mind you wonder if you are ready for what is to come? I wonder if I am ready too. Even though you are going to be twenty in a few months, you are still our daughter and the instinct to protect and look after you is unshakable and never-ending. Having worked so hard with you to get you this opportunity, mine and your Mum’s hearts are bursting with pride at what you have achieved, but they are also breaking in two that you won’t be around for so long.

Once we are all through the pain, tears and heartbreak of the airport goodbye I want you to remember a few things whilst you undertake your American Adventure.

1. Relax, you’ve got this. Don’t worry about anything as there is absolutely nothing to worry about. Should anything go wrong you are only a few hours away and we can either be there with you or have you home in the blink of an eye. With that in mind take each day as a new opportunity, soak it up, wring it dry and make the most of it. It will be over before you even realise.

2. Work hard. Whilst you will be in your happy place there is a job to do and you must do it well. Grab the job by the scruff of the neck and be the excellent cast member we all know you can be. Delight every guest, give them the magic you adore so much and you will get much more back in return.

3. Trust yourself. You are great, believe me. Don’t feel intimidated by others with more self-confidence or more years on the clock. They are just as lost, confused and unsure as you and everybody else is. Nobody gets Disney more than you, be yourself, and everyone will love you as we do. Listen to your instincts, trust that you’ve been brought up correctly and do what you know is right. Be considerate to others but stand up for yourself.

4. Have fun, lots of it. Embrace social situations and the chance to meet others who feel as you do about WDW. Be a little crazy, (in moderation!), laugh till you cry, make friends for life and remember every day only comes along once. I promise you, not too far in the future you will wonder where the year went. Make it count!

5. Record your memories. For God’s sake don’t spend the year staring at your phone, but do make sure that you record your experiences. We want to see everything of course, but when it’s over you’ll want to look back on your time there again and again.

6. Treasure your room-mate. They are going to be very important to you in your time over there. Look after each other, look out for each other and DO NOT let your room get into the state it does at home. You will be sharing some of the best times of your life with them, treat them well and if they don’t do the same to you, tell them!

7. Be Tough. There will definitely be times during the year that you will get fed up. I know you will be in WDW, but it is still the real world and there will be times when you are tired, home sick, lonely and grumpy. Sit tight, it will pass. Remember what it took to get there, think back to those long London journeys and grueling interview processes when you never thought you’d get to where you are now. Go to a theme park, have a very calorific snack, watch a parade, send a Tweet, Instagram or Snap Chat (not that I understand the bloody thing) or get on Skype to one of us. We’ll show you the inevitable rain outside where we are and make you feel better. Everything and everyone here at home will still be here when you get back.

8. Be Careful. Orlando is still a big scary city filled with its fair share of not very nice people. Don’t drop your guard or your common sense and do silly things. Always travel with someone, keep your wits about you and your eyes open.

9. Keep in touch, but don’t put the pressure on yourself to be Skyping us every day. You’ll be busy, we’re busy, we’ll do what we can when we can. However, a simple message on a regular basis to let us know you are alive, eating, healthy and happy is a requirement. Think on!

10. Be proud, every day. You have come through a highly competitive selection process as the youngest in the entire UK application pool. You have overcome some real challenges as I know you thought your shyness and lack of self-confidence could hinder your chances, but you have shown others with more life and work experience how it is done. Remember that, always. You is kind, you is smart, you is important! Carry that approach on, especially in the early days as you meet new people and settle in. Be you, cos you’re great.

From that day of your first interview when I said goodbye to you in Starbucks and watched you walk away to the group of applicants you were meeting, I have known exactly what it has taken for you to do this. My heart broke then as I watched you leave me, as it will on Tuesday, as you leave once again. But you know….

All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.

I know now that you are your own woman and you can look after yourself (most of the time!), but we’re here, and always will be. Your determination and drive have been literally awesome and we are all so proud of you pud. We’re going to miss you more than you will ever know. We’ll be counting the days until our trip in August even more than usual. This experience will be the making of you. You deserve it and it deserves you.

Remember, relax, enjoy, embrace every experience and we’ll be thinking about you every single day.

dad scruch nose

mickey 1

 

emily airport

 

louise 2007

emily

1emily yummy

Mum, Dad and Rebecca x

In The Bleak Mid Easter.

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon, Walt Disney World

Right, I have two complaints.

1. Who the bloody hell said it was OK to pinch an hour of my weekend? I have not authorised this.

2. I was “promised” an Easter heat wave. Instead I have just returned from walking Oli and it took me longer to remove my layers than it did to do the walk.

As we wave goodbye to March, we seem to be doing so with November weather and it simply isn’t good enough. The end of March is often welcome as it signals better weather, often some days off work and for us the end of what is a very busy month. It starts with my Mum’s birthday, closely followed by Mother’s Day and ends in a flourish with three family birthdays in the space of two days, one of which being Louise’s.

So from a cash flow perspective I am glad there is only one March in each calendar year and it is now almost behind us. We celebrated last night, both Louise’s birthday and the ending of her training with a Chinese meal in Tottington, a small village not so far away. For the first time in a very long time, it was the four of us. It was nice for it to be so and we had a lovely meal. It will of course be the last time we can go out and be together in this fashion for some time, as time marches on and Emily will soon be overseas. The case, is out…..

We are all making lists, mental and physical of what she must take. It all has to fit in that case though, not due to an airline restriction, she has a 43kg limit as she is flying all posh and Premium, but more because she won’t be able to lift anything heavier. Louise now has time at home before she starts work, so will be able to make sure Emily is all prepared and packed of course.

On the day itself, it has been decided that the farewell party will be kept to a minimum at the airport. Just the four of us will make that journey. Emily doesn’t want hordes of family weeping uncontrollably as she will be in bits anyway. She’ll just to have to contend with me, Louise and Rebecca sobbing away.

This week, Emily has sorted out her room-mate. A young German girl called Lea, who she has been chatting to on Facebook for weeks now. Disney have a clever online thing where they can link themselves to others to denote they want to share a room etc, and they can also put their preferences down for which accommodation/complex they want. None of it is guaranteed of course and she won’t find out until she gets there, but it is highly unlikely she won’t be put with her nominated roomy. It has been trickier for Emily to sort this out as she is under 21. The rest of those starting in the UK on her date are all over 21 and this means Emily can’t live with them as they will be able to have alcohol in their apartment. So it was very handy that she got chatting with Lea, who is even younger than Emily. Emily is rubbish at drinking so it is an enormous sense of comfort to me that she won’t be able to do it over there. Her last attempt at a drunken night out here ended up in A&E and several weeks of limping with a badly sprained ankle.

It all got very real for Emily earlier this week when one of those already out there sent her this, which is currently pinned up in the kitchen at the Rose and Crown.

rosecrown list

She’ll be there to see it soon.

I have spent a lot of the last week (none of it during working hours of course) searching for a car. A few weeks ago I flogged mine and get a short-term lease on another to give me time to look around at what I want next. After weeks of doing so I’m more confused than ever and no closer to a result. I have been through about six different “I’m getting one of those” and now have no clue at all. I think I need to stick a pin in something soon as it is driving me insane.

I do not enjoy the process of buying cars, I have to be honest. On all but one occasion in the past, I have come home with my purchase feeling as if the deal I have done has the sales chaps rolling about laughing in the showroom. Used car salesmen, like double glazing sellers, get a stereotypical bad name, and I’m sure it isn’t anything like true, but the one chap I have spoken to this week about a car I was interested in has done nothing to remove that impression for me. My suggestion of a discount off the listed price brought about a reaction as if I had asked him to sacrifice his first born. He countered my offer with one that represented no discount whatsoever and has hounded me ever since despite me telling him to stick it (politely). It’s a first world problem for sure, and hopefully I shall solve it next week.

I must go now as I need to encourage the qualified nurse I live with to make me some tea.

Till the next time……

A Busy Blog About Being Busy

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon, Walt Disney World

It has been a busy week. It has been a busy weekend too, and so I won’t have much time to be waxing lyrical (or whining and moaning) here much today.

Work is stupidly busy at the moment. The upside of that is that the days and weeks do tend to shoot by. Home life too is hectic, with Louise’s final weeks of her placement and studies before she qualifies, Emily preparing for her departure and Rebecca popping in every now and again for food, money or bail money. Yesterday she was involved in a minor car accident. She wasn’t driving and thankfully everyone is absolutely fine but it’s just another minor drama that we seem to take in our strides these days.

I may have mentioned last week that I was slightly upset with my car. It had more ailments than a hospital ward and so I resolved to get rid, rather than spend the fortunes to fix it. Courtesy of one of these “We Pay You Much Less Than You Car Is Worth.com” services I did exactly that on Saturday morning. As pleasing as that was to get that done and out of the way so quickly I now have no car. This is a mild inconvenience to say the least.

Hopefully that shall be resolved tomorrow, on a short term basis at least.

The rest of this weekend has been spent playing my bass. Of course you all know that I am a guitar God, and that I have been playing regularly for the past twenty years. I play once a year, regularly. Since my last gig sometime around 1995 my playing has been limited to showing Rebecca a few bits and bobs, so it is safe to say that I am very rusty.

The reason for the playing of the bass is that the band my brother has been in for some years is in need of a bass player and I am to give it a go. Having learned about 25 songs on Saturday my head hurts, but not as much as my fingers, arms and hands. We shall see if my brain and meagre talent will be enough to be able to do a decent job of it. If not I shall bow out gracefully, but fingers crossed I’ll be OK. Well, I would cross my fingers but the huge blisters on the end of them are getting in the way. Luckily, even though I haven’t kept up the playing, my rock star six pack has remained so I have something to bring to the party.

So with my head spinning from such a hectic week and weekend I hurtle into a new week for more of the same. Conscious that I am short-changing you word count wise this week, I shall point you at a blog from Emily. It’s been a while, but she brings news of final preparations and paperwork from Disney.

We’ve just filled out her Visa application (another £130 plus trains and a hotel in London again) and booked her appointment at the US Embassy for early March. Have I mentioned what a long arduous and expensive slog this thing is? This is her last administrative hurdle before the plane.

As it’s taken me three hours to type this using the few fingers that do not have blisters on them, I shall call it quits and try to get some R&R in before the madness starts again.

Now then, how does Jump by Van Halen go again???

Till the next time…….

Books, Blogging Again and Being Busy

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon

It feels like a long time since I did my last proper blog. Some might argue that I have indeed never done a proper blog, and I for one would not be one to argue. However, I of course mean that it has been a good few weeks since one of these regular Sunday evening things.

The return to work was truly awful. I don’t mean that there was anything particularly bad this week, rather that it was just soul destroyingly boring and such a jarring contrast to the previous two weeks. It was about mid afternoon on my first day back when I sent Louise a text to tell her I wasn’t sure I could make it until the end of the day, never mind the next week, year or till retirement.

I did of course, as I have to. I’ve hated other jobs and companies far more than I do this one. In fact it is hard to fault where I am now, but of course it is still work, and I do still have to go.

Louise had her own challenges, being straight into irregular shifts at her new placement, this time in A&E. The highlight of the week for Louise has been to watch the removal of a couple of eyes for donation. She’s strange like that.

To make matters worse, after the first week back at work, I have been weekendless, as it just so happened that I had to go away with work. There was a launch event at Celtic Manor in Wales for our whole company, so from early Saturday morning until my about 3pm today that’s where I’ve been.

Celtic manor
To the Manor driven…on a coach

It’s a lovely venue, although I only got to see the inside of a conference room and my bedroom, but still it looked nice. Oh and Wales, let me know when you have a mobile phone signal and 3G and I may come back.

So life feels busy at the moment, and it is stopping me from cracking on with the trip report. I have started, and I think I got up to the part where we take off. So not very impressive progress.

Next week, I’m down in Marlow at head office for a couple of days, so getting anything done next week isn’t looking too good either. Real life does always seem to get in the way.

So far, I have been dodging a few questions about when I’ll post it and where. This is because I don’t know. Or at least I didn’t. Without even realising it, I seem to have sub consciously decided that it is going to be a book. This is because the format in which I started to write it is that, rather than for any forum. As I say, a decision made without me realising it.

This isn’t some attempt to make more millions of pounds from book sales (NOTE: I haven’t actually made millions of pounds from book sales). I think it will force me to do a better job, certainly in terms of spelling and grammar.

I don’t plan to charge for this book. However, Amazon do charge me for “delivering” the book, and as it will contain many photos, so I’ll just have to cover that. This does of course mean that it won’t be ready for a while.

What I might do is post Day One here when it is done. I hope that is OK?

In other news this week, Emily submitted her application for the Disney Cultural Representative Programme.  For those that don’t know, this is the people you see in World Showcase in each of the pavilions. Emily has had this in her mind since about the age of 15, so it is a bit of a big deal.

UK Pavilion
CRP People

Competition is fierce no doubt, but all she can do is give it her best shot and see what happens.

Rebecca starts her college course next week too. She will be studying Media Make Up and Hair at Bolton College. She has small ambitions to end up in Hollywood doing the make up for major movies and stars. Fingers crossed.

Based on my feelings about my last week at work, as ever, I just want them to find something to do that they enjoy and are passionate about. If you don’t, it sure ain’t fun.

So with a following wind and a bit of effort I should be able to get Day One posted at some point next week. If you read it one word a day, it might keep you going until I get the whole thing finished! Consider it the perfect stocking filler for that relative you don’t really like!

Till the next time….

Ending Eras

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon

Football isn’t a topic I cover here very often.  This is because nobody can seem to discuss it on the internet without eventually turning into an arse.  Besides, I’d always be right and everyone else would be wrong.

However, football has it seems come to the end of an era all of a sudden.  I can’t remember so many retirements at one time, and it may take a while to sink in, but I don’t think many folk recognise the impact of all these eras that are about to end.

The likes of Beckham, Carragher, Scholes and Owen have been ever presents for what seems like forever, and they have all decided to call it a day at the same time.  The fact that Fergie has joined in too means the new beginnings of next season are exciting, unknown and a breath of fresh air.

Jamie Carragher
He isn’t going to Carra on

I know it is only football, but you only have to have watched Twitter this afternoon to see the impact it has on people.  Condolences to all Spurs fans by the way.

We too are staring down the barrel of an ending era.  Both Emily and Rebecca are due to leave their secondary school this summer.  Emily has been there since 2006, and Rebecca 2008, and it will be strange to have no connection with the school that I went to all those years ago too.

The seemingly endless parent’s evenings, school trips, projects that are always started too late and all that homework that simply could only be done with a large chunk of parental involvement.  It’s all coming to an end.

Maybe.

Rebecca is hoping to study Media Make Up and Hair at college so no doubt I’ll be using my enormous knowledge about hair to help with her course!  Emily is preparing to apply to Disney for the year-long Cultural Representative Programme, and hoping not to need a Plan B should she not be lucky enough to be accepted.  It’s going to be very competitive but we’ll see how it goes.

Neither her or Louise and I have completely reconciled how difficult it would be to have Emily live overseas on her own for a year!!  However, Emily’s impending adulthood also brings home just how quickly things are moving along.

To counter that, I do find it endearing and touching how you only have to sit Emily in front of Les Miserables for a couple of hours to see the little girl in her pouring out of both eyes.  It gets to her every time, and the blubbering is guaranteed.

By the way, as I type this, we are watching the DVD for the second time this weekend.

I was very pleased last week as both of the girls secured part-time work in the same bakery.  Frankly, they are becoming a very expensive hobby, and with this little bit of cash they may be able to start to support themselves a little.  They start next Saturday, and as grown up as they seem it does feel strange knowing that they will be out in the big wide world.  There speaks an over protective Dad.

Rebecca appears to be developing some sort of WAG lifestyle, with false tan, hair products galore and more make up than a Kiss tribute act.  Once she starts to pay for some of these out of her earnings it will be interesting to see what she does.

On a personal note this next week sees the conclusion of a major project at work, and I know you will be sick of me referencing it, but believe me not as sick as me.  Don’t get me wrong I am enjoying what I do, but this has been a long road and I just want to see the smegger done and dusted now.

This weekend has flown by in a whirl of DIY, dog grooming and dodgy European singers.  Yes, last night we all endured and enjoyed the Eurovision, and it was the usual mix of madness and pure crap.  Still, it is odd yet strangely reassuring to think that as I was posting pithy and annoying crap all over Facebook, somewhere out there in Azerbaijan or Belarus there was another similar balding overweight forty something doing the same thing.  What he would have made of Bonnie Tyler I will never know, as frankly I wasn’t sure either.

Oli
Streamlined Oli

Till the next time…..

The return to work ramblings.

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon

Rain, Downtown Abbey, Strictly, X Factor, darker nights, wearing my large pants and a lack of planning.  All these are signs that we are entering autumn, and our holidays are well and truly behind us.

So the world turns most years.  I am quite impressed that I have managed to get three days of the trip report done, which is a lot more than I thought I might.  These low expectations of output were mainly as my return from holiday saw me start a new job…again.  I really do want to keep the blog away from work as much as possible, so I won’t rattle on about it too much.  To summarise, I was approached shortly after starting my last new job, by an ex colleague about an opportunity where he now worked.

It took some time, but just before I left for holidays it all got sorted and I started as we returned.  Suffice to say it is just “better” in pretty much every way, and I’m a happy chap and consider myself lucky to have had the offer.

So on we go, and I really hope we can avoid any further talk of work for quite some time now!

I write this post on the day that is exactly 100 days to Christmas.  I only tell you this as I don’t see why I should be the only one to deal with that fact.  I simply cannot cope with a Christmas in my condition.  There was no pre holiday diet this year, and despite only eating salads for the entire trip (plus the odd Donut burger, and a few desserts) criminally I have added a few pounds.  For me though, the first few weeks back afer a holiday are the toughest food wise.

Banana Cream Pie
Why did I put weight on????

Whilst away your body is used to taking on food whether you like it or not.  Indeed the biggest challenge of most of our days in Florida is trying to convince your body that you are actually hungry even though you have already consumed the calorific limit of a small town already.

So when back in the UK, mix in a massive change to the body clock, and a reduction in calories of around 3000% and you can pretty much guarantee that hunger is a constant companion.

With my new job I have also had to be away from home for a few nights.  This means that getting a healthy diet is less than easy.  So no doubt since returning, I have added yet more poundage.

So as I was saying about four paragraphs ago, I can’t afford any thoughts of Christmas just yet.  So if you are feeling in any way festive feel free to keep it to yourself until around the 15th of December.

In real life news this week, Louise has a bad back.  It “went” on Thursday, in a similar way in the way in which it last went in 2010.  I know it was then, and can tell you the exact day as we were away in WDW, for my fortieth.  I remember her literally having to crawl across the room at Beach Club Villas to use the loo.

Similarly incapacitated this time around she has had to spend much of the last three days laid low, and in a lot of pain.  There are signs of returning to normal but she is still struggling.

Emily went to Blackpool yesterday.  It was to work on the second part of her Photography coursework.  The first half was to take photos in WDW, and then once home do the second half somewhere not quite so glamorous as some sort of contrast.  She did OK and enjoyed most of it, apart from the drunken brawl on the train on the way home.  She wasn’t actually involved of course, but was very close to what sounded like quite a bad punch up.  The police came and turfed them off the train, and Emily and her friend continued their journey pretty shaken up.  On top of that Emily has had a bit of a set back, in that it appears she is unable to apply for the Disney Programme she wants to do until she is 18.  That isn’t until next July, which would mean she probably couldn’t start until the summer after.

So now, she has the problem of what to do with herself during what is looking like an enforced gap year.  Ideas on a postcard please.

Emily has started work at a local charity shop to get some retail experience for her Disney application whilst she looks for proper paying part-time work.  Again, ideas and offers of employment are welcome.  Her specialist skills are lie ins, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram and Facebook with a high level of expertise in shoulder shrugging and TV remote control use.

Rebecca’s weekend has centred around a “gathering”.  She went to a boy’s house last night with a few friends for a “gathering”.  We suspect she has designs on said boy as there has been quite a bit of socialising and tweeting, and the preparation for this casual “gathering” began at around 9.30am on Saturday and she left the house at about 7!  It is best that I don’t ask too many questions in these situations, but I have sent the boy in question the customary horse’s head so that he clear of the consequences of any behaviour that may not be in the best interests of my daughter!!  These are testing times for a Dad.

So my weekend has been a bit hectic with Louise laid up, with big shops, trippie writing, taxing the girls, tidying etc.  Before writing this here blog today we all watched The Father of the Bride for about the millionth time.  It is one of our all time faves and one that we can watch time and time again.  Each time I do watch it, it reminds me that the events of the film rush ever nearer to us, and whilst I can guarantee that neither of the weddings I will be paying for will be as expensive as the one in the film, I do wonder how I would cope with “giving” them away.

Father of the bride
As long as it is in WDW it’ll be OK

Granted, some days I would gladly pack their bags and drive them where they wanted to go, but I have to say I’m not looking forward to that.

So after waffling on about nothing in particular I shall leave you.  It is clear that I am not yet back in the swing of blogging and promise to do better next week!

Till the next time…..