Tag: wdw countdown

World Class Whinging When WDW Wasn’t

by mkingdon, posted in Walt Disney World

You’ve known this was coming. I have known this was coming. The last few months have been like standing on a beach watching the tsunami approach, fascinated by it, but unable to do anything but surrender to its majestic and irresistible force. This blog post should have been my last before heading off to Florida for my special 50th birthday celebrations.

That fact that it is not may see levels of moaning and childish foot stampery than has ever been witnessed and we all know this blog has witnessed a lot of that over the years.

It’s a gut-wrenching pain. A sorrow so deep that it is eating me up inside as the intended day of departure gets closer. It’s the little things. That magical early morning at the airport when you are an over-excited bundle of new trainers, not much sleep and an £80 breakfast. The passive-aggressive social media posts from the airport with no other intention than to signal to anyone watching that you are going on holiday and they aren’t. Sigh…..

The happy, aimless wandering around duty-free shops, spending amounts on pointless perfume that you would normally resist paying for a week’s grocery shopping. That combination of dozens of perfume sample smells mixed with Starbucks coffee and raw anticipation should be bottled and sold….oh wait it probably is.

It’s the strange zombie-like state in which you queue for immigration upon arrival at Orlando airport and then jostle for your cases before inevitably waiting for Louise to spend half an hour on the toilet, despite having sat next to one for the last nine hours.

The sudden shock of being behind the wheel of a large unfamiliar car, on the wrong side of the road with a “trunk” full of luggage and a bum crack full of sweat. The toss of a coin decision as to which exit you’ll take out of the airport, as despite having gone every year for two decades, it always feels like they changed the entire road layout since last year.

The absolute all-consuming relief as you wedge your “as slim as it’s going to get for a few months” body into the booth at the first night eatery of choice after dumping the cases and doing the supermarket shop. The blissful feeling of a whole new holiday lying in front of you untouched.

You see, what I should be doing right now is stressing out over incoming tropical storms and hurricanes, wondering if the 20 day build up on the news will deliver total carnage or a light drizzle….like these two currently making their way to the US, potentially spoiling the holiday I’m not having. The fact that I am not currently spending more time with Denis Philips than my family is not OK.

Sigh……again. The mood, as you might imagine, has not been ebullient in Mkingdon Towers this week.

In this week that should have been, I don’t wish to come across like a “playa” but to lift the mood I bought a new car. I didn’t just wander into a showroom with a bag of cash and demand the keys. My average family saloon is three years into a four-year deal and typically this is past when we do a swap/upgrade. Having just had it serviced and MOT’d last week, I walked out of the dealership after the rare experience of not having spent a penny. I had a service plan that covered the routine stuff. I did, however, have an estimate for work that was “necessary very soon” for just over a grand, so dropping the car like a hot brick into the arms of the dealership giving me a “new” car was the right thing to do. I pick it up next week. I don’t know what day yet, but by rights, it needs to be Wednesday at around 11am when we should have been accelerating down the runway.

At my time of life, this new car should be a large red convertible. It is instead a silver mid-range family car. What mid-life crisis?

The car I should be driving next week is the ridiculously huge thing I have hired for our Florida adventure. It is an extravagance I feel no need to justify. What will be odd this next trip, which as you may know, is not happening next week, is that there will be other potential drivers. Usually, I do all the driving. I don’t mind. I enjoy it and I can even tolerate Diet Coke most of the time. However, Louise says she wants adding but we also have Tom and Emily who are both now over the magical 25 years of age. Emily doesn’t fancy it, not wanting to “kill us all”, but I bet Tom wants a go, so I may get a beer or two. Not being the best passenger in the world (control freak? Me?) I may need those beers and a blindfold to let someone else navigate the Orlando roads.

So when Wednesday morning comes, and I am sat on my seven millionth Teams call, barely feigning interest, my heart will be at Manchester airport and the trip that never was. I’d ask you to spare a thought for me, but I know that so many of you are in the same position and have your own struggles to deal with.

You might think that this blog post will be the drawing of the sting, and with the passing of departure day I will be “over it”. It’s almost as if you don’t know me at all. The week after next will be my actual birthday and next Sunday will not only see me continue to piss and moan about not being in WDW, I’ll be on the precipice of my fifties too. I bet you can’t wait.

Till the next time…..

The Hundred Day Bore

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon

For hardened rock and roll legends like myself, there’s a condition that afflicts us all, especially when you are of a certain vintage. Gigamortis is ravaging my body this morning after a Mustard outing last night at a 30th birthday party in Stockport. I told you I was rock and roll.

As enjoyable as playing is, it comes with a lot of pre and post show effort and of course a late night, so waking up the next morning feeling stiff (and not in a fun way) is an occupational hazard. It feels like I have been run over by a truck. I think it was the third stage dive, or maybe the twelve foot knee slide that may have tipped me over the edge.

On second thoughts it may be that I was sat in the lounge at 1.50am with a cup of tea and three jaffa cakes that destroyed my body. There’s only so much candle burning anyone can take.

Louise is working all weekend again ( I do wonder why these politicians keep going on about moving to a seven day NHS?) so that gives me a great excuse to do very little aside from the daily walking of the dogs. Rebecca, Tom and Freddie are due for Sunday tea later. In my current state the chances of me making a Sunday roast are zero, although I make good one, so a Chinese is on the cards.

You know that food is important to this family, and I suspect most of those coming for tea will be pleased with my decision. On the subject of food, whilst I was out gigging last night, a prior crime caught up with me. Here is a snippet of our family group chat of which I am not proud, but, you leave stuff like that in the fridge for more than a couple of days and there is only one outcome.

Now then, whilst you are here, look, we are at an important milestone….

Is there anything more tedious and tiresome that some idiot telling you how many days it is until their holiday? Suck it up, I’m telling you anyway. The digits will be double tomorrow and this countdown does seem to be progressing nicely. Being busy at work helps with that I guess, and on this week’s to do list was the renewal of my passport.

Much has changed in the ten years since I got my last one. Firstly, it seems a lot easier to do it now. It’s all online and you can supply your own photo. Last time I was up at the local Co-Op pumping pound coins into the photo booth trying not to recreate the Tenacious D video for Tribute (Google it). There were also a load of forms to fill in and post off if I remember rightly. We’ve come a long way baby.

The other thing that has changed is my photo. If you compare the two photos from this week and 2009 all I can say is that they are a fair reflection of the trial and tribulations of the last decade. I won’t be sharing the new one as I have the look of a stroke victim or a very tired middle aged man. Either way, it didn’t enhance my fragile sense of self-confidence.

It takes around three weeks for the new one to arrive and then I’ll have to go online and update all of our ESTAs, as Louise and I both have new passports and we need to put our US accommodation details for this year in. I’m not sure that really matters, but if it saves me a cavity search at Orlando airport it seems a small price to pay.

I have resisted the ADR urge this week. There was a brief moment whilst watching a Tracker video that a dessert party was almost booked (it was the Star Wars one at DHS we were watching, and the food looked tremendous) but a quick google confirmed my suspicions that it wouldn’t be on when we are there as Galaxy’s Edge will have just opened and you’ll need a FastPass just to get into the parking lot.

One thing I am trying to build into this year’s plan is something I’d be open to your suggestions on please. One thing we like to do, Louise especially, of an evening is to head back to the villa for showers, a liberal application of After Sun, and some loose fitting clothes and to head out for a nice meal. You know all that of course, but as an additional bonus, somewhere laid back to have a drinkie or two can be lovely if we can stay awake long enough. As an example, in previous years we have done so on the deck of Bahama Breeze whilst listening to the steel drum man. The Boardwalk can offer a similar experience, Disney Springs has a few places with this on offer and City Walk is a busier place to do this. In the absence of beach side bars, anywhere you know of that ticks these boxes would be interest. I thank you.

I am away now to cosset my gig ravaged body, take some drugs (Ibuprofen) before spending five minutes trying to make it look I’ve tidied up before Louise gets home.

Till the next time…..

Living in Slow Motion

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon, Walt Disney World

Traditionally, in the coming few days, we should by rights be setting off for another American adventure. The fact that we aren’t, yet, means that the next two and a bit weeks loom over us like some ominous time vacuum standing between us all and where we want to be.

Yep, we are now at that stage in the countdown where time slows down. The rational part of me understands that every minute, hour and day is of equal measure, but right now, the remaining time at work seems insurmountable, chocked full of days that will last for weeks.

Planning wise, I have spent a lot of time this week on the My Disney Experience app and website, booking further Fastpasses. What I only realised this week was that you can also add other stuff to your plans beyond Fastpasses and ADRs. I’ve found it quite handy to add in the entertainment schedule around the World Showcase on the day we will do that for example, so that we can try to have our tour around the countries coincide with the goings on in each pavilion.

Sarah, Rebecca’s friend, who is coming with us this year, popped round this week for a preparatory chat. It is fair to say she is just a little bit excited. I think all of us old timers are just a little jealous of what she is about to experience as a first time visitor and we are definitely hoping and planning to make it as special as possible. She likes rides and food and as such, there can surely be no better holiday experience for her.

We talked her through the essentials to take, which in summary was two pairs of comfy trainers, and an appetite, and walked her though the plan. I suppose it is quite an alien concept to have each day of a holiday mapped out in any level of detail, but as I explained to Sarah, it is key to know where we will be most days as then we know where we will be eating, which let’s face it, is the most important part of the planning. As I talked her though each day all she could greet it with was “I’m SO excited!”. Well, so am I.

Another landmark was passed this weekend with the final Mustard gigs before the holiday. We did two weddings this weekend to bring our “summer tour” to an end. Most of my fellow hard rocking amigos from the band are also heading off for holidays from about now and by the time we are all done we will reconvene in September to begin gigging once again.

wedding 8-8-15

Ryan the rucksack, who has recently been drafted into band duty, carrying around my leads and other musical paraphernalia, will now move back to his true calling as we prepare for departure. He is nothing if not versatile. I will need to ransack a few wardrobes now to find out where I safely stored my bumbag two years ago and there’s a US sat nav knocking around somewhere that I’ll need to blow the cobwebs off before we go. I’ve also noticed that Louise’s passport isn’t in “the folder” with everyone else’s, as she needed it for work recently. Louise, if you are reading this, please return it to “the folder” asap.

As I do before every trip with a few weeks to go, I got “the folder” out this week and went through everything to make sure it was in order. By that, I actually mean in order as in, correct but also, in the right order. I appreciate the OCD nature of this but I arrange the relevant documents in the chronological order in which they will be needed. This starts with passports of course, this year it is then security fastpasses, moving on to the car hire voucher, and well, you get the picture. That picture being that I am a sad individual who clearly needs to get out more.

As my social media is awash with folks currently over in Florida, it is whetting the appetite nicely. If you are one of those lucky folks, I only hope you can forgive me for wishing your holidays away. When you realise you are coming home already and it only feels like you’ve been there for five minutes, you can blame me.

So wish me well with the slog through the rest of the countdown. The struggle is real. I only hope the holiday goes as slowly as the next two and bit weeks will.

Till the next time….

It’s August and I’m Annoying.

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon, Walt Disney World

Well, hello August!!

For anyone without a current countdown to a WDW holiday we are now entering the zone where these weekly blogs will be unreadable…well, more unreadable than this stuff normally is. Florida is getting so close now, I can almost smell it, and the potential to upset those not due to holiday there with my constant countdown nonsense is immense.

One thing I try to do every trip, but seldom succeed in doing, is to savour these last days of the countdown. It is so easy to simply wish them away, desperate to get to the departure day, but, I honestly never know if and when we’ll have another countdown, so I try to fight my natural instincts and enjoy the fact that we have everything booked and the trip is so close.

This week we went sub 30 days on our countdown and for the first time ever this has meant booking some Fastpasses ahead of time. It went pretty smoothly for the couple of days we’ve done, but for our first day we’ll be there so early that it will hardly matter. We have a lunch time ADR at Crystal Palace and once that food hits our stomachs all we’ll want to do it head back to the villa and vegetate.

One the subject of these Fastpass plus things…I would welcome comments and advice from anyone who has used Magic bands and stayed off site. Our plan is for me and Emily to nip to Downtown Disney on our first evening and at Guest Services convert Emily’s Magic Your Way voucher into a ticket (she has a 4 day ticket to use before she checks in and gets her Cast Member one) and buy Magic Bands for all of us. Looking at the MDE app/web site it appears you can link Magic Bands to your tickets via that. Has anyone done this? Is it easy? This would certainly be easier for us than getting everyone to go to Downtown Disney in person when they will be tired and trying to unpack etc. We’d also rather get it done before we head to Magic Kingdom on our first morning as any delay at a ticket window and/or Guest Services will have me in fits of rage at the thought of all those people getting on rides whilst we faff about.

I also ordered and received some dollars. I say some, as they will no doubt not be enough. I have paid absolutely no attention to the dollar rate since booking. Until I physically have the cash ready to change there seems little point in stressing about it. On Friday when the time came I did about four minutes research into recent trends to quickly discover that all and any recent variances would mean about a $20 difference in total, so rather than sit watching the rate for the next twenty odd days, I just ordered.

As we speak, Louise is out “holiday shopping”. This may be a wasted task as she tells me that she is so terrified of the flight this year that she may well not get on the flight. To be fair, this is an annual event, but every year she tells me she feels worse about it. I’m sure with the correct prescribed medication and the usual red wine or two she’ll get through it. My hand usually comes off worst with nail marks there for weeks after as she grips it for dear life upon take off. The reward at the end the flight has always been enough for her to tough it out and so I expect this year to be the same.

So after this post today, there are just three more blog posts (Sundays) until we go. I shall shortly be procuring the customary new bright white trainers that are as much a part of a WDW holiday as Mickey Mouse and Ryan the Rucksack, and I am in the middle of my annual struggle to lose enough weight to allow me to eat like a lunatic in Florida and not have to buy a whole new wardrobe upon my return. Progress has been made, but not enough and the struggle continues.

As a distraction to the now almost endless obsession with the never-ending slow creep towards our holiday, (what did I say about trying to enjoy the countdown?) I am quite busy over the next couple of weeks with some gigging. Last night we played a lovely wedding in Cheshire and we have two more next weekend too. Last night was good fun, at a lovely venue, Hollin Hall In Bollington, with an appreciative crowd who never left the dance floor.

Here’s a lovely shot of the back of my head. I can’t believe nobody told me I had a bald spot!

hollin hall 1-8-15So I’ll see you here again next week for more stunning gig photography like that and more tiresome countdowning to our holiday. What more could you ask for?

Till the next time….