Orlando, FL - Day #3 Magic Kingdom

Lying in bed at 7:30am I thought, no way! How is it possible that Thing 1 is up, awake, hyper, and ready to go, go? He hasn't slept much in 2 days, and it's been a long 2 days! When will he EVER want to rest? When will he sleep? Where is this energy coming from? And most importantly, how do I get some of that? Enough whining, get your butt out of bed you lazy piece of crap.Thus, began day 3. Like every vacation that we've been on, this one seemed just as physically demanding as the rest of them were. Unlike the others, however we were planning on visiting Magic Kingdom this day. But even as an adult with arguably childish hobbies, how excited can someone possibly become about visiting Magic Kingdom? When I was six years old I would have been going out of my mind, and in fact I think I did that one time my family and I went to Disneyland in LA (of course Mom put an end to that very quickly with yelling and beating which resulted in crying, screaming, and Kodak moments that immortalized that entire experience). This was going to be different, though! This time I was there as the parent with my own family, and my good buddies from residency were there with their families.

So out the door we went at 9am. I didn't realize that the parks actually open at 9am; I thought they were already open at 7 or 8am. No wonder the parking lots seemed almost empty when we arrived that day. Another peculiarity about at Magic Kingdom was how one actually entered the park. I was accustomed to parking the car, then riding a trolley to the front entrance to buy your ticket. Not the case here. For anyone who hasn't been here you have to park your car, then take the trolley to the main gate, then from the main gate take a train or boat over to the front entrance....and from the front entrance you ride a hot air balloon to this beacon in the mountains, where a pack of dogs and a sled team takes you to a guide awaiting your arrival on this glacier where you travel on foot until......Okay, not the latter three. But you get the point.


Izzy, Thing 1, and Thing 2. Looks like someone fell in the back there.


That bulge is my cel phone. No, really.

Magic Kingdom is where all the classic rides were, and I think we rode them all. One reason we were able to do so is because the weather wasn't very kind to us in the morning. Sure no one likes 80 degrees and 90% humidity at 9am, but 65 degrees and rain and drizzle aren't weather favorites on most people's list, either which was the case here. So the wait times weren't too bad for each ride; maybe 20 minutes was the longest. Snow white, Small World, Peter Pan, and Haunted Mansion were all done. The kids loved it.


Although it was tough to tell with Dryden's expression, or lack of. I couldn't tell if it was boredom, stoicism, or stimulus overload. It couldn't have been fatigue because this was the first ride of the morning.






Now, usually Small World is my least favorite ride and it's something that I never had a particular interest in. But am I must say I was very thankful for this ride on this day. It was during this ride that I had time enough, and it was dark enough that I figured out that my camera flash wasn't going off. Thank God for Sony's technology for capturing light in low-light areas. I would have had even worse pictures than I already had; no wonder everything was slightly blurry or under-exposed!

Stupid camera! Where's my auto-flash?

While we were walking, we saw this sign that said "start time: 2 minutes". I had no idea what it was, but everyone just starting running in this building. When in doubt, follow the leader. Following K, we plunged deeper and deeper into the dimly lit and winding corridors until we stopped at a counter with glasses. A show! And a 3-D one, no doubt. This would be interesting, as neither of the kids have ever watched anything in 3-D.

During the show, needless to say Thing 1 and his buddy Iz were having a blast, laughing it up through the whole show. At one point, Thing 1 was swiping the air in front of him, trying to grasp at the 3-D images he saw. Meanwhile, Thing 2 had no clue what was going on. He was content to watch the show WITHOUT the 3-D glasses, which meant watching a blurry show. Everytime I put the glasses on him, he'd watch the screen for 5 seconds and then start screaming. Granted, Thing 2 is a big chicken to begin with but when you're 2 years old and you're watching Donald Duck throwing a fit as if he were on an LSD high, I can see how things can get a little scary.

It was approaching noon, and there were still so many things to do and see. One thing that K recommended was a show that played every so often at the castle. Not sure what it was all about since we missed the beginning but there were characters, singing, dancing, and music.



Whatever it was, it was enough to entertain hundreds of people.

By the time the show was over, it was past noon and by that time we were all hungry. Time for lunch, but where to go? We ended up eating what Roxanna fondly referred to as park food in a little tavern/restaurant next to the Haunted Mansion. I'm still trying not to think of where they got their meat. That didn't stop Dryden from devouring his food, nor did it thwart his attempts at devouring his brother's, mother's or my food.

I actually tried taking pictures and video inside the Haunted Mansion but it was so bloody dark it was pointless. Now that I think about it, I should have taken out my old Sony bazooka video cam with night vision. Oh well, maybe next time.

After the Mansion, K and the family were "parked" out, having visited amusement parks all day for the 3rd or 4th day straight. And who can blame them? There's only so much happy-happy-cheerie-brightness one can take. I almost felt like I needed to watch Dark Knight to balance things out. But I had just the remedy for that, something that would enable us to stay at the park a few hours longer.

Pirates of the Caribbean! Another dark ride, literally. Luckily the whole Pirates mania had died down by this time (I guess some thanks should also go to the horrible writers of the 2nd and 3rd movies). Again, throughout most of the ride I was watching Dryden's face for some sort reaction, but like a Small World, Dryden was very stoic. Sensory overload, again, perhaps? He actually showed more emotion and excitement after the ride when we walked out in to the souvenir store for Pirates. Unfortunately, the same thing happened as in the Mansion and the whole ride wasn't very picture friendly. Oh well, no pictures of this, either.

Afterwards, we wandered for an hour or so, watched another parade, and then finally decided to go on one more ride before heading home. Of all rides, I'm not sure why we wanted to go back to Dumbo. But we did, and so there we were. Obviously, Keenan was too young to go on this. So R and Thing 1 would ride Dumbo while Keenan and I watched from below. It was during this time where I started to play around with my camera a bit more in preparation for taking R's and Thing 1's pictures during the rides. I took about 4 test runs and they all went fine. By the 4th time, I think people were beginning to wonder why I was randomly taking pictures of strangers on a ride. And of course as Vince-luck would have it, once R and Thing 1 got on the ride I blew it! I took a bunch of blurry pictures, but thank god I was able to recover and got some nice shots.




It appears that everyone was still having fun. But actually we were all dead-tired by this point and wanted to go home. So that's what we did.

Orlando, FL - Day #2 - Marathon Day

This morning was pretty tough: sleeping in an unfamiliar bed always makes me sore everywhere in the morning. I was still operating on a bad sleep deficit that probably rivals our national deficit in terms of hours. And what REALLY didn't help was the fact that Thing 1 was SO wound up from the trip that he didn't sleep until 11pm the night before, kept Thing 2 up all night as well, and woke up at 7-ish.

But that was fine. Getting up early would tire both kids out and also let us get a good jump start to the day. Apparently, we had a lunch reservation at one of the Disneyworld Parks, the Hollywood Studios to be exact. The funny thing about this, or the not-so-funny thing about this (depending on how you look at it) is that this reservation was apparently made months ago and I had no idea that we even had a reservation, what it was all about, where it was, or anything. In retrospect, I recall talking to Kev about it and he mentioned it off-handedly the day before. However, as I inquired more about this and my confusion quickly became apparent he deftly changed the topic of conversation. Slick, but it didn't go unnoticed, Kev.



This reminds me of National Lampoon's Vacation trying to get to Wally World. At this point, I felt like Chevy Chase running through the parking lot. We had finally made it.



So this is what the lunch reservation was all about:

Having lunch while a group of Disney Characters walked around, signed autographs, took pictures, and danced to music. From the kids' perspective I can see how this was loads of fun. From the parents' perspective it was great, too because you'r children could be loud and unruly and it was okay. Because ALL the children in the restaurant were like that when the Disney characters started dancing and singing and you didn't have to worry about your children bothering anyone else's quiet mealtime. Also, it was an all-you-can-eat buffet with decent food. That was KEY!



For some inexplicable reason Thing 1 took a particular liking to Oso. And if you can imagine this picture with both of them jumping up and down in unison, that's exactly what happened. It was hilarious.



Now for some strange reason, Thing 2 really didn't like any of the characters. Not one. I'm not sure if it's because the costumes make them look 10 times bigger or what. He was quite scared when they came by for photos.



Sorry, Thing 2, but this is going on the internet for all to see. Almost as funny as my niece's picture with Goofy when she was about 3-4 or so. Actually, funnier.

After lunch, we headed out and just outside the door was Star Tours. Unfortunately, Thing 1 was about 1 inch too short and wasn't allowed on to the ride. Sorry, kid. Next time. But that didn't stop Kev. So away he went. And somehow R convinced me to follow him so I found myself in line, too.



But Kev and J were too far ahead of me and I didn't want to cut in line. So whoopee! Here I am, riding a thrill ride....by myself. It was then that I realized that parents have fun at these amusement parks when their kids have fun. I couldn't care less about going on these rides on my own. But when I have my family with me and they're having loads of fun, it doesn't matter what ride I'm on, or how lame or awesome it is, or what we're actually doing. If Thing 1 and I went on the Cinderella ride and he loved it, then I'd be enjoying myself, too.....I'd just be getting in touch with my feminine side. Which is what actually happened. KIDDING! There's no such thing as a Cinderellla ride.



So after Star Tours, I came out of the ride and couldn't find anyone. Not even Kev, who was just ahead of me. R and the kids were no where in sight. It's times like these when I'm thankful that I have the car keys. So I called up R and she told me where she was, which wasn't helpful in the least because R had the map. She could have told me she was at the front entrance and I'd have no clue which way to go. So I did what any typical guy would do: wander aimlessly without stopping and asking for directions.


I wandered the streets of Manhattan for a bit. Just like I did when I was a med student and I was doing rotations in New Jersey and New York City. Believe it or not, there are some similarities between Disney and NYC: it's definitely an international place with people from just about every country speaking many different languages, there's a ton of things to do and see, and you can easily get trampled to death by the mob.


Then I wandered the streets of San Francisco for a bit. Not really sure why, though since I lived there for about 20 years. So things weren't looking so good, especially since I was heading back in to the neighborhood of San Fran. Hell, I had to get out of there fast!

Thank goodness just past the next snack bar I caught up with our baby caravan. R and Thing 1 had lined up to take pictures with Buzz and Woody, leaving everyone else outside. It was a 45 minute wait and so while I tried to amuse Thing 2 outside, Thing 1 and R were slowly making their way towards the promised land.

That's not to say we weren't amused, though. While we were waiting, Thing 2 had fun pushing around the stroller in circles. And I had fun watching the Green Army Man character from Toy Story scare the crap out of Thing 2.


Good work soldier! Keep on scaring those kids; it's a matter of national security.


Meanwhile.....



Thank goodness they had things for kids to see and do during their 45 minute wait to see Buzz and Woody. I'm not sure what his expression was all about...maybe making a face makes you fly higher?








Finally, the promised land!!! What amazed me about this whole thing is that Thing 1 was such a good boy during this whole time. And I could tell that by R: she was smiling and pleasant. See, there's no need to ask, "How did things go with the kids? Did Thing 1 misbehave? Was he difficult?" It's all readable in the Mom. When Mom is happy and laughing, smiling, and pleasant, then you know the kids behaved and were good. When Mom looks disheveled and her eyes are glowing crimson with a dark expression, no need to ask. You know the kids were bad. And the first thing you don't want to ask is, "how were the kids?" But if you are clueless/brave enough to ask, be sure you're out of projectile range or that you can dive for cover behind something close by.



Uhhh.....who is this guy, again?

By this time, it had been about 2 hours after lunch and Thing 1's bladder must have been exploding. First order of business: Thing 1 to do Number 1. So we walked a bit further and found the washrooms. Ironically, we wandered in to the area where there were a bunch of OTHER Disney characters taking pictures, signing autographs, etc., etc. I figured why not just check out the lines, see how long they were, and if they weren't too bad we could line up some more.


More Jake the Pirate. I still have no idea who this is or what he's all about.


Thing 1 had no clue who these guys were or what they were all about but I had him take pictures with them anyway.


First thing he did was hug Pooh. Not even sure why. Maybe it's because he's a big furry animal and the first instinct is to hug him?

After that we headed back towards Star Tours because I had seen earlier they actually have a little skit for people to see and for kids to participate in. I was hoping Thing 1 would be able to take part; lightsaber battles with Darth Vader. Who wouldn't love that? But as we did a 180 and began our walk back, we noticed a crowd starting to line the streets. Apparently, a parade was about to begin. So we jockeyed for a spot in the front row and waited...and waited...and waited in the hot sun and slightly humid air with other hot and sweaty people hovering just over us. And so finally the parade started.

Just when they went to sleep!

So the dilemma was: the kids were obviously tired. Should we wake them up to see this parade that we've all suffered and waited for or should we just let them sleep and catch up on rest and have them miss out on all the Disney characters parading? Who knows when the next opportunity would be to see all the characters all at once so close, again. It's times like these when for some reason I can clearly hear Gah's voice telling me,

"Ah, let 'em sleep later! They'll won't have a chance to see this again for a long time." Okay, wake up! Wake up!

Funny thing happened during this parade. We actually saw a Thing 1 in the parade! Since when did they make a character out of my son?
Can we collect royalties on that? So just in case you can't really see the resemblance...




See? No difference, right? I swear Disney has our family pegged. Check out these other pictures:



Yeah, I can't tell the difference either.

But anyways, seeing the characters from Up was probably the highlight of the event because it was like seeing Thing 1 as himself in the parade. Journey on!

Back at Star Tours, Thing 1 watched as all the stories about Darth Vader not being real faded away. Seeing him live and in person made Vader just as real as the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, or the Tooth Fairy. Which is fine because that's exactly what I believed in when I grew up: Easter Bunny, Santa, Tooth Fairy, and Darth Vader. (Yes, a very disturbed childhood)




By this time, it was late. The sun was setting and it was about 5-ish. At this point we had a choice between calling it a day and going home, or checking out Fantasmic. Again, this was another dilemma: we were all tired and hungry. Should we go home and rest or should be press on and get every penny's worth out of our admission ticket regardless of how excruciating it was? We opted for the latter, which in retrospect was probably a big mistake for reasons I'll explain later. So we bought dinner (park food, or overpriced fast food. Whichever term you prefer) and went to go get seats for Fantasmic.

Now I have no problem getting to shows early for good seating, especially when I'm on vacation. But we were about 1 hour early and we had 2 restless and tired munchkins whom we had to keep amused without scolding them or going crazy. Ethan Hunt, where are you? But we did it, we lasted and so did the kids. They watched and enjoyed the show even though they had no clue what was going on. It was all eye candy for them: lights, and fireworks, and dragons, and canons, etc., etc. And the blaring music that was 10 decibles too high from speakers that were too close to the audience. 2 minutes in to it and my ears were ringing and my head was pounding. Hell, I had no clue what was going on either at that point.



Finally! It was time to go home. Remarkably, we got home around 8-ish and were able to bath and put them to bed by 9pm. I thought that after this day, the kids would be so wiped out and they would go down like a ton of bricks. That was true of Thing 2 because he was unconscious the second we put him in his crib. I have no idea where Thing 1 got his energy but he was wound up again and was fooling around until about 10pm before drifting off to sleep.

Orlando, FL - Day 1

When you have that feeling that you've forgotten something when you leave the house, you probably have. Especially when it's 7am and you're on your way to the airport. The adventures started already when we left the house. The kids were packed, we were packed and we were running late as usual (It probably didn't help that I played hockey the night before- a possible explanation for me moving a little slowly). About 5 minutes in to our drive to the airport, R realized that she had forgotten her glasses.

"Oh well, that's okay. Everything will just be really blurry for a few days, then." Well, what's the point of going to Disney World and Universal Studios if you can't see? So I turned the van around and returned home. We picked up R's glasses and headed out to the airport once, again.....not realizing that I had forgotten my checkbook, as well. Not something you want to leave at home when you're going on a trip.

The 180 minute plane ride was grueling as could be expected with a 4 year-old and a 19 month-old. But we survived (barely) and arrived in sunny Orlando where it was a balmy 80 degrees. NOT the perfect weather for jacket, jeans and long sleeves. But when you're leaving an area where it's 40 degrees, how do you dress?

So already when we disembarked the plane, we were all already uncomfortable, sleepy, tired, and hungry. Now add to that hot and sweaty. Next order of business: collect luggage and get the rental car. Sounds simple enough, right? For those of you who have never driven at Orlando, FL international airport, let me say that it is a little stressful. The signs to return to the terminal are about as confusing as trying to navigate the Los Angeles freeways. The signs read:

"Return to Terminal A, far right. B, far left." So you go right. Then,

"Return to Terminal A, far left. B, far right." What? Crap! So you change 3 lanes over, almost ramming the 2 cars flying up behind you in your blind spot. Then,

"Return to Terminal A, far right. B, far left." Dammit, I was just there! You try to change lanes back, but too late. You're leaving the airport. Then you have to decide if you'd like to leave the airport via the north exit, or the south exit. Uhhh.....what difference does it make?

After 2-3 laps of this I finally got the hang of it and made my way back to the correct terminal where R and the kids were waiting. Kev waited there with R so that she wouldn't be left all alone with the kids. That was super cool. The next 5 minutes or so was spent loading up the car, getting the car seats installed, and....figuring out where I was going.

Which brings me to another point: always know where you're headed from the airport. The Top Gun Maverick "Fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants" thing doesn't work well in these situations. I was planning on following Kev to the hotel since we were all staying at the same hotel. And being that he was driving a minivan and I was driving an SUV, it should be no problem keeping up.

Wrong again. That guy has a lead foot regardless of what vehicle he drives, so needless to say I lost him. More stress. I quickly asked R to help me navigate via her Maps app on the iPhone, but of course we were in a location where the iPhone couldn't get a good signal. So much for fancy shmancy iPhone 3G blah, blah, blah. More stress. At that point I got a little snippy, but unrightfully so. So I kept my mouth shut and just drove.

About 20-30 minutes later we reached our destination, the Sheraton Vistana Resort where I met up with my good buddy from residency, Kris and his family. By that time it was 3-4pm. Too late to do anything interesting with kids, so we just got some take-out and called it a night.

Dryden Stories

Ah, yes. Let the tales begin. For years we've been laughing at Gong Wing, Mui, Wei, and Stevie about all the funny things they've done when they were younger. Sooner or later, Dryden's time would come. It's like a coming of age in the Wong/Hume lineage.

Now one thing that Gah always told me was that babies aren't stupid. And they're not. At about 7-8 months Dryden was able to recognize his milk bottle and everytime he saw it he would start crying because he wanted it. He wanted the milk in it and he'd bawl until he either forgot about it, or we finally fed him.

So one day Richel went out to buy some more bottles/sippy cups because we only had 3 of them (only?). I'm not sure how many we actually need because he uses 3/day. In any case, Richel bought another 3 probably to cut down on washing the dishes all the time, maybe? Plus the mouth pieces were starting to yellow and look a little icky.

At the store, Richel picked out another package of bottles that look exactly like the ones he uses now. Up until then Dryden was having fun riding in the cart and fairly happy. But when he saw the bottles he instantly started crying because he wanted milk. He didn't realize that bottles in the package only contain air. New concept for him.

A few weeks later I was home with Dryden and getting him ready for his bottle/snack. I always chit-chat with him and tell him that I'm going to feed him and after that he can rest a little bit and play a little more. Usually he's struggling to break free of my grip because he hates being in the high chair; he twists and turns and looks all around. But once I uttered the word "nai-nai" he snapped his head and looked straight at me before I even before I finished my sentence (Huh? What was that? Nai-nai?) and started wailing.

Well, he's got the milk part down pretty well.

Homecoming Part VI

Well, much has happened since our visit to Canada. And unfortunately I haven't had time to keep up-to-date with all the blogging. Man, this could take hours. But let's continue where we left off...

The next day in Montreal, we decided to drive to Vieux Montreal since it really wasn't a close walk, and it was hot and muggy, and Richel was in delicate condition. After getting lost and driving around aimlessly for about 30 minutes, we finally found our way (hey, it wasn't my fault. They actually closed off a series of roads.)

This time we were determined to visit the inside of the Basilisque de Notre Dame. I had heard of beautiful churches and such, but I was not prepared for the spectacle within the Basilisque. In one word: incredible, awesome, magnificent (...oh, that's 3 words). This is definitely a recommended place to visit if ever in Montreal.





Later, we walked the streets of Vieux Montreal. I've been told that walking around this part of the city is much like visiting Europe, so that's something that I really wanted to do. It was difficult, though, because I can walk forever. Unfortunately, with Richel's condition we couldn't walk too far or go too fast (she was 7 months along at this point). But we did the best we could, enjoying the archaeic architecture; it definitely had a very old French feel to it.



I thought this building had a very French feel to it...except for the Honda in front.



This was a very interesting building. I believe this was city hall. But there was really nothing interesting inside, just a big open hallway with a bunch of rooms off limits to the public.


It was fun walking down the streets of Old Montreal, pretending to be in Europe. Although, we didn't have to try very hard to pretend. I did have a burning desire to suddenly speak French to everyone, but was afraid my horrible accent would offend someone.


By this time Richel was becoming seriously annoyed with me, as you can probably tell by her expression. I can't blame her, I wanted to walk here, walk there, check this out, etc. And when it's 85 degrees with high humidity and 7 months pregnant, it definitely is not fun. Although I suffered Richel's wrath I knew that one day in the future we'd look back on this day and reminisce and laugh. And that inspired to me to just push on, even though I probably shouldn't have.


The oldest street in Montreal.



While walking around, it was Richel's determination to find a French pastery. How typical, satisfying that insatiable sweet-tooth of hers. Fine. We did find this one place that sold these little pastery/truffles. I was blown away by these things. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of the shop, but these truffles were so rich with flavor, yet light and in no way too sweet. They were perfect. I had never tasted anything so refined and perfected before, not even Chinese food. (We later bought French truffles in Chicago because we missed these things so much but they weren't even close. Too heavy, too hard, too sweet.)


These were pictures of random buildings that I took. I wasn't sure of their significance or history, but I thought they looked very European, and very French. I thought they had a lot of character. Believe it or not, this reminded a lot of Old Port in Maine.