Royal Treatment

Math Man, Mr. Sha, and I had a pretty magical day.  It started by with the alarm going off at 5:00 a.m. and our inability to figure out how to silence the thing (so it must be magical).  Next, we packed up and headed to the front desk to seek a room change.  Cast Member Betty (more pixie dust!!) was not only able to accomodate our request for two queen beds, but she was able to upgrade us for a nominal charge to a Tower room at the highest level that's not "special club level" -- 11th floor! Magic! 

Off to Epcot we go!  Lunch with the Princesses, and they were so lovely!  We asked them to say hello to a special Princess back in Logan, and they all did.  Even Mr. Sha obliged to take a couple of photos!  Of course, this was soon countered by extreme royal sword fighting in Germany.  I loved the fact that they now have PINK swords, shields, and crowns.  Mr. Sha was handily defeated, of course.

Since the Joid is not with me, I had to ride the wimpy green version of Mission Space.  This did afford me the opportunity to take photos of the scenes in which Joid claims there is a Hidden Mickey in the clouds.  Can anyone spot it?

And the best part of Mr. Sha's day (not) was his introduction to fine music.  He attended a few sets of Starship.  This photo pretty much sums up his feelings:

Now we are back in our lovely hotel on the 11th floor.  Math Man is helping Mr. Sha with his math homework.  He won't answer whether doing his math is better or worse than the Starship concert.

Tomorrow...off to see the Animals!

We arrived! Today's adventures included a lovely second class air trip (complete with continuous seat kicking for second flight), and a cool rental car (Nissan Maxima -- keyless ignition! We couldn't figure out how to start it and had to ask). We got to our hotel in time to move dinner up (at the Wave in the Contempary, where Mr. Sha first learned he loves scallops) and had time to walk over to the Magic Kingdom to check out some rides. Since we were missing the Joid and the Stuc, we decided we would honor them by going to a totally awesome attraction first...Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor. You can see by the top photo the level of excitment this generated in Math Man and Mr. Sha. It was actually better than it was before. We also, believe it or not, went on the Tea Cups, and photographic evidence is hereby provided of this historic occasion. No turning of the central disc was allowed, so no tossing of the lovely dinner at the Wave occured. We manged to attend several attractions, including the tail end of a very patriotic Electric Light Parade, photos of which will be posted to my Picasa album. They are just too moving to be available for wide public consumption.

A new chapter in vacations begins

Here we are in our Hilton Hotel (which looks just like the Hilton I stayed at in Washington D.C. last weekend), starting our much anticipated vacation to the Holy Land. This is a new one for me. I realized on the drive down to SLC that I've taken vacactions, or at least work trips with some fun time tossed in, with just Mr. Sha, with just the Joid, with Math Man, with just the Stuc...and with the combos of Mr. Sha, Joid, Stuc; Mr. Sha, Stuc; Joid Stuc; Stuc, Math Man, Joid; ... every combo *except* Math Man and Mr. Sha! This will be a first!

I am a bit sad to not have the whole family together. I miss Stuc and the Joid, but know that in May we will have a glorious trip in which we celebrate all that is holy and pure about the most magic of places.

Mr. Sha is not too happy about the fact he must work on some math while on vacation. He actually did 14 of the 96 problems he has to do, so has 14.6% completed. It took him less than 30 minutes...but the build up of dread was at least an hour. He does not wish me to report his psychosis. He worked very hard to make up as much work as possible prior to our departure.

Math Man is laughing at a book Mr. Sha's teacher gave in to read about color. It has a chapter on romatic logos and features two rabbits humping. It promises to be an interestng week.

Tomorrow we rise at 5 a.m. to catch our flight. Stay tuned for daily updates.

The Michigan Mystery of Coney Islands

While in the Detroit Metro area this past weekend, we counted 14 different Coney Island dining establisments. Why does Detroit have so many? Well, let me tell you! According to the Internet's most reputuable source, Michigan actually developed a type of Coney Dog (with the other type developed in New York where the hot dog is served with saurkraut). The Michigan version is described as "a hot dog made from beef with casing, topped with an all meat chili, diced yellow onion and yellow mustard."

For more info, go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coney_Island_hot_dog

Additionally, according to Wikipedia, the "Coney Island" also refers to a type of restaurant in Michigan and northwest Ohio. It's usually a diner type of establisment, and they frequently include Greek and Mediterranean items on the menu - thus expaining the frequent "Coney Island and Greek Food" signs we saw.

We tried to snap photos, but it was difficult while driving! Here are a few, with Rick showing of the Coney Dog he had for lunch at a Greek restaurant on our last day there.

Now I've learned something new, and on my next trip to Michigan, I'll appreciate the Coney Island stands even more.

Summer

Since I posted a photo earlier of the front garden earlier, I thought it might be nice to show how the flowers have grown. It's hard to believe that in a month or so, it will frost and be time to pull out the flowers!

Back to Blogging, Back to School

Surgery got me side tracked. Back to blogging in earnest now! Both boys are back at school now. Here are there first day of school photos (which, as Jordan reminded me, I never have taken until now...but it was Jordan's last first day of high school so I had to start!)

Happy Birthday First!

We can't send cake and ice cream through the internet, but we can send you our warmest birthday wishes! Have a good one! Finally 21 - what a milestone!