Kiss Goodnight

Well, it's been a few days and people have started to complain, but honestly most of the time my life here isn't THAT fascinating. Mostly I just do normal things during the day, then go to work at night. I'd love to go to the parks every day before work, but honestly it's a lot of trouble, and I find myself exhausted pretty much 24/7, no matter how much sleep I try to get. However, I don't sit at home ALL the time, so here's a recap of the past couple days.

The 19th I didn't have to work until 7 PM, so Allie, Alex, and I spent the day at MGM (ok technically it's DHS, for Disney's Hollywood Studios...the name changed in 2008, go back to my first blog and I wrote about this. But I still call it MGM because I'm stubborn and I like it that way). The park was pretty much dead, and we walked straight on to almost every single ride, with the exception of Toy Story Mania. However, we were able to fastpass it, which can be almost impossible during peak season. From the name, you'd think it was just another kid ride, but it's amazing. Especially if you like competition! It's basically a 3D "shooting game," but it is considered 4D because they have special effects such as wind when you shoot a balloon, etc. Also, the standby line includes a huge animatronic Mr. Potato Head, who is actually the first animatronic character able to remove and replace his own parts. I also decided to be very brave and try meeting a character. Bad idea. Much like cats always gravitate to the cat-haters, apparently characters can sense fear in people. Buzz cornered me (as evidenced by the picture below), and messed with me for probably close to 3 minutes (quite a while when there's a line of kids waiting for pictures too).

The next day (aka yesterday), Corri, Allie, and I were all off, and Alex only had to work until 3 in the afternoon, so we decided to make an evening of it. Alex made us reservations for 5:40 at Mama Melrose's, an excellent Italian restaurant located at MGM (*cough, DHS). We all dressed cute (yay!), and killed some time before dinner by taking pictures. See below...

DHS is all about the movies...this is a recreation of the famed "Singin' In the Rain," if you couldn't tell...

Allie, Corri, me, and Alex! No, that's not a real walkup/townhouse. It's part of the San Fransisco "set" towards the back of the park.

Our dinner was pretty awesome; we all had a ton of leftovers that we carried around for the rest of the night. We wanted to make the 8:00 Fantasmic show, so we raced to Great Movie Ride and thankfully got on with no wait. Next we (by that I mean Alex and I) had to get dessert for the show, so we stopped and got my new favorite park food, chocolate dipped marshmallows rolled in chocolate sprinkles (plus they come on a Mickey straw, you can't beat that!). After that Allie and Corri got in line for Fantasmic (they're only doing the show two nights a week since it's low season, so it can get pretty packed) while Alex and I literally ran for Tower of Terror. We were in the pre-ride room with the most OBNOXIOUS BTG (Brazilian Tour Group...they can be scary sights, I'll talk more about them later) ever. They screamed every time a light went on or off, and they were yapping so loud we couldn't even hear the pre-ride video. We made it off just in time to find Allie and Corri (who were already seated and saved spots for us), then Fantasmic started. Now, as anyone who has previously read my blog knows, Wishes is my very favorite thing ever (besides Cher of course), and it exemplifies Walt's vision in every way, but Fantasmic captures every aspect of Disney showmanship. It includes pyrotechnics, live performers, fire, video (projected onto huge sprays of water), and of course, an amazing soundtrack. While it includes quite a few princesses and almost every villain, it really is Mickey's show, which is fine by me (check out the subtitle of my blog, that should clue you in as to how I feel). After the show, Corri and I decided to drive around and check out the Boardwalk (the actual Boardwalk and the Boardwalk resort), and the Yacht and Beach clubs. I've never really spent time here, and I have to say I almost regret it. It was really nice and relaxing, and we had fun just walking and watching the people. We also were thrilled to find a dance club! All four of the roommates have repeated over and over how much we hate that all the clubs on Pleasure Island are closed (they're refurbishing the entire area). This is such a theme with us four that we even named our wireless network/apartment PleasureIsland...and it's also how I got my last blog title, in case anyone was wondering. On the next night we all have off (which could be a while, lining up our time off is something like trying to line up a slot machine), we fully plan on going out and dancing.

Today began as a lazy day for me, Allie and Alex both had to work and Corri had a phone interview at 3. Afterwards it was pouring, so I almost decided to stay home, but we decided to suck it up and head to MK. This was a good decision, because the rain had stopped by the time we arrived, but the park was still cleared out of most guests because of the previous downpour. We just wandered for a bit, stopping to get "pixie dusted" in the little girls store Castle Couture, riding Snow White's Scary Adventures and Peter Pans Flight, then visiting Allie at Cosmic Rays. They have amazing new billboards around the Fantasyland Expansion describing different coming attractions, so we also went and looked at all those. This is me beside one of them, with my very favorite princess (I basically AM Belle, I swear! Look, she's even reading!)

Eventually Alex met us, and we watched the new show (that takes place 20 minutes before Wishes). It's called "The Magic, the Memories, and You," and it. is. AMAZING. The castle becomes a sort of projector for a video, and photos taken during that day by the Disney photographers are also projected onto the castle! When I first heard this concept I thought it sounded a little dumb, but as usual, Disney pulled it off in high style. Even the details projected onto the castle itself are amazing. I have no idea how they did it (obviously they used projectors, but it's still an amazing feat). And it ends with the entire castle projecting a video of Walt saying "To all who come to this happy place, welcome!" Remember that from my last blog? A perfect ending, in my mind. Afterwards, we saw Wishes yet again! Then we waited around for about half an hour for the "Kiss Goodnight." This was just a little 3 minute bit in which they play Roy Disney's speech from the Magic Kingdom dedication while lighting up the castle with a bunch of sparkles (everyone knows how I feel about sparkly things), then Mickey wishes everyone a good night. Such an unnecessary but Disneyesque over-the-top touch.

There was basically no one in the park after the Kiss Goodnight, so I took this picture. No people in the background! That's definitely a first. This also seems like a great way to end this post.

So, until next time, have a magical day!

(P.S. I'm so living there someday.)