...and only one more working day!  Yippy!

3 more weeks until Disneyland!

Did you get your tickets to the parks yet?  Last year, we got a 3-day Parkhopper pass (both parks).  That included parking, and early entry one day.  If you're a BCAA member, you can get the pass at a AAA office, which was the cheapest place we found.  But it might not be worth it if you're not driving.

The early entry was worth it if you want to get pictures with the characters and/or get autographs and/or try out the rides.  You get to go in an hour before Disneyland opens and all the characters are wandering around.  We got a bunch of pictures, tried almost all the rides in, um, I think it's FantasyLand and then went back to the hotel for a nap.

Fuckers.

I want to go back so bad that I think my hair has started to fall out.

_and_ we'll be taking a cruise back up the coast afterward.

nyah nyah nyah nyah!

(at least it's your hair, not the other end)

We have a 5-day parkhopper pass and early entry one day.  No need for parking, we're flying.

Wayne, you can't count.  We don't leave till Sunday so 4 more days till Disneyland.  (I don't know who is more excited.  Wayne or the kid)

You'll never make it to that chicken pie restaurant I mentioned w/out a car...

Keep in mind that if you like it enough, and you want to go again within a year, you can upgrade the parkhopper pass to a season's pass.  My wife got all the info. on this, so I have no idea where to find it on-line, but if you go to the season's pass office on the right just after you go through the gates and under the railroad you can upgrade.  I think you get the full value of the parkhopper applied towards the season's pass, even if you trade up on your last day.

Where are you staying?

Why do women pretend not to get excited about Disneyland?  It's an epidemic.  My wife kept calling me a big kid, too, as if she weren't anticipating it just as much.

We are staying at the Sheraton Anaheim Hotel.

I admit I have my moments!  Especially when its Wayne's turn to put the kid to bed.  (I'm so evil)

Staying at the Sheraton Anaheim Hotel:
http://www.starwoodhotels.com/sheraton/property/overview/index.html?propertyID=995

Only one of you puts the kid to bed on any given night?  Weird.

My wife is so full of shit...  she's insanely excited.  I'm low-key on the whole thing.  I have trouble being excited about really big stuff until I'm pretty much on the way.

"Only one of you puts the kid to bed on any given night?"

Not exactly...  she likes to be tucked in by us one at a time.  Whomever goes first "puts her to bed".

You're the polar opposite of me, then.  My trip last October was booked in March and I was salivating over photos of Disneyworld for the whole 7 months.

Hey Ward, What cruise line are you taking back?  I had thought of doing the whole cruise thing but by the time I had looked into it most of the cruises were sold out.

Wayne, you are just as full Shit as I am.  You are so not low key!

"My trip last October was booked in March and I was salivating over photos of Disneyworld for the whole 7 months."

Yeah, that's exactly how my wife is.  She's on the Disneyland site (and others) constantly looking stuff up, etc.  I've only done a tiny bit of that.  I also like to be surprised, so I don't want to know everything before I get there.

It was a good thing I looked stuff up constantly, or I'd never have made reservations and we totally ended up needing them to get into the better restaurants.

I let my wife deal with that stuff..  she's pretty good at it.

My wife does most of the travel arranging, she's the queen of Priceline.

You could walk to the trams from where that hotel is.  If you ever miss the shuttle, you could walk to the trams from the parking lot and go in that way.

We're taking a repositioning cruise on the Norwegian Pearl.  It's probably too early for any of them for your trip, I don't think they start coming up from Mexico until the last part of April. 

The prices on our cruise have come down since we booked, and there's still space, so you could still get on that if you can wait until the 6th of May.

Well thats good to know about the location of the Trams.  I've only had the maps to go by as I have never been to Disneyland.

Since we are going for Wayne's Daughters birthday (April 12th) that kind of ended the cruise idea.  But let us know how the cruise was as we might look into doing it another year. 

Where are you staying while at Disneyland?

Haven't booked it yet, expecting to get something on Priceline.  Last year we were in the Hyatt Orange County which was too far to walk, but we had a car, took their shuttle one day to try that.

We have a booking at a timeshare that's pretty close to the main gate, but it has iffy reviews, so we'll probably cancel that.

It's not a great walk from your hotel, but it's doable.

I can't imagine not staying on the property after my last trip.  It was just so convenient and easy.  More expensive, I'm sure, but total lack of hassle made it worth it.

For us to stay on the property it would cost us an extra $1200.00 for the week to stay at the cheapest of the 3 disneyland hotels.  I just couldn't justify the extra cost.  I've heard that at Disney World its worth staying on site but not at Disneyland.

It's probably less critical in Disneyland - there's a whole city all around it.  You can be staying at a hotel right across the street.

Wayne/wife: did I already post the thing about getting a TMobile pay-as-you-go phone for $30 and getting $35 worth of airtime with it (gives you 20c/minute.)  It's sooooo much cheaper than the roaming charges that it's worth it if you think you'll need to call one another.  On our trip to Portland this past weekend, we ordered the phone and got them to deliver it to the hotel.

Thanks for the Tip regarding T-Mobile.  I'll look into it.

You people have roaming charges in the continental US?

Yeah..  the US is "international" to us.

Oh, god, you can't imagine.  Every time I see someone from the states whining about cell companies I think "you bastard, you wouldn't survive 10 seconds of taking up the ass from Telus, Bell, or Rogers."

95c/minute on the first plan I could find quickly.

$6/MB data roaming!  We bought a Treo from Sprint last year because of this- data plans are like $50 for a limited amount of data, $12/MB for overage, + roaming in the US.  The Treo is $15 for really unlimited data on the device, we paid $50/month for unlimited while connected to a PC and put about 500MB through it on the last trip.

Or, we've got an older Virgin Mobile phone from the US (got it for free a couple years ago on thanksgiving).  You could have that if you want and just recharge it.

I went to Disney World after Navy boot camp and I wasn't particularly thrilled about it.  Epcot Center was nice, I guess.

What would excite me is a month long visit to a kick ass boot camp with crazy mofos who make you run up hills for 3 hours straight.

That's what I want.

I always forget that you suckers are from Canada.

Never understood the appeal of Disney for adults.  I just don't get it.  Why go to an artificial theme park when the world is full of real attractions?

I'm not putting you all down for liking this.  I just personally don't understand it.

Artificial attractions where there's no bugs, there's an entire culture of pandering to tourists, absolutely everything is thought of and the entire environment is engineered for enjoying yourself and not worrying about anything, and all of the staff kisses your ass and makes damn sure that you are happy.

Can't imagine the appeal, really....

I'm sitting in my hotel room finishing up five days in Paris with the family. Tomorrow we fly to Prague for four days.

And I still want to go back to Disney sometime...

Europe is nice and educational.  I imagine the kids would enjoy Disney.  I'm not into it though.

I do like the idea of visiting a place long enough to soak up more than just the tourist attractions.  Every time I've gone somewhere, I be-friend natives who take me to experience the gay life of the place I'm in.

I'm sure most wouldn't enjoy that, so I respect that others would enjoy Disney even though I think its a plasticized homogenized piece of crap :)

"Why go to an artificial theme park when the world is full of real attractions?"

I live in Vancouver, BC... we supposedly have some of the best natural attractions: skiing, hiking, rivers, mountains, the ocean, etc.  God, I'm so sick of it.  I'm looking forward to some plasticized artificial homogenized attractions for a change.

Must be the *gay* life, right sharkfish?  Can't be the local culture, within the context of your own homosexuality.  Nope, has to be the 'gay' life which is somehow distinct from 'life'.

As always, you're a homophobic racist.

I wouldn't say we've travelled extensively, or to anyplace really rough, but we've been to various places in Europe and to Russia and China.  Mostly big cities, nothing too primitive.  It's been great, we learned a lot, got to see some _very_ different ways of living, met interesting people, blah blah blahj...

Sometimes, though, you just want to relax, have things go smoothly, get away from almost every type of problem.  I don't know if I'd personally choose to go to Disneyland if we didn't have a young kid, but I certainly enjoyed it and have no problem with going again.

"I don't know if I'd personally choose to go to Disneyland if we didn't have a young kid"

You're so full of shit.  Man up and admit that you enjoy goofy cartoon characters and saccharine environments with amusing rides and hourly parades.

It's the saccharine that makes me sick.

Anyway, the gay life is about being around the people, not the scenery.  Family. Among strangers.  But you wouldn't understand that, muppet, because we/you live in a white man's world so it's ALL ABOUT YOU mofos.

Having a gay surrounding means that, when I go to the bathroom, or I'm waiting at an elevator, people fucking TALK TO ME.  At any place else, even on vacation, white heteros BARELY BOTHER WITH POLITENESS.

Well fuck that.  When I go on vacation, I want to be around people that find me interesting, want to talk to me, and want to hang out.

The rest is just business.  So going to Disney is like being surrounded by the SAME HOMOGENEOUS PHONEY MOTHERFUCKERS as when I'm at work or walking down the street in Chicago.

If you can't understand that, it's because, again, you live in your own redneck world and you wouldn't be able to grasp the concept that the rest of us need community, too.

So yes, falling for the bait:

I vacation from white people.  There.  I said it.

"Having a gay surrounding means that, when I go to the bathroom, or I'm waiting at an elevator, people fucking TALK TO ME.  At any place else, even on vacation, white heteros BARELY BOTHER WITH POLITENESS. "

You're a ractist idiot, sharky.  Never change.

You have to be the same color and sexual orientation as your peers in order to participate in a community and a society.

You're so fucking sick it stopped being amusing a long time ago.

You're such a fucking idiot that I don't care.

I see nothing wrong with you wanting to be around 50's style remembrances of a world gone by in plastic land, so I don't see why it's so hard for you to understand why I enjoy being around gay people more than Disney.

See what an idiot you are.  You are so intent on proving me a bigot you miss the point entirely when in reality, we agree with each other.

>>> You're so full of shit.

If I was single and won a lottery and could do anything I want, I'd probably just sit somewhere nice and read books all day.

>>> Having a gay surrounding means that, when I go to the bathroom, or I'm waiting at an elevator, people fucking TALK TO ME.  At any place else, even on vacation, white heteros BARELY BOTHER WITH POLITENESS.

Bad examples, it's nothing to do w/ being gay or black that keeps people from talking to you in bathrooms or waiting for the elevator, it's called minding your own business.

++Ward.

I wasn't making any comparison of your sick description of what it's like to be black and gay to Disneyworld.  You're providing your own twisted context, as usual.  We had moved on to another point in the discussion.  You are not good at following along, and it's no skin off my nose, honey.

I think the difference here is that Muppet, Ward and Us have kids.  If we didn't have the kid then Disneyland wouldn't be on the top of our Vacation list, but since we do and we want to do something special for her then off to Disneyland we go. 

We have done other things with her for Vacations which have been quite enjoyable.  Did a tenting road trip through BC and Alberta 2 years ago.  She still talks spending the few days at Christina Lake.

"it's called minding your own business."

It's called a lot of people have issues with people who are not like themselves.

You must be one of those idiots who never says hello to the person you are with waiting for the elevator.

It never ceases to amaze me how normally smart people have not a whit of social grace and only show such grace around their own kind.

Fucking idiots.  You have no idea how different and more pleasant my world is when I'm surrounded by non-vanilla,  non-suburbanite fucktards.

"It's called a lot of people have issues with people who are not like themselves."

I don't talk to white, young males waiting for the elevator, either.  It's a 30 second experience, not worth striking up a conversation.

Again, you're a racist idiot.

"Fucking idiots.  You have no idea how different and more pleasant my world is when I'm surrounded by non-vanilla,  non-suburbanite fucktards."

No kidding!  Your obsessive-compulsive, borderline schizo-affective racism finally quiets down and you can hear yourself think.  NO shit!