Thursday 24 May, 01
The Cast:
Sean Yoda age 36
Pamela ‘meeko’ age 32 ½
Biscuit Meeko stuffed raccoon age 5 1/2
Brer Bunny (Biscuit’s stuffed buddy) age
1 ½
Sean here!
Mickey called and woke us up at 7am. Today was our day to visit MGM. We weren't in a rush since MGM was not opening until 9 am. Before heading out, we had one other duty to take care of. During Wednesday night's chat we had arranged to have breakfast with Zazu on Friday morning. We decided to dine at Boma's at the new Animal Kingdom Lodge. For that we had to phone in Priority Seating. Making the PS for Boma's was odd because, unlike other restaurants, we had to give a credit card number as a "deposit" and were told that we could not cancel less than 24 hours before our seating. Anyway, we made our PS for 9:40am. Sometime later in the day we knew we would have to call Zazu to let him know the time and place of our rendezvous, but now it was time to head off to MGM.
We grabbed our refillable mugs and headed out the door to the food court. Since it was a busy hour, the pin cart next to the food court was actually open. Unfortunately, there weren't any good pins for trade. Fortunately, after we refilled our mugs and walked to the bus stop, we only had to wait a few minutes for the bus to the Studios.
Once in the Studios, our objective was to pick up FastPasses for Who Wants to be a Millionaire: Play It. The FastPass was for the 11:15 show, so we had an hour and a half to wander around. We wandered down Mickey Avenue over to New York Street. When we reached New York Street it dawned upon us that neither of us had seen the square without the Osborne Lights on it in quite a while. It just seemed strange.
Our next stop was the SciFi Dine-In. Neither of us had eaten there before, so we made priority seating for 1:15 (figuring that would give us enough time after Millionaire). With that out of the way, we next stopped at the ABC Commisary for a light breakfast. The breakfast offerings at ABC Commisary are similar to those at the All Stars food courts: scrambled eggs, french toast, breakfast meat, and hash browns. We ordered one breakfast with an extra side of hash browns. It was enough to tide us over to lunch.
After breakfast, we still had pleanty of time to get to Millionaire, so we strolled to the Chinese Theatre. We looked around the courtyard to see whose hand and footprints were there. It turns out that Pamela's hands are the same size as Audry Hepburn's! We also noticed that many of the cement slabs are cracked, and some are even unreadable. This is quite disheartening. :( While we were in the courtyard, a CM watched us and eventually jokingly said, "OK, you've wandered through the entire courtyard. Isn't it time you went on the ride?" We said that we had FastPasses for Millionaire, but that we would ride later in the day.
At that point it was time to join the FastPass line for Millionaire. We made it with about two minutes to spare. The only things special in the FastPass queue were monitors above you displaying various bits of Millionaire trivia (in the form of questions asked Millionaire style). We watched, in case the questions came up in the game. We were then ushered into the "sound stage". It looked very similar to the set you see on the TV show. As we sat down, we had no idea how the game would work for us. After about five minutes, we were briefed on how the game worked (all audience members have a chance for the hot seat) and then experienced a brief pre-show which included Regis. Then the "Florida Host" was introduced. Our first chance to get to the hot seat was the "fastest finger" question. Unfortunately, neither of us even cracked the top ten. Another audience member was chosen. Then we found out the other rules. First, unlike the real game, each question has a time limit (15 seconds for the first five questions, 30 seconds for the second five, and 45 seconds for the last five). Second, we were told that each audience member would play along, and that after the first hot seat contestant answered wrong, the audience member who had answered the most questions correctly and in the fastest time would get to the hot seat.
The game begun, and we had a sinking feeling for the person in the hot seat. On her first question, she had to answer the following question: "Which Disney is currently a Vice President for the Walt Disney Company? a. Toon Disney, b. Team Disney, c. Roy E. Disney, or d. Zoog Disney." She didn't know the answer and had to poll the audience. After that, she did much better, and reached the 32,000 point level before blowing it. Unfortuantely, neither Pam nor I cracked the top ten list, so neither of us made it to the hot seat.
The next hot seat contestant started out better, but still had a funny moment. At one point he looked at his watch and the host asked "What? Do you have to leave? Do you have a FastPass for Rock-n-Roller coaster?" The audience just burst into laughter. This contestant also made it to the 32,000 point level before bowing out. Unfortuantely for us, the game ran out of time, so no chance at the hot seat for us. If it wasn't for our PS for lunch at Sci Fi, we would have jumped into the stand-by line for the next show. It's pretty addictive to play along.
We walked over to Sci Fi Dine-In and checked in for our lunch. The waiting area was crowded! Pamela sat down while I tried to call Zazu to let him know about the next day's plan. Unfortuantely, the cell coverage (for AT&T Wireless anyway) stinks. When Pamela tried speaking with Zazu (after I had zero luck), she tought she had reached a wrong number because she thought that the person we called could not speak English. With that failure, we looked around to see what was on the walls. The walls included some coming attractions posters and the standard "work rules" you would expect to see in a break room for a movie theatre. I was impressed with the details. We waited about 20 minutes before being escorted to our "car". We were seated in the back seat of a car that was in a drive-in movie theatre. Movie trailers, news reals, and cartoons were showing on the movie screen while we were being served. Our waiter introduced himself and told the folks in the front seat that they had picked up some hitch-hikers and that "as the driver" they had to pay for our meal. (Don't we wish!)
We started off with Onion Rings, which were quite yummy. Pamela had the Applewood Smoked Porkloin while I had the Smoked Prime Rib sandwhich. While we enjoyed our Onion Rings, we regretted ordering them because we were too full to finish our lunches. Still, we saved room for shakes for dessert. We had heard that the shakes were the best thing on the menu, and we both left agreeing. On our way out we needed to visit the restroom, and discovered something about how they cut a few corners at MGM: some restaurants share restrooms. In this case, the Sci Fi Dine-In and the ABC Commisary share their restrooms.
After that, we wanted to ride Rock-N-Roller Coaster, but decided that, because we had eaten so much, we should take a rest. What better way to get a rest then riding the Great Movie Ride! We had both been on GMR during earlier visits, but had never noticed that the version of "Hoo-ray for Hollywood" that plays at the begining of the ride is the same version that is used in the entrance plaza for Disney's California Adventure. (This turned out to be one of several DCA moments we experienced at the Studios.) I said that GMR is a great way to relax; For the first time, I didn't come close to falling asleep.
Following our ride, I noticed that I was in an area with a better cell signal. This time we had no problems reaching Zazu and made arrangements for the next day. We then went off to ride Rock-N-Roller coaster. The standby line was about 20 minutes, with the FastPass time in about 40 minutes. We snagged FastPasses and went into the standby line. It worked out perfectly. Following our first ride, we had just enough time for a restroom break. On our way to the restrooms, a CM stopped us to get our photo in front of the giant guitar outside the Rock-N-Roller Coaster building. After the restroom, our FastPass entry time had arrived. Rock-N-Roller is one of our favorite rides, so it was great to ride it twice.
Now we needed to kill some time before our photo was ready, so we went window shopping. Our first stop was the Villains shop. The only item that interested me was a slushee (hey! it was hot, and I was thirsty). Our next stop was the Hollywood Blvd shops. There we ended up chatting with Doug, a very nice CM who congratulated us on our marriage. He then offered to trade his "tie tack" (a special Goofy pin) for any pin on my lanyard. I gave him a limited edition Mickey Mouse in exchange for his pin.
By this time, we figured that our photo would be ready. The line at the photo shop was long, but the wait was worth it. We saw our photo and decided to get a copy. Pamela was astounded since I "never" like the photos they show us. With our photo in hand, it was time to go back to our resort and get some rest.
Actually, only Pamela needed to rest. I wasn't tired, so I logged on to take care of some work administration. Even though I was on vacation, I still needed to fill out my time card. (I like getting paid.) I took care of some other on-line chores and chatted with folks before it was time to wake Pamela from her slumber. It took her a little while to wake up, but once she was out of bed, she was ready for baseball. We donned our wedding ears and hopped in our car.
The drive to Wide World of Sports led us down a new road for us. We drove right past the new Pop Century resort (which opens in December). Pamela wanted me to stop so she could get a photo, but I reminded her that, because this was the same way to get to Animal Kingdom Lodge, we would be driving past it the next day. We had no problems getting to Wild World of Sports. Thea was waiting for us with some tickets. Since there was a little time, she gave us a brief tour of the complex before we entered the ball park.
For a minor league park, I was impressed. The park had a large replay screen in the outfield and a second deck. I know that the stadium is also used by the Atlanta Braves during spring training, but other spring training facilities I had visited: Scotsdale Stadium, Phoenix Municipal Stadium, and Peoria Sports Park, were not this big. While the park's facilities impressed me, other aspects did not. Thea had warned us of one annoying aspect: When an opposing batter is anounced the spectators are supposed to ask "Who?", to which the park announcer would repeat the batter's last name, to which the spectators reply, "Ohhhhh." Imagine the following:
announcer: Now batting for the
visiting
Giants, Barry Bonds.
spectators: Who?!?
announcer: Bonds
spectators: Ohhhhh.
As Biscuit would say, "LAME!"
Equally unimpressive was the food. I expect every ballpark to have some type of signature item. In San Jose, it's the barbeque. At Pac Bell park, it's the Garlic Fries and the Clam Chowder. At the Oakland Coliseum it's the waffle fries. Even Scottsdale Stadium had "Dippin' Dots". I can't remember anything distinguishing about the fare offered by the Nashville Sounds, but even they had an amusing beer vender who would act like he was falling down. Here there was nothing distinguishing about the menu. Even the inbetween inning promotions were nothing special, except for one especially painful activity -- Karaoke. I won't go into details, because it force me to remember something more painful then getting stuck on it's a small world.
There was one cool thing about the game. After it was over, they let the kids run the bases. After Sunday day games at Pac Bell park, Leo, Shelley, and I often watch the kids run the bases. Here the kids looked like they were having just as much fun. Following that, it was time to head back to our resort and take care of laundry. What?!? The score?!? Yes, there was a baseball game played, and the Orlando Rays lost to the Chatanooga Lookouts 4-2.
We returned to our resort, refilled our mugs, and went to our room to gather laundry. Since the laundry facility is next to the 24 hour quiet pool, we also put on our swim suits and aquasocks to enjoy a dip while our clothes got cleaned. The pool was quite nice and almost completely empty. While our clothes were in the washer, we were able to enjoy a nice relaxing swim. We got out of the pool just after our wash completed. With another thirty minutes for our clothes to dry, we returned to the pool. Unfortunately, some guests with kids had decided to play "pool football". I know that it's not specifically against the pool rules, but it bothered us because they weren't very quiet. At least, because of the shape of the pool, we were able to get back in the water at an end of the pool where their football would not splash us. After we finished swimming, they too decided to get out of the water and head back to their room.
By this time, our thirty minutes were up. We checked our clothes; they were not completely dry, but we knew that we could put stuff on hangers and let things dry out overnight. Soon, we were back in our room, with our clothes drying, and us ready for a good night's sleep.