Dates: Feb 7th – Feb 13th
Resort: Pop Century
The small two person cast is me, Bill (in the 49ers shirt below) and my best friend/brother Steve (best man at my wedding). First off, while it doesn’t matter, we are not a couple. I am married with 2 kids and he has a gf for 2 yrs (save the “nice cover jokes…lol). Trust me….as he stated during our trip, “if people heard our conversations while here….” lol. We’ve been friends since 1997 and he became informally adopted by my late Mom about 6 yrs ago. He was going thru a divorce (and has no family left) and around Easter time, I invited him to Easter at my Mom’s as I didn’t want him alone. While eating dinner, she told him, “You’ll never be alone on a holiday”. From then she was Mom to him. My mother passed away on January 4th of this year after a long battle with COPD and the last year was extremely difficult. He and my wife were my rock thru it all and we truly became brothers this past year. We always talked about this trip with her during the last several months and she loved hearing about how excited we were. She said more than once that we go no matter what happened. And when Mom talked, we listened.
Yes, a touch odd that two grown 42 yr old men went to Disney together but there is a backstory to it. Back in March/April of 2012, Steve mentioned wanting to go to WDW since he hasn’t been since early 1999 and his gf didn’t want to go at the time. So as we talked my wife said, “Bill will go with you”. My wife knows I love WDW and will go any chance I get. We are taking the kids this October but going to twice in the same yr is no problem. She told me it was my birthday and Christmas present and I said “OK!!!!”. So we planned the time and in what felt like forever and no time, we were sitting at Albany (NY) airport eating lunch saying, “can you believe we are going to WDW?”
We left Albany at 2:00 and arrived a little after 5:00 and off to the DME. Since he hasn’t been to WDW for 14 yrs, the DME was new (among many other things) and such began the full blown addiction he would end up having with WDW by the end of the 7 days. We arrived @ Pop and were met at the online check-in by a newbie (earning his ears). My wife and Steve’s gf planned a surprise that was supposed to be in our room, but he messed up and gave me my gift at check in only. I was surprised and the card said it was to me from my wife. I called my wife on the way to the room to say thank you and she said, “did Steve like his gift and why did you get it at check-in?” When I told her there was nothing for him she was ed. More to come…..
After we dropped our carry-ons in our room we decided to go to MK instead of chillin at the resort. He wanted to ride Space…..all he talked about for 7 months….lol So off we went.
As we arrived, the MSEP just started so we had to go up the right side of Main St to get to Tomorrowland. As we got to the corner by the Plaza, it became apparent; this was not going to be easy. Steve called it “running the gauntlet” getting thru the masses around the hub ad getting to Tomorrowland. We did and went to Space for a FP. We decided to hit Cosmic Rays for dinner and for the first time in 4 visits for me, it wasn’t good…..but oh well, we were in MK and were in 22 degree weather 6 hours earlier.
We headed over to Frontierland while most were still around the hub waiting for Wishes. BTMR was all of a 5 min wait so that was a no brainer. Got the front car and off we went just as Wishes started. In what turned out to be an awesome start to the trip, as we went around the first ”curve” the fireworks were going off right "in front of us" and it was an incredible sight. We got of Thunder and we got right back on with no wait.
We then headed to Space for our FP and then did Buzz on the way out.
As we approached the bus stop, we noticed there were four million people in line for the Pop bus (well…maybe a little exaggerated but…lol.) We were behind a woman who was by herself and talked our ears off for 40 mins…OMG! I actually texted my wife to call me to get me out of it….which she did and that prompted a text from Steve standing right next to me calling me an a$$-hole for subjecting him to it alone. HA HA HA.
Unbeknownst to us, my wife called Disney Florist b/c she wasn’t happy that they messed the presents up (says on my card to be delivered together with his stuff), spelled her name wrong on the card, certain things weren’t in my bag that were supposed to be and a few other things that were wrong. An extremely nice CM on the phone named Jeannine apologized profusely to her and said she would take care of it. When we returned to our room, she provided us with a Mickey mug and Pluto (Steve’s favorite) mug with 2 fastpasses each. It was not necessary and incredibly generous of her. His present was also there. His gf got him a large Mickey balloon and personalized ears with his name on it (he wore them every single day for the rest of the trip). It’s fitting for him as he is a loud, doesn’t give a damn what people think type of person where I am the polar opposite. My wife got me a small cooler bag with a bunch of snacks and I now use that as my “lunch bag” for work.
Resort: Pop Century
The small two person cast is me, Bill (in the 49ers shirt below) and my best friend/brother Steve (best man at my wedding). First off, while it doesn’t matter, we are not a couple. I am married with 2 kids and he has a gf for 2 yrs (save the “nice cover jokes…lol). Trust me….as he stated during our trip, “if people heard our conversations while here….” lol. We’ve been friends since 1997 and he became informally adopted by my late Mom about 6 yrs ago. He was going thru a divorce (and has no family left) and around Easter time, I invited him to Easter at my Mom’s as I didn’t want him alone. While eating dinner, she told him, “You’ll never be alone on a holiday”. From then she was Mom to him. My mother passed away on January 4th of this year after a long battle with COPD and the last year was extremely difficult. He and my wife were my rock thru it all and we truly became brothers this past year. We always talked about this trip with her during the last several months and she loved hearing about how excited we were. She said more than once that we go no matter what happened. And when Mom talked, we listened.
Yes, a touch odd that two grown 42 yr old men went to Disney together but there is a backstory to it. Back in March/April of 2012, Steve mentioned wanting to go to WDW since he hasn’t been since early 1999 and his gf didn’t want to go at the time. So as we talked my wife said, “Bill will go with you”. My wife knows I love WDW and will go any chance I get. We are taking the kids this October but going to twice in the same yr is no problem. She told me it was my birthday and Christmas present and I said “OK!!!!”. So we planned the time and in what felt like forever and no time, we were sitting at Albany (NY) airport eating lunch saying, “can you believe we are going to WDW?”
We left Albany at 2:00 and arrived a little after 5:00 and off to the DME. Since he hasn’t been to WDW for 14 yrs, the DME was new (among many other things) and such began the full blown addiction he would end up having with WDW by the end of the 7 days. We arrived @ Pop and were met at the online check-in by a newbie (earning his ears). My wife and Steve’s gf planned a surprise that was supposed to be in our room, but he messed up and gave me my gift at check in only. I was surprised and the card said it was to me from my wife. I called my wife on the way to the room to say thank you and she said, “did Steve like his gift and why did you get it at check-in?” When I told her there was nothing for him she was ed. More to come…..
After we dropped our carry-ons in our room we decided to go to MK instead of chillin at the resort. He wanted to ride Space…..all he talked about for 7 months….lol So off we went.
As we arrived, the MSEP just started so we had to go up the right side of Main St to get to Tomorrowland. As we got to the corner by the Plaza, it became apparent; this was not going to be easy. Steve called it “running the gauntlet” getting thru the masses around the hub ad getting to Tomorrowland. We did and went to Space for a FP. We decided to hit Cosmic Rays for dinner and for the first time in 4 visits for me, it wasn’t good…..but oh well, we were in MK and were in 22 degree weather 6 hours earlier.
We headed over to Frontierland while most were still around the hub waiting for Wishes. BTMR was all of a 5 min wait so that was a no brainer. Got the front car and off we went just as Wishes started. In what turned out to be an awesome start to the trip, as we went around the first ”curve” the fireworks were going off right "in front of us" and it was an incredible sight. We got of Thunder and we got right back on with no wait.
We then headed to Space for our FP and then did Buzz on the way out.
As we approached the bus stop, we noticed there were four million people in line for the Pop bus (well…maybe a little exaggerated but…lol.) We were behind a woman who was by herself and talked our ears off for 40 mins…OMG! I actually texted my wife to call me to get me out of it….which she did and that prompted a text from Steve standing right next to me calling me an a$$-hole for subjecting him to it alone. HA HA HA.
Unbeknownst to us, my wife called Disney Florist b/c she wasn’t happy that they messed the presents up (says on my card to be delivered together with his stuff), spelled her name wrong on the card, certain things weren’t in my bag that were supposed to be and a few other things that were wrong. An extremely nice CM on the phone named Jeannine apologized profusely to her and said she would take care of it. When we returned to our room, she provided us with a Mickey mug and Pluto (Steve’s favorite) mug with 2 fastpasses each. It was not necessary and incredibly generous of her. His present was also there. His gf got him a large Mickey balloon and personalized ears with his name on it (he wore them every single day for the rest of the trip). It’s fitting for him as he is a loud, doesn’t give a damn what people think type of person where I am the polar opposite. My wife got me a small cooler bag with a bunch of snacks and I now use that as my “lunch bag” for work.
There's nothing wrong with wearing those ears with pride! Welcome to the boards, Stephen!
