Trip Report THE ONE FOR MOTHER’S DAY IN MAY (duh)🥑COMPLETE🥑

Welcome home!
Said no one in my house upon my return.

Who went? Well.....if you have read any of my previous trip reports (Christmas, February, March and April) you know I multitask when in Florida. This trip was no different. My oldest son, X, was finishing up his second year of college in SoFlo and I went down to help him pack up and move out.
The original plan (why is there always a plan A, B.. etc?) was to pack him up, drive his truck to WDW and put it on a transport. Then we would spend a few days in WDW and fly home. I even bought the plane tickets. But, do you know how much it cost to transport his car from Florida to Long Island? Just north of OMG!!!! Plan B: no transport, no flight home. We would be driving. We also had to trim 1.5 days from our Disney stay to allow for travel time. (Heavy sigh)

We stayed at Saratoga Springs in a studio,
May 10-13. I bought him a two day park hopper as he does not have an AP like the rest of the family.

Ok, we have the who, what, where, when and why. Lets get to it!

DAY ONE/MAY 10
I woke up at 4:00 am and left the house at 4:43. Ant drove me to the airport and we got there at 4:57 (he was driving slow this morning). My flight was at 6:10 going into Fort Lauderdale. My son’s school is equidistant between FLL and West Palm (PBI) and they both have the early morning flight. One is 6:00am and one is 6:10am so I usually book the cheapest. However, if I am renting a car I prefer FLL. PBI has their car rental offsite and it can be a hassel.

The morning before, at 6:10am I had checked in and gotten A37😮. What? I havent seen the A’s since SW started charging for better boarding assignments. Maybe the flight is empty?

The flight was not empty! The announcement came that there would be about 10 empty seats. I sat in an aisle in row 4. ROW 4!!!!
There was a gentleman at the window and our middle seat remained empty. Go figure. I have decided that I do not love sitting up that close. I am not sure why but it felt different, bumpier or something. Perhaps I was thrown off because I had a shortened horizon to look at? Or maybe I am just used to the back? Who knows.

It was an uneventful flight and we landed 20 minutes early. My son had a 10:00am final (seriously, who gives finals on the very last day of class?) and couldn’t be there when I landed. I could wait but it would take him 30 minutes each way which would have us close to noon. We still had a few trips to make to the storage unit and I wanted to be on the road to Disney by 1:00. We decided I would Uber.

Walking to the ride share area I passed the shuttle for the tri-rail. The tri-rail is a train that originates in Miami. I am not sure how far north it goes, I think it goes to West Palm. Thus the tri, as in three airports (I think). Anyhow, there is a station not 5 minutes from my son’s school. I made a mental note to look into that for next time.

I found Marco, my Uber driver and said, “hello, how are you today?” He said, “NO English”. Great. We hit some traffic and my 30 minute $36 drive became a 45 minute just shy of $50 (with tip) drive. On the plus side, I had time to research the tri-rail. If I read correctly there is a Free shuttle from FLL to the station and my trip to Boca Raton would cost $5! and take 30 minutes. Sorry Marco. No more Uber from FLL for me!

I had Marco drop me at a Dunkin Donuts near my sons school. (Yes, @VincciL , the one on Yamato). I got a tea and an egg sandwich and sat at a table outside.
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It sprinkled the entire time. Of course it did. It’s ME!!! This picture is of the sprinkles on the table.
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This picture is of a lovely palm tree I was sitting under.
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I do love palm trees.

I was sitting there, eating, checking TR’s to see what @Back!Elbow!Shoulders! @NunuBelle and @NothatDonald were up to in their livish reports. I also knew @Tuvalu had left the day before and wanted to see if she made it home safely. A man pulls into a parking spot just in front of me. Then another man drives up and words are exchanged. Man1 cut off man2 or something. Man1 invites man2 to say it to his face. Man2 parks. Man1 gets out of his car and he is a huge bald guy (why are the always bald?) Man2 gets out of his car and he is smaller than man1 but not small. They are yelling, cursing etc. Man1 gets in man2’s face. Man2 pushes man1 away. Uh oh. Do I call 911? This is not going to end well. Man1 just keeps going back in man2’s face. Man 2 is, esentially cornered and keeps pushing man1 away. What do I do? Millers Ale house had just opened and I was hoping someone in there, having dealt with belligerent drunks, would know what to do. A scrawny, barely post pubescent guy comes out of Millers. Really? But another guy and his wife happen to be walking by and the guy (we can call him guy3) is bigger than man1 and man2 put together. Now man1 is throwing out racial slurs (man2 is hispanic man1 has to be a FLID) guy3 puts himself between the men. Man2 says he just wanted a cup of coffee. Guy3 says “I will buy you that cup of coffee” and walks him into DD with his arm still around him. Man1 turns to run his errand, notices me for the first time and says “sorry, that was bad” then went into Jersey Mikes to get his sandwich.

All before 11:00am.
 

Songbird76

Well-Known Member
DAY TWO/ MAY 12 cont

X and I headed for the busses after SSE. We had watched Illuminations together on Christmas Eve so we were all good there. Besides, we had to get up early and start the drive home. 🤮

When we got to our stop I told X to go to the room, pack up and shower so in the morning all he had to do was brush his teeth and get in the truck. I was going to stay on the bus and go pay some of the bill with the gift cards I had.

X got off at our stop and I stayed on. It was like dejavu of the night before when the driver missed our stop, but on purpose this time.

It was quiet in the SSR lobby. A CM, Todd, asked if he could help me. I said I wanted to pay some money toward the bill and he told me he could help me with that. I started searching my bag/wallet for the GC’s which I had put in my crossbody purse for safe keeping. The crossbody purse that was in my luggage. In the closet. In room 1332.🙁

Todd said he couldnt help me with GC’s anyway, I would have to go across to the other side of the lobby to another CM.

Then Mary came over. Mary was one of the CM’s who helped me in February when a new CM messed up my friend’s and my bills. I said hello and she remembered me. I asked about Amy who had also helped me in February. They said Amy left to start her own boat restoration business. Disney’s loss.

I stood there talking to them for quite awhile. I have some interesting stories to share with you all, if you like that sort of thing.

But first we got the regular chit chat out if the way. The weather. The love bugs!!! A third CM came over and informed me that the high number of love bugs was due to the rainy spring.
Uh oh......could this love bug explosion be my fault???? The rain loves to follow me and I did spend an unusually high (for me) number of days in WDW this past spring.

Somehow we got on the subject of pixie dust or magical moments or whatever people want to call it. Todd and Mary confirmed that that was the best part of their job. They went on to say that they are allowed to give up to a $200 value (of pixie dust) without a managers approval. Wow! That seems like a lot. Then Todd told me two of his favorite stories.

Once upon a time, there was a man who checked into SSR with his son. The son was so excited. “Can we go to Magic Kingdom now Dad? Can we? Can we?”
But Todd could see there were no tickets linked to the reservation. The man (lets not judge his lack of planning skills) admitted sheepishly to Todd that he didnt realize how expensive everything would be.

The man and his son went into Artists Palette to get something to eat. Todd got in touch with his manager and together they worked some magic. A few minutes later Todd went into Artists Pallette and presented the man and his son with park tickets good for their entire stay. Todd said the man was crying and hugging him and was so grateful. Todd might have teared just a little and admitted that is why he loves his job so much.

Then Mary said, “what about those girls from South America?”
Turns out, some girls went to WDW on vacay from South America. They purchased park tickets from a third party and they ended up being fakes. The young girls were devastated. Todd to the rescue again!

I ended up emailing the resort GM to praise Todd and Mary as well as some belated praise for my February trip to Amy and her manager. And also some belated praise for our one night stay at Christmas to a houskeeeping manager who helped us out.

I walked back to my room, got ready for bed, packed what I could, set my alarm for 4:30 and hit the pillow. X was already asleep.
Wow!!! Those are amazing stories! I thought the threshold was $50. I follow a vlog on youtube from a girl who did the DCP, and she said $50, but maybe it's different for regular CMs as opposed to the DCP? And she's from the UK, so maybe that differs as well. But that's awesome that they can do stuff like that. I love hearing those stories!! My daughter really wants to do the DCP, but it doesn't look like she can....the Netherlands isn't one of the countries they work with. Of course, who knows....she's in her last week of 7th grade, so maybe by the time she's in college, they'll have more countries they work with!
 

Songbird76

Well-Known Member
Beautiful! Thank you for thinking of me🌴


I know!!! ( say that like Monica Gellar!)
One day, my friend, we will meet.
And thanks for reading!


There should be another trip if all goes according to plan. I will be driving X back to school and took the advice of all the good people here saying I had to make a stop at WDW.


Thank you so much for reading. We have some overlap coming up. Eyes peeled👀


Ha ha ha. 8:00pm Thursday nights!!!


Thank you for joining me!!!
When does X go back to school? Any chance you will be in the area before August 12th?
 

Songbird76

Well-Known Member
OK.. I saw it now... man... that's some pent up rage... to his defense, short guys do get the short end of the stick....

On a side note... I'd like to place and order for Bagels and a couple knishes for September (grin)
Did you see the "what happened next" video where he got his bagel and then threw it on the ground to storm out? I hadn't heard anything about this guy until I read it in this thread...between this and the toon town brawl, I'm a bit traumatized today! What is WITH people!?
 

Songbird76

Well-Known Member
As a under average height yet over average weight guy, I may feel a bit for him and then point out to him, that everyone is born with advantages and handicaps to their situation, learn to live with what you have, make the best of it and you will be surprised at what comes your way. Raging at the world that women don't look at you because your short? That's called a victim puke, don't be a victim. Until I learned that I wasn't successful in my life. Then after years of self help therapy I somehow manged to find a really great woman, married her and have a really great job and a life I love. You make your own reality. Don't let everyone else define yours.
Well, if that's how he's acting in public, I don't think his height is why women aren't interested. And I don't think there are many who are completely happy with their physical attributes, but most of us don't go screaming at employees of local restaurants/stores about it.
@Darstarr , did you say X knows someone who was there when this happened???
 

Darstarr

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
In the Parks
No
I saw the biggest gross things yesterday at the store
View attachment 389529
Is it just me, or do these also seem unnaturally green? They look like giant limes to me instead of avocados.
No, that's how they looked in real life too, and usually aren't avocados a little textured on the outside too? The sign said Florida avocados.
Hass avocados are the darker textured ones. View attachment 389919
I’ve only ever seen the Haas ones in the grocery stores around me. No idea there was the other smoother, greener type.
Same! Thanks for the avocado lesson @krisri18!

My fave!!! Is it possible to have a crush on a cartoon???

@krisri18 is absolutely correct about the names of the avocados. Hass avocados are suppose to be the richer, more buttery of the two. (If you like that kind of thing😉)
 

Darstarr

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
In the Parks
No
Wow!!! Those are amazing stories! I thought the threshold was $50. I follow a vlog on youtube from a girl who did the DCP, and she said $50, but maybe it's different for regular CMs as opposed to the DCP? And she's from the UK, so maybe that differs as well. But that's awesome that they can do stuff like that. I love hearing those stories!! My daughter really wants to do the DCP, but it doesn't look like she can....the Netherlands isn't one of the countries they work with. Of course, who knows....she's in her last week of 7th grade, so maybe by the time she's in college, they'll have more countries they work with!
I love those stories too. Maybe these CM’s have a $200 limit because they work the front desk? I would think there would be different amounts depending on the job one has.

I will keep my fingers crossed for your daughter!
 

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