Darth Vader brings Michael Jackson to a whole new generation

Is it just me, or has there been a lot more Michael Jackson on the radio in the past year than in the preceeding 5 years?

At Star Wars weekend at Hollywood Studios, at the end of each day they do something called "Hyperspace Hoopla". The Star Wars characters put on a little show. As a part of that, Chewbacca, the female Star Wars characters and Darth Vader each compete in a dance contest. Darth Vader danced to Beat It this year, compete with jeweled glove. As a result, my son now loves that song. Chewbacca danced to walk this way, which was hilarious for many reasons. I hope there was a cooling device in that costume, dancing like that on a 95 degree day!

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My son competed in a Fun Run this weekend. Traditionally, I have run with him in these races. This time, he ran the entire time for the first time ever, and he is now faster than me. Granted, my speed is nothing to write home about, but this being the first time I couldn't comfortably keep up with him was a big deal. He liked being able to be waiting for me at the finish line. Yay for him! :-)

Kids Bowl Free

Have you heard about the kids bowl free program? Many bowling alleys in the US participate and kids can sign up to bowl 2 free games each day all summer (no charge to sign up)! Up to 4 adults can sign up for the family plan for $24.95, and they can also bowl 2 games a day. Shoe rental fees still apply.

If you do sign your child/children up, it asks if anyone referred you - People who give referrals get entered into a drawing to win a trip to Disney. So, if you plan to sign up, please contact me and I'll give you my email address to use as a referral and I'd appreciate it so much!

Disney was great, but FREE Disney would be even better. Ha! :-)

Summer vacation...and then summer started

We went on our summer vacation last week, slightly before summer actually started.

We went to Disney World! I have been wanting to take my son there for quite some time, and everyone started saving for it last year. The week I was going to make the reservations, I got laid off from my job, and hubby read my mind when he said "Make the reservations anyway." I'm so glad we did. We had such a good time, and I can't wait to go back!

We stayed at the All Star Sports Resort. If you don't know, it's one of the value resorts. We will stay there again next time. We have a few friends who stayed at the value resorts before and loved them, but I was the tiniest bit hesitant, thinking that if we're going to do Disney, we should do it all the way. Well, there was nothing lacking here. We got upgraded to a preferred room that basically walked out to the pool, the food court had tons of offerings.

I highly suggest the dining plan. I did not keep track to see if we came out ahead by purchasing it, though I think we did. To me, the most significant part was not having to worry about it. Had we been paying for meals as we went, we would not have eaten as well as we did. It was nice to not have to worry about anything but tips, food-wise.

We had a suitcase full of snacks and cereal. Most days we had cereal in our room for breakfast. The dining plan included one table service meal per day, one counter service, and one snack per day. We brought tons of single serve packs of Cheez Its and animal crackers, and we carried our own water bottle. By the end of the week, we were actually scrambling to use our snack credits, as we had done such a good job of eating the snacks we brought ourselves.

The table service restaurants we ate at were:

Tutto Italia (Epcot, dinner) : Hubby and I liked our food (chicken and lasagna), but the spaghetti was a little too "authentic" for our son. Al dente and not saucy enough. He shared my lasagna.

Hollywood & Vine (Hollywood Studios, lunch) : Buffet, character meal, pretty good food. Nice premade sandwiches and salads, barbecue meatballs son liked the chicken nuggets.

Crystal Palace (Magic Kingdom, dinner): Buffet, character meal, pretty good food. Carved turkey, again chicken nuggets for our son, lots of good salads and desserts.

1900 Park Fare (Grand Floridian hotel, dinner): Buffet, character meal. Decent food. Questionable children's option of chicken wings. My son did not like the mac & cheese. He ended up eating roast beef. Desserts weren't as good as the other buffets. We won't be going back to this one for dinner. Maybe breakfast.

Ohana (Polynesian, breakfast): Family style character meal. This was our favorite meal. Lilo & Stitch were there, food was fantastic. Delicious sweet breads, eggs, bacon, potatoes, biscuits, bacon and Mickey waffles. Nothing but good things to say about this one - We will definitely go back there.

Garden Grill (Epcot, dinner): Family Style character meal. This was our least favorite meal. Unique restaurant in which the floor rotated slowly so you always had a different view. Rotation actually upset hubby's stomach. Son did not like a single one of the kid's platter items: Chicken drumstick (not so much into chicken on the bone, even though I cut it off. He likes grilled chicken breast and breaded chicken), mac & cheese and sweet potato fries. He ended up eating roast turkey and zucchini from our platter. Meal was average. Dessert was pretty good: Strawberry rhubarb crisp for adults, cookies & creme mousse for kids.

The parks were all great, and we visited Universal as well. My son rode every wild ride he was big enough for, and especially loved the water rides, Space Mountain and the Tower of Terror. The Toy Story Mania and Buzz Lightyear rides were family favorites, as well as Muppetvision 3D. The timing of our trip was based on Star Wars Weekend at Hollywood Studios, which was such a treat for my son. He got to participate in Jedi training. He battled Darth Vader, and won of course. :)

It was the best trip ever. We were lucky to have very little rain. I never knew a week could go by so fast! Time to start saving again!

Stop! Thief! (alternate title: It's going to get hot in here today!)

I arrived at work this morning to be instructed to call the landlord. Someone dismantled our air c onditioning unit to steal all the c opper inside. There is a sad metal heap where the unit used to be.

The police have come and will be sending a technician to dust for prints. It's like CSI. Except hotter. More like CSI Miami.

The landlord, who is out of town, said he will call someone when he gets back in town tomorrow to see about replacing (repairing?!? is that possible?!?) the unit. Meanwhile, it will be about 90 degrees today. Our windows are full panel and don't open. So...It's going to be hot.

But...ugh. That's something it never occured to me that people would steal. I don't think it's a concern at home, as our unit is on the side of the house where the neighbor's bedrooms are, and they are always watching out their window.

Maybe she should go back to call center etiquette 101

Scene: Lots of chatter in background, clearly a sales call.

"Is "boss" there?"

"He's on another line. May I take a message?"

"Is his wife available?"

"You've reached a business."

"Well, sometimes husbands and wives work together." Then she hung up on me.

Classy.