Are the "Must-Haves for Disney" Truly MUST-Haves? Our assessment...

Before our travel, I went through several lists of "must-haves" for a trip to Disney. Some things, like a Smart phone and a camera and a change of clothes for Mal, we would have taken even without outside forces hadn't suggested them. But I'm going to address a few things that we just didn't use at all, and a couple of things that were indispensable.

1) Plastic baggies of various sizes. USED THEM! A lot. We had clothes that needed to be rinsed out when we were out and about, and a couple of times had a left-over cookie (about which I forgot and which then got pulverized in my bag) or other snacks. Every day, I had two each of the gallon, quart, and sandwich-sized bags, and I used many. Just replenished at night at the hotel. Oh, we also used them for disposing of wipes (which we use, because it's easier to get a kid clean with wet wipes than just TP) so as not to stink up the hotel room. Recommend.

2) Ponchos. DID NOT USE. It rained every single day on our trip, the majority of which were when we were in the park and running around. Many people put on ponchos, wore them for 20 minutes, and then either had to stow them or toss them. I'd gotten very inexpensive disposable ones, because I didn't want to have to deal with folding them up and trying to tote them after if we did use them, but we did not. We actually left them in the hotel room because we ran out of room in our luggage. I hope someone was able to use them rather than their just getting tossed. Unless you're going when all day rain or severe storms are expected, don't bother. What we DID find useful...

3) Compact traveling umbrellas. USED! We each had these umbrellas that come in what looks like a glasses case. These aren't huge, but they'll keep your head and shoulders dry, and they dry out very quickly after use. They were easier to access and utilize, then stow again, than the ponchos would have been. Plus, you always get wet when you take a poncho off, right? The umbrella would also have been good to keep the scorching sun off, if you're there and not pushing a stroller. Now, I have one in my purse and one in my car for unexpected weather events. Recommend!

4) Portable phone chargers. DID NOT USE. I know, I know. "Everyone" says that your phone battery WILL die when you're in the middle of a Disney day. Mine never did. James's sputtered after he'd put it into a waterproof bag during the rain, and I think it overheated. But in terms of use, we just didn't use our phones enough to kill the battery on any day. I only got below 50 percent the day our a/c went out and I was using the Messenger app and texting a whole lot. I DID use My Disney Experience, and opened it often to check or change or add plans. But I shut it down when I wasn't using it, so it wouldn't run in the background and drain the battery. I also had all apps closed, including Messenger, for the same reason. I wasn't posting to social media or taking pictures with my camera in the park, so pretty much used it as a clock and for planning. We never waited in lines long enough to utilize Play, and we didn't do Agent P's in Epcot, then we were never in the parks more than about 7 hours on any given day, so we just did not need to recharge until we were back at the resort. We both have our chargers now, which might prove useful in the future. But we just did not need them at all when traveling. I certainly can see how you might, if you have a good phone camera and use it, plus post to Instagram, plus just leave the MDE app open and habitually turn to your phone in down times, etc. So use your judgement on this one.

5) Quarters and pennies for pressed penny machines. Sadly, DID NOT USE. My first kid would have blown through all $20 in quarters that I'd brought, but this kid was not too into the whole thing. He chose maybe 2 or 3 the whole trip. And you know what? When you have rolls of change in your carry-on luggage, the TSA's equipment can't tell what it is, and you have to let them go through your bag. Then when you don't use the change so you still have it at the end of your trip, they check it again! My purse is really heavy now. I suppose I could go to the bank and get paper money, but I never have change for the carhop at Sonic, so I guess I'll hold on to it.

6) My Disney Experience. USED A WHOLE LOT. Guys, I get that some people aren't planners. But I can only imagine that it's very difficult to tour Disney with a small child without at least a little bit of a road map. We used it a lot in the parks, to help us find bathrooms and such, and also to make new FastPasses and to verify times when we'd set other stuff up. But I used it and the Disney website at length before the trip. We'd set our dining reservations the day we were able to (180 days in advance) and, though I changed several around at the last minute, we could not have gotten in to Be Our Guest if I hadn't. And Tusker House was full fairly far out. We also set the maximum  number of FastPasses we were allotted 60 days in advance. Flight of Passage, Na'vi River Journey (which, to my surprise, was 115 minutes compared to FoP's 75 minute wait), and Slinky Dog Dash would have been impossible without the FastPasses, because I don't wait in lines for more than 20 minutes. Furthermore, we saw people on the elevators heading down to the pool who didn't realize our pool was under renovation until they got there. We talked to another family on the pool shuttle to the other side of the resort who said the same thing. I can't imagine not having that information before leaving, just to mentally prepare and have a plan. Disney gives you tools to help make your trip easier. I recommend using them!

Also, there were a lot of FastPasses we let lapse without using, because Mal wasn't up for it, or we didn't feel like whatever it was going to take to get there. One time, it panned out really well for us. I had made a FastPass for Goofy's Barnstormer, an exceptionally short kiddie coaster in Fantasyland, the night of the Halloween party. But we knew by then that Mal was not going to be ready for ANY coaster rides on this trip. Turns out they had to close it due to weather, and they gave us an "open" FastPass for anything from 5:30 PM until 9:00 PM that day or the next. I didn't see the free pass until much later, but we were able to use it to ride Test Track the next day, after having made our Tier 1 FastPass for Soarin' (you can only make advance passes for one of those two). So if you think, "I only need two at this park," just make one for the heck of it.

7) Another app I'd used before the trip, in conjunction with the website, was Lines by Touring Plans. My Touring Plans subscription really helped me decide when to go for sure, what days to hit which park, and to lay the foundation of how we'd make our way around the parks, by giving me an idea of how long it takes to walk from here to there, how long they expect the waits will be, and then how long the experience lasts. There's an app you can use to update plans in the park and to check actual wait times (which vary from posted wait times because Disney uses the wait times to direct traffic flow just as much as it does to kind of give you an idea how long you might have to wait). Well, after the second day, I deleted the Lines app from my phone. Once you had completed a step in your plan, you click "done" and it moves it off of the top, going on to the next item. OH MY GOSH, it takes forever to do that. Like 10 seconds or so. Which sounds like a petty grips, but when I'm trying to do it on the fly, and we've done 8 of the things... I really don't feel like waiting for my app to process everything. Definitely recommend the website and yearlong subscription. Maybe have the app for an outline of your plans, since MDE only has the FastPasses and meals? But I wouldn't plan on it helping too much in the parks, unless I was doing something wrong or had crappy hardware (it's a ZTE Axon, but other apps function fine on it).

8) Wipes. Yep, USED THEM. Ever since D was too old to need wet wipes for cleaning up after toileting so I didn't carry them anymore and then a pigeon pooped on D's dad's shoulder while we were waiting for the San Antonio River Walk boat to fill up so we could take off and a lady on-board with us had a wipe to give, I've thought that wipes are just a good idea to carry around, anyway. And with snacks like cotton candy and super melting Done Whips, wipes are a lot better than dry napkins. Recommend!

BONUS: I don't know whether this is on any lists, but we also utilized and loved the packing bags that act like vacuum bags, but you don't need a vacuum, you just press the air out with your weight. I suppose it helped us fit more into our small bags, but even if it didn't, I was able to organize clothes by days so unpacked several days at a time as we needed clothes and then pulled more out as we freed up hangers. Also, in case anyone had needed to go through our checked luggage, we wouldn't have had any cases of a pair of underwear falling out and getting left behind, or caught in the zipper, or anything. Maybe they did go through our bags. I have no idea. It was all tidy when we opened them.

BONUS THOUGHT ON THE DINING PLAN: As I mentioned, we got the dining plan for "free" ($300ish upgrade to make our park tickets Park Hoppers, which we never used) and, in that case, it was well worth it. There was a 25% discount on our room at the time, too, but financially, taking advantage of the free dining made more sense. Whether it makes sense to purchase the dining plan when it's not offered gratis (and rumors are that the gifting times are almost over) depends on several things. For instance, we had a table service meal for every night of our stay, or the equivalent as we skipped one day but ate at Jiko, which uses 2 table service credits as it's considered Signature Dining. In every case but the one I just mentioned, the tab for the three of us usually came to right at $140-150 before tip. The dining plan is roughly $75 per adult and $25 right now, and assuming the we ate other food throughout the day, it seems like, yeah, we'd easily spend $180 per day on food.

However, with the dining plan, you can get specialty drinks and, on table service meals, dessert. James might have splurged on a neat cider or something, but while I enjoyed the beverages I got, if we'd been paying out of pocket, I would have just ordered soda. Also, given how our child is about eating, there likely would have been several meal times when we would not have ordered him anything at all. And we were always full, so likely would only ever have eaten desserts as a snack, never to end a meal. So, on our own dime, we actually would not have spent quite so much on food. It was fun not to worry about how much a dish cost, and just go for it, though, so I can see the benefit of that. For our family, though, I would not purchase the dining plan. It was super fun stocking up on goodies to bring home at the end of the week when we hadn't used a bunch of credits, though!

Home Again, Home Again...

By the time we went to bed (VERY EARLY) Monday night, I was *almost* caught up. I had pulled the third and final load of laundry out and laid the pieces so they wouldn't wrinkle. But I'd done the rest of the laundry and put it away, I'd unpacked everything, vacuumed the house, and cleaned the bathrooms and kitchen. I'm still waiting for my left foot to get back to normal. It doesn't hurt, but the swelling is just weird.

To backtrack, on Saturday we took it super slow at the resort in the morning, including my taking Mal swimming, and his also playing at Simba's Cubhouse. A bit after lunch, we took a bus to Magic Kingdom, then got on the monorail to visit some of the resorts. we looked around Polynesian, where we had a dinner reservation, and tried to rent a boat to explore the lake. But just as we arrived to do so, they called a hold due to lightning in the area. So we rode the monorail over to the Contemporary and looked around their lobby. Mal also bought a set of resort buses he'd been looking at since he played in our lobby with some other kids who had them.

After that, we went back to the Poly for a delicious dinner at Kona Cafe. Mal had fun playing on the beach after, and I felt bad when we took a Lyft back to the hotel and realized we hadn't gotten all of the sand out of his shorts.

The Poly smells so good, and it made me excited to visit Hawaii in a couple of years. Also, it made me excited that where we stay isn't overrun by so many people!

The next morning, we had breakfast at Boma, which, according to our server, is the #6 breakfast buffet in the country, according to maybe USA Today? Anyway, it was great, and I finally got to try the POG juice! We'd eaten at Boma our first night, and really love the mix of Afro-centric cuisine and more "Murican" stuff for our nuggets-and-fries kiddo. The server brought Mal a light-up Buzz Lightyear, which was sweet. He's usually served as a souvenir in a kids' drink we can't order using the dining plan.

After breakfast, we took another Lyft to Art of Animation to see the Cars... cars.

This was undeniably cool, but, good gravy, Mabel, it was in full sun and so so so so hot. The day had a high of like 91 but with a real feel of 106. Seriously, this week made us feel like Austin weather is AMAZING. We stepped into the Austin air and were like, "Oh, this is nice. 88 and 60% humidity. Sweet."

Next, we went to Disney Springs, which was Downtown Disney last time I was in Florida, because James had a date at The Void. There is a lot of construction, and we had to walk around a bunch to find one of the only ways "in" to this outside shopping center. And, have I mentioned, it was hot? We enjoyed a soda on the rooftop bar of the Coke store, then walked toward The Void. Mal wanted to ride a tiny train, so we did that. Then we shopped a bit while James did his thing. In the end, we made it back to the bus stop and were going to go back to the hotel, but the bus took so long to get there that James was done and caught up with us. This is what he did.





That night, we had an amazing "signature dining" experience at Jiko, where I had elk loin for the first, and maybe last, because where the heck else am I going to get that?, time. It was amazing.

And the next morning, we had to wake up early to head out. Mal cried, and said he wanted to live at the hotel, that he would miss his animals. We really did have an incredible week. D did a great job house-sitting, and it really didn't take too long to get everything back in the order I am used to... once I remembered where everything went!

Now we're settling back into a rhythm, and it's raining a lot, so that's pretty cool.

Yawn. Good (last) morning!

I have to wake James up in 10 minutes, but thought I'd pop in here to say that we're on our way back home in a few hours!

To catch quickly up on the past few days: Friday, we went to Hollywood Studios. Because of my legs giving me issues and how much we have loved the resort, I had pushed everything back to as late as I could. Consequently, we got into the park, had some fun photo shoot activities, watched Muppets 3D (which Mal loved, and also I wasn't sure where my backpack was so I was a little distracted, but I still enjoyed it and my backpack was just in the stroller), started to check out Toy Story Land but decided it was too hot with zero shade, so spent the rest of the time before lunch in "One Man's Dream."

We ate lunch at the Sci Fi Dine-In Theater, and it was so much fun. Then James and I rode Star Tours. Although we knew Mal wouldn't be up to it, we walked him through the line so he could see C3PO and R2D2. He really wanted to meet them, like a character interaction, and was disappointed that he didn't get to do that. BUT he met BB8 later in the day, so that helped.

Okay, we did the "First Time in Forever: A Frozen Sing-Along," and I have to tell you: It lives up to the hype. Such a fun show, and the adults in our party might have teared up at the very end (and I knew what was coming). Highly recommend. Our historians were brilliant.

"He's got the whole Aria in his hand..."

We had FastPasses for Slinky Dog Dash at 6:50, and did rider swap for that. Then it was time to check in to the Star Wars dessert party. It was super neat, and Mal got to interact with some Storm Troopers, in addition to our meeting Kylo Ren, Chewbacca (a special treat for James), and BB8. I was dealing with the fact that our A/C was out at home, an apparent thermostat problem that ended up not being a thermostat problem after all, but fortunately our expert house-sitter and my parents got things taken care of on the ground so that by the fireworks, I was dialed back in to the vacation.

Mal would have talked to BB8 all night, seriously.

Chim-chim-i-ny

Okay, that's all you get. Time to pack up and hit the road. Then the air. Then the road again. Grocery delivery this afternoon, and I have to tell you: I love the future. Safe sitting around and sleeping while we travel!

Some Observations About Disney (and maybe about myself)

We did Animal Kingdom yesterday, and it was a great day! We got into the park around noon, and explored Discovery Island then did the Gorilla Falls trail before lunch at Tusker House. It was another character meal, and we met Mickey, Goofy, Daisy, and Donald, who were all dressed up for a safari.

It was getting pretty close to time for our Flight of Passage FastPass (which is like *the* pass to have, as wait times are always more than an hour, and often more than two). We'd promised Mal he could play at the dino dig, so we headed in that direction. We'd actually had FastPasses for Expedition Everest, as I mentioned in the last post, but guess what? It was down, for some reason. They gave us blanket FastPasses for the rest of the day, but we were so busy, we didn't get to take advantage of them. We really didn't have time to do them, anyway, after I'd pushed back our lunch time.

We ended up not seeing a lot of stuff, including the trail in Asia, but it was better to do a shorter day, because by the end of the day, Mal was falling apart and I got my first "old lady" ankle rashes from walking in the heat! Huzzah!

Mal liked the playground and dig, and we got into Pandora in plenty of time to find out where stuff was (there are no signs; it's supposed to look like a natural planet, and signs would muck it up).

I rode Flight of Passage while James and Mal rode Na'vi River Journey. Everyone talks about how awesome Flight of Passage is, and they're not kidding. It was fantastic. The closest thing I can compare it to is Soarin', but on steroids. It's 3D, and you're astride a banshee. You can even feel the banshee breathing. The scenery is bonkers. So beautiful. I was crying a lot of the time on the ride, and for a bit after.

Mal and I explored Pandora while James did rider swap to experience Flight of Passage, then we headed over to Lion King. It wasn't seating yet, so we went back through the Gorilla Falls Trail to see the hippo, which we'd missed before. It was totally worth it! We'd noticed the fish in the pool the first time, but not the hippo. He was right there!

We ended up getting back RIGHT as the Lion King started, but they let us go in. We made it through 2/3 of the show before Mal had to go to the bathroom. He really liked the tumble-monkeys, though!

The last thing we did was to go on the safari. We got to see two female lions in a kerfuffle, which the driver said he'd never seen before, and the sun was just going down, so it was beautiful. On our way out, we walked through Pandora, which was getting lit up for the night. Even the sidewalks glow. I took the opportunity to get a Pandora sunset beverage, too.

The we boarded the bus for the ride back to the resort.

Over the past few days, I've pondered a few things:

1) HOW DO INSTAGRAM AND YOUTUBERS WHO COVER DISNEY LOOK SO GOOD?! We step out the door for three minutes and I'm melting. Now, granted, I haven't properly fixed my hair since Mal was born, but here, I'm just getting it up off of my neck because it's so dang hot! Forget full makeup (another thing I don't really do, anyway) and a sleek long hairstyle. Not happening. Also, there have been plenty of people I've seen in heels and ornate outfits. IT'S 400 DEGREES! HOW?!

2) So is Disney just this busy now?? One of my favorite things about being at Disney has always been meandering around, enjoying the view. We've found a few pockets of places to do that, but overall, we have to keep on the move because there are SO MANY PEOPLE. This is the slowest time of the year now, which is why I tried a summer trip at all (every other time I've been to Florida as an adult, it's been in January, but they have the marathon now and it's apparently busy in January, too). I have memories of getting right on a bus and going, and now almost every bus is packed, and we've almost had to wait for a second bus, before a last-minute sardine situation. It's a lot of people to handle. I'm glad we picked a quiet resort.

3) Thank God we're on Free Dining. We would probably have eaten at all of the same places (except maybe Jiko) and it would have been VERY expensive. Most of our table-service meals have been about $145 before tip. And we're doing one of those every day. If we weren't on the dining plan, we probably wouldn't be getting dessert and fancy drinks, but it would still be in the $100 range. Then $4-8 here and there for snacks throughout the day, $12ish for adult fast-service meals, etc. $$$$$$

4) I'm old. In the past, I've LOVED seeing me in my Disney pics. "Oh, look how cute I am in France!" Now, I'm having to just say, "Welp, there I am. Someday I'll cherish these pictures." Plus, the ankle thing. My mom used to get that, and, you know, your parents are old people. I had a child when I was ancient, and although I've never gotten the "are you the grandma?" question yet, I feel like it's right around the corner. Sigh.

5) Bonus observation: Why do people like Havianas? I got a really cheap pair from the Disney website, and they're cute, but they're heavy and slippery and super uncomfortable to wear. That said, I'm wearing them today because my feet need a break from my other shoes, but they are HORRIBLE. Are all Havianas like that?

6) Disney PhotoPass is cool, and I love Memory Maker and all... but you either have to download ALL of your pictures or do one at a time, which involves clicking on the picture, clicking "download" clicking "okay" then at some point going to the download area and actually downloading it So the latter is cumbersome, but the former results in the generation of multiple large zipped files that you then have to download and extract, and you can't tell in advance which pictures are the ones you already have until you've downloaded them. And the wifi in the resort is, well, typical public wifi. Why can't they give you the option to "download new" or "download pictures from this date"?

7) The cast members are so great with kids. It becomes contagious and a lot of guests are, too. Also, the Mousekeepers in our area have been so good juggling our coming and going. There have been times, on cruises and other hotels, where I felt pressured to get out to accommodate housekeeping, or just to tell them "don't worry about it." Here, if you're in your room, they move on and come back. It's great for families who aren't the "out the door at sunrise, back after dinner" kind of people. Which I used to be. But not anymore. We've just had extremely positive interactions with pretty much everyone we've encountered.

8) Parents can get pretty tightly-wound when they've spent a lot of money on vacation and their kids are not following the program. Some of these moments have hurt James's an my hearts. Yesterday, he overheard a lady tearing into her little kid in the lobby of our hotel. When we were going into Enchanted Tales with Belle and a probably 8-year-old girl was sobbing because of the magic mirror scene, her mom leaned over and said, "You are TOO OLD FOR THIS." I wanted to hug that little girl so bad. Now, I have definitely "gotten onto" Mal a couple of times, but that's when he was acting crazy and at risk of hurting someone else, or when he was being a jerk in the kids' club and saying, "I don't want anyone else to be here." And then, I mostly just offered to take him back to the room where he could be alone.

I get it. It's hard. Like yesterday morning, we were taking it easy, and Mal suddenly put on his shoes and said, "Let's go somewhere!" We were not ready to leave for the day, so I asked him if he wanted to come with me to get breakfast. He said, "No, I want to go somewhere. I'll get my stroller." I told him I was going to get us breakfast, and that I needed some tape for my blisters, and he could go with me. He said, "I'm just going to get my stroller, and we can go." I reminded him we weren't leaving yet, and asked him if he wanted to stay and play with James while I got some stuff done. But he didn't. He didn't want to stay, and he didn't want to do what I was doing. He wanted to get his stroller and GO. I finally just left, and could hear him crying in the hallway.

So I turned around. I offered to take him with me in the stroller, and that seemed to make him happy. I pushed him down to the lobby, we went into the gift shop where I let him pick out some candy (I KNOW; we have lots!), and then we went to get breakfast. That was all it took to make him feel better, and when we got back up to the room, he was ready to hang out for a few before we left for the day's adventure. We keep telling ourselves "It's his vacation, too." And D's. That's why D isn't here. By choice. Not my preference. But it's not just a vacation for the grown-ups. I wish we were all better about remembering that.

And as tired and overstimulated as we are, the kids are more so! That's one reason we're trying to build in down time every day. Once again, I changed our plans for today. We were supposed to get into Hollywood Studios around 2:30 for lunch, but I pushed it back to 4:30. We'll end up doing way less, but we have tickets for the dessert party before the fireworks, so we need to make it until 9!

I guess that's it for now! Reminder that the pictures are here. Yesterday's photos should be up soon; they stopped uploading last night, so I'm having to babysit them this morning.

Half Way

We've had a fun-filled, busy couple of days!

Tuesday, we took it easy in the morning, went to play in the activity center, and then headed over to Kidani Village, which is another part of the Animal Kingdom Lodge (we're staying in Jambo House). Kidani Village is all Disney Vacation Club rooms, so was built specifically as a DVC property. There are some DVC rooms in our part of the resort, too. In fact, we're staying in one of them, so we have a microwave, which has come in handy a few times already!

First, James and Mal swum while I looked at wildlife. I would have gone swimming, but Mal had insisted earlier in the day that he didn't want to, I think because the first time we went over there, they had to close the pool down due to lightning. Anyway, after they had about an hour out there, we went in for our lunch reservations at Sanaa, a widely-recognized fabulous restaurants. I got an appetizer for my entree, because it's something I've been looking forward to for months: The bread service.

This is Traditional Naan, Garlic-Ginger Naan, Spiced Naan, Onion Kucha, and Paneer Paratha. with Roasted Red Pepper Hummus, Mango Chutney, Tomato-Date Jam, Tamarind Chutney, Coriander Chuntey, Garlic Pickle, Red Chile Sambal, or Spicy Jalapeño-Lime Pickle. I think the hummus was my favorite. Or the garlic pickle. But all SO good. Actually, James got to eat the spiced naan and paneer paratha because they were too hot for me.

Our desserts were amazing, but Mal had the most fun with his: a brownie with ice cream, and a paint-your-own-shield cookie.

When we got the bill, I was once again so happy we'd gotten the free dining plan! HOLY COW, the food was amazing... and it was expensive.

We went to check out the community hall at Kidani Village, which is similar to Simba's Cubhouse here, but actually a bit more homey because that's what it was designed for (whereas ours used to be drop-off childcare). They have a pool table, foosball, games, and lots of crafts. Oh! We learned the other morning that we can actually check out board games to play in the room, so that's cool.

After playing, we hopped a bus to the Magic Kingdom for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party.

We got there a bit after 4, and the park was officially opened until 6. We got our wristbands and our first trick-or-treats, then did all of the stuff in Tomorrowland that we hadn't done on our first visit: Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, Tomorrowland People Mover (AKA Tomorrowland Transit Authority, AKA Wedway PeopleMover), and Carousel of Progress.

In trying to explain Carousel of Progress to Mal, I'd said it was a stage program that showcased some of the ways technology has improved our lives, but instead of actors, there are Audio-Animatronics, which was basically robots. All he heard was "robot show" and he did NOT want to do it. He ended up enjoying it, and sang the song the rest of the night.

We decided to try our luck with Pirates of the Caribbean and work up to Splash Mountain, as Mal was getting more confident. Both of those rides were closed for technical issues (also, I think Pirates had to make some changes, including adding a live human, for the Halloween party). So, we went over to Haunted Mansion and rode it with a 10 minute wait. That part was fun, because we'd done the FastPass line before, and had missed some of the interactive elements in the main queue.

When we'd gotten to Haunted Mansion, it was 6 o'clock. There was a cast member at the entrance, checking for wristbands. A group of 3 guys came up, and she said, "I'm sorry; if you're not staying for the party, the park is officially closed." They were said, "We have to leave?" She said, "You can go to the shops or restaurants, but the rides are closed." Ha! At first, though, they kind of stepped forward, like, "This is stupid," but they turned around.

Within about 20 minutes, the wait time for Haunted Mansion, necessarily popular for the Halloween Party, was up to 40 minutes! Whew!

After the ride, it rained for about 20 minutes, so we hid out in the Storybook Circus gift shop, which resulted in our spending $25 on an Under the Sea playset Mal "needed." After that, we made a few trick-or-treat stops, and went back to check on the rides. Splash Mountain was running empty logs, but still not open. Pirates of the Caribbean was closed. We decided to do the People Mover in the dark and look around at the lights.

Then we meandered through the Monsters Inc. dance party and marveled at the costumed characters really getting down in the heat! After that, Mal was pretty much done. James wanted to stay for fireworks, but that was still an hour away. I was a little disappointed. There were SO MANY people there, and it was fun to see the costumes and novelty t-shirts, but so many rides were not running, and I'd expected it to be a little less crowded, as this is allegedly the least-busy night of the party this year.

We had gotten to see some pretty stuff, like the darkened castle in the rain.

And the Halloween soundtrack was pretty fun. And we got a LOT of candy.

As we made our way toward the exit, people were lined up a dozen people deep for the parade. We walked through the roped-off area on Main Street until we got to the end, where Mal wanted to go into the candy store, where he picked out a sucker bouquet. He didn't seem to understand our very strong assertion that we were, under no circumstances, paying for candy when we had a backpack full of it.

There are some REALLY cute ear hats. I wish I could buy a pair of them all. James and I need these.

The inside ears make a heart!

We were about to cross to the exit when we heard the announcement of the Headless Horseman. We waited to see him ride through, as there were very few people around the hub at the far end of Main Street, so we were able to get right up to the rope. We decided to hang out for the parade, which had already started at the far end of the park, but took about 20 minutes to get to us. Mal's dream came true when a Cast Member was handing out Mickey-shaped SUCKERS to kids!

The parade was a lot of fun, and after that, Mal and I headed for the bus while James stayed 20 more minutes to watch the fireworks. It ended up being a nice evening, so I'm glad Mal wanted to stop at the candy shop.

Yesterday, we went to Future World at Epcot, and it was GREAT. First, we lounged in the morning. Mal and I went swimming. Then we hopped the bus to Epcot and went to the festival center to see the chocolate sculptures. Here's one:

Yeah. That bored-looking creature is chocolate. We got a drinking chocolate at the Ghirardelli booth, and... have mercy. It was amazing.

Then we went to Club Cool to sample international sodas. As expected, James was not a fan of Beverly. Mal wouldn't try anything, even the really good fruity one from Brazil. Next we rode Living with the Land, then went upstairs for lunch at The Garden Grill, a rotating restaurant that looks into some of the scenes from Living with the Land. Oh, it also has characters! Farmer Mickey, Pluto, and Chip and Dale all visited us while we enjoyed family-style food, some of which was grown downstairs in the greenhouses!

We did Soarin' next, and Mal was ready to ride something by that point. Unfortunately, the initial swooping action freaked him out. I showed him how to look down to see the sides of the screen, and that helped. But when we got off, he said, "I'm not going to look that way. It makes me think I'm flying!"

Fortunately, The Seas with Nemo and Friends is a slow-mover, so after that and Journey into Imagination, he was okay with rides again. We explored both of those pavilions, and got a couple of drink flights from The Light Lab, then went to the playground, which Mal remembered from our first day at Epcot and had been asking to do all day.

Oh, a kind of cool thing: We'd made a couple of FastPasses for the time in Magic Kingdom before the Halloween party. One of them was Buzz Lightyear, and the other was for Goofy's Barnstormer, a ride I thought maybe Mal would be ready for, but we didn't even try because he just isn't. The following morning, I realized that something had happened and they'd had to cancel the FastPass, so they'd issued us a blanket one from 5:30 - 9:00 PM that night or the next (which was last night).

The way FastPasses work at Epcot is that you can only make one "Tier 1" FastPass per day, and both Soarin' and Test Track are among the Tier 1 FastPasses. I'd chosen the one we could all ride, as I knew Test Track would be too much for Mal. And although you CAN make any FastPass you want once you've used your first 3, the ones for the Tier 1 rides are typically gone by then.

SO, we were able to use that throw-away pass I'd made to ride Test Track! James did it while Mal played on the playground, but then Mal was just ready to go home. We were going to let James and Mal leave early, but it started raining and they shut down the ride. Test Track had been closed for refurbishment the last time I was here, so I'd never ridden it. Oh well. We decided to hit Spaceship Earth and call it a day.

Mal was put off by the "spaceship" part, but then realized it was a slow ride and... fell asleep. It's a long ride, like 12 minutes, and Mal snoozed the whole time. When we got off of that, it wasn't raining anymore. James took Mal home, which was fun because Mal got to ride the scooter with Daddy! I got to ride Test Track, finally! And I got to see the park lit up after dark.

We have 2 more park days. Today is Animal Kingdom, and tomorrow Hollywood Studios. I changed today's plans so much. We were supposed to be in the park... right now. At 9 AM, when it opens. But seeing how well things have gone playing it slow in the mornings, and seeing how freaking exhausting the heat was the one day we got up early and went in at rope-drop, I was skeptical that we could make it through to dark, which we definitely want to do at Animal Kingdom.

So I changed our FastPasses around and we're having lunch at 2:30 instead of 11, and will probably stay here at the resort until noon or so, then meander over. Now I'm getting dressed and going to the lobby to see what's up today. Have a good one!

Hot Epcot Hot Food and Hot Wine Festival of Heat

Greetings once again from central Florida.

Today, we took it slow and left the hotel around 11:00ish. We took a bus to Hollywood Studios, then took a boat on a scenic trip to see the Swan and Dolphin, Boardwalk, and Yacht and Beach Clubs. Hindsight, we should have taken the walkway from the Studios. A boat ride sounded fun, but, gosh, the boats we've ridden in the past around Magic Kingdom were open air. These had windows so we enclosed, and no air conditioning.

Fortunately, we'd bought Mal a stroller fan and used that to keep me from dying. It was very beautiful, for sure. But I was kind of fried by the time we got to the park.

We were looking forward to enjoying the Food and Wine Festival, and we did have fun, but we ended up eating not too terribly much, because there's just a LOAD of food available, and there were a couple of things from permanent restaurants we wanted to try.

Our first stop was France, where Mal got a scoop of vanilla ice cream, and James and I shared the brioche ice cream sandwich. You heard me. Sea salt caramel ice cream with chocolate sauce, then smashed like an Uncrustable. Mercy. Great breakfast.

We made our way counter-clockwise and didn't eat in Morocco, but spent a LOT of time there. It's just gorgeous, and Mal loved the little gallery. He ran around for 20 minutes or so, and we had a great time enjoying all of the artistry that went into the space.

The first Food and Wine booth we hit up was India. They had a chickpea curry James thought looked good, and I'm always about bread. And the frozen mango lassi. Oh my. I told James that I liked him better than that drink, but it was by a slim margin.

It's been fun having Memory Maker, so that I actually get to be in pictures. We explored the other countries, and found Japan to be particularly beautiful. We ended up in Norway just in time for our FastPass to ride "Frozen," then enjoyed some School Bread there. Mal got the Frozen mini-cupcakes.

Interesting note: although only the School Bread was listed as being eligible for a snack credit, they both rang up as a snack credit. Even though the cupcakes were trice the price! So if you go to Norway and want the cupcakes, try to get it charged to your dining plan. They would have been $8 otherwise!

Also: obviously, there's the troll, and Olaf, and the blue and white icing with snowflakes is Elsa. So what's the pink one? Is it supposed to be for Anna? Couldn't they think of something more evocative??

Touring Plans has Epcot at a 3 out of 10 today, and though that's only for ride waits, it seemed VERY busy, because of the festival. When we go back in a couple of days, they have the estimate at 1 out of 10, so it will be interesting to see. Anyway, we made our way around to Mexico, and agreed we'd skip the UK and Canada and see if maybe we could hit them next visit. And if not, we shall survive.

Mal wanted French fries, so we were making our way past Electric Umbrella on our way to the exit, anyway, and though I've never eaten there, it seemed a safe bet for fries. We stumbled across the Greece booth first, though, so had to do try a couple of things. James got the vegetarian "nachos" on pita bread. And I got spanakopita, which I have to have any time it's served, because why wouldn't you?

As we ate that by the lake, I pre-ordered Mal's dinner. LOVE MOBILE ORDER! It was ready when we walked into the restaurant. Mal was being crazypants, though, and fortunately the Electric Umbrella is really close to where there's a family play area during the festival. Mal ran off a LOT of steam there before we headed out.

It was tough to pass by Club Cool and Spaceship Earth, which had a 5-minute wait, when means walk on, without doing them, but we were all a little refreshed from the clouds and spending some time in the a/c and it felt right to cut out while we were buoyant.

Here's what's funny: I'd gotten Mal an adorable turkey sandwich with his fries, which he did not want. So I ate it for my dinner. What Mal DID want was a jelly sandwich. Not peanut butter and jelly. He doesn't like peanut butter. They sell Uncrustables down in The Mara, but he wasn't interested. So I had an idea: I looked and there were jelly packets with the condiments. I snagged three of those and went into the grab-and-go area. They had two slices of white bread shrink-wrapped for $.99. Whatever. I walked up to the cashier and said, "Yes, I'm buying two pieces of bread." He just smiled and waved and said, "That's fine. Go on." So never let anyone tell you Disney doesn't give anything away, because today they gave me a couple of slices of bread. So with everything available at Food and Wine, my son had a jelly sandwich. In the bathtub.

We're On Vacation, and Everyone's Crying

Hey, kids! We're at Disney, and we're having a great time! If you're only interested in pictures, here they are, and I'm updating daily, as it is possible.

Yesterday, we flew in SUPER early, and got to the resort at around lunchtime. We wandered a bit before we found The Mara, and had our introductory meal. We happened to come at a time when Disney was offering "free" dining. We DID have to upgrade to park-hopper tickets to get it, and we probably won't park hop, BUT that cost about $300 to do, and we would have spent just under that yesterday on our two meals! So it's already paid for itself!

We saw so many animals, then got to our "standard view" room and have been BLOWN AWAY by the frequency and variety of animals we have seen over here. By the time we were ready to swim yesterday, there were thunderstorms, so we just relaxed and explored. Mal and I found Simba's Cubhouse, which used to be childcare but now is just an activity center. It's a super space to hang out: bigger than our room; with a bunch of toys like a wooden train set, potato heads, board games, Xbox; and both free crafts and higher-end crafts for purchase.

This resort has so many activities, I don't think there's any way we could do all of them. From medallion-rubbing in the lobby to cookie decorating at one of the restaurants to learning to use African instruments to Mickey tie-dye to stories by the fire at night out back, it's just a ton of stuff.

We went to bed super early last night, and got up early today for one of only two "alarm" mornings of our week here. We made our way to the Magic Kingdom as it was opening, and my tears started when our bus pulled away from the resort and a pre-recorded message came over the PA instructing us all to be on our best behavior on the motorcoach, because on this day, we were traveling with a princess on board. There was one little girl dressed up, and just the idea that Disney goes to that much trouble to make kids feel special... it's why people fork over tons of cash to spend time here.

For James, I think he got choked up during the opening ceremonies at the castle. It was a simple little show, but all of the characters came out and welcomed us.

We hadn't had breakfast, so got a Cheshire tail and raspberry lemonade slushy on our way to ride Pooh first. Mal seemed to like the ride, but said he didn't want to do any more rides, but wanted to come back to the hotel to swim. Soon after, he said he wanted to ride It's a Small World, so we did that next, but as we were about to get on, he decided that he didn't want to ride... but we did. Then we used our FastPass for Peter Pan.

After that, Mal asked to go to the fountains that come up out of the ground. I think he meant our pool area, but we took a detour to Casey's Soaking Station and then realized there was basically no wait to see Goofy, Donald, Daisy, and Minnie at Sideshow Pete's.

We went next to the Jungle Cruise, for which we had a FastPass, and after walking through the Swiss Family Treehouse, we enjoyed a Dole Whip swirl on pineapple upside-down cake. Goodness, that was brilliant on such a hot day. There was a line at Aloha Isle, too. Mobile ordering is the way to go.

Our next FastPass was Haunted Mansion, and I was a little concerned about Mal, but we got to chill out on the way, to watch the Muppets' American history show. And he seemed amenable, so we tried. He did great! Man, I love that ride.

Having used all of our FastPasses, we saw that the wait for Enchanted Tales with Belle was very short, and went there. While we waited, I made a FastPass for Little Mermaid, which we didn't need need, but we got to pass some people. All we had left on the agenda for the day was lunch, which I'd pre-ordered while we ate our Dole Whip.

Be Our Guest is super popular, and allegedly difficult to get into. I DID make our reservation 180 days out, BUT.. what made the biggest difference in our experience today was using pre-order. I walked up to the window at 1:40, when our reservation wasn't until 2:25. I said, "We're super early, but can we check in?" She said, "Yes, and I see you've pre-ordered, so here." She gave me a yellow hockey-puck-looking thing and said I could go in on the left side. The right side had a line outside of the building some 50 people deep. We walked straight in on the left side (after I sprinted back to the stroller because I'd left my camera hanging on the handle!) and saw that the line snaked around another room inside, up to two cash registers. We waited behind one person to "pay" for our meal. Then we looked through the castle before deciding on a table in the drawing room, primarily because that was the only room that had a table available.

As we ate, we chatted with a couple next to us. The girl said, "It's amazing to me how you can have a reservation, but still have to wait so long." I asked if they'd used mobile ordering, and they hadn't. So, people, if you're going to Disney and you're doing BoG for breakfast or lunch, DUDE, MOBILE PRE-ORDER IS THE WAY TO GO. All of those people were waiting in line to order and pay. We'd done the front end work, and it paid off big-time!

Also, the food was good, but not stellar. I had the Croque Monsieur, which was tasty. James's tuna nicoise was probably the stand-out. Actually, James and I both liked Mal's peach apple sauce, which he refused to try. He also said his turkey sandwich was for me, so instead he ate my fries while I ate his sweet potato chunks. Also, I DID have his sandwich for dinner.

We'd accomplished everything on the agenda except Tom Sawyer Island, which we'll try to hit later in the week. We stopped several times for Photopass photographers, because I bought Memory Maker. I wasn't ever willing to wait in much of a line, though. We'll see if any of the prime places are slower when we go back for the Halloween party, which seems unlikely, but maybe if all of those people are trying to see characters... Also, I was disappointed because one set of pictures didn't show up. Maybe it will later; maybe it's just lost to the ages. We still got some great ones.

On the bus ride back to the resort, it poured rain. Great timing!

Mal played with his mini-racers for a bit, then was ready to swim. We took the shuttle over to Kidani Village (our pool is under renovation) and had fun for about 20 minutes before thunder and lightning shut the pool down. We came back and watched some TV, then Mal wanted to show James the kids' club, so they went down while I did some organizing in the room, and then I joined them. We got dinner and brought it back to the room, and now my son is sleeping while James and I face each other over blue-lit screens. It's very romantic.

This trip is purposefully different than any trip I've taken to Disney before. I have a different family, and I had to plan slow days. We got a lot done today, but I completely left Tomorrowland for next time, and didn't try to hit either mountain in Fronteirland... also, skipped Pirates until maybe next time, when Mal's a little more confident. But beyond that, it's just a more laid-back pace because that's what the people I love need. It's working out great so far.

Tomorrow: the Food and Wine Festival! Woo hoo!

Disney Pixar Cars Movies and Music, Entry 3 of 3

It's interesting: The third installment of Disney/Pixar's Cars franchise is easily my favorite. The soundtrack is probably my least favorite. One reason might be that for this outing, they didn't include the score, so the run time is only half an hour and a lot of our drives are that long or longer, so it feels even more repetitive.

Digressing a moment, Mal really enjoys listening to the scores. He wants to know the name of each movement, and then later when he plays those scenes at home, he also hums the score.

That's a couple of bars... repeated... from the final race scene in the first Cars movie (yes, he's playing with Cars 3 vehicles).

I would recommend Cars 3 to literally anyone, but it will pack the greatest emotional punch if you've seen the other two movies. It will pack maximum gut-wrenching if you've viewed the other movies multiple times and these are starting to feel like people to you, and how much longer until we move on to the next thing I think I'm going crazy

...

Where was I? Oh yes... Even as a stand-alone, this movie has very ambitious and relatable themes, especially to those of us of a certain age.

I'm going to digress AGAIN, because it seems like my wont this evening. I've read extremely disparaging reviews of Cars. One mentioned that the entire franchise is a victory of marketing over art. I think that art is subjective, but in my experience, Cars is every bit as emotionally-satisfying as, say, Toy Story, without being quite as "Hey! I'm tugging on your heart-strings right here! Feel it!" (And we won't talk at all about "Up," which I like, but good gravy.) And maybe I feel protective of it because my child loves it so much, but here are some things we've discussed because of the movies:

1) That "bad guys" aren't always "mean." He notices that ***no spoiler here*** is extremely personable throughout one of the movies, and asks me, "Is he a nice bad guy?" So we've gotten to talk about how people who have bad intentions can be charming and seem nice, but that doesn't mean they're good people.

2) Death. Oh, gosh, death. Probably because Paul Newman died, Doc Hudson dies between Cars and Cars 2. Mal has told me that Cars 4 is about when McQueen is dead, and Cars 5 is about when Sarge and Carla Veloso are dead. I've had to point out that Doc doesn't "come back," even though he makes appearances in the third movie. He's represented on old film and in McQueen's memory. Mal understands enough to know he doesn't want to die. He's asked about James's and my grandparents. He's being able to work through these scary and complicated issues because of a few animated films.

3) Concentration and frustration and anger are different emotions but might look the same on someone's face. This comes up from the way the cars look when they're really racing hard. There are times McQueen is having run racing, and his concentration is underlied by joy. But sometimes, he's just trying his hardest and it doesn't look great... Oh, also, somehow animators MAKE A VEHICLE HAVE THIS RANGE OF "FACIAL" EXPRESSIONS, so you can pipe down about "artless." Anyway, we've talked about how to think about a situation to try to figure out what a person (er, automobile) is feeling. In other words, empathy.

There are other things, like the scenarios he creates when he's playing with the toy Cars. Like he'll make good guys decide to be mean, or bad guys take a new lease on life and are kind. Or one car will give another one a pep talk to get them to do something they're scared of. Again, it's all play/work through some pretty deep experiences. I'm grateful to the franchise for those opportunities.

Back to the actual Cars 3 installment...

Lightning McQueen isn't as young as he used to was. He finds that the newer-generation cars are simply physically faster, no matter how hard he pushes himself. After a huge set-back that causes McQueen to miss out on the end of a racing season, he is faced with the reality that his career might be over, and has to decide where to go from there.

After having seen the movie once, going back and watching his training scenes and realizing what is actually happening... I'm seriously tearing up writing this. It is so simple and elegant and beautiful. The relationships that develop among several generations of cars throughout the story are hopeful. Comforting. The things McQueen learns about his mentor, and the end of his racing career... whooo. I can't. I can't talk about it. Let's move on.

Nathan Fillion is in the movie, too, so there's that.

I've seen reviews that talk about how this is an interesting examination of how aging athletes deal with their futures, but, I'm telling you, it's applicable to every career, to everyone. I can't say anymore because I'll spoil it.

This is too long for me to go into much detail about the soundtrack, so I'm just going to list it and then share my favorite song.

Kings Highway - James Bay
Truckaroo - Brad Paisley
Thunder Hollow Breakdown - Brad Paisley
Glory Days - Andra Day
Ride (feat. Gary Clark Jr.) - ZZ Ward
Drive My Car - Jorge Blanco
Freeway of Love - Lea DeLaria

The two songs by Paisley are instrumental, and a lot of fun. It's amazing how different "Glory Days" sounds from the 1980s song it covers. "Ride" is the one Mal started singing first, and he loves it best. I was skeptical of an Aretha cover, but "Freeway of Love" is pretty good.

My favorite song I have been unable to find a correct lyrics listing for anywhere online. But the parts that mean the most to me are at the beginning, when he speaks of feeling the "outstretched hands of time" with foreboding. Then he decides that he's going to be purposeful and do what he has to do, so everything changes. "I shake the outstretched hands of time." Then later, the bridge: "When I lay on my pillow at night, I think about what's still going right and thank the stars up above there's still things left that I love." <3 <3 <3 Same, man. Same.

Disney Pixar Cars Movies and Music, Entry 2 of 3

"Cars 2" was our entree into the entire Disney/Pixar Cars franchise. Mal watched it about a year ago, and rewatched it, and just kept watching it. He loved it. I'm tempted to say that, though thoroughly enjoyable, it's my least favorite of the trilogy... But when I think about it, it actually has a lot going for it. It's just very different from the other two films.

Unlike Cars and Cars 3, Cars 2 doesn't focus as much on Lightning McQueen (even though the film is about his participation in the World Grand Prix). Mater actually takes center stage in this movie.

If you are a James Bond fan, this movie is likely to tickle you. There are so many parallels, from Michael Giacchino's characteristically Bond-sounding score to the intrigue plot, down to the name of a female agent recruit: Holly Shiftwell.

The story itself centers around a nefarious plot surrounding a multi-national automobile race. Finally allowed to tag along with McQueen (which isn't the first time he's had to heed Sally's empathetic advice in this regard), Mater finds himself accidentally embroiled in the criminal activity, but with the good guys, of course.

There are several international locales represented here: Japan, Italy, and Great Britain. To see a Cars take on them is a lot of fun, most notably the Japanese restrooms. Some friends recently visited Japan and said they do not understand why our toilets are stuck in the dark ages. Mater might have a different take.

Right now, Mal doesn't have any kind of context for "dead," but it comes up a lot in the movie. We don't actually see any characters die directly, but from dialogue and a cutaway scene or two, it's clear that they do. That might frighten some kids. It seems a little intense to me, but I guess is in keeping with the spy/bad guy theme.

What ends up being the biggest plus for this movie is that the overt theme is just a vehicle for the more subtle, overarching ones: being yourself, accepting people for who they are, what it means to be a friend... and maybe that you should be kind to all people because some marginalized groups might just unite under one bully who doesn't underestimate them??

No song sums up the first three quieter themes like Brad Paisley's Nobody's Fool. "Now I’m nobody’s fool/ It ain't no fun anymore/ 'Cause now that I’m nobody’s fool/ I'd rather be yours./ Well you know what they say/ The truth sets you free/ And that’s just great unless you don’t wanna be..." What great lyrics. I'm telling you: I have historically not appreciated country music, but Paisley's going to turn me, if we keep listening to these over and over and over again.

It's pretty appropriate that this Cars soundtrack also includes a Cars (the 80s band) cover: "You Might Think," performed by Weezer. Then, to go along with the global visuals of the film, there is the pop/dance "Polyrhythm" by Perfume; and the French "Mon Coeur Fait Vroum" (or "My Heart Goes 'Vroom'"), written by Giacchino and performed by Bénabar.

The song I'll feature here isn't necessarily my favorite song (which just might be "Nobody's Fool," dang you), but is both a fun summation of the movie, and a gentle reminder that our world is indeed global, and we can't "sit this out no more." Although the lyrics focus on superficial differences (and, annoying to me, repeat the monetary part when I could have liked to hear a fresh comparison) and never actually addresses any of the deep issues that we allow to divide our countries from one another, the reminder that our best hope is to see the best in each other is definitely a timely one (even though the movie came out 7 years ago).

Disney Pixar Cars Movies and Music, Entry 1 of 3

To say my life has been monopolized by Disney Pixar Cars for the past half a year is no understatement. I think it started when my mom found a Cars 2 busy book a while before Mal's birthday. Though she made a cursory attempt to "hide" it at her house, Mal found it and played with it often before he turned 3.

Since then, we've watched each of the three movies multiple times, though often only a bit at a time, and frequently with some scenes played over and over. Eventually, we purchased the soundtracks, as well, so I'm pretty well-versed in those as I have a child who revels in repetition even more than most.

While my appreciation of the movies has grown with subsequent viewings, and because of my son's fandom (oh, and I do have a definite favorite, but we'll get to that soon enough), I have been so taken in by the music from the soundtracks. Enough so that I wanted to talk about them here, and share one song from each collection with you.

So without further ado, let's chat about Cars 1 ("There's not a 'Cars 1'!" is Mal's refrain, but just saying "let's chat about cars" sounds like I might want to hear about transmissions or something, and I really don't.)

I guess that digression might qualify as "ado." I apologize for that.

The initial Cars movie came out in 2006, and I'd seen it with D, though I don't remember when. Last year, I recommended it to James, and we watched it together. At the end, he expressed surprise that a movie about vehicles could move him in the direction of tears, but you know it's not a Pixar film if you're not crying at least once.

In case you haven't seen it, the basic gist is that Lightning McQueen is a rookie race car who is on the verge of winning the Piston Cup his first season running. He is full of himself, dismissive of others, and might be a bit lonely if he were ever prone to introspection.A series of unfortunate events (probably TM) lands him in a tiny rural town in the middle of nowhere, unable to leave, risking his chance at the final race of the season.

The town is Radiator Springs, located in a purposefully vague spot along the old Route 66 in either New Mexico or Arizona. A formerly bustling little place, I-40 has robbed Radiator Springs of its foot traffic and business, jeopardizing the locals' livelihoods.

As McQueen unwillingly gets to know the residence there in "hillbilly hell" (his words), things start changing for him. He still wants to race, and he still wants to win, but by the end of the movie, the audience wants him to win, too. We want everyone in the movie to win.

This movie's soundtrack is a fun mix of rock, Mowtown, doo-wop, and country. It includes Sheryl Crow's "Real Gone" to open the movie. Of course, "Get Your Kicks on Route 66" is present... twice. The first time, it's the Chuck Berry version; for the closing credits, it's John Mayer. "Our Town" is characteristic James Taylor is predictably heart-breaking. And "Sh-Boom" by the 1950s band The Chords is a lot of fun; it's also the only hit they ever had. I think it holds up!

There are a few other songs, and the score is enjoyable, even apart from the movie.

But the song that means the most to me is this one. I never thought that a country song could be the anthem of my life, but this one fits. It's called "Find Yourself" and it's by Brad Paisley, an artist who appears on all three Cars soundtracks. He also wrote and performed "Behind the Clouds" on this soundtrack, and it's a super fun old-school/honky-tonk-sounding country song.

The song is brilliant because of how well it fits the overarching theme of the movie from Lightning McQueen's viewpoint, but also because you can take it on its own, apart from the film, and it's still profound. I was going to write some more but instead, just listen to it. I listened to it four times in a row on the drive home today while Mal slept, and I cried every time.

If you think the "new" Beauty is any kind of revolution from the canon, you weren't paying attention

We saw "Beauty and the Beast" last night. I'd seen the headline to this earlier in the day, but didn't read it until my husband mentioned it last night.

Oh my goodness, what the heck?? Why do people want to be mad?

First of all, I'm "just" a domestic woman. I don't have a job. I am a dreamer. I haven't done anything remarkable. And I feel like a feminist, anyway. This movie didn't make me ashamed for who I am. Oh, and I use my words, as the article mentions, but I don't always use "soft" "kind" "vulnerable" words, nor do I spend an inordinate amount of time sobbing into my sheets. Still consider myself pretty much full on lady girl type person.

Second of all, I do not think that Emma Watson is an amazing actor as much as I think she's a capable enough actor, and an amazing person. So some of the "vulnerability" or "feelings" they might miss from the cartoon might be a function of her just not having the range to express those things.

But, anyway, the gist of the article is that "Emma Watson" (meaning, collectively, this movie and all involved in developing the character of Belle) has ruined Belle, and Olivia Friedman is going to tell you why.

So here are some excerpts from the article, and the issues I have with her hypothesis:

"To that end, Belle does not follow the path of the original Disney movie." How? The exact same things happen. There's not a real departure.

"She is thoughtful, sweet-natured and touchingly vulnerable." Really?

"In the original film, Belle wants more than her provincial life, but she is a dreamer." Yeah, true. Have you listened to the words of the opening song, "This Provincial Life"? Belle is haughty and elitist. Even in the original film, she talks (sings) about how she has "more" than those tedious province-dwellers have in store. She's destined for more. She sees herself as not like them, even as she seems to blanche at being seen as strange. She herself feels she's "other," and, one gets the impression, somehow better than they are, bless 'em.

"In contrast, the Belle of 2017 does not vow. When the Beast won’t come into the light, she swings a candlestick at him, catching him in its glow so as to reveal him against his will. Similarly, she forces her father from his prison, locking herself into his cage after whispering into his ear that she is not afraid and that she will find a way to escape. When Lumiere unlocks her cell door, she hits him with her dungeon stool. As soon as she is in her room, rather than sobbing on her bed, as the Belle of the original film does, she starts tying sheets and ribbons together in an effort to escape from the castle. At first, she has only disdain and hatred for the beast, spitting defiant words at him through her locked bedroom door and standing up to him rather than retreating into herself."

Ugh. Where to start with that one. So what, she wants to see her captor? So what, she knows her father would never let her trade him places? She does what she does out of FEELINGS (which they go on to pontificate she does not have and this is what makes her an offensive uber-feminist butch-y ass-kicker instead of "vulnerable") for her father, knowing him and that he, too, would sacrifice himself for her.

Also, she spat defiant words at him through her locked bedroom door in the cartoon, too. Here's a clip that's been over-dubbed by a fan, but Disney is super protective of their products and it's not easily/legally available online in its original iteration. But anyway, here she refuses him multiple times. She doesn't say, "I'll never have dinner with you," but she says "I'm not hungry," a tense, forced, "No, thanks," and then finally, "NO!" So she doesn't just "retreat into herself." She refuses. Strongly.





"The message is that the original Belle is not sufficiently heroic. She reads Jack and the Beanstalk, loving magical tales, instead of being familiar with Shakespeare and Romeo and Juliet. She blows dandelion spores into the wind. She uses words, not violence, to save her father."

OH MY GOSH. STOP. "She blows dandelion spores"??? That's so important to the feminine ideal, what brutes they were to cut that! And, honest to God, I don't see the difference in Jack and the Beanstalk and Romeo and Juliet. Even Beast kind of mocks her for loving romances. Sounds fairly dreamy to me.

And who says the message is that the original Belle wasn't sufficiently heroic? Any time a movie is remade, there will be some additions and changes. I personally liked the tying-fabric-together scene, because... well, she's not using VIOLENCE or "stereotypical masculine" behavior; she's not using words, but she's using her freaking brain. So that makes it offensive? To whom??

The article talks a lot about how the original Belle "sobs" onto her bed, and, again, feels all the sad lady feels... but I'm guessing the person who wrote this never saw the Broadway musical? Because if they're mad she's so defiant to the Beast, then they can't have heard the TWENTY-THREE-YEAR-OLD lyrics, "Yes, I've made the choice: for Papa I will stay, but I don't deserve to lose my freedom in this way, you monster. If you think that what you've done is right, well then you're a fool; think again... Build higher walls around me; change every lock and key. Nothing lasts; nothing holds all of me." (And then I feel all the sad lady feels.)

The article talks a lot about how Belle has to be "fearless." "To be a 21st century heroine means that it is not enough to be afraid and still choose to be brave — no, one must be fearless." When her father encourages this of her, I don't think he's saying, "Don't be scared" like, "Don't be a little baby scaredy cat." I think he means, "You might be scared, but do it, anyway, because you're awesome." I think it's semantics and lots of splitting hairs to argue that bravery in the face of danger and being fearless are hugely different. If someone truly has no fear, they're probably psychotic.

"And it is that vulnerability that the 21st century heroine version of Belle — Emma Watson’s Belle — does away with. To be a 21st century heroine, we are taught, means to stand up for oneself, always choosing to be active rather than reflective, to be defiant rather than vulnerable, privileging logic over emotion."

I think that might be the second most offensive part of the article. I don't think we're "taught" this, but I also don't think there's anything wrong with it. If I were locked in a castle by a scary monster, I might cry a little bit at first, but I'd also be spinning my wheels, trying to figure something out. And women SHOULD stand up for themselves in times of oppression, if they can. Everyone should. If I am unjustly arrested and jailed, should I take the time to parse it out in my thoughtful mind wanderings, blowing dandelions (or whatever they have in jail), or is my time better served calling a lawyer and figuring out what to do about the injustice?

"And in the iconic scene after the dance where the Beast lets her go, we loved the fact that she told him she was happy with him but wished to see her father again because she missed him so much. This allows the Beast to do the right thing on his own. This, as opposed to the 2017 version where, when asked if she is happy, Belle prompts the Beast, asking, “Can anybody be happy if they aren’t free?”"

HOW CAN YOU LEVY THIS AS A CRITICISM?? I have nothing to add to that.

"Yes, she wanted more than her provincial life, but living happily with a man she loved, respected and who understood her was sufficient." I don't see how that's any different in this movie.

"She was an idealist, someone lost in books and fairytales — not an inventor, or someone logically sorting through how to break the curse, or consistently fearless. She valued the Beast’s being gentle and kind because that’s who she was."

I'm going to go out on a limb and say she valued the Beast's being gentle and kind because people don't like it when others are mean to them. I can't believe I'm having to point that out.

And I can't believe a woman wrote this article. "Someone lost in books and fairytales..." Okay? So, how is that better than being logical? I think those are moral-neutral things to be. Why are we having this conversation?

"The Belle of 2017, with her strong, defiant, stoic attitude — choosing anger over sadness — sets us back. It says that a woman of today is not impressive if she does not do something, such as become an inventor, or if she feels too much — crying rather than creating escape routes. It takes much of the Boy Code that makes our culture of masculinity so toxic and applies it to women, arguing that heroism is linked to toughness and stoicism."

This is the most offensive paragraph, along with the bit later about how Belle acts in "stereotypically masculine" ways.

I don't think the movie said any of these things, first of all. But secondly, DID YOU WATCH THE FIRST MOVIE?! Belle wasn't just a doe-eyed dingdong crying and floating through the story.

After Gaston's marriage proposal, she said (sang): "He asked me to marry him. Me, the wife of that boorish, brainless..."

That sounds pretty angry and not really "kind."

Anyway, I thought the movie was beautiful and, armed with reasonable expectations, I enjoyed it. Of course, it's the first movie I've seen in a theater in 2 years, so that was something.

Conservative corners are mad about the "big gay storyline" (which wasn't, actually; even though LaFou did have every LOL line in the film); LGBT corners aren't thrilled that the first portrayal of an openly gay character in a Disney film is someone literally named "fool;" and now this. Man, they're just supposed to be fun flights of fancy, and I enjoyed mine.

As a bonus, this is my favorite song from the Broadway show. That was one slight disappointment I had: they added some mini songs to string together the new scenes, but I would have loved to see some of the music from the play in the new movie. They did hint at "Home" a couple of times when Belle was in her room.

But overall, a pretty non-controversial, sentimental retelling of a Disney classic. Can I get an "amen"?