Return Day

1. We have arrived in Orlando to find our flight - excuse me, the first leg of our flight - doesn't leave for EIGHT hours. The fee to change the flight is $1800. We can't even check our bags for four hours.  I have four children. This will suck.

2. Screw it. Superdad saw a Hyatt sign in the airport and rented a room for the next eight hours. I dread coming home and checking my bank balance. I may cry. My mortgage company may cry more when I can't pay them. But let those bankers keep my kids at an airport for 8 hrs. Then they'd understand lol

3. Everyone is either asleep or watching Flea Market Flip.

4. I have blisters on my feet and toes. My left ankle hurts and is swollen. My right hip and left knee ache. I have scrapes on my arm, a cut on my hand, bruises on my chest and I'm exhausted. And yes, it was fun.

5. YaYa and I both had our cameras going non-stop throughout the trip, and Lisa pre-paid for Memory Maker, which gets you every professional shot at WDW. Once I lost wifi I stopped supplementing all of the above with phone pics, but fear not: I plan on breaking the internet with all our pics once we're home.

6. Just touched down in Atlanta. Just a note: the last row of a 717 is a noisy place - and no window!

7. Nerves frazzled. We took four kids across a continent and part of an ocean. Who wouldn't be frazzled? Whoever picks us up should bring booze as a welcome home gift! Lol

8. Home safe and sound but the airline lost Lisa's bag.

Our Rooms on the Disney Dream

Our stateroom (we had two)

The Bus Ride to the ship and our arrival aboard the Dream!

Our arrival on the Disney Dream

   

Epcot with YaYa

Boring "memory bookmark" post here. 

At Epcot YaYa and I stopped at the Coca-Cola exhibit, where a boy "tricked" me into trying the incredibly bitter Italian soda called Beverly. I was going to pretend it was yummy, but it was so awful I had to spit it out. Yuck. It's like their atoning for Fascism by punishing themselves with bad soda. 

Then it was on to the Japanese exhibit where we saw a drum performance and bought her kimono. I got some sushi but she refused to try it; however, a passerby humorously offered to try it instead.

At my insistence we watched a performance of "The Spirit of America"' where we saw a ledger accounting for 500 slaves  (I'll always remember the phrase "increase (in inventory) by birth"). I loved the bookstore next door btw but they wanted 900 for a framed autograph of Bush 41!

*I broke the clip on my pedometer squeezing into one of the chairs in the auditorium :(

I wanted fish and chips but it was legitimately cold as heck so we headed back. A guy came up to Yaya and asked her where she was from. He was bundled up and she was in shorts and a tank top. When she said Milwaukee he said "Ah, that explains what you're wearing. I'm from Florida and this is miserable for me"

A great time with a great girl. :)

My New Bookworm

LuLu has brought a book everywhere.

IMO

I think it was a catastrophic act of negligence for the government to allow Ebola patients to return to U.S. soil.

Finally, it's gone!

It's done. I went to a private dentist this morning and was seen by a junior associate who chatted with me about law school. In the end not one but *two* teeth  were pulled, with the second one a surprise to all, but deemed necessary by the doc while I was in the chair. I objected b/c I was paying out of pocket and didn't want to double the charge. 

"Shut up," ther dentist said. 

"I'm serious, I don't have another $200 to spare -"

"Dan, SHUT UP before my boss hears. I'm going to pull it.. As long as he doesn't see it  we're good. If he does . . . whatever, it's done and you already have your receipt."

"Wow. Thank you."

"No problem. Marquette looks out for Marquette, you know?"

So apparently my exorbitant, soul crunching law school tuition has already done me *some* good in the world.

Congrats!

Got accepted into the dental hygiene program🙏 - my niece Caitlin

Agony

I waited nearly five hours at Marquette, and in the end they WOULDN'T pull the tooth, instead putting me on antibiotics and telling to get it yanked once the infection clears up. What $%##% B.S.

In Which Tooth Pain Makes Me an Ass

I've lost a crown and the tooth below is badly cracked - plus my gum is swelling and the pain is rather nasty. Naturally, I am having the run around with my insurance and I fear, in the end, I'll just wind up waiting in line at Marquette for emergency treatment. Spare me your 'helpful' comments suggesting this doctor or that, or this course of action instead of X - it's all crap, total crap, and all just the bitterest proof that the system is, as advertised, horribly flawed.

Raise My Glass

I spent most of the day mucking around with a research project for Legal Writing that *still* isn't finished. What a pain in the keister. A pox on it Now, I'm sitting with Lisa, getting ready to watch a movie - and drinking a mudslide in honor of Carlos H. IIRC, it's his favorite drink.

Gird Your Loins

Grumbling about Who

I'm not sure I'm fond of this season of #DoctorWho. I don't mind an older Doctor. Or a grumpy Doctor. Or a Doctor annoyed at humanity. Or a Scottish Doctor I strain to understand - but so far he's a little bit too much of "all of the above" for my liking. Plus, what's with all the black students in London? If you take the show at face value, England has a larger minority population than Watts, not to mention the fact that no one in Cardiff appears to be heterosexual.  WTH?

Quotes

Anything is possible, but not anything is reasonable.

Winter Prep

It's been a wonderfully productive day off so far

 #TeamSlap prepped the backyard for winter. Smiley and I cleaned out part of the shed, put away the patio furniture, the double swing, the BBQ and the hose, and when that was done we took out the snow equipment. LuLu cut the lawn while LK raked the leaves. Then OJ and I took an axe to a tree that's taken up residence behind the shed. (Princess YaYa got out of work by being at grandma's) Afterwards we took the oldest girls to their first Cadet meeting, I paid the electric bill, and then LK and I walked the mile or so home. 

Following that PD and I changed both furnace filters and took out all the window A/C's. 

Now, we have to start dinner.

Halloween Decorations

From a neighborhood walk today

A Bit of a Mix Up

I took Junie to the ear doctor this morning for a follow up to her ear tube surgery - all good, with perfect hearing! Score! 

OTOH, I came home to multiple voice mails saying LuLu was missing a permission slip for a canoe trip (we'd signed it once but it had been rescheduled). By the time I called the school the class had already departed with LuLuleft behind. We are bracing for a s**tstrom of verbal abuse from my hormone ridden kid.

IT WAS UR FAULT U WHERE AT THE SCHOOL BUT DIDNT COME IN - LuLu

Your'e a brave girl to post that of fb. it will be there foreeeeeeeever - Grandma J

Quote

I found it when looking up what foods YaYa's Muslim friend couldn't eat on her sleepover. "That which is necessary makes the forbidden permissible", Quran 2:173.

In context, it simply refers to a Muslim being allowed to eat pork and other forbidden food if they are in danger of starving or in a situation out of their control.

Out of context, and forgetting  any associated political/religious baggage, that's a pretty powerful quote. A desperate person in a desperate situation is a dangerous entity. 

Gulp

Just finished cleaning the fish tank, and got more than a few mouthfuls of fishy poop water when siphoning it out. Yum. Now, in a touch of irony, I'm watching Catfish the TV show.

Lisa: "I don't want to hear about you and the fish water. You probably have a flesh-eating virus now."

Me: "God willing"

Lisa: "Yeah, the problem with that, Slappy, is that it's never your stomach the virus eats. It's always an arm, or a leg."

Me: {shrugs} "Still be down 70 pounds."

The Chestnut Walk

I took advantage of the beautiful weather to accompany Junie on a one hour walk around the neighborhood (3142 steps if my pedometer is accurate). She has it in her head to make Halloween decorations for the house, and Lisa bought her some paper plates and ribbon to get started - it was up to me and LK to get the leaves and whatnot!

First stop was a house I remembered from walking to summer school with her. It has, as far as I know, the only horse chestnut tree in the neighborhood. I grew up with one in the backyard and made wide use of the chestnuts as baseballs, golf balls, puppets, projectiles, and whatnot. She'd never seen one, and found them just as appealing. 

Then we walked to my friend's house, stopping along the way at two rummage sales, then perused the park before heading home. 

I hope this weather holds. I dread the thought of winter on the horizon.

More on Slenderman

Re-watching the 20/20 on the Slenderman case and growing more and more annoyed at the media. Junie - who is SEVEN - watched it and called the girls idiots for believing in a "make believe" character. He has no facial features and f*ing tentacles and lives in a mansion in the woods; c'mon! These kids weren't suckered by a character's portrayal, they were mentally ill or radically dumb.  #wishIdcreateacharacterasremotelyinterestingasSlendermanbeforeIleavethisearth

Boom Boom Mancini - Al Ford

I'm watching the Boom Boom Mancini - Al Ford fight from April of '81. As an eerie foreshadow of events to come, the announcers were calling for the fight to be stopped in the 4th when Ray was overwhelming Ford, saying "this is how tragedies happen [in the ring]." 19 months later Duk Koo Kim was dead by Mancini's hand.

The Coffee Cup Salute

I think that the hubbub over President Obama's "coffee cup" salute is much ado about nothing. I don't think he meant any disrespect, and frankly, as Commander in Chief, if he decides the new standard is for the President to return a salute with a wave and a wink, it's his call. We have become hyper-pro-military in this country. It's a natural swing of the pendulum away from the liberal idiocy of decades past, but I detest the venom it produces.

Our Spiders

Come nightfall, the outside of our house is often ceded to a host of huge spiders, some with bodies as large as a nickel. It's been that way since we moved in. They've never bothered us or ventured inside, - and they keep the mosquito population down to zilch. Plus they vanish at dawn and let us 'rent' the backyard in peace. 

Personally, I dig 'em. 

As usual they were nowhere to be seen this morning, but for once they left evidence of their passage. Lulu's bike was covered in webs, and they spun a beautiful web in the bush on our front lawn.

They're Ready!

Our TEAM SLAP shirts are done and in our hands! I need to lose 15 pounds or buy a damn good bra if I'm actually going to wear the thing, but they look sharp as heck. Woot woot!