01/28/10 Day 1: So Long SoCal, Hello Florida!

Welcome to the blog for our trip! "Our" being Steevin and Beth. "Who?" you may ask. But more than likely you already know who at least one of us is. But just in case and just to cover all the bases:

I'm Beth. Long time Disney-Nerd. I've been to Disneyland more times than I can count on account of my Annual Pass. I've been WDW (Walt Disney World for those who are NOT nerds) a few times but this time I got to go with Steevin. Eeeee!

Steevin is my boyfriend of just over a year and a half. He is... a Disney-Tolerate-er.  He has an Annual Pass to Disneyland as well but truth be told, I know he goes because I like it. That's the kind of selfless person he is. Oh sure, he enjoys himself there but that's mostly because we just have a good time being together. However, I was pretty sure he was going to like WDW. I tried to talk him out of going several times because I didn't want him going JUST for me. But he told me "Shut up. We're going and I don't want to hear any more excuses." Out of love of course.

So he left it to me to plan everything. When we were going, where we were staying, what dates we were going to what park, where we were going to eat. So I called around, scoured the internet, found some good deals and the next thing I knew... we were booked for a trip to WDW in just two weeks!

I was really looking forward to this vacation. The past several months had been stressful and weird. Well, I guess that's just life. But a week away from worries, jobs,  job searches and the internets sounded amazing. And a week away with my Steevs sounded doubly amazing!

6am rolled around on Thursday morning and I lept our of bed with the speed of...something really speedy. A cheetah or something. Maybe not that fast but I was definitely ready to get a move on. Steevin is a little more on the slow side in the morning in general. I wouldn't call my self a morning person but compared to Steev I'm practically "perky" by comparison. I was plesantly surprised to see Steevin up and getting dressed by the time I got out of the bathroom. I wandered around packing up last minute things and came back to find Steevin crawled back into bed. I knew it was too good to be true! "Come on, Steevin! We have to get ready." I said as I shook him. He replied with "Muffle muuurff mufffuff." which I think meant "I aaaaam ready." but like a good sport he got up and helped me get the rest of the last minute stuff together. I put my shoes on and when I looked up again, Steevin was missing. Ugh! Shake, shake, shake "Come ON, Steev!" "MUMBLE!" (I won't translate what I think that one meant) We played our "fun" hide and seek game two more times before my Uncle arrived to take us to the airport. We kissed our kitty, Mable (quite literally the worlds cutest cat) goodbye, loaded up our arms with luggage and headed to the airport.

Check in with Southwest was quick and easy. Security was okay for me but Steevin somehow managed to bring TWO laptops on an "Internet free" vacation so that took some time. We got muffins at Starbucks for breakfast. But then, after waiting in a mile long line and purchasing said baked-goods, Steevin decided he didn't want a muffin. He twisted and deformed his muffin bag to keep it "fresh" and then went to get a breakfast sandwich. Soon it was time to board.

Waiting excitedly for our flight. Wheeeee! Florida!

We almost missed our prime Southwest boarding time because we are noobs at their whole seating arrangement. But luckily a kind fellow passenger directed us to where we were supposed to be and we were soon boarded, seated together and in the air. We had a stop in Albuquerque and no offense to Albuquerquians but that is a place I'd never want to visit. Cold, flat, cold, flat and cold. I didn't even see any homes as we flew over so it seems no one else wants to be there either. After that brief stop we were off again and I napped while Steev finished his drawing (Kick-Ass Tink - click it).

Wheeee! We were landing! We gathered up our carry-on's, took the airport monorail (woooo, first ride!)  and had the quickest and easiest check in at Disney's Magical Express. We hopped on our bus, and two minutes later we were on our way. The Pop Century was were we where staying and it was the first stop. We collected our luggage and checked in. At check in they gave us two "Happy Anniversary" buttons because we were celebrating our year and a half anniversary and they gave Steevin a "first visit" button. It was a sweet touch to have those waiting for us as soon as we got there.

Woo hoo! Anniversary and 1st Visit. Those are some great things to celebrate!

We were in the 80's building (In case you don't know the Pop Century is themed from the 50's-90's). You would think looking for a GIANT lit-up Rubix Cube would be easy, but we somehow managed to get lost. Well... Lost might be a strong word. We'll just say we took the long way to get there. We finally found our PINK building (Oh 80's... you're so radical!) and dropped off our stuff. It was about 8pm so going to a park was out of the question. But that's okay because although Steevin refused to learn anything about where we'd be going or what there was to do there (that was my job to figure that out) he did know that his *favorite* resturant of all time was at Downtown Disney. We took the bus to DTD and headed straight to Earl of Sandwich. When we go to Vegas we have to eat here several times on our trip. We've been know to eat there twice in a day. LOL! Steevin's favorite food is "sandwich" so this was one thing he knew he'd be enjoying.

 

We've got a hungry Beth on our hands. "Put food here!"

I got The Original 1762 and Steevin got Hawiian BBQ (ew. Gross. I am not a fan of warm pinapple OR BBQ sauce on my sandwiches.)

 

Lookin' cute after sandwiches. Go Earl!

 We completely enjoyed ourselves and decided we had room for dessert. ICE CREAM! We looked and looked for Ghirardelli's but couldn't find it. Until we turned around and it was literally right behind us. It was super busy but we ordered a hot fudge and caramel brownie sundae to split and found a table. We people watched until they brought us our decadent dessert. Wow. It was SO yummy.

 Tell me that doesn't look amazing and I'll call you a liar!

We checked out the Lego store (dude... have lego's always been so expensive?!) and walked through Pleasure Island. I explained to Steev how Pleasure Island used to have a lot of nightclubs and places to dance. Now it has a guy in stilts playing Hannah Montana and teaching kids how to do the Cupid Shuffle... which is actually pretty cute. LOL! (If you don't know what that is... You can check it out here.) Steevin wished that Pleasure Island still had "Pleasure" because we would have loved to go dancing but we managed to entertain ourselves quite nicely and got a few good pictures by the fountain.

 

Getting down in "Pleasure" Island

Rocking out to some Hannah Montana

 

 

Steev and I are a rare breed that can entertain ourselves doing nothing but being goofy.

We did some preview souvineer shopping. LOL! That's where you look ahead of time but don't buy yet. DTD was closing so we got on the bus back to the hotel and I sang Grease along to the radio while Steev shook his head at me. But then Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" came on and Steevin can't help but sing to that song so HA! He looked silly too. We finally figured out the fastest route to our hotel room. found out that our checked luggage had arrived safely while we got our nosh on and went to sleep so that we would be ready for the first park in the morning!