The Magic Kingdom: Where People Go to Throw Money Away · 5 days ago by Whitney
Today I visited the Magic Kingdom for the first, and God willing, last time. This is all going to be old news to those of you who grew up in Florida, but the whole thing kind of freaked me out. You see, my family was not the the amusement park sort (and now I can see why with startling clarity).
To get into the Magic Kingdom they have to scan your fingerprint. Your fingerprint is associated with your ticket so you can only use the ticked once, with one person. This seems like mega overkill to me (they must be using those fingerprint scanners for something nefarious right?) From there on out everything is perfectly manicured. The buildings are all tapered at the top to make them appear taller and at least 75% of the plant life is plastic. It takes between 20 and 60 minutes to get on any given ride and none of the rides are longer than 3 minutes (the teacups remain my perennial favorite amusement park ride, perhaps because they are the only ride where the passenger has any modicum of control.)
Not the least disturbing was the people. Its been a long time since I’ve been around large numbers of normal people (I appreciate the insulation of the bubble all the more now). Americans are rude, loud and poorly dressed. And fat. And most of the people at the Magic Kingdom did not look happy. In fact, it was largely screaming children and disgruntled parents, sweaty tired and overcharged.
People had thrown spare change on almost every available surface. It was like people had literally come to Disney to throw their money away. I could retire with all the change that is at the bottom of the Its a Small World ride (which I’m not even going to go into, save to say that I lost the piece of my soul which resided between my 3rd and 4th vertebra on that ride and I’m never getting it back).
At the end of the evening they have to close of the section of the park around Cinderella’s castle and constantly hose the whole area down with water for an hour or so so it doesn’t catch fire when they do the nightly parade and firework show.
The rides were boring, the people were smelly, the weather was awful. I’m glad Jon was with me, hanging out with him made the whole thing fun instead of terrifying.
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In Which Cadet McAuley earns a Commendation · 8 days ago by Whitney
I’m telling Jon how cute the new house is as we are pulling up to it. In some cosmic act of good timing there are butterflies flying around and a mamma duck with three ducklings walking through our carport. Its an adorable little brick house with white trim. The floors are all tile and there are lots of windows. Rent is only $850 a month, which comes out to about $285 for each of us (me, Calvin and Katie). I am going to have my own room for the first time since I moved out of my parents house. The house is literally right behind CVS and the Smugglers Cove (the fact that we can hear the 80’s music Smugglers Cove plays all day over our fence only makes the whole thing more adorable). I’ll probably end up doing about the same amount of driving I do now since I’ll be able to walk to the store and have to drive a block or two to my friends houses (instead of vis versa). Katie wins so hard for finding this house.
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In unrelated news, this clip from “the adventures of mark twain”
