Prelude

[JamelUK]

IMPORTANT MESSAGE

The original title of this Trippie has been changed by request.
If you are easily offended by Carry On style innuendo in the spirit of Benny Hill kindly close this page now.

For everyone else, please keep up to date with all chapters over at The Index

If anyone would like a list of ALL the original chapter titles and promises categorically they wont hold them against me, please PM me.

MESSAGE ENDS

Once upon a time, many years ago, we used to look up to the sky here in the UK and see a big, round, yellow ball called "The Sun".


It was a wonderful thing. It brought warmth, happiness and laughter to the people as they spent their holidays caravanning in the Lake District.


Sadly, those days are now quite rare. In more recent times the Sun has disappeared from our skies.


Now, at the slightest suggestion of sunshine, the citizens of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland run out to their nearest car park, remove several layers of clothing and scream into the skies – “Burn Me! Burn Me NOW!”

Im not entirely sure how and why we lost the Sun, but I believe it might have been when George W Bush was still in power.

You know what he was like.
"Hey! That Sun thing. Its pretty. I want it. Get it for me.
And get me some more bananas while you're at it."

Over here in the UK, some junior civil servant at the MoD took a sensible decision.
"Oh just give it to him, before he throws a tantrum, falls out with us too and starts another illegal war."

And so the Sun now lives over the other side of the pond, in America, mostly in a place called Florida.

The new President Obama has promised we can have it back at some point
in a safe and environmentally friendly manner.


There was even a program about it on the BBC's HD channel the other night - "Can Obama Save The Planet?"

Well of course he can’t. On his own? That's just silly. For starters there is NOT an iPhone app for that.

But then I found myself thinking.

There is no denying that he is the coolest President in decades.


Maybe he could actually pull it off in some kind of MacGyver style,
armed with nothing more than a swiss army knife, an empty tin of Ovaltine and a melon baller.

Im not getting political. I just thought Id take this opportunity to big up the Big O.

Thats Obama, not Oprah.

Or that other thing probably discussed in one of the DIBBs many "Ladies Only" threads.
(I wouldn’t know. Just like those discarded copies of OK magazine you find, I never read them... )


No, just thought I’d say how much we like President Obama.
Just in case one of those wonderful Border Security people over at Orlando International are reading our ESTA's right now.

Because we're going back there. Again. Next week.
Woohoo!

[JamelUK]

Who are we?

Hi!

I’m James (JamelUK).
Friendly, yet occasionally impulsive IT Geek.
Competitive by nature.
Adrenalin Junkie.
Fascinated by the physics, engineering, technicalities and psychology of roller coasters, thrill rides & theme parks.
Currently unemployed – CV available on request
I was born the same year WDW opened, meaning that I am not yet 40.

This is DW Melanie (Melanie R)

She’s celebrating her 40th birthday this year
She is very important and does clever things with numbers & invoices for the NHS
She has members of staff who have mother’s younger than her.
She is very beautiful and I love her enormously.
Her date of birth is 31st Jul 1969, in case you can't believe she looks 40.
Id post a copy of her passport photo to verify, but Im sure that would break some sort of law. Or security rule.
Or my camera.

It’s a match made of Pixie Dust – we are both Disney fanatics.

Our first holiday together as a couple was to Disneyland Paris.
Back in the days when I didn’t have this gold reminder around my finger, but did have my own bank account as well as my own money, I whisked Mel off for a wonderful weekend to celebrate her 30th birthday.
We had a fabulous time, and have been again many times since. Our latest trip was as recently as September.
You can read that trippie here.

So it was a guaranteed certainty that, when I decided to ensnare my gorgeous girlfriend for life, there would be only one destination choice for our honeymoon – Walt Disney World, Orlando.

We planned to do everything we could, as this would probably be a special, once in a lifetime trip. We told ourselves that its too expensive to do Orlando as a regular thing.

That was back in November 2004. We did have a brilliant time, and have many wonderful memories of that trip.
The problem is though, some of those memories are quite vivid, and quite powerful.

Within hours of returning to the colder climate of the UK I kept hearing this tune in my head...

"It's A Small World After All
When You Hear This You'll Have To Call
Come Back Near Christmas And Have A Ball
Here At Walt Disney World"

I still hear it now. It is often accompanied by images of dolls head rotating on the end of a Black & Decker, all laughing manically “Nyahaahaahaaa! ”


We simply cannot resist the hypnotic suggestion, and have been back for our wedding anniversary every year since. Whenever I wash the pots, I’m convinced the Mickey & Minnie mugs we have on our kitchen windowsill look at me with that "We're expecting you..." look.

[JamelUK]

So this will be our 5th trip back home, to collect our anniversary badges.
When you think about it, they're probably the most expensive pins in our collection!

We booked this one in the Christmas/January sales within a week of getting back!

Our last flight back to Manchester on Virgin was awful. Poor service, noisy flight, hell.
On reflection it probably wasn’t that bad, and a lot had to do with VA cancelling an earlier London flight and squeezing as many of its passengers into the overhead lockers on our flight instead.

Based on a colleague raving about her recent trip, we decided to have a change and originally booked with First Choice. Not the cheapest, but the promised seats on the new ThomsonFly aircraft looked very appealing.
Some weeks later we had a letter through the post – “We’ve cancelled your flight. Please call us to discuss.”

The Customer Experience we received during that “discussion” gave me enough material to fill several more pages of ramble. Oh. My. God.

Long Story Short – their alternative was to book us on a Virgin FLIGHT for several hundred £ more than we had seen quoted for a Virgin HOLIDAY on the VH website that morning!

We cancelled, eventually got a full refund and scratched our heads.

Then I discovered Travel City Direct.
Cheap. Available. Click. Booked. Done.
Saving us near £800 from our original FC quote!

However, this is not a They’re-Better-Than-Them post, so back to our pre trippie...

Although our 5th trip, we are both very much looking forward to this visit to the Mouse House, for a couple of reasons...

[JamelUK]

Firstly, it’s been a tough year.

My name is James, and I occasionally suffer from manic depression.

I’ve actually had it on and off since I was small, but only realised something was wrong with me quite recently, when poor Mel noticed that the James she was living with was not the James she fell in love with.
It seems to manifest itself in a cycle about every 6 years. My head tells me to do stupid things, to act in weird ways, and to ultimately get myself in a pickle and in mischief.

I noticed the signs earlier in the year and asked my GP for my usual prescription. Life at work was a bad environment with many management changes and much uncertainty about our future.

It became clear that medication alone wasn’t working this time and determined to break the cycle I headed back to my GP.

I was signed off work for several weeks and took the opportunity to get some proper therapy and learn much more about me. A scary journey, but I understand my component parts now. Some who read my posts may occasionally find me bolshy. I apologise – that’s kind of me. I do my best, but take me as you find me.

I learnt that I have much in common with Stephen Fry, Spike Milligan and, to a certain extent, Albert Einstein. Better still, I can relate to their stories. And that helps me, most of the time, to keep it at bay.

I returned to work, but at the end of August I was made redundant.
It had nothing to do with my condition. The writing had been on the wall for some time, and I was actually glad of the release – it did me a favour. The dark black cloud disappeared and the Sun came out to play again.

I am extraordinarily lucky that the NHS is stupid enough to pay Melanie a huge salary for fiddling with a calculator occasionally. She will be reading this later.

Melanie - I love you to infinity and beyond – you are my rock and always there for me. Thanks.

[Melanie R]

Originally Posted by JamelUK

Melanie - I love you to infinity and beyond – you are my rock and always there for me. Thanks.

See more...

I love you too - and I'm really looking forward to this trip and ending a rubbish year on a high note!

[JamelUK]

Which brings me, finally, onto the other reason we are looking forward to this trip so much.

Disney is always guaranteed to put a smile on anyones face – however low or fed up they feel.

Needing to cheer myself up, having to take an occasional break from hunting the Monster and with a family trip to DLP to plan I hopped onto The DIBB.

I have been a guest lurker since our first trip back in 2004, but with more time on my hands I have recently become a regular contributor. Mel soon followed and bought our annual pass.

The result of this well spent time is that “The Plan” is extremely comprehensive this year, and includes a number of First Times.

We have read so many reports of the wonderful Disney restaurants, but have never previously tried any. Every walk up we have ever attempted has resulted in an epic fail.

Now we know why, this is our first trip out on DDP with ADRs. My pharmacist has prescribed some cream for this, so we should be fine. If not, as YOU all recommended DDP, its YOUR fault!

On the list of eating establishments to sample are The Rose & Crown, Kona Cafe, Le Cellier, Teppan Edo, Whispering Canyon and Ragland Road with some character breakfasts scheduled for Chef Mickey’s, 1900 Park Fayre and The Crystal Palace.

As it’s Mel’s 40th, we’ve booked the Dolphin Swim package at Discovery Cove, and are both really looking forward to this. Dolphins are magnificent creatures and I still find this truly awesome...

[Cinnabon]

Great post.

In the next week the big "O" is going to have to show the world if he has what it takes.

Have a great holiday.

[JamelUK]

Also on the itinerary is the Keys To The Kingdom Tour. If this is even half as good as everything Ive read about it Im going to be bouncing off the walls for weeks.

I am truly a Disney fanatic and have read much about the World, the Man, the Mouse, etc – David Koenig’s RealityLand and Mouse Tales being some of my favourites. To actually see the magic at work first hand is going to be amazing.

It is testament to how enthusiastic Mel is about this trip that she has agreed to get up early to see the Opening Ceremony and Rope Drop at Magic Kingdom.

Normally Mel doesn’t do mornings. There was a moment whilst I was driving her to work at 8am earlier this week when I feared for my own life. I simply turned the radio up from 11 to 12 (it has to be an even number!). The look I got burnt a layer of flesh off the side of my face.

One of our greatest discoveries for this trip is the Picnic In The Park at Animal Kingdom. Order your packed lunch on the way in, collect it for lunch. As we always struggle to find somewhere to eat in Animal Kingdom this looks a really good idea.

Finally, the part of the plan we are both really hoping for. That Mel can finally join me on Hulk, Kraken & Manta.

It’s not because she has chickened out on previous trips. Sadly it has been as a result of Mel’s ample curves.

I am so proud of her this year. I shouted at her. She shouted at me. I stood my ground and shouted back. She took the hint.

Mel made the decision to shed the weight this year. And she has done just that. Several dress sizes smaller we are much more confident of squeezing her into a Bolliger & Mabillard restraint on this trip.

I’ve just checked one of her bras against the new Virgin baggage dimensions and we’re good to go!

So there we are. We fly out next Thursday 3rd December on VS075, staying for 14 nights at All Stars Music. We will takes hundreds of piccies and have a full trip report once we’re back and recovered from jet lag.

Oh the trip title thing?

Well according to the wikipedia list of wedding presents,
it is traditional on your 5th anniverary to give your wife some wood.

"Time for bed!", said Zebedee




>>Next Chapter>>"

[Guest]

As they would say here in Ireland 'ur not near wise' but sure its grand we all in that same boat. have a great time and long live the 'O'

[streamlines]

You will love the Dolphin swim, they are the most wonderful animals. They seem to love to play and have fun with these strange animals that come into the water with them.