Disney Trip: Day Seven

Short summary: We packed. We checked out. We drove to the airport. We gave our nice cars back. We checked in to the airport. We went through security. We flew home.

Here are some various random thoughts that didn’t fit anywhere else:

· It never rained while we were down there. (At least during the times we were in the parks.) That’s never happened to me before… usually it rains a bunch! And we were right in the middle of hurricane season!

· I’ve still got two more value resorts to test out: All Star Sports and Pop Century. We really enjoyed the movies… wish the main pool wasn’t under construction… because we really would have preferred to stay in the Toy Story section.

· My favorite travel guide for WDW is the Unofficial Guide put out by Bob Sehlinger and Len Testa. Comprehensive, Informative and funny!

· Next time I go, I think I’d like to go for two extra days… and then alternate by doing a park one day and then taking the next day off. Every time I go, I feel my lack of physical fitness sooner and sooner. I had blisters by day two on this trip… and I was exhausted by day three… to the point where I didn’t even really want to go to the parks in the evenings. Next time I’ll do it differently.

· Something I never realized until I took a kid that wanted to get character autographs: Most (if not all) characters are trained to sign autographs in a certain way. Yes, folks, all Mickey Mouse’s sign their name in the same way… there are usually little ‘touches’ that set one character apart from another character as it pertains to their autograph. I’m not wanting to get into specifics here… other than to say that I never knew that and it’s another example of how Disney is so good at taking care of the smallest details.

· Love bugs. Too many love bugs. Must get away from the stinkin’ love bugs. From what little I learned about these things, they appear about twice a year. They are bugs that you always see in pairs. Point is… everything you saw had love bugs crawling all over it. From what I heard on a podcast after the trip… it was an unusually large infestation that hit central Florida this year. Yuck.

· I hate driving to the Magic Kingdom. I understand Walt Disney’s concept of wanting guests to leave the ‘real’ world behind… but it takes forever to get there. You start in the parking lot, take a tram to the monorail or ferry, and then take one of those to the Magic Kingdom. Whew. I get worn out just thinking about it. The free bus ride from the resort is the best way to go.

· I hope I never have to use a double stroller at Walt Disney World ever again… it was way too bulky for trams, trains, buses or anything else I had to take it on. Unpacking it and unloading it in any quick fashion was almost impossible. Grrrrrrr.

· FREE DINING PLAN ROCKS!!! Total estimated ‘spending’ on food: $850.00 – That’s a lot of free food, ladies and gentlemen. And I enjoyed every little bit of it… believe you me.

· When can I go again? Please, Melissa, can we go soon?

Ok, I'm finally done. For MUCH more recent trips to Disney... check out The Evans Family or The McKee Family.

Disney Trip: Day Six

Alright... two of my friends: Jesse and his family; Matt and his wife... have recently gone to Disney World and they are putting me to shame because they are immediately getting their stuff posted and here I am still trying to finish up my trip report some seven months later. Here's our sixth day and tomorrow I will post our seventh day and final day...

We went to Magic Kingdom in the morning. Oddly, it wasn’t that busy when we got there in mid-morning. Melissa and I rode Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain… I love the detail and scope of both rides… both are examples of how Disney takes a traditional thrill ride and makes it infinitely better. Good stuff. Emily, Aaron and the grandparents rode the Liberty Belle Riverboat… which is a neat little ride around Tom Sawyer Island… which I STILL have not been on yet. I was hoping to get Emily over to there all trip… but we just ran out of time!



Our lunch was spent at Tony’s Town Square Restaurant. This was a cool little Italian restaurant right on Main Street. The theme was based off of movie Lady and the Tramp in the restaurant where Lady and Tramp shared a bowl of spaghetti. There was a cool little fountain in the middle of the restaurant that Emily liked. Food was alright, ambiance was great. If I remember right, dessert wasn’t very good. But I hate fancy and rich flavored desserts. Just give me a brownie and some ice cream and I’m happy.



After spending yet another afternoon napping and swimming at the hotel, we went back to MGM Studios to see what we could see and try to take advantage of the evening extra magic hours. On this particular night, we took in my favorite 3D show: The Muppets. I know this show doesn’t have quite the advanced effects that other WDW 3D shows have… but man, it makes me laugh… and it’s nostalgic, because I absolutely loved the Muppet Show when I was a kid.

We also took in The Little Mermaid, which Emily STILL talks about. She loved the bubbles and the special effects that made you feel like you were ‘under the sea’ but she hated the HUGE Ursula that party crashes the show. We got her through it by letting her call Ursula a big ole cranky butt. I know, probably not the best thing to let her say… but we were desperate.

We also rode the Great Movie Ride. I made my feelings about this ride public on my last trip report posted back in October of 2004. I love the various scenes… but I feel like ride needs a serious update or overhaul. I also think it would be better if it wasn’t so dependant on how good the cast members are at acting. I don’t think I’ve enjoyed the cast members on this ride since my trip back in high school.

Jim and Frances took Emily and Aaron back to the hotel, while Melissa and I stayed a little later to try and ride a few of our favorites. We found out that they don’t distribute fast passes during extra magic hours… which I should have just assumed. So, we got in the 40 minute stay by line for Rock ‘N Roller Coaster. Within a few minutes, we were notified that the ride was having technical difficulties and they were shutting it down for the night. Very disappointing… this is Melissa’s favorite ride at DisneyWorld. Tower of Terror was about a 50 minute wait… and while I love that ride, I don’t love it enough to wait 50 minutes at the end of a long day at the end of a long trip. So we found an ice cream place still open… bought some ice creams… and sat down and spent some nice quality time together. It was a great way to end the trip…

Podcast Review: Part 2

Alright… picking up where I left off… here are a few more of my favorite podcasts:

· Catalyst Podcast: Great stuff here. Every month they interview an influential church leader: Like Rick Warren, Erwin McManus and others. The interviews are well done and lots of valuable info usually is brought out. The podcast also contains other interesting segments. As I said before, this comes out on a monthly basis and episodes are usually around 40 minutes long.

· That’s What She Said – The Office Podcast: I just found this great podcast a couple of weeks ago. As many of you know, my favorite TV show right now by a landslide is The Office. Makes me laugh and then I watch it a second time and it makes me laugh even harder. This podcast is usually about an hour long and a new episode comes out whenever a new episode of ‘The Office’ airs. The two guys on this show do a great job of reviewing the episode. They play audio clips from the show, read listener questions and mail… among other cool segments. Probably my favorite podcast right now.


· WDW Today: Great podcast about Walt Disney World. It’s hosted by four guys… all with a different area of expertise. They frequently have guests and other creative elements. Having four hosts is great because the show never gets old. This postcast is published three times a week and usually runs about 20 minutes in length. They also broadcast live call in shows and trivia contests through iTunes. Great podcast if you want to learn more about Walt Disney World… or if you have a trip coming up that you’d like to get excited about!

· Theology Unplugged: This is a treasure of a podcast that I just happened to stumble upon. Three guys host this podcast: two graduates of Dallas theological seminary and a professional radio host. They have started a program for lay people to learn theology and this podcast is an offshoot of that program. They attempt to hash out theological issues…. for instance, they spent 11 episodes talking about trinitarianism and 9 episodes talking about sources for truth. They are humorous, interesting and really do a nice job of making theology accessible. Episodes come out about once a week and last for about 30 minutes.

· The ForceCast: All Star Wars all the time! Seriously. This podcast, which is put out in a joint venture between theforce.net and rebelscum.com, is released two to three times a week. They have a feature podcast, released on Fridays, that lasts a little over an hour. Then they have several ‘micro-casts’ that feature interviews, book reviews and even showcase Star Wars inspired music. Micro-casts, which are randomly and frequently released, usually range from 15 to 40 minutes. Great Star Wars content… and you never really know who may drop in for a discussion. Sometimes even Star Wars actors!

· The Lost Podcast with Jay and Jack: This was my most recent find. They broadcast one hour episodes twice a week. Two hosts talk about the TV show ‘Lost.’ They’ve got some interesting segments like: Crackpot Theory of the Week, Weekly Episode Review… and an interesting spoiler segment which features a person that gets access to the set to see various future shots that are being filmed. This one is still fairly new to me, so I can’t give a huge review… but based on the episode that I’ve heard… it looks to be a good outlet for conspiracy theories and other ‘Lost’ related news!

The Human Arch

So... Aaron is nine months old today... which is extremely hard for me to believe. Anyway, he still isn't crawling... but he is pulling himself up to a standing position. He also does this thing that I would like to call 'The Human Arch.' You can take the boy out of St. Louis... but you'll never take the St. Louis out of the boy. Enjoy.

Podcast Review: Part 1

For Christmas, I was given an iPod Nano… 2 Gigs of listening pleasure. Currently, it is completely full: 231 songs… mostly U2; 35 podcasts which are good for 21 hours of listening time. It has been great to find interesting podcasts to listen to on a regular basis. I enjoy them more than listening to talk radio… probably because most podcasts cover a specific topic or theme. So I thought I’d write a quick blog “reviewing” the various podcasts that I’ve tried.

• Podcasted sermons: First of all, I’ve subscribed to various churches who broadcast their services and sermons over the internet through iTunes. None them have stuck, however. I find that those episodes usually just sit in my queue and never get listened to. I get worship services on CD from my home church, Heritage Wesleyan, and that’s good enough for me. I may subscribe to some of these in the future… but I do not currently have subscriptions to any churches.

• NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) Retrocast: I found this podcast early on and really enjoyed the earlier episodes. They had one section of the show that was pretty fun to listen to… it was called ‘Going, Going, Gone.’ They would look on ebay and see what Nintendo related items were selling. There was some weird stuff being sold for a lot of money! I ended up canceling this podcast because their episodes became very sporadic and when they did broadcast… it would be two hour long episodes! In addition, the discussion started to drift more and more from Nintendo topics to unrelated banter. The last show I listened to was, at best, 10 percent Nintendo related content. Ladies and gentlemen, in a two hour episode, that got very boring in a hurry. (I know some of you are saying… listening to two hours of NES related material would be boring enough… well, to each their own!)

• Cardinals: The Baseball Podcast: This little podcast isn’t great… but it’s the only Cardinal related podcast that I could find (until I get my own show up and going someday.) There is only one host… which is a pet-peeve of mine. I would never do a pod-cast alone… it is so much better when there’s someone around to bounce ideas, humor and arguments off of. I would love to do a Cardinals related podcast with my brother someday. Anyway… this guy broadcasts episodes about every nine or ten days… and the episodes usually run about ten minutes or less. I will unsubscribe from this podcast as soon as I find a better Cardinals podcast.

• The @U2 Podcast: A podcast all about U2. The first few episodes weren’t great… but the show has evolved and is getting better and better. The last episode was all about the Joshua Tree (2007 is the 20th anniversary) and they had a round table discussion going through the Joshua Tree track by track. It was very interesting to listen to. They also released a pod-cast all about ‘Pop’ because, believe it or not, 2007 is the 10th anniversary of THAT album. Very nicely done… they used the same concept with round table track by track discussion. It’s always interesting to hear what people think of various U2 songs. It’s also fun to hear various listener stories in their feedback segment.

Stay tuned for part two where I’ll review the rest of my favorite podcasts!

Emily Gymnastics Video

Book Review: Fresh Power

Last month, I finished ‘Fresh Power’ by Jim Cymbala. It didn’t offer too many new insights… but lots of crucial reminders! I thought I’d post some of the more interesting quotes from the book: (And my responses… if I wanted to comment on one of the quotes!)

“While Christ’s work on the cross, the shedding of his blood, was the only way to settle the problem of guilt, sin, and condemnation, the coming of the promised Holy Spirit was God’s way of changing human beings from the inside out.”

“In the Bible God gave us HIS vision for the church – what it is supposed to be, how it is supposed to operate, what its goals are, what power will sustain its working. To hold any vision apart from Christ’s vision as stated in the Bible is the height of arrogance.”

(Lord, I am so sorry for the times that my vision for Your church hasn’t matched YOUR vision for Your church!)

“Charles Spurgeon admitted: ‘Without the Spirit of God we can do nothing. We are as ships without wind or chariots without steeds. Like branches without sap, we are withered. Like coals without fire, we are useless.’

(Good reminder of the Spirit's role in our lives and ministries…)

“A.W. Tozer once commented that if God were to take the Holy Spirit out of this world, most of what the church is doing would go right on, and nobody would know the difference.”

(This was a sobering observation from Tozer… and probably a pretty accurate one, unfortunately. I am scared that I might be running ministries where this is true and I so desperately want the Spirit to be leading as I minister and serve.)

“Revival comes when people get dissatisfied with WHAT IS and yearn deeply for WHAT COULD BE.”

(Amen. The challenge is getting people to become dissatisfied… but that’s probably not my job completely… the Spirit will HAVE to get involved in this!)

“Sometimes we think we’re really getting sanctified, we’re really growing in the Lord – and then a trial comes along to prove otherwise. When the sun is shining and everything is going well, you don’t really know what kind of Christian you are. Only the storm reveals that.”

(Man oh man... I have experienced this to a certain extent since late summer. I’m just so glad that God is the master at taking the painful things in our lives and somehow turning them around to build His kingdom.)

Opening Day Predictions

About once a week during spring training, I'm going to make my predictions for who will make the Cardinals Opening Day Roster:

Starting Line-up

SS - David Eckstein
LF - Chris Duncan
1B - Albert Pujols
3B - Scott Rolen
CF - Preston Wilson
RF - Juan Encarnacion
2B - Adam Kennedy
C - Yadier Molina

Starting Rotation

Chris Carpenter
Kip Wells
Anthony Reyes
Adam Wainright
Braedon Looper

Bullpen

Russ Springer
Jason Isringhausen
Ryan Franklin
Tyler Johnson
Richardo Rincon
Brad Thompson
Josh Hancock

Bench

So Taguchi
Aaron Miles
Skip Schumaker
Scott Speizo
Gary Bennett

DL:

Mark Mulder
Josh Kinney
Jim Edmonds

On the Bubble:

Reliver: Troy Kate
Reliver: Randy Flores
Starter: Chris Narveson
Outfielder: John Rodriguez
Outfielder: Skip Schumaker
Outfielder: Rick Ankiel
Catcher: Eli Marerro
Infielder: Jolbert Cabrera