This past vacation to Disney World was languid. I cannot sing the praises of the Disney Vacation Club's Old Key West resort enough. Mom and I were able to sleep in separate rooms! This made such a difference to my quality and amount of sleep it was ridiculous, and made a very peaceful nap time. I needed a nap every day, but I only one really bad episode the entire trip, and used a very small amount of my xanax.

The parks were fairly crowded. The crowds this trip a different vibe from normal, as it was considerably lighter on the families and heavier on college spring breakers and school trips. And for some unfathomable reason, I noticed WAY more Canadians. The time of year also meant that Muslium families were out in force, since the humidity was low, and the temperature was on the razor edge of "warm" and "chilly." My last crowd observation is that I saw far, far more child-sized wheelchairs than adult ones.

The only people I had a specific problem with was the spring breakers, as some of them were being complete jackasses and waiting for a show to begin with them is far more noisy and stressful. I wasn't able to see Fantasmic because this fact, plus I was having a bad day already, I would have had a massive episode.

But, all of the above was helped by the incrediabally slow pace we set. We've been to WDW before, so there was no pressure to do EVERYTHING EVER, which cut out a ton of stress. As the lines for the E-Ticket attractions were often an hour plus, with some of the really popular attractions having a two-hour plus wait at times. We managed the Magic Kingdom by going to extended hours, and it's remarkable how short lines are at 2:30 AM. = )

The biggest ride highlight was that we had an completely awesome tour guide on Jungle Cruise. The majority of my enjoyment of the Jungle Cruse is listening to the twist each guide puts on the jokes and puns, as some parts of the trek I've heard over fifty times. There was some new stuff too, with some "Legends of the Hidden Temple" references and one of the jokes had been changed as to catch out people who have been on the ride a lot before. But this guy had the best Embittered Graduate shtick, as after he pointed out that one of his favorite plants he rattled off a long list of termonology about the fern - and pointed out that, one day you too can aspire to get a degree in biology and do tours on Disney's Jungle Cruise.

The best show was not Finding Nemo, this time, but seeing the giant cock-up at Illuminations: Reflections of Earth. And getting people's opinions that the show was just great anyway. What happened was that a large part of the middle of the show is a copper-looking globe rotates in the middle of the lake, and the contentients are really video screens. The video screens quit working after 20 seconds, so there was large swaths of time where the only thing that was happening was that there was music playing and four small fountains changed color in the lake. As I hold the opinion that the the globe is tacky, and hard to see in quite a few locations around the lake, it was nice to see that the show could actually survive without it.

Vacation, Ho!

Almost everything is packed and cleaned and sorted for tomorrow. With the exceptions of my laptop, my meds, and some drinks I'm waiting for the condensation to stop forming on them.

In the morning, I need to pick up my meds and pack the car. Tomorrow is the first day I could get a refill on my prozac, so I called in an order to the pharmacy to pick up tomorrow morning.

But that's it. All done. More or less ready to go.

I've made Progress: My clothes are almost entirely packed! And everything else has moved to the stage where I have everything I need, except that it's just all over the place. Yay?

I have also scheduled my stuff in summer storage to be dropped off on Sunday between 10 - 12 AM. I could have waited even longer, but I need some books in there for classes on Monday.

I can't believe classes start on Monday.

Also, Manpower called for a two day assignment starting Monday. After having nothing being available since late June. I am very, very lucky I was not counting on money I earned this summer to pay for food or rent or medication.

Mama is paying bills, and I've caught up with my fic fix, so I have time to update everyone. To that effect, we must jump in the way back machine to last week.

Last week, my grandfather had a gall bladder attack. Which is like a kidney stone, only in a different organ. Last January Papa also had gall stones, but that included a bonus where the stones were pressing against his liver and causing it to fail. But the stones were small enough that they could be passed, and his platelet count was way down and they didn't want to do surgery.

This time, he was healthy enough for surgery. Originally they were going to stick a very, very long surgical item though his mouth to get to his gallbladder. Everyone ( including other doctors ) went WTF NO! so that was the end of that. So they got a new surgeon, and this one my grandmother trusted because he preformed surgery on her many moons ago. There was a combination of the operating room being booked and trying to boost up Papa's health a little bit, but he went in on surgery on Sunday. The surgeons were going to do lasoptic surgery, but when they opened him up the gall bladder and surrounding area was inflamed, infected, and just generally icky so they opened him up all the way. The gallbladder came out, and since he was open they fixed his navel hernia.

Papa came out of surgery in the morning on Sunday, and was either asleep or non-lucid for the rest of the day. Obviously, Mama was up in knots. The next day, Monday, he looked better, but since my Uncle and his family were going to a science fiction convention, I came out to keep Mama company.

Tuesday I flew out to Shrewsbury. Wednesday Mama and I went to the hospital, stayed with him for a few hours, and came home. Early Thursday morning Papa called and said that he was being released today and that the hospital staff wanted to send him to rehab. Mama's reaction was, again, WTF NO, and made arrangements with my Aunt Linda to take him home. So we get to the hospital that day. Mama tried to help him from the chair to the bed and completely failed. So it was generally decided that he'd go to rehab. After several hours, some complications where Northborough was confused with Northbridge, they picked him up at 5:15 and carted him away to the short term rehab center.

And that's where we are. Well, actually, we're home because Mama is doing some things around the house and needed some time to chill out.

This is just the bare bones stuff. The more juciy details shall be recorded further in Flock. Though I do have to say that driving with my grandmother has to be punishment for something very, very bad I did in this or a past life.

Today I applied for my passport. I have the most god-awful picture I've ever taken as the photo, but the application is in the passport office ready to go out in the morning. I can even track where it is online!

And yes, I have my aluminum foil at the ready. While it doesn't block out the alien mind control signals, it does a prety good job with RFDI signals.

Also, the car is all packed for tomorrow for the drive to Bloomington. Except the computers, obviously.

Dear Flist:

I'm heading off to Walt Disney World. Please don't burn down Livejournal while I'm gone, or if you do, please email me the screen caps. I might make voice posts, but if not, I'll see y'all next Sunday.

Kisses,
Twincityhacker

I'm back from Chicago. I've been back to a few hours, but as my mind is currently so made of mush I haven't even attempted transcribing the notes I took on the trip.

I had an great time in the city, even if the bus trips were not so great.

Back home in Bloomington.

I wish to correct some statements I made yesterday. I misspoke when I said that the Chicago Museum of Art was an entrance to purgatory. It is, in fact, one of the processing centers for admission into Hell, which I forgot in my fluster at my flight being delayed three times. So, the Milwaukee Airport is the only entrances to Purgatory that I have en counted. ( As the entire state of Ohio is just a little bit too big, even for an entrance into eternity. )

Comparing Only Human to "The Fall of Numantia" by Miguel de Cervantes, "Fuente Oveja" by Lope de Vega, and "The Trickster of Seville and his Guest of Stone" by Tirso de Molina is deeply unfair to "Only Human." It's like comparing "Only Human" to "Don Quixote", "Saint Joan", and "A Midsummer's Night Dream."

I'm not taking back the parts where I say the only good bits are where Das and Jack are there. Because action/adventure and science fiction book should be a faster and more enjoyable read than Aristotle.

But I did get my books today that I ordered. Today, when I was not sleeping or at class, I was reading "Anything Goes." I am tempted to write a fan letter to Carol because the idea to footnote the aides was brilliant. And quite possibley one of my favorite parts of the book, other than the description of places that John and Scott have gone SCUBA diving, Marn, and Minge.

I'm off to my grandparents tomorrow. If 4:00 in the morning can be called "tomorrow" and thus will be deeply variable in internet access.

In other words, see y'all next week, if not sooner. = )