Long Time No Blog!

Busy busy, lots of Disney in September. We are taking a break from Disney for the month of October, though we'll be there at the end of the month, staying at the French Quarter. I cannot wait. Life has been a tad stressful, and it's almost not worth going into now, because I clicked on the National Hurricane Center website to find this:

We live comfortably inside the western curve, and that M means Major Hurricane. That M means very, very bad things for basically everyone I know and love up and down the coast.

I'm not an alarmist or one of those idiots who doesn't believe that will ever happen here. I've been through a few relatively minor "major" storms, and in 2004, the last time FL really got hit, we had several in one year and I spent a memorable week taking cold showers in the morning and blow-drying my hair at the office, where the power had been restored, and scavenging for ice, and everything was incredibly sticky and hot and it was miserable, but not awful. I lost shingles, not the entire roof, and life got back to normal in a week or so after the worst storm, and a day or so after the lesser ones. Those were not M storms.

I'll be stocking up on batteries and water and pet food, etc., and hoping this sucker decides to go east. Go East, Matthew! Please! I am not panicking, but am taking this seriously. I'm particularly concerned about the M part. I've done Category 1 hurricanes (too many times, all in one year) and that was messy and destructive, but most of the energy was spent south of here, so by the time it got to my house it took shingles, not the roof. If this sucker stays on its current path and hits this far north as a major hurricane, holy shit. Nobody should take this casually. Turn East, Matthew! Go East!!!

Edit: FL is now under a state of emergency. Oh, joy.

In other, far more cheerful news: as I mentioned above, we spent a hell of a lot of time at Disney in September. It just worked out that way. We're on a break right now until the end of October, and Matthew better not break anything at Disney that will mess up my weekend. Seriously.

So, how do I catch up on an entire month on this sadly neglected blog?

Highlights:

After the Hollywood Studios day we met up with my daughter's friend again at the Magic Kingdom, and closed the place down. It was good.

Then daughter and I played hooky from work to do Epcot Food and Wine on a weekday, when it wasn't so crowded. It's the only way to do it, it's a madhouse on the weekend.

This was taken from a shady sidewalk table near the water around 11 a.m., while we sampled croissants with escargot in garlic butter and I had a truly amazing (but far too tiny) glass of chardonnay that makes the stuff I buy at Publix seem like nail polish remover:

Go on a weekday. It's so civilized. Don't take small children. You can if you must, of course, it won't be a disaster, but it's really a grownup focused event.

Then to top off the month we had a special weekend at the Magic Kingdom with my daughter's best friend and her girls. Her friend is a single mom and works for the school system, and though she's been able to swing Sea World stuff via her teacher discount, her girls (13 and 5) had never been to Disney, despite living 40 minutes away. There was some sort of passholder discount thing where my daughter could get them one day tickets at a discount so they managed to swing it, and it was truly a blast. I met up with them around 10 a.m. and it was HOT and crowded and noisy and all things Magic Kingdom, but thanks to my daughter's ninja scheduling skills, the girls got to do a ton of great things and had a blast. They met princesses and went on many rides and it was hot and exhausting and nobody wanted the day to end.

They managed to cram in a ton of fun, and we must figure out a way to do that again.

It's been a year since Murphy left us. I'm considering a new blog, but also a bit superstitious about it. Just hanging out there, waiting to see what happens, but it appears that Thursday and Friday will be a bit too damn interesting. Go EAST, Matthew!