Part 10

December 11, 2005

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Today marks the 2nd birthday I have spent at WDW.  I was here for my 20th, and now for my 23rd!  It's no coincidince that I'm waking up at my favorite resort for my birthday!

I decided that the only way to start a birthday is with a big breakfast order from room service, so I called up to order Tonga Toast.  Now, if you actually get up and walk to the Great Ceremonial House and order Tonga Toast at Kona, it's about $10.  However, if you are lazy, and have it delivered to your room, by the time you add the cost of a glass of milk, the delivery charge, the automatically included gratuity, and a bit of extra tip, you're paying $20 for your breakfast.  Thus, this doesn't happen often!

 Try as I might, I could only eat half of it.  My stomach just can't handle all that sweetness first thing in the morning! 

I forgot to post something in the last part that I wanted to include.  A while back, I was browsing some Hawaii resorts online, and came across this photo:

Is it just me, or does that remind anyone else of the Polynesian?   The wicker chairs by the balcony in particular, I guess.

I decided to head over to Animal Kingdom this morning to see Festival of the Lion King, because I really wanted to videotape it before going home.  I can't believe how short this trip seems!  I'm usually ready to go home by the end of the 5th day, but this trip seems like it needs many more days added on!

On my way to Camp Minnie Mickey, I wandered through some of the trails around the Oasis, and stumbled upon a beautiful macaw.  "Hi!" I said to him, and "Hi!" he said back.  Ooh, a talker!  I talked to him for a minute, and he gave me the occasional "Hello!" and such, but the minute I pulled out the video camera to tape him, he shut up!  I do, however, have on tape the moment when I started to walk away from him, and he said "Come here!"  So cute!

Festival of the Lion King was awesome as usual, but I was disappointed that my favorite guy wasn't there today.  The one in his spot was good, but not *as* good.  Videos of the show to come!

I decided that I wanted to catch the parade at MGM today, so after a little bit of wandering around Africa, I took the bus back to the Polynesian.  For some reason, I was now *starving*!  Too bad I hadn't kept my leftover half of the Tonga Toast!  Instead, I picked up a pizza (shut up!) from Captain Cook's.  Well, perhaps "picked up" isn't the right term.  I ordered my pizza, and was told there would be a few minutes wait.  So, I sat down for a few minutes, and then when I saw them put a pizza out, went over.  The lady who was supposed to be handing out the food was preoccupied with filling another order, though.  Then she called out the number *after* mine, and gave them their meal.  Five minutes later, I'm still standing there, staring longingly at my pizza just out of reach.  Apparently the other girl noticed my sad eyes, and figured out that the lady had apparently forgotten me!  Pizza in hand, I set off to watch some TV in my room, and eat as quickly as possible, since the long pizza wait had me now running late to get to MGM in time for the parade!

I found a nice parade viewing spot near a lamp post (Gotta love having something to lean on!) near the MGM entrance, and it wasn't long before the parade was on it's way up the street!  I was kind of disappointed that it was the Christmas parade, and not the regular Stars & Motorcars parade, because I've never seen the original version, and had been looking forward to it!  It was still a fun parade, though! 

The villains were the best part of the parade- the Queen of Hearts had a sign that said No Ho Ho!  and Cruella stole the stuffed puppy that a child near me had, but gave it back because it didn't have spots.

After the parade, I went over to see the Indy show, which I have actually never seen before!  I liked it, but it's not on my must-do list. 

I stopped in the shop near Muppets to do a little shopping- people were buying sweatshirts like crazy because it was SO cold!  I got a princess coloring book, a WDW magnet, and a cute stuffed Stitch.  I wandered over to the New York Street area, where a band was set up in what is now the stunt show area, and was playing Walk This Way.  Very cool!  Speaking of cool, it was now FREEZING out, since the sun was starting to go down.  I finally just gave up and decided to go back to the Polynesian to warm up, and maybe to go out later.  The going out later part never happened, of course!  Instead I bought both cheesecake and chocolate cake from Captains Cook's, which were my birthday cakes, and snuggled up in bed watching National Finals Rodeo, because there was nothing else on.  And so my 23rd birthday came to an end!