Mickey Mickey Mickey

Good job, Disney World. You've managed to turn my daughter into a bona fide Mickey-phile without her ever having seen a Mickey Mouse before. Some kid at her daycare loves Mickey mouse merchanidse, I'm told. It was another one of those random discoveries where she saw the iconic mouse among a cavalcade of other characters on the back of a Golden Book at home. Much to our surprise, she pointed to him and yelled "MICKEY!" She did a similar thing to a Barney balloon in a party store a few months ago. The stages of grief as parents are: Shock, Realization That She's Watching TV at Daycare, then the Forehead-Slap With Eyes Closed.

We did Disney World for a day, driving there from my sister's house near Tampa. Bob Barker fans take note: Actual retail price for two adults at Disney - $247! That's just to walk in the gate. We opted to get a "hopper" ticket so we could go to multiple parks during the day, thus inflating the price. We had our reasons. Mostly they had to do with a fish named Nemo. We also thought that it being during the school year, we'd walk on rides fairly easily. Not necessarily the case. Apparently free chicken tenders was enough incentive for parents to pull hundreds of kids from their 'rithmetic. Disney was offering a promotion: Stay at a Disney Resort, get Free Food! Get the wheelbarrow, Cletus!

About half way through the day, after she passed out on the Peter Pan ride, we got her a small Mickey and Minnie. She wouldn't put them down for the rest of the day. The Power of Branding.

Some thoughts on Disney World: Animatronic of Jack Sparrow/Johnny Depp on the Pirates ride was eerily lifelike. When you name a section of your park Tomorrow Land, don't sell prehistoric looking turkey legs there. FastPass to avoid lines - great idea, Walt. Walking in and out of air conditioning and 90 degree heat then getting rained on a couple of times will get you sick - plus all the filthy kids running about with and without their leashes. If a thunderstorm is clearly approaching and people are bottle necking for the exit, maybe get that Electric Parade out of the way - there was no escape! When your parking lot is the size of Iceland, maybe install some visible cues marking sections that you can see from afar. Was booking Albert Brooks really too expensive to record a few lines for that Nemo ride? Seeing that animated fish with someone else's voice felt wrong. Thank You for making It's A Small World less annoying. Alina wanted to ride it three times. You don't hear the actual lyrics until the last minute. It used to just play and play and play on a loop until you wanted to drown yourself. Snow White is a really dark and scary ride - dark forests, evil witches, she tries to drop a rock on you. Geez! How 'bout a song, dwarves?? I tried distracting her by making her Mickey & Minnie toys dance. But in the blacklight, their eyes and hands glowed and it just made them look menacing.

Alina sorta kinda liked the people wearing the character costumes. I thought she'd either love them or cry and run in fear. Something in the middle ended up happening. She really wanted to see them, just from 5 feet away. "I can see them just fine from here, thanks" was the vibe she put out. They even tried to get on one knee and spread their arms out for a hug. Ummm, no. However, pictures had to be procured. So we just made sure there was a human between her and the loveable 6 Foot Rat.

We had a great time, though. And we'll most certainly go back when she's a little taller and more used to the idea of animatronics. It turned out to all be about repetition. The first time on any ride she was mostly staring and sucking her thumb. She didn't know what to make of it and it was damn un-photogenic of her. After a few tries though, she'd be dancing and pointing things out. Very cool.