Head Exploding In 3...2...

What could possibly explain this look on NKC's face? 6 words for you:

HIT ME BABY ONE MORE TIME

More details than you can shake a tassel at coming up.

Nothing Witty

Bet you thought I keeled over, eh? Nope, still here. Alive and kicking. After digging out of our post-Disney depression, the Half Street is back to continue the re-cap. Carry on.

The rest of day two was spent in a haze of fast passes, hot dogs, cute outfits and broken rides.

Outfit number 2 for the day was purchased on Etsy (eBay for crafty folks, only no bidding, just buying. Ok maybe not like eBay. Whatevs.) after being inspired by the Libbanator. I went from knowing nothing about Etsy to dropping some serious cash on the site, within 10 minutes of setting up my account. Awesome.

And just in case you thought Sofia wasn't getting equal billing:

Remember how I said tons of hot dogs were consumed? I wasn't lying. Here we are enjoying our "Corny Dog" after finding out the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was closed.

Some thoughts about this: Who says "corny" dog? I'll tell you. People from Dallas. For example, SIL-E and CRuff. The rest of the world says corn dog. Or at least this is what I believe. Correct me if I'm wrong. Oh and BTMRR being closed? Slightly annoying. When you get right down to it, there just aren't that many rides at the Magic Kingdom. So when one of the staples is closed, well. Annoying. Anyhoo. It didn't get Ella down. All her rides were open. Like Dumbo (time #2) And Aladdin's Magic carpet ride, which she can be seen waiting patiently for here:


While her Dad and Uncle mastered the fine art of the Fast Pass (more later), the ladies enjoyed a cool drink.

If you ask me, Sofia had the best seat in the house.

Part 2: A Sh!t Ton of Princesses

On Saturday we woke up before the dawn to make sure we were on time for our breakfast date with Cinderella. Those that know me will find the next statement hard to believe: we arrived at the park BEFORE IT FREAKING OPENED. I don’t think I’ve ever been at the door waiting for anything to open in my life. Early riser, I am not.

But there we were. Ready to go, and dressed to the nines.

Well at least Ella was.

We were there in enough time for the boys to run over to grab a Fast Pass for Space Mountain, and for a fortuitous meeting with a certain fairy godmother.

As we rounded the corner heading towards Cinderella’s castle, we spotted this lady with a smattering of people around her. I was thinking ‘who is the crazy lady and what’s with the pink bow?’ SIL-E was saying ‘ohhhh looooook Ella. The Fairy Godmother!’ Holy cow! She was right.

I was kind of prepared to be underwhelmed by her. After all, we were on our way to meet Cinderella, the REAL DEAL. But in the end she was my favorite character we met. She was insanely nice. Even though a huge line was forming behind us, she took her time to gush over Ella’s dress and even come over to where I was standing with the camera and Sofia to say hello to me, er Sofia. Plus she could spell. More on this later.

So after our Fairy Godmother interlude, and finding the boys, we proceeded to breakfast. I’ll try to set the stage for those who aren’t aware. Little girls love princesses. Disney knows this. Or maybe Disney created this. It’s all a little foggy to me. What I do know is that someone somewhere is making a ton of money off of this phenomenon. And it’s not me. The Mecca for all this princess worship is Cinderella’s castle in the Magic kingdom where little girls (as well as some big girls and boys) can meet Cinderella herself, eat breakfast, and visit with all the rest of the princesses in the Disney arsenal. To say that it is expertly done, is an understatement. The wise folks at Disney have it all down to a science. First up: meeting the big lady herself.

“Hey Cindi! What’s up? Nice shoes. Mom made me wear these more “sensible” ones. Gotta protect those arches, ya know?”

“Look we’re twins!”

“Geez Belle. A little cas', don’t you think? You couldn’t bust out the yellow dress for your guests? I mean you don't see my girl Cindi traipsing around the castle in her pre-ball attire, do you? A little effort here please”

“Now that’s what I’m talking about! There is a girl who knows how to dress! Although you’d think you’d be able to crank a dwarf or two out of bed to greet some guests. I got my Tia out of bed for this, and she’s the Sleepiest dwarf of all!”

“Oh man Jas, my Tia almost wore the same thing! THAT would have been embarrassing.”

Ok we have to take a little break from Ella’s thoughts to give some adult commentary on this particular princess. Aurora. You might know her as Sleeping Beauty. One thing that little kids can do in the park is carry around an autograph book and get characters they meet to give them an autograph. It’s neat for the kids, and fun for the adults to watch Mickey try to master a pen with those big mitts on. When we met the Fairy Godmother I was impressed with her autograph and wondered if that was part of the audition process. It might be, but spelling is clearly not a prerequisite since Sleeping Beauty misspelled Aurora. No lie. I mean seriously lady. You have a limited scope of responsibilities here. Smile, have your picture taken, AND SIGN YOUR NAME! It’s not like you were caught off guard by my niece’s request. There were about 100 little girls in the room, all armed with a pen and autograph book. In this economy, you’d think she’d at least try to guarantee her job security by mastering A-U-R-O-R-A.

Even with the spelling mishap, I think we all enjoyed the princess breakfast. Even the HSH. More so because the food was good, but whatevs. To each their own.

More later, after a costume change.

Part 1: Walt Disney Laughs In The Face Of The Recession

We had three things on our agenda for day one in Florida: Paint our nails, get to Orlando, and see some fireworks. A girl just can NOT meet Cinderella with bare finger/toe nails, and who doesn’t love fireworks. We ended up accomplishing quite a bit more than that. Namely, unexpectedly seeing the parade (we didn’t think there was one that day) and riding Dumbo. We were supposed to have dinner with Pooh and friends, but some lovely Orlando traffic threw a wrench in that plan. No one seemed to mind too much though, as we located a primo table to camp out for the parade and grabbed the first of many hotdogs for the weekend. Seriously, I’m not sure what the deal was but I think I tripled my annual hot dog consumption this weekend alone!

Ella inspecting her mother’s work.

Blowing the nails dry.

Packed up and ready to go. The ride was pretty uneventful. Or at least it seemed that way to me from behind my eyelids. The HSH wanted to bet my brother a twenty spot that I would fall asleep. My brother, having known me for 30 years, was smart enough not to take it. This wasn’t his first rodeo. Plus he figured he’d need that 20 bucks to buy a coke in the Magic Kingdom.

Waiting for the “Mickey Bus” to take us from our resort to the Magic Kingdom. The coolest part about 2 years olds is that they think everything is an adventure, not an inconvenience. Ella was as excited to wait for her turn on the Mickey Bus as she was to wait for her turn on the Dumbo ride.

Fireworks! Ella LOVES fireworks and kept talking about them all weekend. This was fascinating to me, mainly because we were right in the thick of it, and it didn’t phase her at all. I mean, REALLY in the thick of it. We had gone to the other side of Cinderella’s castle to jump on the Dumbo ride before it closed, so as a result the fireworks were launching pretty much from my back pocket. I was startled several times by the noise. Ella not so much. And Sofia? She slept through the whole thing.

Up next: Our first full day in the park, and some insanely cute outfits. The girls’, not mine. And princesses: Some pretty ones. Lots of nice ones. One really dumb one.

Who's The Leader Of The Club That's Made For You And Me?

Went to the rodeo last night. Had a blast. Always do. One of my favorite parts about living in Houston. No idea why I’m writing in fragments. Oh, maybe to skip over that and get to the good stuff…..

So this weekend, I may or may not be cavorting about with 2 little girls and a very large but lovable rodent. To say I’m excited doesn’t begin to do it justice. I commit to documenting the entire experience and posting 2C4W (too cute for words, duh.) photos in this space in the coming week.

Baseball. Yay!

Well baseball season has officially started. The Rice Owls have played 4 games and in fact will have played 5 before I can even make it to one of them. I guess I’m off the hook for the ones in California that opened the season, but I was sad to miss the first home game against the coogs on Wed. We won, so I guess that is all that is important. I hope Rog appreciates the sacrifice I made, as I was out in Humble celebrating his 30th birthday. Geez. You’d think the guy would have enough respect for me to not turn thirty on our home opener. Some people.

This weekend is the annual College Classic that the Astros host. It’s usually a really good tournament field, and this year is no different. The Owls will be taking on UCLA Texas A&M and Baylor. Of those 4 teams, the Owls are the lowest ranked. And we’re number 10 for pete’s sake. Baylor is 6, UCLA 9 and A&M... Well lets talk about A&M.

My father and I have entered a period we like to call “radio silence.” I told him this week that he succeeded in forming me in his own mold…its just too bad we don’t cheer for the same team. You see, when Rice plays A&M in any sport, but mainly baseball, we have decided that the best way to not say something we will later regret, is just to not talk to each other for a period of time surrounding the game. Before we instituted this policy, the time before the game was spent talking trash and the time after was spent gloating or complaining about the terrible umpires, fans etc. Its just not in either my Dad nor I’s nature to not take things personally, and conversely not to push each other buttons. Even when we’re trying to be gracious winners, the other one typically interprets it as insufferable self righteousness. Don’t get me wrong. I grew up cheering for A&M. The first song I remember being able to sing on command was the Fight Song. I still love to see them succeed at the national level. But not in baseball. At least not at our expense. Baseball was supposed to be OURS! That was the deal I made with the universe when I went to Rice. I figured the fam could cheer for A&M in everything else, but come spring they could cheer for the Owls without having to feel like turncoats. I mean, my family doesn’t even really LIKE baseball. I’m the only odd ball in the bunch that loves it on any level much less college. But now? Oh no. They keep turning up in our Regionals in the post season, inundating our home field and really annoying the piss out of me. And even worse, the Aggies had to go and get ranked number one in the country and ruin it all. Thanks a lot universe. Glad to see you’ve got my back. And so. Nothing. No contact is the best way to handle it.


I guess no one will ever accuse of us not being passionate.

Fishing Beer and Friends (not necessarily in that order)

I don’t think I’ve really discussed it here before, but I’m really lucky to work with some old/close friends of mine. It just so happens they are all guys. My working environment most closely resembles a high school locker room, but oddly enough I really enjoy it. The boys joke around that they’ve ruined me for more civilized company, and I proved them right when at a women’s luncheon last year. I cursed rather colorfully and didn’t really notice it till I saw the surprised look on the faces of my eating companions. I have to remind myself that what the guys on the trade floor find funny, doesn’t always translate well to a hoity toity fashion show. Oh well. Live and learn I suppose.

Anyway, me and this group of people go back like rocking chairs. I’ve known most of them for 8+ years, and we’ve all been friends for far longer than we’ve been co-workers. So, to celebrate this fact, or maybe it was to celebrate February…Oh who am I kidding, for no good reason what so ever, we took a little retreat this weekend. CLee graciously invited us to his new lakehouse, mainly because he was tired of hearing from us ‘Hey when are you going to invite us to your lakehouse’ (like I said we’re all pretty close). It was supposedly a fishing weekend, but Shaife was the only one spotted with a fishing pole in his hand. The only fishing the rest of us did was in the cooler for another beer. Regardless, a good time was had by all. The main highlight for me was playing poker far beyond my skill level, and taking some portion of the winnings in 3 out of 5 tournaments. Go me. Really this whole post is just a thin cover for being able to brag about that. But since you stuck around this long, here are a couple pictures for your trouble.

Our fearless host

Proof that some fishing was done.