Living the dream and remembering the Bagman LIVE UPDATE 10/2 About This Page:

[DrDolphin]

My emotions reading this =

PrincessSharon will be at Bagman Days -

Thinking about Bill and needing to remember to pack tissues

Facebook has an "On This Day" app - where it pulls posts from previous years on today's date - and I often see Bill's comments to my posts, or just that he liked my post, and my heart goes into my throat... and my eyes get damp. It is still so hard to accept that he is gone.

[SuperDave]

Marie,
That is so unbelievable and just so tragic of a freak accident. Lost at just four years old! I can't even imagine what her family must be going through!

[NanaTink]

Oh Marie, how horrible! My heart goes out to that poor family. How devastating!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by CRCrazy

Ok Cheryl, you need to stop making me cry with your pre-trip report. If I can't handle this, how am I going to make it through Bagman Days?

Hey, some of the most wonderful and emotional comments I've read are actually yours, so you can't hold me responsible for that.

I'm feeling a bit emotional today - on top of the memories that are piling on with Bill, we had another tragedy very close to home this weekend.

My next door neighbor's granddaughter was killed in a tragic horse show accident Friday night. Labor Day weekend is always the Lancaster Fair weekend, and their daughter's 4 year old was showing in the horse show ring with her aunt. The horse lost its balance when it was backing up, and rolled over, she fell off, and the horse landed on her. I'm just devastated.

Oh my goodness, how terrible.

I'm going to try to make my random acts of kindness in Bill's memory something to bring joy to young children. When I think of Bill, I don't think of Bill the policeman, although that was an important part of his life, I think of Bill the Disney fan - bringing smiles and laughter to all, especially his beloved Abby. I think that bringing joy to children will help to ease the sadness over both of these tragic losses.

Oh that is such a wonderful idea.

I'm so excited to hear that Sharon will be there over the weekend. I haven't seen her in years.

And we'll be seeing her three times this trip!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Cam22

Thanks for the suggestion as it would make an awesome Christmas gift, but unfortunately, it is not available on Amazon here in the US yet. e

Oh that is such a shame. Now if we were seeing you, I could get hold of some of them and bring them over for you. Sorry it didn't work out and we're heading to NYC instead of coming back to Disney on 30 September/1 October now...

[chezp]

Originally Posted by DrDolphin

My emotions reading this =

PrincessSharon will be at Bagman Days -

Thinking about Bill and needing to remember to pack tissues

That's pretty much how my emotions are going right now as well.

Facebook has an "On This Day" app - where it pulls posts from previous years on today's date - and I often see Bill's comments to my posts, or just that he liked my post, and my heart goes into my throat... and my eyes get damp. It is still so hard to accept that he is gone.

I hear you on that.

[chezp]

Pre-trip report – part forty: I can get a “birthday pig”

Saturday 27 August

Two weeks today! In fact, as I write this, at around this time in a fortnight, we’ll probably be having breakfast, packing the last bits and pieces, and getting ready to head out. Oh my goodness, suddenly time is hurtling past towards this vacation!

I did post in the Facebook group just to check whether there’s a specific meet when everyone will be wearing their T-shirts, as my pre-trip report is all about those and it made me wonder whether we had arranged anything. I thought we had for the sunset meet on the Thursday night, and sure enough, that appears to be the plan. Marie for confirming that one!

Hmm… now this is interesting. Joan (good grief, I cannot remember her board name now ) and Karen (zacksmom1993) are now staying off site with Crystal (crystallobear I think? ). I always knew Crystal was coming, but I asked Mark and he said he didn’t remember Joan and Karen coming before, so I think they may be very welcome late additions to our group. I cannot wait to see them both again.

Sunday 28 August

I went through our itinerary today, as I’ve made various tweaks over the last couple of weeks, since I first printed it out. Stupidly, I didn’t make a note of which days I’d changed, so I had to go through the whole thing and cross check. That’ll teach me and that’ll be the last time I do that. Normally I highlight a day anytime I make changes and now I know why – so much simpler!

As I went through the itinerary, I tried to change some of our dining reservations, as we’re now down to just the two of us for the Skipper Canteen, as Sheri and Danielle won’t be joining us, and I still want to change the Garden Grill from four to two, as Maci and her mum were originally booked with us. No joy on either front, so I’ll just stick with what I’ve already got, and explain when we get there.

I had a think about our Tiffin’s reservation, which was originally for 4:55pm in the hope of getting a dining package to watch Rivers of Light. Well, I think I can now safely say (or at least as safely as you can with Disney ) that won’t be happening, so I’ve changed the time of our reservation. It’s now at 7:45pm, which is better, given our lunch is 12:30pm. I figure we might as well enjoy the evening at Animal Kingdom before dinner.

By going through our itinerary, I also realised that I hadn’t actually printed out the signature forms for our Disney cruise. I remember saying when I completed filling them in that it was a bit stupid on Disney’s part that they want you to print the signature form out, but they mark it as complete without you having to print it. Of course, I meant to do it, but it obviously slipped my mind. This is why it’s worth having a printed itinerary to go through…

I have done a few small bits of packing. My eye drops (I now have to use them six times a day as part of my ongoing problem with my eyes) are in the case, along with three dresses. One is a sundress that I suspect may be useful for Florida. There are two more for dinners at Palo and Remy. I also plan on taking a nice pair of trousers with a couple of different tops, so that I can wear them for things like dinner at the CN Tower. One of those tops is in the case now, but as I wear the trousers for work, I’ll wait a while before I pack those, and I still need to pick another couple of tops to take.

Monday 29 August

I had my first Disney vacation dream last night, except it wasn’t about Disney. All I know is it was based around a link that Larry (LLaffinPlace) posted on Facebook yesterday: http://blog.touringplans.com/2016/08/27/s6_toothsome/ and therefore we were at Universal CityWalk, exploring some of the new places they have there. I don’t remember much more about it, except we were shopping, and we bought some stuff, and were trying to work out how to get it shipped back to Disney. Yep, a bit weird I know, but that’s dreams for you…

I threw a few more bits in the case today, but they haven’t actually come downstairs yet… Mark seems quite opposed to doing that. I did show him how much is in there, but it had no impact. I am however starting a pile of things to take downstairs next to my carry-on luggage. I did suggest Mark might want to look through his collection of hats, but even that didn’t get much enthusiasm. He is definitely a much later packer than I am though… I will happily everything packed a week before (and that’s my aim for this vacation too ) and he’ll still be packing the night before…

Tuesday 30 August

Someone posted in the Facebook group today that they received their MagicBand covers for Bill in the mail and they had a good cry at that and knowing that the first anniversary of his death is right around the corner. I think I’m now glad I said we’d pick them up at Disney, otherwise if they’d have arrived in the post, I think I’d be a mushy, crying wreck too…

I completely forgot to mention this, but someone posted on my pre-trip report a couple of days ago to say that Disney, along with Universal and SeaWorld, are now giving out free insect repellent in response to the arrival of the Zika virus in Florida, which I think is a really good move. I mention it as someone posted about it on the boards today, and I was reading it thinking “I’m glad I’m not the only one to only just find out about this…”

In my pre-trip report, Cam posted that Luke (her husband just in case you don’t know, but of course you do… ) had read somewhere that Animal Kingdom may get a night-time show at the end of September. While I kind of hope it’s true for everyone visiting around then, it would be very frustrating if that happened, as that would mean only those of us going in September miss out.

I went to load some final money on to the travel money card at lunchtime, and now I’ve got some nice round figures on the card in terms of both American and Canadian dollars, which will make it a lot easier for me to remember the totals we’re starting with, as we deplete them gradually with our spending along the way. The woman in the travel agents asked when we were going, and I told her next Saturday and she looked at me in amazement and said she couldn’t believe it was finally here, as I’d been coming in for so long to top it up!

When I got home, I did a little bit more packing. I’ve got a couple of pairs of crops in there now. I’ll be taking three in total, along with a pair of shorts, and a pair of leggings. I think that should be fine. I also packed some socks, and tried some sock re-unification, which ended badly. Out of seven single socks, only one was re-united with a partner. The others went back into the drawer to hopefully wait for their prince to arrive one day… Ah well, maybe that’s just too much of a fairytale…

Mark announced later on that he’d be able to get a “birthday pig” – at least that’s what I thought he said… what the heck? I asked him to repeat it, and eventually got it, he meant a birthday pin at Disney. Ah yes, good point, you can get one of those. I think it’s a big deal for him, given we don’t usually go away for his birthday and certainly not to Florida, as obviously it’s way too hot for us at that time of year.

Anyway, by that time, I had pig in my head, so I told him it was just as well it wasn’t a birthday pig, as he wouldn’t enjoy that. He protested, telling me he liked pigs and I pointed out his slight issues with Piglet which did lead to a rant about how much of a problem he has with poor Piglet. That then set off the song in my mind “With A Few Good Friends” by Carly Simon, which is from one of the Pooh movies, possibly even the Piglet movie, at which point Mark got really irritated with me! I told him it was that or “It’s A Small World” and promptly burst into that song, which irritated him even more!

When I went to bed, I swapped TV channels, as we were recording something, and I didn’t want to watch bits of it. I ended up on BBC2, and found a documentary all about New York City. I knew it was on, but I wasn’t going to watch it, as our time there is pretty much all sorted, and I didn’t want to find myself thinking “I wish we could add x in”, as that’s what usually happens with these things. It turned out to be more about life in the Big Apple, rather than anything else, and it was very good.

The bit I saw started off at Grand Central Terminal, and talked about how they refurbished the building. They showed what it looked like before the work got underway, and explained how the ceiling was black from pollution, and cigarette smoke. It turns out there’s even a small patch they left that colour, so you can see the difference. Wow!

They then went on to talk about taxi cabs, and I didn’t realise this, but most drivers rent their cars, often from big companies. Apparently the taxi cab medallion itself that gives you the right to drive can cost $1 million. Yes, I can see why most people rent! It was really interesting, and they were saying that trips in yellow cabs are declining with the uprising of things like Uber. That was so sad, and they were saying that they have cut prices to compete, but to a certain extent, they’re also reliant on tourists. Well, we’ll certainly be taking one to and from the airport, so at least we’ll do our little bit to help support them.

Next: I’m sold… but would Mark be?

[NanaTink]

You've gotten quite a bit ready to go! It's so close now! I'm so excited for you and know this TR is going to be amazing to read!!
I'm a packer like you and Dave like Mark...drives me crazy because he also doesn't understand my packing method and invariably causes me to have to pull everything out and re-sort! You would think after 38 years, he'd know!

[Tara O'Hara]

I am also with you on the packing front!! I don't understand how Miffin can wait until the night before a trip to pack. Maybe it's just a boy thing.

P.S. Your thought process is very interesting!

[cubfancolleen]

It's definitely guys. Mike packed the day before our trip. And don't get me started on DS's packing methods!!
I think Mark is clearly crying out for a Piglet shirt for his birthday gift. He's just too shy to come right out and ask.

[disney_duke]

It's getting so close now!
That written itinerary is so important. I did the same thing with our Canada one - made some changes but failed to follow through on some things! Good thing I kept going over it.
I used to always pack luggage ahead of time too, but I don't know. Lately, I've been a last minute packer which is odd. And I don't like it! I put things in a pile so I don't forget them, but I just don't put it in luggage. Maybe that's close enough!

[Ciavobella]

We just returned from my son's wedding in the San Francisco area where we fell in love with Uber. Price and convenience couldn't be beat to get around SF.

I can't wait to see this trip via your photos. I love New England and Canada, especially in September.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by NanaTink

You've gotten quite a bit ready to go! It's so close now! I'm so excited for you and know this TR is going to be amazing to read!!

I certainly hope so - I will do my best!

I'm a packer like you and Dave like Mark...drives me crazy because he also doesn't understand my packing method and invariably causes me to have to pull everything out and re-sort! You would think after 38 years, he'd know!

Oh my, so similar! For us though, it's only been 16 years of marriage (17 in November) and in January 2017, we'll have been together 20 years, so you have a lot of time on us...

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Tara O'Hara

I am also with you on the packing front!! I don't understand how Miffin can wait until the night before a trip to pack. Maybe it's just a boy thing.

Must be...

P.S. Your thought process is very interesting!

I dread to think what a psychiatrist would say about it!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by cubfancolleen

It's definitely guys. Mike packed the day before our trip. And don't get me started on DS's packing methods!!

I dread to think...

I think Mark is clearly crying out for a Piglet shirt for his birthday gift. He's just too shy to come right out and ask.

I think you've hit the nail on the head there!