The Great Big East Coast Adventure - PTR - Page 3 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
As of January 1, 2019, we have closed our forums. This is a decision we did not come to lightly, but it is necessary. The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk. The server software itself must be updated, and it cannot be without removing the forums.
So it is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our long-running forums. They came online in 2000 and brought together so many wonderful Disney fans. We had friendships form, careers launch, couples marry, children born ... all because of this amazing community.
Thank you to each of you who were a part of this community. You made it possible.
And a very special thank you to our Guides (moderators), past and present, who kept our forums a happy place to be. You are the glue that held everything together, and we are forever grateful to you. Thank you aliceinwdw, Caldercup, MrsM, WillCAD, Fortissimo, GingerJ, HiddenMickey, CRCrazy, Eeyoresmom, disneyknut, disneydani, Cam22, chezp, WDWfan, Luvsun, KMB733, rescuesk, OhToodles!, Colexis Mom, lfredsbo, HiddenMickey, DrDolphin, DopeyGirl, duck addict, Disneybine, PixieMichele, Sandra Bostwick, Eeyore Tattoo, DyanKJ130, Suzy Q'Disney, LilMarcieMouse, AllisonG, Belle*, Chrissi, Brant, DawnDenise, Crystalloubear, Disneymom9092, FanOfMickey, Goofy4Goofy, GoofyMom, Home4us123, iamgrumpy, ilovedisney247, Jennifer2003, Jenny Pooh, KrisLuvsDisney, Ladyt, Laughaholic88, LauraBelle Hime, Lilianna, LizardCop, Loobyoxlip, lukeandbrooksmom, marisag, michnash, MickeyMAC, OffKilter_Lynn, PamelaK, Poor_Eeyore, ripkensnana, RobDVC, SHEANA1226, Shell of the South, snoozin, Statelady01, Tara O'Hara, tigger22, Tink and Co., Tinkerbelz, WDWJAMBA, wdwlovers, Wendyismyname, whoSEZ, WildforWD, and WvuGrrrl. You made the magic.
We want to personally thank Sara Varney, who coordinated our community for many years (among so many other things she did for us), and Cheryl Pendry, our Message Board Manager who helped train our Guides, and Ginger Jabour, who helped us with the PassPorter-specific forums and Live! Guides. Thank you for your time, energy, and enthusiasm. You made it all happen.
There are other changes as well.
Why? Well, the world has changed. And change with it, we must. The lyrics to "We Go On" for IllumiNations say it best:
We go on to the joy and through the tears
We go on to discover new frontiers
Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
Moving on with a spirit born to run
Ever on with each rising sun.
To a new day, we go on.
It's time to move on and move forward.
PassPorter is a small business, and for many years it supported our family. But the world changed, print books took a backseat to the Internet, and for a long time now it has been unable to make ends meet. We've had to find new ways to support our family, which means new careers and less and less time available to devote to our first baby, PassPorter.
But eventually, we must move on and move forward. It is the right thing to do.
So we are retiring this newsletter, as we simply cannot keep up with it. Many thanks to Mouse Fan Travel who supported it all these years, to All Ears and MousePlanet who helped us with news, to our many article contributors, and -- most importantly -- to Sara Varney who edited our newsletter so wonderfully for years and years.
And we are no longer charging for the Live Guides. If you have a subscription, it's yours to keep for the lifetime of the Live Guides at no additional cost. The Live Guides will stay online, barring server issues and technical problems, for all of 2019.
That said, PassPorter is not going away. Most of the resources will remain online for as long as we can support them, and after that we will find ways to make whatever we can available. PassPorter means a great deal to us, and to many of you, and we will do our best to keep it alive in whatever way we can. Our server costs are high, and they'll need to come out of our pockets, so in the future you can expect some changes so we can bring those costs down.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your amazing support over the years. Without you, there's no way us little guys could have made something like this happen and given the "big guys" a run for their money. PassPorter was consistently the #3 guidebook after the Unofficial and Official guides, which was really unheard of for such a small company to do. We ROCKED it thanks to you and your support and love!
If you miss us, you can still find some of us online. Sara started a new blog at DisneyParkPrincess.com -- I strongly urge you to visit and get on her mailing list. She IS the Disney park princess and knows Disney backward and forward. And I am blogging as well at JenniferMaker.com, which is a little craft blog I started a couple of years ago to make ends meet. You can see and hear me in my craft show at https://www.youtube.com/c/jennifermaker . Many PassPorter readers and fans are on Facebook, in groups they formed like the PassPorter Trip Reports and PassPorter Crafting Challenge (if you join, just let them know you read about it in the newsletter). And some of our most devoted community members started a forum of their own at Pixie Dust Lane and all are invited over.
So we encourage you to stay in touch with us and your fellow community members wherever works best for you!
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Saturday morning, we're up and at em, and we'll either get driven to Penn Station or we'll take the LIRR. We'll hop on another Amtrak down to DC, and from there, will either take the metro or will catch a ride from a friend, into our hotel in Arlington. My goal is to get to the hotel by 4pm. Then we'll hang out with my cousin and babysit her son. We will likely grab room service for dinner and relax. Definitely early to bed this night!
Sunday morning, we'll meet one of my best friends, Jennifer, and her daughter at the metro, and then we'll all go into DC. We don't have any firm plans, but I think I would like to spend the day sort of hopping around to the big "photo op" places. The White House, Lincoln Memorial, Washington Monument, Capitol Building, etc... If it's raining, we'll hit the Museum of Natural History, and a few others on the mall. Lunch will most likely be at Johnny Rockets. Jennifer and I have a long history with Johnny Rockets, and some fantastic memories we'll likely relive and laugh about!
For a fun little tidbit... for my junior year prom, our limo driver was new to the whole "limo driver" gig. A couple of weeks prior to that, he had retired from his job as a nighttime security guard for the Capitol Building! So, after the prom, we got to drive down to DC and he took us for an after-hours tour of the building! He told us we were the first visitors to ever visit at night! It was an amazing private tour, and very memorable! Frankly it was the best thing about prom, since my date was an absolute bust.
We'll spend all day together on Sunday, returning to the hotel around dinner time, so my cousin and her husband can go out again, while I am on babysitting duty!
Monday morning we will bid adieu to the family, and we'll head on the metro into Northern VA, where my friend Toni will pick us up. Toni made her debut in another trip report I did, back in November 2009. She came to Disney with us! We'll spend the morning with Toni before getting dropped off in Ashburn at my friend Chris's house. This is our final "home away from home" on this trip, and we'll stay here for the next 5 nights!
Phew! We're going to sleep so well on this trip!!!
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Days 10-14 will be fun, if slightly boring for a TR... We'll be staying in Ashburn, VA, and seeing a lot of friends. I do hope to do some "touristy" stuff in the afternoons, though.
My home-office is in Chantilly, VA, so Meri and I will be going into the office from 9am to 1pm every day (Tues through Fri). For a little bit of background on me... I lived in Ashburn and worked in Chantilly six years ago before I had Meri. When I knew I was pregnant, and doing it on my own, I told mom that I wanted to raise her near family (here in TN). Since mom had been making noises for years about moving here to be near her sister, it was quickly decided that we'd relocate here shortly after Meri was born.
I gave my boss 6 months notice that we were moving. I figured that would be enough time to hire and train a replacement. Needless to say, my boss was NOT happy to hear that she would be losing me. It became a running joke where she'd say, "Stay!" and I'd say, "Let me work from home in TN and I will!" I guess sometime in November or so, I started wondering if I COULD do my job from home... so I started making lists of what I could and could not do from home. I made a list of costs that work would incur, and a list of savings they'd have. Then I started realizing that hey... It was entirely possible that I COULD do this from home.
I showed my list to my boss, and she loved the idea, but wasn't entirely sure of it. After much discussion, she agreed that she would go to our "big boss" and give her the final say-so. I think a lot of factors worked in my favor there. I'm just grateful they had that much faith in me, and continue to do so. I work my tail off to continue to earn that faith and trust, and I think they know that.
I went out on leave a day before I checked into the hospital to be induced, and moved 2 weeks and 1 day later... and I've been working from home ever since! I go back yearly to visit and hang out in the office (with part of the deal being that I organize and clean my bosses office, lol, because I'm very anal-retentive, and she loves the way I get her stuff all cleaned up). I'm so blessed to have the flexibility and leniency that this job affords me. And let's face it, the leniency that my boss affords me.
So, anyway, Meri and I will spend the mornings in the office (where my coworkers will all pass Meri around and entertain her while we all pretend to get work done), and then in the afternoons, I'll see friends and do some touristy things in the area. I'm not sure specifically what I'll do yet, but I promise to find interesting things. I know I'd like to try to go to dinner at Medieval Times. I think Meri would enjoy the heck out of that, and it's one of my favorite places, going back to being a child. Maybe one of the days I'll head up to Baltimore to the Inner Harbor (another place I loved going when I lived in NoVA). They have paddle boats and water taxis, and there's plenty to see and do up there, including a carousel on the other side of the harbor.
I also know that there are a couple of PP'ers that live in the area, so maybe I can meet up for coffee with one or more of them! My schedule in NoVA is generally pretty packed because I have to try to cram all of my friends into a short period of time... but I will gladly make room for a PP'er coffee meet!!
Saturday morning we'll head to the airport, and we'll fly home!
So... that's my schedule of events... I can't wait to see how it all ends up unfolding. So much is "up in the air".
Over the next few weeks I know I want to get some kind of "touring plan" for Boston and DC in place. Since I have such a short period of time in each place, with so many things to see, I want to have at least an outline of what I want to see, and a possible order to follow. I know I'll be consulting with Laurie for the Boston segment. She's already been so helpful with regard to finding me a place to stay and she's got a wealth of knowledge about what is where in the city. For Washington, I'm fairly familiar with it from having lived there for so long... but it's been a while since I've been to the "touristy" stuff, so I'll need to consult with my best friend, Jennifer, who works in DC (and who will be doing the touristy thing with me), and she'll be able to help me sort out a touring order.
As the weeks go on, I'll flesh that out on here and let you know all about what I come up with. This weekend I'm going to book my train tickets for Boston to NYC. I want business class seats, so I have an outlet.
I've also got to start thinking vaguely about what to bring. Like I said before, I'm going to attempt a two week trip with one small suitcase. I'm the QUEEN of over-packing so I'm not entirely confident in my decision... lol. But I'm trying to streamline here. But I'll get into a discussion of packing in a later post, to spread this out.
That's so great that you were able to make working from home a reality!
We used to live in Ashburn; moved to Reston almost 6 years ago. My DH works in Chantilly!
I know what you mean about having to cram so much in to a visit when you're returning someplace you lived/worked. We find that to be the case when we go to Chicago - where DH & I both lived most our non-adult lives.
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Your work situation sounds ideal! I'm sure you were able to make it happen by making yourself indispensable. Some bosses don't recongnize a hard worker, though, and it's wonderful that yours did. Ask away for the Boston portion. Delighted to help.
That's so great that you were able to make working from home a reality!
We used to live in Ashburn; moved to Reston almost 6 years ago. My DH works in Chantilly!
I know what you mean about having to cram so much in to a visit when you're returning someplace you lived/worked. We find that to be the case when we go to Chicago - where DH & I both lived most our non-adult lives.
I lived in Herndon with mom before moving to Ashburn! Had a LOT of friends in Reston. Would love to get together for coffee or something if you end up with time at all that week!
Quote:
Originally Posted by lauriep
Your work situation sounds ideal! I'm sure you were able to make it happen by making yourself indispensable. Some bosses don't recongnize a hard worker, though, and it's wonderful that yours did. Ask away for the Boston portion. Delighted to help.
I am very grateful that mine recognized my hard work, and continues to appreciate it. She knows that if she calls me at 7pm, I'm here and I answer my work phone. She knows I come in early, stay late, work weekends, whatever it takes to get something done. In return, she's extraordinarily flexible with my incessant vacation requests, lol.
You will be definitely hearing from me re: the Boston portion. I've been looking at maps and trying to decide what to do in what order. Once I get an idea of it, I'll send it to you and you can look at it and tell me how wrong I am, lol, and tell me a better way to do it. I really appreciate your help!
Quote:
Originally Posted by pamcarey
What a great work-from-home situation you have!
I really love it. It's afforded me the ability to spend time with Meri during her formative years, and I've loved it! Some of my coworkers take smoke breaks or "social-breaks" in each other's offices. I take 10 minute "flying a kite" breaks out in the front yard or 15 minute "splash in the pool" breaks or even 5 minute "mommy push me on the swing" breaks. You cannot beat that! I have the best of both worlds. A job I absolutely love and the luxury of being a stay-at-home-mom, all at the same time!
I lived in Herndon with mom before moving to Ashburn! Had a LOT of friends in Reston. Would love to get together for coffee or something if you end up with time at all that week!
If we can find a time & place that works for us both I would love to meet up! It would be my first official passporter meet!
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