If Brother’s confused wife felt she had to keep Brother & I apart, she was in a lot worse shape than I thought. It was hard not to give Brother a hard time about his life, but it was HIS life and if he wanted to try to make her happy then it’s really none of my business. It wasn't me she was making mad, it was Brother.
I was willing to follow him all over the 47 square miles of Disney World. It was the world largest game of hide and seek.
I called Brother as soon as we stepped off the bus at MGM. I wasn’t giving his confused wife a head start again. By the time the crew & I got through the turnstiles Brother and Waldo were standing there waiting. They were so happy to see us that I thought they would drop to their knees and cry. Brother hugged me hard enough to crack a rib.
Apparently there had been a great deal of un-Disney-like power-complaining and they needed a break.
Waldo greeted Beatlebum with a pinch, and then held out his arm for his return pinch because he is a polite southern gentleman. Beatlebum rolled her eyes at him because she had to explain the rules of ‘pinch-fighting’ again to Waldo. Beatlebum power-pinched Waldo as a lesson NOT to LET someone pinch him.
He’s a fast learner.
That bruises easily.
Brother was pushing an empty wheelchair because his confused wife decided she needed to go in the gift shop on their way over to meet us. I guess she thought if Brother didn’t have her in the chair he wouldn’t leave the gift shop and he’d wait for her.
She was not only mistaken, she was pretty mad when we went back to get her. I was pretty sure I heard her growl when she got back in the wheelchair. I nudged Brother and asked him why we came back to get her and he said;
“Three people to the left.”
‘Three people to the left’ was something we used to say when we were teenagers and wanted to lose our parents in MK. You wait until your family is in the middle of a fairly good crowd and just step three people to the left.
Presto! You’re free.
** Note to teenagers: Don’t try this at home; you WILL make your parents very mad. This could earn you the mother of all sunburn slaps. **
We were doing it to Brothers confused wife so we could get on RnR without having to listen to her complain on the way. She thought we were heading for another gift shop.
Isn’t it always better to avoid the complaining if you can?
When we got to the intersection of RnR & TOT, found a good sized crowd forming for Fantasmic, Brother pointed his wife’s wheelchair back down the street towards the bright lights of a gift shops and we all stepped three people to the left.
If you do the math it was really more like 21 people to the left, but you get the idea.
Brother and I just had to ride RnR one more time before we left. We knew it was the last time we would be in MGM so it was now or never. We all walked very quickly stiff-legged and stiffed-armed to the entrance of RnR so to not upset any CM’s. When we got into the holding room before Steven Tyler’s studio we were told there would be a small wait before we could go in.
I knew what happened, someone else pulled the shoulder harness down too hard like I did and the CM’s were doing their secret hand code calling him an idiot.
We enjoyed our last ride on RnR, looping under the Hollywood sign with Brother & I singing at the top of our lungs, Em screaming ‘ya-hoo’ and Scuba Steve puckering.
I bought the ride photos but I did it quickly, I didn’t want to miss Fantasmic again. This was the last chance we had to see it. We were lucky that there were two shows that night and the CM outside directing people-traffic told me the first show didn’t fill up and he was positive that this one wouldn’t either.
Yeah, that’s because everyone was bunched up in MK for the premier of ‘Wishes’. I bet there wasn’t one stroller left in the stroller garage.
People began group-lining up for the next show. There were small groups of people in a nice line heading down the street. That makes one very wide line and very easy to step ‘three people to the left’, which Waldo did and we lost him. He apparently he never went further than ‘three people to the left’ because he just showed up later and knew everything that had happened.
Sometimes Waldo just doesn’t understand our little games.
Brother’s wife got out of the wheelchair and was looking around for something sweet. We were standing 10 feet from an ice cream cart, but that wasn’t good enough; she needed something ‘sweeter.’ She knew of a chocolate shop not far and tried to convince Brother to go with her to buy some candy. Brother got upset and tried to get her to see the group-line forming behind us.
Brother ended up following her to the chocolate shop to keep her from throwing a temper tantrum in front of the kids. He was getting a little LOUD himself because I think he had enough of her games.
The group-line started moving about 10 minutes after they left and we had the empty wheelchair. This was freaking me out because we had never pushed a wheelchair around Disney and I was terrified that we would be ushered to the wheelchair reserved area and take up room from someone else and their family that needed the area. I had no idea if they had a stroller parking lot that we could dump it in and was thinking about leaving it right there in the street. I went down the group-line up a little bit and found a family that was pushing a stroller to find out if there was a stroller parking lot ahead.
There is. They really need to mark that on the maps.
Em got in the wheelchair because her ‘rash’ was acting up and we can’t be pushing an empty stroller never mind a whole wheelchair. She rode in it until we were down the pathway and in the stroller-parking lot. I called Brother thinking they had to be right behind us, not far.
They were in the candy store that is at the END of the street. Brother was standing outside watching the end of the group-line go in the entrance.
Well, thank God she got her candy.
The crew and I were heading to the stadium and stopped at the soda & beer stand which is located right next to the light up toys stand. I got the girls a soda and Scuba Steve a beer and we were chatting with the CM’s working the stands. They were very nice and telling Commando Nikki about the college programs offered at Disney. We were talking for a few minutes when someone came up behind me and pushed me over sideways.
I looked at the soda & beer stand CM and told him I had just been assaulted by someone I didn’t recognize. He looked similar to someone I grew up with but I just couldn’t place him.
Brother shoved me sideways again harder and almost knocked me over.
Love ya, mean it.
Scuba Steve had made a break for the smoking area with the girls. Brother, his confused wife and I followed them over. While Brother, Scuba Steve & I were talking the girls were running for a trash can to spit something out.
Problem girls?
Brother’s wife had given them some bizarre chocolate and they hated it. She got upset with them for spitting it out. Commando Nikki got upset with her because they didn’t want it in the first place. The girls took it because Brother’s wife was getting mad at them and forced them to take it.
That’s what peer-pressure will get you, a bad taste in your mouth every time.
We decided to get into our seats for the show with Commando Nikki leading the way. We were pretty close to the front and center when we turned around and saw Brother and his wife were gone.
That was fine; at least we were finally in the same park.
Fantasmic was outstanding with great music, the walls of water with movies playing on them, the wall of fire from the dragon, the character boat with the signing and dancing. I missed most of it because I went down the bleachers a few seats ahead of us, turned back around and took pictures of the girls’ wide-eyed open mouthed faces.
I’ll catch it the next time we go.
The show ended and we made our way up the bleachers. At the top we found a very angry Brother. I tried to shrug it off for his sake, but he was really irritated with his wife at that point.
Yeah, know how you feel.
The girls had wanted to buy charm bracelets since the first day. I was afraid if we didn’t do that then, they wouldn’t get them at all because we were leaving the following day.
Another terrible feeling right behind not being able to send your packages back to your room is awful feeling knowing it’s time to tie up your loose end stuff while you still have the chance.
We were heading to the gift shops right on the corner heading to the exit to get the girls their bracelets.
Much to everyone’s surprise Brother’s wife finally had enough shopping and wanted to go straight back to the room.
“Raise your hand if you did not see that coming.” Scuba Steve said to the crew loud enough for Brother’s wife to hear it.
Nobody did.
Brother and I said our ‘Love ya, mean it’s, see you back at the room’ and they left.
Scuba Steve found himself a bench to sit on in front of the gift shop. Waldo appeared out of nowhere and sat down next to him. Scuba Steve did that raised eyebrows, eyes wide open shocked look at him.
Brother and his wife forgot something. Waldo!
“Where have you been?” Scuba Steve asked him. His answer was “‘Three people to the left’ until it was safe.”
Waldo was a very bright boy.
The girls were picking out the charms for their bracelets. Em wanted a monorail charm but we couldn’t find one. Em also had about 20 charms at $3.00 each and I had to get her to put a lot of them back. I let her spell out her name and put on a few princesses.
I hope who ever found her bracelet that she lost on the way back to POR was also named Emily.
We were in the gift shop for so long they started closing the store around us. Commando Nikki was stalling because she knew when we left to go back to POR we had to pack. She stood around talking to the CM’s in there for another 15 minutes about the college program.
Commando Nikki was deep into packers’ denial.
Scuba Steve and I had to drag her by each arm out of MGM. She kept trying to sit down on her butt because she didn’t want to leave and she sure as heck didn’t want to pack. Waldo was busy fighting off Em who was swinging her bag at him because she wanted to go back to POR by the monorail.
Em fell asleep on the bus ride back leaning on Waldo.
Bag swinging takes a lot out of a kid.
When we got back to POR, Brother was outside waiting. He had the same surprised look on his face as Scuba Steve did when Waldo came walking up with us. Brother looked at his door and back at Waldo like he could have sworn he just saw him or something.
“Lose someone Brother?” I asked him. Waldo was always so quiet and cooperative that he would be easy to overlook with all that complaining going on.
I believe if we were driving back to Maine instead of flying Waldo would have popped out of our backseat around Pennsylvania.
Brother knew that the MK was the plan for our last day. We start and finish our vacation in MK. It’s our hello and good-bye to Disney World. We made plans to have our pictures taken in the wooden shackles in liberty square and for our last ride on IASW.
Then we all went into our rooms to pack and prepare for Brothers wife’s grand finale.