An Emotional Trip to Florida

I don't know how others feel about it, but this is now one of my favorite days to spend with RRCers. Experiencing IOA with friends from RRC has made me realize this is a park I would *not* want to visit alone. It is so much better getting to experience things like dueling face to face with friends on Dueling Dragons, or having an informal takeover time on One Fish Two Fish!

We met a sleepy eyed Mike and Patti in our hotel lobby at 8:15 a.m. Apparently Cindy and I kept them up all night with our usual antics. We arrived at IOA at 8:30 only to find the park already opened and Hulk already running! We met up with Jeff Johnson, who seems to have struck out in the ongoing RRC comedic soap opera, "For the Love of Elissa," but somewhere along the way we lost Mike and Patti! Patti got held up buying tickets while Mike became catatonic and could only utter one word, "Wow!"

Thanks to our Universal Express no wait/no line tickets, we were ushered through the back door of Spiderman, only to find many of our group already waiting in line! David Hamburger immediately began directing first timers where to sit. As we sat next to each other just before the ride began, David leaned over and whispered to me that he had never seen a big green penis before. I thought that was a disgusting thing to reveal to a heterosexual at 8:30 in the morning, but I kept my composure and nodded sympathetically.

As the ride progressed it became apparent that many additional effects were now working properly. This added a great deal of enjoyment to my ride as I thought they added a great deal to the ride experience. Amazingly at one point in the ride, as if on command, a giant green penis revealed itself, fully erect. I pointed to it and screamed at the top of my lungs "THAT'S A BIG GREEN PENIS!!!" I looked over at David and he was grinning from ear to ear. I thought the man was going to break out a cigarette.

Matthew seemed surprisingly mute after the ride. I feel bad for folks expecting to experience something more than what Spiderman really is. I mean, it's state of the art technology, but after all, it's still 3D interactive. Still, the rest of us clapped enthusiastically and the day was off to a good start.

We headed over to Doctor Doom next. Our Universal Express pass gained no noticeable advantage for us on this ride as we had to wait an excruciating 5 minutes. As for the ride itself, whee!

Steve!!! Son!!! Steve Nuss ran up to me and it sure was good to see my favorite sixteen or seventeen year old. Steve is such a great kid and I really love talking to him. For a sixteen or seventeen year old, he has a good head on his shoulders, except when it comes to matters of the heart. We talked about his latest lessons in love, and when he said "I wonder where Elissa is," I knew he, too, had once again fallen prey to the coaster vixen.

The Incredible Hulk was next and the Incredible Dictator Dave was just winding up for the day. He insisted we go through the regular line first since the line would not be that long, THEN use our Universal Express the second time. WTF ever, Dave, just get your ass in line!

I know most people prefer Kumba to Incredible Hulk, but not me. I think the first half of this ride is the finest sit-down experience you could ask for. I love everything about it! The launch, while not the most powerful, is my absolute favorite! I love the layout, the inversions, the pacing, and especially the swift changes in direction. At one point just before the midcourse brake, there is a change in direction that includes a swift and sharp dive down, and I love this moment. As an added bonus on this wonderful day, the train barely kissed the mid course brake before diving down into the second half of the ride. The airtime off that brake is superb!

Dave, now transforming into Love Boat Cruise Director Julie, shooed us all over into Seuss Landing, only to find Cat in the Hat temporarily closed. No problem, we'll just hit One Fish Two Fish! Many in our group of around 30 had never experienced this ride before and there wasn't a soul who wasn't immediately charmed by it! The ride op noticed James' ACE shirt and struck up a conversation with him. After slipping him her phone number, she held some of us back so that we could all ride together! Informal takeover time!!! YAY! Seeing Matthew and Mike smile while watching this was one of those moments I'll remember from this trip.

I refused to ride Cindy Stout, who has drenched me for the last time! Mike gamely agreed to be her passenger, as he confessed he likes to get soaked! Patti rode with me and assured me she would do her best.

She failed.

Miserably.

What is the deal here? Is it a woman thing? Does the "you never know!" line in the song send them tailspinning into a fit of indecisive maneuvering? I don't know, all I know is that I came off the ride just as wet as when Cindy was at the helm. I summarily dressed Patti down as is my duty on this particular ride.

Cat in the Hat had opened by this time so off we went. The ride broke down as we neared the end, and we were stranded for several minutes. Spatch and his hilarious friend, Sam, cracked all of us up with non-stop comedy, including Sam's dead on Don Pardo imitation. Cindy had us roaring when she sang "I'm too sexy for this couch." It was the funniest ride break down I've ever experienced, and I'm glad it happened.

"That's it!," David shouted the second we were out the door. "Time to hit the water rides!" Fine, go, shoo! I'm doing CaroSeussel. "If we don't hit the water rides now there'll be an hour or more line for them later on in the day." I'll take that chance. Go! Have a good time! I'm not running around all over this park like a crazy person!

Only five or six of us went to CaroSeussel while the rest started to follow Love Boat Dave and his 9 a.m. water ride conference. At some point they had a change of mind and everyone came back over to ride the carousel. Dave looked very irritated! I hope he enjoyed his moment on the carousel.

Somebody said "Let's do Poseidon's Fury." It was right next door, it seemed logical, why not? Again, Dave protested. "I thought we were going to wait and do that with everyone." Well, where is everyone? There's a big group right here, we're right next door to the ride, and will you relax, you're making me nervous!

Lots of oohs and ahhs were heard as we rounded the corner and the statues of Poseidon's Fury came into view. Sean said he was excited to see his Mom's reaction, so I tried to stay as close to them as I could. Matthew and Fred were next to me, too, and I wanted to see their reactions, too.

Poseidon's Fury is best on its first viewing. After that it just seems kind of ridiculous, even cheesy. The timekeeper's entrance and introductory story is kind of cheap and awkward. The middle section is my least favorite though. For one thing I really hate laser art. The technology hasn't improved since the 70s and the drawings always look amateurish. The mermaid with the cinnamon bun boobs just embarasses me. The water vortex *is* awesome, but the battle between Zeus and Poseidon is always too hard to follow. The water screens don't make good projections and the images are always too fuzzy to be truly effective. I like what Disney did with their water screens for Fantasmic, but they don't work as well here. Anyway, it was great seeing Matthew and Fred's reactions following the final battle. I think Fred is still wondering what happened!

We headed for Dueling Dragons next, and I thought Dave Hamburger was going to have a cerebral hemhorrage. Relax, Dave! Go with the flow! The day doesn't have to be set in stone! Along the way we encountered what is now known as the mean fountain. This came to be my favorite group moment of the day. The fountain was just dead funny and Mike, Patti and Jim all had their moments talking to it. The fountain would make fun of Californians then shoot streams of water at them from all different sides "Where do I stand, where do I stand, where do I stand, Doesn't matter!" and he'd blow his lid raining water down on them everywhere. We must have stayed there laughing for at least fifteen or twenty minutes.

Finally, Dueling Dragons. Four of us went to the front of Ice, another four to the front of Fire. It was a blast getting to duel head on with your friends! I really do like the front of Ice and the back of Fire, with Fire obviously being the hands down better ride.

I should also say something at this point about the condition of IOA. I had heard comments that it was starting to look run down and not kept up very well. But I didn't see anything to lead me to believe that. The place looks as great as always. No trash, reasonably graffiti-free lines, nothing noticeably faded or worn out. I think IOA is in great shape.

After our ride on Dueling Dragons it was getting close to noon and our meeting at Mythos. Several people suggested we ride the Flying Unicorn since it was so close by. Well, here comes Dave and I'm beginning to get scared of him.

"We're supposed to be meeting everyone at Mythos at noon." "Well people want to ride the Unicorn." What do you want me to do? "Somebody should at least walk over and see if anybody's there."

David, you know I love you, but if you don't stop this I'm gonna knock you down! You're driving me crazy!

"Why don't YOU go over and check?"

And off he went. And off WE went to ride the Unicorn. This is an extended roller-skater, which I really liked. The color scheme was dark brown and black, which I really DIDN'T like. I rode with Steve, who pointed out the moving and talking lanterns on the lifthill. The ride is nicely themed, I suppose. It's just kind of ugly.

Dave came back and told me there *were* people at Mythos and they went off to do something else. Okay, now PLEASE, I am BEGGING YOU, stop worrying about everybody! Let people do what they want!

We walked over to Mythos and even though we were a half hour early for our reservations, we decided to go ahead and eat. The thing is this and here's the thing: I know what Dave is doing. And I know why he's doing it. He's just trying to maximize our time. Also, we had a group photo meeting time of noon at Mythos, and he was just trying to be respectful of those who made the meeting time. But the thing is, on a day like this, you just can't put these things in stone. You can't dictate to people where to go and what to do, and you can't always control queue lengths and meeting times. And you can't control the lure of the ride. When something's sitting right there that you haven't done before, why NOT ride it? What is the big deal? So you end up having to wait longer for that water ride. Who cares? If it's THAT important to you, go ride it! Nobody's stopping you! If you think you know what's best then go out and do your thing on your own. But if you want to be with a large group you have to be willing to go with the flow. Sometimes we might not know where we're going, and that's great! It might land us in front of a talking fountain for twenty minutes, having a great time. The point is to have fun. And whatever you need to do to have fun, you should do it and not worry about what other people are doing. And if you miss the meeting time, well, sometimes that happens when you're with a large group of people! If somebody wants to dictate what everybody is going to do, as long as people are willing to go along, that's fine. Otherwise, you just have to relax and go with the flow and not make yourself and others crazy by trying to schedule the day so tightly.

Lunch at Mythos was *fabulous!* I sat with Steve, Sean, Barry, Cindy and Phyllis. Sean had, drumroll please, cheese pizza. I didn't see what Elissa, now flanked by predators Jeff Johnson and Kevin Teufer, had but I suspect it was, in fact, drumroll please, cheese pizza. I had a chinese chicken wrap. It was excellent except for one problem. It was full of chinese broccoli. Now chinese broccoli is about a mile long, and you *cannot* bite it off. Consequently, with every bite, I had this wall of chinese broccoli dangling from my mouth and hanging down to my chin. I had to pull it, strand by strand, and put in on my plate. It was terribly undignified and I became self-conscious about eating it! I looked up and saw Greg Galley grinning at me in a very sneaky way. PUT THAT CAMERA AWAY!

Mythos seemed to get high marks from the thirty plus people in our group who chose to eat there. Patti wisely ordered the creme brulee for dessert (my favorite), but Dave's chocolate thinggy looked delicious. No wait, that was an unfortunate choice of words. His chocolate..... I don't know what it was! It was a chocolate plate and had like six or eight different chocolate desserts on it! Anyway, he offered to let me try some of his but...... he offered to let me taste it ......he offered me a bite.... oh you know what I mean!

While we were waiting for latecomers to finish their dessert, The Amazing Sam Marks came to our table and proceeded to wow us with a magnificent magic trick! If any of you get the chance, ask Sam to show you his magic tricks! You'll be amazed!

We took our group photo on the Mythos Terrace. I thought we might be on the balcony with Hulk in the background. Instead somebody climbed on a big rock and pretty soon others followed and before you know it we had a great setting for our group photo! Sorry not everyone could make it, but last year's photo made up less than half the group as well. It's just too hard to get *everybody* together!

Since this was the only day at Universal for many in our group, a large number of us headed over to Universal Studios for a ride on Men In Black. I had never been to this park before. To be honest I had no desire to go to this park before. But I have to say, I was extremely impressed! I thought it was very interesting looking and seemed to be everything Disney MGM Studios is not. It has the look of a real movie studio lot and offers a large number of intriguing attractions. Because our time here was limited we were only able to do three things, but I would definitely love to come back and experience everything!

I have mixed emotions about Men In Black. I liked it, I want to love it, but I just don't fully get it. I was confused by the gun and the power loss, and I was never fully sure where to aim. I didn't know any of the "tricks" necessary to gain a high score, in fact I scored an embarrassingly low 11,000 points. Before my second round I was told to shoot at the green eyed targets, but I really didn't see that many. Perhaps they're too small and I need to look harder. In any case, I scored a respectable 167,000, so I must have done something right.

Most everyone headed back for IOA, but a few of us - Sean, Phyllis, Steve, Robert and Sam Ulrich, Cindy and me headed for Twister. I liked it, but I'm from Kansas and had a tornado go over my house once so I was fascinated. I thought the cow on a string was really, really stupid. But the ending surprised me and made me yell, and in turn, made Sean laugh.

Then we headed over to T2, but not before I stopped for a root beer float! T2 was exactly what I expected. And I expected to love it. The woman who played our hostess was fall down funny and reminded me very much of Jan Hooks' tour guide at the Alamo in Pee Wee's Big Adventure. She was "SUPER!!! Heh heh he heheh heh......Okay!"

The one thing I did not get to do was the Hanna-Barberra cartoon motion simulator ride. But I will definitely be coming back to Universal Studios. It's a fun park.

Back at IOA, we decided to head for the Dragons. Along the way we stopped at Jurassic Park and who should be waiting in the queue but the gang from California! We filled one boat and had a good ride. I think I like this ride a lot more than most people. My favorite moment is at the beginning when the music builds to a crescendo as the massive doors open to reveal the park.

We *thought* we were going to end the night on Dueling Dragons! But after three rides Mike Miller jokingly suggested we end the night on Bluto. "Okay!," I said. "Let's do it!"

This turned out to be my favorite moment of the day. How insane are we to be doing a violent rapids ride like Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges just as the park is about to close? Insane enough to ask for a reride! That's right, as you might have guessed, we were the only ones on the ride and they allowed us to go right through for a reride.

This ride is so much fun. It just blows everything other ride of its kind out of the water, so to speak. It also blew Mikes glasses off and knocked the plastic tarp off! I really expected to Mike to be a homer and say Perilous Plunge was better, but I gotta hand it to him, he gave the ride its due.

We all got off soaking wet, went to the front of the park and changed into dry clothes. No big cookie for us, and no birthday cookie for Sam Marks, the shop had closed. Everyone had already left, so we decided to stop for a margarita at Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville. I got mine first and wandered over to the terrace overlooking the channel and what I call the real CityWalk. For those of you who may not have seen it, it is a long sidewalk and open plaza area that sits level and runs alongside the channel. There is a nice grassy area and several ledges to sit and take in the view. I yelled first at Cindy to come over and eventually Mike and Patti, and all of them let out an "ahhhh" once they saw the pretty view.

We sat there talking and laughing and drinking and enjoying ourselves for what seemed to be the longest time. I could have sat there all evening. This was my favorite moment of the day.

We headed back to our hotel and had a wonderful dinner at Shogun, a Japanese steakhouse connected to the hotel. The four of us joined Matthew, Matthew's Dad Jim, and Greg Galley. Matthew picked the place and made the reservations and I have to thank him so much. I have never been to a Japanese steakhouse before and I *loved* it!!! It was so much fun watching the chef, and he had just the right personality for our group, entertaining without being pushy. The service here, in fact, was just great, as was the food.

I really hope RRC Day at IOA becomes a long lasting tradition. And despite my teasing David about being so bossy, I think everybody had a great time. I really enjoyed myself this year, much moreso than last year. Last year the park was overly crowded and not at its best. This year it was not terribly crowded, there was only one minor breakdown, and certainly there were a lot more people this year who stuck together as a group. But whether you're part of a large group or you wander off alone to do whatever you want, the point of this day is to relax and have fun at the most amazing theme park in the world.

On that point I think we succeeded.

Up Next: The Magic Stroller Kingdom