Always Remember That

For years, I’ve felt that my definitive Mallory story was about how she refused to ride a bicycle. Well, now I’ve got a new one. Last Friday, Mallory made her theatrical debut in Annie, Jr, put on by the summer drama workshop held at Chris’s high school. She was an orphan/servant, had no lines, but was part of the chorus for the four big songs: Hard-Knock Life, You’re Going to Like it Here, NYC, and Tomorrow. The kids put on two performances – one in the early afternoon, one in the evening. Chris and I attended both. During the matinee, Chris and I shook our heads fondly at Mallory during the first two songs – she knew all the words, she knew all the steps, but she had a kind of grim look on her face the whole time, and she was about 5 seconds behind the rest of the cast. (Incidentally, here’s a way to cure any young performer of stage fright. Let them know that any parents in the audience are ONLY watching their own kid. I have no idea how the other kids performed during any of th...

Before returning to the Magic Kingdom for our last day of fun, we stopped at Downtown Disney, a huge shopping/dining complex in the middle of all the resorts. There the kids saw more characters than we ever saw in the actual parks (although it’s true these were not animate, and some were made of Legos): After some serious shopping, we headed on to the park. This time, at Mallory’s suggestion, we rode the ferryboat to the gates instead of the monorail. We all agreed that it was a far superior way to ride: It was, by some stroke of fortune, only in the mid-80s on this day – and it turned out to be the best day we had. Being only moderately hot and sweaty, instead of miserably so, does wonders for one’s attitude (especially Phoebe’s attitude). We got off the ferry, then immediately hopped on the Walt Disney World steam engine for an express ride to Toontown, where we visited Mickey’s house and garden (adorable!): And then Minnie’s house and garden (also adora...

DHS is, as you may have guessed, a Disney park devoted to the movies and show biz. It also has, of all the parks, the least amount of child-friendly rides and attractions; hence our decision to go there in the late afternoon on Thursday. It also is supposed to have an absolutely spectacular fireworks show. Spoiler: We didn’t get to see that. The first thing we did at DHS was the “Great Movie Ride,” which is, surprise, a ride that takes you through scenes of great movies, like The Wizard of Oz and The Searchers and some Jimmy Cagney film and Alien and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom . General consensus: mostly goofy, and the robot thingies meant to represent the characters were not that good. We did, however, get to see one of the carousel horses from Mary Poppins: When we left the movies, it had started to sprinkle, so we ducked into the line for the Little Mermaid show: …at which point it started to pour: The show was very cute; it was a 15-minute version of th...

We’re in the home stretch now, people. Bear with me. As an anniversary present to ourselves (12 years! We rock!), Chris and I decided to take a morning and go, sans children, to Universal Studios. He wanted to see the Marvel Superhero stuff; I wanted to see the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, which had just opened two weeks before. I overheard Chris telling a friend of his that Universal lacked the magic of Disney, and this is true; but it was very visually appealing. It had six or seven clearly demarcated sections – Superheros, Comic Book Alley, Dr Seuss Island, Jurassic Park, Harry Potter, and I’m forgetting one other – and they were all very cool. Here are some shots of the superhero area, which are not good pictures at all, because I took them as we were leaving and I was so hot I had lost the will to live, but you get the idea: We hopped right in line for the Spiderman 3-D Adventure ride, in which you are a Daily Bugle reporter who gets to leave your desk: And go o...