At long last, I have been able to get back in the swing of things at work and at home, so I thought I'd share my adventures in Orlando.

Erika and I woke up way too freaking early to be at the airport for a 7 AM flight. Before most people had even had their first coffee break at work, we were in sunny Orlando. After giving over an arm to Enterprise to rent a car for 12 days (thankfully I was allowed to keep my legs), we found our hotel and headed over to Universal for the day.

I must say that I was definitely not in the Christmas spirit upon arriving in Orlando. I wasn't even in vacation spirit by that time. I was in one of those "I just don't care about anything" sort of moods. I could have been there or back home at work and still felt the same. The last half of the year was a continual downer, so you'd think I would be all over a vacation, but I suppose the happiness was being held back by all the negativity I had been experiencing.

We wandered around Universal most of the day. We said farewell to the Back to the Future ride which is really starting to show it's age. Rumor has it the ride is being removed in lieu of a Simpsons ride later this year. We went right over to the Men in Black ride next which is like a video game. Each car holds six people who have modified laser pointers to fire at targets while trying to get the highest score. We also rode Revenge of the Mummy which was pretty fun. It is an indoor rollercoaster similar to Aerosmith's Rock and Roller Coaster at MGM Studios, but it is only a one car train and there are no loops. The first time we tried to ride it, it broke down while we were in line. After 20 minutes or so of waiting in line and listening to an automated message telling us every minute that the ride was experiencing technical problems, we decided to come back later. Unfortunately, Revenge of the Mummy took over the King Kong ride. I never got to ride that the last time I was there. But that was ancient times. The last time I was at Universal they still had a Miami Vice stunt show in the lake.

That night we went over to the Magic Kingdom to celebrate Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party. The park wasn't as crowded since it was only open for a limited number of people who had to purchase tickets. It was very disorganized as they were trying to usher everyone that had gone during the day out of the park while admitting just the night guests. We managed to get in, but we should have been given wristbands to prove we had paid to be there since it was limited. The ticket reader guy never gave us one so we had to go back and deal with that hassle after asking someone inside the gate what the wristbands were for.

The first thing we did was wander over to Tomorrowland to experience the new Stitch ride first and Buzz Lightyear's Astroblast. It certainly wasn't my planned course of action, but I didn't complain.

Just getting to the Magic Kingdom started to lift my spirits. By the time we finished the Stitch ride, my mood was much improved. I guess Stitch will do that to you.

We wandered around the park riding a few things, but we were mainly there to see the special Christmas parade and shows. We capped off the night with a quick jaunt through the Haunted Mansion around midnight right before the park closed. On our way out of the park, I had to stop by one of the gift shops to pick up my special Stitch Santa hat. When I saw someone wearing one that night, I almost tripped over a stroller while gawking. Instead of tripping I was attacked by this little kid's balloon. This got a good laugh out of Erika.

That was just the first day. There are plenty more to talk about.