Ann Arbor - Day 2, April 25, 2010

The rain came down last night while we were sleeping.  Big water drops would clank on the metal air conditioner shell jutting outside the window, but fortunately I was tired enough to ignore it.  The weather forecast called for rain again today, but it ended up cloudy with a very slight drizzle every once in a while, thank goodness.  Today was a later start than yesterday as the only limiter was to be at Zingerman's before 11am so Ada could get cinnamon french toast.  We got up at 10am and headed to the deli.  The walk was about a mile and a half into an area known as Kerrytown.  I was expecting a huge line out the door at Zingerman's, but fortunately there was only one party ahead of us at the ordering station.  It would have taken me some time to figure out how to order food there and not look like an idiot had Ada not been around as a guide.  There were two buildings; one looked like a restaurant, with tables, sweets shop and coffee brewed/served inside, and next door was the deli/gourmet shop.  I would've thought to go into the restaurant and order, but no, you go to the deli, and someone is there to take your order on a 3- or 4-part custom printed form, repeats the order for verification, then s/he rips off a part and puts in the order behind the counter and tells you to take the rest of the form to the cashier, which is in an adjacent room.  You wait in line there, and the cashier rips your form apart, gives you your copy, and takes your money.  It was rather tight in that room as merchandise was also being sold on shelves; I felt like if I didn't take care, my shoulder/purse/butt would knock over expensive glass jars of gourmet eats.  The orders were also coming out of a door near the cashier; I didn't know where to stand as I was in the way of servers taking food to the building with the tables and drinks, and in the way of customers browsing among the Zingerman goods.  After paying, we went to the adjacent building to select a table.  I thought popular Chinese restaurants in San Francisco packed their tables the closest, but Zingerman's may take the cake.

So what did we order?  Ada ordered a breakfast platter (eggs/sausage/toast) and an order of cinnamon french toast.  Though I love to eat breakfast foods, I had to order a sandwich, because it's a famous deli!  I got an order of #11 (JJ's), pastrami and swiss.  Yum!  I knew it would be huge, so I planned to eat half and take the other half with me for dinner on my flight back.  The meat was very tender and not fatty at all.  Bread was good too.  I tried a piece of the cinnamon toast and it was really tasty, especially because I could tell how much melted butter was on it, along with a thick layer of cinnamon sugar.  You can't go wrong with butter, cinnamon and sugar!  I washed everything down with a glass of iced green tea (without the ice).  It's serve-yourself with unlimited refills.  By the time we were done, there was a line out the door.  Very lucky to have avoided the queue.

We headed back to campus and went to the Museum of Art.  A very nice collection.  My favorite was on the second level, Charity.  I stared at it for so long, amazed at how realistic the flesh tones were on the babies, down to the tips of their little fingers.  Then it was off to Hill Auditorium, where we enjoyed a concert by the Life Sciences Orchestra.  All the members are involved in the university's medical and life sciences division, whether undergrads, grads, or even faculty.  It's wonderful that a student could pursue an education in the life sciences and also continue their passion with orchestra.  Three pieces were performed - a modern one called "Voyage" by John Corigliano, followed by Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat Major, Opus 73 "Emperor", Movement 1, then Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5 in E Minor, Opus 64.  The auditorium is supposed to be a "monument to perfect acoustics", that the furthest seat from the stage could hear a pin drop. Sounded pretty good to me, though I wasn't seated way in the back.

We had just enough time to head back to Ada's apartment and share one of the cupcakes I bought the day before.  The Michigan Bumpy looks kind of strange, like a cupcake that suffered from a bad case of hives.  It's a chocolate cupcake, topped with white buttercream "bumps", dipped in chocolate ganache and drizzled with white chocolate.  It looked strange but I decided to buy it because it was a popular selection.  It was sooooo good.  The chocolate cake was moist and rich, not tooth-achingly sweet.  The frosting was sweet but it matched the cake flavor perfectly.  It actually felt refreshing to eat it; I wasn't dying for a glass of water.  Ada and I were speechless besides the occasional "mmmmmm".  Then it was time to go.  Thanks Ada, for planning such a great itinerary on short notice, for a trip that was only 24 hours long!

I made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare, as I wasn't sure how bad it'd be to fly out of Detroit.  It started raining right when I was pulling into the Alamo car return, perfect timing!  I'm glad there wasn't any rain when we were out and about.  At the airport, there was no line to print out my boarding pass, and I was able to jump into a shorter security line for first class passengers.  I had an hour to spare before boarding and I remembered I passed a Lufthansa Senator/Business Lounge when I arrived the day before.  As a 1K member, you are also considered a "Star Alliance Gold" member, and Star Alliance lounges will allow Star Alliance Gold members to partake in their lounge for free, as long as you have a boarding pass on any Star Alliance partner.  The nice part about this is that it doesn't have to be an international ticket!  The United Red Carpet Club lounges only let us 1K's in for free if we have an international ticket, else you have to purchase a Club membership.  But Lufthansa will let you in, very strange.  I stroll into Lufthansa's lounge and show my ticket and 1K membership card.  The matron writes down my flight number and boarding time, and directs me to the lounge on my left, telling me that it will close in 30 minutes.  No wonder it was pretty empty.  There was also a lounge on my right, maybe that was the "Business Lounge".  The lounge I entered (Senator Lounge) was pretty nice, with a decent spread of food and drink, with leather chairs to relax in.  I wasn't interested in eating any more calories since I pigged out in the last 24 hours, so I skipped most of the food and just had a snack of tomatoes and cucumbers and a glass of apple juice.  You could have a whole meal there if you wanted:  cold salads, cheese and crackers, hummus, warm pasta, packages of Sun Chips and breadsticks, dessert tarts.  Since I was there 30 minutes before closing, I'm sure there were selections that were gone (fruit perhaps?), but what was left was still better than what you get at some United lounges.  There was a coffee machine, apple and orange juices, bottled water, wine, liquor you can help yourself to, and a refrigerator filled with soft drinks and beer.  I didn't visit the restroom, though I should have to see if they had any toiletries and shower facilities.  At 6:30pm, we got kicked out of the lounge and I waited the remaining 30 minutes near the gate.  I noticed a strangely named food establishment.  It's like a bad English translation...cheeburger?  And repeating it twice too.  That's very Asian, hehe.

I would be riding a CRJ-700 jet again, but this time for over 3 hours to Denver, and in bulkhead seat 1A, meaning no underseat storage.  I was worried that the passengers in 1B and 1C would take up all the overhead compartment space, and even if that wasn't the case, that my weekend bag wouldn't fit and that my cupcakes and sandwiches would get smashed.  But all was well and I was able to use the overhead bin space, though the lady in 1C tried to smash her laptop bag into the compartment and I was worried for my food.  She gave up and used row 2's compartment since no one used it.

The legroom in 1A is very good, especially for tall people.  I definitely prefer 2A though.  I like having my underseat storage and since I'm not super tall, I still have leg room too.  Since the flight was over a certain amount of miles, food was offered in the first class cabin, but because the jet does not have a kitchen, the offering was a "snack box".  I asked the flight attendant what was in it, and she mentioned chips and cookies.  I decided to forgo the snackbox as I had the leftover sandwich from brunch, which would be magnitudes tastier.  The other five people opted for the snack box.  I wonder if they were thinking I was crazy not to take advantage of free food.  I didn't need to eat it, and I didn't want to take it home either.  I couldn't take a good picture of the snack box as I was unwilling to get near the cockpit door nor point a camera at someone's tray table, so a glimpse of the galley is all you get.

The jet doesn't have any entertainment (no movies or music), but I always travel with my iPhone, iPod, and a battery pack.  If my mind is active, I'll play games on my iPhone, but I usually relax to music using my noise-blocking in-ear headphones.  One time I was flying, I forgot to bring my headphones and suffered...the sound of the airplane engines drains you, but unfortunately not enough to make you go to sleep.  For me, it feels a lot better to block out the noise and focus on more pleasant sounds.  Fortunately I had a pair of earplugs with me that time I forgot my headphones, and it helped a bit, but I'd always hear the noise ever so slightly and my mind would focus on it.  If flying isn't relaxing for you (not counting the fact that you're 33,000 feet above the earth and the plane could fall out of the sky), try some noise-blocking headphones/earphones or even earplugs if it works for you.  I think that is why the Bose QuietComfort headphones are so popular, though pricey.  I got my pair of cheapo Creative headphones from eBay for $9.95 and they work great! :)

After landing in Denver, my gate wasn't too far away and the plane was a 757.  I was sitting next to a guy who was wearing flip flops.  He'd take off his flip flops and put his bare feet on the back of the armrests of the seat in front of him like an ottoman.  This is why you don't want to touch anything if you can help it.  I've seen people put snot-filled tissues into the seat pocket in front (us Chinese people joke that the person is folding won-tons) or curl their bare toes into the pocket.  Yuck.  I'm glad that at least his feet didn't stink.

No meal service on a 9:35pm flight, but first class gets a "premium snack mix" (no picture, but I don't think you care, right?).  I land in Sacramento and decide to walk back to the parking garage, which was a good choice as I didn't see any buses for a while.  I get back home, having to wake up in 5 hours to go to work.  Oh well, work does pay for these trips.  Looking forward to the next big outing...Maui for Memorial Day week, followed by a week in Hong Kong plus Shanghai for the World Expo!  (I know, I know, Hawaii again!?!?!?!  Don't I get bonus points for the World Expo?)

Ann Arbor - Day 1, April 24, 2010

I'm headed to visit my cousin Ada in Ann Arbor today.  She's an MBA candidate at the Ross School of Business.  I had planned on visiting her at some point, but when I saw a decent price to Detroit pop up on FareCompare, I immediately contacted Ada to see if she would be free this weekend.  She said yes, and I pulled the trigger on the ticket.  I even got to use my 5% discount coupon that I received for flying so-many-miles in Q4, 2009.

United replaced their e-500 upgrade program with "Unlimited Domestic Upgrades" (UDU), so this was the first trip that I got to see UDU in action.  When I looked at my itinerary online, it showed "Upgrade:  Pending", meaning that the UDU system was working, and it had automatically applied my flights for upgrade.  As a 1K member, UDU upgrades are confirmed starting from 100 hours before departure, so I had to wait until 4 days before to see if I cleared.  Thankfully, all of my flights cleared, though I wasn't looking forward to the first class cabin on two of my four flights, as they were on CRJ-700's, which are small jets.  If you look at SeatGuru, the first class cabin is configured as 1-2, meaning 1 seat on one side of the aisle, and 2 seats on the other side.  There were 2 rows of first class, so a total of 6 seats.  I was able to secure 2A on my flight to Detroit, and 1A back.  I didn't want to have to sit next to someone if I didn't have to.

6am flights out of Sacramento are brutal, as it takes 40 minutes to get to the airport from my house (driving very fast) and I have to wake up especially early and I am not a morning person.  What's worse is that United is in Terminal B, and they closed the Daily B parking lot for renovations, so I would have to park in Terminal A meaning (1) take the Inter-terminal bus to Terminal B, or (2) walk to Terminal B, meaning wake up even earlier.  I did consider parking in the Economy Lot since the bus goes to both terminals and is 40% cheaper than the Terminal A garage, but now that I drive a Lexus, I can't get myself to park it outside for a long period of time collecting dust from the nearby fields.  So snobbish. ;)

The walk to Terminal B from the garage isn't terribly far, but I decide to wait for the Inter-terminal bus since I had time.  It didn't come for a while, and after the Economy bus had arrived and left did I think about hopping on it, as the next stop would've been Terminal B!  So hopefully other people will take note of this if they find themselves in a similar situation.

Finally the bus arrives and I get on for the 20 second trip to Terminal B.  (should've walked!)  I already printed out my boarding pass the day before, so I bypassed the long line of people checking in bags.  I didn't have a bag to check in anyway, but if I did have one, I'd be queued up at the 1K line, which only had 3 people in it at the time.  The long line was for non-elites.  Short queues are a benefit of being a frequent flyer.  Another benefit:  if you are a Premier or Premier Associate, you don't have to pay baggage fees for 2 bags, which saves you $55.  If you're a Premier Exec, 1K or GS, you don't have to pay baggage fees for 3 bags, and they can weigh up to 70 lbs each, as opposed to the regular 50 lbs.  That's pretty cool.

First flight was from Sacramento to Chicago, and breakfast was served, a choice of cold (fruit plate) or hot (cheese omelette).  I went for the hot breakfast.  It was all right, as you can't really mess up eggs, except the cheese they put inside it.  It was some herbed soft cheese mixture that I scraped off after a few bites, bleh.   The omelette was accompanied by turkey sausage, hash browns, a small cup of fruit, and a choice of either croissant or banana nut muffin.  (the baked goods were offered after I took the picture)   Later in the flight, the purser came around with a "snack basket" from which you could choose (1) a banana (though they were on the green side), (2) a bag of Sun Chips, (3) a package of Biscoff (caramelized sugar cookies), or (4) a Ghiradelli 60% dark chocolate square.  Guess what I chose?  Chocolate of course!  About 30 minutes later, the purser came by again with the basket and asked if I wanted anything else, gesturing to the chocolate, hehe.  I declined, as I had to watch my calorie intake since Ada planned a foodie itinerary.

We land in Chicago and fortunately my next flight wasn't too far away from the arrival gate.  This is the jet I've been dreading.  But I was actually comfortable in my 2A seat, as pictured here.  I had read that the overhead compartment storage was non-existent for the 1A and 2A seats and the compartments themselves were narrow and cannot fit a normal rollerboard bag.  The underseat storage for 2A was enough to hold my purse and my weekend bag, so I was happy, though this made me not look so forward to my 1A seat coming back, as I would have to fight for overhead space with the people in 1B and 1C.

After a short flight, I arrive in Detroit and got my rental car from Alamo.  I arrived too early in the day (~3:30pm), so I was the unlucky recipient of the last economy car in stock, a Hyundai Accent.  That thing hardly had any pick-up and I had to roll down the windows and lock the doors myself!  Power nothing!  Okay, my first car was power nothing, but it's been a long time since I had to lock the doors myself.  I think it has been 5 years since I had to roll up windows manually.  They also included an ice scraper/brusher in the car.  I didn't think Detroit would ice up at this time of year, but perhaps that is standard issue.

I get to Ann Arbor and took the wrong fork in the road but thank goodness for iPhone maps!  I made it to the Forest Avenue parking structure and met Ada at her building.  She has an apartment in this really old brick building, with an elevator that you have to slide a folding gate plus another thick door open and press a mechanical button to go to your desired floor.  The studio apartment itself was pretty spacious for one person or possibly a couple.  A small kitchen was in its own room plus a dining nook.  The main room contained her bed, computer desk, TV, bookshelves, and a small sofa bed.  To go to the bathroom, you have to walk through the walk-in closet to get to it.

We catch up on the latest happenings in our lives, and then the stomach needed food. :)  We walked to the business school and Ada showed me around the common area, looked at a classroom, checked out the gym.  The classrooms all have power outlets and network connections at each seat.  This is totally not what we had in school back then.  (well, we didn't carry around laptops and iPhones either)  We checked out other buildings on campus such as the law library.  It totally looks like a cathedral inside!  Then we walked across the campus to get to "downtown".  I visited the first Borders store.  I didn't know that the business started in Ann Arbor.  There were lots of other "college town" stores, such as used bookstores, ATM's, collegiate apparel shops, coffee shops and cheap eats.  We were supposed to hit the Cupcake Station after dinner, but we answered our stomachs' growling and made it the first stop.  It's okay to have dessert before dinner, right?

The Cupcake Station sells...cupcakes.  Imagine that!  Actually, Ada was after one thing there which was not a cupcake...a tub of their freshly made banana pudding.  She was lucky as there was only 1 tub left.  I wanted to be good and got a mini carrot cupcake.  Both the cupcake and the banana pudding were delish!  I don't think I've tasted a fresher, natural tasting banana pudding, and I'm not really a pudding person.  I ended up buying 6 more cupcakes (regular sized), pictured starting from the left in clockwise direction:  Boston Creme, Chocolate Petal, Honey Lavender, Michigan Bumpy, Oreo, Peanut Butter.

We then went over to Pacific Rim, an Asian fusion-style restaurant.  It's located in the "posh" part of downtown.  Everyone there seemed to be dressed up, and we're in our casual clothes and jeans, but at least the lighting was dim so not everyone would notice, hehe.  Ada ordered the seared tuna and I ordered the seared hamachi.  Both dishes were very yum!  The dishes were preceded by a house salad (greens tossed with a soy vinaigrette), and the server talked me into getting an "upgrade" which included other mixed greens plus arugula, mozzarella cheese, radishes, beets.  It was okay.  I really liked my entree though.  I love eating sashimi.  There was also a little "yarnball" of soba noodles.  It was nice to have a bit of carb to balance out the meal.  It was all washed down with a cup of ginger tea (free refills!).  It was very ginger-y, spicy, like a tastier version of the Chinese medicine that our moms would brew whenever we went home, haha.  Nonetheless, our tummies were satisfied, and walking back to Ada's apartment was a great way to end the night (and burn calories).  The weather forecast had called for rain, but it didn't start pouring until we were back at her apartment and ready for bed.  Great timing!

Tomorrow, Ada's planned a brunch at Zingerman's Deli.  My tummy is looking forward to that!

Disneyland - Day 3, April 18, 2010

Today's the big day!  Happy birthday to my babe.  In lieu of a birthday cake (last time I brought a cake on an airplane, it got smushed), I registered the two of us for the Sweet Sundays dessert demonstration 10:30am to 12:30pm at the Festival Showplace in California Adventure.  Disney had published the list of dessert chefs for most of the Sweet Sundays, but not for April 18, and I couldn't book until they finalized the chef.  I was worried that I wouldn't get a seat because historically the sessions are fully booked way beforehand.  Finally one month before, the chef was determined and I could book:  it was Jean-Marc Viallet, executive pastry chef of the Disneyland resort.  I googled him and found that he specialized in creative, exotic pastries and also chocolate, so that was a plus!  I had read some reviews of past Sweet Sundays, and people were complaining about not having chocolate desserts, especially for an event that was sponsored by Ghiradelli, and I had hoped that the April 18 chef worked with chocolate!  Yay!

We had a late start to the day, ended up taking the 10am shuttle.  We made it to the Festival Showplace 10 minutes before the event started.  It was sold out.  There were about 12 round tables set up, and chairs were only set up for 6 people at each table, and all of the seats were facing the stage kitchen, which was a nice touch.  I was glad that all seats had a view of the stage kitchen, so you could eat and watch the demonstration at the same time.  I checked in and found we were assigned to Table 2, which was front and center!  I was surprised to get a table assignment, as I was under the impression that seating was first come first served, but maybe that was for the free events in the park like Guy Fieri.  So it does pay off to book as early as you can, if the seating was indeed assigned based on when the tickets were purchased.

A bit after 10:30am, they started letting us into the venue.  The servers were standing at the entrance; each server would take turns leading parties to their table.  We shared Table 2 with four other ladies.  It was obvious that our tablemates were no strangers to these Food and Wine Festival events, as I believe the Festival director himself came by.  He asked them if they were making new friends and gestured to us, hehe.  We chatted and found that the ladies have been to Sweet Sundays in the past, and was planning to attend every one of them during the Festival!  If they were local, that would make sense, but I think I heard from one of the ladies that she was from Fresno.  That's not exactly local.  Must be a true dessert fan.  If I lived near Disneyland and had an annual pass, I might have considered attending all of them, but at the cost of $70/person, I'd be broke.  The $70 includes gratuity, but not tax.

A light breakfast buffet was served in the back of the room.  This consisted of a fruit tray, pastries, vegetarian quiche, sausages, and roasted potatoes.  Coffee, orange juice and cranberry juice was self-serve nearby.  (I had asked a server what the "red juice" was, and after what seemed to be an eternity, he finally responded with "pomegranate".  It turned out to be cranberry after I tasted it.)  Water was already on the tables and a server came by to pour two kinds of bubbly:  a dry white sparkling wine called "Fairy Tale Cuvee", and a slightly sweet sparkling red wine which I believe is called Magicale Brachetto.  The Magicale was soooo tasty.  I'd like to have a bottle.  The Fairy Tale Cuvee was good, but I have a preference for sweeter wines.  Also, every place setting had a copy of the recipes, a pencil for note-taking, and decorated with three squares of Ghiradelli 72% Twilight.

Chef Viallet is from France and was very entertaining throughout the demonstrations with stories about his past experiences working in posh hotels (one example was making a cake for an Indian wedding, entirely covered in gold foil), his current wife who's Mexican, his ex-wife who threw a cast iron pan at him.  There were a bunch of Disney big-wigs hanging out at the back of the room:  the chef's boss; Carlos, who plans the latest and greatest food projects; a lady whom I think was Carlos' boss.  I can't remember all their names or positions, but at the time, it sounded very big-wiggy.

The stage kitchen had an induction stove.  This was the first time I saw one in operation.  You have to have special induction cookware, as heat is created by magnets.  The stove is a flat surface, easy to clean.  The cookware gets very hot, very fast, as evidenced by the couple of spillovers that happened throughout the live show.  Someone asked Chef what kind of stove he preferred, and he said he liked gas stoves.  That is also my preference too.

Three desserts were presented:  French Toast Creme Brulee, Apple Charlotte, and Chocolate Trio.  Really it was 5 desserts, so I felt I got a good value.  I knew that I was going to eat my daily calorie limit during the event, haha.  The format of the show was that the chef would prepare the dessert with help from the sous chef, and the servers would serve the already-made dessert at around halfway through the demo so we can eat and watch/take notes at the same time.  I noticed that the recipes didn't have every detail, so when Chef mentioned a technique that I had not heard of, I had to take notes.  For example, I have never "bloomed" gelatin sheets before.

First dessert was the French Toast Creme Brulee.  Chef called it a breakfast dessert.  Though I enjoy my creme brulee a bit more dense, it was still a very good dessert.  Next dessert, Apple Charlotte, was a bit more complicated to make, as it required a special silicone mold that you buy from a professional cooking supplier (JB Prince), as well as "airbrushing" a mixture of half chocolate and half cocoa butter to create a "velvet" texture.  I think this was my favorite one of the three.  I took one bite of it and it was yum!  The texture was so smooth and the flavor quite light, yet still sweet.  The third dessert, Chocolate Trio, was good too.  I really enjoyed the Chipotle Pot:  a thick chocolate pudding mixed with chipotle.  Spice and chocolate work very well.  It was inside a gold-colored egg shell, which was a cool presentation.  You can buy these shells pre-cut and sanitized.  The chocolate mousse was delectable, very airy.  Completely opposite from the chocolate mousse I had a month ago for a retirement party dinner where it was thick as mud and I could feel individual sugar granules on my tongue, yuck.  Then the chocolate ganache in a triangular pastry shell; rich, but good.  The fun part was the 24K gold dusted chocolate-covered rice puffs on top.  I was so full.  After the demonstrations, people  stormed the stage to get pictures and autographs.  I was able to get a picture with the chef. :)

We went over to Disneyland.  As we passed by City Hall, I asked the birthday boy if he would wear a Happy Birthday button...of course he said no.  You can go to City Hall and get buttons for your "celebration", as that is this year's theme.  I saw buttons for birthdays, anniversaries, "1st visit", honeymoon, etc.  I even saw a generic "I'm celebrating!" button.  Too many people were wearing buttons.  I remembered the last time I visited DL, only a few people were wearing a button, and everywhere you went, cast members would exclaim "Happy Birthday!" and who knows what free stuff the birthday people got?  But with everyone wearing the buttons, I think the magic got diluted.

Went over to Adventureland and yay, Indiana Jones was working!  We grabbed a Fastpass, ate a beef skewer at the Bengal Barbecue (since when did they stop serving it with green onions?), rode the Jungle Cruise for a dose of cheesy jokes ("the back side of water!") and animatronic hippos wiggling their ears.  Tiki Room afterwards.  Then we went over to Space Mountain, but the wait was 55 minutes and the Fastpass return time wasn't until 9:30pm, a bit too late for our last day.  Headed to Innoventions to look at the "home of tomorrow".  The gadgets in there were pretty cool, considering you can buy them right now.  Like the Microsoft "Surface".  There was a demonstration with the robot that Honda built, called "Asimo".  I had never heard of it before.  We got to watch it move around, dance, walk up and down stairs, and even run!  This YouTube video shows a bunch of its moves:



We went over to It's a Small World.  I heard it was redone.  I saw they put Disney characters into the different sections of the world.  Cute.  The song sounds the same though.  The last room on the ride with all the children of the world harmoniously in one place, wearing white?  That's "heaven".

Finally time for Indiana.  Last ride of the day.  Worked out to have front row seats.  Of course I put him on the edge seat.

It was getting close to dinner, so we took a cue from Ed and Angela and had fried chicken at the Plaza Inn.  Yum!  One plate was enough to feed the both of us.  Three huge pieces of chicken (breast, drumstick, thigh), buttermilk biscuit, and double veggies instead of mashed potatoes and gravy.

Shuttled back to the hotel, packed up and relaxed...the end of a nice birthday weekend.  Had to wake up early the next day to catch our flights (drive straight to work, ugh), plus get gas and drop off the rental car.  Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, I paid for a Alamo economy car and ended up getting a midsize Dodge Caliber!  They always run out of the lowest category car, especially when arriving at night, so they have to upgrade you for free.  I used the Alamo self-service kiosk to avoid the agents at the counter trying to sell me insurance, GPS and car upgrades.  Though it was a midsize, it didn't have enough "oomph".  Driving a Lexus with a V8 engine really spoils you.

This weekend, I'm heading to Ann Arbor, MI.  U of M, here I come. (Go Blue?) My cousin Ada has been so kind to plan a great itinerary, including eating yummy food, even though she should probably be studying.  I got all my flights upgraded to first class too.  The "Unlimited Domestic Upgrade" program (UDU) is off to a good start!

Disneyland - Day 2, April 17, 2010

Sorry to disappoint avid Disney fans, but I did not get to Disneyland (DL) when it opened, not even for Magic Morning (when the park is open 1 hour early).

The Doubletree shuttle leaves for Disney half hour before Magic Morning (7:30am in this case), then every hour on the hour.  It drops you off at the "Silver" drop-off zone.  It's the furthest shuttle stop from the Disneyland gates.  Even the cast member shuttle drop-off is 20 feet closer.  But it wasn't a long walk.  The return shuttle picks up from the same zone starting from 2:15pm and every 15 after the hour until 10:30pm, then picks up every half hour until 12:30am. (this was for park hours that go from 8am to midnight)  The shuttle ride only took at most 15 minutes and I liked that it was exclusive to Doubletree guests, not like the other hotels on Harbor Blvd where they stop at two or three different hotels.  The shuttle wasn't full at all when we departed and returned either though your mileage may vary. (YMMV)

We were to meet up with my brother Ed and his wife Angela at California Adventure (CA) park opening at 9am, so we took the 8am shuttle.  (okay, technically I did get to a park at opening but it doesn't count)  I was starving (this is quite common), so we entered DL to grab some breakfast at the River Belle.  Standard eggs/pancakes/country potatoes/sausage/bacon/fruit offerings.  Mickey-shaped pancake for kids.  Ed calls around 8:45am...they're running late.  That's fine, because I'm still stuffing my face.  After satisfying my stomach, we head over to CA.  This weekend started the Food and Wine Festival, which lasts until May 31.  I've never attended Food and Wine here or at Disney World, and since I enjoy food, I was looking forward to tasty treats.  There were booths and areas set up just for the festival, and I noticed a long line of people waiting at the Showcase Stage.  They looked like they were going to be there for a while, as I saw blankets laid out on the ground just like when people wait for hours before a Fantasmic show at DL.  I found out later that Guy Fieri (ie. Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives show on Food Network) was the featured chef.  I didn't know he was popular enough to have people line up and wait 6.5 hours.

We head to Soarin' and the wait was just 10 minutes.  I forgot to ask to sit at the "top", so people's legs ruined the view, but oh well.  Then, we  headed over to the Toy Story 3D shooting game.  Lots of fun, though I am not very quick at pulling the cannon string to fire.  I think guys would do lots better than girls, because the pulling motion is similar to what guys do in private, ahem.  I'll let you figure out who was Player 1 and 2.

Ed calls again; he and Angela are in the park.  They meet us at California Screamin' roller coaster and we get on.  I didn't think about asking for the front car, but it worked out that way anyway!  I really like this coaster, so smooth.  No wait, maybe 5 minutes.  Getting in the park early helps with the lines.  We avoid the Maliboomer since Ed isn't too fond of drop-rides.  Neither am I, but I tolerate them better than he does because I psych myself out to ride.  People believe we must have been dropped at birth.  I still have qualms riding the Supreme Scream drop ride at Knotts (too tall) and Summit Plummet water slide at Blizzard Beach, never done either of them.  Don't know if I ever will.  Maybe one day, way way in the future.  We end up riding Mulholland Madness, a "wild mouse" roller coaster.  It looks tame, but it actually has some exciting turns and drops.

Ed somehow agreed to ride the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, despite it being a drop.  Maybe I bullied him into it.  The wait was again very short, maybe 10 minutes.  As luck would have it, we're in the front row, didn't have to ask for it.  My brother was so funny, he kept on screaming "Air time!  Air time!" when the ride was randomly taking our car up, down, up, down, down, up, down, and so forth.  You can tell from the picture that he was really enjoying the experience. ;)
 After these stomach-churning rides, it was a perfect time to look for lunch!  ;)  The Food and Wine festival was showcasing tapas-sized entrees for tasting, so we went over to the "Taste of California" Marketplace located at the Festival Showplace at Stage 12.  It was a bit hard to find, as the signage wasn't very inviting.  No big arrow or sign directing the way; Stage 12 looked like it was a private event and we were hesitant to walk in until we crept up a bit closer to see the menus posted outside.

I order the quesadilla, ahi, and the profiterole.  Turned out Ed and Angela also ordered the same thing but added the slider.  I had considered it, but it didn't look as juicy as I'd liked.  Good thing I didn't, as Ed confirmed the dryness.  The quesadilla was tasty as well as the ahi, though wished there were more pieces.  The profiterole was decent.  I forgot to take a picture of the slider, but the menu has a picture anyway.  I took pictures with my digital camera, so I was unable to post these food pics on Facebook, sorry foodie friends!

While we were eating, a cast member came up to us and asked if she could shoot video of us for an internal promotional piece.  We agreed, and she said to just eat and she'd tape us.  It was a bit unnerving because I kept thinking to myself, "Am I eating too sloppily?  Taking too big a bite?  Do they see teeth marks on my quesadilla?"  I think she focused a lot on Angela, so I was glad, because she looked the best of all of us, and ate very lady-like.

You could buy wine and beer.  Stella Artois was prominent everywhere.  I thought it was strange that the beer sold at the booths in the park cost less than the beer sold here inside the "Taste of California" Marketplace.  Maybe it was because you got to sit in the "Star Lounge".  We intended to try some of the wine and beer tasting.  It was $10 to do the wine flight, and I think it was the same to do the beer flight.  But we noticed that there was no food offered at the wine or beer tasting tables, so we skipped it.  I'd get drunk very quickly without some food to munch on.  Maybe you were supposed to purchase the "Artisanal Cheese" plate and take it to the tasting?

After lunch, we went to do Turtle Talk with Crush inside the Animation Building.  Crush is the turtle from the movie "Finding Nemo".  This ride is copied from Epcot; Crush is on a screen that looks like the glass wall of an aquarium and he interacts with the audience.  It's pretty cool technology.  You definitely have to be a good improv person to be Crush, because you never know what kinds of questions you will get from the audience.  One girl asked him, "Do you speak English?"  Crush paused for a moment, and responded, "Si."  That was a creative response.

Inside the Animation Building is a Toy Story "zoetrope".  It's pretty much a 3-D cartoon flip book.  It spins and then strobes help your eyes see the cartoon.  It was so cool, I had to watch it 3 times.  I took video of it, but I can't store video on my picture site; the following YouTube video shows it quite well: 



We trotted over to the "Bug's Life" 3D movie.  It was hilarious watching everyone jump from the effects.  We hopped over to Disneyland and tried to get a Fastpass for Indiana Jones, but the ride was broken down.  It was like that throughout the day.  Ended up going to Big Thunder Mountain roller coaster instead.  The entire Rivers of America was fenced off for renovations so no Fantasmic show, plus four attractions were down, so the park felt a lot more crowded than normal.

We went over to Tomorrowland to watch the Captain EO 3D movie.  I have never seen Captain EO.  Michael Jackson is the star of the show.  It was replaced years ago by Honey I Shrunk the Audience 3D movie, but with Jackson's death and fan requests, Disney brought it back for a limited time, so I had to go watch it.  This movie was definitely shot in the 80's.  Mullets, leg warmers, big hair.  At least I can say I saw it once.

Buzz Lightyear only had a 20 minute wait so we did that.  I didn't have to take a picture of a picture there, as you can email the photo to yourself...that's a nice touch.  Assuming you can grab an available computer.  The night before, I didn't bother emailing the photo due to the long lines.

We tried again to get a Fastpass for Indiana Jones, but it broke down right when we were approaching the Fastpass machines.  Consolation prize was getting a pineapple whip from the Dole stand near the Enchanted Tiki room.  By this time, it was close to 4pm and we wanted to catch the shuttle back to the hotel to drive over to visit my brother Allen's family, especially see my niece Alison, who is just over 10 months old.  Ed and Angela wanted to maximize their time at the Disneyland resort, so they stayed.  Really, they wanted to have the fried chicken over at the Plaza Inn.  ;)

Allen and his wife Lisa live not too far away from Disneyland; in fact, you can see the fireworks from the backyard of their hillside home.  We had play time with Alison.  She has a lot of toys!  The house is like a mini-Toys'RUs, like most families with young children.  Alison has a fascination with mirrors.  It was cute when she saw my reflection in the mirror, then turned around to look at the real me.  She's getting it.  We just chilled out at the house, enjoyed Thai take-out and fresh strawberry pie from Polly's.  Lisa joined us in the evening after she got out from work.  We thought we'd be able to make it back to Disneyland to squeeze one more ride (Indiana Jones?), but by the time we got back to the hotel, we were tired, and Ed called as well to let us know they were done for the night.  The time was 10:45pm.  DL doesn't close until midnight!  What is this madness?

Time for beddy-bye.  Tomorrow is a big day...