Disney World 2015, day 9: Epcot (not!) / laundromat

Our room.  Day 3, dose 1 for Kid #2’s ear drops.  He feels yucky: coughing, sneezing, sniffling.  I’ve got clogged sinuses as well.  Wifey isn’t feeling 100%.  Only Kid #1 (the germophobe) seems to be okay.  So it looks like we’ll have to skip another day at the park.

Epcot.  Attractions visited today: none.  Today was supposed to be our visit to the back half (“World Showcase”).

Art of Animation laundry room (near Big Blue Pool, 12:15pm, 1:00pm, 2:00pm).  The laundry machines are no longer coin-operated.  Instead, you swipe your credit card at a central console and press a button to indicate which machine gets the money, then go to the machine and select a cycle, then go back to the central console to press “OK”.  Also there is a cute website that you can use to monitor your load from the comfort of your hotel room.
      The cute website is just a Flash app that only updates once per minute, so it really shouldn’t need to eat up 90% of available CPU time on my laptop for its very simple two-step animations of cartoon washers and dryers (the ones in use are shown as vibrating).
      The heat index is over 100°F today (yet again) and I have to walk across the resort complex to the laundry room.  On my first trip, I bring only the clothes we will wear during the remainder of the vacation.  I put them into the washer, but it’s only ⅓ full.  So take them out and carry them back to our room through the searing heat.  Get *all* the dirty clothes we have and carry them across the resort through the searing heat of Central Florida in September.  The washer is now barely full.
      My credit card is charged $1.00 for a box of dryer sheets (I pressed the wrong button), then another $1.00 for box of soap (what I actually wanted).  I think each of these is good for two loads, but none of the laundry-room signs actually says that.  The high-efficiency washing machines warn that you must not use more than 2tbsp of soap but there are no measuring spoons anywhere.  The soap box says “1.9oz”, which *might* mean that it contains four tablespoons.  I eye out half a box of soap, pay $2.00 to start the washer, then leave the other half of the box near the soap vending machine.  Then walk back to our room through the searing heat.
      Then back through the searing heat to move the clothes to a dryer and pay $2.00 to dry them.  Use one dryer sheet (since I have it) and put the box with the other dryer sheet next to my leftover soap that no one has taken yet.  Then back through the searing heat to our room.
      An hour later, back through the searing heat to collect the clothes — but they are not dry yet!  So another $2.00.  At the central console I allocate the money to dryer #16, but then at the dryer I accidentally press the button to start dryer #15.  Somehow this causes the money to be allocated to the machine above the one that the clothes are in, so I transfer them.  My leftover soap and dryer sheet are now gone, so I don’t have to worry about whether I should use the other sheet (at home we generally don’t use such products).  Back to the room through the searing heat.
      Another hour.  Searing heat.  Clothes are dry and hot.  Stuff them into the trash bag I brought them in — of course they are now fluffier so they barely fit in the bag.  Walk back to the room, carrying the bag of clothes through the searing heat (which isn’t doing my stuffy nose any good).  Wifey packs the clothes we won’t need into the UPS box for shipment back to Canada.

Ink and paint (12:56pm).  Wifey had asked me to choose a replacement antenna-topper for our car.  We need something to make our blue Chrysler Voyager stand out in parking lots from all the other copies of this popular model.  The current topper used to be “Glitter Mickey” but he lost an ear and his glitter eventually fell off, so we want something bright.  The “Mike Wazowski” is big and fluorescent green, the “Mickey wearing a rain poncho” has high-constrast black and yellow, while the ”Rainbow” is… pretty and gay.  At the gift shop, I note that Wazowski is heavy; our current topper makes the car antenna bend a lot at highway speeds, so I don’t want anything heavier.  Which of the others should I buy?  The toppers are $5.95 each or two for $8.00, so I buy BOTH OF THEM!!!  (*cue the Cookie Monster noises*)  Back at our room, Wifey is surprised at my sudden attack of spendthrift.  I suggest that we install rain-poncho Mickey (who looks like he’s wearing a dress) on our car in Ohio, then perhaps switch to the rainbow after crossing the border and exiting from the homophobic USA, where it is no longer permissible to say “I just like rainbows”.

Landscape of Flavors (5:20pm).  Fruit cup for Kid #1.  Snack-credit.

Our room.  Wifey doesn’t feel like doing anything today for the second night of Rosh Hashanah.  My childhood upbringing was in American Conservative Judaism, which celebrates two days for major holidays, but our own family practice is more like Reform or Humanistic Judaism which generally celebrates only one.  But at home we usually eat two special dinners.
      Some people may be offended by how we practice our religion.  How can we go on amusement rides during the Ten Days of Repentance?  Perhaps what we need to atone for is not the things we have done, but the things we did not do because we were afraid to try anything new.  It has always been easier for us to justify field trips that were “educational” than those that would have been “fun”.
      My father (ז״ל) would not be pleased by the poor Jewish education I have provided to my children.  Mistakes were made, but they cannot be corrected now because the kids are grown.  It the job of the children to review the ancestral ways passed down to them and to prune the ones that no longer make sense — and it is to be expected that the parents will be displeased by some of those pruning decisions.  I almost never speak Hebrew, so my children have never seen much point in learning it.  Kid #2 almost never associates with other Jews, even though his gem collection (which includes a diamond) is a stereotypically Jewish hobby.

Intermission (at All-Star Music Resort, dinner 7:13pm).  The plan is for Kid #2 and Wifey to stay in the hotel room while Kid #1 and I go fetch some food.  (I have to go because Kid #1 hasn’t taken her road-test exam yet.)  Wifey looks around online and finds a menu for All-Star Movies Resort that says they serve cheesesteak subs, which are not available in our resort’s food court.  All-Star Movies also offers salmon, which Kid #1 likes but is not available in our own food court.  Kid #2 selects chicken nuggets and french fries.
      We drive to the food court for All-Star Movies Resort, but they no longer offer cheesesteak subs.  A cast member suggests that maybe the adjacent All-Star Music Resort still has them, so we drive over there — but no go.  Attempts to contact Wifey via the TracFone are unsuccessful (later we find out that she detected the incoming call too late and was unable to access the voicemail).  So we decide to just buy food for Kid #1 and Kid #2 for now.  Salmon and chicken nuggets in take-out containers.

Landscape of Flavors (dinner, 8:04pm).  Get two “create your own pasta” entrées for Wifey and myself to eat.