I Can't Wait for This! Ha!

My Life is So Strange (but in a good way)

This was one of those weekends where I love my job. I always enjoy my job, but some times it is way too good.

For this whole experience to make sense, I need to go back over twenty years ago. It was the summer before I went into seventh grade and the Disney Channel was only a few years old. One particular day the channel was showing old retro editions of the Wonderful World of Disney. The episode airing that day was the Osmond Brothers and Kurt Russel opening the new Haunted Mansion attraction. I taped it (on VHS of course) and watched it over and over. The show was so cheesy, it was wonderful: the bell bottom costumes with fringe, the hair cuts and the whole "gee-whiz" attitude. To this day... amazing in every sense of the word.

Advance to May 20, 2011. The Osmond Brothers were going to be performing at the theatre. Wow, they must be really old. That's what I thought and I was right, but from the show they put on, you would never know. By far one of the best I have seen in the past two years. Nothing but pure bubblegum joyfulness. Not only that, they were some of the nicest performers we have met- they even tried to buy our dinner in Atlanta.

Coming from Branson, where the brothers are currently performing, they were flying into Atlanta airport with their band. Someone would need to pick them up, so Samuel and I headed down Friday afternoon with the shuttle bus for an 8:25pm pick up of the American music legends. I knew things were going to go well when the first thing they said when they got on the bus was, "Where is the nearest Chic-fil-a?" I kid you not...

Show was great (see above section of this post) and Sunday morning back to the airport. Since it wasn't late at night this time, they were very talky. I answered lots of questions about the area, the theatre and giggled under my breath when they got excited everytime they saw a veggie stand on the side of the road. To quote, "Wow, we don't have farmers markets in Branson." It was lots of fun to talk to them. After I felt like I wouldn't be annoying, I brought up the story of watching them on a re-run episode of the Wonderful World of Disney episode that summer before seventh grade. Not only were they excited to talk about it, but they told me all about the experience of how they filmed it and several other projects with Disney.

How crazy is life. Today I drank Dr. Pepper with those same guys with the silly haircuts and deep down, secretly in my heart if only for a brief moment, I wish I had fringe on my cuffs.

Spectacular!

If you don't already know I am a nerd, then where have you been?

I found this great picture of the construction of Spaceship Earth at Epcot, or as Nikki calls it, "the big, silver golf ball." This is taken from the rear of the attraction and you can see the monorail beams circling the someday to be park. The greatest thing about this photo is you can see the corkscrew design of the ride inside the sphere and realize how high you actually go.

Fun facts bout Nikki's second favorite Disney ride:

The geosphere is 165 feet in diameter, 180 feet high (it stands 15 feet off the ground), encompasses 2,200,000 cubic feet of space, weighs 15.5 million pounds, has an outside surface of 150,000 square feet, and is covered by 11,324-silvered facets on 954 triangular panels. The exterior tiles are made of Alucobond¨ material, a composite of ethylene plastic which has been chemically bonded between two aluminum panels. The name comes from ALUminum Composite BOND. This material can withstand the Florida climate and is self - cleaning. A specially designed gutter system prevents water from cascading off the sphere; rainwater is channeled through the structure and sent to underground drains, where it replenishes the World Showcase Lagoon. The pilings for Spaceship Earth extend far into the ground with a range of 110 to 185 feet.

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