A magical weekend
Posted
Friday, September 07, 2007 4:51 PM
If you are going to have a joint bachelor/bachelorette party -- make sure the celebration reflects you. We wanted to make sure that no matter what happened last weekend, we were true to ourselves.
Friday, I picked up my cousin/bridesmaid Elana at the airport and brought her back to our house – where she officially became our first houseguest.
We're both big on family – so Saturday was spent getting people from point A to B to C, etc.
Adam and I took two cars down to Orange County. He picked up cousin/groomsman Daniel on the eastside and drive him down to cousin/bridesmaid Stephanie's house in the O.C., where he was spending the night so he could be close to the action. He then went to pick up brother/groomsman Zack and brother/best man Evan from the hotel, where Adam's folks were staying for the weekend for a conference, so he could bring them to Dave and Busters at the Irvine Spectrum.
Meanwhile in car No. 2: Elana and I went to Vons in search of Disneyland tickets (they were out, of course). No biggie, we figured, we could buy them at the front gate the next day. The two of us (sans most of the maps that I had printed out for the weekend and the magazines she had left in the room) drove down to the Howard Johnson in Anaheim (across the street from Disneyland) to check-in. (Luckily I have an internal beacon that can get me from anywhere on the planet to Disneyland.)
We made it there, checked in and changed so we could get to Dave and Busters by 6 (the party was called for 7, and since D&B doesn't take reservations, we had to put our name down). I proudly sported my bride-to-be sash and pin (and was asked by a guest at the hotel if I was going to "be naughty at Disneyland" – I told him that would be impossible).
The trip down the 5 freeway took all of 10 minutes – and after putting in our names and shopping, we waited for the others (D&B wouldn't seat us until half of our 13 had arrived).
At 6:55, Daniel and Steph rounded the corner – I sent them in with Elana (four down)
At 7:02, Adam, Zach and Evan rounded a different corner -- the Spectrum is HUGE, I think there are 17 places you can enter (seven down – we could sit!).
Did I mention our bridal party rocks? The seven who arrived early/on time were all in our bridal party (Adam's three and two of my five – the other three are OOTs).
We had just sat down when habitually late Jen came – earlier than everyone else … we were shocked. Judy, Alan and Yoko arrived (yeah 11!) and Alison and Tony, who were stuck in traffic on the 1, came about 20 minutes later.
Adam enjoyed his Smirnoff Ice, while I imbibed some banana-strawberry concoction. Neither of us are big drinkers and both of us had to drive that night – despite the urging of my bridesmaids that we party.
After an enjoyable meal – it was time to play. The group ventured off in different directions, but we all kept seeing each other.
At 8:45 p.m., the 13 of us met at the large trivia game for "Beat the Bride" – the 12 of them (Adam included) vs. me. We played twice – I won both times (and ended up with a slew of tickets as I not only beat my friends, I beat the other four people sitting at the game).
We played the rest of the night, even as our ranks dwindled, but we knew we couldn't stay out too late – Disneyland opened the next day at 8 a.m. We heard rumors that our friends were going to pool their tickets and buy us something – but since we don't know what we'd do with ANOTHER automatic card shuffler, we told them to use their winnings on themselves.
We all headed our respective ways. Adam almost fell through the door when he came back to the Howard Johnson after taking his brothers back (he'd have to go back the next morning at 6:30).
At 7:25, the seven of us met at our hotel (we wrangled another parking pass for Steph) and Adam proceeded to use his bottle of ice tea to give us the grand tour: "to your left you will see a big van, to your right a wall"…. (I think he was still a wee bit out of it).
I again put on my bride-to-be sash, but I added a "bride" baseball cap (I bought a groom one for Adam who wore it for the morning).
After smuggling my Starbucks bottle through security (it isn't even a challenge anymore) Adam walked Zach, Evan and Steph over to Jamba Juice and I took Elana and Danny to the ticket booth. (See no problem. I'm sure you though there would based on my earlier statement – ha!)
In typical Murphy's Law style, three of us didn't hear four of them shouting at us as we walked through the turnstile – so we ended up waiting for them to make it through (Daniel and I enjoyed "fake fighting" while we waited).
The rest of the day was heavenly – I loved being in a place I love with the people I love. Especially when those people let me lead them around all day – I told them the trade off of selling their souls to me for two hours was no lines.
So using a combo of brainpower, luck and FastPasses, we saw everything we wanted : Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, Star Tours, Indiana Jones and the temple of the Forbidden Eye, Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, the Matterhorn, the Tiki Room, the train, Pinocchio's Daring Journey, Snow White's Scary Adventures, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, it's a small world, Roger Rabbit's Cartoon Spin, the boys went on Splash Mountain, the afternoon parade and had lunch at Café Orleans -- and all before 4 p.m.
The longest we waited all day was about 10 minutes at the theater of "Disneyland: The First 50 Magical Years" when a stupid teenage boy got his foot caught in the seat while climbing over a row.
We didn't get to stay for the fireworks – Steph had event that night, the boys had to get home and Elana had a flight out of Long Beach – but it was an incredible day.
Our friends said it was one of the most fun weekends they've ever had.
We didn't see strippers, we didn't get drunk and we didn't do anything illegal -- outside of bringing a glass bottle into the park … we had to do something mischievous, after all, it was our bachelor party!
