Deja Disney

$100 to get in? This couldn’t possibly be worth it, could it? Well, we are in Orlando. Why not? It’ll be a recon mission. We will find the answer to the question. Will we ever want to take our kids to this horribly expensive and crowded “happiest” place on Earth?

As we board the ferry to cruise over to the Magic Kingdom, I’m already thinking the answer will probably be no. I feel like an immigrant fleeing Cuba, heading for the sandy shores of Florida. Getting off the ferry even tests our patience. There are people who can walk, but they’re riding in motorized wheelchairs. They are all over the place. They expect you to jump out of the way for them.

Now we are on Main Street. It’s a sea of strollers and rascals. There are odd groups of people walking around. They all have the same shirts on. As I study them throughout the night I realize they are wearing family reunion shirts. Some of the shirts have the dates of the trip on them. Another one read 4 generations, 4 parks, 1 magical Disney vacation. It appears to be a trend to have a family reunion here. I am suddenly so thankful Orlando was never a family reunion destination for my family, my wife’s family, nor will it be for our family 40 years from now.

We are at Magic Kingdom for the nighttime Christmas party. Crowds are apparently thinner during this time of year. It doesn’t feel that way, but the lines are short. Thank God! We ride on every attraction that is remotely interesting to us. We even walk through a giant tree. Decent headroom in that thing. Kate sits out two rides. The Big Thunder Mountain and Space Mountain coasters. On the latter, I hop in the rollercoaster cars with a mom and her three kids. It’s really awkward. I’m sitting right behind her. Everyone else is talking to each other, naturally, because they know each other. I’m just the silent, extremely huge person sitting right behind you who is thinking he should probably duck a little bit during this ride. Last time I was on these tracks I was a lot shorter.

Peter Pan’s Flight is insanely short. The coolest part for us comes as we fly over a miniature London. It’s beautiful, with little lights darting here and there, mimicking cars. Cars have never moved that fast in the real central London. But then this is Disney, everything is magical, like how the hell did they manage to attract two adults to this park so we could pay nearly $200 to stand in line for 20 minutes to ride this one minute flight?

As we exit another ride I see two adults yelling at a Disney employee. They tell her to get the manager on the phone. I hear her say, Okay, I will, because I haven’t done anything wrong here. It just makes me sad for some reason to see the adults throwing a fit. I’m sure what ever happened wasn’t that big of an issue. You’re at Disney World for crying out loud, get over it! I feel for the employee. Dealing with the American public in a customer service setting like that is poisonous. It can make you a little cynical. Can you tell I’ve been there before?

It’s a whirlwind tour of Magic Kingdom. We pretty much see everything. It’s after 11pm and we are dragging ourselves down Main Street one last time. We aimlessly wander into a few stores, don’t buy anything, and carry on toward the gates. At last, we exit and now I feel more magical than I did while I was in the kingdom. That’s not what Disney intended, I’m sure.

And we have an answer to our question. The recon mission was a success. We both don’t foresee us taking our family here. Certainly, the youngest we would take a kid to Disney World would be five-years-old. Younger than that, and you are spending $1000s on something a kid won’t remember when they are 10. But even with, say, an eight-year-old and a five-year-old, would we travel to Orlando to go to the Disney parks? Maybe not. There are many other places we would want to go with kids instead of here. Going to Kauai with two kids for a week would likely be cheaper than taking them to Disney World. Actually, without a doubt, Kauai would be cheaper and insanely more magical than any Disney park.

I guess right now, we are both people who want to take our kids on really awesome vacations, but we also want those kids to remember those vacations for much of their lives. I don’t expect either one of us to change in this regard. So, as a Disney vacation is one of the most expensive trips we could envision ourselves taking with kids, it will certainly not happen until they can grasp its significance and remember it years down the road.

Even with older kids, a less manufactured weeklong getaway would have a stronger appeal to us. For my wife, that’s because the most memorable family trips for her were to the Oregon coast, where she could explore tide pools with her dad and sisters, where they could return home every evening to a beautiful house they rented for the week and make a wicked family meal. For me, that’s because the most memorable vacations I had when I was growing up were ones of exploration, where there was no admission price, no walls, no massive crowds, just God’s good Earth laid bare in its many beautiful forms, all enticing to a boy who wants to climb, swim, get dirty, and run down a path without having to dodge fat people on rascals.

Obama...the smallest government spender

Don't know how I missed this one, but this handy little graph and article is a good way to fight back at the Thanksgiving table when your relatives start talking about how economically irresponsible Obama is and how he is ruining the country by spending more than any other president in the history of the United States. 

Check it out here.

Veteran's Day

Look at these guys. Back to Back World War Champions! Thank a veteran today!

The Man Behind the Inspiration

Last weekend was a beautiful testament to a great man. I am humbled by how many lives my grandpa's life touched. His service and the weekend spent with family was exactly what he wanted. Below is what I wrote for my grandpa. He had the opportunity to have it read to him almost two months ago. It was important to me, and, I'm sure to him, that he heard it before he left this world. I read it aloud at his service on Saturday.

The Knot

I was young enough to not remember exactly when you taught me. But I was old enough to still be able to picture your hands confidently working the line in twists and loops. It is your hands I am fixated on. They look a good kind of worn, like a man’s hands should be, used and aged, but strong and capable. They are a work of art as you tie a knot you have tied so many times. Your attention to detail and your serious tone convey the importance of this lesson. I follow along and tie the knot a few times myself. The first time the knot does not take, but eventually, it holds true and strong.

The significance of this lesson did not fully register with me until some twenty years later when my father-in-law took me fishing. I hadn’t fished in a long time and I was worried that when we arrived at the shores of the Flaming Gorge Reservoir I would have to ask my father-in-law to tie the fishing knot. And he would have, without comment, because he is a gentleman, but a twenty-eight year old man should not have to ask for such things, whether he regularly fishes or not. So, I didn’t.

I took the fishing rod and reel he handed me along with a few lures down to the shore. Silently standing there, with the water lapping at the rocks, I threaded the line up through the tip of the rod and started the knot. My fingers moved like I had fished every day of my life since you first taught me all those years ago and the knot held fast as I checked its strength.

In minutes I was fishing the Gorge with a great man, but I was thinking of you. You, who knew that, whether I would fish every weekend of my life or just once a year, to tie a fishing knot was a necessary skill to have. And I knew it then, in a funny way, but clearer than ever, that I had passed a great test of manhood simply by tying a knot, by feeling capable, even for a fleeting moment. And that as important as teaching me how to tie a knot was, it was more important to teach me so that I might someday know how to teach my son or daughter so that they would learn from me as well as I have learned from you and, selfishly, that I might be remembered, as I remember you now.

A Man's Man

This weekend my entire family will be traveling to Fort Collins, Colorado to celebrate the life of my grandfather, Bryce Howard Neff. I was extremely close to him and I am honored to have the opportunity to speak at his memorial. I will share those words here on the blog after this weekend. For now, I will just say that I have always loved my name, not just because it is relatively uncommon, but because I am named after such a great, strong, capable man. He was a patriot, Air Force Captain, father, esquire, grandfather, great grandfather, a friend to countless people, an amazing storyteller, and a devoted and loving husband over nearly sixty-two years of marriage. Godspeed, Grandpa.

This is a picture of my grandpa (at right) when he was stationed at Iwakuni, Japan in 1950 and 1951 during the Korean War.

30!

I had an amazing time last night celebrating my 30th birthday with these great people! I am truly blessed by this circle of friends. 

Quote of the Day

"When friends speak overmuch of times gone by, often it's because they sense their present time is turning them from friends to strangers. Long before the moment came to say goodbye, I think, we said goodbye in other words and ways and silences. Then when the moment came for it at last, we didn't say it as it should be said by friends. So now at last, dear Mouse, with many, many years between: goodbye."

- From January 31st in Listening to Your Life by Frederick Buechner.

Happy Birthday Chris!

It wasn't hard to find a picture of you jumping off of something or doing something cool. This is Lake Michigan, July 2007, after you devoted most of your week to helping Kate and I move to Milwaukee. I may not always express it, but I appreciate how you're always willing to do crazy stuff at the drop of a hat. It's not exactly how I roll, but as friends it is also our differences that strengthen our bonds. Here's to another great year for you, one full of adventure, love, travel, long conversations, and cliff jumping.


Have a great day tomorrow.

Atypical Bachelor Party Photo

I was just going through some August 2011 photos this morning. A lot happened that month and there are so many pictures I would like to share on here. Here is just one of them from Kyle's bachelor party. Kyle is on the left. Erik is to the right and above him. And Aaron is standing on the ledge to the right of Erik. Cliff jumping into the Cache la Poudre River.

the War of Art: Redux

I first blogged about The War of Art on April 1, 2009 after reading it because this man recommended the book. Well, I’ve just been hit by a wave of anti-resistance. The resistance I write about in the older blog. You can read about it there. But I just wanted to share some passages that still rock my world. Thank you, Pressfield.

“Late at night have you experienced a vision of the person you might become, the work you could accomplish, the realized being you were meant to be?”

“Resistance will bury you.”

“If you take Resistance at its word, you deserve everything you get. Resistance is always lying and always full of shit.”

“The more important a call or action is to our soul’s evolution, the more Resistance we will feel toward pursuing it.”

“The most pernicious aspect of procrastination is that it can become a habit. We don’t just put off our lives today; we put them off till our deathbed.” Pressfield brings it with this one.

“Anything that draws attention to ourselves through pain-free or artificial means is a manifestation of Resistance.”

“Instead of applying self-knowledge, self-discipline, delayed gratification, and hard work, we simply consume a product.”

“What makes it tricky is that we live in a consumer culture that’s acutely aware of this unhappiness and has massed all its profit-seeking artillery to exploit it.”

Man, I hope one of these quotes just came up into your life and tossed things about like a little tornado in your soul, especially that last one. Read this book. And go do what everyone is telling you, you can’t do.

29 Years Old

Lots of happy birthday wishes today. Thank you! One of them was posted by one of my former swimmers to Facebook last night and I've shared it below...


"29 years ago today the world had no idea it was going to change forever....and be a bit taller."

Happy Holidays - Animal Style

Fearful of retribution given out by Monte, my parents brought her with on their trip to Denver for Christmas and New Year's. It was good to see the old lady.

She's got fire in her eyes.

She was either sleeping or going to the bathroom. Luckily, it was the former.

Max, the only Scotty I've loved. One of the Bradley dogs.

In fact, I love him so much I would never subject him to this horrible purple sweater and allow him to be held by some stiff old man in Loveland.

This is another Bradley dog. Her name is Daisy and she is a Corgipoo. Did your testicles just shrink? Mine did.

Christmas 2004 - 2010

Merry Christmas! I was thinking, how far back do my digital photos of Christmas go? And I found out, they go back to 2004. So, as I sit here waiting for family to arrive and for my wife to get home from work, I put together a short sequence of a picture from each Christmas since then.

2004: Phoenix, AZ. Pictured here with my cousins Daniel, Brian, Jacque, and my sister, Megan.

2005: Longmont, CO. The trees we could fit in that corner of that room were rocking. It was a fabulous room for many things, but on Christmas morning it was the best.

2006: Longmont, CO. Here with dad and Megan. I had to include a picture of the Christmas blizzard of 2006. Longmont got 20 inches. 

2007: Oak Creek, WI. Our first Christmas after getting married. The snowiest year on record in Milwaukee welcomed us to Wisconsin that year. We got over 112 inches of snow that winter.

2008: Oak Creek and Burlington, WI. Like the year before, the Bradleys visited and brought all of their dogs. Kate is here with Molly on her lap and Max on the floor. And this is about the time I discovered our then camera was busted. Notice the blurriness at the corners.

2009: Farmington, NM. We joined my parents in Farmington for their first Christmas there. It was an unforgettable and tough Christmas after all the crap and abuse they had been subjected to over that last year, but we did our best and we had an awesome time seeing their new home and experiencing their new life in New Mexico. 

2010: Denver, CO. This was our first Christmas spent by ourselves. It wasn't as depressing as we had thought it would be. Actually, we quite enjoyed it, knowing that in a couple days the Bradleys would join us for the New Year's celebration. We relaxed, took a long walk outside (it was in the 50s), and cooked a bomb meal. 

Triple Threat

Katelyn Sellers Hoge

8 lbs. 7 oz. 21"

11 October 2011 4:35pm

I am thrice an uncle. 

The New Whip

My mother-in-law bought her dream car last weekend. Apparently, she has wanted a convertible for 30+ years and on Saturday in Fort Collins whatever separated her from actually buying a convertible came crashing down in a big way. 

I have to say, her choice was excellent because I can sort of fit in this vehicle (front row only) and it is fun to drive (she let Kate and I take it out for a little spin in Laramie on Sunday). I know it's the first convertible I have ever driven (really good visibility in this thing) and maybe it will be the last, who knows? I just don't see myself getting one any time soon nor in the distant future. For now, it is a little fun to actually know I can ride in one when I want (at least 3 months out of the year in Wyoming).

2011 Volvo C70

Farmington, The Last Frontier

My dad jokes that Farmington is the last frontier. After learning that even Greyhound is discontinuing service to Farmington, that there are no emissions tests required for cars in New Mexico, and after seeing that it is customary to leave every car you have ever owned in your front yard like your own personal carhenge, it's hard to disagree with him. However, it does have its beauty, whether that's a beautiful sunset or an expansive junkyard or an 1100 -year-old city. Here are some pictures of the last frontier.

Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico.

A series of very short doorways for Hobbit-sized people. Apparently, even Chacoans had to duck some.

Turns out, walls start to bow and do what they feel like after standing for 401,500 days.

Vulture. Chaco Canyon.

Flying at sunset.

Clouds. Sunset. Farmington.

The last frontier and its expansive sky.

Fungus hanging on to a tree near Durango, CO.

Sunglasses and a Skoal can left in a car, which is part of this massive junkyard on the edge of town.

Broken windshield. Cars to horizon.

Ford Ranger. God Bless America sticker.

Even the school bus comes here to be picked apart over the years.

When you are all picked over, you become the ideal surface for paint swatches and paint balls.