Day 9: Card Sharks and Salad Bars
Trip Start
Jul 21, 2006
1
13
29
Trip End
Aug 13, 2006
Orlando,
Florida,
United States
Saturday, July 29, 2006
We then found out that the home was under multiple listings so we had no idea how many people had the keys. We were so annoyed! We wrote to Chris to tell him what had happened and that we didn't want anyone coming in the home. Just to be safe, mom made a sign for the front door that said, "Beware of Dog, Keep Out!" It was just a very crazy situation and another complaint to add to the list. It's bad enough that all of our stuff was in there, but if we were gone and someone came into the home while Oreo was there, who knows what would happen?
At 2:30 Mike went in the pool and mom and dad sat outside with Oreo while I took some pictures and then watched TV. We had wanted to go to Universal Studios that night but I knew that it would be packed since it was a Saturday night. I really wasn't in the mood for dealing with the crowds so we decided to forget it and just hang out around the house. Dad was upset because he had been looking forward to going on some rides, but we still had two weeks to get everything done and we decided to head over to Universal Studios the next day. At 3:00 mom, Mike and I decided to play an early game of California Rummy. We had some snacks while we played for an hour, and I wound up winning the game!
At 5:45 we headed out for dinner. We were going to decide between Ruby Tuesday's and Shoney's since we wanted a salad bar, and we decided on Ruby Tuesday's. We drove over to the restaurant and were seated in a booth near the entrance. We ordered within ten minutes, and mom, dad and I all got the salad bar while Michael got soup. We went up to the salad bar and it was nice, but not as nice and clean as I had hoped. The tongs were all kind of greasy which really skeeved me out, and the salad dressings were mixed together in some spots which was also gross. It wasn't too bad, though, so we all took some salad and went back to the table to eat. The last time I had Honey Mustard dressing had been a year ago and it was delicious. While we were eating our salad Mike's broccoli and cheese soup came which he really liked.
Our food came ten minutes later and it was all pretty good. Mom and Mike both got crispy chicken sandwiches, dad got a barbecue burger and I got a lump crab cake sandwich. The crab cake was really good but it was so spicy. It actually hurt going down and I knew I would have an upset stomach later on. Oh well. I ate half of it before we got the check, which came to $60. We were then on our way. We got back to Crescent Lakes at 7:00 and dad pulled over so Mike could get in the driver's seat. He drove back to the house and I joked about him crashing the car on us. I was scared! Haha! He's a good driver though. He was supposed to take his driving test a few months ago, but since had had surgery on his shoulder in December it was postponed. He's planning on taking it soon. He did a good job driving and we were back at the house within five minutes. Mike wasn't feeling well so he just hung out while mom, dad and I decided to head back out to Target. I really wanted to get my books, but I again had a feeling that Target wouldn't have them.
We drove over to Target taking the same back road that we had used coming back from Walmart the day before. We were there within twenty minutes and the store was pretty nice. It reminded me more of a Kohl's than Target. The bags were all in the front of the store and I didn't think twice about them since I didn't need a new bag, until mom told me that I should pick one out for school. I was going to wait until I got back home but I looked through the bags and found a nice brown one that I liked. It was big enough to fit all of my books and had enough pockets to hold my pens and cell phone. It was originally $40 but was on sale for $20 so I had to get it. We then went to look at the books, and unsurprisingly they didn't have the ones I wanted. They had a few on sale for $6 including "In Her Shoes" and while I was interested in them I decided to save my money in case I found the books that I really wanted. I then looked at the DVD's since I had been wanting the "Tristan and Isolde" DVD for a while. I love that movie; the entire story is just so mythical and magical to me. I didn't see the DVD at first which I was surprised about since they had every other new DVD imaginable. I finally found it, though, and it was $20 so I decided to get it.
Mom and dad were looking for ant spray since there were always a bunch of ants outside the front door of the vacation home and as we were looking for it we happened upon the toy section. We picked up two packs of crayons for Alison and Zach and looked for cute Disney-themed coloring books but they didn't have any. We then made our way over to the Home and Garden section where we found the bug spray. Afterward mom looked at the jewelry and picked out a ring and a pair of earrings before we made our way over to the counter. On our way to pay we found the $1 bins and saw a few nice things. Mom picked out two big claw magnets (one for her and one for my Aunt Stacy) as well as a pack of four small Tootsie Roll magnets. We then went to pay, and the girl at the counter said that she had gotten Napoleon Dynamite magnets in the $1 bin a few days ago. I would have loved those! As she was ringing up mom's things she was quoting different scenes from "Napoleon Dynamite" and not paying attention to what she was doing. It was really weird but funny! She then closed the money drawer without giving mom her $26 in change, so she had to call someone over to reopen the drawer before she was able to ring up my stuff. We were out of there by 9:00.
Dad wanted to go to Dairy Queen for ice cream since we had already been in Orlando for a week and hadn't yet had Dairy Queen, so we drove over to the nearest one. On the way we passed a Walden Books that I knew would have had the books I wanted but it was closed. We parked at Dairy Queen and went inside. There was a family in front of us who we had to wait to finish getting their ice cream before we ordered. I got a Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Blizzard, dad got a Strawberry Cheesequake Blizzard and mom got a French Vanilla Coolata. We got covers to the containers and decided to eat them back at the house. On the way home we listened to the radio, and I have to admit that Orlando has way better radio stations than New York does! New York doesn't have a single modern rock station and we only have one classic rock station. Orlando had two modern rock stations and four classic rock stations. It was awesome!
We were back at the house by 9:45 and we all hung out. Mom, Mike and I played another game of California Rummy that I had been winning the entire time until Mike put down the wrong hand and no one noticed. I had also been able to put down that hand right before we noticed Mike's mistake, and instead of Mike just picking his cards back up we restarted the round and I wasn't able to put down. I got screwed and mom wound up winning the game.
01 - Hanging Out in the House
It wasn't fair that I had to lose because of Mike's mistake! Haha! At 11:00 we all watched TV in the living room before I went into my room to read my psychology book until I fell asleep at midnight. 
