A long trip..

The traveling Narayanan's visited Florida between 4th and 10th July. It was a bold and risky move taking three older people with health conditions and two little kids with only two able folks handling the other five through air travel, theme parks and adventures!

The good news is that we had our ups and downs but overall we had a great time and made it back in one piece. It has taken a few days to get back to the old routine and get settled...

There are 1600+ pictures out of which at least 250 hold promise and that means a lot of photo and video editing over the next few weeks whenever time and Sangeetha permit the process!

On tuesday we had got up at 6AM Florida time and reached here at 1 in the morning, which was 4AM florida time. That was one 22 hour day for everyone. So we came in, threw the suitcases in the living room floor and hit the bed and it was lights out for everyone in a few minutes. The next day Sangeetha had told me that she had a very important meeting and had to leave at 8 AM.

I was still getting visions of going in various rides and was a little dizzy and tired. So at 3AM, in the middle of a dream, I wake up thinking we are in a boat and the ride has ended and we have to get out.

The fact that the home exercise machine that used to be at our bedside was sold a day before we left on the trip and yours truly has not yet got used to the empty space and the green light from the smoke alarm on one side and the red light from the TV monitor on the other side made the dream realistic..

Frantically shook Sangeetha and said "we are the only ones left on the ride.. everyone has left. get down"

Sangeetha :We are in our bed. Go back to sleep

Me : We are on a boat. look, it is floating. we have to get out. I can't get out on this side. you have to step down from that side.

Sangeetha : (fully awake and totally pissed off by now) Ok. That's it. This is our bedroom, you are on our bed, that is our bathroom and I am go there right now. So wake up, go to the bathroom and let me sleep!

After following her out of the boat (er.. bed) and realizing that she was indeed right, apologized and went back to sleep.

When driving to work it was so weird. I kept looking to the passenger side and behind the van so frequently to check on non existant passengers! Six days of going everywhere on a 7 seater van loaded with 7 people and suddenly driving an empty van gave me a lonely feeling.

Now the dreams of the rides are not recurring but there are tons of happy memories from the six day trip.

That was just a sample of how wild things were..

More to come!

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Posts..

The lamp ones.. not the blog ones..

Found throughout Disneyland in various themes..

Caught these in the New Orleans section..

Next time we should spend a week there and explore every little detail in that place.. just fascinating!

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Mickey... we see you!

The little one had her first glimpse of Mickey mouse two days ago. This is her first trip to Disneyland where she can remember things. The last time was when she was 1 1/2. Not exactly the perfect age to get hyped on the mouse.

This time she watched Mickey and we watched her and it was truly amazing to see the kid believe. She knows her parents are the real Santa, but thinks Mickey mouse is real!

We drove all Thursday to Anaheim with a quick stop at the Malibu temple.

Friday was spent at Disney from morning to night and it ended with the fireworks and an exhausted bunch of kids and adults. We spent Saturday visiting friends and drove back. Our drive back was interesting as we made 2.5 miles in one hour on I-5. It was raining and at one point folks started switching off their engines. The next exit was 6 miles away and we thought we were going to spend the night on I-5! Thankfully it started moving again and we got home a good 2 hours later than planned, but got home.

There are tons of pictures and many won't make it to the blog..

This last photo sums up the excitement.

It was great to go with friends and family to a place where "your dreams come true" and "you believe in magic" and you watch that sparkle in your five year old girls eye as she gets up and blows kisses at Mickey mouse when she can barely stand up after "walking the most in her whole world life" close to 10 in the night..

For our family thanksgiving is about being thankful..

to Eisenhower for coming up with a highway system that can get us from SFO to LA in 6 hours (okay 9 hours but we are still thankful)

to Toyota for making a van that makes it worthwhile and bearable to have two little kids and a mother in law who need a comfortable ride get there without them taking out all their anger at the driver

to friends and family who make the trip memorable and finally

to Walt Disney for having the vision to make our birthday long weekends fill up with fireworks in November!

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The Superbowl Prince

The deal with San was that if I got to watch "Tamizh Padam" yesterday, she gets to watch it today. The hamster brain forgot to put Superbowl into the equation, what with the sinus headache and not being able to think through those devious details.

Was hoping to convince the girls that watching Superbowl would be a good idea, what with the great ads and all.. but they convinced me otherwise.

Big screen wall mounted 52 inch TV - 1600 bucks

Goody bag puzzles and Disney princess memory game - probably under 10 bucks

Your kids forcing you to switch Superbowl off and make you play princess games - priceless!!!!

Youtube has all the Ad's in a "rate the ads" contest. No marks for guessing what I will do after the kids go to bed..

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