From a parrot to a real boy

We found something much more uplifting than Mass to celebrate the day after Halloween--Disneyland! We got an annual pass, too, since if you go more than once in a year that's by far a better deal, and Tristram seems to love it. I got my Halloween fun after all.

Here you can see Tristram in his parrot costume. It turned out a little big in the hood, since guess what? Babies don't always cooperate very well for fittings. Strange...Anyway, I console myself with the thought that it's not bad for a first garment ever created, and I can start a tradition of dressing up on more and more days till I find one when it fits him.

So he did not get to wear a costume to the park, but I don't think he minded. He loves Disneyland, both the Californian and European versions. Again, a day-long trip with no crying. He loves seeing new stuff all day, and we are careful to feed him BEFORE he gets upset. I learned that taking him to the National Zoo and watching kid after kid have a meltdown upon saying they were hungry and being told to wait.

He is, in fact, much easier to handle when he is out all day than when he is home all day. All he wants is for me to make our apartment as busy, exciting, and full of new things and people to look at as Disneyland! I console myself with the knowledge that novelty preference is the strongest indicator of future intelligence.

He also discovered his ability to entertain people while we were waiting in line and on the train there and back yesterday (it's a long train ride). He had everyone around us cracking up in our longest line (45 minutes). He thought that was fun, so on the train back he started leaning around to make faces at people and wave at them to see if they'd wave back.

Then, this morning, he became a real boy: he stood up holding my knee, let go, and calmly turned around and stepped over to the couch.

Today's go/stay comparison is a comparision of EuroDisney versus the original:

California is much, much better about smoking. Europeans will light up any damn place. In line, under an overhang, right outside a door...I find it impossible not to be judgmental about people smoking in front of their kids, and even blowing smoke onto their babies' faces. I even saw a pregnant woman smoking. California is also much cleaner; my theory is that the EuroDisney staff have to spend so much time picking up cigarette butts that they don't have time to clean up quite all of the other trash.

EuroDisney, though, has some design advantages. Being built so much later meant they had more Disney culture on which to draw. and being French meant that they co could make Tomorrowland largely Jules-Verne-focused. Space Mountain, for instance, is designed after the Baltimore Gun Club, and is set up as the giant pistol that shoots out the car to the moon. It's also less bent on tying every ride to a movie directly, so Pirates of the Caribbean, because of the later design, better materials, and lack of perceived need to add in new movie gimicks, is superior (though the ceiling is too easy to spot for the illusion of being outdoors). Also, because Europe is less litigious, they are more willing to make "dark" spots actually dark, which adds a nice ambiance.

EuroDisney is spread over a much larger area, but has fewer rides. That makes for more lovely landscaping, but less of the delight of finding something fun tucked into every possible space. That is how we spent a whole day there but did only three rides, yet were busy and content.

EuroDisney also is severely lacking in covered seating, which was quite a problem at lunchtime since it was raining. We ate standing up in the restaurant. There was plenty of seating, but most of it was out in the open. We later discovered that Fantasyland is the absolute worst place to look for protected seating, which is strange since it's the home base for small children. Where were the quality control people when that design got approved?

The great advantage of EuroDisney, though? Fewer parades. Sadly, they are lacking the only good one, the Electric Company Parade, but one's day is not constantly interrupted by the Parade of Dreams. So, while it is altogether seedier, it is in many ways more guest-friendly. I cant't help wondering, though, that the ghost of Walt Disney did not rise from the grave to drag that smoking pregnant woman to an otherworldly vengeance of cartoon hilarity.