* After you read this report you may want to check out the pictorial updates in our Disneyland Resort Pictorial Update section

Hello everyone,

Friday was a relaxing day for me at the Disneyland Resort. The crowds were mild and the weather ok for a autumn Friday. There was a slight hint of smoke in the air from the fires but much better than earlier in the week. The lines for most attractions were manageable with Nemo being the long wait and I never saw it dip below an hour.

Jason

Trip logs and mileage reports are in the Park Miles section.

Disneyland & DCA Thoughts and Observations:

• As you saw in the pictorial update I stumbled into a character training session or something. It was great to see so many characters in such a small space and some that I had not seen out in quite a while. Also I found it interesting to watch the Disney CMs who were observing them. They had several using polaroid cameras taking shots of various things (I guess that's quicker for them than digital)? As I mentioned in the pictorial update I was amazed at the number of people who did not know some of the characters. It was especially troublesome the number of adults who had no clue the penguins were from Mary Poppins (I overheard at least three different people talking about them, and two of them were not talking to children). They kept referring to them as Happy Feet! Also I was surprised that more people knew the Country Bears (or at least that they were Country Bears) than knew the Pinocchio people.
  
  
• I decided to give Golden Screams a second try, I did not care for the show that much but thought why not... after all the guide map said it was new... well it was not too new. Really the only change I noticed was the Queen of Hearts was gone and the Judge from Hunchback was part of the show instead. I still did not find the show too appealing. I did enjoying seeing some of the old clips on the big screen again though.
  
  
• As I was leaving the Golden Screams I heard an announcement that the High School Musical 2 show was canceled.. never did find out why.
  
  
• While walking around the Rivers of America I noticed two CMs setting up for the next Pirate show on the Island and they tested a splash effect in the river. I had not seen that before... it looked to be for the canon sequence. I was not fast enough to get a shot of it and I was a little short on time so I did not stick around for the show to see it.
  
  
• I grabbed a quick dinner at the Taste Pilots Grill at DCA and now (or at least the CM that helped me Friday) was enforcing the $10 min. on an order to get the annual pass discount. No place in DCA had ever given me an issue with this before. Wonder if this is a new tightening of the belt... its too bad.. but I guess in a couple years a burger and fries will be $10 but by that time they will probably raise the min to $15...
  
  
• I got off the train in Tomorrowland and had to walk through the smoking section... I still cannot believe enough people have complained about this to force it to be moved or just closed down... It seems like such poor planning to making the smoking area be along the only walkway from the train depot to Tomorrowland and on top of that its a narrow walkway to begin with... so in addition to the smoke you have people jammed in there..
  
  
• I spent some time walking around Innoventions which is really a shell of its former self right now. The entire first level is walled off as they are preparing new exhibits, I read somewhere it will be a Microsoft exhibit. The second floor also has a huge gap as the Pioneer exhibit is gone too. You would think with all that was closed they would offer some extra, later in the evening, ASIMO shows, but they did not. It was kind of nice to walk up the ramp and right in without having to wait or go through the film.
  
  

Be sure to check out the picture update that goes with this Geekspeak column, it can be found in our Disneyland Resort Pictorial Update section

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