keith_h

1 hour ago, Tri-Circle-D said:

Aw, who cares?  They can use that land to build more condos and McMansions.

What about drainage?

What about the burden on the inadequate infrastructure?

Who cares?  Think of the property taxes those new suckers Florida residents will be paying!

Everybody wins!

TCD

That's what happened in many areas of SoCal although years earlier. Throughout the 70's and early 80's we would drive from Orange County (they lost their oranges in the 50's and 60's) to head up to Idyllwild in the San Jacinto Mountains for weekend get aways. Once we were through Corona about all you would see were orange groves and farms unit you hit the mountains. Today other than the California Citrus State Historic Park all you see are subdivisions and cars.

I don't see a problem with resorts guests using the facilities nor as I said above off duty CM's. The problem is these Facebook organized gatherings are not resort guests but locals who abuse the situation knowing that nothing will happen to them. If it was just a few freeloaders I don't think most people would mind, if they even knew, but hundreds taking over the campfire or flooding Halloween is wrong and needs to be addressed. It wouldn't hurt anyone if guests were scanned for a valid MB, reservation or guest access to a camping site before being allowed into Fort activities. Even if is did result in some inconvenience it is far better for the guests than being crowded out by people who shouldn't be there to begin with.

38 minutes ago, djsamuel said:

It isn't very full. The loops that were open look to be about 50-70% filled.

That wouldn't surprise me after being closed and folks cancelling stays. Add to it that it is the middle of the week. The real test will be the next weekend or two when the Fort is usually full.

2 hours ago, BradyBzLyn...Mo said:

I was hoping for a barrel of Kungaloosh

That takes care of the anesthetic.

37 minutes ago, rdsclr said:

Sadly someone on the event post said that she works as a cast member at FW ...

That's part of the problem. Any CM encouraging freeloading should be reprimanded and if it happens again fired. I have no issue if they wish to use the Fort in their off hours with their family and friends but helping to organize large groups to take over the resort from paying guests is going too far.

2 hours ago, Tri-Circle-D said:

They will also have that new Star Wars hotel to fill at WDW.  I don't think anything has gone vertical on that yet, and they may be dragging their feet on the attractions to let the hotel get caught up.

Doing that really makes sense and allows for them to exploit the synergy between the two elements. I could foresee special Star Wars packages with the hotel and exclusive access to the new Star Wars Land if they can manage to open them concurrently. We all know as well as Disney that there are a lot of Star Wars fans who would be willing to pay for a more immersive experience.

I haven't really been paying attention but the Millennium Falcon ride looks like it might be a centrifuge ride.  

I remember watching that on TV.

1 hour ago, ftwildernessguy said:

I fill my tires with helium.  My trailer weight decreases by 1%, allowing me to buy more Disney crap when I am on vacation.

Not to mention you can also use it to make silly voices to entertain the kids.

I rarely comment in people's trip reports and will admit I don't read them all but do enjoy reading through TRs and looking at the pictures.

1 hour ago, Retired and Happy (Ken) said:

.... there are a LOT more hills to push the wheelchairs UP (never seems to be DOWN).

That's all part of being a Dad. You know, "I had to walk up hill both ways add your own embellishment here."

2 hours ago, djsamuel said:

Does the stomach pain decrease when he eats?  Your husband's symptoms sound eerily similar to a situation I had.  I had frequent stomach pain that culminated in a hospital stay about 3 years ago (I was 54 at the time).  Prior to that, my pain was initially diagnosed as gastritis and I was told to take Prevacid, which did help a lot.  Then in March 2014 I was in church and suddenly got very sweaty and cold, and felt like I had the flu.  My daughter wanted to take me to the hospital, but I went home since my wife was home not feeling well; I figured I caught what she had.  that night I passed out, but felt better in the morning.  By the next night, I passed out again and could not get up.  My wife called 911.  The EMTs came and said my blood pressure was 60/40.  I went to the hospital and they discovered I was bleeding internally from a ruptured ulcer.  I needed two transfusions, and a lot of intravenous fluid and acid inhibitor.  They put the camera down my throat and identified the ulcer.  I always remember the doctor coming to the bed and asking me if I took Excedrin or any other NSAID.  I told him I take Excedrin every day due to headaches and he said I won't be any more.  He said Excedrin and other NSAIDs cause a lot of damage to people.  I developed a fever in the hospital and they had no problem giving me Tylenol for that.  They said Tylenol does not affect the stomach like NSAIDs and is a very safe drug as long as the dosage limits are not exceeded. 

Have him get the camera down the throat to check for anything.  It was simple, not painful, and finally solved the problem.  I lost about 2 months of work to recover, but have been fine since, but have moved to NSAID free medication; including aspirin free Excedrin.

A friend of mine had the same thing happen to him. He and the doctor thought his stomach problems were from gastritis and he was put on a proton pump inhibitors. About a year later he was in the back of an ambulance and a spent couple of weeks after surgery in the hospital. 

3 hours ago, bdm said:

Damage from a tree, or weather (if the camper is parked) is covered by your home owners insurance policy anyway (if the camper is at home, storage facility, or campground i.e. not traveling).  Your Full coverage for the camper is just to cover the camper while traveling, identical to how your car insurance is.  -This is my understanding, as I just renewed my insurance this last week-

 

Also the whatever you purchase with the money from the equity loan has no weight on the loan.  People use the to pay off credit card debts, pay for vacations etc etc

That's not the case for my policy. Auto and trailer are only covered under my auto policy regardless of location. No comprehensive , no coverage. There is an exception and that is contents from the house like TV, computers or phone they are covered under my home owners.

Depending upon where the back surgery was it is possible that it is nerve damage. One of my daughters had a collapsed lung and the treatment damaged the nerves for the ribs in that area near her spine. As a result she has permanent pain. Radiofrequency ablation helps for 6-12 months but a lot of insurance companies won't cover it for her condition so she has stopped having it done. 

Are you sure it isn't the Diverticulitis? A long term work friend of mine has this condition. He has tried dietary control with poor results and has decided to have surgery to remove the affected portion of the bowel.

17 hours ago, twiceblessed....nacole said:

 Nothing about that paragraph is comforting… 

I figure that is why they are taking so much time to clean up. It takes time to go around all of the loops and look for those things up in the trees and remove them.

That's funny.

It doesn't surprise me that the Fort will take a while to clean up. Downed trees are easy to clean up. It is all of the Widow Makers hanging around up above that will take time to take care of. They might look fine now but all it takes is one decent thunderstorm to bring one down on a guest or their RV. I rather they clean up the right way than rush to reopen.

A lot of power availability also depends upon whether you have above ground or buried service in your area. Our current neighborhood is all below ground, the older one we attach to is all above ground and we both attach to the same above ground mains. Duke is pretty good about getting the main line up although with all of the trees it can take a day or two. Once it is fixed we have power. The older neighborhood can take a week or two as they repair the street feeds then get to the individual houses. Our setup also means we get the other utilities that share the poles up an running faster since they can't start work until the electric is finished. I've never had power restored faster than our old neighborhood. We had the area supervisor as one of our neighbors and our feed always seemed to be first on the list.    

2 hours ago, Travisma said:

No one carries a road atlas anymore where they could look for alternative routes.

We do. I don't use GPS as it frequently doesn't pick the best driving route and phone web browsers are just too small to try and read on the go. There have been a couple of research articles lately saying that GPS appears to be having a negative effect on people's innate ability to determine direction and more or less know where they are. As an example there was a recent report of a woman in the UK who drove into a river following GPS. Seems the road is the same name on both sides but someone forgot to build a bridge.

25 minutes ago, shoreline99 said:

There are also those that believe the Disney move is a red herring, and that the announcement was to force further negotiations with Netflix, but so far nothing has come of it.

Could be FUD. Normally a company isn't going to announce something like this two years out and potentially lose the revenue stream in the interim. I'm sure you saw that Netflix share value didn't change but Disney's dropped in reaction to the announcement. Not something that will go over well in the new Disney.

3 hours ago, BradyBzLyn...Mo said:

Yep!  And I'll be in line with the rest of the masses.

We wouldn't have expected anything less of you.

2 hours ago, Travisma said:

 and a bottle of Clamato juice. 

Add a Medelo, some Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce with a splash of lime and you have a michelada. 

2 hours ago, Travisma said:

Schools are going to be a major issue.

Even if the schools physically have the ability to open it doesn't mean they can get the kids there. Our school system determines its closures largely on the basis of how many of the bus routes can be run. If they can't run all of the routes for all schools they stay closed to ensure everyone gets the same number of education days. 

5 hours ago, shoreline99 said:

My limited understanding of this deal is that overtures had been made several times from Disney to Netflix, as either a partnership or a straight buyout, and they were rebuffed.

So, they set up their own gig (which is basically where they were headed with Disney Movies Anywhere)

Disney needs to find a replacement for Iger that understands the changing markets they operate in. Someone like Netflix CEO Reed Hastings would be well positioned to move Disney into the new distribution channels. I also suspect would be enough of a carrot to get him to seriously consider an offer for Netflix. 

With Disney's history of poor IT implementations I don't understand how Iger thinks this is a good idea. He'd be better off if Disney bought Netflix and let them run the streaming business as an independent subsidiary. It would also be good for Netflix as while they've had a few decent self produced shows most of their stuff could use the production expertise of the Disney film houses. 

Good to hear everyone made it through safely and with minimal problems. We've got some Florida folks that evacuated to our area and most are saying they aren't going back until the power in restored. I don't blame them.

1 hour ago, ImDownWithDisney said:

The wind picked up pretty good here in NE AL yesterday evening. We live right in the middle of 7 acres of huge pines and hardwoods with just enough of them cut to build a house. Those pines were going in about 40' circles at the top. I have never seen them sway so bad. I just knew one was going to come down on the house, but we just have limbs down.

I've always had more problems with hardwoods coming down than pines during hurricanes or high winds. Just the opposite for ice storms. The worst we had was after Fran came through. We were on 2 acres and lost 30-40 mature hardwoods. One area was a stand of nine, 40" - 48" tulip poplars that just tipped over 15 - 20 foot root balls and all.