YoshiFan

To add to this, I was at Sam's Club again today. I was going to get a hot dog and soda combo. The line didn't move at all and there were people waiting for hot dogs after they ordered and paid that were complaining they were waiting for 30 minutes! Needless to say, I got out of line.

I was going to try to get the whole set but our local McDonald's decided to be a huge ripoff and charge over $3 for a happy meal. When I see they have the Pluto figure at the local McDonald's I'll probably just get that one.

Undecided right now. XBox 360 doesn't look that great to me. I'm worried Revolution is going to be another Nintendo only system (some great 1st party games but no 3rd party support) and the rumored price of PS3 is making me hesitant to get that as well (if it's over $299, forget it!). I'm happy with the current generation of systems right now. Plus, games for PS2, XBox and Gamecube are cheaper than ever (older games can be as low as $5 new) so I'm content playing games now. Plus I have the DS which looks to have a great fall lineup so that will keep me busy as well. Once all 3 systems are out and have a wide variety of games, I'll make a selection.

I seem to have a lot of bad experiences at restaurants. One I remember was the Rain Forest Cafe. They have some VIP club where you can pay $10 and get priority seating. I didn't have a problem with that, just the way it was handled. We were taken back ready to be seated and just as we were about to be seated, they told us we had to go back and wait for another table because that was for someone in the Safari Club (VIP). In other words, after we were taken back to the table, they gave the table to someone else who was in the club and still outside in the waiting area. Once the hostess took us to the table, they shouldn't have made us go back and wait even longer. The service was overall just horrible. Besides the service being slow and our orders being wrong (ordered a well done hamburger and got a burger that was pink inside), we had some issues with the staff. A kids meal comes with a soda. A soda was ordered and it was brought out in a regular sized glass. We got the check and saw we were charged for the soda. The waitress called over the manager and he said something along the lines of, "That was not the kids meal sized soda, and since it was consumed, you have to pay for it." How are we supposed to know that they brought out the wrong sized soda. After some arguing, they took off the charge for the soda. Another issue I had, though not with the actual experience but the restaurant in general is that they charge more for fries. Every meal such as a burger comes with chips including the kids meals. If you want fries instead, it's $1 extra for the kids meal and $2 extra for an adult meal. When they are charging $9 for a burger, I think they can give you fries with it. With the kids meals it's worse because it's almost restaurant standard to offer fries with the kids meal and on top of $6 or so for a kids meal, another $1 even seems more of a ripoff. They actually closed up in our area, I guess we weren't the only ones didn't like the place

Yeah, that's the flip top. Both modding and installing a flip top looked to complicated for me considering I'm really not good with that type of stuff. It took me almost 15 minutes just to replace the spindle hub on my Playstation 1, so I took the easy (though expensive) route and got a Japanese PS2.

I think the one at XS Orlando was Percussion freaks, the Korean version of Drummania. Unfortunately, there is some stupid copyright with the MTV Drumscape "game" which is probably why it was removed. The Amercain version of the game does have a wide mix of music. Besides modern songs, it has some classical songs, some Namco original songs (like the Katamari Damacy song) but a lot of the songlist is mainstream US music including some oldies and 80's songs like Walking on Sunshine. In order to play imports on a US PS2, you need a mod chip or a flip top. A flip top is much easier to install from what I have heard. I don't know if I can link to the sites since they talk about how to play burned games on the site but do a search for flip top to find out the specifics. Modded or flip top systems can play both import and US games usually (always with the case of the Fliptop). There are sites that sell the Fliptop cover and mod chip sites that sell mod chips and pre-modded systems. You can get import games from Import sites such as Play-asia.com, NCSX.com, Japanvideogames.com etc. There is also EBay of course which is where I buy most imports because they are cheaper.

Good to hear you finally got the drum from Toys N Joys. I have the US version. They really Americanized the songlist compared to the imports though (Good Charlotte for example). I chose the US version over the import because like you mentioned, they are in Japanese (whereas Konami's Bemani games are 95% in English) It's fun but the drum is very loud. I like the game but prefer Konami's Drummania series more. I don't think it sold well in the US though considered Best Buy has the game and drum for $19.99 (if you want a second drum, it's much cheaper than buying it standalone).

I remember that commercial as well. For some reason as much as I try, I really can't get into the series though. I have SSBM and have played it enough to get 100 trophies but for some reason I just don't enjoy it as much as everyone else.

Costco all the way. Sam's Club is dirtier and darker looker (compared to Costco's bright looking stores). Costco always has plenty of registers opened and makes sure you get checked out as quick as possible even if it means 2 employees per register. Sam's Club doesn't care how long you wait in line with them having no more than 3 - 4 registers opened at once. Costco usually has more free food samples and better samples. Last time I was at Sam's Club they had Chicken Soup and Nesquick to try. Costco had Cheesecake Factory Cheesecake, Smoothies, Bread, Chicken Sausage, Nachos, and some loaf cakes. And finally, I think the snack bar at Costco is better. The hot dogs seem better at Costco and they are better prepared to handles crowds at the snack bar. I waited less at Costco to get a hot dog and soda combo with 3 people in front of me then at Sam's Club where there was no one in front of me and only 1 person was there who had to take the money, put on gloves, get the food in the back, come back and then get the soda cup.

WDW. 4 parks so it has the most variety in rides. Plus Epcot is great.

Sandcastle Stadium in Atlantic City, NJ for the Atlantic City Surf Yes, those are casinos in the background

Why would the hurricane have anything to do with a park closing in Texas?

Wow, kind of surprising to hear. Didn't the park say they would have a no tolerance policy towards that kind of stuff?

That's not surprising. The way people play with those test seats probably causes more wear than neccessary. At Hershey, I saw kids (who had no reason to try it other than for "fun" because they were either too short to ride or could easily fit) playing around with both the ones for Great Bear and Storm Runner.

Nice photos. In the first picture I see there is a sign up about a test seat for Nitro but it looks like there isn't a test seat.

2nd choice. I buy them once in a while especially if I see them on clearance after a holiday like Easter or Halloween.

Hershey Park Morey's Piers Gillian's Wonderland Pier Playland's Castaway Cove Fantasy Island (Long Beach Island/Beach Haven, NJ) Out of those Hershey was the best.

I really liked the die cast ride vehicles as well. I think I have almost all of them and they were inexpensive (for Disney souvieners) and fun to collect. I wish they hadn't discontinued them.

Interesting, I hope it works with green head flies too. I spent most of my summer at the Jersey Shore and I got bitten by them almost every day I was outside for a long period of time. It got to the point where you couldn't even sit out on the beach because you were getting bitten so much.

I remember that episode. That was the first episode of Wild and Crazy Kids that I ever saw. It became one of my favorite shows but that was my favorite challenge out of them all the shows I saw.

Rattler must have been the wooden coaster I remember seeing then. It's weird how back when I saw the movie for the first time years ago I never even gave a second thought to what coaster or park it was at, now it seems interesting to learn what coasters and parks were used in these movies.

I think it works if you are determined but it doesn't seem like something that I would ever want to try. I don't think I could give up stuff like bread, and other high carb foods. To lose weight instead of giving up everything unhealthy, I had my own plan and tried to change what I ate without giving up everything. Like I still eat cookies and snack crackers but I eat them in the 100 calorie packs from Nabisco and Sunshine. Each bag only has 100 calories and 2 - 3 grams of fat which is a great way to still enjoy "junk" without all the fat and calories. I also started to eat flavored rice cakes and low fat granola bars which are also better alternatives to junk. It seems to be working but slowly. I have lost about 5 pounds so far which isn't much but it's a start and it's better than not losing any weight or worse, gaining weight.

It's a video but Kidsongs Ride The Rollercoaster was filmed at SFMM. It was filmed in 1990 and they showed Ninja, Colussus, Revolution, Metro, the log flume, river rapids, tidal wave (not sure of exact name), the bumper cars and a bunch of kiddy rides. Richie Rich has Iron Wolf from SFGAM (it was supposed to be in his backyard) Blank Check has some park in it but I can't recall which rides it was other than it was a wooden coaster so I don't know which park it is. A bunch of shows had episodes where they went to Disney World like Full House and Boy Meets World

Nice photos. I was surprised to read that you said no fast passes were needed at Animal Kingdom. I have never been there without huge crowds. Even on days when it doesn't seem that crowded compared to other days, the lines are still long and the park seems congested. Hopefully Everest will take care of some of the crowds. "This is me attempting to play Taiko since my stupid drum controller has yet to arrive!!! Dang it, where is it? Yes, I am talking to you video game store from Hawaii!" Was that store Toys N Joys by any chance? If so, you might be in for a long wait. I ordered an import DDR game from them and it took over a month to arrive. It was backordered and they don't tell you if it's in stock or not when you order.

Cedar Point