Puddlejumping and "Tubthumping."

It was a dark and stormy night.

No, like, LITERALLY.

So Bethany and I have been planning a trip to Downtown Disney (more specifically, the Rainforest Cafe) for well over a year now. She had a gift card and neither of us had been before, so we were like, "YES, we are doing this." So we got all prettied up--wore dresses, actually DID our hair and makeup--and decided to go.


We got there and it turns out there's this neat little ferry that takes you from place to place (it's FREE) so we decided to ride it out to Rainforest Cafe.


So as you can see, it was sunny and nice and everything was awesome. The destination:


We got there and ate this DELICIOUS appetizer sampler dish (we split everything...including drinks. Sorry, waiter!) and had the most amazing frozen raspberry lemonade on the planet. We actually ate outside because it was, no pun intended, a zoo in the inside. And we actually wanted to be able to hear each other talk and stuff, so we ate on the deck by the water. Then we went inside and looked around.


Bethany thought this penguin was an owl (it IS a penguin, right??)



And we found some weird pimp/hippie hats (Disney merchandisers, wtf.).



That's when things got sketchy (and not just because of the pimp hats). While we were eating outside, it got progressively darker (like that scene in the first "Pirates" movie when Elizabeth Swan falls into the ocean and the weather changes like *that*). We brought umbrellas with us so we were like, "Yeah, we're good. It'll probably pass in an hour or so."

Umm, FALSE.

Let me just show you the satellite image from last night:

Neither of us bothered to check the weather. MAJOR planning fail.

So we left the restaurant and started to walk, in the rain, around Downtown Disney. We made it about 20 yards before the rain became a torrential downpour, so we ducked inside this massive Disney store for a while. And we were there FOREVER. And here's the really stupid part. We were in heels, right? So they hurt. And we were wet. So we found a little corner to sit down in and just wait until the rain lightened up. But OH NO. Apparently, you're not allowed to sit. Anywhere. Ever. Seriously, for being the "happiest place on Earth," Disney (and their employees) and pretty effing annoying. Especially considering it was basically a monsoon. And the store was PACKED with people all trying to just wait it out.

So we stayed there for like an hour being bored out of our minds and shooed away like a couple of stray dogs before we decided we'd had it. So we took off our shoes, popped the umbrellas and decided to just go back to the car where we could at least SIT until the storm had passed.

Well.

Let me just show you a map of Downtown Disney, complete with our various locations and the path we took, in mid-calf deep water, to get there:


We. Were. SOAKED. And for those of you who were wondering, both of us determined that wet chiffon may well be the most uncomfortable thing in the world. But anyway, this was epic. It was like Lord of the Rings, the "barefoot in posh frocks" edition. Bethany fell down (she's fine, btw). Her umbrella also broke halfway through. We sang "The Little Mermaid" songs at the top of our lungs because what the hell else are you supposed to do while running across Disney in a semi-hurricane? We encountered some lost old people. We got lost ourselves. We probably picked up some kind of weird thing from walking barefoot across an entire park. And then we FINALLY found the car.


This is Bethany's umbrella in the OPEN position.



So we sat in the car for a good while playing Pop Quiz on Beth's iPhone before it finally let up enough that we could SEE the road in front of us to get home (it was during this time that I introduced Bethany to Chumbawamba. Was I the only one who listened to Chumbawamba in the 90's? I thought they were awesome because they were English! Granted I was like, 9...).

So yes. Overall, it was wet but it was AWESOME. I haven't laughed that much in a looong time. And I was just ecstatic to see my Friend in real life instead of on a computer screen. :)