Toy Story 3 on Ice Excursion
Kat and I left early to go - i was estimating 2 hrs for travel. and i wanted to be there early to not be crowded when shopping for souvenirs. plus, i wanted some "oh god i got lost!" time thrown in, just in case. and, of course, lest we forget. IT FRIGGIN SNOWED AGAIN and i had to clean off my car. so i left 3 hours before the 4pm show.
it was surprisingly easy to get to. i mean REALLY easy. got there at 2:15 - whoa did we have some time to kill. so we goofed off with the camera (at least we got to wait inside) and stared at some trains and watched a kid chase a pigeon around that refused to take to the air for a good 3 minutes.
so BEFORE the show, we bought a Rex toy (her collection expands again!) - she bee-lined right for it, past everything else! a Jesse Mug with a Woody Silly Straw - bought all three of those for $25 dollars total - used a prize gift card i got from work to pay for it, so i decided not to count those against my original budget. got her a program book that came with a mickey mouse hat (with toy story character pics on the front) for free. then we went to get her picture taken with the Jesse cut out - which we got a free activity book with.
Our seats were in Loge 7, Row D. After having seen what our seats were numbered as at the Verizon in Manchester (Row AA - front row floor seating on one of the long sides), i assumed that there were a great deal of seats in front of us. imagine my surprise when these 55 dollar (apiece) seats turned out to be floor seating - we were only 4 rows back! we were, of course, right on the short end, instead of the side, but i could deal with that. especially for that price!
while we were down there, Kat decided she wanted a Jesse hat after all. which she got. and during intermission she also got a Jesse wand (she calls it, the wand of imagination). I did NOT like their light choices - that's what the Jesse wand was. There were a total of 4 light souvenirs. the wand, a buzz sword and a buzz light year with permanently extended wings that spun around. that was it for the toy story ones. then there was the mickey mouse one done in the style i hate. the spinning light whips. not much choices. you could tell this wasn't considered their big budget baby.
the show itself was awesome - obviously it didn't follow the movie faithfully. there were some changed scenes, deleted scenes and added scenes. i loved the flashback scene with buzz at pizza planet - and i could NOT believe they started playing the Star Wars Cantina song!!! (i snagged a little video of that - its on facebook). and i loved the scene where woody tries to cheer up Jesse (Introducing the Woody's Roundup Gang skit - minus the prospector)
However, i was kinda upset that neither Bonnie OR any of her toys showed up - even in the ending sequence. Katrina kept asking me where Mr. pricklepants and buttercup were. alas, there were none. just lotso, and ken (can't exactly get rid of them!) and the octopus.
Barbie did a "i have to tough it up!" scene where, again, i could NOT believe what i heard playing. i tried to record it, but apparently "I'm a barbie girl, in a barbie world" was just too much for my camera because it didn't make it!
for some reason, my camera had an even HARDER time focusing this time around then last time. i think some of the lighting was stranger (for instance, all scenes with army men and aliens, they were covered in a strange light. or a green light) i also discovered my ISO setting had been knocked down a bit. i fixed it at intermission, but the damage was done.
I was VERY much impressed with the people who played Jesse and Woody (their rag doll floppy movements were spot on) and ken and Barbie (who's angled, limited movements made you absolutely POSITIVE they weren't real at all!!!) but i was MOST impressed with Jesse - she had the most emotion and she was very very expressive with those exaggerated, exuberant full body gestures she does....
and i liked how they did the end. compared to the rest, andy felt very ordinary, extraneous even, though they tried to make up for that. but at the end, he's going through his box one last time, pulling out each toy, saying their name and reminiscing for a sentence or two. while behind him, each toy he pulled had set themselves up as a tableau one at a time, standing/sitting there frozen in place, a dim spotlight on each.
then on the way home, i found i was a full 45 cents short of taking the T (i had 1.25 on the card) so i had to put $5 on it just to get that 45 cents.
So, other than that, the lemonade, the light and a cheeseburger - i actually stayed SPOT ON on the budget! and even then, i think i managed to stay under the "oh crap! do i have EXACTLY ENOUGH RENT?" bar. if not, i can borrow 20 bucks for 3 days easily, i'm sure.