First Time in Florida

I have reached my goal of Silver Medallion status with Delta all because of a quick sojourn to Orlando, Florida the first weekend in December. I took the super early departure out of La Guardia to land in O-town before 11am. First stop off of the plane was to pick up my smokin' hot convertible from Dollar. Next stop was to get lost coming out of the airport parking lot and again trying to get out of the airport itself. Note to the Orlando government...better directions for out-of-towners would be greatly appreciated.

Being me, I had located the closest Target, Cheesecake Factory ("T.C.F.") and shopping mall. Lucky for me all three were within about a block of each other. Good planning Floridian government/retail people. :) After eating my scrumptious meal of salad, coke and bread at T.C.F. I headed into the mall and was completely bored within about 30 minutes. Luckily I was able to pick up Joani's Christmas gift.



Leaving the mall was surprisingly simple and my hotel was a short drive of about 10 miles. The shopping gods must have been on my side because there were outlets across the street from my Hilton. Of course I had to stop and enjoy their bounteous goodness. After shopping I headed to the hotel to clean myself up and get ready for the rock 'n roll stylings of Jimmy Eat World.

The House of Blues was located a short walk across the street and through Downtown Disney. I arrived at the venue at about 6:30pm which is quite early for me to arrive at a concert. The line was VERY long to get in so I decided to take advantage of the HOB "Pass the Line". So I headed into the restaurant bar to order a coke and some food which would allow me to skip ahead of the masses. This was a good idea but didn't allow me any time to actually eat the food I had purchased. Thankfully I made friends with the security guards so I had someone to shoot the breeze.


Once inside I pushed my way to the front of the stage where I became surrounded by Silverchair fanatics...not just fans...fanatics! Silverchair started promotely at 8pm and ended around 9pm. During this hour of noise three fights broke out where the band had to stop playing and security had to dive into the crowd. One fight was between two women. Come on! After waiting about 25 minutes my boys Jimmy hit the stage. By this time I had pushed my way even closer to the stage.

The band played a very similar set to the New York show. A few notable exemptions were Kill, For Me This is Heaven and the ENTIRE encore. The band played for an hour then the curtains closed and that was it. NO ENCORE! I was a very annoyed person as I walked back through Downtown Disney to my hotel. Luckily I was able to find a nice churro vendor to put my head and heart back at ease after the loss of an encore.

Overall the Florida experience was good. I wished the concert was longer and the food was better. The only way to determine if it was all worth it is if I am able to upgrade to first class at least once when flying next year.

Stay tuned...