rambling

And Disneyland...

Denise Mastenbrook

07 Nov 2026 • 8 min read

Random picture heavy post ahead.

So how was the trip itself? And where are the pictures? That's what I imagine 3 of you are asking.

Which leads me to a slight digression on how my picture taking has shifted. I had already started the shift before I left the metaverse. We do a lot of similar things which leads to similar pictures. Wait, let me backup a bit...

I know it seems weird for a lot of you but I used to not take many pictures. Especially not pictures I was in. I shifted that quite a few years ago. There was an article I read about moms needing to get in the picture, and I realized that I had done that for sure. Photo albums looked like Katie raised herself. Brent didn't want his picture taken and I for sure didn't want mine taken, at least not until I lost that 5 more pounds...

So I started making sure I took pictures of all of us. This was before camera phones, I had my digital camera (there are a few people out there who can remember me always carrying a camera) and I would turn it around and take a family selfie. Then came the camera phone and the ease of taking selfies and I did those. Then Picture of the Day came and those went up. And basically everything we did I shared with everyone online in photos.

Now back to what I was saying before. I realized a few years ago that unless you were a marine biologist all of the whale photos looked the same. So I stopped taking new ones. I just watched. Which I was watching most of the time before, not constant photos, but now just watching, very rarely a photo. A selfie at the beginning of the cruise/snorkel trip and that was that. And I didn't miss not having the photos.

So now I take a lot fewer photos. There are some rituals, the shoes on the carpet at PDX, the airplane selfie, the selfies at the start of an event, just to say, hey we were here, we did this and hopefully trigger fond memories of the things we saw afterward. But I think a lot of people watch the world through the small viewer on their phone and end up missing a lot of what goes on around them. I wanted to make sure that wasn't happening to me.

The ritual shots do go up on Bluesky so if you find that you miss them might I suggest getting an account there? I know, I've been trying to get you all to move for years, but I'll still keep doing it.

So Disneyland...

The trip started as a joke. Hey, Brent, you've just retired from over 30 years at Intel what are you going to do? I'M GOING TO DISNEYLAND! And then we decided why the hell not?

Since it was Halloween we also got tickets to the Oogie Boogie Bash and did our second round with that. It's fun, but the Villains Night we did at Disney World was better, most because they really limit the number of tickets and so you get to do rides and photos much easier. They also have the villains just wandering and interacting, like live pirates on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride.

But we started with Oogie Boogie. They had a new parade this year with Madame Leota and it was really good. I had scoped out online what the route was because I wanted to see the Headless Horseman's ride again and the parade and I figured that there had to be someplace they crossed. Turned out I found a great spot. The parade stopped right in front of us and did a long dance number so we got to really take in the floats and the dancers. Really good, and again, what makes Disney Disney, cast members totally buying in to the fantasy.

Speaking of buying in to the fantasy...the costumes on the people at the event were amazing. We saw some amazing ones. Some Disney, of course, like two characters out of the Haunted Mansion that looked like they just walked off the ride, but also What We Do in the Shadows, and Martians, and Dinosaurs, and on and on...really good stuff. We didn't take pictures of people since Disney asks that you don't (not that it stopped everyone else) but trust me they were great.

We did the treat trails, but not all of them and even when we did the trail we didn't pick up candy on each of them. Last time it was the three of us and we did all the treat trails and ended up with three massive bags of candy. Way too much for us. Even not picking up treats on each trail, and only doing half of them, and leaving a bunch in the hotel room, we still have a lot of leftover candy. Disney does not skimp on the goodies.

Maleficent was perfect as always. The actress they have playing her seemed like she was having a ball. I thought she waved at me as we left but it turned out she was waving back at Brent. Flirt. Either way she was beautiful and I loved seeing her. Not as much as the woman who was dressed as Scarlet Witch loved posing with Scarlet Witch, she broke down into tears afterwards. I mean...it's not even Elizabeth Olsen, it's just a Disney cast member, but it was sweet, and I geek out over a live action Mal so I can't say much.

The next day we went into Disneyland and had a lot of fun. Haunted Mansion is done up as Nightmare Before Christmas and they do a really good job with that. We do need to get back sometime that isn't a holiday to see the real one again. It's been all Nightmare for us for a few trips. We even got to see the projections and fireworks. That doesn't always happen at Disneyland, either because I'm tapped out by 9:30 or they are cancelled. We've had a few times where we waited it out and had them cancel at the last minute, one terrible time we waited all day, and it was freezing, then they cancelled after shooting off two fireworks.

The best part of Disney was that Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was running. The past three trips we've taken it's been closed, either a break down or a scheduled refurbishment. It's my absolute hands down favorite ride so we rode it. A lot.

California Adventure was Saturday, we only do a small handful of rides there. I don't like going upside down so the roller coaster isn't on our every time list, and Brent doesn't like the big drops so Tower of Terror isn't either. We will hit those every third trip or so. Each of us sucking it up for the other. We rode Toy Story Mania a few times. My second favorite ride. And Webslingers. I beat Brent once on TSM, one out of like 5 tries. I generally win Webslingers because I don't try and do it like Spiderman, I just act like it's a speed bag and shoot web everywhere.

We also had reservations for Fantasmic Saturday night. There was rain in the forecast but we toughed it out. It was light rain and often with a light rain they do an abbreviated show. Not always. And if we were going to be back in Disney the next weekend we could have used our reservations again. Yeah, it was cancelled at the last minute. So still no Fantasmic for over a decade I want to say. We'll catch it next time I think. Might not do the reserved seating since the meal was not great, but we'll try and catch it somehow.

We did a lot of shopping, as is my way, got the girls a couple of thank you for watching the cats gifts, got a new t-shirt, a new sweatshirt, some prints, a Christmas ornament, some coffee mugs, and some pins. Ate a few corn dogs and churros. A few! Walked around a checked out all of the decorations and noted where they were already slipping in Christmas even though it was Halloween weekend.

All in all it was a lot of fun. Even with the changes I talked about last time and the reminder that we are getting older and even though we are in shape for our age, it's still our age that is a thing that has to be considered.

I still do love Disneyland. I hope to hold on to that for a lot of years to come. I hope they stop changing the things that are detracting from that and realize what makes them special.

And now a small (ish) collection of photos from the trip, like I said, if you want more head to Bluesky, or come visit and I'll hand you my phone.