Okay, now we're off to Brooklyn, and maybe San Francisco.
They are only a few steps apart in Hollywood Studios, and even if the old British phone box has gone, there's a Chinatown SF one to replace it. Nearby there's the Golden Gate Bridge, seen here in a view with accompanying Telegraph Hill that you wouldn't get in the real San Francisco.
Then again, turn and look back along the same street, and it could be Newbury Street, Boston?
The Fast Pass Plus system helps get around the parks at a good speed.
We decided we've reached a kind of Zen Mastery level of the parks now, skipping from one mountain ride to another, whilst slotting in a few of the shows too.
By the evening, we needed a rest for ach day's 9-10 miles of footwork. I've loaned out my fitbit, but still have 19,000 steps recorded for one day and 17,000 for another.
Today, for recovery, we headed along to the Contemporary, to their Californian Grill, which serves fine food and also is a fantastic place to watch the fireworks across at Cinderella's Castle.
That'll be the castle on the left...
It makes a change from our usual road trips, to this time to be in one place for enough days to get in some provisions.
“Bustelo, Marlboro, banana by the bunch” - Oops, that's the Rent lyric. Ours (obtained from Publix, of course) would be coffee, breakfast, that kind of thing.
Fully technological, with our whizzy bands for Access All Areas. Normally I'd say more about the technology, but on this occasion I will just call it magic.
I know, a reversal of the usual lyric, but we're in Florida for a few days.
Last time we were in Miami Beach was a couple of years ago, on the way to the Keys.
We stayed in the hotel that they used in that episode of The Sopranos, when the New Jersey gang met the Miami gang.
Whenever I see Scarface or one of those Miami movies I have to do the 'been there!' when I recognises certain scenes. The picture shows the hotel next door to the one with the staircase from Scarface. The actual 'apartment block' has been Johnny Rocketed.
This time , for us, it was a quick stopover as we were on route back to a more northern part of Florida.
I haven't written about any music gigs lately. Yesterday we were along to see the great Joan Armatrading in the intricacies of the Barbican. This was the 120th gig of Joan's current tour and the first time she's performed a tour completely solo.
An immediately recognisable singing voice and some rebuilds of well-known songs as well as a few less familiar. Joan plays a tidy lick on the guitar too, weaving acoustic, slide, jazz, blues and stinging rock into the set. She accompanied a few songs by piano and modest loop and synth for a couple of the very familiar tracks from the set.
I'd last seen Joan Armatrading at Glastonbury where she was playing a bluesy set on the Jazz stage. Here, for the Barbican, she mixed it up using a small selection of guitars (including what looked like a blue Variax) and the keyboard.
I realised just how much I'd listened to both of my vinyl copies of her early albums over the years and was treated to several tracks from them, mainly re-worked for the solo performance as well as some full-on dialled-to-eleven guitar work in other numbers.
Joan is clearly very comfortable performing and with around 40 years of touring she's met and played with many well-known folk. About half way into the set she kicked back and gave us a slide show of some of the moments along the way. Elton John, Paul McCartney, her MBE, a one-to-one with Nelson Mandela all featured as well as small stories about being photographed by Annie Leibowitz, Robert Mapplethorpe, Patrick Lichfield. And to round it off - yes - a cartoon strip in the Beano.
It was a fine crowd in the full house too, warm applause when she arrived on stage, singing along when she asked, creating an encore for which she waited patiently on stage.
A great evening of entertainment from a powerful performer. And I just found the Beeb's recording of 'Love and Affection' from Glasto.
The BBC really ought to re-screen 'Our Friends in the North' what with that there election coming along.
Maybe it's too complicated, from a contractual standpoint, with so many of the then fresh faces now as big names in their own rights. Christopher Eccleston, Mark Strong, Daniel Craig and Gina McKee in the starring roles. Malcolm McDowell, David Bradley, Peter Vaughn - even Julian Fellowes as a multi-jobbed politician.
And there's the point. The storyline, which spans 1964 to 1996, tells of four main characters and their intertwined lives around Newcastle and partly London's Soho, in situations that start with a story involving inadequate and poorly built housing but which leads to corruption, sleaze, drive-by politicians, tabloid press tactics - the list goes on and on. And although it starts in 1964, the themes still seem very topical today as well as against their original backdrop of Macmillan, Douglas-Home, Wilson, Heath, Callaghan and Thatcher.
The BBC series was originally made in the 1990s, and it's interesting to look back on the older 60s parts and marvel at the access to the locations and the items needed to make it look authentic. Thirty years after the earliest events, most things required were still available, and it adds a kind of haphazard authenticity which is harder to recreate another twenty or so years on. The London scenes are similarly well painted and it's fascinating to see the action on location outside the Old Palace Yard of Parliament in a way that security has long since banned.
I've still a couple more episodes to re-watch. Right now I'm still in the power cuts of Heath's three day working week. Swan Hunter has just closed. Even by the end the rejuvenation of the Quayside won't have occurred. There's no Sage or Hilton looking down from across the river in Gateshead. Of course there's no Gateshead Millennium Bridge. The south side of the Tyne Bridge looks empty. Some things change, whilst the series shows that others remain just the same.
Another sign of Spring as the gnats have formed a sort of singles' bar in the back garden, doing that spirally dance. Accidentally walking through them and thinking the obvious expletive is probably a pretty accurate description of what is happening.
I know that trick to hum at the gnats to make them change their flight patterns, but I've also noticed that it works a lot better with a guitar. A few chunky chords on an acoustic and bizarrely you can have the gnats responding by dancing up and down in no time.
I think it's something to do with the way they listen to wing beat patterns. Maybe I'll film it some time.
