Eating at Disney

Eating during our brief respite while in the Disney compound alternated between being frustrating and being reasonably tolerable. When you're considering doing the individual things that you like to do in a meager attempt to "green it up" at Disney, keep in mind you will, at times, be thwarted.

Case and point: The morning of our arrival, we decided to have a quick breakfast at the resort cafeteria. I brought in my cup and, as we went through the cashier, I said, "I've brought my own cup for coffee." The nice gentleman tallying our meal said, "I'm sorry, we can't let you fill your own cup, but you can buy one of the refillable cups we have for your coffee." They call these plastic mugs "bottomless cups" which you may fill as often as you like during your stay.

"Okay," I said, "how much are the cups?"

"$13.37."

"Well, could I just use a soft drink cup for my coffee, instead?"

"No, because you might burn yourself."

See, they give you this flimsy styrofoam cup for your coffee, but the soft drink cups are paper and about the same thickness. I was just kind of stymied by that point and gave up, accepting the styro cup rather than go without another shot of coffee before magic time.

We got bagels and the way you can get around using a ton of plastic utensils is to either share implements, like a knife for cream cheese, or just get finger-type foods.

We had lunch at Pecos Bill's and did their burger bar, which is such an awesome idea. DJ got a kid's meal with a little burger, little fries, and a cookie and juice. It's a great deal, but the only drawback is that it's served in a black, type-5 plastic container shaped to look like Mickey's head. It has one big, head depression for the burger, an ear depression for a cup with fries, and a second ear depression for the drink cup. As you can see from this crude representation of the plate, it's stylish and sleek, but plastic. I guess my question to the folks at Disney who decide this stuff would be, "If Dixie is providing the oval plates and baskets made from paper, why not have them design and manufacture a paper plate that looks like the plastic one?"

I guess the answer would be, as with all things Disney, that it's cheaper for them to produce plastic plates rather than paper ones in the shape of Mickey's head. Of all the attempts at green-ness I saw at Disney during our visit, this just seemed counter-intuitive.

Another interesting feature was the recycling bin I saw near the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse. One side was for trash, and the other side had two holes for recycling cans and plastic bottles. Again, another lovely drawing:
Honestly, I noted this before we left the park to check into our room, and by the time we got back it was too dark to look for others, and we were racing against the clock to visit as much stuff as possible before DJ had a meltdown and passed out -- or, the old man and I had a meltdown and passed out, whichever came first.