My Big News

No, not pregnant - I am almost 50, remember.  No, I didn't win the lottery and can suddenly travel with no limitation. 


I have a new job.  And tis is a big part of my writer's block.   There are some very specific rules and limitations about how I am allowed to promote my new position so bear with me as I tread carefully.


This past November, I applied for and was hired for a position with a company which I am not allowed to name without prior corporate approval.  I can say that they are a well known auto club / travel agency.  The reason I have to be so discrete involves agreements between the different local clubs of this national organization. 


Here is one example of the official language I am authorized to use:

I recently took a position where I am working part time helping people plan their trips to the most magical

place on earth. In this role I have the ability to make reservations and really help all of my friends and

family to get the best value on their vacation. I would be more than happy to help everyone with

planning their next vacation to Disney and sharing my knowledge and experience.

As a result of this new position, I attended and graduated from the College of Disney Knowledge (an online course) which is required by Disney for anyone who sells Disney vacation packages.  I am not an Authorized Disney Vacation Planner.  I also attended a two day "in person" class where we learned even more about booking Disney vacations as well as more about our agency.


I am very excited about this because I am one of those self proclaimed "Disney experts" who perks up every time I hear that someone is planning a Disney trip.  I cannot help but jump in and try to help people plan their trips.  Now, I can do this and also help them save money by passing along discounts that are available through my affiliation with this agency.  So far, I am having a blast.


In my position, I am expected to generate my own sales but at the same time, I am limited in what I am allowed to do on the internet.  This is a very new program and they are trying to adapt the rules of an existing program to this new one.  With the old marketing methods, it was very easy to keep marketing within the geographical boundaries of this club.


Basically, I have been told that I can go outside of our marketing boundaries if I have a pre-existing relationship with someone outside of the club's territory.  I was told that since this is an existing blog, I have a relationship with my readers. 


Although I do plan on posting more about Disney in the future (ins and out, tricks, suggestions etc), I do want to keep this blog as originally intended - a travel blog, chronicling our adventures.  I am hoping to find the right balance between the  two concepts.  I may try to split eh blog off into two blogs while adhering to the policy of my new employer.  Stay tuned to see what I come up with.




So, that said, if anyone is planning a Disney trip or just wants to have me run some numbers, please contact me and I will gladly provide a no obligation quote.

Updating the Travel Blog

I developed writers block about halfway through my Las Vegas trip report and took a long, long break from both of my blogs.  Hopefully I will give people a reason to return. 


We are still traveling but I am afraid that life has a way of getting in the way and I fear that we will not be able to achieve our goal of 50 states in 2 years.  I am thinking about renaming the challenge "50 states by 50" in honor of my turning 50 in October. This would make it more plausible to reach the goal but doesn't really honor the kids' role in the challenge.


We are sitting at 29 states visited so far.  We took some time off from traveling for football season since Big Boy had games every weekend for a few weeks, then the holidays came around and we were too busy to travel. Then, of course, after the holidays we were too broke to travel.  Then it was too cold, then it was... yet get the picture.  We have had more reasons not to travel than to travel.


But, there is plenty of blogging to do.  Since I last wrote, we have been to the following states.


Florida (again)
Wisconsin
Rhode Island
Pennsylvania (again)
Florida (again)
Tennessee
Washington
Alaska
Connecticut
Florida (again)


So, I have a  lot to write about.


Now, part of my writer's block came from being stuck on what to say about Las Vegas.  But, a big part of my block came from how to word an important announcement.  I am going to post this now and work on the wording of my announcement.  Stay tuned - it will be posted tomorrow.