We are fortunate to be able to go about three times a year. I am fortunate to have a good job that pays well and investments that have paid well. Not saying to brag but rather to say that dispite our financial situation we have a SWA Visa for helping with air travel, stay almost exclusively value resorts, and have AP's. We like to stay on site even though offsite is cheaper, we don't really mind resonable waits for rides, and because we go frequintly we never are disappointed if we don't do everything every trip. As a result we can easily go three times a year since it is just the wife and I. When our kids were young it was certainly more of a struggle but we managed. Less trips (one a year) but still had a great time.
I don't really know how to describe it but I remember quite well the day we left for home on our first trip with the annual passes. Every trip before we had regrets on that last day if we missed a ride, or did not see a show but after the AP's we said no big deal, we are coming back. The reduction of stress coupled with the flat out dollar and cents savings made every trip since then so much more enjoyable. Now this is not the same for a larger family but for us it has made going a lot more fun.
Maybe I feel better also because I see some of the folks here taking trips to the world that seem to cost more for a week to ten days than all three of our trips cost in a year. The magic for us is there regardless of where we stay or how much we spend.
I don't really know how to describe it but I remember quite well the day we left for home on our first trip with the annual passes. Every trip before we had regrets on that last day if we missed a ride, or did not see a show but after the AP's we said no big deal, we are coming back. The reduction of stress coupled with the flat out dollar and cents savings made every trip since then so much more enjoyable. Now this is not the same for a larger family but for us it has made going a lot more fun.
Maybe I feel better also because I see some of the folks here taking trips to the world that seem to cost more for a week to ten days than all three of our trips cost in a year. The magic for us is there regardless of where we stay or how much we spend.
It's crazy what people will pay if you put a fancy name on it. For example I dont sell pepperoni pizzas I sell handcrafted artisanal home cured organic pork pies lol
They do!! I spent a year interning to become a funeral director and it was actually a pretty regular part of certain cultural death rituals. In particular for traditional Chinese funerals, Buddhist monks would hire on as "wailers" and yes, that's exactly what they did. Not sure what that sort of thing paid because they were hired by the families directly but we did serve them lunch, pick them up and drive them home in one of the funeral parlor's stretch limos. 
I certainly did the first time I saw it, early on in my employment there. I didn't think much about the 6 monks in saffron robes who filed into the chapel together but when the gong sounded and they all fell to the floor "wailing", I almost fainted. 
It's kind of comical in hindsight, because I was responsible for running that particular prayer service and I wasn't sure what exactly I was supposed to do about this spectacle. Thank goodness the receptionist had been there for a long time and quickly clued me in before I intervened.
