Degrees of Oddity

Spring Break

March 6th, 2012

It’s my spring break, ironically following one of the busiest weeks of my semester.  I just got off being soundboard operator for a play at my school and now I don’t have class for an entire week.  I do have work, though, so no exciting trips for me this year. Been making some plans with friends to do all sorts of things from a four-day weekend in Chicago to flying down to Hawaii some time after October. Lots of great ideas, lots of things to save up for.

 

Well, it’s late at night, I don’t seem to be all that…babble-friendly. So, I’m going to go to bed and hopefully come up with something more interesting to talk about tomorrow.

Surprise!

November 16th, 2011

So, I up this morning to find I had a text and an e-mail from my mom. It was about the Research Paper I had sent her. We ended up spending my hour of work-ready time discussing the theme of my paper. My paper had focused on the female breadwinner model and how it affected women. Not to mention how society affected women who were female breadwinners. And it was a real eye-opener. I loved the paper once it was finished. I’m happy with the finished product and am hoping for a good grade from my teacher.

I went to work, said my goodbyes to my mom, and clocked in for the day. I was scheduled to work Sorcerer’s Hat and Pin Station, thus I was happy when my first assignment sent me up to the hat. I got to stand by the pin board for a good chunk of time. And, that’s when the first surprise got me. I was standing there, just to the left of the pin board, facing two guests that I was chattering with about pins and their days and everything.

Suddenly someone just over my shoulder chimed in with my question and I turned, an answer prepared. Of course, all answers flew out of my head when I found it was Papa! I gasped. Loudly! And everyone started laughing. My leader came over and got a picture of me with my Papa and Grandma. They hung out for a little while, looking at pins and talking with my co-workers. They were there with a brother and sister, a nephew and a friend, all of whom I got to see and wave enthusiastically at.

They headed off to go do stuff and I went back to work. I was sent on my first break and, upon my return, got scheduled for the pin station. I was there for another two hours before my second break, and when I returned from that I was sent right back to the pin station. That doesn’t appear so bad when written, but the pin station is just a little place where guests can look at and purchase pins. But not a lot of people stop as usually they’re headed somewhere like Beauty and the Beast, Fantasmic, the Tower of Terror or the Rockin’ Rollercoaster. So, I spent a good chunk of my four hours answering questions about where things were and how to find beer. Not even joking. All the parks except Magic Kingdom sell alcohol and one of the popular questions is where it can be found.

At the end of the night, two of my co-workers came and shut down the pin station and sent me off to the Hat. I went up there to basically do more standing around because two of the four registers had been shut down for the night and the other two were being manned already. One of the Coordinators came up and I asked him if it was time for my bump out, I literally only had four minutes left on the clock. He said yes and we got to talking when I felt something tickle the top of my head. I whirled to find Papa again, with everyone else in tow. Everyone laughed over the fact that he’d gotten me twice that day. I moved off to talk to Papa and Grandma about meeting up with them after I clocked out. We agreed to meed in the handicap parking lot and I ran off to clock out.

Clocked out and ready to go, I made my way out of the employee gate and back over to the handicap parking lot where I found the van everyone had piled into. We stood talking, and I explained my need to catch a bus. I got hugs and kisses, Grandma took a picture of me and Papa and then I ran off to make it to my bus stop and they piled back into the van.

As I was crossing bus paths to get to my stop, Papa passed me in the van and shouted something. I didn’t quite catch it, but I did start waving and shouting excitedly back. This, of course, gathered the attention of the tons of people (all other College Programers waiting to go home) at the stop and I got a few stares.

There was an oddly large number of people waiting for the bus, but no one had to stand, thank gosh.

I got home, realized that Housing was throwing the Thanksgiving Party tonight, so I changed quickly and went back out there for free food and pictures with Mickey. I even got to tell Mickey that he was my favorite!!!

All in all, it was a great night and I loved it!

BIG NEWS

October 31st, 2011

So, Saturday night was crazy.  Party at the boys’ place across the hall.  There was drinking and silly games and crazy dancing.  Why the party? Not just for Halloween, but also because T’s birthday is..well, it’s the 31st, but we celebrated on the 29th because he went home for a week. This week.  It was a little crazy and insanely fun. Not that I can disclose much. Why?  Because some things are meant to be kept quiet.  Anywho, I threw together a last minute costume.  Country Girl.  Yup, that was me. I put my hair in pigtails, threw on a country-ish tank top and some jean shorts.  It was pretty fun.

 

This week, as in Sunday, I started my week of deployment at Downtown Disney.  I’ve been deployed to Once Upon a Toy in specific.  Sunday I had an insanely long ten hour shift.  I wasn’t sure it would ever end.  To be quite honest, I look forward to going back to Hollywood Studios next week. I miss it.  I miss it a lot.  Not that giant Toy shop is bad, it’s unique and different.  I mean, it’s a giant, multi-room toy store.  It’s really cool. I spent a couple of hours helping guests put light sabers together, which was really crazy because it’s a popular station with the little ones.  The highlight of my night?  When, at the Water Stage, the DJ’s equipment broke down so the manager at Toy picked out myself and several others who were just stocking or tasking and put a bunch of light up toys on us.  We paraded through Downtown Disney to the Water Stage where we entertained the impatient children with bubble guns, limbo (via a double-sided light saber) and stickers.  You wouldn’t think kids would get excited about stickers, but they do.

 

I had several boys who were about ten or eleven who returned twice each for more stickers. I was nice, but I can admit to some frustration. Especially since it was the same boys who kept putting their hands in front of my bubble gun as though to stop the flow of bubbles.  I was momentarily terrified as kids pressed at me for bubbles and my bubble gun broke down.  A little tilting got it working again and appeased them.  Eventually, one of my co-workers and I put our guns away and turned to light saber limbo.  Eventually, a woman tapped me on the shoulder and thanked me very, very much and said the DJ was all set.  So, we got the heck out of there and let him do his thing.  It was hella fun, especially since he had some pounding music going.  The equipment for the show was down, which was why we’d been called in.  We weren’t the only ones. Some Fairy Godmothers from the Boutique showed up and I got splashed with glitter (along with all the kids).

 

Eventually my work day wound down to an end and I left only to try and navigate my way back to the college program bus stop in the dark. I made it, got on board and called my mom for the last time.  She’d left me a message earlier and I had worked on getting ahold of her all day.  She was home from her own eventful day and picked up.  The reason she’d called?  I had gotten my acceptance letter from Grand Valley State University.

 

I’m going to my college of choice in the Winter.  God, but I’m so freaking excited.  I got in!  I started crying on the bus.  It’s not every day that you get notification that your application was successful.  Now, I just want to ace this semester and I’ll be happy.  I’m off to bed for another long day. I’m gonna try to sketch out an outline for my introduction (for the ten-page research paper I have to do for Soc.) while at work.  Wish me luck!

New Roommate

October 27th, 2011

A lot has happened since my last post.  I went and saw the Three Musketeers, I’ve spent several more days at the parks and now the due date for an assignment is looming.  In Hollywood Studios, I work at several locations, one of them being the Sorcerer’s Hat. Another being a store called Five&Dime.  Five&Dime got a big transformation around the 22nd of September and now it is our major Christmas Store in Hollywood Studios. A fact I find somewhat amusing as there is A Wonderful Shop, the year-round Christmas store is the back of the park.

Also, during the last couple of weeks, one of my roommates left.  She got accepted into a new university wherein the semesters are actually separated into four parts, thus the College Program would cause problems with her schooling.  So, she’s gone.  Yesterday, after I left for work, one of my roomies text me saying we had a new roomie who would be moving in the next day. This morning, I got a rude awakening when a guy came into my room.  He told myself and my roommate that we could stay where we were (in bed), but that he was going to be doing some hammering.  We both sort of sat up and moved our stuff a bit out of the way.  He was quick about it, the whole point was that they installed a bunch of cork boards.  Two per bedroom and then one in the main living area(s).  Seven altogether.

 

Poor T got a rude awakening even earlier than I did when maintenance busted into her bedroom to thoroughly clean D’s old half of the room. Vacuuming and all sorts of crap.  It was kind of funny because we had gone through the stuff D had left behind just the night before and gotten it all cleaned up.  I got a brand new set of sheets and a new pair of shoes out of it.  Woohoo!

 

Now, I’m sitting alone in the apartment, eating ramen and getting ready for work.  The others have all left, which I find amusing.  They all work Magic Kingdom, so usually they start later than I do and end at two or three in the morning.  Today, for once, I start later than all of them.  Of course, I have to remind myself that some of them leave an hour or two in advance of their shifts.  The Magic Kingdom bus takes an hour.  Add onto that the time it takes for the bus they catch at West Clock to take them to the entrance of the tunnels and then all the walking and everything?  For my custodial roommate, all the stuff she has to do before work means she has to leave two hours before she works.  Which means she’s out of the house for about twelve to thirteen hours today.  Why? Well, she has a ten and a half hour shift, she left two hours before it started, and it’ll take her at least an hour to get home.

 

My job, Hollywood Studios, is not nearly as bad. I still usually leave about an hour in advance so that the bus trip, which takes about half an hour, can drop me off with enough time to spare.  Today I’ll have twenty minutes because of the way the bus system works, but it’s enough.  The walk from the cast bus stop to where I work takes about ten minutes or less, so I’ll be perfectly fine. Just no dawdling today.

 

I can be surprisingly honest and say that I do love my job.  And I don’t really want to go home.  I like what I do. I like the work.  I’m not looking forward to next week.  They’ve deployed me to Downtown Disney (or DTD; Hollywood Studios is HS, Magic Kingdom MK, Disney’s Animal Kingdom is DAK and Epcot is just Epcot).  And, DTD is completely different from any of the parks in that it does  not have an extensive back stage area.  I mean, for serious.  You get off the bus at a bus stop where there will be guests waiting.  You are onstage the minute you arrive.  I kind of find the difference interesting.  I’m only not looking forward to it because I know HS like the back of my hand at this point. DTD is a maze to me.  I know I’ll enjoy it.  I mean, I get to work in a toy store for crying out loud.  But I am feeling a little anxiety about the technical details.

 

I’m gonna try to post more often, even if it’s just short ones detailing what happened in a day. I feel like I’m not giving a clear picture of my College Program, so I’m gonna step it up.

Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party

October 13th, 2011

So, halloween is officially here! And the only major theme-park-centered party I’ve been to is Disney’s.  The tickets for us cast members are still $40, but for regular folk it’s, like, another $70.  A little ridiculous, you think, until you realize that, for the party, they are exclusively pulling some major male characters out.  I have to say, five hours (that’s how long the party is) is not enough time to properly trick or treat your way around the park AND also do all the character meet-n-greets.  My roomies and I ended up splitting up, ’cause two of us REALLY wanted to meet the princes, and Flynn, all of whom are never ever out on normal days, while the third wanted to finish trick or treating.

 

I spent almost an hour in line just to get some fantabulous pictures.  And I’m not kidding. The wait was pretty ridiculous, but the pictures really made up for it.  I asked, very shyly, if I could have a picture with both Prince & Princess and then a solo with each. Keep in a mind that the line was for Cinderella & Prince Charming, Snow White & The Prince (FERSERIOUS), and Rapunzel & Flynn.  I got three pictures with each set.  One with both, one with the female and one with the male. It was kind of like meeting celebrities for me. I can’t even explain why, but it was so very exciting!!!

 

The decorations were amazing, the castle spent part of the night in a dramatic green-red lighting that I simply fell in love with. It was so…evil and inspiring.  I’ve got pictures, I do, but I haven’t yet figured out how to put them in my posts. As soon as I do, I’ll put some up.

 

We saw the Villains show, which was pretty amusing, especially with the cast of villains they pulled out (Capt’n Hook, Cruella, Queen of Hearts, Maleficent, Evil Queen). After the show, the villains literally entered the crowd and took pictures with people. Unfortunately, the line was so long that there was no way I could do it before the parade started.

Now, the parade was simply stunning.  First, the Headless Horseman came charging down Main St (and I was sitting RIGHT in front of the castle!), then the Boo to You parade started with Mickey and friends at the head.  I work at Disney World every day and yet I still get super excited about the characters and the parades, you’d think it’s my first day every single time. I got some phenomenal pictures of the parade, and some not so good ones.  My favorite is of one of the ghosts on a float that stood still just long enough for me to catch a really eerie shot of him.  I need to figure out how to upload pics onto my blog!!!

 

Okay, I need to finish some homework! Until next time!!!

Water Parks and Lion King

September 21st, 2011

So, today, on my second day off (for this work week), I and three of my roommates headed off the Typhoon Lagoon. Original choice?  Blizzard Beach, but we missed the bus, so I had us jump on the Typhoon Lagoon bus.  It was worth it.  We got there with about two hours to spare and so we rented lockers and headed for Crushin’ Gusher, which was really fun.  It’s one of those new water rides wherein you go down and up.  We headed over to the giant wave pool and spent a good twenty minutes just hanging out for a while before I abandoned them to hit Mayday Falls. It was fun and kind of wild with the bumpity slide (at several points, the slid literally as bumps in it, simulating white water rafting is my theory, that or waterfalls, not sure).  I met up with them at the giant pool and dragged Mandy and Deanna off to get food, Tweetie trailed after us when we didn’t return.  We got talking to the food people and I gave them my name and e-mail so we could be FB friends, which I’m excited about.

It was while sitting and talking that I noticed these new, really awesome waves were happening over at the pool.  Those were the six-foot waves with 90-second intervals between each one. Me, being the crazy person I am, I rushed back out, caught one while getting into the pool and caught another four or five in the deep end (well over six feet, so I couldn’t touch bottom even when there was a lull) and then caught another one on the way out.  I met up with the others with twenty minutes to spare and dragged Deanna off to hit Kowabunga, which is one of those lay on your back and cross your arms and feet kinda rides. I had a hard time not trying to stop myself.  At the bottom I had, of course, the mother of all wedgies.  It was bad.  After a quick rush to the restroom, Deanna and I met up with the others and we left.  It was a quick, but suitably wet two hours at the water park with a mild scare of a T-storm in the middle.

We got home, and I started texting my California Girl, who agreed to meet up with me at Chatham after she got home from grocery shopping with her co-worker. I showered and dressed and then sat down to watching Law & Order: Special Victims Unit with my roomies while I waited. Katie texted me, I made sure I had what I needed and left. I met up with her outside security and got in her car. We drove off, giggling and conversing about random stuff, to Downtown Disney. Getting there, the first thing we did was buy our tickets to Lion King 3-D, which had us super stoked. With tickets purchased, we had two hours to kill, so we wandered around the West End stores and restaurants.

We stopped at Wetzel’s Pretzels and got some unique pretzels before sitting down and babbling good-naturedly. This is when we both figured out what we wanted to be for halloween, previous to this we’d been stumped. Katie’s gonna go as a female Buzz Lightyear and I’m gonna be a Lion (mane and all).  We’d been joking all night about how we were on a date and it didn’t stop then. With time up, we headed to the movie theater, got to “invent” our own drinks. No seriously, they had drink machines that let us choose exactly what we wanted (I put Cherry Vanilla Coke, Cherry Coke and Vanilla Coke together, I know, there’s a pattern there).  Bought our drinks and headed into the theater with 3-D glasses.

I sent Katie in and made a quick run into the restroom before following her and admiring the beautiful theater.  I got in the hallway and was surprised to learn that the theater was backwards. You enter not from behind the seats but from behind the screen, which I found epic.  And the theater was HUGE.  So, you came in and you could decide to go up, go down or stay in the middle-ish area.  We start up a bit and then went down a bit to a great pair of seats in the middle of a row.  Not very front, mind you. Just a few rows down from the handi-cap section.  And the “down” part was not the floor seats, those were the first three or four rows and we were a good six or seven rows behind those.  When I said huge, I meant huge.

 

We sat down, watched the previews and others trail into the theater. The more people arrived, the greater the excitement and buzz. Eventually the screen said “Put Your 3-D glasses on” and we all started cheering. First, we had to sit through several 3-D previews. But finally, FINALLY the big blue Disney logo showed up and then the screen went black. We sat there, making sounds of impatience and waiting.  Finally, the movie- the EVENT- started.  Immediately, I was at home and happy.  The seats, by the way, were leather and huge and super-comfy.  But what made the movie so great is that everyone sang along. When the title showed up the first time, we all cheered and clapped and screamed.  We sang and quoted along with the movie because we’d all seen it a million times and the atmosphere was comfortable, laid back, happy.  Dead silence for Mufasa’s death, but that’s to be expected. I think there were tears shed, I know I cried.  We clapped for several scenes, including the Live Bait scene performed by Timon and Pumbaa, screamed and cheered for Simba several times and adored on Scar’s evilness while at the same time hating him.

 

We all oohed and aahed over Baby Simba, went “aww” at the love bit for Nala/Simba (and several other really cute parts too).  But I loved it. I want to do it again, or something similar.  The entire atmosphere of the theater was..It was like going to a slumber party. And, I can guarantee that at least 90% if not 100% of the audience members were College Programers.  Lion King was one of our movies.  I mean, people were shouting quotes with the movie, singing as if there was no tomorrow and generally actively involved.  We all were.  And when the title showed up at the end again, we exploded with cheering and applause. It was like being at a premiere without the craziness. It’s probably the absolute best movie-going experience I have ever had. And I hope I never forget it.

 

It was like seeing the Lion King for the first time all over again. I laughed at things I haven’t laughed at since I was a little kid, got excited for parts I knew were coming and cried at the saddest scene (the scene that I remember made me hate the movie for a while as a child).  On top of that, I saw it through new eyes. I saw the story of Simba and I loved it. Again.

 

This was a night of Disney Magic and it had nothing to do with the parks themselves.  Thank you, Disney, for giving us Lion King 3-D.  It was amazing. It was superb. It was perfect.

 

It was brand new.

Harry Potter

September 20th, 2011

So, last week was really, really crazy. Mike and Cindy (I will not name last names) came down to Florida for a week. Since they couldn’t get their timeshare on Disney property, they rented a condo off property, wherein they could see the top half of the various Disney Park fireworks at night.  I met up with them on Wednesday night, just in time to see the Light Parade at Magic Kingdom.  It went down like this:

I got off work, rushed to costuming, got changed and rushed out to the bus ring where I caught the Magic Kingdom bus.  I got to the TTC, caught a monorail to the park, rushed up to the locker rental, got a locker.  And then marched inside.  Cindy texted me that they were in front of the Emporium. I spotted across the street from where I was standing. So, because the sidewalks were crowded with people, I turned left and tried to burrow my way past the crowds to meet up with them.  I got a good fifty feet only to realize that the opening for the parade to come through was right between where I was and where Emporium was. So I turned around and rushed back through the crowds in a desperate attempt to beat Tinkerbell. Literally racing her float to get far enough down the street that I could cross.

I paused only once to ask somebody and they pointed further down. So I was forced to “please” and “excuse me” through hordes of people.  I got to the crossing and had to shove my way past families to get out into the street.  As I crossed, I glanced to my left, where the parade was coming straight at me. Talk about WHOA! Made it to the other side and rushed back down to the Emporium, trying to catch the dancing fairies and the Tinkerbell float as it passed.  I finally decided to just stop and watching the parade and then find Mike and Cindy afterwards. Lemme tell you, the parade was beautiful. I saw Peter fighting Hook to the death on Hook’s ship, I saw Snow White dancing in the street with five of the seven dwarves.  I saw Prince Charming momentarily.  I witnessed a mighty dragon make his way down the street and even saw the biggest, lit-up American flag in the history of American flags.  It was, to put it simply, amazing.

 

Afterwards, the crowd exploded into all sorts of directions, a good percentage stampeding for the exit while another gigantic percentage headed for the Castle to see Wishes.  I forged through the crowds up and down Main St, USA in front of the Emporium, looking for Mike and Cindy.  I found them, after cautiously walking up to a guy who looked like Mike and circling to stand in front of him.  He called my name and I turned. They had me lead them to a good spot for Wishes and I got two pictures in front of the lit-up castle with them.  I set them down in a beautiful spot and then, midway through the show, had to abandon them in favor of, quite literally, racing back past the crowds to reach the locker rentals and return my key before all hell br0ke loose. And, when I say that, I don’t mean it in jest.  When Wishes ends and Magic Kingdom closes, things get scary.  I made if, of course, and stood around waiting outside the gate.  I was waiting by turnstiles that weren’t being used to get the masses out. Even so, I watched one family open one of the stroller/wheelchair gates and exit. Of course, that lead to a whole flood of people following. I ran down to the nearest Main Gate personnel and asked if they were supposed to leave that way. At his negative, I offered to close the gate, saying I was a worker from Hollywood Studios. His harried smile was extremely grateful and I darted back to the gate. One woman I tried to stop looked at me as though I was stupid and refused to stop, she forced her way through and went on to catch one of the three modes of transportation out of Magic Kingdom. I stopped the next family and sent them to one of the actual turnstiles where a personnel was waiting.

Cindy texted me that they were sitting in front of the main sign and I rushed down to meet them.  They came out of the gate and we headed for one of the monorail lines. The first one we got on, we realized it was the Resort Monorail and left the line to get into the Express Monorail line (Express goes right to TTC, whereas Resort stops at the Contemporary and then the TTC and two other hotels).  I convinced them to take the bus and lead the way past the resort ferries, the TTC ferry line (which was huge) and down the wrong path. We had to turn around and go back to where the paths diverged to head towards the buses, only to have a parking personnel turn us around. The TTC bus wasn’t running that night. Why? Because the demand to get back to resorts was higher than the demand to get to the TTC. I disagree, the lines for the two major routes (Express Monorail and TTC Ferry) were horrifyingly long. Still, we headed back with a little tidbit of advice, to take the Resort Monorail since the line was shorter and since the second stop was the TTC.

 

It took us a while, but we got onto a monorail and headed out.  Second stop, we got off and headed to the line for the trams.  Got onto a tram, were dropped off deep in the parking lots and then we all climbed into the car that Mike and Cindy had rented for the week.  They drove to Chatham Square and waited while I ran off to my apartment and packed some stuff.  Then we headed of to their condo.  After a little conversation, we all headed to bed.  I had a room that had two queen sized beds, a tv, it’s own bathroom (with a lovely shower stall) and the washer/dryer in the hall. It was fantastic.  I stayed up watching TV before I finally convinced myself to turn it off and sleep.  After sleeping for almost a month with another person in the same room, it was really hard to sleep in that beautiful room by myself. I missed my roomie, Mandy, like mad.

 

I woke up near to 11am (we’d all gotten to bed at about 2am) and immediately felt bad as we’d planned to head out to Universal Studios that morning. All was well, though.  They weren’t mad and we spent several hours watching Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles before I did some necessary homework and we all headed off to the water park at the resort (one of two, I later learned).  We went around the lazy river several times, sat around in the sun and generally lazed around. At one point, I called my mom and got the okay to go to Islands of Adventure the next day. I was worried about the expense, but Mom said go for it (I’d gotten my financial aid refund the day before).  Later on, Cindy and I went and played Putt-Putt Golf, which was fun and really hard.

 

The night ended with us going out and getting Chinese, which they kindly paid for, and then another stop at my apartment so my roomies could, very generously, come down and give me my camera/camera case.  We went back to the condo and everyone went to bed.  I had another restless night, struggling to get to sleep in a too-empty room and turning the tv on and off to try to appease myself.  The next morning, my alarm woke me at 7:30am, I sprung out of bed and into the shower.  I’d washed my clothes the night before, Mike and Cindy had been kind enough to invite me to use the washer/dryer they had at the condo for free (it’s $1 per load per wash/dry. So, $2 for one load to go through washer and dryer at the apartments).  We all got dressed, ate breakfast and left.

 

We got to Universal Studios, decided on preferred parking and headed into CitiWalk (you have to go through that to get to either Islands of Adventure or Universal Studios). I took pictures of EVERYTHING!  I went and bought my ticket to Islands of Adventure while they waited and then we all headed inside.  First, we made a beeline for Harry Potter, bypassing Seussland & Lost Continent on the way.  We started there by heading right to Dragon Challenge, after first getting some snaps of Hogsmeade and the train.  In Universal Studios, you can’t take your stuff on the rides, so they have rentable lockers near every ride.  You can rent such lockers for free for a certain amount of time, after that time is up it’s $3 per, like half an hour or something.  Except near the water rides, oddly, where it $3 no matter what.  So, we rented a locker and got on Dragon Challenge. I have to say, the ride was amazing, but the seats were a little uncomfortable for a bigger person.

 

We got off and picked up some butterbeer, which Mike very kindly bought for me. We got the frozen variety  (there’s the cold variety also, but I learned that that one was waaaay sweeter), which was amazing.  It had a nice butterscotch taste without being overly sickly sweet.  It took us a while to finish that off, so we meandered over towards the castle. I made a stop at the girls’ bathroom and had a mild freakout when I kept hearing Moaning Myrtle’s voice.  It was an awesome, if slightly freaky, feature for the bathroom.  I dunno what the guys’ had.  I told Cindy and she decided she’d have to visit the restroom later for it. We finished our drinks and headed off for the next ride.  The Forbidden Journey. It was AMAZING. I’ll actually go into details, but warning. If you haven’t ridden the ride and plan to and don’t want it to be spoiled DO NOT READ THIS PART:

So, it said about 20 minute wait, which was cool with us.  We got into the line and weaved our way up to the door to get into the castle, through a green house with mandrakes!  We went through the open doors and saw a statue (none of us had cameras with us for the first time, but we brought them second time around), beautiful with lion near the feet. Of course that’s what I remember most, was the lion.  And then we passed the point counter for Hogwarts. I think there was another statue before we got to the big circular area with the beautiful bird.  A tapestry on the wall was next.  We passed through a wonderful area where Dumbledore was waiting, a room wherein the paintings on the walls were discussing the “muggles within Hogwarts’s walls”.  And then, the most exciting moment, we got into a big room where Harry, Ron and Hermione were mid-warning about the adventure to come.  They disappeared under the invisibility cloak and left. Just as we were leaving the hall, they were coming back to warn others.  The reason it was a 20 minute wait?  All the little things to look at along the way.

 

After the warning from the trio, we stepped onto the ride platform.  It was something I was familiar with. You step onto a moving walkway, just like at several popular Disney attractions and climb into your bench and sit down. When I first got in, I sat next to Mike, but the attendant asked me to move down to the end. I did with some confusion and trepidation.  I got buckled in and off we headed.  Hermione was the first to greet us by  asking us to say a spellword and then she threw some dust or powder at us, which let the bench fly.  She told us Harry and Ron would meet up with us. We passed through some great stone…areas, can’t really call them hallways, but still. Which is where we ran into Ron and Harry who flew us around the castle. We passed under a bridge wherein Hagrid stood holding an empty chain asking if we’d seen a dragon. That’s when Mr. Dragon showed up. Ron disappeared and we followed Harry through some pretty amazing aerial stunts.  We left him and ran into a tower, where the dragon caught up with us. This is where I first learned why the attendant had had me move down. The ride is a combination of simulation and animatronics.  And there was a giant dragon waiting for us.  It turned it’s head as we passed, preparing to fire at us. I thought that, like most Disney rides, it would just miss us. Nope. It got me. I screamed when it first showed up and then I screamed even more when I realized it was gonna get me.  I was enveloped in a plume of smoke and red light. After that, Harry met up with us and took us right smackdab in the middle of a quidditch match.  A bunch of dementors showed up and we spiraled out into the forbidden forest. A run-in with some spiders had me freaking and squirming in my seat, in a rather pathetic effort to get out or run away. Those animatronic spiders got really close, I’m telling you!

 

We pulled out of the spider infested forest and ran into more dementors. One of them sucked my soul out, or tried to. Apparently Harry saved my poor, soulless butt.  We pulled out of the forest and nearly got clobbered by the whomping willow (like seriously, animatronic willow, freaked me out).  But we helped Harry save the day and everyone clapped. As I got off, Dumbledore reminded us to grab our belongings from the back of the seat. As I got up, I noticed a little area of the seat that could be popped out to slid cameras and phones into. Nothing huge, very small, but useful as, when you’re on the ride, it’s part of the seat.

 

We caught a ride on a hippogriff after that and then headed out of Hogsmeade and over to Jurassic Park. We stopped in the Discovery Center for a meal wherein Mike and Cindy paid for three all-day meal days, once more providing food for me.  With our new meal-deal wrist bracelet things on, and a fully stomach, we headed out to catch a ride in Jurassic Park itself.  We saw some very friendly dinosaurs on the ride only to get diverted, probably by the raptors, into the dangerous area where the raptors were wrecking havoc.  We heard some ominous sounds from T-Rex and ran right into him before falling down a huge water-hill and getting soaked.  It was terrifying and awesome. All of the other rides in the area, there were only three altogether, were either kiddy rides (the pteradactyl ride) or closed. So, we headed to Toon Lagoon where, again, only one ride was open. Ripsaw Rapids.

 

Ripsaw Rapids had us helping Dudly Dooright save the girl and beat the badguy, and get soaked doing it. It was spectacular fun and we all walked off with squelchy shoes.  We headed over to Island of Heroes or whatever where the Marvel Superheroes were wandering around. I considered a picture with Captain America before deciding against it (I later regretted this choice).  We got on the Hulk, which also had uncomfortable seats, even the “modified” seats were uncomfortable, but the ride itself was amazing. It took you up on the chain like any other roller coaster and, near the top, shot us up and out.  I screamed myself hoarse.  We, as a group, decided to get on the Spiderman ride, which turned out to be worth it when we realized it used similar technology to Forbidden Journey.  Except with 3-D glasses and we were in a car, running around getting pictures of the Super-Action for Peter Parker’s jerk of a boss.  Spiderman had to save our butts quite a lot.

 

We headed over to Seussland, where we caught the cute, crazy Cat in the Hat ride and then got on the people mover which was almost annoyingly cute.  The Lost Continent had nothing of interest for us, no rides, just shows. So we forged back to Harry Potter, where  we finished by re-riding Dragon Challenge and Forbidden Journey (I got the same seat and screamed my fool head off, again).  This time, for Forbidden Journey, we took our cameras and spent the “20 minute wait time” taking pictures. Ferserious, the wait time is just all the time spent taking pictures. At least, in off-season.  Otherwise, it’s a walk-on ride.  Again, off-season. With a second dose of Butterbeer, we went back to Suessland for a second meal.  We went back to Harry Potter to do some mild shopping (I bought a chocolate frog and some Pumpkin Juice, that’s it), but we found most things to be too expensive. For instance, the robes are $100 apiece. No way.

 

It was about the time that we were heading out of Islands of Adventure that I took another look at my ticket.  I realized that the ticket booth guy had up-talked me into buying a ticket for both parks.  A two-park ticket.  I told Mike and Cindy, feeling frustrated that I got tricked like that. Cindy told me that, with an hour left, I could head over and hit the ride I really wanted (the Hollywood Rippin’ Rocket).  And guess what? I hit it twice!  It’s another, oddly enough, ride that has a moving belt, so you have to hurry to get on and they had to press the bar a notch further than I would have liked, but what can a big girl do?  Anywho, then you have to quickly choose some music or, as I found out on my second ride, it’ll choose for you.  Then you, quite literally, go straight up. And are shot straight back down.  Both times I got on the ride, I was lucky enough to get right in front. BOTH TIMES! And it was freaking AWESOME!!  There’s a camera that tapes your ride and you get to view it afterwards, which is hilarious.

 

I left the park and headed back to the parking lot where I met up with Mike and Cindy again. Cindy asked if I’d made it to the Mummy. I told her I hadn’t, as I’d been too afraid of wasting time with walking.  She told me next time I came I had to hit that ride as it was well worth it.  And, I’m sure, next time I go, I’ll go to Universal Studios and I’ll hit all the movie-rides.  Although Harry Potter alone is worth choosing Islands of Adventure over Universal Studios.

The craziness of work!

September 15th, 2011

So, I’ve been incredibly busy since my last post.  That week I spent my singular day off at home.  Which, looking back, was a mistake.  Since then, I’ve figured out how to better juggle homework, work and fun.  I usually try to get all of my homework done around my work schedule and reserve my two days off for fun time.  Last week I had both Thursday and Friday off. I spent Thurs at Magic Kingdom, which was amazing. Except for the fact that I managed to break my Tinkerbell bag while boarding Space Orbiter. I bawled the entire time I was on the ride and made my way over to the nearest store wherein, after explaining my sob story, the people there got me a voucher for a new bag.  So I went to the Emporium on Main Street, USA and, while everyone else was watching Wishes, I found myself a new bag.

 

On Friday I went over to Animal Kingdom with my roommate Deanna and we started with Lion King, which was amazing.  Then we headed over and climbed onto Dinosaur. Which, of course, broke down. And it didn’t just break down, it broke down first right under the Pterodactyl and then, AND THEN! We got to the spot where the giant T-Rex was coming out of the surrounding greenery to scare us silly and everything went pitch black.  We could still hear him, which made it all the worse.  Eventually, the lights came back on, but we were sitting in a dip, so we only had one light and it kept flickering.  Eventually one of the cast members got on the mic and told everyone that someone would be along to get us out, but until then to sit tight. You can guess that I was NOT happy about that. We were sitting right next to an angry, hungry dinosaur, after all. I did not want him to come out and eat me!!

 

Work is..phenomenal, fantasmical (my new made up word), amazing, frustrating, and splendiforous all at the same time. Everyday is a new adventure, I never know if I’m going to work at Oscar’s, the Sorcerer’s Hat, or in one of the stores.  I’ve got at least three costume checked out at all times.  By the way, we have a building called Costuming for all of us cast members, not just the princesses and stuff. That’s where we can switch out our old, sweaty costumes for fresh, clean ones or pick up a spare costume. Or, on the odd occasion, pick up a costume for another location if we get deployed or pick up extra hours or any number of things.

 

I’ve checked out Cast Connection, which is our version of Goodwill.  Anything that’s not sellable to the guest ends up there, along with all sorts of other stuff that we get to buy for tons less money. I managed to pick up a hat, two key chains, and a coloring book for about $12 there. Pretty awesome stuff.

 

ALSO!  Halloween has started here in Disney World.  On alternating nights, Magic Kingdom goes full Halloween mode rather than the typical night.  Which means on the nights of Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party, the park closes at 7pm for regular guests. If you don’t have the super special secret ticket, you need to leave.  Luckily, I work at Hollywood Studios, so I don’t have to worry about all that nonsense! Woohoo!

 

Okay, I gotta go to bed. You see, Mike and Cindy, Bob’s brother and sister-in-law, showed up this week. They paid me a visit at the Sorcerer’s Hat on Monday, met up with me for Wishes just yesterday evening and invited me to stay at their condo for two days.  Today we lazed about, and I caught up on my rest/HW. Tomorrow? Tomorrow we got to Universal’s Islands of Adventure and I get to go to HOGWARTS!!!!

 

Oh yes, and I got my new camera in the mail today, so pictures galore!

Work work work!

August 29th, 2011

I am such a busy, busy bee!

I trained all of last week and spent a good portion of last week, when not working, in the parks as a guest. So far I’ve spent the most time in my park (Hollywood Studios) and in the main park (Magic Kingdom). I spent about a half an hours in Epcot on Wednesday of last week and it was pretty epic.

I got two days off, Friday and Saturday last week and I spent them lazing around either at my apartment or across the hall in the boys’ apartment. On Saturday, I went to diner at Buffalo Wild Wings with the boys and then three of us went and saw 30 Minutes or Less, which is set in my hometown of Grand Rapids, Michigan and even has some scenes in the city. Which made me homesick again.

I started back to work yesterday without a trainer, which was frightening at first. But everyone’s very helpful and nice and everyone asks questions all the time, so I’m feeling a little more confident. Tonight, I start work at 6:30pm and I won’t be getting out until about 3am. Which means I probably won’t be home until 3:30am or 4am.

Tomorrow I have to be at work at 2:30pm, so I’ve not got a lot of time to cram in sleep/food/etc. Tomorrow night, I’m gonna get online and work on some homework, woohoo!

Okay, off to go finish getting ready for work!

First Time Disney

August 21st, 2011

So, it’s been several days and a lot  has happened in that time.  Let’s see, I got off my plane just fine, had somebody waiting for me in the airport and found my way to my shuttle and then to my hotel just fine.  I spent my first night down here in Florida at Downtown Disney with others who were checking in on the same day. I met some fantastic people and had a lot of fun. I also had a little bit of alcohol that night (although I haven’t had any ever since).  I didn’t really want to go back to my lonely hotel room after hanging out with others all evening, but eventually I did need to go back so I could sleep and prepare for the next morning.  It took me a while to fall asleep, I can promise you that.

 

The next morning, I got up bright and early, packed up whatever I had pulled out of my suitcases and caught a taxi to check-in at Vista Way.  Of course there was a little drama when I realized I’d left my phone in the backseat of the taxi.  Luckily, the driver was kind enough to both notice and bring it back for me.  Check-in was a long, hot process, but I made it through and I got my housing ID!!!  After all the check-in stuff was finished, my fellow Michigander Mandy and I headed over to wait for a bus to go to casting.  Of course there was somebody propelling people to get on a luggage bus over to Chatham, so we followed orders.  And, I can promise you that it was very, very painful and very exhausting lugging three giant suitcases all the way up to the third floor.  A third roommate (we got a three bedroom, so there are six of us altogether) was already there when we arrived.  All we had time to do was get our bags up there in a room and leave again.  We rushed back down to the bus stop and waited with everyone else to catch the bus.

 

At Casting, another very long process, we got all the legal stuff done and out of the way.  Everyone got their work assignments too, which was super exciting!!!  Finally, we got to go home and meet the other roomies.  A bunch of us took off on Wednesday in the only car we have between the six of of us and bought groceries.  Then we all came home and unpacked the food and our luggage.  The next day, a large chunk of us had to get up and go to the Housing Welcome.  That was a little more frustrating because we got there and waited, Mandy and I, yet we and a good chunk of other people got turned away.  So, we caught a bus, mistakenly thinking it would drop us at Chatham.  Oh no, instead we went on a long bus ride and got to see the back of Epcot, which was still really awesome!  We got back, got home, thought about it and decided to just go to the 1pm housing welcome thing.  So, we met up with another roommate, Elena to go (the other three got into the 10am one).

 

Mandy’s Traditions got pushed back to an afternoon time so the rest of us all got up at 6-something in the AM and got ready for work, eating food and all that.  We made the trek over to the bus stop they wanted us to meet at and I had another little drama in the parking lot. I’d forgotten both my driver’s liscense and my housing ID.  I ran back upstairs and could only find my driver’s liscense, I let it go because I thought it would be okay, but then I found out that I needed my housing id to get onto the bus.  So I called up my roommate and begged her to run it to me.  She, being the best roommate in the world, slipped on some shoes, grabbed her keys and my id and ran it out to the fence.  I still owe her chocolate for that.

 

Traditions was long and…totally not boring!  Well, it sort of was.  Early in the morning, getting told more reasons why I’ll get termed is not my idea of exciting.  But we did get a really really exciting visitor!!!  MICKEY MOUSE!!! He came to see us and gave us our name tag pins.  It was super fantastic, because we’d sat there watching videos and then gotten dragged around the Magic Kingdom for a bit in all our finery.  So, we loved him.  We couldn’t keep him though, he had to go deliver other boxes, but we had him for a nice time.  The Traditions Trainers were handing out little plastic toys for answering questions, participating, and such. I think there were five different toys in total and I got four in this order: Pluto, Donald, Goofy and Minnie. The only one I did not get was Micky, which I was super bummed about!

 

Traditions ended, we all went home where my roommates and I sat around eating food and relaxing a bit.  I took off within two hours of the end of Traditions and headed out to the parks with a friend from Patterson, another apartment complex.  Amanda and I headed for the Magic Kingdom first, which was somehow so much more magical as guests than as workers.  We did all sorts of things like Space Mountain, Peter Pan, Stitch’s Great Escape, Monster’s In. Laugh Floor, and got a good dinner.  Then we went over to Hollywood Studios (where I’ll be working) and hit The Tower of Terror (ooooooohh) and Aerosmith’s Rockin’ Roller Coaster. Finally, we went to Fantasmic to end the night and it was AMAZING!!!!

 

Just yesterday I had my Orientation for work, so I got all dressed up in my business finery and headed over to Hollywood Studios.  I met up with two trainers along with a group of others and after some preliminary information, they split us into two groups and walked us around HollyWood Studios, pointing out various things on the way.  Lemme tell you, when you’re wearing your best business professional clothing (and shoes) and you’ve already got blisters on your heels from Traditions the day before, it’s extra super painful to do something similar.  Still, we got a nice little lunch break after about two hours and then headed back to watch some more videos about specifically Hollywood Studios.  Finally, finally, our Coordinators came and we got divided up into separate groups by what we were doing (Merchandise, Attractions, etc).  My much smaller Merchandise group got dragged all the way back to the front of our backstage area to the casting building.

 

Which is where I got my costume, or at least  the skirt part, they’ll have the shirt today when I go in.  I had to get three of each the skirt and the shirt.  We got our schedules, got reminded of the four keys for the millionth time (not that that’s a bad thing, it’s a really good thing!) and sent on our way.  I went barefoot almost the whole way home.  I got home, went shopping for the third time (I went on the day of the Housing Welcome as well) and picked up a bunch of stuff to try to protect my feet.  Got home, put on some tennis shoes and headed back out to the parks. I started at Hollywood Studios in order to hit The Great Movie Ride and then I headed over to the Magic Kingdom in order to hit the Haunted Mansion and Pirates.  Well, I got to the Mansion all right and Pirates was closed and Space Mountain would have taken more time than I wanted to spend, so Mandy and I went up and watched the show for Magic Kingdom before heading home.   We left the park at 10pm and didn’t get home until 11:23pm.  Not even kidding you.

 

 

I got up at 6:30am this morning and put on two layers of socks in an attempt to stretch out my black leather shoes as I have to wear them with my high-end merchandise costume.  I’ve got a rather pathetic plan, though.  I’ll put the padding on my toes and heels, double later the hidden socks meant for flats and put these gel strips on the back of the heel, in order to attempt to protect myself.  Well, I gotta go finish getting ready for work, eating and all that.  Talk to you all later!!!

Powered by WordPress. Theme by Sash Lewis.