Update!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!

Thursday June 29 2006

Ok so my shift on The Land Cart wasn't bad at all. There was a small change in the plans when I got to work leaving me opening the Nut cart that I had closed the previous night. We wern't there for much more than maybe 30 minutes before we were able to go to the Land Cart. When we got there we found out that there was 2 girls there who had another 2 hours of work remaining, so we went off to do some paperwork. At this point a guest asked me what was going on at the Rock-N-Rollercoaster, but being as it was in a different park I had no clue just what was going on. (Fox News story). Anyway when we were done the paperwork we got to have our lunch break. The rest of the shift was spent on the land cart. I enjoyed this cart becuase there wasn't a lot of food for sale. For food we had regular Lays potato chips, Nacho Cheese Doritos, and pretzels (with optional cheese dip). There was a lot of beverages though, we sold draft beer (Michalob), fountain pop, cappichinos/hot chocolate, bottled water and slurpies (blue raspberry, and raspberry lemonaid). Apparently the slurpie machines cause the most heat but it really wasn't all that bad. Anyway as always the shift went by quickly, yet the closing down/cleaning/counting stock took hours so I left late at midnight. I didn't mind so much because I got OT pay for it. There's not a lot to report about it otherwise, and I don't remember a whole lot more to be honest, except before the fireworks the three of us that were in training were doing the wave and we were trying to get the guests to wave and be dorks as well.


Friday June 30.

Today was a long long day, yet at the same time oh so fun! After my late night at work I had an early early morning. I had arranged to meet Shanan (from the Haunted Mansion) to go to the Animal Kingdom. When I met Shanan on the bus she had a friend with her as well who also worked in the Haunted Mansion. I believe his name was Migual and he was from Peurto Rico. Anyway it was the first time I had ever visted the park so we planned on getting there shortly after park opening meaning about an 8:30 bus for each of us. When we got there we decided to head for Expedition Everest and get a fast pass so we wouldn't have a huge line when we were ready to ride the ride. Once we had our fast passes in hand, we went to the Killimonjaro Safari, where we saw many animals from Elephants, to Giraffes, Lions, and hippos. We then went on a little walking tour thing where we saw a few more animals, Turtles, fish, Meerkats, and Gorillas. After we saw all of those animals we headed over to ride Expedition Everest. It was good but for some reason I expected a lot more. It was a little shorter than I expected and wasn't as intense (not to say that it wasn't intense) as I expected. From there we headed to the Dinoland area of the park and ate lunch at Restaurantasauras where my roomate Jared works. We didn't see him there however so we enjoyed our McDonalds (yes he came down here and got placed at what is basically a McDonalds), and headed over to a ride called Dinosaur. It was VERY similar to the Indiana Jones ride in Anaheim just with a different theme. The vehicle was basically the same and so was the ride mechanics. At this point we had done pretty much everything that we wanted to do in the park and it was barely the afternoon (maybe 1 or 2 oclock). We went to check the Kalai River Rapids but it had almost an hour line so we passed on it.

We decided to go to the Magic Kingdom, and to get there we figured we'd take a bus to the Grand Floradian and then take the monorail to the Magic Kingdom. While leaving the park I saw my first characters out in the park since I arrived, Baloo and King Louie from The Jungle Book. Once we left the park I spied some vending machines and paid my 2.50 for a Poweraid, heard the bottle drop in the machine but it never materialised. Miguel wanted a drink as well so he also tried to buy a poweraid in the hopes that we'd both end up getting our drinks. As you can probably guess neither of us got our drinks and in total we lost $5.00.

The Grand Floradian is Disney's flagship Florida hotel and I must say it is very posh/nice. We didn't spend a lot of time in it, but we walked in the lobby doors (you can see them in the top right of this picture) across the main room you see here, up some stairs and out to the Monorail (the station was above the main entrance). There was a Disney wedding going on that day as the coach was outside the hotel and the bride was getting her pictures taken to the left of this picture on the grand floor. We didn't have to wait long for the Monorail and we were off to the Magic Kingdom.

When we entered the Magic Kingdom I saw more characters! Donald Duck was by the flagpole and Chip and Dale were somewhat hidden off to the side. We then headed down mainstreet and into Adventure land. Our first stop was Pirates of the Carribean where we wanted to see if there was going to be a cast member preview or a soft opening (the ride is open but don't be mad if it's down for maintence if you want to ride it). Turns out neither was on the schedule except for a few CM previews on this upcoming Thurday (the day before the ride is set to re-open). We then headed off to get Fast Passes for Splash Mountain. Once we had those passes we went to see Mickey's Philharmagic where we got center row seats which made the show just that much better.

When the show was over Shanan had to temporarly leave to go to Vista Federal Credit Union to do some kind of banking. Me and Miguel did a little more exploring. I hadn't been to Toontown yet so we went there to do a little looking around, which didn't last long as Toon Town is small. On the way out we passed a pin cart and by browsing it I found a pin of Grumpy playing hockey and figureing I wouldn't find another hockey pin made sure to pick it up.

We then progressed onto Tomorrowland where we planned on riding Tomorrowland Transit Authority (Originally named The Peoplemover). Before we could get there though I saw one of the characters on my short list of characters to track down for Emily or Alisa (My cousions kids), Buzz Lightyear. So I grabbed a few pics of him and we headed onto the People Mover. After the ride we were surprised that Shanan hadn't arrived yet and began to head back towards Adventureland. While we were passing Cinderella Castle we noticed that Cinderellabration was starting (a show imported from Japan) so we paused to watch it as neither of us had actually seen it before. I maneged to get pictures of 5 princesses and their princes for Alisa thanks to this show! When it was over we continued on our way to Adventureland and I think I got a text message or something because we paused to sit on a bench. While I was typing my reply Shanan called and she was finally back in the park, I told her where we were and before I was done typing my text message reply she had rejoined our group.

We progressed back into Adventure land and went to Aladdin's Magic Carpets (which I've never been on). It's not a thrill ride by any stretch of the imagination but it was only a 10 minute wait. While we were standing in line someone Miguel knew went up to him and very quietly mentioned that there was currently a CM preview going on Pirates of the Carribbean. So we quite quickly left the short line for the carpets and made a beeline for PotC. When we got there we were told to head backstage where they would let us into the ride. I'm not going to say much about it since taking pictures was a terminatable offence (thus I have none), but the changes were nice. After the ride I was in a pirates mood so I ended up buying some PotC merch (including a pin showcasing one of the new parts of the ride to commemorate my CM preview). It was then time for our Splash Mountain fastpass so we went on that ride.

At this time it was getting close to the time Shanan would have to leave us to begin working in the Haunted Mansion and I had a need to ride that ride so we headed off to the Mansion. When we got there Shanan had to leave us because the wait was too long so me and Miguel went on the ride anyway. Thus I had managed to ride my 3 favorite Magic Kingdom rides in one day, even though one of them is currently under refirbishment! When we left the mansion Miguel showed me a ring embedded in the cement at the exit of the ride. This ring is apparently the ring of The Bride (a ghost in the ride). He also showed me where Mr. Toad's grave was (Mr. Toad's Wild Ride shut down in Florida to make room for a Winnie the Pooh ride thus he was immortialied in the graveyard at the HM).

Since we were pretty much done in the park at that point me and Miguel went on the Jungle Cruise (another ride I like and havn't had a chance to ride since I got here). When we were leaving Jei invited me over to her place to watch a movie (boondock saints) so I took the bus to the Commons instead of Chatham for the movie. It wasn't bad but I found it hard to follow (mostly because Mattieu and Amanda were talking at the start when the story was being established), but from what I understood it wasn't a bad show. I then headed off for Chatham where my roomate Watkins was quite depressed about his job and had allready booked a flight home...

Saturday July 1.

Well Canada day for me was somewhat uneventful. I slept in, went to Wal Mart (needed laundry soap, since I hadn't bought any yet and had hit dire times to do laundry), and did a few loads of laundry. About 3:30 I went to Epcot to see Jei who was working in the Canada pavilion for Canada Day (11-5 was the Canada day celebrations). Christine tagged along and while we were on the bus Jei called to tell us it was raining, and her popcorn cart had closed down and she was off to get a new (dry) costume. It just happened to work out that she was entering the cast services building to get her new costume as me and Christine were passing through it. Anyway to kill a bit of time and to let Jei get back to Canada me and Christine went to Mouse Gears (as far as I know it's the big merch shop in Epcot). Before we knew it, it was 4:45 so we headed off to Canada. The celebrations consisted of me getting some Candy (that was labeled product of Mexico), a bracelet (which might have been Native American/Canadian but looked like it could have come from Mexico as well) and some stickers that looked like they could have been Hot Wheels stickers (ie nothing to do with Canada).

Jei also showed me some Canada maps that they were handing out to people. Accoriding to these maps, P.E.I. dosn't exist, Halifax is spelt Halilfax, and theres Manotoba, and to really drive it home, Toronto is apparently our nations capital... In other words not much thought went into the celebrations. There was a lot of Canada flags everywhere and each provincal flag was setup. Those were probably the most positive parts of the celebration.

Well at 5 Jei was off work but she forgot to bring a change of clothes with her to Epcot, so instead of hanging around the park, we had to head back to The Commons so she could change out of her costume. This worked out well since Christine also needed to head back to Chatham to meet up with Jarad who was getting off work at 6. Me and Jei got off at the commons and she changed out of her costume and sat on her computer for a bit while I flipped between T2 Judgement Day and Blue Streak (which were both on TV, and were both brutally edited). We were mainly sitting around waiting for Christine and Jared to be ready to go back to the park. After about 2 hours we got the message from Christine that they'd be ready soon so me and Jei walked back to the commons only to watch the two of them run off to see a girl from Quebec who's apprently quitting. Me and Jei were a little frustrated but went to Epcot anyway so that we could be there in time for the fireworks (whats Canada day without fireworks).

Jei's roomate Amanda was working the popcorn cart when we arrived, and Jei asked if we could stand along the fence behind the cart. There's one person who's in a bit of authority there who came over to tell us we were ok this once, but it's for guests first cast members second. A minute or two later he came back and told the two of us to go through a small cast member section of the fence that took us behind a section of rocks but gave us a great view of the lagoon and thus the fireworks. We were also right underneith a speaker so we could hear all of the music clearly. It was a great view, but Matt Chan (who was behind us by the popcorn cart) started text messanging me trying to find us (which was impossable you couldn't see our spot from where he was). So I missed a bit of the fireworks while that was going on. We met up afterwards and went back to Mouse Gears where we guessed prices of various random items in the store for a bit. Matt and his roomate went home and me and Jei were thinking about going to Downtown Disney for some food. We jumped on the Monorail to go to the Magic Kingdom (so we could take a bus to DTD). But once we got to the MK we decided to just call it a night.

Sunday July 2
Happy Birthday mom! Today I had work from 11:00-7:30 on what I thought was a support shift (stocking carts or covering breaks). When I arrived I went to ODF Base to double check that and found out I was working an Ice Cream cart in Future World, meaning I had to go get a new costume. This one was so similar to my old one all I needed to do was get a new shirt and hat. Rather than the red shirt and white hat of my previous costime, my Future World shirt and hat were purple in colour with many random colours on them. But they're not as bad as I just made them sound (when I get my 3rd costume I'll take pics of all 3 of them). Anyway I was on my own on this cart all day, so it took me about an hour to get everything together, loaded up and pushed out to my loaction and then setup at my loaction (so about an hour before I was ready to start taking money from the guests). I then worked from about noon to 4:20 before someone came to cover me for an hour break. It also rained pretty solidly from about 3:00 until I went on my break. Honestly the rain was the worst part of my shift.

Because of the rain I had to make sure my money and touch screen PDA cash register thing were covered at all times. They were the most important items and since it was so tricky to keep them covered while I was using them. Oh well other than my troubles with keeping things dry my day alone on the cart was fun. I served 6 types of ice cream (sandwhiches and popscyle styles), bottled water, chips doritos and Cheetos. A pretty easy enough cart. Although after that long day at work my back is sore and I am pretty tired. Wattkins came home with good news he found a loophole and is transfering his job to Pleaseure Island thus he isn't leaving. Oh and did I mention HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM?