So this last week was fun! I worked more! Went bowling with new people I met, one of them who works at Innoventions with me and the other a safari driver at Kilamanjaro Safaris, and went to Universal!

I had Monday and Wednesday off this week, which was nice.  Monday I was busy! I went to Hollywood Studios where there wasn’t too many people.  And a cast member was really unnecessarily nice to me.  I was in the fastpass distribution line for Rock’n Rollercoaster and this lady was in front of me and she must have been getting fastpasses for everyone in her family reunion party because I was behind her for like 3 minutes before I sort of did something.  I held my cast member ID, which you also use to get your fastpass, at an angle so the cast member at the fastpass distribution would see it and maybe, if he was nice, do something about it.  And he did! He gave a one that was good for up to three people! So I thanked him and went and got one for Tower of Terror.

But I really didn’t need to use it for TOT because the stand-by lines there were only “13” minutes long.  I rode it about 5 times in the course of the day, so much so that I was actually sick of it.  But the neat part was that I think I experienced all 4 or 5 different sequences they run.  I think my favorite is the one that actually pushes you up before they drop you, since it is so unexpected!

Then I rode Rock’N Rollercoaster (RNR) single rider twice, and had enough of that.  It is no longer exciting for me.  :(  But I heard that they regularly have cast member night where they leave the lights on so that might be cool to do. I also got a “real” fastpass for RNR but it was for 5:30 and I was pretty much done with the park by 4:00 so I didn’t want to wait and waste my time. 

I also rode the Great Movie Ride once more and  somehow ended up in the middle of a large family that had met down here, and when it came time to tell the person how many in the party, the guy said 13 instead of the 12.  It was really cute how they “adopted” me for the ride! But I was more excited that I got to be in the front set of cars, since one part was different than when I rode in the back set of cars.  If anyone gets a chance, ride both, if not ride in the back set of the cars, as that experience is better.

After The Studios, I went to Magic Kingdom, and did all the “boring things” that nobody who is usually with me would want to do like the Hall of Presidents and The Country Bear Jamboree.  At the Hall of Presidents, the film they were using was wearing out so a part of it had a line running through it, like what you see at the dollar movies. But the audio animatronic presidents were really cool…until they started introducing EACH ONE by name…and then the Bush Jr. one gave a 2 minute speech about something, probably defeating the terrorists or something, I really wasn’t paying attention.

And then I watched Spectromagic, the newer electric light parade, and did the Country Bear Jamboree, which really was not anything special.  And as I was getting ready to watch the Fireworks, Daniele called and asked if I wanted to go to Downtown Disney and so I nixed watching the fireworks to beat the crowds rushing out of the park to the monorail, and picked Daniele up and went to Downtown Disney to do some shopping before my larger “holiday” discount expires on February 13.  I unfortunately didn’t get to make another rice crispy treat, but did get SOME shopping done!

Tuesday, I was supposed to go to Epcot with Denise, an Innovention co-worker and her kid to show them around, and play in the parks (of course!), but she didn’t call.  Her loss…so I called Daniele up and we went to Universal Studios (US), where I got a season pass for 12  months to both US and Islands of Adventure (IOA) for $99, the Florida discounted price of $130-$30 for having a coke product (even though I neither had a Florida driver’s license, or a coke product! The lady at the booth was just feeling really nice!)  One thing, both Daniele and I noticed was that the workers were not really nice! But the pretty decently sized pizza I bought for $8 was pretty good.  And next time, when the park is open longer, I and Daniele are thinking of doing the meal deal, where for $20 a day, you can eat all you want, all day! Quite a deal, especially at a theme park!

And Christopher Walken is an integral part of Disaster! That was probably the highlight of the day! And MIB was fun, as was dueling dragons and Jurassic Park river adventure, and The Mummy was quite the ride! It is definitely unique!  I will give Universal Kudos for that.  And Shrek 4D was also fun!

So today, I worked 9 hours and 15 minutes.  At least I get paid time and a half for overtime.  And for firework duty tonight, we were working a religious convention that rented out the whole patio in the front of the lagoon. And lucky us, the wind was blowing toward us so the Firework smoke ended up burning my eyes during the show! That was no fun! But it was easy, and I got to talk to some people, which made the time go by a lot faster.  Now I’m tired and want to go to sleep but I have to finish watching Mr. and Mrs. Smith on FX…such a good movie! Even when it is edited! :)

I think I am getting too busy to write these! But I will push myself to do them so I’ll have memories of my trip down here! So yesterday, at work, we had two groups of executives come through the house of innoventions.  One was taken by another worker, but then the next group came through when I was up! Thankfully I didn’t screw up there part of the spiel!  AND my coordinators (Rita and Diane) gave me a fanatic card for “going above and beyond at HOI (House of Innoventions) when he was one of 2 presenters available—and was pleasant about it.” And about three different people told me that it would go on my record!  I guess it is quite the accomplishment?

Today, it was a rare day when Daniele, Krystyna and I all had the day off, so we decided to go to Typhoon Lagoon before our free entry to the waterpark stopped on February 13^th!  :(
It was lots of fun, the theme and execution was brilliant (it was about an typhoon that hit an area) and all the rides were pretty much built into the big structure at the front of the wave pool, so no huge slides really stood out.  Unfortunately there were only a few really fun slides. 

One of them, was the Crush N Gusher, a watercoaster that pushed back up a hill; that was not just awesome, but WICKED awesome. It really made you think you were going to fly off the tube if you did not hold on! Thankfully the lines were short so we pretty much just rode again and again.  And I swam with Sharks and fish and stingrays in the “coral reef” but I had a hard time breathing through my snorkel since salt water kept coming into my mouth.  Even with the saltwater in my mouth, the experience was still really neat!  And I had never seen anything like that wave pool! Every 90 seconds, a GIGANTIC wave would come out of nowhere and just push you toward shore! I hope I got a good picture of that wave behind my with the waterproof disposable camera I bought for today.  If it turned out, it should be really cool. 

So we did everything by three and went to Bennigan’s since the girls didn’t have that in New York, where they’re from.  I got a very yummy bacon cheeseburger brushed with their AWESOME Guinness sauce, AND when I got the bill, it was discounted to $4.99 because it was “burger Wednesday”! What a nice surprise!

So we got home, showered changed, then went out to Epcot and I FINALLY got to see Honey I shrunk the Audience! I have been wanting to see it again for about 3 weeks now! And every time we go to play in Epcot it is closed, along with some of FutureWorld, at 7pm. It was pretty crazy and the whole audience was laughing and screaming the whole time. It was great fun (minus the crappy pre-show/advertisement for Kodak!). And then we did Mission: Space on the green “less intense” version and I was still impressed with it.  It is still pretty fun, but not AS fun as the “original” “more intense” version.  And then we played Mission: Space Race, which is actually run by Innoventions. And Krystyna and I had a blast on that! That was a lot of fun.

After Mission: Space Race it was time for Illuminations, and we were able to sit in the very front of the showcase plaza and see the fireworks.  I think I prefer my spot by the speakers when I’m doing crowd control for them.  But as a guest, I wouldn’t recommend it unless you have the front row, or are sitting on the raised edge at the back.  And Brett, one of the managers actually recognized me in plain clothes. 

Now I’m tired and ready for bed. Krystyna and I are going out to Magic Kingdom tomorrow.  AND my new roommate, Justin, had 8 fastpasses that expired TOMORROW (1/31/08) and he let me have them.  Awesomeness!

So today, I went to work for 6 hours and 15 minutes, from 1:00-7:15 and ran a number of tours through the house of innoventions.  It is now getting easier, but I still keep on dreading doing the tours and prefer smaller tours.  One of the tours had this kid with an annoying talking Mickey and he kept pressing it and Mickey kept talking and distracting me! It was really annoying! But I survived!

And then I came home had dinner (my last Arby’s sandwich) and then headed out to Downtown Disney to do some shopping before my 40% discount expires!  :(

There I bought some pins, so I could actually start collecting SOME(!!!), bought a present for myself (a Jack the Pumpkin King mug that would scare mom) , and this awesome marshmallow treat from Goofy’s Candy Shop. This thing was a Mickey Rice Krispy Treat dipped in white chocolate then covered in butterfinger pieces, crushed Oreo cookie crumbs, crushed Reese’s Peanut Butter cups, and then drizzled with milk chocolate and caramel. At the end, it was just a huge layer of chocolate pieces and all types of candy.  I included a picture so that I can remember it forever!

And I just want to add that time flies when you are having fun (like pin hunting and shopping!) I almost spent all the money I made today at work.  :p

And I found out that our cast member discount at DisneyQuest cuts the cost down to $19.75 from $37. And we get 30% off for Cirque du Soleil BUT we have to buy the tickets that day starting at 11 AM. I’m excited because those are both on my to-do list!

So I checked out of training, meaning I passed, by doing a spiel in front of real people.  The group was actually really distracting and I think my trainer, Peg, passed me out of pity, since I just kept going through the show.  There was only like 8 people, but those 2 families were distracting as nothing else was.  The young girl was swinging on the ropes, even after I warned her not too, and when the rope broke, the dad was like “see what happens when you don’t listen to authority!” and just various stuff like that throughout the whole show. That was Wednesday and I have been working since then.  My next two day break is Wednesday and Thursday, meaning I get to work for 7 days straight! That is what happens when you work for Disney.

So I have done about 7 tours so far, from groups ranging from 5-25 people in each, and I AM getting better.  It is exciting, but when you screw up, you are just like “uhh” and people are looking at you and waiting to go on.  I have a feeling most people can tell that I am still pretty new at this and are like “good job” at the end, or I am just being critical of myself.  I had one kid about 6 actually ask me “who can afford all this stuff.” I made up something about prices dropping fast enough to be able to afford some of it soon. 

So I went to church yesterday, I think it was pretty good.  But what was interesting is that it was ONLY a church sanctuary.  And everything else was in portables “modular buildings” next to it.  I had never seen that approach to building a new church before.  I also found the Target and Taco Bells (yum…I’m ready for my 4^th meal!)  and went to Panda Express (double yum when it comes to their orange chicken!)

Then I went to Disney’s Hollywood Studios (formerly Disney-MGM Studios) to go merchandise shopping and ended up going on Tower of Terror twice, MuppetVision, the Great Movie Ride (which is definitely a must see!), and various other things.  And I didn’t mind that I was alone since I was learning my House of Innoventions Spiel (“Spiel” is the official name for it, as apparently it is not a “script”) in line, when I did not utilize FastPass (one of the world’s GREATEST inventions!).

And on my way out, I saw the FUNNIEST show at Disney! On Sunset Boulevard, there is a ragtag group of comedians that all they do is tell jokes and act all crazy.  And these are the really terrible jokes that make you laugh really hard! It was so good, that even though the temperature was in the forties, their jokes made you forget about the weather!

 This morning, Krystyna and I went to the Studios again, got our FastPass to Rock’n RollerCoaster, then stood in line for it. We weren’t there early enough for the rope drop, but it was good enough to only have to wait 20 minutes in the standby line.  Then we did Star Tours, Muppets 3D 4D (yes, I did also see it yesterday, you can never have too much of the muppets!) the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, Star Tours, Sounds Dangerous, Rock’n Rollercoaster (using our FastPasses) and then the Lights! Motors! Action! Extreme Stunt Show before we had to leave around 2, so Krystena could make it to Magic Kingdom (MK) by 4.  I had forgotten how much fun Indiana Jones was, and even though the car stunt show was REALLY loud, it was really cool! I wonder how many sets of tires those cars go through a month! There was rubber all over the stage when they were done!

And I came home, took a nap, worked on my spiel, wrote this out, and hopefully I will be going to Wal-Mart with my roommates (when they eventually come back!) so I can get some food!  (Not for tonight, as I really am craving Taco Bell tonight!)

Disney Fact:

The asteroids on Space Mountain look like Chocolate Chip Cookies! Supposedly the imagineers just scanned in chocolate chip cookies, instead of creating their own.

Today was the second day of training for House of Innoventions (HOI) and it was pretty much memorizing! I took a really nice nap during my lunch and that helped me stay alert for the rest of the afternoon.  And the Chex Mix and Milky way (provided by our Trainer, Amber, and co-trainee, Denise, respectively) helped too.  We made it through page 4 of the script, up to the “Liftmatic Oven by Siemens.”  Then in the evening we wanted to go “The Studios”(really called “Disney Hollywood Studios”, formerly Disney-MGM Studios) to see Fantasmic, but they closed at 7, and we (my usual posse) left our apartments at about 6:20.  We wanted to do Fantastic Plastics and Segway Central at Innoventions, but they cut off the line early and we did the HOI.  At least Daniele had a blast going through it.  Then we did Turtle Talk with Crush, Soarin’, Spaceship Earth (which I video’d with my phone, I hope it turned out), and then headed back home.  At Soarin’ it was a walk-on, but we asked the girl if she would turn on the interactive video game/screens in line, so we could play, and we had a fun time playing in the queue line.  The girl said that was a first for her.  :)

Overall, a good day, and I should go do the elliptical and learn some more lines.  (Exercising helps increase the blood flow to the brain, which helps with better memory!) And tomorrow since I get off early (I get off at 4:15), Daniele and I are going to the parks to see Krystyna and make fun of her and her lapbar closing motion that she gets to repeat a million times! Hehe!

So the roommate did not show up today, which is nice.  I went to the front desk to pick up housewares that we were missing when we moved in, and hadn’t gotten, and asked the guy about the roommate: he said he was coming from Commons, and that he had 48 to complete his move.  Acting on that, Krystyna and I went to Animal Kingdom, which “is a jungle, not a zoo.”  I beg to disagree but it was the coolest zoo/jungle I’d been.  I took a bazillion pictures on the Kilimanjaro Safaris (alligators, giraffes, and hippos, oh my!). Then we did Everest, twice, with fastpasses, did the spinning wild mouse coaster, saw Finding Nemo the Musical and the Festival of the Lion King, and rode Dinosaur (formerly Countdown to Extinction) twice!  Everest was fun, riding in the very back AND the very front, and when riding in the front, you can see the structure of the mountain, and how the track changes (very cool and unexpected). The wild mouse coaster was “eh,” if not rough, the both shows were GREAT, with the Nemo show being really well produced, but a few of the songs could use tweaking.  Dinosaur had me really scared my very first time, and the second time was a little bit pleasant, with some fear thrown in.  The second time, we were with a family with two little boys (one was about 5) and he kept his head down the whole time, and both mom and dad came off the ride with the little kids’s face make-up on their sleeves, because the kids were so afraid!  And we did all of this in basically 5 hours!

Then from there we went to Epcot, to finally see what I was going to be presenting in innoventions! It is nice when you don’t have to pay for parking since you can park hop with your car all you want! So we saw the House of innoventions, then did Test Track, Ellen’s Universe of Energy (which was as slow as I remember, but was still funny with Ellen) then headed to the world showcase, did the Three Cabellero Gran Fiesta boat tour in Mexico (which seemed to me the same thing as it’s a small world, except with a different theme), the Maelstrom in Norway (with the same smell and twirling white light I remember from years ago) and then walked around through the rest of the countries.  We wanted to eat in one of the countries, but our 20% discount did not go far enough for it to be affordable!  Then we went to Spaceship Earth, where we discovered the great new ending! Krystyna and I could not stop laughing! Since Krystyna had not seen Illuminations, we HAD to stay for that :p and then

Disney Trivia:
In the Winnie the Pooh ride, you can See Mr. Toad handing over the deed to Pooh, as the ride building used to house Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.

Woke up, went to company connection, found sunglasses for 25 cents, Christmas tree ornaments for $1 a piece, 2 camera cases, and 2 pretty good umbrellas.  Then went to play grocery bingo to, as the name suggests, win a bag or two of groceries.  So I get there at 11:15, and we play until 1, and it seems that about one third of the people there (total of about 50) get groceries, and it just seems like I had a crappy card! MAYBE next time, if I have another 2 hours to waste.  So I had scheduled to go to Wal-Mart and get groceries and stuff after bingo, in the chance that I would not have to buy some things, but I thought, “hey, the parks close at 8 or 9, let me go after that!”  So I found Krystyna (from two floors above me, also a big Disney fan and full of trivia too!) and we went to Magic Kingdom.  We did a ton of stuff, like the Astro Orbitor, for my very first time, space mountain twice (both with fastpasses, which are really a godsend, when you have them!), Philharmagic, which was VERY cool(!), Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin twice, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (again, with the help of a fastpass), Pirates of the Caribbean, and the Jungle Cruise (where our skipper was very funny). The skipper/driver had actually lived in Plano in the 70s, and currently had investment property up in Allen, which she herself said “was a smart move) and she had retired from Arthur Anderson, moved to Florida, and worked part time at Disney on the Jungle Cruise.  And since I hadn’t been in the parks for my Birthday, I got my “It’s my Birthday” button from the Magic Kingdom Town Hall, and got wished a happy birthday from CMs (Cast Members).  Oh, and this time, I saw Wishes without the interruption of rain, but just in case (and also to make it out of the park to the monorails before most people) we were under a covering at the train pavilion just inside the entrance of the park. 

After I dropped Krystyna off, I went to Wal-Mart and then Chili’s (to get a Chicken Caesar Pita to go) to use my gift card I had stolen from home.  And I was still wearing my birthday pin, and when the server saw that, he brought out a free bowl of ice cream, which I had there, at the bar, waiting for my food to be done.  It was very nice of him, but I felt a little awkward not being able to share any of the ice cream with anyone, and having random people at the bar singing happy birthday to me!

I’m pretty much done for the night, and going to sleep, but first I have to clean up everywhere (I am mostly tidying though), since our new roommate is coming tomorrow, and we (at least Tank and I) are curious to see what kind of person he will be!  Mikey probably doesn’t care, since usually when he at home, he is sleeping anyway!

Today was more general training about innoventions called M.E.R.G.E. and then crowd control training dealing with illuminations, woohoo!  So starting at 12:45 all five of us innoventioners were all dressed in our “costumes” and ready to go.  On top of learning how to make someone’s day magical, we got a better look at the tunnels, which I think are pretty cool, as we can get from one part of the park to another without any of the guests really knowing! And they are going to be a lifesaver when it rains!

Then we had dinner at the Disney Diner, run by none other than my dear friend Aramark!  But the only difference here vs. UTD was that the prices were pretty reasonable here.  The food was still only “eh,” but at least we didn’t pay too much for it. 

And in the evening (about 7:30) we headed out to showcase lagoon, where illuminations is held and helped with “crowd control” (ie: making sure people don’t cross the ropes into the safety areas where ash may fall on them, or into places they aren’t supposed to be).  Illuminations was really cool!  Even if you are standing in front of a speaker tower, wearing earplugs (which were thoughtfully given to us). Unfortunately I couldn’t carry my camera while working, but I definitely want some pictures of the cooler parts of the show!

That’s it for now! Tomorrow is grocery bingo, hosted by the living community, so that might be fun, and maybe I’ll meet new people! And my goal is to be up by 8:30 so hopefully I can be at the Company Connection by 9!

 

Random Disney Fact:
Mission: Space’s entire building can fit into the Seas w/ Nemo and Friends’s tank with room to spare! That is how big it is.  Worldwide, it is in the top 5 largest aquariums. AND it has 90% of the same water it opened with; that is how good the water filtration system is.

This morning I took the bus to the Epcot “cast services” building, since I had no idea where to park as a “cast member.”  So I took the 7:20 AM bus to be there at 7:50 and be on time for my 8:00 “discovery day” training.  So we walked around futureworld and saw the many different attractions and rode in the clams on The Seas with Nemo and Friends (formerly the Living Seas).  We got to enter through the tunnels because of the half marathon running through the park and that was in itself exciting for me.  We then had a boat trip around the World Showcase and were told some really neat facts about the different world pavilions.  One such example is a drawbridge that goes up around 2-3 pm for about half an hour for workers to bring out the barges that are going to be used for the fireworks show into the lagoon. 

After the tour, we got a powerpoint on Diversity, and how “we are a part of the show” and got to see the conception of EPCOT.  They actually showed “Walt’s Last Film” about the city of EPCOT and how it developed after that.  THAT was really cool!

Then we were split up, and innoventions workers went to lunch with “Ginny” our leader for the day, as our real leader took a personal day.  We went to eat (backstage, they have some really reasonable prices) and then went to costumes.  I am apparently a 36x30 in Disney pants (with WONDERFUL pleats on the front) although I had to tie a belt around my 35x30 khaki pants today so they wouldn’t fall off. While waiting to try the costumes on, I mentioned to Ginny that my birthday had just passed and she dialed a number and gave me phone.  It was goofy wishing me a happy birthday!! And the extension coincidentally was 2144, the first and last digits of my phone number!

After costume fitting, we went to the Wonders of Life pavilion, which is now permanently closed and did computer based training about chemical safety and how to properly interact with guests, etc… AND THEN we got to go up INTO THE PAVILLION (!!) and see it from inside.  I wish I had my camera, because it was quite a site, partially emptied out.  Ginny said they use it for Segway training (and it was last used for the Food and Wine festival).  So then we got to go back to innoventions and see the backstage area of that, and meet more important people.  AND we found out that we could get involved with pin trading if we wanted (which is definitely a plus!) but that comes after training.  And speaking of training.  I have training tomorrow (Sunday) from 12:45 to 9:45, have Monday and Tuesday off,  and then kicks into high gear Wednesday through Saturday.  And then they already have me down for training in a brand new attraction dealing with Velcro, which starts on February 9^th! Talk about planning!

After training, I came home, had some cereal, and headed out to Magic Kingdom with Danielle and Krystyna, since it was open until 11 because of the fact that it was a Saturday [I know it is a really long sentence, but I’m sorry, I don’t want to rewrite it].  We rode TTA (Tomorrowland Transit Authority), with the model of the Walt’s EPCOT on display, Stitch’s Great Escape, Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin, and then went on the Teacups before we went to go watch “Wishes,” the fireworks show.  I’ve been told the view is better from Adventureland since they shoot the fireworks from both sides of you, but since it was my first time seeing it, we saw it from the front.  And five minutes into the show, I had a drop of water drop on me, and 3 seconds late (no joke) the sky OPENED UP and it was pouring hard.  So we ran to a restaurant, then decided to go to Winnie the Pooh, and then went on to Haunted Mansion, and then wanted to utilize our fastpasses to Space Mountain,  but it was shut down “to refuel the rockets.”  We wanted to see Space Mountain with the lights on from the TTA (it goes right through the building, with a great view of the ride), if they were trying to fix it, but that was shut down too, perhaps to prevent guests from seeing that.

So then we went on Space Mountain and called it a day (even though we still had an hour left to play), since everyone was already tired and still wet.

All things considered, it was a fun and eventful first visit to Magic Kingdom!