Week Thirty-One: Solar Eclipse and Another Wedding!

August 21st (Monday): It was the solar eclipse day, so everyone was FREAKING out about walking around/working in the parks. Luckily I didn't work until it was mostly over, so I just saw the lighting outside go from light to dark to light again. Solar eclipse glasses were sold out everywhere, but I heard it was pretty cool from a few people!! At work we had one full grown woman try ride the Barnstormer without shoes (what??) then her family got mad when we wouldn't let her ride. Hadn't ever had that one happen to me...also I KILLED it at grouper ("how many in your party? Rows 1 and 2" person) and had a bunch of wheelchair parties, so I was feeling pretty accomplished. I worked from 4:15pm - 10:15pm.

August 22nd (Tuesday): I did laundry in the morning, packed for home, then went off to work. My shift was 3:45pm - 10:45pm. Work was weirdly busy then super slow and also SO HOT OMG EVERYONE WAS MELTING. Work was pretty good but I ended up getting my 30-minute lunch at 9:15pm which is super late. It was fine though!!

August 23rd - August 30th: I got to come home for a wedding!!! I love weddings!! I was able to switch all my days off to fall on the days I'm home but still had to call out a few days. The wedding was beautiful, it was two of my good friends from high school so a ton of old friends were there.

I had a busy week in Seattle seeing old friends and hanging out with my family, and it was definitely a break I needed from that Florida summer heat and humidity!!! Halloween parties have started so I'm excited to go back and check out all the fall festivities :)

Flower & Garden Festival (SUPER BELATED)

Okay this is ridiculously late so I'm sorry, but here's a bunch of photos of food and my thoughts on what I ate!!

So first off, Flower & Garden Festival is an event held at Epcot that runs from March 1st through May 29th (for the 2017 year), and it's basically a bunch of booths around the World Showcase that each sell different food dishes, plus a bunch of pretty flowers up everywhere and some other smaller shows/events (like a butterfly tent). I was able to buy at least one dish/drink from every single booth, so without further ado, here are my thoughts and photos!!

The Berry Basket (located just before you enter Mexico): I had the Twinings Green Tea Berry Mint Julep (non-alcoholic) and it had awesome flavor. I found the texture to be a little bit too icy where I had to eat it with a spoon rather than drink it, but the flavors were spot on with predominantly refreshing mint and berry with a hint of green tea.

Northern Bloom (Canada): I had the Beef Tenderloin Tips with Mushroom Bourdelaise Sauce, Whipped Potatoes, and Garden Vegetables and it was DELICIOUS. For sure one of my favorite things I had to eat.

La Isla Fresca (near Mexico):  So I tried two different dishes, but don't have pictures of either of them (whoops!) but I had the Sugar Cane Shrimp Skewer with Steamed Rice and Coconut Lime Sauce, and the Caribbean Conch Salad with Avocado, Mango, and Onions. I had definitely a bigger fan of the salad, it had awesome flavor and it was all my favorite things. The shrimp sauce was good but the shrimp itself had very basic flavor (in my humble opinion;)).

Cider House (UK): I tried two different items, the Pear Cider-brined Shredded Corned Beef with Braised Cabbage and Branston Dressing with Pears, and the House-made Potato and Cheddar Cheese Biscuit with Smoked Salmon Tartare. Both were pretty tasty, but I think I preferred the corned beef! The cheddar biscuit was awesome on the other dish, but the salmon had a little too much dill for my taste!!

Urban Farm Eats (just before the UK): I had the Urban Fairy Cocktail and it was weird. I wasn't a fan, but a lot of people were. It has cucumber, lime, and absynthe but I found the flavor to be very licorice-y, which is the flavor from the absynthe. Not for me!

Pineapple Promenade (also by the UK): I had the Frozen Desert Violet Lemonade and it was INCREDIBLE and also beautiful. One of my favorite drinks for sure. It's non-alcoholic and was the perfect texture and perfect blend of fruity and floral!

Jardin de Fiestas (Mexico): I tried both the Hibiscus Margarita and the Elderflower Pineapple Margarita and they were both pretty good. The hibiscus was a little less sweet, and both were pretty strong. I think I liked the elderflower pineapple one better just because it had more flavor, but I would probably skip both if I were to go again.

Lotus House (China): I got the Beijing-Style Candied Strawberries (multiple times) and the M.S.G. Wine Cooler (mango/strawberry/ginger ale). I really enjoyed both of these, the candied strawberries had a hard candy exterior with sesame seeds, so simple but delicious, and the drink was a good blend of fruity sweet and a hint of ginger spice. Yum!

Bauernmarkt: Farmer's Market (Germany): I had the Roasted Bratwurst with Curry Ketchup and Paprika-spiced Chips and it was yummy. Better than I thought honestly. I really liked the bratwurst and ketchup, and enjoyed the chips but not enough to finish them all off!!

Primavera Kitchen (Italy): I got the Strawberry Tiramisu which was basically tiramisu with strawberry instead of coffee (I don't like coffee), and it was okay. A little too much thawed frozen strawberry flavor for me.

The Smokehouse: Barbecue and Brews (America): I had the Frozen Lemonade with Firefly Blackberry Moonshine and I thought this one was also just okay. The moonshine sat on the bottom with the frozen lemonade on top, so it was hard to mix together and the flavors were pretty muted.

Hanami (Japan): I got two items here, the Frushi (pineapple, strawberries, and melon rolled with raspberry coconut rice and toasted coconut) and the Matcha (Green Tea) Sake. Both were AWESOME, I got the frushi multiple times, it was the perfect dessert for a hot day where you don't want to feel weighed down. The sake cocktail was also really good, but you have to enjoy the grassy green tea flavor to enjoy that one!! Which I do :)

Taste of Marrakesh (Morocco): I got the Baklava which had chocolate and almonds, and it was pretty good!! Maybe a little bit too flaky and crunchy for me, I like my pastries to be squishy!

Florida Fresh (by...Norway I think? It's somewhere across the World Showcase....): I got the Watermelon Cucumber Slush (Non-Alcoholic) multiple times because it was SO GOOD. Texture was great, flavor was AWESOME and it's a pretty drink. The alcoholic one I heard was good too, but comes in a much smaller size!

Fleur de Lys (France): I got the La Vie en Rose Frozen Slush (Grey Goose Vodka Orange, St. Germain Liquor, white and red cranberry juice) and it was ALSO DELICIOUS. Probably my favorite alcoholic drink from F&G. Again, great texture, really well balanced more delicate flavors, and overall just really light and refreshing. And pretty!! Lot's of pink in this festival haha :)

And that sums it up!!! I was able to get something from every booth, the highlights being the Rose Slush, Watermelon Cucumber Slush, Frushi, Beijing-Style Candied Strawberries, Beef Tips, and Violet Lemonade. Lots of good things to try!! Now that it's already August 24th, I CAN'T WAIT FOR FOOD AND WINE FESTIVAL TO COME OUT IN ONE WEEK!! WOOOOOO I LOVE FOOD.

Week Thirty: New Roommate!!

August 14th (Monday): I got my new roommate!! Her name is Martia (pronounced like Marcia/Marsha) and she's from Maryland! She's really wonderful, and weirdly enough she's an actual fall CP, so the poor soul had to do casting/housing/Traditions with randoms. And that was fine because she gets along with everybody, but she moved into an apartment of five girls who have all been here since January. She's awesome though and will be working at the Contemporary as a seater at The Wave! At work we were short staffed, like always, and had to close the play tent TWO HOUSE EARLY because we couldn't staff it. Also we got a 30-minute weather downtime.

August 15th (Tuesday): We are still in the CP gap, so a bunch of people who NEVER close were closing and it was weird. Also I decided to take the bus to save money on gas but the bus that came to pick us up from West Clock after work completely skipped us because it was full of the new CP's playing the park for the day. So we got to sit at the bus stop for like 45 minutes, which sucked.

August 16th (Wednesday): I did laundry before work, then went to Target to pick up a few things, and Panera for lunch. I had a pretty good day at work! Some struggles at grouper (the person that places you into your rows at the Barnstormer) because there were some bad listeners and large parties and parties with wheelchairs, and it was just a lot to juggle. At night though we had someone leave a balloon at the Barnstormer so I gave it away to a little girl which was super adorable.

August 17th (Thursday): Work went by super quick which is WONDERFUL but we were super short on staffing. We originally only had FOUR closers (you NEED a minimum of eight to close) but enough people volunteered to stay that we ended up being okay. We again had to close the play tent early, but not a bad day.

August 18th (Friday): I was off so I spent the morning cooking and relaxing, then went to Magic Kingdom to hangout with my roomies!! Martia had Traditions so she got to spend her first night in the park with us :) It ended up being Martia, Jani (who works at Festival of the Lion King), and me. I did Mickey's Philharmagic before they got to MK, then got Casey's Corner for dinner with Jani (one of our other roommates, Kristen, works there). Jani and I did Pirates of the Caribbean while waiting for Martia to finish up Traditions, then when Martia got to MK I got a nutella waffle and we staked out a spot for fireworks. After the fireworks we rode Buzz Lightyear, Winnie the Pooh, and Dumbo. Then headed home! Also we went through the Emporium and all the Halloween merch is out which was super exciting.

August 19th (Saturday): I made more food before heading off to work, and work was pretty good! I just had one cranky guest who told his kids they couldn't ride because of me. They had three kids under seven, and just two adults, so I told them that we could do a rider switch or find a single adult in line to ride with them. Well he got super mad and blamed it all on me, like sorry sir I don't make the rules, calm down. But whatever. The rest of the shift was good!

August 20th (Sunday): We went down for weather for 45 minutes or so, and we FINALLY had a slow day. Kids are starting school, so crowd levels are way down (PRAISE). At work I bounced around a lot of positions, giving people breaks and stuff, but it helped make the day go by quickly.

That's it for the week!! We have Halloween parties coming up next week, starting the 25th, so hopefully I get scheduled a treat shift (handing out candy and wearing a cute costume), then Food & Wine Festival in Epcot starts the 31st, in a week and a half!! SO excited. And lower crowd levels until Thanksgiving, with the exception of Labor Day and Halloween. FINALLY.

Week Twenty-Nine: RIP Great Movie Ride (For Real This Time) and a 15-Hour Shift!

August 7th (Monday): What a day!! My flight got in at 2:35am, so I got home and in bed around 4am. Luckily I had a short 4:45pm - 10:45pm shift. At work we had one amazing family of a mother and two children who had just spent 45 days in a domestic violence shelter and had escaped a violent home, so that was pretty brave of them. Incredible family of three!! We also had a whole lot of bodily fluids at both Barn and Dumbo, so lots of custodial calls.

August 8th (Tuesday): I had the day off, so I slept in and unpacked, then went to Animal Kingdom with one my coworkers from the circus and one of my coworkers from my first program! When we first walked in a little girl was on the ground throwing a tantrum and the mom goes "oh great, you're having a meltdown in front of a vine" and at first it didn't make sense, but then we looked up and there was one of those giant green vine ladies hahahaa. Super funny. We wanted to do Flight of Passage, but standby was 220 minutes so NOPE. We rode Expedition Everest twice, Kilimanjaro Safari, saw Festival of the Lion King, and did both the Gorilla Falls and Maharajah Jungle Trek walk things. Also we got free ice cream and free cinnamon nuts! Yum!! At night my friend Audrey asked a photographer man to take our photo with her nice Nikon and he was AMAZING and walked her through all the settings and how to adjust things and our photo turned out awesome!!! I don't have it since it's on her camera but you'll just have to take my word for it ;)

August 9th (Wednesday): Wednesday was exhausting because I worked from 10am to 12:45am, almost 15 hours, but it was a pretty good day!! I mostly pulled positions I really like, like ringmaster (inside the play tent receiving pagers) and strollers (moving strollers). Not much to say, it was pretty busy but we're about to slow back down again so it's bearable.

August 10th (Thursday): I came back and worked 10am to 10:45pm and I pulled Dumbo B remote FOUR TIMES THROUGHOUT MY SHIFT which is A LOT. That's the position where you take boarding passes from guests and spiel a lot, so it's a very interactive (exhausting) position. Also after close we had two families who wouldn't leave Big Top Souvenirs then got mad that the train wasn't running to take them to the front of the park hahahaha. Like first of all, the park is closed so they wouldn't let you on it even if it was running, and second of all, the train closed over two hours ago. Closing was pretty funny too because we had a bunch closing who never close! We're in a CP gap between the old CP's leaving, and the new ones coming in, so all these people were asking me how to close.

August 11th (Friday): I got to sleep in, so I cooked a bit before work. Unfortunately I burnt my thumb on the inside of the oven, so that is all nasty now. Work was pretty good, we went down for weather for like half an hour, which was a nice little break during my shift. My shift was 2:45pm - 10:45pm. After work I went to Walmart to go grocery shopping and I figured it wouldn't be busy since it's 11:30pm but the parking lot was SWAMPED. And I had to wait like 20 minutes to checkout. Crazy.

August 12th (Saturday): I worked 11am - 10:45pm and it was a good day! We went down for weather TWICE for 30 minutes each, and it rained pretty much from 2pm - close. Also we had this psycho guest (woman in her 30's, riding Dumbo by herself) threaten to fight another guest who happened to be a PREGNANT woman. This lady was CRAZY. Luckily nothing came from it, but that was nuts.

August 13th (Sunday): I was off and spent the afternoon at Hollywood Studios with my circus coworkers, Michael, Michael, and Michaelene. Funny, right?? Well we got to ride Tower of Terror FOUR TIMES IN A ROW, fastpass Toy Story, and fastpass Great Movie Ride on its last day ever!! So great afternoon.

After studios, Michaelene and I went to the mall and bought me some new wax melts from Yankee, and a dress to wear to an upcoming wedding! Then we went to Olive Garden and got some killer green apple sangrias. :)

Busy busy week with a few more busy ones coming up, but then we get to go back to slow and normal! PRAISE!!!!!

Week Twenty-Eight: RIP Great Movie Ride and Colorado Wedding Time!

July 31st (Monday): I worked from 4pm (I think?) - 10:45pm. It was breezy and rainy all day long which was AMAZING and such a wonderful change. It's all we got from the tropical storm that was supposed to come through, not mad about it. It also meant we had low crowds which was FANTASTIC. On the sad side though, it was Michaelene's last day :( She was spring advantage so now she's hoping for PT/FT! GOOD LUCK GIRL! She's the best.

August 1st (Tuesday): Somehow it's already August? What? We were weirdly crazy busy in the middle of the day then it went back to normal. AND we got to go down for weather for the last 25 minutes which was great. We came back up at like 10:10 (after park close) so just in time to close haha. Super nice. My shift was 4pm - 10:45pm.

August 2nd (Wednesday): So my blue ID scanned red (had been scanning red for three days) and I had to call a leader and it took forever and I ended up being late to work because of it. SO APPARENTLY after you've been working six months (yes, even as a CP), you need a new blue ID! So I know have one with my photo on it :) So rough start to the shift, but it is what it is. We were pretty busy, posting a 45-minute wait at Barn at one point which is pretty long for that ride. I also got to deal with a lost child, but after we found her mom another guest told me that I handled it really well and that was just really nice to hear. OH and we had this family come up the Dumbo exit and legitimately think it was okay to enter the exit and sit down and ride. Because apparently the kid had to pee so they had left the line and didn't think it was fair to wait again...well that's against the rules and I had to call a coordinator to get clearance to load them. Big pain, people are really silly sometimes. I worked 4pm - 12:45am.

August 3rd (Thursday): Before work I went to Hollywood Studios with some coworkers and that was really nice! I hadn't been to Hollywood in over a month. We rode Tower of Terror and the Great Movie Ride (for the last time, RIP), and watched the Frozen Sing-A-Long! I also went and got my new ID before work, and it's the Disney version of a DMV haha. You pull a ticket and everything! Kind of funny. My shift was 4pm - 10:45pm. At work we had a 45-minute weather downtime which is always nice, and one of my coworkers switched end times with me so I was out at 9:15pm instead of 10:45pm!! YAY DAN!

August 4th (Friday): I flew out SUPER early in the morning to Colorado for a wedding (my flight took off at like 6:50am).

August 5th (Saturday): Wedding time!! I got to see my college roommate's beautiful mountain wedding :)

August 6th (Sunday): I spent the morning in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, then flew back out at 9:15pm to Orlando! We flew through a thunderstorm which is the scariest thing EVER to happen to me on a plane.

Sorry this is super late and lacking in photos, I've been SO busy I haven't had time to upload much! Give it like three weeks and everything will be back to normal :)

Week Twenty-Seven: Goodbye Spring CP's!!

Okay so for some reason we've just had the worst guests the past two weeks, and that keeps on continuing....I don't know if it's the heat or the humidity or the people, but guests have just been really nasty. Besides that though, it's been a pretty good week!!

July 24th (Monday): I went to Pike Place Market in the morning with my mom and sister in Seattle, and we ate lots of yummy food :)

Then that night I flew out of Seattle to head back to Orlando!! My flight was a red-eye and left at 9:25pm.

July 25th (Tuesday): My flight landed in Orlando around 6am. I took a shuttle back to my car, then drove home and slept from 7:15am - 1:30pm. Then I worked from 4:45pm - 11:45pm. It was a TON of people's last day, so that was a bittersweet shift. Everyone who extended from spring through summer had a July 27th end date, and July 25th last day of work. So we said goodbye to eight (I think) CP's. Our coordinators were AWESOME and let us all ride Dumbo at night then take a ton of photos, so that was really special. I'll post pictures if I remember when I upload them!

July 26th (Wednesday): I worked from 5:45pm - 1:45am for Extra Magic Hours, so I got to eat my lunch at 10pm which is super late and kind of funny. ALSO I had Dumbo automatically cut its power (if the ride detects that something is off, it will shut down or emergency stop or something like that) and we were down for like thirty minutes while maintenance tried to figure out what was wrong with it. So that was weird, I'd never had that happen before. But we got it all fixed up! Also we were down for weather from 11pm - 12:15am so we had literally NO ONE at night.

July 27th (Thursday): I HAD THE MOST RIDICULOUS GUESTS. I had one really angry Irish woman rant to me for 25 minutes about how much she hates America and Americans while I helped her figure out how to work the app. Like I get it, you're frustrated, but she never thanked me, complained the entire time, and stormed off after I fixed it up for her. So there was that, then I had a family holding a clear cup of urine because apparently it makes more sense to stay in line and have your child pee in a cup then it does to walk the 30 seconds to the bathroom. So that was pretty gross and the poor guests behind them were mortified. We also had it pour rain for five minutes, and went down for weather for all of twenty short minutes. But this man refused to leave the line and was yelling at us about the weather as if we can control that. But I had the dream shift of 10am - 6:15pm.

July 28th (Friday): I worked 3:45pm - 10:45pm. We were down for about 75 minutes and let me tell ya, the thunder was UNREAL. I like to call it gunshot thunder because it's THAT loud. Absolutely insane with crazy lightening and rain too. Also I had a woman come up to me and get mad while I was at Dumbo STANDBY greeter, because I wouldn't let her two children go up the FASTPASS entrance. Okay first of all lady, I have ZERO control over who the FP greeter lets through. Secondly, the FP greeter told me you only had two SPLASH MOUNTAIN FP's. This lady starts getting mad because now her 7-year old is going to cry and it's "not about the kids" and I'm thinking to myself, do you have any idea how many kids come through Disney?? THOUSANDS per day, and we can't just let random people go through FP just because they want to. So that was interesting.

July 29th (Saturday): We were super slow in the morning, then it rained for a little while, and all of a sudden we were SWAMPED when the rain went away. So weird start to the day. I also felt like I spent my entire shift explaining how everything worked. Like no one understood FP, no one understood how DAS (disability) worked, how the Dumbo play tent queue worked, I was explaining a lot. And that's fine and all, but it's exhausting. Also, I had a really funny child brighten my day because I was talking to him about his lightsaber he was holding, and he told me he got to fight Stormtroopers with it. So I told him I was glad he made it out in one piece and he just goes "I kind of wish I was sliced in two so I could meet my Grandpa and Uncle Chuck. Uncle Chuck was blown up in a land mine explosion! And my grandpa died from natural causes but was once shot in the arm." And I just go "oh that's too bad" because how do you talk to kids about that hahaha. And he just goes "yeah, it's a shame". So this kid was hysterical. I worked 10am - 10:45pm.

July 30th (Sunday): I worked 11am - 10:45pm and we had the WEIRDEST weather. It rained all day long, but like misty rain. So Seattle weather. Which is so uncharacteristic of Florida. But it was nice because it was cooler, and less people were riding our rides! So chill day. I did have this woman on the Barnstormer taking forever to stow her backpack and everyone else is ready to go, I'm just standing there waiting to check her lap bar and her kids behind her go "mom you're holding up the whole line!" and this mom just looks at me and says "oh, this is Disney, she doesn't care, she has to smile no matter what". OKAY woman. Also when I was at Dumbo FP I stepped on a snail on accident and squished it and it was disgusting. OH and I got an ER for 10:15pm even though I didn't ask for one, and went to Buffalo Wild Wings with my coworkers! I had been craving fried pickles for like three weeks so I was very happy to get those and some mini corndogs. Yum! And great company of course.

That was the week!! Hopefully it starts turning around with guest attitudes, it's much more fun when people are happy :)

Week Twenty-Six: A WEIRD Week and Long Weekend Trip Home!

A little late this week, but I was able to go home for a long weekend so I just got back to Orlando yesterday morning!

July 17th (Monday): I went grocery shopping in the morning before work, then worked from 3:45pm - 10:45pm. At work I didn't get a break for 3.5 hours so that was a long way to start work off. It was an absolutely insane day, in the span of one hour we had to E-stop Dumbo once, operate the ride with this CRAZY lightening going on (apparently it was reflecting off clouds, so it was further away than it looked), and our Dumbos were landing WAY off from where they were supposed to. So basically our coordinator is just running back and forth trying to deal with all the craziness that was going on. But on the bright side, we had a really beautiful double rainbow.

July 18th (Tuesday): It was another weird day. I had one guest call her daughter (about six years old) a "shit head" for trying to hop in an elephant before a little boy. We see all kinds of parenting styles here... I also had a guest get in my face when I was at Barnstormer merge, asking me to send fewer FastPass parties because "this had been happening to him all day long and he was tired of being slighted" and I told him we had a set ratio that we follow to merge our standby and FastPass parties and then he gets REALLY close to me (to the point where I'm literally backing up) and said something like "just remember that our grandparents died to protect what we have today" and it was extremely uncomfortable. Later in the shift we went down for weather for about two hours, but when I was at Barn FastPass I bent down to rub in some bug spray, then smacked my head on the greeter booth when I stood up. So I had to fill out an incident report with my manager, and sit with ice for like thirty minutes. I had a lump on my head and they almost called for an ambulance! ALSO I had a blister pop and get blood on my costume so I had to run to costuming to get a new one. So QUITE the shift. I worked from 10:15am - 9:15pm.

July 19th (Wednesday): I worked a dream shift from 3:45pm - 9:45pm. We went down for weather for about an hour, but there wasn't much rain or lightening so guests were really annoyed. After we came back up though, we had these weirdly long wait times. Like Barn was a 30-minute wait at 8:30pm. Why? I don't know.

July 20th (Thursday): We had one guest pass out in line that we had to call an ambulance for, and actually shut down for a bit because we couldn't get guests past her in line without like stepping over her which is definitely not okay. So that was crazy. Then right after that we went down at Dumbo A for an unusual noise, so our coordinators had a BUSY morning. Also I asked for my breaks to get pushed back and one actually got deleted, so I went almost four hours without a break, then ended up taking a 45 minute lunch instead. Odd. The shift ended great though, because we had a THREE HOUR weather downtime!! It was INSANE, pouring down rain and extremely close lightening and thunder. Super awesome but also slightly terrifying. My shift was 11:15am - 9:15pm.

July 21st (Friday): I got up at 4am and drove to the airport, getting into Seattle at 10am and I got to surprise my little sister which was awesome!! Also one of my good friends from high school whom I hadn't seen in over TWO YEARS picked me up which was fantastic.

I also hung out with my parents and had my best friend from high school stay over, which was WONDERFUL. AND I ATE SO MANY FRESH BERRIES.

July 22nd (Saturday): We celebrated my grandma's 80th birthday, so we ate lots of good food and went on a hike! Also we got to go crabbing to catch our dinner, so that's always fun.

July 23rd (Sunday): We ate breakfast in the morning (a really delicious and homemade breakfast) then my sister and I picked up a friend of mine and we went for a nice hike! We failed at jumping photos, but had a really fun time attempting them hahaha.

After our hike we headed home, had dinner, and I had a couple friends come over and I got to catch up with them which was really nice. Then off to bed! SO nice to sleep in my big bed back home.