Goodbye and again and again

This has been a weird week. It was Nycoles last week with us and it went on longer then I thought it would.

Sunday:

I finally did everything that I wanted to do. I went to publix and bought fresh food and then did laundry and relaxed. Basically an amazing day and a good way to finally get over the stomach bug that I had.


Monday-wed and friday:


These where just normal days at work nothing exciting that I can remember happened.


Thursday:

I slept in and then went to the Florida mall. It was not as good as I thought it was going to be. I bought a few things and the forever 21 store is better then the outlet but not as good as the one at fairview mall. That will forever be my favourite store. I bought something from Macys in the sale area. It was on sale because someone returned it and turns out they wore it and then returned it… ewwwwww. Oh well I will was it so many times before I wear it. I got the bus back home and then just  watched a movie and then went to bed.

Saturday:

Today I thought was going to be my last day with Nycole. We had a roommate lunch at BJ's with Kim, Carrie, Monica, Nycole and myself. After lunch Monica, Nycole and I went into the death pool (hot tub) for a few min. Then Monica took Nycole back to her hotel to get the Magical Express. I stayed home for a bit and then decided to go to walmart. I spent way more then I wanted too. I have been trying to save up my money for the past few week. This trip to Walmart I bought everything I haven't for the last few weeks. Oh well it should last me awhile and I can count that as my grocery shoppin for this pay check. When I got home Monica was in the kitchen and she told me what happened. Nycole got to the airport check in and there was a problem. Apparently they thought she still needed to pay for the fact that she changed her flight. She already payed and so by the time the guy got everything sorted out it was too late for her to get the plane. She started freezing out ad the guy ended up having to call the police. Six officers came over, I think that's overkill and she's this little brazillian girl... Yeah so dangerous. The guards where apparently nice and helped her get on the next flight instead of loosing her money. Monica told me she was in a cab on the way over to te apartment. Not long after that we hear a knock at the door. It was Nycole. We got her stuff to Monica's car and got her settled at home. Understandably her biggest concern was her brother, he is 17 and can't speak English. He made his flight a few hours earlier and that meant that he was in LA alone. She got everything sorted as best she could. Eventually K and Kim came home and they where happy and mad to see her. Typical nycole having something bad happen to her. Before they got home Monica nycole and I started watching a movie so we all finished watching it. Well Monica and I did. Nycole and K fell asleep ad Kim went to her room.  

Sunday: 

Today was the day Nycole finally left. Monica and I took her to the airport at 4, well really 4:30 by the time we got to the car. We got her to the airport and then helped her her bags inside. After that Monica and I drove back home. I had to work so I went to bed for a few hours before getting up and getting ready. Work was okay. I was working with a good cast which always helps. We where running smooth all day untill around 5:45. Matt comes out and puts his costume shirt in the kidcot box and said he was going on a keys walk with Caleb one of our managers. It happens all the time so no big deal. Other then we had 2 bump outs and 3 breaks to still happen before 8. Matt was gone for almost two hours and the last half our there where only three of us in the attraction and then only two when Kirsten went on break. After the last two breaks where given everything was fine. I learned that the phone in the theatre is really off as I thought that we still had time for one more show. Turns out it was 9 so we didn't oops! I decided to wait for Carrie and Carolyn as I knew they where both done at 9:30. I sat in the trailer untill 9:30 and then walked really slowly and didn't see them utill I was in the bus driving away. I got home made fries, wrote my last post and then went to bed. 

Have a magical day! 

Sam

Brain fart

I can't believe it has been so long since I last updated. I don't really remember what I have done between then and now so I will write about last weeks days off and nothing about work recently unless I think of something.

Last week Matt's best friend and his girlfriend came to visit. On thursday I had the day off so I joined them at the magic kingdom. They got there early and I was in no rush so I showed up around 11:30. Once I got there I met up with them at the exit of the haunted mansion as they where on the ride. We walked around and went on a few rides and I don't remember what ones in what order we did. I think we went to big thunder after. Matt didn't go on as he felt bad that I just arrived and we stayed off and watched the people on the ride go by. We then went back to their hotel so they could change and out pants on. We then ate in the food court at the hotel. After that we got back on the bus to MK to watch the fire works. We went on a few more rides then watched celebrate the magic and then wishes. Celebrate the magic is definitely my favourite thing at MK. They project stuff onto the castle and it is amazing, in my opinion way better then the actual fireworks. After the fireworks they where trying to figure out the plans for the next day. Eric invited me to join them at Hollywood studios. After we figured out what the plan was we walked towards the busses. Once Matt and I Got back to vista he told me he would text me letting me know what bus he was going to take in the morning, I didn't have to take that one if I wanted to come later. After I got home I just got ready for the next day and went to bed. Matt like he said he would, texted me and told me what bus he was going to be taking. The next morning I got up showered and left the house in 30 min. We got on the bus and on the way there Matts friend called him saying they where running a little late and would be leaving soon. Once they got there the four of us went into the park to devise a plan of what to do. The wait for tower was crazy long so we decided to do star tours as it only had a ten min wait. Really it was more like a walk on with a long que line to go through. After that we went over and watched the Indiana stunt show. It was super cool! Definitely something I will take y family too! After the show was over we where all cold and hungry so we went and got food. Well Matt and I did anyway. We ate out food waitig for the lights motor action show. It was cool but not something I will take my family too unless they really want to. After we did that we went over and got on the great movie ride. Definitely one of my favourite things to do at Disney. After that we went over to tower of terror. I love that ride more and more very time. After that we came up with a plan for the rest of the night. We ended up getting on a bus and going to down town Disney. We looked in a few stores before going to the Lego store. Matt and Eric decided to make Lego cars and race them. We where probably there for almost an hour. Finally when they finished their card they had te big race. Everyone around was watching then as there where a bunch of kids and then two guys in their 20's getting overly excited over their Lego cars. After they had their big race we walked and chose a place to eat. We went to planet Hollywood. I had been to one before but it was so long ago I forgot really what it was about. It was super cool! It wasn't that expensive and it was good good which is always a plus. When we say down I noticed the kid at the table next to us had a cup that glowed. I obviously wanted one too. I saw the drink menu and of course they where are movie names. I got the tangled, it was puna colada mix a few types of juice and then grenadine I think. It was $6 but getting the cup was soooo worth it! After dinner we said out goodbyes and went our seprate ways. It was a good way to end their visit. It was so much fun hanging out with them. Matt and Eric reminded me of Danielle and myself. Friends for a super long time that they have this unspoken communication and are both totally crazy. It was nice to be around someone like Danielle at the whining of her adventure. Once Matt and I got home we met back up half hour later to go to Walmart. I was running low on food and I normally go to both publix and Walmart. I decided it's always better to go with someone then alone. Once we got home from shopping we both where super tired. So I just went home and rght to bed.

Friday my plan was to go to publix do laundry and relax. Basically everything I wanted to do the past two days. That didn't happen though. Nycole also had the day off and she wanted to go to a park. I agreed to go because I knew she was leaving soon and I didn't really get a chance to hang out wth her. We went to the outlets first quickly and then where going to get the Hollywood studios bus. Turns out we would have had to wait almost an hour for a bus. So we decided to go to EPCOT instead. We went on space ship earth and then went on the figment ride. It was the weirdest thing I have ever done. I do not ever want to do that again unless I am forced there was no joy in that ride. After we did that we went over to watch the Canada movie. We went to kid cot first and coloured for a bit and then went to go see the show. I wasn't really paying attention to what was going on so I didn't point things out like I wanted too. After that we walked over to Germany and I bought a chocolate bar. I ate it so fast I ended up not feeling to good. I thought that it was because of how fast I ate it so I ignored it. We went on the Norway boat ride and then visited Monica at the bakery. After that we went home and I went to bed as I wasn't feeling well.

I went to work on saturday although I felt really sick I was too afraid to call in so I went anyway…. Big mistake. It was the sickest I have felt in a while. I powered through the day though and I went right home and went to bed.

I will write about sunday in my next post. At least now I am caught up for two weeks ago almost!!!



Have a magical day!

Sam

Why can't people just do their jobs!

This has been the motto for the last few days of work. I said that things changed in the attraction and I thought it would be for the better but I was wrong. It has turned out to be the opposite of that, people in the attraction have just stopped caring. Thats not what we want/need at all! Robyn was the top dog and everyone else was below her. Now that she is gone we don't have a leader anymore. No matter what if anyone steps up to be the leader the chances are no one will listen. I talked to someone recently about this and the way the place has been going and we are terrified. I have only been here for two months and a bit and I can see the attraction on a good day and a bad day. On a good day everything is on time and everything is clean. A bad day we are so behind on shows, no one is pulling on time and the place is a mess. We are really hoping that when the new people come in that they will help us get back on track. So if any new people are reading this basically my only advice to you would be; don't be afraid to ask questions (to the right people), Pull on time and have fun with it. Our job is mind numbingly boring at times. Hate to admit it but its true, but you make the most of it really. If you have this constant attitude of, oh this job sucks it's so boring. Then please do everyone a favour just go home. Other then that Everything has been good. I am running out of food though, it sucks. I need to go grocery shopping but I don't really want to. I am done tomorrow at 6:45 as matt wanted the day off so I have to think of something to do tomorrow night. Being done at 6:45 is fantastic! It is the earliest that you can ever be done unless you er but still fantastic! Things are going good with people at the attraction, it's so nice having a group of people you can actually have a conversation with not just small talk like normal.



I am so tired right now I don't even know what I am typing anymore….. I am going to bed. will update when I can concentrate.



Have a magical day!


Sam

Goodbye holidays

So now that the holidays are over it is now dead season in the parks. This is good when you want to go to the parks as a guest… not so much at work. Yes, it's nice to not having to deal with all the crazy people, it just makes the days  go by slower. The days in general depend mostly on who is working, working with someone you like days are okay. Working with people you are not that close with are not that fun. No matter what the days have been going slow, we just have to get use to the low amount of people in the parks again. When I first started after food and wine, we had a small dead time but it was still quite busy. I am finally feeling better with people at work. I am becoming closer to almost everyone at work and the people I was closest too I am learning more about. Work was a normal four days. EMH was the same, the device thing didn't work like usual and surprisingly we had more people I thought we would. I am so thankful that the hours are back to normal. I was done at 11:15 instead of 11:45 like during holidays. My friday which was really a tuesday I was done at 9 for the second time ever I was not closing! It was super exciting because there was not a large crowd for the bus like there normally is. In reality it's only 15 minuets earlier but it makes a difference at least in my mind. Other then that exciting day work was normal as usual. I understand now why people normally don't wright about work on their blogs…. because nothing really happens. Anyway hopefully next week will go better then this week did! I have noticed a shift since Robyn leaving, not in a bad or a good way just different.  Robyn was the highest in seniority obviously, and she was kind of the head of the attraction. Now that she is gone everyones position in the attraction shifted. There is a new head of the attraction who will remain nameless and I can tell things will be different. I am glad though that I have gotten to know the new "leader". I might also feel like the attraction has changed because on Robyns last wishes/MK night I bonded with some of the other attractions cast members. So I am friends with more of them then I was before. I am optimistic about the way things are going and I will hope for the best for the rest of my year here.



Have a magical day!

Sam

The island of misfit toys

This isn't going to be a long post or an exciting one really. I just wated to share something one of my co workers said that I found intresting. We where talking about the people in the program and he said "I feel like the crp program is like the island of misfit toys. We are all running from something back home. We might not know what it is but..." Then I finished what he said by saying "but there is always something." This is so true. When I first signed up it the program if someone had told me that's what I was doing I wouldn't of believed them. As it got closer to the program this became more clear to me. At the beginning I chose to do this program because I wanted to the icp had my heart set on it and when I found out I couldn't do it decided to go for the crp. I thought now was a good time as I didn't have a real job. I'm not married or in school. I had no commitments holding me back and I really wanted to do it. As it got closer to it though, thinking about what I would do when I get home was and still is impossible. I view this year as a beginning of a new chapter. This year is the start of something new for me. I remeber being in Toronto before coming here thinking that I was so excited to just leave every thing behind. Not meaning the people in my life. Every thing else though. I will find out who really matters and cares about me friend wise. My life has been amazing compared to other people. I am not at all saying my life sucked before Disney. Like any teenager it had its challenges. Not really finding myself or confidence until grade 12 and then spending a year doing nothing totally sucked. Disney is a fresh start for me, no one knew me coming in so I could be who ever I wanted. Not that I am acting different then who I really am, I'm just acting like who I truly am. My anxiety surprisingly since being down here has gone down so much. Yeah it will always be there but it's not holding me back as much. From day one I was outgoing with my roommates. Well so I thought. Apparently it took some time warming up to them. I tried though and didn't care because that's why I am here.  I said so many times that if people from back home saw how I was acting when I first got here. They would think I was totally different.

Have a magical day! 

Sam 

Osborne spectacle of dancing lights

Today was a not very exciting day. I went grocery shopping and then I came home unpacked all of that and then I decided to go to Hollywood studios to see the lights. The last day is the 5th of january and so I wanted to see them before they where gone. I went and then walked to the streets of America and then I looked at the lights for a bit and then they all danced to christmas music. I totally forgot they did that because I guess my brain wasn't working. I looked around for a few min and then I went over to star tours to get a fast pass for my collection and then I went back to get the bus. As I was walking to the stop a bus pulled up. I started to run/ jog to it and lucky someone on the bus told the driver I was coming so they waited for me. On the way back it was really cool because there where two guys talking about how they are "friends" with characters they where talking about the costumes and things about the job. I love that side of Disney and my dream job would be a character attendant/ dancer. It was cool to hear them talking about and how clearly this one guy loved his job and cared about it and the guests that they saw. After I got home I made some food and watched a movie in bed and then I went to sleep nice and early as I have decided I have been going to bed too late/ for too long and I need to change it. So I decided to go to bed super early and yeah still ended up sleeping in….. Oh well maybe next time!




Have a magical day!!!

Sam

Oh housing….

Note to anyone who is going to be moving into housing at any point. No matter how much you clean you will never get the place looking nice. I spent 5 hours "cleaning" my room and organizing and it looks just as bad as it did before. One good thing that came out of this was that I finally watched Pocahontas 2. I heard this was a really bad movie and so I was too afraid to watch it but I am glad I finally did, it was so good! It is based off of a true story so it didn't have the fairy tale ending as you would expect but the Disney version of what really happened. After that I was sitting in my room when one of the girls I work with posted something in the FB group about going out to down town Disney that night. She had mentioned it to me a few times and so I decided to go. I can't drink here and even if I could I wouldn't because thats not my thing. I decided to go though in order to make an effort to get to know the people I work with better. I came here to make new friends and have new experiences and even in the last two months of me being here I have found that I have habits that I was starting to form that I didn't really want to have. So I went and I am glad I did because it was fun. It was nice to get to know these girls outside of work. I learned things about them I would of been okay with not knowing but what ever. I came home again and they where there to question me about this night events. It was a nice night with the girls and hopefully it will happen again.



Have a magical day!

Sam

A night full of firsts and lasts

Today was a bitter sweet day. Kim had the day off and although I had plans for a little bit of the day but I thought we would still have time to do something together. It was a girl I worked with Robyn's last day at work so I wanted to go and see her last spiel. I hard planed to go see that and then come home and go to Walmart. Kim also wanted to go to Walmart so we decided to go quickly before I had to go to Epcot. It normally takes about 25 min to get from vista to Walmart, not today though. It took 30 min to get to the commons with the traffic. I thought about getting off the bus and then going back home until I needed to go to Epcot, but I decided to stay on the bus. I got everything I needed from Walmart and then went back to housing as I possibly could. I heard Robyn tell someone that her last spiel was going to be at 3:30 and as we didn't leave housing until 2:18 I thought for sure I had missed it. It took me a record breaking time of 6 min to get from cast services to greeter at the attraction. That was really fast as I didn't run or jog and walking my normal pace takes me almost 10 min to get from cast services to backstage. I saw that Jeremy was at greeter and so I went to say hi, he asked if I was there to see Robyn's last spiel. Thinking I had missed it I just told him I was there to say good bye. Turns out I was there just in time as she was going to do her last spiel the beginning of the next show. I went inside and stood off to the side and watched it happen. I didn't really know how it worked so it was a good learning experience. To anyone reading this who is going to do the program, go to someones throw out / last what ever who you are not that close with. I know the next two people who are going to be leaving will be harder for me to say goodbye too. Well, at least one of them. After that I stayed around to watch her boot toss. This I had seen before but it was the first time it was someone from the attraction. After Robyn went into the office to sign something and I knew they where going to MK after. I asked her if it was okay for me to join them. She said it was okay and so from there we went back to cast services to drop off her last costume and then we started to walk back into epcot. We where going to get the monorail bust first we decided to get lunch from Japan as that was something Robyn could eat as a veg person and it would be less busy. Oh yeah, I should probably explain who "we" where. It was Robyn, Leah and this girl Tori from F&B. After lunch we walked to the monorail to MK. This was the first time I had done this so it was good for me to finally do this. We decided to go and get fast passes for big thunder mountain and with the passes we had we could get 7. After this we went to the people mover. We went around once and then decided to go again, this time space mountain was 101 meaning they where down and we could see everything. After going through that part we decided to go around again. Unfortunately space mountain was 102 meaning they where down but they where having test runs. After the three times around we decided to get Robyn that ice cream she wanted. Fun fact they have vegan ice cream at this place too! When I saw it I got super excited and ordered some obviously. While we where in line to order Matt showed up. We went outside and where we were standing we had a good view of the parade and so we decided to stay and watch it. It was the main street electrical parade. It was my first time seeing that and I was super excited as I knew the music I really wanted to see it in person. After the parade we went and got our spot for wishes. This is where everything went interesting. It was so cloudy you could not see the fireworks that came off behind the castle. It still looked cool that the entire sky changed colours but it was not the real thing. Obviously Robyn was upset about this and so the rest of the night we all tried our best to make it as much fun for her as possible. All though it ended on a not so happy note I was glad that I went to MK with them. I am choosing to have my last memories of Robyn be before wishes because I saw who she truly was. She was the one person I knew the least out of all the cast and I am glad I had that afternoon to get to know her more before she left and the opportunity was gone. I learned that on the carousel Cinderella and Prince charming both have a horse. So we ended up going on that ride twice so Robyn could ride Cinderellas horse. Overall it was a good day and one I will remember for ever. When I got home K, Kim and Nycole where sitting on the couch and they questioned me about where I was. I understand why as this was the first time I had done anything with anyone other then my roommates. I was so tired I just went right to bed.


Have a magical day!


Sam

Happy New Years!

It is finally 2014! I can't believe it! It feels like just yesterday I was back in Collingwood with the Sorleys counting down the hours untill 2013! We knew it was going to be super busy and so I had been bracing myself for when it got really busy. I didn't start work untill 4:30 so I did what I normally do in the morning... Sleep. I thought traffic was going to be horrendous so I got a super early bus. The 2:15 bus left and arrived on time and as it takes only about 10 min to get to work I had a lot of time to kill before work. The park was super busy that if the park was any more full it would of taken me longer to walk to canada then the bus ride to the park. I sat in the break trailer for almost two hours before I started work. People from the attraction would come inside and tell stories about how had it was out there and it terrified me. By the time I got out there apparently the crowds died down a lot. We didn't hit capacity but at one point we had 510 people in the theatre so 100 people short. They blocked off the top floor of the pavilion as they often do for special events. They did it because it was part of the dinner package that le cellier offered. It was a fireworks viewing. This made people only come through one entrance in the pavilion so our numbers dropped a lot. That was okay with me. We all did our best with the crowds and then once time for fireworks came around there was only Kristal, Vicky, Leah, Alison and myself. We all left position and went to watch the fireworks. There was only one way to go to the movie and the guests would have to pass us so we kept an eye on it even though we knew no one would come. The fireworks started off with the normal illuminations and then they had fireworks for every country in world show case that had already celebrated New Years. They went in order and then once that was over they had a count down and the once the clock struck midnight a huge finalle. It was so cool it looked like the just put all of their brightest fireworks off at once. It was so loud you could eat the buildings around you shaking. After that it meant we only had an hour left. This plus the fact it was a new year made everyone still there in a good mood. It was only three of us at this point because Vicky and Allison went home. The hour went by so fast and then Kristal and myself closed the attraction and then wet as fast as we could to the bus. She was telling me how a cordinator told her they had a movie set up ad a zig zag que. I didn't believe her. Untill we walked out and saw that the indeed had a movie playing with a que line. We got on the third bus that came and so where only standing in line for an hour maybe a little less. I got home at about 2:30-3:00 wich was earlier then I expected. I got home and ate food before going to bed. Like I normally do. Over all a good day and a great start to the new year.

Have a magical day! 

Sam 

6 days in a row

7 really but I feel like New Years deserves a post of its own.

Boxing Day was crazy! The busses where half hour delayed because of crazy traffic!  Other then that the day went by fairly fast. It was surprising because I was working untill 12:45 that night. The park was open untill 10:30 and we had emh till 12:30. I knew I was going to be late when on my schedule that I was there untill 00:45. It was me a Kirsten for the last hour and a bit and that was fine. Surprisingly it didn't drag in as much as normal emh's do. We ended up closing a few min early with permission from a manager. We where filling out the papers and the maintenance people came and asked if we where done for the night. When we said we where they turned all the lights off in the attraction. The only ones on was the table light we have in the office. I waited for Carrie to finish at work and then we went home together. 

I don't really remeber much of what happened on Friday. Probably just the usuall stuff. Nothing stands out in my mind about it so I'm going to guess it was fine. 

Saturday again was a normal day of work.  Again nothing exciting happened. 

Sunday (yesterday) was an intresting day. It was this girl Robyn's throw out. What a throw out is for those who don't know it's basically the big send off that the pavilion gives before they leave. The problem with this was that Robyn's boyfriend who also works in the attraction got his schedule confused. He thought he was done at 9:30 like he has been for the last month. Really though he was done at 10:30. So him getting home for it was going to be a challenge. The big problem was it was at his place. He was going to be there (hopefully) by 11:30 but he needed to get there earlier then that. Luckily it all worked out and someone from merch with a car was also done at 10:30 so they went together. I brought clothes with me to change into. I was with this other girl Nicole from the attraction. We both changed and so we ran as fast as we could onstage to get to the bus. Turns out it was the 11:10 bus so we had some time to kill. We here not that worried about getting there on time because of the fact that out of everyone we had the biggest reason not to be there on time. We ended up getting a taxi to housing payed for by the people in food and bev. The more people they have in the cab the cheaper it is so there was 9 Canadians all together. They went to vista first and Nicole, myself and this other girl from merch where so early we had almost a half hour to kill. I went back and it a protein bar to eat on the way as I was starving. And we started to slowly walk over. We where taking our time when we saw that other people went into the apartment so we went in. It was a nice send off she gave some of the stuff she didn't want away and have out the awards she had. Who ever wanted to said something about Robyn. Normally a story about something that happened when they where together. I wanted to say something too. I have only known her for two moths and we never made a real realationship but I still wanted to say something. I basically said how I was glad to have someone around who I could always look at and learn from. Coming into the attraction is a hard thing to do. The cast is so close because there are so little of them. Finding the people you can ask questions and look up to is hard. I always knew that when Robyn was around I could learn and ask her questions. It was nice to go and see what a throw out was like and not be too attached to the person leaving. 

Monday was a normal day. It felt like it went on forever and all of our cast where just trying to get through the day. No extra magic was made that day. Overall an okay day before the madness. 

Have a magical day! 

Sam