A Universally Good Time

Dana and I had been in contact with Josh about going to Universal on our day off this week. Since I had just done pretty much all of Universal Studios with my mom a few weeks ago, I really wanted to conquer Islands of Adventure. The only things I had done in the months since I had gotten my Universal pass was Hogsmead.

Dana and I headed out around 10 and on our way there we saw two gators! One was hiding in a pond and only I saw him. The other was HUGE and was out of the water sunning by a pond near a CVS. Dana luckily was able to catch a glimpse of him too without crashing.

We got there much earlier and started off in the direction of Seuss Landing. We went through the If I Ran the Zoo play area. We had super fun. lol. Then we went over to the Cat in the Hat ride and had to fight off the urge to by the things (especially mugs) in the gift shop. Then we went on the One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish ride. It shoots water out as you go around so we tried to avoid it. I unfortunately was on the side with the water and I got wet. Next we headed off to the Caro-Seuss-el. Dana had her eye on this pink elephant. As she was taking a picture of it, two girls pretty much pushed her off of it. So we found another elephant and I got on a flying fish. Last we finished out journey in Suess Landing by going on The High in the Sky Seuss Trolley Train Ride! It was cool since it went over the whole land and through one of the dining areas. They only were using one side and I want to know what the other side is like. Before we left, I got some pop.

The next land was The Lost Continent. Poseidon's Fury had a long wait so we decided to skip it. We also checked out the price of Mythos Restaurant (which is very highly rated) wasn't actually too overpriced. We checked and The Eighth Voyage of Sindbad Stunt Show was going to start in a few minutes so we decided to check it out. It wasn't super awesome. It was cool too see but wasn't really worth seeing again.

We were walking through Hogsmead and Josh and crew were supposedly nearly there, but Dana and I were hungry, I was in the mood for burgers, and Dana knew that they had some in Jurassic Park. I was so happy since I love that movie!!! Josh and his new girlfriend Amber and her friend Allie (I think...) met us and got some food too. I got a combo which came with fries and a shake and I paid to get some cheese. Totally delicious and worth it. Next we headed back to Harry Potter Hogsmead and rode Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey and we actually got to see the bubbly snow in the charms classroom. Flight of the Hippogriff had a bit of a wait so we skipped it and headed to the Dragon Challenge. Josh didn't want to do it so he held all of our purses while we went on the last row of blue coaster. I haven't ridden the red coaster so I will have to do that next time. We debated going to take the Hogwarts Express over the Diagon Alley, but the wait was 20 minutes and I still wanted to check out more of Islands of Adventure.

We decided to head back to Jurassic Park and rode the Jurassic Park River Adventure which Amber and Allie hadn't gone on. It was pretty good. I would totally go on it more often, but it is a water ride. I totally got the least of the water, but the drop was so worth it. So much better than the Splash Mountain drop and a better lead up, too. Pteranodon Flyers looks awesome but you have to be a kid or the parent of a kid to go on it. :( We decided we were going to pay some parents to let us borrow their children. We skipped the next two rides Popeye & Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges and  Dudley Do-Right’s Ripsaw Falls since they were both water rides. I totally want to do them sometime though.

The last land was Marvel Super Hero Island. First was The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man. It is a lot like the Transformers Ride in Studios. Next Allie, Dana, and I went to Doctor Doom’s Fearfall. The shoot up was pretty cool but the drops were super lame. Josh had run into someone we knew and had given him and Amber some free hot dogs (apparently weren't good) and I got a free coke refill. Last up in marvel we went to The Incredible Hulk Coaster Amber and Josh skipped out again. It had a ton of loops. It was crazy. No one wanted to go on  Storm Force Accelatron besides me so I'll have to go back. We checked to see if Captain America had come out so Dana could get a picture with him, but his line as closed. I luckily got the last picture with Woleverine, though.

Allie really wanted to go on Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit, but that is Amber and Josh's "no" ride so she had never gone on it. So even though Dana and I were ready to leave we headed over to Studios to go on it with her. It was down when we first got there so we headed over to The Mummy which is Amber (or was it Allie's?) and Dana's favorite ride. It confirmed that some of the effects weren't working right when we went on it. We headed back over to Rockit and it had a bit of a wait, but it was even better than before. I wasn't as tight so I had a more free ride. I even thought I was going to fall out at the beginning. I chose "Bring Me to Life" by Evanescence. It was a good song choice.

It was a great day. We did almost everything in the park, so I think with another day I can finish everything from both parks I haven't done yet. So pumped.

I'll add pictures later.

VoluntEARS: WE Gives Back event

So today didn't start off great. I had some crappy children and crappy families when I started at flamingo, and after I took my 30 min break and headed to tracking it didn't get much better. I was swamped with people and within the first 5 min I was pushed by some guy since I was apparently in his way of taking his kid's picture. Because asking to move is just too much work, am I right? So after an hour and a half of tracking, when I went to lunch I was in a pretty foul mood. I felt super nauseous and couldn't eat anything so I got some Jamba Juice and ate some popcorn. I am normally a pretty patient person and normally like my job, so maybe it was because I was sick, but the day wasn't going well. I got to Animal Call and Forestry and felt like I was going to throw up on the children and was going to ask to go home but it was so busy I didn't get a chance to call Core Team. I even got ipaq'ed by Krystal and didn't even get a chance to talk before she gave me a thumbs up and walked away. I made it through that hour and a half and took a quick break offstage to compose myself before heading to Gibbon. I didn't make as much as an effort to recruit people or go up to guests, but I still had some decent conversations as I tried to keep myself together. I got to my second 30 min break and pretty much feel apart but figured I just had headquarters to go so I could push threw. Headquarters ended up being the best part of my day and closing went pretty easy (Anastasia even came by to help out since I had helped out with her signal 70 while she was at Animal Call) and I got a second good ipaq for the day/week from Krystal. 

I wasn't going to stay for the VoluntEAR event Krystal had set up, but talked myself into staying. I had signed up and really wanted to do it and felt bad backing out. I also figured I would reward myself with the pizza we ordered at the event. It was a ton of fun. We used old t-shirts (some grey ones from textile services and other colors) which was a cool way to recycle. I guess they have diverted over 500 tons of the entertainment shirts from landfills which is pretty exciting and the doggies at some shelters will get some cool handmade toys! First we cut some shirts into strips and we used a square stitch sort of thing I used to use all the time for the lanyard things I made at Kids Kamp when I was younger to put them together, so I caught on really quickly and was the first to finish so I made so more. It was fun to eat good food, chill with my fellow Wilderness Explorer Troop Leaders, my manager, and the leader from the Nutrition center who taught us how to make them. She is apart of the blanketEARS group which does a lot of crafty things so I might join if I end up staying another semester. At the end we even celebrated Christina's birthday with a cake and everything!

The one dog toy that I made! Super easy and super fun.

So ultimately, while today started on a sour note, it ended on a good one hanging out with people at the event while also giving back.

Trying to be a Good Blogger

So I started this blog as all people do, with the best intentions. While it may appear abandoned, like I previously said, I actually have been good about trying to update my bucket list and ride count pages. I have also done a decent job at keeping a record of what I have been doing as well. It is more of a bullet point style that I have kept as drafts all of this time. Therefore, since I was home sick today (stupid fever/flu I have been dealing with since Saturday evening), I decided to be a good blogger and try to actually make those notes readable and post date them. So starting today I have a few "new" posts for June and am going to try and keep updating like this so I have a better record for myself. If others ever find this blog and actually read it, it will also hopefully be more helpful for them as well. Right now I will continue with catching up on some early days stuff, but I might transition to real time posts as well. 

After my fever broke after hours of sleeping, I got bored.
Hence, I channeled my inner 5 year old and took a selfie with my stuffed animals. 

Going back and writing this stuff in complete sentences and adding pictures is helping add to the realization that I only have 2 and a half months left down here and have been here over 4 and a half months. Dana and I were having a conversation about it today and how there are so many things we have left to do while we are here since we possibly could never be back. She leaves in exactly 2 months. I have 3 more weeks than her, but it doesn't seem like a lot at this point. I haven't been going to the parks as much recently and have gotten into a routine with work and coming home and watching Netflix (granted the last month or so was pretty crazy for a few reason out of my control that prevented me from doing much at one point). So we were making a list of some of the things we have yet to do. Luckily we have the same days off now and can hopefully conquer some of these things together.

Here is the list of some of the things we talked about:
-seeing the manatees as they head this way for the winter
-going to the beach before it gets any colder
-exploring the rest of Islands of Adventure (since I have only been to Hogsmead)
-deciding about getting tickets for Very Merry Christmas party (I am definitely going but Dana wants to make sure it is worth it)
-Seeing the Candlelight processional (maybe one that we know people singing in the choir!)

I'm going to end with a picture. I never got a good picture of our apartments massive Halloween decorations (thanks to Amber), but in true Disney spirit I put up our first Christmas decoration this evening (thanks to my mom).

Leah said she wanted to see it everyday.
So she decided it should be prominently hung from the fan chord!

My Apartment and Roommates at Falcon Square

So back in June I never made a housing post, so I figured it would be better late than never, especially since acceptances for the next wave of internships are rolling out so people (including myself) might be thinking of where they might be living in January if they get the exciting news of an offer.

Well, the day we got into Orlando back in June, my dad and I drove through Independence to check it out. I took a picture with Tigger in front of one of the Falcon Square buildings, and come to find out, that is the building I ended up living in!!!

Tigger on my building sign the day before I moved in!

Unfortunately our building is the furthest one away from all of the others, so it can be quite the hike to pick up mail or visit anyone else. I ended up driving to visit my friend on the complete other side of Falcon when he was here during the summer since it was such a walk and that way I wouldn't have to do it in the dark either. I haven't been to the pool at all, which is sad, but the weather is looking like it is turning back around so I might try and spend some time reading by the pool in coming weeks. We also always try and check our mail when doing errands. When it was nice I would go on post-work walks and get the mail (especially after my best friend down here went back to school and I suddenly had a ton more free time) but nowadays we check it less frequent since it isn't really convenient.

Pic of my room taken back in August

Anyways, that was a bit of a tangent, I chose to live in Disney sponsored housing since it was very hard to find reasonable places that offered short term leases, especially ones that were furnished. My rule was that I was only going to live off site if I could find something that would be cheaper. I did get close to getting a vacation home, but it didn't end up working out. Disney housing is nice since rent is taken out of our paycheck, it is furnished, utilities are included, didn't have to worry about signing a lease with other people, etc. It does stink a little that if you look at how much we are paying for a 2 bedroom apartment between 4 people it is a lot, but it really complicated finding housing down here. The apartments are decently sized, and I never really feel like we are on top of each other. Different apartments have different layouts, too. I like the area where we live in a lot. It is really peaceful and doesn't have that touristy feel a lot of other areas with apartments do. While Animal Kingdom is furthest from our apartment, the area by Magic Kingdom is 5 minutes away. Everything seems like it is 20-30 min away from Falcon, but honestly, I feel like that is how it is around Orlando. I just don't think they had a very good civil engineer plan their road ways so things might look close on a map, but the accessibility seems really inefficient wherever you go in the Disney area.

Another view of our room.
Including out closet, which you can walk into and is actually very spacey

I ended up choosing 2 of my roommates before and we were able to list each other. We met through a Fall 2014 Animal Programs Facebook group and it ended up working nicely. I am kind of glad that I chose ahead of time since I knew who I would be living with, and we have similar interests, but at the same time I would have loved getting to know interns from other areas of the company. We did hang out with a few Imagineering interns a lot in the summer, but once they left for school/got another job, we were left to our Animal Programs selves again. I liked getting to meet Nick's roommates, too, who were all pretty much engineer/imagineer people since they were more math-y like me and were fun to talk to.

My desk

We have had 2 other roommates in the course of our internship. The first was an Engineering intern who had been here since May and had lived with 3 Ed. Presenters but apparently they moved them to another apartment for the last 3 weeks of their internship (I was never told this would be a possibility since our internship is longer than all of the others, but apparently Amber was. I hope that we don't end up having to move. I might end up trying to fight it since I wasn't told upfront). Her internship was through August, but she ended up extending through December and moved out to a house with some friends in August (and she ended up being offered a full time position in late September/early October!!!). Our second roommate is still in college and is an Industrial Engineering Intern in the Safety division from August-December. She is from Ohio and is pretty awesome. Since our first roommate had done a previous internship and had been here, she had her own friends she hung out with and when she did hang out with us I was often hanging out with my friend Nick who was only here for the summer. Our second roommate was new and she hangs out with the other engineering people too, especially since none of us have traditional weekends and she goes home more often then the rest of us, but we still hang out with her quite a bit. 

My bulliten board from back in August. (everyone in Falcon gets one)
A few more DWCF buttons have been added since then

Anyways, I am glad that I chose to live here this semester. It allowed me to meet some awesome roommates, be close to a ton of other interns (even if I haven't been able to meet many others besides my Animal Programs friends), got to hang out with Nick when he was here this summer, and overall, it has been a lot less stressful than living in another place would have been (one friend has had nothing but problems, and a few others ended up paying more than us per month even though initially it would have been less). If I get another internship for next spring, I am thinking of finding a vacation home to rent with a few other people if some of my Animal Programs friends end up staying around and are interested.

Also, I just realized I never took pics of the common areas of the apartment so I'll want to do that before I leave and will perhaps try to put them up here eventually (but no promises).

Working at Disney World

If you ever want to know what cast members go through some days, this SNL Indiana Jones skit video is a good example. Many people who come to the parks don't speak English, and even those who do sometimes say/do the most ridiculous things. As a presenter, sometimes people just don't get how to make a W or be a bird (and some children honestly don't even know where they are from, let alone what animals live there). I love working with families from all over the world, but sometimes when it can get frustrating not being able to communicate (especially if they are intent on not every trying to listen/watch you do a badge by hand motions or broken Spanish) sometimes it can be good to have a good laugh at some of the interactions you end up having, because they can actually look kind of like this video sometimes.

Indiana Jones SNL video