Universal Studios: Disney With Water

So I've discovered from my second visit to the Univeral Stuios, that they really offer the same attractions as the four Disney parks with one exception: nearly every attraction at Universal features water of some sort. I was joking about it for a while, noticing that some attractions sprayed you with a little water during parts, but today every attraction I visited at Islands of Adventure, except the Dueling Dragons, got me wet. Poseidon's Fury, Spiderman, and the Hulk all got me somewhat wet. That isn't the half of it though. The Popeye ride, the name escapes me at the moment, is insane. If you have ridden Kali River Rapids at Disney's Animal Kingdom then you know that it is not that great, it gets one or two people wet, but it's a fun little ride. The Popeye ride drenches you, I won't ruin the surprise of the ride, but there is a significant increase in the amount of water used in the Popeye ride.

Little Wonders

It's amazing that life can go 180 degrees in an instant. You can go from happy to sad in a matter of milliseconds. Someone you felt so close to can take something the wrong way, and it can all be lost. Things can be shattered and never be repaired. Sometimes it's your fault and sometimes it's not.
But it's best to not dwell on the sad times. I was at work, dredging away in my most unfavorite job at Rosies All-American Cafe, and a realization struck me. We had all of these people working "extra hours" at our location. "Extra hours" is a term for basic work shifts people can sign up for outside of their normal work location often for an increased pay rate. Unfortunately, at our location we seem to attract slackers and people who don't understand how to do simple tasks, so the extra hours folks just seem to gum up the works. This wasn't my realization however, I noticed that in our trainwreck of extra hours workers, one of our regular cast members was doing a stellar job. Besides just being a good hardworking cast member with a good attitude, this cast member has some handicaps that prevent her from doing some of the more difficult jobs at our location. Even so, she was plugging away at helping to fill orders during our busy time, and doing things that the other "extra hours" cast members had trouble with. She had a few spills during the shift which almost caused her to lose her focus, but she held tight and got back to the task at hand, and I was really proud of her.
This isn't the best part though. We have a way or recognizing cast members who are doing hard work, and to do so we fill out a card that is signed by a manager and then we give this card to the cast member doing the hard work. They can then enter this card into a drawing, but generally it is the fact that the cast member is recognized for their work that is important. When I presented the cast member who worked so hard with me at Rosises with her card, she was extatic. She went around showing it to everyone at the location and held it with genuine pride. She even showed me that I spelt her last name wrong, but she didn't care. That made me laugh. But ultimately I was genuinely happy that she was so happy from recieving this recognition for her hard work. So it goes to show that lifes little wonders really can do some good too.

God Forbid I Do Anything to Help Anyone Other Than Myself!

So I'm fed up with work once again. I've said this before, and I think I've pin-pointed another reason why this is so: very few if any people at work are out to help anyone other than themselves. One would think that at a place where "Dreams Come True" that Cast Members (these so called "Dream Makers) would by and large want to do things to help make dreams come true. Unfortunatly, at least at Sunset Market Ranch, this is not the case. I am sick of working with people that hate their jobs, don't respect the people they work with, and think that they should get paid for standing around all day and doing nothing (not to mention that the complain when a manager actually does come in and asks them to do the work they are assigned). I would report this to a manager, but what are they going to do, honestly, they can't fire everyone. If anything they would probably just tell me to report people who aren't doing their job, which won't help either, because the "stern talking-to" they recieve doesn't have any force behind it. I'm basically just hosed for another 34 days.

The Sky is Falling!

So today it rained. In fact, if one were to calculate our rain that we accumulated today, I would put it in the "buckets" range. This did a few things for us at Disney-MGM Studios. First, it decreased the amount of guests at the park. This was quite nice considering that the past week has been absolutely insane. Second, it increased the consumption of coffee, hot chocolate, soup, and pretzels at the park. This was less good, because most of those things take a heck of a long time to prepare. I ended up closing Min and Bill's Dockside Diner, which is easy, especially since one is given two hours to close it. I'm a little irked though, because I haven't had a day where I haven't closed something since the first month or so I worked here.
There are a few things I haven't mentioned in the blog that I wanted to during my long hiatus. The first is that if you haven't checked out When Curiousity Met Insanity then you are missing out. A wondeful artist, Bri-Chan and a grand writer Zippitydodah27, are crafting an interesting love story between Alice and the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland. Bri and Elizabeth (Zippitydodah27) were both members of the Disney College Program at Disneyland, and they share a lot of the same love of Disney that I do. Another thing I need to share is that Meet the Robinsons was AMAZING! I'm really proud of Disney on this one. I totally knew what was going to happen about 10 minutes into the movie, but they kept me hooked all the way through. I'm so hooked, in fact, that I had my picture taken with Wilbur and Louis at Disney-MGM and Wilbur is currently gracing my desktop. If you haven't seen this movie, drop whatever you are doing and see it now.


... Why aren't you seeing Meet the Robinsons?

Unlucky Number Thirteen

So my only day off this week was sort of a bust. I went to Walmart (the bus was 30 minutes late), did my laundry, and sat around my apartment. This was much more pleasureable than going to work, however, I would have enjoyed being at the Magic Kingdom more, but the hordes still own it. Next week though, the Spring Break crowds will decline and my precious parks will be mine again. I plan on going on a pin trading expedition to get more Peter Pan pins. It should be fun.
I bout one of the "Learn to Draw: Mickey Mouse and his Friends" books, and I realized, once again, how much I like to draw. I've been drawing Mickey's face all night and I almost have it down to a science. Hopefully I can get him down perfect, and then I can draw him for little kids waiting at the airport.

Uncertaintly and the DOOM of Spring Break!

So it seems that I have neglected this blog, as I do with most blogs, but I do hope to remedy this in the last 40 days I have here at Walt Disney World. We are smack dab in the middle of what I like to call "The DOOM of Spring Break." It has been so crazy at the park in the last few weeks that I haven't been able to think straight. This week I work over 60 hours and next week I work over 55. It's pure insanity. I'm also kind of amazed that guests can get into a line for food and see that the line is at least 40 people deep and then complain when they reach the register. Honestly people, if you go to the most popular theme park in the world on one of the bussiest weeks of the year, and get in a line that is over 40 people deep, how can you not expect it to take a long time? I've almost walked out of Rosie's three times this week and the only thing that is keeping me there is my College Program friends and the fact that I would have to buy a plane ticket home.
I'm also pretty uncertain as to whether I am returning to the University of Idaho in the Fall. My original plan was to go back in the Fall and finish up the classes I had left and student-teach in the Spring. However, as luck always has it at the UI, they aren't offereing the classes I need to take to graduate. I'm pretty angry about the whole thing, but I'm hoping that maybe taking the Fall semester off to work and maybe move to Seattle will give me some new perspective on things. I don't know for sure yet, I haven't talked to my parents about the whole thing, but we'll see how the next few weeks pan out. That's all for now. I have to run off to catch a bus so I can work my second shortests shift of the week eight and a half hours. It's only one of two below eleven hours this week.

I Can't Smell Anything

I'm not posting very much today, because I'm not having a very good day. I woke up this morning to find that what I thought might just be some allergies was actually a cold, and as a result I spent most of the day at work coughing and achey. I had to spend the afternoon at Tuscaluca Turkey Co. in Sunset Ranch Marketplace at Disney-MGM Studios, and all I can say is that I'll never eat a turkey leg by itself ever again. I want my turkey legs to come in pairs, with bodies of turkeys. To cap it all off, I had to ride home on a horribly overcrowded bus ride where all conversations were in a different language, so I could only think about my cold. Also, all my friends from back home that I wanted to talk to were busy when I got home, so I'm just sitting here in my PJs thinking that bed is the only alternative. Maybe sleep will make the icky day go away.