Week 10

Sunday, July 31.

Asia - Anandapur
10:30-19:30

Steve wouldn't get off my back. As I started my trash run at 16:00 the perfectly blue sky suddenly filled with big stormy clouds and we could hear thunder rumble in the distance. I still started my run, I figured if it started raining I would go grab my rain gear in the break room and if there was lightning there were a couple places for me to hide and wait. About twenty minutes in my run Steve (another Custodial, no one "special") started telling me I was working too slow, that the rain would start before I finished and that I should concentrate on getting the trash out of the Kali River Rapids queue line. I answered that I would be fine, I could easily get my rain gear and it wasn't raining yet. So he walked away and stood there staring at me while I emptied a few more cans. In a desperate moment he emptied one of the cans for me trying to make it more efficient and told me he would go grab the trash in the Maharajah Jungle Trek while I grabbed Kali so I would be done before the rain, at that point I told him that I would be fine (yay me for being firm), that the rain wasn't there yet and that if I couldn't get it done now I would finish later. I think he understood that I was being serious, plus it was time for him to leave for the day so he gave up/in, wished me luck and left for the main office. Ten minutes later, as I continued my run the clouds mysteriously disappeared and the sky was once again blue with an incredibly burning sun. That taught me to stay firm, and amongst other things, not to fear the rain. As soon as you tell yourself it doesn't matter if it falls or not it doesn't, just like carrying rain gear on you during Parade Pre-Lining keeps the sun out and the rain away (most of the time).

Monday, August 1.

Off - Rain, Applebee's, and Walmart. Leaky buses and room cleaning.

I believe Ricky worked at 18:00 or so. We were planning to go to Walmart on Tuesday, but since we had time I had the brilliant idea of going on Monday. At 11:00 or so we decided to go back to Golden Corral, the incredible buffet down the road. By the time we walked to Applebee's (about half way to Golden Corral) the rain started pouring so we ducked into Applebee's instead. Ricky had the riblet basket and I had the provolone stuffed meatballs. Delicious. It also appears I am getting converted to mango, the mango lemonade tastes wonderful.

By the time we finished eating it had stopped raining so we made our way back to Vista and had a few minutes to catch the 14:00 bus to Walmart. I checked the schedule and realized that the buses to Walmart ran every half hour for once, not every hour as we had thought. It turned out for the best since we didn't make our Walmart trip an hour long but an hour and a half. Ricky wouldn't believe me that it ran every half hour but he was proven wrong. Just throwing that out there =D
The buses we are provided are fine, you know - free stuff and all, but as soon as it pours out it pours in as well. Half of the seats have to be checked before sitting. A car would be nice, more groceries, healthier food, etc etc etc *hint hint*.

After our trip Ricky got ready for work and I went into cleaning mode and straightened up my room and closet.

Tuesday, August 2.

Off - Epcot with Ricky.

When we went to Animal Kingdom last week Ricky was not happy with leaving "late", so I figured for once I could pull myself out of bed early and we would be able to make it to Epcot by 8:53 and be there when the park opened. On Monday Ricky worked late and at 7:30 I was not ready to get up so I texted Ricky to ask him if he wanted to sleep in more or if he wanted to leave. SLEEP was the basic answer. So we pushed our day back to 10:00, with no need to go to Walmart that afternoon/evening we were in no rush. At 10:00 Ricky texted me all bright and shiny, I didn't hear it, I finally pushed sleep away at 10:30 and rushed to get ready. So we made it to Epcot by 11:30, not that bad.
We skipped the rides in the front half of the park and opted for a walk through the eleven countries surrounding Epcot's lake in the hope of finding food. We rode the Three Caballeros ride in Mexico, it's a boat ride with songs and amazing decors, and the boat ride in Norway called Maelstrom.

Mexico.

Norway.

I also took photos of a few characters, like Snow White, Alice, and Aurora. We went through most of the stores but refrained from purchasing anything, go us!

Mulan waiting to hug a little girl.

They actually walked through our restaurant at lunch time.

Aladdin waving at the crowd.

Snow White seeing her crowd for the first time.

Aurora walking back to her Castle.

Alice and mini-Alice.

For lunch we decided to eat in Morocco, at Restaurant Marrakesh, where we had couscous and beef and chicken kebabs. There was a belly dancer and baklavah for desert. If I can say anything, it was definitely worth the price. I also got to keep the souvenir glass from my drink, I had a Moroccan Sunrise, it had pineapple and strawberry juice with orange water in it, yummy yummy yummy.
Our goal is to eat in the fancy restaurants of each of the eleven countries. Apparently the French food we had at the Boulangerie the first time we ate there doesn't count. So far we have eaten in Morocco and Japan. Looking forward to the other nine.

Morocco was halfway through the countries so we kept walking and made it back to the front of the park, by that time we had digested a bit so we had the chance to ride Test Track (I love that ride), and Nemo. The aquariums we can see after the ride are great, with all the little fish from Nemo. We tried to ride Soarin' but we definitely need a FastPass for that one. Instead we went to watch the 3D Captain EO and then went to learn about the five senses and imagination with Figment - it took me all the way back to philosophy and how our senses lie to us... I miss the good old days and 9am philosophy.

We reached the 19:00 mark and decided it was time for ice cream. The food vendor we went to was out of Mickey bars so we wandered over to another one but were interrupted by Edy's ice cream shop. So we ate delicious (and huge) scoops of ice cream. Which amongst other things leads me to ask why I bother to get two scoops when I know I can't eat more than one; Ricky ended up eating three scoops hehehe.
We then made our way out of the park, over to the buses and transited to Hollywood Studios in the hope of seeing Fantasmic.

Oh my, is that a skirt? Florida, what have you done?!

We were a bit early so we walked around and managed to make it to the Star Tours, that thing is fun; the fact that there are multiple plots/endings will force me to go over and over. Disney, how could you!?
Before Fantasmic I grabbed a Turkey leg, I can't resist them. We went over to the Fantasmic stage but there was lightning in the distance so we left, figuring it would probably rain soon or the show would be canceled. We walked around a bit, munching on delicious turkey and ended up in the Pixar area where we went to Toy Story Mania. The wait for this is usually quite long but with the rain that had just started pouring people were starting to leave the area. Toy Story Mania is a shooting game, you sit in a moving vehicle like any other ride, but then each big screen has a setting and you shoot arrows or rings at balloons, plates, chickens, etc. Like any computer game you just try to rack up as many points as you can to beat the person sitting next to you while also keeping a good accuracy level. I'll have to go back there as well. These things are addicting.
The second show of Fantasmic seemed to have been on so we left before the public trampled us and ended up waiting for a late bus. Oh bus system, why are you so terrible?

After making it back to Vista we went our separate way to shower, and by the time Ricky came back over to my place I discovered that I had ants in my keyboard. Small freakout moment for me, Ricky tried to calm me while telling me that the ant problem was not new and I should have done something about it (I had a Payday candy-bar the other day and ants appeared on my window sill. That situation was taken care off by washing the ledge with dishsoap). We went to Walgreens to buy a little toolkit and Ricky proceeded to try and take apart the bottom of my computer to see if the ants had gone beyond the keyboard.

Scary sight. I never want Gilgamesh taken apart again.

The computer wouldn't come apart easily but we know that the hard drive and other small parts haven't been touched so I calmed down a bit. Since then I've been killing one ant at a time as they come out of the keyboard or run across the screen. I have not seen any for the past two days (as of the 9th).

More photos will be added when I add them to Picasa.

Wednesday, August 3.

Asia - Anandapur.
13:30-20:00

I don't recall anything going wrong that day, to be fair I had to think about it a minute to recall if I was placed in Anandapur or Caravan. My closing trash run went smoothly, as always. Once you get used to the cans it really goes by fast.

Thursday, August 4.

Main Entrance - Restrooms.
9:30-19:30 (extended to 20:30)

I was supposed to be Main Entrance streets, but once I reached the office Mary told me I was being switched to the Restrooms in that area because Betty called in. To be honest, when it comes to Main Entrance I'd rather be in the restrooms than outside in the heat. A few guests thanked me for keeping the area clean so that made my day. I also remembered to sign in and out of the restrooms every single time, that's a first hehehe.
Mary had me extend my shift until 20:30 so I would be closing. She seemed relieved when I said yes. Who am I to say no to more overtime?

Friday, August 5.

Africa - Harambe.
13:00-19:30

I love Harambe, the International Cast members are great. I keep going to "Harambe School" to learn about the different areas they are from. I don't remember much but I'm sure by January I will have a few facts put together. For instance, to go from one South African country to another you need a passport, it makes it difficult when living at the border. Thuso (African International) asked me a few sentences in Spanish so he can wish guests Happy Birthdays and how they are. I think the international aspect of Disney is the best part. The people we interact with are wonderful and from all over the world, even within Custodial we get Spanish, French and Vietnamese.
I had my trash run at 16:00, way too warm outside but a cloud cover started to build so it wasn't as bad as it could have been. I also took the time to clean the lips and lids of each can, any manager would have been proud of me. I figured Justin, who did the closing trash, probably wouldn't. At 18:30 it started pouring and Barb called us to remind us to cover the drums, so I ran out of the break-room and the cooling feeling of the rain kept me from putting my rain gear on. I was drenched within the half hour, but it felt amazing. Until I go to the bus, at which point I froze until I got back home and in the shower. Totally worth it.
Facebook tells me this was the night the Custodial CPs met up at Applebees to say goodbye to Edna and Luna who were going back to Mexico and Cancun. It was the first time I hung out with them outside of work since I missed out on Aida's half-birthday party. It was fun, and Ricky (who I forced to come along) was nice enough to take a photo for us.

Photo from Dan's phone.

You can see on the left: Amanda, me, Edna, Luna, and hiding behind her Aida.
On the right: Marcie, Nick, Brian, Huan, Dan, and Van.

Saturday, August 6.

Training - The Magic Unfolds
7:15-10:00
Main Entrance - Bus Side
10:00-19:30

Yeah, between Applebees until 2:00 in the morning and having to get up at 6:00 I obviously didn't get much sleep. I function pretty well on little sleep, I think it's the nerves, they're high strung and I don't crash until a good number of hours later (here until 18:30).
Aida did give me a ride to work since we had our training at 7:30. We met up with Dan and Huan at the Main Office and started on our way to the Cast Services building across the park at 7:15. When we got there the building was empty and dark. We walked around for a little while, something in the back of my mind was telling me that I already new this until Huan told us that when Van and Justin had their early training it was a Pizzafari. And that's when I realized that the schedule had said to go to the Upside Down room in Pizzafari. So we rushed over to Pizzafari and realized that our training group only had one more Custodial (Alvin) so we started on our way only a few minutes late. "The Story Unfolds" is a walk around the park where our trainer tells us stories behind the theming of the park. It's incredibly interesting. He explained the names of the different rooms in Pizzafari, for instance the Upside Down room is filled with murals of ostriches, bats, and possums. The Nighttime room has animals that roam at night, I don't remember all the names but it's fun to see that there is some sense to the madness.
So we started at Pizzafari in Discovery Island and made our way to the First Aid with the ladybug lanterns. He actually couldn't tell us why the ladybugs represented First Aid, I told Dan that ladybugs eat the parasitic little bugs on flowers, maybe that was why and he laughed at me so that was that.
We made our way to Africa where we learned that the village was actually built based on a real African village and that workers from there actually worked on it, building the roofs made of twig that keep the rain out. It reminded them of their home so much that special accommodations were made for them to stay in the park instead of the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We walked through Pangani, we didn't learn much from our trainer, to be fair we work these areas all the time. Dan showed us a rock that looked like a Turtle and when you walk through the tunnel it forms it looks like a Gorilla on the other side. He obviously spent too much time in Pangani. We didn't have time to go to Rafiki's. The train wasn't running yet. We walked over to Asia where we learned that the Yak and Yeti restaurant was only four years old or so, before there were two carts, one with fried chicken, the other with french fries from McDonald's. That explains why people still ask us where McDonald's is in the park. We were told that Everest and its surrounding is all themed as a preparation to climb the mountain, the restrooms are themed as a hotel where supplies can be bought.
Dinoland is a camping ground of sorts, two travelers Hester and Chester settled there and set up camp. Orlando (our trainer) told us that the park owns two trees, of which there are only 300 in the world. One of them is planted in the smoking area of Dinoland. The other one is in the park's greenhouse.
That's about all we learned, the greater part of our morning was spent walking around. We finished our training at 9:00 so we had an hour to kill before our shifts. We made our way to Pride Rock and had a delicious breakfast. I had an egg-sausage-cheese sandwish, hashbrowns, and a biscuit.
At 10:00 we bumped out of training and clocked in to go to work and were told to hurry up and go to the Track Talk. The morning Manager-talk takes place in the outside eating area of Flametree so we got there late but the meeting took up about forty minutes of our morning. Aida and Huan were not happy with having to attend, I was glad to be away from the Main Entrance.
I had the 14:30 trash run on Bus Side which went well but is still a killer. While doing the trash at the actual bus stops everything goes well but the space between the stops and the actual park entrance is incredibly warm. I can understand Ricky not feeling good while on a black road for hours.
It was Greg's last day as a DAK Custodial, he received a full-time job in House Keeping at the Old Key West Resort. Since we clocked out at the same time he offered me a ride home, which only took fifteen minutes compared to the half hour on a bus. Aaaa the advantages of having a car...
By 18:30 I had a splitting head ache but I was so close to the end of my day that I refused to go to the Office, instead I waited until I got home to crash on my bed and slept for about three hours and felt alive again.

Week 9

Sunday, July 24.

Africa - Dawa Bar.
14:00-20:30

So now that the new Tamu Tamu courtyard is open we split up so that of the openers one person takes care of Tamu Tamu while the other takes care of Dawa Bar. The ones who come in later usually help out in both with a strong emphasis on Dawa Bar. So when I got there Tamu Tamu was well taken care of so I went and helped Greg with Dawa Bar. Turns out I like busing tables, you're constantly busy and chat with people. Early on we noticed that something was wrong with the table arrangement, they get moved constantly but it's usually easy to see where they go back, for some reason there were too many tables. So Greg and I moved some tables around, switched small ones with bigger ones and finally managed to get everything back in order. I had the bright idea to move each table over a little bit instead of dragging a large heavy table over a large distance and breaking our backs in the process, Greg said I was smart. I thought it was common sense... works either way.
Closing Dawa/Tamu consists of cleaning up the tables and empty the trash in both areas. Easy peasy. I had extra time so I gave in to my OCD and disinfected all the tables in Dawa Bar (it's done all day each time a table empties, but not all of them at once when everyone is gone).

Monday, July 25.

Off - Post Office.

Going anywhere with this bus service is an epic trip. Wouldn't a car be nice? *hint hint* The trip to the post office is long, which was alright with me since I'm trying to finish my book. I got to the post office to send off two postcards to France and to buy American and International stamps (no future trips to the post office except for packages). That took me five minutes. The bus wouldn't be there for another half hour or so. So I walked around to see the few shops around, Cici's Pizza, Dominoes, a billiard, an Irish Pub, and a little supermarket/gift shop. I went in there and bought some pre-cut watermelon and cherries. So gooooooood. I actually finished my cherries as I wrote this last line. I sat on a bench and read until the bus arrived and then made it home again. That's the main problem with a lot of these trips, going somewhere is a pain, getting back is just a few minutes.

Tuesday, July 26.

Off - Animal Kingdom and Harry Potter with Ricky.

THIS DAY WILL BE UPDATED WHEN MY PHOTOS ARE RESIZED. CHEERS!

Wednesday, July 27.

Dinoland - Boneyard.
14:30-21:00

The rain can go away, just a little bit. It doesn't work on the Brazilian tour groups anyway, so right now it's basically pointless.

I left early and stopped by costuming before work for new pants, a new rain suit, and a new hat. I gave up my hat, I now have a cap, it looks a lot less silly, haha.
I met Wayne today, he was mad that it started raining (part two) right after we finished drying the trash cans in our area and pushed all the big puddles back to the drains. Turns out the big green brooms made my little muscles ache, it made my day go by faster.
They were testing out Primeval Whirl so I had to explain to guests that the ride was not actually running, they were just testing it. People either look sad or angry when told they can't ride a ride. They need to take that thing off of the map for a little bit.
I (tried to) helped a lady who lost her six year old son. She was freaking out and my coordinators were not willing to help me out so we ended up going up to the Nemo area where they have a phone and the lady working there helped us out by calling security. Turns out the son was found before security showed up (they're not the fastest). That's when the first batch of rain came down. I didn't have time to get my new rain jacket.
This was also the day the managers held a meeting near the Dinoland compactor because of its safety hazard. The compactor there is build to be used near a dock where you would need to go up on a small platform to reach into your banana boat. In our situation we go up two steps and have to reach down into the boat. See the problem? Yeah, so did I a number of days ago, reaching down into the boat when on the same level is already a pain in the lower back (har har har), having to reach below our own feet is ridiculous. At least they figured it out, I'm not sure which custodial reported it, it should have been done a long time ago.

Thursday, July 28.

Africa - Pangani.
14:30-21:00

Pangani again, do I love Pangani or what? Actually I really do. The animals are wonderful to look at. I was Parade Pre-Liner with Dan (who took forever) so it was fun. Barb (manager) and Doreen (coordinator) went with us. Barb did all the talking with the crowd while Doreen stuck with Dan until he started falling behind at which point she gave up and joined us as I grabbed trash from both sides of the Parade line.
Greg was on his day off and brought his kids to the park so I got to meet them, they're awesome.
Overall a fun day, my trash run went well as usual. I had the joy of cleaning up a Code V at the very start of it, which relieved the Pangani staff who did not want to take care of it. I decided to dump at the Safari compactor rather than Africa/Asia and a guy from Tusker restaurant dumped my trash for me. I didn't know how to take it, whether he thought I wasn't strong enough or if he didn't want to go back in to Tuskers. I decided to stay positive and take it as "yay, less work for me" and went to dump my recycling.
We're now allowed to throw the plastic bags in the recycling bin because of the bees that fly around. It used to be we HAD to empty the bags.
I also had to cover the drums in Harambe before leaving (almost being late) because Dan forgot to do so. Good job Dan, you owe me one - I'll take one of your $25 pin, thank you.
Dan is one of the five of us who will be here until January and he is addicted to getting the fancy pins so he can look them up on Ebay and dream of all the money he's going to be making off of Disney's back. It won't happen but one can always dream, right?

Friday, July 29.

Main Entrance - Medical Side.
13:00-21:30

It had better be Medical Side, with the crazy heat and humidity Bus Side would have killed me. Especially when I realized that Xavier had two runs in a row, hahaha, sucked to be him. He blamed me for it, I'm usually Bus Side.
Other than that it was an easy day, a bit boring, people weren't pin trading as much as usual, it usually kills a few minutes at a time.
I drank at least a bottle of water an hour and only used the restroom once so I can imagine how bad my body needed the water to regulate itself. Good job for making it through another day Body.
The baby birds are so big! The nests are getting too small for the parent bird with two offspring. They're becoming a bit more noisy as they demand food so the Guests are starting to notice them, it creates other magical moments as they are part of a once in a lifetime experience of seeing Spoonbill babies.

Saturday, July 30.

Africa - Harambe.
13:30-20:00 (Extended to 20:30)

This was one of those weird days where I don't have a radio and I don't have a trash run. It became even stranger when I got to the main office and Doreen discovered that my name had been crossed out of Harambe and "Dinoland Restrooms 16:00" was scrawled in. She joked that I could relax until 16:00 (I wish) and then called Ladonna to ask her where I was supposed to be until then. I was told to go to Harambe until then and sweep sweep sweep. So I put my sunscreen on, went outside to grab my pan, broom, and towels and then went back in to ask when to take my breaks. I was told that being as helpful as I was I could take breaks every two hours or so, whenever I felt like it really. The paper said I was supposed to have a lunch at 15:00 and a break at 17:00 so that's what I did (I extended my break to a second lunch - shhh).
It turned out we also had a Track Talk (you know, where the managers give us the latest news) at 14:30, so I went up to Africa, swept for an hour, found the South African International Thuso to wish him a happy birthday, and then walked back down the Main Office. The meeting took about fifteen minutes so by the time I made it back to Africa it was time for my lunch that I took five minutes early thinking I would have to be Pre-Lining the Parade at 15:30. It turns out that Amandine, the other French CP, was scheduled to replace me since I had to be in Dinoland by 16:00. I left before the Parade so I could make it through Asia and found Jasmine, in charge of the Dinoland Restrooms, and got the AirClic radio from her. She was running late so I told her I would take the trash over to the compactor for her, not to worry, mainly so I would have something to do, the restrooms being sparkling clean.
The Dinoland Restrooms are the ones near the Hester & Chester store and the ones in Restaurantosaurus, they stayed clean the whole time, it was a great place to work. It's always nice to work in a new place/area. It also turned out that a lot of fun people were in Dinoland so my 17:00 break turned into a great lesson with Greg and Nick of the ethics of UPS who apparently use boxes to stand on when reaching for other boxes. Greg drove their trucks, Nick had a girlfriend who worked for UPS and they both agreed on that specific point so it'll be a bit before I outright pick to send a packaged through UPS.
At 18:45, before going to close my restrooms, I went by the Dinoland Custodial closet and found that a mini Custodial get together was there: Dan, Justin, and Rafael were discussing Spanish, and Rafael taught us the easiest phrase to remember "eso si que es" S.O.C.K.S. Huan and Greg then showed up and we all chatted for a while before some of them left for their trash run and Rafael and I left to go close our restrooms.

Today was the last the park closed at 20:00. Starting next week we close at 19:00.

Week 8

Sunday, July 17.

Off.

Our inspection is on Monday so we've been cleaning the apartment. Which means Cristina cleaned the bathroom before leaving for work and I cleaned the kitchen, the dishes and the floors. The rest didn't do shit. I went to get a vacuum at the main office, like usual the lady down there wasn't in the best of moods. I vacuumed the whole apartment except Jessica and Erin's room, Jess said she would do it. By 16:30 or so she decided she wouldn't have time to vacuum before going to work so I waited for her to leave to vacuum their pigsty (at least the main part, you know, the ground I could reach). By the time I got back to the office they were closed, so I am stranded in Vista with no Property ID, therefore no going out of the complex. Am I slightly ticked off at them? yes. They did clean up their room so it'll be alright. And we explained the situation to the Security men so I was able to get Wendy's for dinner.
In the meantime I was somewhat productive watching America's Got Talent and resizing my hundred photographs.

Monday, July 18.

Off.

White Glove Award! We had our photo taken in our PJs, sadly Laura wasn't there, but I'm sure Photoshop can do wonders if we ever get that photo.
I finally caught up a little bit on this blog, added lots of pictures to past entries and added bits and pieces to some blogs. For instance my day off at Animal Kingdom that was never written... what was that?

Tuesday, July 19.

Africa - Harambe.
14:30-21:00

Harambe is a warm place. Very very warm. I believe I did the Pre-Lining, all the way around the park this time. I coached Anthony this time. He should have done it before but every time the Parade was cancelled. He knew where the garbages were but he didn't actually know how we went about actually Pre-Lining. We're supposed to be at the Safari Gate at 15:30 so we can start walking by 15:40 or so. That means Custodials AND coordinators/managers. By 15:40 no one was there so I called a coordinator asking about the managers, Mary told me they should be on their way. They ended up showing up running telling us that we should have left already and they were going to catch up to us on the other side. At which point I put my foot down telling them that we are expected to wait for managers at the gate. They looked at me like I was stupid and told me that wasn't quite true. I don't care, I'm going to keep doing what I was told by the coordinators and wait for them at the gate.
During my closing trash run I was called to go clean up a Code V in the Tusker Marketplace. Turns out that's inside the restaurant where people can eat buffet style. Looks pretty fancy in there.

Wednesday, July 20.

Main Entrance -Medical Side.
13:00-21:30

I got the side I wanted, Dan got Bus Side, he was not happy. Actually except during his trash run he didn't do much. He mostly stood in one spot and chatted with the animal presenters. We went to the Discovery Island back area to get some Powerade before it disappeared and I went to watch the Parade when it came by, it made me get out of my section, but I would do a lot to see the Parade.
We cleaned up two Code Vs, one we found on the bridge to Discovery Island, it wasn't called in, we just happened to be there so we took care of it. The second was called in by the outside Guest Relations, I ended up cleaning it up while Dan went to take care of a lost child.
As far as the animals go, they were trying to get the Babirusas to mate so the male was following the female all day while she acted angry towards him the whole time.

Thursday, July 21.

Main Entrance - Bus Side.
13:00-21:30

Custodial Heather showed me  Spoonbill baby birds! A while ago they placed extra fencing in a V shape against the fence around the Spoonbills and the Flamingos because of four or five nests that were built. Well I didn't realize it yesterday but the eggs hatched and there are the cutest little baby birds in those nests. Actually they're not small, they're a good size and all white and fuzzy. There are also baby ducks, so adorable.
Not much happened, my closing trash was smooth and easy, I was done right on time and had a few minutes to walk the area again - it's still very creepy at night.
Oh! We did have another Code V. It was a bit of a mess (not the Code V, the situation) because Brian and I didn't have the right radios so the right person didn't get the right calls. The office was told that the Code V was near the bag check before the turnstiles, it wasn't. We looked around for a little bit before the manager of the store a bit away from the bag check found us and showed us where to clean up. Fun times. Actually it was fun, Code Vs become a joke when you're not alone to clean them up.

Friday, July 22.

Asia - Caravan.
14:30-21:00

Friday started a little strange. When I got to the office I was told that Trina "had an emergency" and so had to leave, therefore my area was down one person. I went up to Asia to get the radio from John who was leaving at 16:00 and just wanted to get rid of the radio (who doesn't?). Brian who came in at 14:00 had to take over Trina's trash run at 14:00 and then do his own at 16:00, let me just say he was not happy with that.
At 15:30 it started raining, just in time to put the Parade on hold for half an hour and then have it canceled. It was now the Guests' turn to be unhappy. It then proceeded to rain for the following five hours. It was still raining when I did my trash run at 19:30 and stopped at 20:40 when I started my trek back to the office. I love my poncho.
Asia was empty by 19:00 or so, the outdoor attractions had been closed for a long while because of the rain, lightning and thunder. The only outdoor one still running by the end of the day was the Kilimanjaro Safaris in Africa. So overall, after 18:00 the only things left to do were the Kilimanjaro, the Dinosaur ride and watching It's Tough to be a Bug!.

Saturday, July 23.

Africa - Pangani.
14:30-21:00

Pangani is a wonderful place to work. Especially with a closing trash, it's incredibly relaxing and easy. The cans tend to stay rather empty so I did my run in one time and had time left over to walk around Harambe and listen to Alex, from South Africa, complaining about having to close the area when everyone is gone by 19:30 anyway. Totally worth it.

Week 7

Sunday, July 10.

Off - Walmart with Cristina.

Walmart, when you take the bus, is a pretty epic journey. I've gone with Ricky and we made it back alive with a good amount of bags but we kept it realistic considering we take the bus and then have to carry them across Vista and up stairs.
With Cristina that idea doesn't come about. She had to go to the pharmacy to transfer her prescription so we decided to go shopping in the afternoon (the first Walmart bus on Sunday is at 13:00). We ended up grabbing so much grocery it was ridiculous. The good thing was the fact that I bought a little laundry basket so we packed a bunch of groceries in there. The amount of frozen food (meat) and snack food Cristina bought for us was impressive. I also bought a body pillow - not my brightest idea - but it's so big and comfortable I have no regrets. So we had a fun time carrying that from the bus to our apartment. Good times.

Monday, July 11.

Off - I would write something here but I need someone to remind me what I did that day.

Tuesday, July 12.

Discovery Island - Pizzafari.
14:30-21:00

It's kind of sad to write about a day when nothing notable really happened. I got to watch the Parade from very close by. I stood amongst the crowd. It really is a beautiful Parade, each float is great and the people on stilts between them have amazing costumes and dance like pros.

Wednesday, July 13.

Asia - Caravan.
11:30-20:30

I had my trash run during the day instead of the closing trash which is nice because you can take your time and take up most of your day but when you're done there's nothing to look forward to except clocking out. When you have a closing trash run you have a mad rush at the end which I think makes it all worthwhile. Coordinator Mary had me put all the chairs in order near the two food vendors and I found one metal chair that had a strangely twisted foot. It either melted or had a very heavy person sitting on it. I'm voting for a mix of those two things.

Thursday, July 14.

Dinoland - Boneyard.
14:30-21:00

Dinoland is not the most exciting but at least Greg was working Dinoland so we were able to chat every now and then. As soon as I came in Trina (a Seasonal custodial) asked if I could take care of a Code V for her while she did her trash run. I'm sorry to say that I denied her that request (also kind of glad that I stood up for myself and said no). It's important to know that Trina is not appreciated by the other Custodials because of her tendency to slack off (and spend most of her day in break rooms/back areas). So I said NO, and that ended up getting back to Greg who proceeded to laugh his butt off when I told him my side of the story.
We also had the pleasure of noticing that there was no 16:00 trash run scheduled so Greg had to call a coordinator to ask what was going on and we got stuck with two trash runs instead of one. By the end of the first one it started raining. Oh joy.
I met Aanse (I don't think that's how it's spelled but I didn't write it down) who is an older gentleman from a Northern country and has a really wonderful sense of humor. We Custodials have a jolly time now don't we?

Friday, July 15.

Africa - Pangani.
13:30-20:00

This was a weird day, I was not given a trash run and I had no radio. Pretty sweet is what it was. From the moment I arrived I was told to cover the lunches of those in Dawa Bar so for two hours I just stayed around Dawa Bar and the new Tamu Tamu courtyard wiping tables and carrying empty trays back to Tamu Tamu.
At 15:30 I got ready for the Pre-Lining, Greg decided to take the second garbage since no one showed up for it (Brian ended up showing up but the coordinators let Greg do it). We got to the middle of Discovery Island before we realized that the Parade hadn't started. Apparently a storm was supposed to happen so the Parade was cancelled. We turned around and put our garbage cans back where they belonged in the Africa closet and went our separate way.
I spent the rest of that day walking around Pangani and through the Safari cue line. I also spent a certain amount of time chatting with Laura who was standing at the entrance of the Express train telling people that it stopped running at 17:50. The sad look on people's faces is quite sad.


Saturday, July 16.

Asia - Anandapur.
11:30-20:30

I'm not sure why but since my first day almost fainting in Anandapur it has been a bit of a scary place for me to work in, but today made it seem a whole lot better. As I said before I'm not a fan of runs during the day but this was not as bad as I would have expected.
Ladonna told me when I got in to sweep the Kali River Rapid cue line as much as I could, we've been called out on the state it's been at closing. So that's what I did all day, I swept the cue line (fighting the line) and walked the Maharajah Jungle Trek. It's a gorgeous trail to walk, you can see tigers and bulls and birds. For some reason I've been reticent to go away from the path into the "Bird" area of the Trek, but it's silly, it needs as much sweeping as other areas. So today I walked it a few times, and the birds are gorgeous. It's so peaceful to walk through there.
I also chatted with the people working Kali Rapids and pretty much had a great time the whole day. My trash run was easier than I expected. Cue lines in the middle of the day are not always the easiest, but I managed pretty well and found a few shortcuts.

Week 6

Sunday, July 03.

Discovery Island - Pizzafari.
14:00-20:30

I had the 16:30 trash run so I had the chance to see the Parade from a good vantage point, I love it. The Pizzafari trash run is not hard, it's just a hassle to get the cart from Flametree side and then having to go back and forth between the two sides. I showed the route to the CP guy after me. For some reason I can't remember his name, he's from Turkey though.

Isn't it gorgeous?

The best part of working on this side of the Tree of Life is that you get to walk on the trails that go right under it and you can take a close look at some of 325 animals carved into it.

Monday, July 04.

Off - Costuming and pool with Ricky.

We were debating which of the two to do first, costuming won out since it was the important thing to do that day before Ricky went off to work. I kept the shirts I have (I wash them myself, they fit so well I don't want to give them up) but got five new pairs of pants. Ricky got his shirts and shorts. We're still not sure why he has to go to DAK Costuming when he works at Hollywood Studios, I suppose it's just one of Disney's mysteries.
When we got back we put on our swimsuits and jumped into the pool, felt sooo good. We didn't stay long, the pool at 13:00 is full of sun and Ricky had to get ready for work. I spent the rest of the day doing nothing, that's how I roll.
Around 21:00 I felt like a slob with everyone gone to watch the fireworks and Ricky and Lynn at work so I finally convinced myself to move and made my way to Hollywood Studios to watch their fireworks. I recorded it all on camera, it will get uploaded in the very near future. Ricky was working inside for that, apparently he was able to see them as well by leaning on the wall near the door. After the fireworks I went around the park to see it at night. There's something very magical about the parks at night, with all the lights on.

The renown hat.

So full of magic and stars.

The crowd before/after fireworks.

The tower at night.

They had a group performing for a bit during the evening, up until one in the morning so I stuck around listening to them. Ricky finished working at 1:15 so it was perfect timing for me. I got to go backstage and see the Photopass offices and they gave us cupcakes and Fourth of July cake because there were a bunch of leftovers from the day. Nummy nummy! That made the end of that busy day that much better!

Tuesday, July 05.

Off.

It took me a minute to remember what we did, good thing I have pictures to remind me of what happens from week to week.
So on this sunny Tuesday Ricky and I made our way back to Downtown Disney in search of entertainment. We made it to the AMC Theater and went to watch Kung Fu Panda 2. We had silver tickets with reduced prices because we're Disney Cast members (woot!) and free fountain drinks and popcorn (well not completely free, we did buy reduced coupons). I loved the movie, just as much as the first one. The story was original and the art-style they use when going through memories and stories within the story is just gorgeous. I suppose I could have waited for it to come out on DVD but for reduced prices, totally worth it!
After that we made our way to Team Disney, a building a little bit away that has a Company D (with wonderful discounted items for us). Team Disney is a crazy architectural building. We weren't sure what the building was every time we drove by on the bus, now we know, it's all offices offices offices. Gorgeous.

Makes you wonder who designs these buildings.

Ricky!

We went back to Downtown Disney debating between going to Magic Kingdom or home. Magic Kingdom won out in the hope that we would find a funnel cake vendor (we did). We caught the bus to the Contemporary Resort and caught the monorail from there. The Resort is insane, crazy(awesome) design, very futuristic, and the monorail runs straight through it.

That little girl actually stood up on the table. Manners...

Rows and rows of rooms.

In the monorail.

We made it to the Magic Kingdom and went through all the shops to see what they offered, and I must say everything is amazing and magical. While in the candy store we heard music starting up so we made our way back to the main square where a Veteran was honored with the park's American flag. After that we made our way to the Castle where we took pictures and were on time to watch the "Dream with Mickey" show. We then went around the park, literally. We went around to all the different "lands" and rode a number of rides, amongst them Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted Mantion and It's a Small World. We grabbed a Funnel Cake in Sleepy Hollow and kept walking around the park.

Big castle.

Tiny castle!

THE statue to see.

Isn't he just adorable?

That's  all folks! After that we went home.

Wednesday, July 06.

Restrooms Checker.
8:00-17:30

I think that being a restroom checker has to be the best job in the world. For some reason I was the only checker to end at 17:30, the others had to stay until 18:30. As a checker you are assigned a certain number of restrooms and all you do is walk from one to the other checking that the person actually in charge of each restroom is doing their job correctly and help them out during their lunch break. Most times you do it on your own but Raymond had the same ones and didn't have his set of keys so we stuck together the whole time so I could open the custodial closets for him. He has a lot of stories so I spent the whole day listening and not speaking much, pretty perfect in my opinion.
I got to the Main Entrance restroom and then realized that the scanner did not connect to my radio so I had to go back to the Main Office so Coordinator Mary could give me a new scanner (it attaches to the radio). I then made my way back to the restroom, checked them, and we continued our tour. We were in charge of Main Entrance (inside and outside), Camp Minnie-Mickey, Pizzafari, Baby Care, First Aid, Africa (Harambe and Tuskers), and Caravan (Asia). When we got to Camp Minnie-Mickey Raymond's scanner stopped working at which point we realized that it was missing the red glass in front of the scanning ray. So once again we made our way back to the Main Office and as soon as he showed it to Mary it started working again. Apparently that little red glass has no utility. We went back to Camp and continued from there. Harambe in Africa was a mess, a whole wall of toilets (7 or 8) were not flushing, that's a third of that restroom. I went to the break room and called Maintenance. We checked Tuskers restroom and then Raymond and I grabbed bikes and rode over to Pride Rock to check out what was left over from breakfast. We weren't actually hungry so we went back to what we were actually supposed to do. We did a few more trips around the park and had to go from Baby Care to the Main Office again to get chemicals for them to clean the baby changing tables in there.
That's about all the excitement I had for that work day. I went home nice and early. When Ricky got home he brought me a gift, a promise ring =D So now I have a pretty silver band that's all shiny, I'm super happy.

Thursday, July 07.

Asia - Everest.
14:30-21:00

Once again Everest. Not much to say, I like this section, I can spend long minutes standing by the Himalayas watching and hearing Guests come down screaming and joking about it with other Guests. The trash run went well, once you get a handle on it it's a lot smoother.

Friday, July 08.

Africa - Harambe.
14:30-21:00

Harambe! I love Africa, I do believe it's my favorite spot to work in. The Afrikaans working there are extremely nice and one of the outside food vendor was part of my DAKlimation class so we chatted for a bit. In the center of Harambe there's a "school" where at different times during the day one of the Cast members from South Africa will take his or her turn and talk to the Guests about their life and their country. I listen to one of them for about twenty minutes learning a lot, not remembering much but I'm sure it's in my subconscious somewhere.

According to my camera this was also the day we tried to see the shuttle take off. The clouds ruined our chances but we had breakfast on a bench by Walgreens hehehe.

See? CLOUDS!

Ricky having breakfast: yogurt and a muffin.

Saturday, July 09.

Africa - Dawa Bar.
14:00-20:30

All the Custodials that hate being stuck in one small space all day will tell you that Dawa Bar is by far the worst area to work in. I personally love it, I bused tables all afternoon and emptied the trash cans when needed. I carried trays back to Tamu Tamu and enjoyed myself. I made friends with Don who lives in Vista and can't wait to get away from Disney where he sees himself as a slave. He's fun though, and I suppose without someone like that to work with Dawa Bar could be a bit dull.