Holiday Madness

Gotta love the Holidays at Disney World.  Cuh-razy!

It blows my mind sometimes when I re-realize just how many people are in this world.  Literally, I just stand there and watch as they drop the rope and this sea of people just comes straight towards us.  It's kind of overwhelming to see that many people walking towards you at once.  Okay, so that's why we don't actually "drop the rope."  Two people walk with the rope to the front of the line.  Because my friend was telling me that a few years ago he watched as the sea of people (I'm seriously not exaggerating, literally just imagine thousands of people all power walking together) came towards him and one person tripped and it was just a domino effect.  He said by the end about twenty people were on the ground all piled up.  Of course, no one was seriously hurt, but kind of crazy to imagine.  And a little funny. Heehee.

Anyway, today I worked Pram which normally sucks, but they pulled me out of parking and put me in the line.  I was basically just separating strollers from the actual line.  It's all about efficiency!  As I was standing there this random lady came up to me and threw her arms around me in a hug, "Ohhh!  You're from BYU-Idaho!!!  I love that school.  We're from Provo!"  Obviously, she read my nametag. Full body hug. Not awkward at all.

I decided as I was waiting to find strollers I'd entertain the line and it felt like my PAC days of yelling random junk to groups of total strangers again.  It's kind of fun to be the center of attention and seeing tons of faces looking at me with big smiles on their faces just wondering what I'll come up with next.  I really don't think I'm that interesting, but to super bored people I guess anything is interesting.  I was yelling about how there wasn't much line left and "just a few more miles down and you'll be there."  This foreign lady walked past as I mentioned this, and said with her accent, "Ohh, just some more miles?  Okay... uh, how many minute is that?"  Not too long, lady.  Not too long...

We were sitting at an 80 minute wait.  Actually, we were saying it was an 80 minute wait.  The FLIK cards showed us that people were waiting much shorter, from what I heard.  More like 50 or 60. But when the line is long like that we always say way more because people just swear that they've been waiting in line forever.  FLIK cards don't lie.  Those are the red cards we hand to random guests to bring with them to the front of the line so we can see how long they're waiting.  To that guy who insisted it had been two hours, I seriously pity him for the amount of people who had to cut in front of him for that to happen.

Anyway, one man told me, jokingly, that he'd been waiting "6 or 7 hours already in this line."  So I responded with, "Well then only 2 or 3 hours more to go!"  In reality everyone who got to the point where I was pulling strollers away was only about ten minutes away from the front anyway.

Due to the wait, I've been more motivated to give awesome safaris lately.  And to be honest, I feel like the people who ride my safaris have been more fun, making it easier for my safaris to be better.  Maybe something about waiting in a 60 minute line makes people want to enjoy it more.  But the people are more likely to applaud at the end and get involved.  And I love it when the parents really get into the story with their kids.  "Did you hear what she said?  There's poachers around!  We better watch out buddy!"  And there's no greater compliment to me when a four year old says excitedly in the middle of the savannah, "This is the best ride ever!"  Melt my heart!

Not that all of my safaris are awesome.  I get burnt out, too.  I get exhausted.  Today I was last truck again.  I love being last truck but it kind of sucks because they bring in a lot of the animals.  Last time I was last truck the only animals I saw for the entire second half of the ride were flamingos and the addax.  Super lame.  No lions, no cheetahs, not even the warthogs!  The reason I like last truck is because I get paid extra to sit in the VM lot at the end of the day waiting for fuel.  Literally just relaxing and doing nothing.  Except pulling the truck forward a few feet every couple of minutes.

Anyway, I could just write forever.  I'll stop here and update some other time.  Just rambling, remember?  My special talent. Heehee.

Hopefully I'll have more interesting stuff to write about next time.  I'm moving into my new apartment soon!  That'll be fun!

DAK PAC

Yesterday I got to work PAC in Animal Kingdom for the first time ever!  I was actually supposed to work on Thursday, but due to scheduling issues and extensions and such, they ended up taking me (and all other Safari Drivers) off of the PAC team.  I was pretty bummed because I was so excited, but that just meant yesterday I was even more excited.

Working PAC in Animal Kingdom is just like I expected it from what people told me.  Everyone I knew who worked both said that DAK is way more relaxed and chill about everything.  It was true.  It made me realize just how ridiculously uptight MK was.  However I will say MK is more structured and better at PACtivities (entertaining guests before the parade begins).  In DAK, the cast members are nicer, more laid back, and happier.

I liked how the people who work the parade daily were actually very patient and kind to us new people.  Had we been in MK, they would have been talking down to us, gotten aggravated, and been overall just annoying to deal with. 

At one point, a little girl stuck her head out from under the rope.  Instead of running down there, screaming and calling to the girl to get back under there or else she'd die, the cast member quietly, calmly walked down to her and bent down to her level to explain that she needed to move back.  Very nicely.  Fortunately, the cast in DAK don't need to be such sticklers because the floats are much more manageable, less dangerous, and easier to drive.  In MK, the float drivers have a much harder time seeing guests in front of them so it really is a bigger deal if people go out in the road.

Anyway, just my opinion on the differences.  I can't wait to work PAC again.  I did have to upset some people when I explained that they weren't allowed to get to the Safari during the parade (they could, they just had to go way down and around out of their way, or they could wait the 10 minutes for the parade to be over, which is a long time for excited vacationers to wait).  However, I successfully kept my area clear and I basically completely owned that place.  I think everyone eventually understood.   I've learned to acknowledge the fact that people are upset about stuff.  Instead of, "No, you can't go through here it's closed." it's better to say, "I'm sorry.  I know it's inconvenient right now, but I can't let anyone through because the parade floats are moving and it's dangerous.  The parade will be over soon, or if you'd like you can walk around."  People are a little more likely to not yell.

Anyway.  Good times. :)

Today I had more training.  We got to walk through Africa and learn all kinds of things about our town and it's history that I didn't know before.  Really, really cool stuff.  I love how Disney constantly has training for it's employees.  Absolutely love it.

Anyway, I'm hungry so I'm grabbing dinner.  Meatloaf!  Mmmm. :)

I Love My Job

I love it when:

people applause at the end of my ride!

little kids tell me my safari was "wonderful!"

little kids cry when they "have" to get off at the end of the ride.  "But it was too much fun!"

the gorilla (who looks exactly like Kerchak from Tarzan) is out in the morning or evening and I can go over and watch him for a few seconds.

the animals walk in front of the road up ahead and my guests freak out. "Oh my gosh!  Look!  There's giraffe in the road!  Oh my goodness, we have to take a picture of this!  I'm sure it never happens." False.

a group of like thirty safari drivers start at the same time and together we take up about half of the bus going back to the Pride Rock

I come around the corner at the end of the ride to "Little Red" and everyone on the truck, in unison, goes "Awwwww!"

I hear the parents making sure their kids are learning from what I'm saying. "Did you hear that?  Those Ankole cattle use their horns to cool off!  Cool!"

I talk to guests on land and tell them that I drive the trucks too and they act all surprised like it's a really big deal!

children (and actually adults) ask the following questions about reality:

"Were there really poachers?"

"Is that a real tree?"

"Are those rhinos for real?"

"Is this ride on a track?"

"Are those ostrich eggs real?"

"What are the cattle guards for?"

"How do you get the birds to stay without flying away?" (they can indeed fly away... you would never guess how we do this actually!)

"How do the lions stay with the addax without eating them?"  I once had a mom ask me this, wondering, "So do you just let nature take it's course out there?"  I just love that it is so hard for guests to figure out just exactly how we do it.  Usually it's a little girl around the age of ten asking this question. (it's okay, we don't let the lions kill the animals who are endangered... we have our ways)  And yes, I went around today to see the cheetah eating a recent kill.  Very nice...

And my personal favorite.  "So do you chain the animals to the ground to keep them in the proper places?"  How inhumane do you think we are!? What part of "free roaming" reserve do you not understand?

I love my job!

Opening Trucks Is Just Not My Thing...

This morning I started work bright and early at 7:15am.  Meaning I opened a truck.  I made sure not to pick 24 this time, from past experiences.  32 seemed like a good number.  I went with it.

I went through all the opening procedures (takes about 20 minutes) cleaning, sweeping, checking, double checking things, etc. etc.  Filled out all my paperwork and finally went to drive the truck.  As I put the truck into drive and pulled forward I heard a loud squeaking sound.  It only lasted a second and I didn't think much of it.  But as I went to drive around the VM lot, I realized it was happening each time I accelerated.  I decided to tell the manager when I went to get my paperwork signed off.  The last step of opening a truck is to get the leader to sign off the paperwork, then you drive on to the ride path.

I pulled up to the leaders and as I put my truck in park and explained what my truck was doing to the manager, a loud alarm went off.  I looked around stupidly for a second thinking, "Is that my truck?  Can't be... I checked the whole thing!"  Turns out my aux brake light and alarm went off.  Just like last time.  Now the truth is (I swear it normally works like this... just not with me apparently) when that happens, most of the time a simple reset will fix it.  So I turned to the manager since she was right there, asked if I could do a full reset, she said yes and I did.

And then I went to turn the truck back on.  Nothing.  Crank... Crank... Nothing.  And that's when we decided this truck was no good because apparently the squeaking sound was from yesterday and it had a loose belt too.  Lame.

So she had me pull around the lot, park the truck, shred the paperwork, and start from square one opening a different truck.  And this time I didn't get to choose the truck.

Fortunately it wasn't 24 they gave me.  That would have been hilarious though.  But no, I was put on 12.  I went through the paperwork to open 12, swept, did the evacuation ladder, everything.  Then drove around the lot, yet again.

As I went to sign off the paperwork, I almost accidentally signed under the number 32 because that was the first truck I opened.  I mentioned this near mistake to my leader as I signed under the number 12, and let her know we might want to double check the paperwork to make sure I filled it out for truck 12 and not 32.  There are three different places on the paperwork where you verify what truck it is.  I accidentally circled truck 32 in one of those places.  So I had to pull back into the lot and refill out all of my paperwork from the beginning (fortunately I didn't have to actually do everything again, just the check sheet).  But still.  Super annoying.  Finally, third time around, I was able to check out.  Oi!

I'm thinking I'm just bad luck when it comes to opening trucks.

Stupid Things From the Mouth of Dianna

I shouldn't do the safari when I'm tired.  That last sentence was my original title of this post actually.  But it's true.  I need to get more sleep.  Here is a list of the stupid things I said on the safari today... during my 8 hour shift of driving in circles talking about animals who randomly jump into the road in front of me.

"Flamingos are the lightest pink of all flamingos." ....no.  That's not right.

"Ostriches can run up to 70 miles an hour!"  ....nope.  Not right either.

"The Ankole Cattle's long horns can grow up to 6 feet in length and 20 feet around at the base!"  I actually said this one a few days ago... the guy behind me repeated, "Feet?"  and then I realized what I said.  Fail.

"Watering holes like this one up here on the right are great places for black rhinos to hang out!"  Guest response, "Umm... that's the left."  Me: "I always fail at directions."

"And up here on the left you'll see some giraffes out there in the distance."  This would have been normal to say.  Except there were no giraffes within sight.  In fact there were only elephants.

We sell this shirt and it just seemed to fit this post like a glove.

"These crocs can snap their jaws shut with over 12,000 pounds per square inch of force!"  Yep... that would be a gross exaggeration.

Fortunately I caught every one of these and was able to correct it.  I just wish the guests would have laughed at me.  I think it would have made me feel better.  Usually I would just pause after saying it and then say, "Nope, that's not right..." And then I'd correct myself.  I've certainly learned my lesson about turning my brain on autopilot.

One time I came around to see the ostrich and accidentally called it a giraffe.  I corrected myself in a way like this, "And up here to the left you can see a giraffe.... wait... noooo, that's an ostrich.  Just kidding!  Whoever caught that gets two points!"

Anyway, final point: Dianna needs more than 6 hours of sleep.  Or else.

Also.  I'm tired.

Rainy Day

It's been raining all day long.  All. Day. Long!  Rainy days in FL are great, as long as you get to stay home curled up in a nice warm blanket with a good book and some hot chocolate.

Unfortunately, I didn't get that luxury and instead made my way to the bus stop bright and early (actually it wasn't bright... I woke up before the sun did) at 7am in the drizzling rain which was there to ensure that everything near Orlando maintained sogginess all day long.  All. Day. Long!

It was also cold today.  Freezing, actually.  So cold that we had to turn on the heaters on the trucks.  And after several months of no use... well let's just say they were smart to announce in the morning that there would be burning smells coming from the trucks and that that would be normal because we would have had lots of worried call ins from people thinking their trucks were on fire.

But it was still a fun day.  The animals were really active this morning.  I actually heard a giraffe today!  I heard it make noise!  And after coming home and trying to look up the noise again online, I'm finding that actually, it's super duper insanely rare to ever hear one.  But I did!  I was driving around and I heard this kind of quiet moaning noise that sounds closest to something a sheep would say (which makes perfect sense because in The Lion King show they tell you that they sound just like sheep... it didn't sound exactly like a sheep, but that is the closest animal noise I'd relate it to).  So cool!  I heard it and did a double take, wondering where that noise came from.  I was on an empty round and I turned my head and looked at the giraffe to my left and there she was and she even made the noise again.  I have no idea why, I'm sure she wasn't upset and she wasn't really even close to my truck.  Absolutely the coolest thing ever!

I also heard the hippos today.  They're much, much louder.  I actually had guests too, and I'm always a little sad at the lack of excitement I get from people when rare things like that happen.  We even saw a hippo out on land today since it was raining all day.  I told them it's very rare to see them out on land during the day, but I think I was more excited than they were!

No sign of the cheetahs all day.  Kind of a bummer.  Although usually they're pretty far away anyway, and they're kind of hard to spot.  The lions were mostly hiding most of the day as well, however there was a short time this morning when they were both out and licking each other.

The elephants were playing with each other.  They kids kept pushing each other around with their trunks.  So cute!

I never saw the addax and only saw the oryx once.  Mandrills, though, were out and visible all day long which is really rare, actually!  Crazy!

Anyway, I won't go through all the animals out there, but it was an interesting day.  Just when I think I'm getting to know the animals, or decide they're predictable, they change things on me!

On The Truck... Day 43-ish

I often look in the mirror at my guests as I drive my truck.  Obviously, that's a good thing to do, I make sure the guests are staying seated and sometimes when I tell them there's an animal in a certain direction I like to see how many are listening (or how many actually understand English).  It's also nice to watch in my rearview mirror for the direction people are watching in case they spot an animal I don't.  When I see several of them looking and pointing in one direction I try to look too to see what they see.  It's very rare that they actually see something I don't, and sometimes it's an animal that's so ridiculously difficult to see I don't even bother mentioning it.  I refuse to mention some animals that are near impossible to see because when the majority of my truck can't see it, it's just a let down for everyone.  But I digress...

So my story for today.  I was showing everyone the Thompson's Gazelle's to the right.  And the Patterson's Eland, also to the right.  As I talked about them I glanced up in my mirror to notice a woman on the front row.  She had a really nice, big camera, and while everyone was looking to the right at the animals, she was quite obviously taking pictures left.  I looked left again, to make sure I hadn't missed an animal.  I had already scanned that area, but hadn't noticed anything.

Finally, just as I noticed a single animal over there, I heard the woman's voice confirm the animal she saw.  "Brandon, look over here!  A squirrel!"

She was taking pictures of a lonely squirrel hanging out on the grass as I pointed out the very obvious (and numerous) animals to the right.  I had to turn off my mic from fear of them hearing me laugh.  Totally awesome.

A random manager got on my truck halfway through the day.  I literally had no idea who this woman was.  I had never seen her before, she didn't say a word to me, and she left before I could talk to her.  I'm hoping it was a good thing she did my safari.  Unfortunately, while she was on my truck, we had an animal stop.  Just as I approached lions an ostrich walked right in front of my truck.  I stopped my 10 feet away, but then it walked right up to the truck so it was literally inches from the front of my truck.  And then it just stood there.  Staring at me.

Fortunately, with every animal stop I've ever had, my guests have been great sports.  Everyone was laughing and making jokes.  We were stopped long enough to make the ride go down.  Animal programs actually had to come out an move the ostrich.  I was totally honest with the guests as the truck pulled up, "So, I have no idea what's going to happen here, but I can tell you we should be on the move shortly."  I told them all the information I knew about ostriches and all I knew about lions, since both lions were up there.  It was one of the most fun animal stops, but I was really nervous with the manager person on board.  (I don't really know that she was a manager, she was just dressed like that... she could have been way more important, or not very important... I really have no clue)

Anyway, today's been a fun day.  I ended up going to work an hour early because they called me this morning asking if I could and I would never turn down extra hours.  Then I realized that despite the fact that I came in an hour early, I only got paid for fifteen extra minutes of work because the hour early turned my 6 hour shift into a 7 hour shift meaning I needed to have an unpaid 45 minute break in there.  Also, because I had to hurry in to start my shift early, I drove the car.  So basically, I made 2 extra dollars but spent 3 for driving.  Fail.

Other than that it was fun, though!  I love my job!  And the people I work with!

Oh Jabali

Jabali is the baby elephant.  And he acts exactly like a little kid.  He can't just walk anywhere, he just has to run.  And he's always looking for attention from the adults.  The older elephants just laze around, slowly walking or drinking or whatever.  And then Jabali comes in and runs underneath them or rubs up against their sides or something.

Well, the awesome thing about today is that I got to hold right by Jabali and the other elephants.  Not only that, but I was running an empty round.  So there were no guests on my truck, I didn't have to spiel or entertain anybody, and there were no other trucks within sight of me where I stopped.  I just got to sit there, listening to the ducks and watching the elephants play.  Or mainly, Jabali annoy the adults.  He's also a climber, just like a little kid, seriously.  There's the watering hole, and there's a way for the elephants to just walk down to the water's edge to get a drink.

Jabali walked around and tried to get attention from the elephant that was doing that, and when he failed he left her and walked over to the only part of the bank where there's a kind of cliff that goes into the water.  And then he kind of slid down backwards on his stomach.  So.  Stinking.  Adorable.

And the whole time I was just thinking how much I love my job!  I got to sit there for several minutes before we were back on the move.  Even then I pushed it a little bit longer and stayed all the way until I saw the next truck.  So great!

On another note, I signed up for Rosetta Stone today.  Apparently I have free access to Rosetta Stone.  But you have to be put on a 3-4 month waiting list and I've never worked here for long enough before to join the list.  But, since now I'm planning on staying through next year, I went ahead and signed up today!  I can't wait!  Hopefully I'll get to start sometime in January.  They also told me that when I do get access, I'll have full access to every single language Rosetta Stone puts out.  I seriously can't even WAIT!

And my final awesome story of the day... After my last safari, a 12 year old boy came to the front of the truck to talk to me.  I often get guests, typically adults that come to the front asking me extra questions (was that rhino really real?) or wanting to take my picture.  Sometimes a concerned little girl will come up who's worried about the lions eating the addax.  But today, it was this boy who excitedly told me, "That was the best safari ever!  And I would know!  I've been on three today!"

He has no idea how good that made me feel.  I mean, really.  It's hard to impress a 12 year old boy.  That comment alone totally made my day!  I seriously do appreciate compliments from guests.

Especially since just yesterday I had a kid the same age who spent the whole safari behind me saying things like, "It's not really a two week safari... it's way shorter!" and "I don't think that lion's real!  If he's really real, make him move!" or "That wasn't really scary!  I knew that was going to happen!"

But really, I always appreciate compliments.  And I'm sure my other drivers would agree with me as well.  They never get old!  And just to clarify, I like my safari, but it is in no way the best.

What a great day!

Food vs. Candy

I had a big group of foreigners on my truck the other day.  In the middle of the savannah, I looked in my rearview mirror to find one of them passing candies out to the others, over three rows of them.  They were all passing the sweets around taking bits here and there.  They were all in the front three rows so I stopped the truck and asked if they could please put the food away.

Their response?

"Noo, no, eet's okay.  Ees not candy."

"Yes, I need you to please put that away.  It's bad for the animals if it accidentally falls out of the truck."

"But, no.  Ees not food.  Ees candy."

Food vs. Candy?  For the record, candy is food.

As a side note, all went well.  They did kindly put it away very shortly after when I explained that candy, too, was not good for the animals and needed to be put away because of the smells.  They even applauded for me at the end of that safari.  I was very surprised at that since I figured they'd be mad at me for making them put away their food candy.

Every day brings a new surprise, a new challenge... a new story!  I love my life!

Pictures of the Safari!

I got to see a baby pelican yesterday!  I knew the birds were nesting, but I had no idea there were babies so as I pointed out the hippos and noticed a tiny little head peeking out of the nest to ask mommy for food, I kind of got really excited.  "And over there you can see a baby pelican sticking it's head out from the nest!  That is so cool!  I've never seen that before in my life!"  I don't think the guests believed me... you know, since I also told them we were in Africa and we were planning on a full two week safari.

For the record, that's a pink backed adult pelican in the photo above.  The babies are, obviously, much smaller and their beaks are tiny.  So stinking adorable. I wonder it the one I saw hatched that day...

Oh yeah, and we have hippos. :)  It's pretty cool when they open their mouths really really wide for a breath or yawn or something.  I feel bad when I'm coming around the corner and I can see one doing that, but the guests don't get to see it because as we come closer, they close their mouths and submerge.  Ah well.

Below is a sight that nervouses us safari drivers, but in the end is actually very, very good.  White rhino crossing.  This one is in the process of walking, so all is well with the world.  This just happens to be the exact same spot I was in just a few days ago where the rhino actually decided to stop, right there where this one is.  And he just stood there, looking around.  I seriously could just see my brother's attitude in him.  "Oh, am I blocking your truck?  Oh... goodness... I just don't know what I could do about it.  Maybe I'll just stand here acting totally innocent like I have no clue that I'm making the ride go 101.

 Some more white rhinos.  The one above actually did end up joining his family, so all was well.  You can also see what our trucks look like a little from this photo.  That truck coming around the corner from where we are is actually really, really good spacing on that driver's part.  Congrats to whoever that is. :)

 This is where I drove around once and found mom elephant with baby, sitting under the water right here with nothing but the tops of the backs and their two little trunks sticking above the water.  They were side by side and their trunks were intertwined with each other.  Cutest.  Thing.  Ever!

And on a totally separate note, this is my roommate Erica and I meeting our pal Chip.  Oh, and also Dale. Heehee.

Six Hours Later

I'm thinking it's going to be one of "those" days today.

After not even six hours of sleep, I'm already very tired.  And I'm going to spend the next eight hours driving around in circles.  Then Walmart.  Then a goodbye dinner for one of my friends.

Yeah, so one of my friends is leaving.  She just can't afford to stay with the hours she's getting and the minimum wage pay and another year of school to pay off.  Which is perfectly understandable because I've been getting 30-32 hours/week as well which is the least I've ever gotten since working for Disney.  And the really stinky thing about that is that I'm in a job where I can't pick up shifts.  I used to be able to pick up extra hours, but my job doesn't allow it.  I'm just hoping that during the holidays things will pick up.

Anyway, back to my being tired.  Not only did I just go to bed six hours ago, but I spent one of those sleepless nights where I woke up every hour or so freaked out that I missed work, or missed my alarm.  So I set four alarms, just to be sure.

Then my roommate came home.  She's always extremely quiet and never wakes me up, but it woke me up.  Then I felt terrible because one of the alarms I accidentally set for 3am instead of 5am (my Ipod still thinks it's in Idaho and I can't get it to believe otherwise!).  And I totally tried to sleep through it for quite a while before I realized what it was.

Now I'm eating cereal and heading down to the bus stop to begin my awesome day of looking at cute baby animals and explaining things to people who don't speak English.

On The Safari: Randoms

On Strollers: Stroller parking is one of my many jobs.  It's actually called "Pram Parking."  Because "Prams" are strollers.  Anyway, it's a fun job because it's the only job where you actually get to interact and talk with other cast members as well as guests.  It's also not such a great job because parking strollers and keeping everything looking good and organized is really, really hard.  But we encounter funny things too, every once in a while.

I can officially say that I have now had a parent attempt to leave their child in the stroller while they went on the ride.  Many parents do so jokingly.  They'll jokingly ask about babysitting and such.  But then there was that one dad.  Who pushed his stroller, with four year old in it, into our area (which is what we like them to do... just we prefer them to take the child out first), and continued down the walkway leaving his four year old happily munching on his Pringles and watching the birds fly around.

It took us a second to track him down since he just continued walking and didn't speak English.  We told him he needed to take his child with him, and he got mad at us!  He actually got mad at us because he said that we told him he wasn't allowed to take the kid with him because his kid had Pringles.  Okay, the Pringles can't go on the ride, but the kid can.  Crazy!

We ask the guests to unload their child from the stroller quickly, and/or in line to make the process as smooth as possible.  It's always annoying when a parent takes five minutes to unload their stroller because they have child, other child, certain buckles, rain shades, food, candy, cameras, purses, etc. etc. to deal with.  This is very understandable.  They are tourists and there is a lot to keep up with.  I just really appreciate it, though, when we have very simple people who have nothing but a backpack and a small foldable stroller with a kid in it.  It's always a relief.

Sometimes guests don't like us to park their strollers.  This is really annoying, but again, understandable for those with trust issues. But it's hard on us because there's a fairly specific system that we use in order to keep everything looking good and organized (and keeping it easy for guests to later find their strollers - for example: park strollers in one places, "limos" in another, foldables are together, and big clunky singles in another, etc. etc.).  But then others come in and mess it up.  But, overall, it really is a nice job.  Plus we get fans.

On Fastpasses: I am thoroughly amazed at the amount of guests who don't understand the Fastpass system.  The more I learn about it, the more I can see where people could get confused, but still.  It's always been a very simple concept for me.  You go to the ride for which you want a Fastpass, you put your park ticket in, it spits out a Fastpass that says "Return between 'A time' and 'B time'" and you return between those times to skip to the head of the line.  You can't get another Fastpass until your current one expires OR two hours from the time you got it, whichever comes first.

I had a very angry man today who showed me his Key To The World card (the card that Disney Resort guests get that is basically their room key, but they can also charge money to it in the parks... kind of like a credit card, and it is their park ticket to get in as well) and insisted that he had paid "good money" for it to have Fastpasses on it and why wouldn't I let him skip the line when he paid "good money" to skip to the front of each line for the duration of his vacation.

It doesn't work like that.  I tried to explain how it worked to him, but he was so mad he couldn't even listen.  He just walked away grumbling about how everyone changes their stories and Disney gipped him out of his "good money."  I literally couldn't even get five words out.  The funny thing is, the way Disney works, if he had just talked to me we were slow enough that I could have just given him some Fastpasses to "make up" for his anger and such.  But he wouldn't even listen to anything I had to say.  He just wanted to yell.  Lame.

It's the worst when I get people who don't speak English asking about it.  It's hard to explain in a foreign language.  But people think you have to pay extra, some think you have to have a Fastpass in order to ride the ride at all, some also get Fastpasses and then still enter through the normal line.  At the very end, right before they get on the truck, they'll pull it out... this always confuses me because I'm wondering what in the world they're thinking it's for.  Weird.  And then of course, they get mad that they paid extra and didn't get anything.

Don't worry though, I get really, really happy guests too!

On BoCo: Booking Coordinator is another really fun position, but it can get extremely boring when it's slow.  You basically stand at the front of the line scanning for food and drinks, making sure everyone is "appropriate" to ride (everyone, even children and babies has to have clothes on, including shoes, which we have to enforce sometimes because parents will strip down their kids when it's hot sometimes), and counting the guests and helping the wheelchairs and such.  I had two little kids the other day who came through and were your classic Disney kids who were unbelievably excited about everything.  "We went on Everest!  It was so much fun!"  "No, my favorite part was Dinosaur, but it was really scary."  "Yeah, she was scared, but I didn't even close my eyes even once!"  "Yes you did!  Remember, with the big dinosaur!?"  "No I didn't, it was so much fun."  "Oh oh, and we got to see Tigger!  We saw Tigger!"  "Mom, where's the autograph book, I want to show her his autograph because we really met him!"

Cutest thing EVER!

On Cute Things:  Baby elephants drinking the water together.  Rhinos rolling around in the mud.  Lions playing, pacing, and climbing.  Giraffes running (actually that looks a little more awkward than cute because their bodies are so long and gangly... it looks like it's got to be hard).  Thompson's Gazelles wagging their tails like puppies.  Baby mandrills the size of my foot running around playing with each other (okay, so my foot is an awkward thing to compare them to, but I couldn't think of anything else that's their size).  Warthogs leaning down on their elbows to eat.  Hippos freaking out at the birds that land on their backs.

I get to see this stuff.  All. The. Time. :)

On Free Stuff: Definitely one of the best parts of any poor college students life (or anyone's life, for that matter) is free food.  I love that Disney randomly has these picnic things where the managers cook for all their employees and we all pig out on the food that is served to us by our managers.  It's just great on so many different levels.  But anyway, yesterday they made hamburgers and hot dogs with Disney potato chips and every kind of dessert imaginable.  Seriously, there were so freaking many desserts.  I'm pretty sure every manger must have brought one, and some more than one. 


Anyway, along with all that free food (which in and of itself was awesome) we had a raffle with prizes.  And nearly everyone who entered won something.  I won another copy of the Toy Story 3 Commemorative Edition on BluRay and DVD.  Goody!


On Playing: I've been out playing a few times lately.  I'll try and put up pictures soon.  LOTS of pictures.  Yesterday we went to Hollywood Studios and then Beaches and Cream and then visited some resorts.  So much fun! :)

Just Living the Dream

When you work at Disney, and someone asks "Hey, what's up?"  or "Hey, how are you?"  The correct response is, "Just living the dream."

The good news is I picked up a shift so I got to work Thursday!  More hours!  But the bad news is that means I only got one day off this week.  Which means only one day to catch up on sleep.  And instead of catching up on sleep yesterday (and laundry, and groceries, and cleaning) I woke up at 7am again and went to the parks with some friends.

I know it's pathetic, but despite having worked here for the past two years, there were still some attractions I'd never been on, mainly because I had decided they were boring and lame.  So I never did them.  Yesterday, Chelsey made me do the ones in MK that were like that.  So I went to Tom Sawyer's Island, watched the Country Bears show and did the Hall of Presidents.  Surprisingly (actually, I really shouldn't have been surprised, this is Disney after all) I really enjoyed all of them.  Especially Tom Sawyer's Island.  I couldn't believe I'd never been there and now I really want to reread the books.

After MK, we went to Blizzard Beach and met up with the boys.  I did the Summit Plummit twice, which is why I'm bruised all up and down my right side today.  I think somehow I accidentally slammed my body into the right side of the slide at the bottom.  It hurts!

After that we ended up at EPCOT after a lot of confusion and meeting people and, of course, the daily thunderstorm.  We went on Soarin' and watched IllumiNations, which is basically one of the best shows ever.

Such a great day!  Unfortunately I only have pictures from the morning since I didn't have my camera in the water park and later it was pouring rain.  But take my word for it, it was fun!

So then today, I had to work at 8:15am.  But due to rotten bus schedules I got to work at 7:30am.  Meaning I left at 7am.  (I'm not complaining about getting to work early because A, I have a car and B, I work with really fun people who also get to work early and we all have fun hanging out)

I opened a truck which I haven't done since training, but I did just fine.  And I only got one ride around before being bumped for my first break.  Then, later I did a round and I came back to pick up my next group of guests and a trainer jumped into the front seat next to me.  I was in the middle of spieling and doing the ride, so I didn't really have time to ask him what was up, or why he was there.  I just kind of went with it and did my spiel.

We went through the whole ride with him and his clipboard taking notes.  I was thinking the whole time trying to figure out if I was in trouble, doing something wrong, had someone complained about me?  I had no idea!

Finally at the end I let the guests off and turned to the trainer to ask what was up.  He was doing "show control."  Apparently, it's a common thing for trainers to randomly do rides with us and listen to our spiels making sure we're still doing it right and we're not veering too far from the script and driving correctly, remembering speed limits and such.  He said I did everything just fine and complimented me.  He said the only negative thing he had was that I sounded kind of nervous, however I was still able to sound energetic and happy... just a little nervous.  Not sure how those go together.

Well of course I was nervous, I thought I was in trouble!  Although it did make me think, because while I was nervous, I thought I was doing a really good job completely hiding it, but apparently not.  Anyway, I need to work on stage fright, I guess.

Later I got to work Departure 2, which is just about my favorite position out of all of them.  It's the one where you ask how many and then assign guests a row.  It's like a never ending tetris puzzle, where the pieces are constantly not going where you want them to go, jumping out of line, or where a piece says it's a blue rectangle when in fact it's a square.

I'm not even kidding.  I would ask people, "How many in your party?"  And the first person would say three so I'd put them in a row and it would turn out there were six people.  I can understand a party of five saying they are four because one is a baby or something.  But really?  Three people being five adults and a child just doesn't make any sense to me.  And it happened a few times.

I would also tell people "Row 4" and they'd go to row 3 or something.  At one point I had assigned them to row 8 and went to the next guests to tell them where to sit, when I turned around again I found that every member of that party had happily decided they would each get their own row, taking up row 3-5... but nobody in the one where I had put them.

But it's fun.  It's like a never ending puzzle that's constantly changing and needing to be fixed.  I have to be constantly thinking and figuring stuff out and fixing things which is fun for me.  I totally love that job, as frustrating as it may be sometimes.

Anyway, I'm still living the dream!  Still loving life!  (and taking more pictures to post on here shortly!)

Tidbits Of My Life!

The reason for lack of pictures is lack of desire to take pictures of myself after work... because I look like this:

But, since you asked, there ya go!  Me in my hot costume.  Literally.. it's hot.  It's covered in sweat, just like my entire body in this picture and my hair is a frizzy mess due to constant sweat and sticking sticky headphones on my head all day.  Blech!

Speaking of my costume, take a look at my patch on my right arm.  The one that says where I work.  That's not really a patch.  We call it our "target."  Because when you do stupid things you get punched there.  My first trainer told me about it, and warned me about an older woman who's a trainer who likes to punch her trainees in their targets when they make mistakes.  I was fortunate enough not to have her as my trainer.

However, I was unfortunate enough to sit beside her in the break room one day.  She started telling a story to the people across the table about a trainee she had who went up on the curb.  "And so I punched him!  Right in his target!" She said.  And she punched me!  Me! I was the innocent bystander listening to her story!  So funny.

Below is a picture of how FLIK cards should not be dealt with.  (no worries, this picture was taken well before park open)  Those cards were a stinking crazy mess.  And instead of helping, I thought I'd take pictures!

I don't really have any more pictures.  Legal pictures that is.  Since technically all backstage pictures are off limits, and that's the only time I have to take pictures of the trucks.  But suffice it to say, they are coming!

So, more random tidbits of my life:

I was driving the truck around empty the other day (reason explained later).  The animals tend to do more interesting things when there are no guests in the truck, I've noticed.  Except that one time the hippos let out these huge loud noises and yawned really big.  That was awesome and the guests went crazy.  Totally got an applause at the end of that one!  But I digress.  So the other day the mommy elephant and her baby (we have a lot of those, but a particular pair...) were hanging out under the water super close to the truck with nothing but their little trunks sticking up out of the water, and they were intertwined together.  So stinking cute!

Then the lion actually stood up as I came around and started walking towards me.  It actually kind of frightens me when the really big animals walk right towards my truck.  Particularly the white rhino since they actually can come right up to the truck.  But anyway, it was the first time in my life, I think, when I actually thought that a lion looked slightly scary instead of relating him to a soft, gentle Mufasa or Aslan.  This lion looked almost ravenous!

While I'm on about lions, the male and female were cuddling today under the tree.  Well, cuddling as much as lions can cuddle.  Super cute.  Again, they only did that when I was driving alone.  When I had guests most of the day I didn't see them at all, and the few times I did see the male he was just laying there.  Then at one point, the male sat up and moved his head and my whole truck freaked out.  It was soooo funny!

There's a part of the safari when music comes on.  Every once in a while I'll say something like, "Oh!  This is one of my favorites!  Sing along, if you know it!"  No one knows the song, it's just some random Swahili song.  And no one ever sings along, and really I don't expect them to.  I just say it to say it.  However, one time I said that and three little kids in the back started "singing."  Cutest sound EVER!  They were trying so hard and I had to turn off my mic I was laughing so much.

I had a little girl who was very concerned today that we keep the lions so close to the addax, and don't lions eat them!?  How do we prevent the lions and cheetahs from eating all the rest of the animals?  She was so concerned, but I assured her that the addax were safe.  I left out the part that in real life, that's just how it works.  Sad, really.

My favorite guests are the parents with little kids.  My least favorite, I recently decided are teenage boys and Brazilian tour groups.

Teenage boys because they spend the whole ride screaming about how "I just saw the elephant peeing! Hahaha, did you see that!?  He was peeing! Hey, hey talk about how it was peeing!"  and "Is that real?  I don't think that's real.  In fact I'm pretty sure it's fake.  Why do you pretend that's real?  You shouldn't lie.  Are you sure that thing's real?  It looks manmade!"

And the Brazilian tour groups because they spend the whole ride singing "La Cucuracha" over the sound of my voice.  I'm not even kidding you! That literally happened today!  30 of them.  Got the truck to themselves, and not a single one spoke a lick of English.  I just gave up spieling because they were too busy singing their songs (they really did break into a chorus of 'La Cucuracha' for quite a while through Ituri Forest) and yelling about the "olifants!"  The only English word they did know was "Stop!"  But they kept yelling at me to stop in places where I couldn't stop.  So annoying.  But for some reason, this group applauded at the end too.

Lots of groups applause at the end!  I love it when that happens!  It feels great!

To explain what I said earlier, we have some shifts where we drive empty trucks around at the end of the day.  That's because the park is closed, so the ride is closed.  But the animals need to stay out longer and the animals are trained that when the trucks stop, it's time to go in.  However, the animals can tell the time of day anyway, and often I'll find them standing by their gates anyway.  The lion paces a lot at that time of day.

This is really long, so I'm going to finish it here.  But there are just a lot of random things about my job I'll have to document at some point.  For the record, I love it!  I love my job!  And I'm scared to be so incredibly happy and satisfied with my life at this point because I'm scared that means something bad is going to happen soon.

But that's just a part of my personality. :)

Kilimanjaro Safari Driver!

You are officially reading the blog of the latest and greatest Kilimanjaro Safari Game Driver! (minus the other CPs that assessed and passed today as well, of course!)

Yep. I passed! Thank freaking goodness! I did the driving and spieling this morning, and the rest of the day was lands. I worked every single possible position today, the driving literally only took up about an hour and a half of the 8 hour day. I had so much fun!

The paper test was the worst part, mainly because so many of the questions are poorly worded or trick questions. Or the answer is just plain wrong (it's a sort of universal test for numerous attractions, and our attraction is different than others on some things). But I had a nice assessor and we went over everything and I was able to prove that I knew it.

Surprisingly, the hardest part wasn't learning the facts, even though I was mostly afraid of that. And to be honest, I've got driving down pretty well now too. I'm thinking, now after I've worked every position, the one that's going to get me the most is Departures. That's the one where we ask how many in the party and assign them to a row. I get so flustered and stressed there. So many people don't listen, don't understand which truck they go on, make up their own rules, don't speak English, refuse to obey, walk around in circles, or whatever other variation they have. It's frustrating for me. Fortunately, it's something that always tends to work itself out with minimal annoyance from guests, so it's not too bad. So even that goes well for the most part.

I'm so stinking excited to officially work here! I love my life!!

Last Day of Training... Hopefully

I was a little nervous for work this morning after my two day weekend of not going over the script at all. That is, during my conscious hours. It turned out fine, though. The very first thing we did this morning was take a truck out. There was a celebrity in the park today who I didn't drive around, but I'm fairly certain I wouldn't have recognized her even had I driven.

As I drove, I suddenly felt something on my arm. I continued talking as I reached over and flicked it off, realizing it was a giant stingy sort of bug. It scared the crap out of me, and I was really proud of myself that I continued my spiel as I silently swiped it off. But then Jeff had to get involved. He started teasing me about tourrettes as I spieled. Then I was working to not giggle as I spoke about the wildebeest. And that's when I accidentally said that "1.5 wildebeest make up the largest migration in the world" instead of "1.5 million wildebeest." Then I was teased for that. Even harder to not laugh. Thankfully, the guests didn't notice and as I listened to them speak amongst themselves, I didn't hear a word of confusion. Then again, I wouldn't be surprised if none of them spoke English.

I also worked grouping today. You know, the person who stands at the front of the line and asks "how many?" Easy. Or so it seems. Except that people don't like to listen. Or they don't speak English. Or, worst, when they pretend to speak English and don't and then try to put themselves on the truck or go places they're not supposed to go. My favorite is when the following occurs:

"How many?"

*blank stare*

"How many people do you have?"

"blank stare* "....yes!"

"How many in your group?" *I hold up my fingers to show counting*

"Yes, group! We have group!"

*facepalm*

Today I also saw the big tour group coming down the line. The one where there's about 30 matching bright blue shirts with tons of noisy kids with the chaperone flags. And then the guests I'm loading start to say things like "Looks like we got here at a good time!"

My trainer wished me good luck and then disappeared. The average age in the group was about 10 years old, but the worst part was that when the first kid got to me, and I asked him how many, he responded "Twenty-four." And then I learned that "Twenty-four" was the only word in English this kid, or any member of the group for that matter, knew.

After telling me the number, the kids flooded the loading dock. Entirely out of my control. I finally decided that they'd get their own truck, and explained to one of the chaperones how I wanted the kids loaded. The chaperone, thankfully, spoke English and translated to the group. All I got across to him was "Put four people per row. Four per row!" Then we had an extra couple of rows on the truck I could load so the line kept moving smoothly. Thank goodness!

That job, and the disability area, were the final areas for me to train. We covered both today.

And so alas, I find myself finished with training. Hopefully. I say hopefully because tomorrow is my assessment day. And if I fail assessment then I have to do more training. But hopefully I'll pass. I've never met the guy who's going to assess me, so I'm just hoping he's nice. But I'm also pretty confident that I know everything I need to know as well.

So tomorrow is the big assessment. Hope I pass!

Sleeptalking and Blizzard Beach

Apparently I've been studying for work waaaay too much. Apparently, last night I was sleep talking to my roommate. I was going on and on about some nonsense. And then I "forgot" the word I was looking for.

"I'm awake. Because I can't go to sleep because the first one can't go until the second one has the sleep."

"Dianna, are you asleep?"

"No! I just can't think of the word... it's like.... something you have to say before the next one can't go to sleep.... but... like when I say 'move all the way to the left, place your bags in the net bag by your feet, and please stay seated for the whole ride.'"

"You mean your safety spiel?"

"Yeah! You can't sleep before the second one does the spiel... thing... sleep."

So, I don't really know exactly what I said, but according to my roommate Erica, that's kind of how it went. I was so stinking tired.

Anyway, today I slept in as late as I wanted. 7:45am.

Then we went to Blizzard Beach and spent the day hanging out in the water, and I didn't even get a sunburn! We had to leave a little earlier than we would have liked because there were thunder and lightening warnings and they made us get out of the water "until further notice." But we had already done everything we really wanted to do. Then Erica and I went to Celebration and had lunch and walked around the town a bit. After that we were entirely exhausted.

I've actually been exhausted ever since, but I don't want to sleep just yet because then I'll never fall asleep tonight. Then again, maybe I'll be just awake enough to sleep talk some more.

I swear, this job is going to make it into every single aspect of my life. For the rest of my life.

Driving With Guests! Finally!

I got to drive the truck today with guests on it! First time ever! And it was so much easier than I thought it would be. I was seriously so nervous before today as to whether or not I was actually going to be able to pull this attraction off. I felt so behind, and like such a pathetic actor. After driving the first day, I realized that the driving part wasn't so bad. And memorizing the animals wasn't even that hard. But pulling everything together was a beast!

But I did it! I actually did it! I drove the truck, with guests, and didn't even mess up! Except for that one time... when I temporarily forgot what the bontebok was called. But I remembered... eventually! My trainer kept telling me that I was going to call it a bedonkedonk.

I thought it would be harder with guests, but it was actually easier. For one thing, having the back full of people makes the truck way easier to drive around. It's less bumpy too, which is nice. Also, the guests were all so happy and excited to be there it helped me get excited about the animals. I loved telling them random facts and having them be impressed at my random figures. "Yes, the white rhino can weigh up to 5,000 pounds!" "Ohhhh, ahhh!"

I even pulled up to each dock correctly, and my trainer didn't even say a single word to help me. Everyone agrees that docking is the hardest part. Which I think is why my trainer made me dock at Cheers 2 every time we came through. It's the hardest one to dock at, and it's not uncommon to have to back trucks out of there for pulling in wrong. Backing the trucks is a pain. My trainer is really hard on me, but as frustrating as it is, it's probably a good thing.

He did have to regulate my speed and stopping during the safari, though. I kept going too fast, or forgetting the stopping points. There are very specific points during the safari that you're allowed to stop, and you can only stop at them in specific conditions, so it's hard to keep track of that while watching the guests, listening to the radio, watching for animals, talking about the animals, keeping on the ride path, and keeping up with the script.

But I did it! And I feel so stinkin' accomplished! I think I'm gonna go buy myself a sundae. Just because! Ahh, what a good day. :)

I Blame Lackage of Sleep

My schedule had me starting at 10 something. But because my trainer had a class, and I like my trainer and didn't want a different one for one random day, we both switched our schedules earlier so we started at 7:30. So I had to wake up at 5:45 to catch the bus at 6:30. Meaning I hardly got much sleep last night. Or the past few nights. But it was worth it. Minus the stupid things I've done today. So let's start the list of Dianna Dum-Dums today.

It all started with me taking the bus going in the wrong direction. Now, I got to DAK okay. But once there, I thought I'd take the backstage bus to my location. It's really within walking distance, but I was tired, so I decided to take the bus. But I got on going in the wrong direction. Then, I realized this. I got off the bus at the stop that's right before where the bus turns around and starts heading in the right direction, the direction I wanted to go. As I walked from the other end of the park (really it was just the Rainforest Cafe) to my location, the same bus passed me twice more. Fail.

Later, I was going through all of the signals and codes I had memorized with my trainer. I finished with Signal 8. Another trainer from across the room threw me a random pop question. "So what's the difference between Signal 70 and Signal 8?"

I had no clue what Signal 70 was. I knew I should have known, but I didn't remember it being on my list. So I answered the best I could.

"........62?"

My trainer would have accepted that. She wasn't impressed.

And then, later, we were going around the ride path. I was driving around, spieling, and purposely talking about every animal in the Savannah except for this one that I didn't know. Of course, my trainer noticed, pointed it out to me, and asked me what it was.

"Ummm, Sable Antelope?" "Nope." "Ummm... it's definitely not a Patterson's Eland..." "Nope." "Ummm... oh! Yeah! I remember his name! But we can't say his name. Umm.. a waterbucket?"

It was a Waterbuck. But my trainer kept making fun of me about waterbuckets the rest of the day. I'm pretty sure that torment will never end. On the upside, I know exactly what a Waterbuck is now.

In my defense, the animals really do look very different in real life than they do in their pictures.

The other problem I had today was I forgot my water bottle. That's a mistake I'll never make again. I was so thirsty by the end of the day that I bought a Powerade out of one of the vending machines (I never, ever buy vending machine stuff) and drank the whole thing in one minute. And was still thirsty.

Then I was on the bus going home. Someone asked if any of my roommates worked in the MK. I told her no, realizing about five minutes later that actually, every single one of my roommates works in the MK. Fail!

Anyway, it's been a crazy day! Totally crazy! Hopefully tomorrow will go better and I'll remember things better. Not likely though, since I'm going to play tonight. :)

Days Two and Three of Training

The past two days I've been training with my "real" trainer, Jeff. Yesterday was kind of boring. We didn't even get to go on the trucks at all except a tiny bit in the morning because we were opening them. Most of yesterday was spent inside with me memorizing random facts. Jeff would give me a stack of flashcards and have me memorize them. Then, when I did that, he'd give me another stack to memorize. This went on for a loooong time. I also had to read about 60 pages worth of "protocol" stuff from the training book. It's required that all new trainees read that stuff. I was falling asleep during it. Not really out of boredom, but out of sheer exhaustion. Working for Disney is tiring!

Anyway, I also went over the spiel several times yesterday and generally did a lot of memorization and such. Today was much more fun! This morning we went out and I actually got to do a lot of the land jobs. The "Land" jobs are the ones like standing at the front of the line answering questions, working the Fastpass machine, working the Fastpass line, working the disability area, seating, etc. etc. I learned all about the Fastpass machines, which was my favorite part of the Land. Plus, today was extremely slow and the guests were all very happy.

I nearly busted out laughing at the guests though at one point. When I was working the Fastpass line I literally had like five guests in a row come and ask me where the bathroom was. And by "in a row" I mean the first one wasn't even out of hearing range before the next one was asking. I seriously wondered if they were doing it on purpose to mess with me. Because I've done that with a group of my friends to certain cast members before. So funny!

After doing lands in the morning and memorizing a few more animal flash cards (there are seriously, so many of them!) I had a P&P meeting with the manager. They basically sat us down and said, "Okay newbies, if you do this, this or this, you'll get fired. Be happy. Have fun."

Then we had lunch and the rest of the day was driving! I spent three hours in the driver's seat today, but it literally felt like fifteen minutes. The first time I drove around the forest I nearly had a heart attack. I don't think I noticed a single animal the first time around. I was way too busy watching my turns and making sure to make "wide turns." They really beat the "wide turns" idea into our heads.

The second time I felt a little better and by the third time I was mostly comfortable. But I was scared to get too comfortable because that's when problems happen. However, by the third time I actually was able to look around for animals. By the fourth and fifth, and all other times (I lost count of how many times I went around, but it was probably about six or seven) I was trying to drive and look for animals. And, let me tell you, it is way harder than it sounds. Not only do you have to memorize the "speed limits" of the different zones (which they are ridiculously specific about... you can't go too slow or too fast, keep a solid 4mph in some places. it's really hard to maintain an exact and steady speed) but you have to watch for animals, do the spiel, make sure nothing's in front of you, keep the turns perfect, and watch for certain safety lights that may flash at you. And I didn't even have guests to worry about today!

I didn't "almost hit" anything because we were going so slow it simply wasn't possible. However, I drove insanely close to several animals including a giraffe, two ostriches, and a white rhino. The rhino scared the snot out of me because there's a place on the reserve where the white rhinos are basically always hanging out. At least, I've always seen them in the same place. When we went to that place, and the addax was there instead, I just figured the white rhinos had gone in or something. Then, later, at a place where I didn't even know the white rhino could get to, I went around a corner and there was a white rhino literally two feet from my truck, walking around. His nose probably came within inches.

Now, I know from training that white rhinos have very poor vision. I was watching him in my rear mirror and could have sworn he was about to walk right into my truck. Fortunately he didn't, and I was left with only a minor panic attack. Actually, I'm pretty sure my whole day was a minor panic attack.

Anyway, I love my job. A lot. In case you can't tell. I'm really, really enjoying where I work. I love all the people, I love the work, I love the animals, and I love Disney! I'm so stinking happy that I get this opportunity. This location may even, possibly beat EPCOT. Unless I get termed for getting into an accident in the truck. But I'm working really hard to make sure that doesn't happen. :) Ahhh, I'm so happy!