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. :)

Picking Up Shifts

I picked up a PAC shift today!  It was awesome!  I was a little nervous this morning when I first picked it up.  I've been checking the Extra Hours line every day, numerous times a day because I've only been getting 30-32 hours each week.  And there haven't been any shifts I could pick up.  The very, very few there have been have been during the time I'm already working.  And no restaurants in the area want to hire me because they need more availability than I can offer.

But today was the day!  I was not only able to pick up six hours tonight, but I picked up eight extra hours for next week so I'll have almost 40 hours both weeks.  Ugh.  Pathetic.  Hopefully things will pick up for the Holidays.

But anyway, I worked the Halloween party tonight so I wore the old purple bat hat costume.  I saw a lot of friends from last year, which was great too.  Plus, it was an awesome night.  However, I have learned that there is an attitude among MK workers that is not present in any other location I've ever worked.  They really are more arrogant about themselves and their jobs.  I wish they'd be more helpful to "new" people than the way they are just judgmental and not helpful.  For me, I already knew exactly what I was doing and actually remembered well enough to the point that I was able to help a lot of the new people.  Some of the EHH-ers didn't even know I wasn't statused in that location.

Some of the cast members just knew I was "new" though and talked down to me a lot and it was really annoying.  However, overall it was a really fun night.  My only problem was that I kept wanting to greet everyone with the word "Jambo!" which is an African Safari word.  Not really useful in the Magic Kingdom...

I spent the day in Magic Kingdom and even got my hair cut under the castle!  I've been wanting to get my hair cut for ages, but it hasn't really been a high priority.  Finally today I had time and a ten dollar bill.  I was in and out of Kingdom Kutters in less than ten minutes and she had cut my hair exactly like I wanted it with layers and bangs and everything!  I was very impressed (and when I told her, her response was, "I should hope so, I've been doing this for thirty years!")

Great day overall!  We also got free rice krispies because apparently tonight we did a phenomenal job at everything!  A few days ago at work we got a free pancake breakfast too and calendars!  They were pushing some sort of donation thing.  Yes, I donated.  Fifty cents.  Of my paycheck.  Each week.  For however long I choose to continue.  They try to get all cast members to participate and they have a looooong list of organizations you can choose to donate to.  And you can even choose the percent of what you donate, but they encourage all Disney employees to donate to charity organizations.

I was skeptical this morning but I'm definitely glad I picked up this shift.  I could have had today off, but I had a lot more fun at the parks than I would have sitting on my butt watching TV and messing around on the computer all day.  Plus, my teacher said to do one thing that scares you each day, and picking up that shift honestly did scare me a bit...

Last Day At Disney

My last night at Disney I worked West and they made me Liberty 2 and Roller. The hardest of the rolling spots.



And it turned out to be the first and only night I ever lost the roll. I lost it in the first parade. Of course. I just had to lose it on my last night to scratch my perfect record. Fortunately Christeen was uber nice about it. She didn't blame me at all and David, Christeen and I worked together to fix it (yep, it takes that many... possibly more, to fix a roll).

This photo was taken before I lost the roll. Back when I was still happy to be roller. It's okay, though, because second parade I did it perfectly again. No problem!

Random Story: You'll notice the roll is made for right handed people. Of course. Well, sometimes the silver turny-thingy gets detached from the roll so you can't roll like normal. When this happens the roller has to actually grab the black sides of the roll with both hands and roll like that... much harder. Well, as I was rolling that night, my right arm just got super tired (like I said, it's the longest and hardest spot to roll on the route) so I started rolling with both hands, forgetting the silver thing. Melissa came over to me and asked: "Oh no! Did the roller break again!?" I answered, "No, I'm just tired... no problems." "Nice Dianna. Nice..."

Yeah, you had to be there... it was just funny.

Question of the Day:

What's worse than being in a crowd of nearly 100,000 people in Disney on New Year's Eve where only 1/3 speak English?



Being responsible for that crowd of nearly 100,000 people.

Hardest day of my life.

But at the same time, somehow, it was one of the best!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Christmas Eve

Second post of the day. But I wanted a mini-update real quick. Because I wanted to note how totally EASY and SLOW the parades were tonight!

It was soooooo stinking sloooooow.

Probably cuz I was west though. The south was totally packed. And my friends who worked south said they sent everyone over to us but nobody wanted to come.

Guests have this weird idea in their head that the parade is only able to be seen from Main Street and that if you watch the parade in any other spot on the parade route, it's not as good or has different dance moves or something. They don't believe us when we repeatedly tell them it's good EVERYWHERE!

But it was a great Christmas Eve. We all jumped and cheered at midnight, and our managers kept us informed all night as to the whereabouts of Santa. He passed over Florida and was headed into Georgia around 11:45. He started in Europe this year, though and was somewhere around Italy as I started work.

Now I get to look forward to TOMORROW!!!

Merry Christmas Eve!!!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas! Seriously. It's is by far the most wonderful time of the year. And despite the fact that I have to work a lot and don't get to see any of my family, I still am happy as ever that it's Christmas. I love Christmas in Florida too! Where else can I eat an ice cream sundae in short sleeves in December!



However, today I'm spending my time psyching myself up for this next week. And now I present to you my schedule for the rest of my program. So in case you need me:


12/24---7pm-1am (PAC West)6 hours

12/25 CHRISTMAS!!!---10:45am-4:15pm (PAC West) and then 7pm-1am (PAC South) 11.5 hours

12/26---10:45-4:15 (PAC South) and then 7pm-1am (PAC South) 11.5 hours

12/27---10:45-4:15 (PAC West) and then 7pm-1am (PAC South) 11.5 hours

12/28---7pm-1am (PAC South) 6 hours

12/29---10:45-4:15 (PAC South) and then 4:15pm-10:45pm (Greeter) 11.5 hours

12/30---10:45-4:30 (PAC South) and then 5pm-1:15am (PAC South) 14 hours

12/31---10:45am-1:15am (PAC South) 13.5 hours

1/1--- (I'm also driving my roommate to the airport at 4am this morning) 4:30pm-10:30pm (PAC West) 6 hours

The hours aren't how many hours I work, but how many I'm getting paid to work (because they take out break times). That's why some of them add up a little weird.

January 2nd will be spent doing laundry, getting my stuff together, and meeting my dad who's coming down here. The 3rd will be spent driving my roommate to the airport early in the morning and moving out and getting last minute stuff done before the 4th, which will be the day that I fly out at 7 in the morning for Idaho, arriving at 7:15pm.

School starts on the 5th. Chemistry at 11:30am.

Maybe next year's holidays will be more relaxing!

Teamwork

One major part of my job is breakdown. We breakdown our ropes as close to the back of the parade as possible to make it seem like no parade ever existed and facilitate the movement of the gigantic swarm of guests that always ensues shortly after a parade. The parade route is, in a way, cut in half when it comes to breakdown. The breakdown process in the west is entirely different than in the south.

For this post, though, I will only explain breakdown for the west. Each person gets two position, one for during the parade, and one for breakdown.

The clipper begins the process by going to each of the posts (or stanchions) and unclipping the ropes from the stanchion and then clipping them to each other. The stanchion puller grabs the stanchion and puts it on the nearby cart pulled by the cart puller. The plugger comes next putting the plug in the hole left by the stanchion. At the rear of the process comes the roller who rolls up the rope on a heavy roll they wear on their chest. Both sides of the route break down at the same time, and to be sure each roller is the same distance behind the back of the parade, there are two rope holders that each have one hand on their roller and one hand on a rope and their job is to push of pull the roller to ensure both sides are breaking down at the same speed.

Ideally, this entire process remains within ten feet of the back of the parade. I'm proud to say we usually do a very good job, too, and it's very fun when we all get it right! But we really heavily, if not, entirely on teamwork to get the job done.

The two hardest jobs are clipper and roller. The ropes are very tight, so you have to be strong to get some of the clips off. I've even had guests help me with it a few times after watching me struggle. The clipper also has to be careful not to cut their hand open (something I've also done) because if you start bleeding you are no longer allowed to help in the breakdown process at all. No bleeding on ropes because we have to make new ones and that takes forever!

Roller is hard because you have to be constantly moving your arm rolling up the rope and the roll gets very, very heavy near the end. It's also hard because if the clipper or others have trouble and get behind, you have to make up for it by suddenly rolling super fast. The third reason it's the hardest is that it's very easy to lose the roll. By "lose the roll" I mean the rope sometimes gets off the roll track and instead gets stuck between where your hand is on the handle and the actual roll it's supposed to be on. When you lose the roll, like cutting your finger open, your done with the breakdown process and kicked off the route and someone else has to jump in and roll the rest by hand which is way harder than using the roll.

The reason I'm explaining this is partly for my own memory's sake, but also because I have learned a lot from this breakdown process. I've learned a lot about team work and learning how people work together to accomplish things.

I have stories, but this post is long enough for now. This post may (or may not) be a precursor to other future posts and stories about my job and things I've learned, so be sure to remember it. :)

A Simple Greeter Shift

I had a nice, relaxing Greeter shift last night. I get greeter maybe once a week, sometimes less (Greeter means I work the turnstiles instead of PAC).

My shift was 7:15pm til 1:15am. I got there and we were fairly busy, but I got to be put on the Cast Member entrance. Since it was a block out date for Magic Kingdom, all I did was notify the few cast members that came to me that they couldn't enter with their guests. They were kind of bummed, but no one yelled at me!

After my first break I was put on exits, which is sometimes terrible if I"m by myself, but fortunately there were like four of us doing exits, so that was easy as well. A zillion people were leaving the park, but everyone listened and I hardly had any people trying to walk through my stroller/wheelchair exit.

Then after my second break it was getting late so I got tasking. First I covered turnstiles with a few people, then we restocked the maps and times guides. Restocking takes forever. And we kind of took our time because we knew they were running out of things for us to do. Then I got to make the white board for the next day. (We have a white board in our break room that has all the info for that day on it, park hours, what day it is, when the parades are, etc.)

I finally ran out of things to do and so worked on exits for a little longer before clocking out. It was such a good shift, I had forgotten jobs could be that easy.

And now I'm re-energized for tonight when I'm doing PAC. I'm ready!

Yucky Day

Yesterday was my worst day of PAC ever. And hopefully, nothing else will ever be that bad again, although I'm considering canceling my Christmas day shift, just in case. I'm trying hard to just forget about it... brush it off.

It was also the first day I ever cried on the job. Most of the girls I work with have ended up crying. I promised myself I'd never let a guest get to me so bad I'd cry. But then it happened.

On the up side, I was also reminded of what an unbelievably awesome life I have. I have such incredible friends who will stand by me as I stand by them. They help encourage me to feel better and be better. One even offered to go find me cookies and hot chocolate! I didn't want any... I just felt sick.

I'm grateful for awesome friends.

Thank you world, for still having decent people. And thanks for creating the nasty ones so I know how NOT to act.

Yep, It Seriously Happens...

I, personally, have dealt with every one of these...

"What time is the parade?" (as the parade is literally coming down the street at that very second) "Oh, well where's the best spot to see it from?" (at this point... just go home! you'll get a better view on youtube)

*on their way to exit, with tickets out and ready* "Where do we insert these?" (no need to insert tickets to leave the park) "Oh... well how are we supposed to get out then?" (just walk through the turnstile... it's okay, I promise) "They just turn?" (yes, I promise)

"Do you get wet on Splash Mountain?" (....... O.o ...........no)

"Where can I get a hot dog?" (Casey's Corner, right over there) "No, I'm sick of waiting in lines. Where can I get a hot dog without waiting in line?" (um, are you aware that you are in Disney World? Line capital of the world?)

"Can you tell me which direction the giant Mickey's Sorcerer's hat is in?" (umm... that's in Hollywood Studios... which is an entirely different park) "Okay, so can I go through the castle to get there?" (*facepalm*)

"How do I get to Disney World from here?" (again... *facepalm*)

"Why is it raining?" "When will it stop raining?" (sorry, I'll check with Mickey about controlling the weather more to your satisfaction)

"What's the wait time for the Jungle Cruise?" (yeah, since I'm a cast member I magically know the wait times of every ride in the whole park every minute all day long.... no wait. No I don't. Let's go with 20 minutes?)

"Is Walt's body really held inside a crypt in the castle?" "How much does it cost to see Walt's body?"

"Where is the exit?" (all the way down to your right) "But there's a rope up! How am I supposed to get over there!?" (well, let's see... you could go five feet around it... or under it... or over it... just don't try to go through it)

"Why is it called the castle stage?" (because it's a stage... and there's a giant castle behind it) "Castle? What castle? Where?" (right in front of your face)

*walking completely opposite from the exit* "This is the way to the exit, right?" (umm.. actually no... unfortunately when people ask this question they never stop to actually listen to an answer so I never get to tell them directions on how to really get to the exit... they just keep walking and I've stopped fighting it. If you walk away before letting me answer a question I'm not gonna answer it)

"Excuse me, do you work here?" (no, I just like to wear this ridiculous car freshener costume and Disney nametag to be funny... in their defense though we used to have a regular guest who somehow got hold of a fake nametag and impersonated a cast member...)

"Can I sit here?" (considering there's a taped X on the ground and no one else is there five minutes before the parade, probably not, no) "Oh, I thought X marked the place where I was supposed to be sitting..." (no, X marks the place where I get to sit. sorry to burst your bubble)

And my personal favorite that I got just last night:

"Excuse me, how do I get to Magic Kingdom from here?" (um... you're in the Magic Kingdom...)

On a more considerate note, when you're on vacation, you really do leave your brain behind. I'm sure I asked my fair share of stupid questions on our cruise. I'm sure I've looked like a total bimbo plenty in my lifetime. The people who asked these probably all could have figured out the answers themselves, but the face that they're on vacation means lack of thinking, and lack of thinking means fun stories for others. Just thought I'd point that out, I'm sure we've all had these moments. :)

Thanksgiving Day!

We have new Park Greeter costumes that took place on Tuesday. Tonight will be my first greeter shift wearing the new costume. I like the new costumes way better. Not because they look any better, but because they fit better and the nametag spot is better. I love how Disney is literally always improving and becoming better. Pictures soon!

Oh, and I didn't forget! HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!! I'm sure your Thanksgiving is going better than mine. Not that mine is bad... it's just not very Holiday-ee. I slept in because I didn't get home until midnight last night and then I had to stay up and watch "I Shouldn't Be Alive" because a new episode came out last night. So I didn't wake up until noon! All my roommates had already gone to work for the day by then. So I woke up, watched a bit of TV, talked to my mom, cleaned the kitchen, cleaned my room, took out the trash (okay, well it's bagged and sitting on the floor ready for me to take out as soon as I'm willing to show myself to the world), and, most importantly...



Put up the Christmas tree!!!!

I have to work at 7:45 tonight (until 2:15am yuck!). This means I'm closing greeter. Most of the people I work with hate greeter but I'm actually okay with it. I mean, I kind of prefer PAC, but greeter is a good change. I'm just gonna laze around for the rest of today and maybe go to work early to start shopping for Christmas presents! Our 50% kicked in yesterday!

Silly People

For the record, if you're trying to list all seven dwarfs, two of them are NOT, I repeat NOT, named Duck and Angry.

That would be Doc and Grumpy. And yes, some guests today called them Duck and Angry during the parade and I would have corrected them but I think I already made them mad by telling them they couldn't stand in my crosswalk.

While I was on turnstile exits today these two older women approached me with their park tickets out and ready to go. They walked up to the turnstile and then looked around, confused as to where they needed to put their ticket in. I walked over to them and let them know they didn't need their cards to exit the park.

They looked confused. "Well then how are we supposed to exit?"

"You just walk right through the turnstile here."

"Through here? I just walk?" The one woman asked me, doubtingly.

"Yep. Just walk right through."

She walked up to it and put her hand on the turnstile and pushed a little. As it gave she slowly moved forward looking back at her friend.

"I just keep going, right?"

"Yes ma'am."

I was trying so hard not to laugh.

In other news I saw some awesome ads recently talking about plans for the new Downtown Disney area Hyperion Wharf. I can't believe all the incredible, nonstop expansions Disney comes up with! But what I'm most excited for is a new park! When is that gonna happen? My friends and I decided we need a Marvel theme park now that we bought them out last year. However, I doubt that will happen. But I do think we're gonna go further with the whole "superhero" theme. I'm so excited!!!

I can't wait to figure out my schedule! I have half a mind to just stay up all night until our new schedules come out! I want to know if I'm working December 3rd and 4th. Because something stinking exciting is happening and I will do just about ANYTHING to work those parade days!! I hope I work and I hope even more that I'm NOT working turnstile shifts! But we'll see.

Our managers warned us today that while we were busy tonight, this was nothing compared to what's coming. It worries me a little. But it'll be fine cuz I have tons of friends and less than a month and a half left. While I've enjoyed PAC, I'm definitely glad it's not something I'll be doing my whole life.

And I'm going to leave this here because I really do need to sleep. I know it's a weird abrupt end to a post but I've never been good at conclusions so this'll just have to do. The end.

Christmas Party

The awesome thing I've noticed about working Christmas parties is everyone is so much happier! I guess it's just the Holiday cheer or the awesome music or the fact that it's a scented parade with horses and roller skaters or that Santa Claus visits Disney World.... I don't know. People are very happy though, and that makes me happy!

I got to play with this 8 year old guest who comes to Disney all the stinking time before the first parade. He's gonna be the CEO someday, I can tell! He insisted that I dance with him during the castle show. I danced for a bit and then told him I didn't know how to dance and asked if Chris (a guy I work with) could dance instead. The kid responded: "Nooooo. You don't get it! When you dance it has to be one guy and one girl. Don't you know anything about dancing? Chris is a guy, I can't dance with him!" And then he made me do twirls in my skirt.

That kid is so stinking hilarious! I love that he comes to my park! And I love that I got to play with him.

I love working Christmas parties!

I Love Kids...

I'm a professional hopscotch maker, ring tosser, juggler, hula hoop hander, bean bag thrower, and Duck Duck Donalder! I love my job!

Tonight was another Halloween party night and was really fun. We had one serious problem, but everything worked out, as usual, in the end, thank goodness. I won't talk about the serious problem, but here's a different story.

During the first parade tonight, I got a crier. I don't think I've ever had a kid who was actually scared of any part of the parade, but as the villains came closer, a little girl near me in a stroller burst into tears, scared out of her mind. I heard her mom trying to console her and finally decided maybe I could help.

So I turned to her and began talking to her so her mom could enjoy the parade with the other kids. I explained that I was friends with the villains and they were actually really nice. They just pretended to be mean in parades, but I assured her Mickey Mouse would never hire anyone who was actually mean. Then I talked to her about how I like to go backstage and dance with them and laughed at them, telling her they were just being silly. Because really, watching Frollo and Cruella dance their weird rendition of the Boo To You song is really silly. And the guys dressed in black and orange playing the guitars? How is that supposed to be scary!? Geez, they're not very good at being bad guys...

I got the girl to stop crying nearly immediately, but she still wasn't taking her eyes off of the hyenas, still pretty scared. So then I started to talk to her about candy. I told her to look for Pluto because Pluto meant the beginning of the candy! Yes, during the Mickey's Halloween parade they hand out candy at the end! So I told her to get her bag ready and she grinned when she finally saw Pluto. It was the cutest thing ever and the mom thanked me at the end. I even got her to laugh with me at how silly the villains looked when they were pretending to be mean.

It's funny because the part of the parade that still freaks me out to this day is the gravediggers. They scare the living snot out of me with their shovels. One came really close to my head during a previous parade as I was watching a guest... they just were literally right there by my face and I still haven't gotten over it. I also am a little freaked by the hyenas because, again, I was distracted by a guest and I turned to go back to my position and the hyena's head was literally right there. I wonder how poor Simba felt!

Anyway, I love my job! I love that every day gets to begin and end with characters, shows, fireworks, parades, or all of the above! I complain sometimes and get pretty bummed but the fact is, over all, I love it!

PAC

I'm doing PAC all day today. And by all day I mean from 1:45pm until 1:15am. Which is not only all day, but all night as well.

PAC, since I haven't clarified before, stands for Parade Audience Control. Basically I make sure people don't run in front of the floats and die... which you'd think isn't much of a job but, seriously, it's ridiculous how much I have to do. Kind of like turnstiles. You'd think people would get how to put their ticket in the opening that says "Insert ticket here." But no. I've actually had people walk up to my turnstile and just stand there waiting for instruction. And then when I ask for their ticket, they act all surprised and they have to pull out their bag and then their wallet and then filter through that to get their ticket. And then, after finally finding said ticket, they just hand it to me, ignoring the machine right in front of them.

Anyway, back to PAC. Since there's no fireworks or parades tonight (It's the Night of Joy which means a bunch of Christian rock bands have come to put on this special event) I think my job for tonight is just controlling all these people. They say the Night of Joy is second (craziness level) only to Grad Night!

Part of my job is actually to protect the castle. We form a kind of human wall around it making sure people don't climb on the stage or go into the castle or anything. I think it's hilarious. Protecting the castle... just another thing I do. :)

So today I work the 3 o'clock parade, then do flag retreat, then break, and then do whatever I'm told to protect the park. This should be fun. I love my job!