When you wish upon a star . . . makes no difference who you are . . . anything your heart desires will come . . . to . . . you . . . I make a wish and do as dreamers do . . . and all our wishes . . . will . . . come . . . true . . .
Ooof today has been such a day of boring errands and what not. I initially planned to go to the Premium Outlets, then Hollywood Studios, then maybe go and see Harry Potter. However, I ended up sleeping in until about 10.30am, then doing my laundry and trying to catch this blog up. No joke I’ve been working on my page for about five hours. No harm done though really as the weather is pretty overcast and it even rained at one stage. Plus I know that most of the people I’m friends with are at work so I’d have to hang by myself which isn’t a massive deal, but I knew I had to do this.
So I’ve been here for three weeks right? And I have seen three famous people on Star Tours so far. They are as follows:
Bob Iger CEO of the Walt Disney Company
Chandra Wilson (or Miranda Bailey from Grey’s Anatomy)
Phill Lewis (or Mr Moseby from the Suite Life of Zac and Cody)
Pretty cool, huh? We've had a couple of sports people too, but I don't know who they are...
Now, I have also met a very ‘special’ guy at Star Tours and he asked me to give him a special shout out. John Holt is a guy from Manchester who actually permanently lives here and works at Star Tours and also at American Idol. He’s also training to be a fireman *insert ‘oooh’s and ‘ahhh’s here*. He is my Gerard Butler in The Ugly Truth. No, he unfortunately does not LOOK like Gerard, however, he has already let me in on a couple of the secrets which determine why guys can be such nobs at times which I quite appreciate. In return, I let him mock me and a particularly incriminating facebook photograph he has seen of me. He blatantly only does it because he wants a piece. And he loves watching me sticker small children. But whatever. J He’s a sweetie. SO THERE IT IS JOHN!!! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW???
Anyways, I’m going to go upload some of my more recent pictures on here then I may head out to the pool in a bit, all on my lonesome. Harry Potter will unfortunately have to wait until my next day off... next Wednesday night, it’s so ON, I’m going to be all over that wizard like ‘white on rice’ as the Americans say.
I had the day off todayyyyy! Well, yesterday, technically as it is so late. You know what I mean.
Work on Tuesday really wasn’t so bad. I’m really starting (slowly but surely) to get used to the uber-long hours.
So, enough about work. Let me tell you about the lush day I’ve had today!
This morning was a bit bizarre. The people that organise the program were holding casting calls to choose some people to star in the next ICP video. If you haven’t seen one of these videos already, check this out... So naturally, you know what I’m like, so I just had to go along! I walked to the Commons where the ‘audition’ was and managed to find my way over to apartment 812. Literally all I had to do was write down my information and answer the following three questions: 1) What’s your favourite part about the program so far? 2) What are you going to take away from being on the program? AND 3) What would you say to someone who is on the fence about applying for the program?
Honestly, I think I gave all the right answers... I was on about making new friends, facing new challenges blablabla. The only problem was that it was all so informal that I was talking in my normal voice. Like, I was expecting to reel off a quick script in my best ‘I’m-a-cheesy-Disney-ICP’ voice. Hmmm, I guess we’ll have to wait and see. The guy said they aren’t sure about how many people they need, but that I’ll hear by Friday if I’m successful, so I’ll keep an eye on my emails I guess!
After all that me and Vikki had planned to go mooch around a Magic Kingdom resort or two, as she’s really not so crazy about the parks. So we decided that we’d head to the Wilderness Lodge. Before we knew it, Louise and Karyn had invited themselves along too (the CHEEK OF IT!) I figured it would be nicer to take the bus to Fort Wilderness then get the boat to the Lodge rather than getting the bus to Transportation and Ticket at the Magic Kingdom then the bus to the Lodge. It was lucky I made that executive decision actually, as we found the best value meal in ALL OF DISNEY WORLD... so far at least.
Now, Trails End is a family favourite of mine. We often go for the lunch/dinner buffet and it is one of the most reasonably priced buffets in the whole of Disney. They serve fried chicken, pulled pork, chilli con carne etc. Really yummy, rustic type food that makes you think of home comforts and whatnot. Anyway, it would seem that they don’t do a lunch time buffet anymore L HAVE NO FEAR they have an a la carte menu which effectively has all of the buffet items on it. And guess what, if we go to any Disney restaurant at lunch-time, Cast Members (CM’s) get a whopping 40% off as opposed to the usual 20%! Epic win. Plus the serving sizes are massive.
Karyn had an appetiser of chilli as her main meal followed by a s’mores dessert which she shared with me so I think her end price was like, $8. That’s like, £6. Louise and I shared a BBQ pulled pork sandwich which they split across two plates for us, and so Louise spent about the same as Karyn. Vikki absolutely pigged out and had the chilli AND a whopping great burger and still only spent about $14 (£11 or so), whilst I added a pot of ‘Hop n Jack’ to my shared items (it’s basically rice and peas with a BBQ marinade) and I spent about $13. That all includes tips as well.
I love it there. I think we’re going to go for the breakfast buffet next Wednesday as we were so impressed with it. Plus, our server, Edsel, was quite literally the nicest man EVER. He had some sort of sexy Southern accent and kept laughing at Vikki for being such a notorious P.I.G and he kept refilling our drinks and being really attentive. We even gave him a Great Service Fanatic card (which is a bit like a gold star or house point on his record card!) as he went totally ABOVE AND BEYOND our expectations. He loved us too.
Once we were full up we headed to the dock and waved Louise off on her way to work before getting our boat to the Wilderness Lodge. I'll be honest, it was odd being there without my family :( Then we spent the next four hours lying on the beach by the lake... it’s a hard life. After a while Vikki decided to head back so she could Skype her boyf (kinky, much) and me a Karyn went and dipped in the hotel pool. Naughty naughty. It was so lush! After soaking up the last few rays, drying off and people watching we headed over to the Magic Kingdom to catch The Magic, The Memories and You, then Wishes. We skipped the stupid Main Street Electrical Parade as she’d seen it about a million times, I hate it and Vikki wasn’t there to bully us into watching it just so she could listen to the bleepy snails.
It was quite a productive night to be honest. We bought pineapple floats (I had orange ice cream on mine this time and yummmmm), rode Splash Mountain and Space Mountain and saw Mickey’s Philharmagic, which I just LOVE with a fiery passion. I had a really good time.
Absolutely exhausted now though! I’m definitely going to go to sleep until whenever I wake up tomorrow as I have another day off. Desperately need to do my laundry but apart from that I have no plans as such, so we’ll see what the day brings. Might pop along to the Premium Outlet mall across the street, sunbathe by the pool and catch Fantasmic and the finale of the American Idol Experience in Hollywood Studios, but I don’t know anyone else with the day off, so we’ll have to wait and see J
Jesus it’s so late! Or should I say early? Whatever.
So maybe things aren’t going to work out with the guy L Not going to go into much detail about it, but it kind of sucks.
Anyways, I guess that’s life. I’ve had today off so I chilled out for a bit and Skyped home. Charlotte came over for a little while which was awesome as I was feeling a tad homesick and she made it all better. I cooked us the pasta I was supposed to cook for The Boy the other night before we decided we’d just eat ice cream instead... *Insert sad/wistful sigh here...* After she left, Joe texted me which was good as I really didn’t have anything to do. He’d been in Epcot all day and wanted to order in pizza, which was absolutely perfect for me. Because Vikki wasn’t finishing work until 9pm and I hadn’t been out of the house all day we took the bus to meet her from work... BAD IDEA as she had gotten and ER and didn’t receive my text until she was on her way home. So we got a fantastic hour-and-ten-minutes round trip on the freezing cold bus in the dark. Was kind of nice though, got me a change of scenery from the apartment and I could vent to Joe for a while.
Once we got back Vikki came over and eventually we found the right number for the Dominos that delivers to Chatham. I had a medium pizza with chicken and pineapple on it and these chicken kicker thingies. NOM.
It was really nice being with my bitches J I showed them Jenna Marbles on YouTube and we laughed like loons on loon tablets (thank you, Georgia Nicholson!) If you don't know who I'm talking about, you should start with this video...
I think it’s time for bed as I start work pretty early tomorrow (10.15am is early to me, ok???) If you find any lovely boys who aren’t afraid to enjoy an entire summer with a British girl before ‘seeing what happens’ in September, send them my way, yeah? :P
1) On Wednesday morning I got a call from Cameron at the ICP office letting me know that my DS-2019 was sorted! Win! All I had to do was go into Casting near DTD and get it all signed, so I went on Thursday morning as I didn’t have to work until 2ish. Got all my paperwork signed, collected my documents and still had a couple of hours to kill so I crossed the road to DTD and got me some Pollo Campero, which was absolutely delicious. I had a fried chicken sandwich with fried plantain and rice with tons of salsa and hot sauce over it. Then I had a Tres Leches dessert afterwards. Nommage. Made me wish my mom was here as she would have loved it! I got CM discount also so I paid about $13 which was a lot for quick service, but I saved half of it for work later and was pretty content with that!
2) Realised that there is not a direct bus to Hollywood Studios so I ended up getting a bus to the Swan resort then getting the boat, yes, the boat (!), to work. It was a nice journey, but I was really cutting it fine to be honest, especially considering that I had to go to costuming before work as something delicious had exploded in my bad all over my uniform. It was some form of chocolate delicacy. No harm done as costuming hooked me up with new gear and sent me on my way. I made it to work with still ten minutes to spare. Success.
3) Work was fine.
4) Some mutual ‘friends’ of mine and The Guy took it upon themselves to ‘warn’ me against him, saying that he had a girlfriend blablabla and that he’s a big old massive player. Combined with his lack of enthusiasm to get too ‘attached’ to me as I’m going back to England, I assumed that they were telling the truth, so feeling like an idiot, I went and had a big go at him.
5) The Guy and I texted that night and he insisted upon coming over on Friday (today/yesterday, whatever) I agreed to let him, but kind of thought he would stand me up. I told him to bring me ice cream.
6) Was up at 5am today to go to social security meeting with everyone. That was a laugh. NOT. At least now I have my social security number and can work in the USA.
7) We all went to Golden Coral for breakfast opposite Vista which was just yummy. Some of us may have gotten into a Gummy Bear fight... *COUGH Craig, Karyn, Louise COUGH* I ate the most unbreakfasty foods ever, including fries, chicken tenders and chocolate cake. In all it was a great breakfast.
8) I needed loo roll and fabric softener etc, so me and Vikki went to Walgreens and blew a $50 shaped hole in my purse by also shelling out for pointless items including nail varnish remover and eyelash curlers. Seriously, I shouldn’t be trusted with cash.
9) We came back to mine and took a nap together. It was really very cute, we were fast asleep for like, three hours. And we missed the space shuttle launch as we were sleeping, although having said that we would have had to go find a place to watch it from as you couldn’t see it everywhere in Florida, so it’s not that big a deal to us. Considering I used to want to be an astronaut, I was very cool about missing it.
10) The Guy came over. I’m not going to go into the details of it, but he’s totally and one-hundred-percentedly NOT a player, nob or meanie. In fact he’s lovely. And he brought really good ice cream J
So, that’s kind of the nub and gist of my past couple of days. I’d better go to sleep as even though I had that nap I’m still shattered. Stupid social security making me wake up so early. Idiots. I’m going to go get me a big old bunch of sweet cuddley dreams J
Ok, so I was definitely supposed to be in work from 9.30am until 10pm tonight, but considering the rawness of my throat and the exhaustion I am experiencing from last night, I called in sick. Yeah, I went there, I did it. So sue me.
Yesterday was... mmm... horrendous. Honestly, it wasn’t that bad until I’d been at work for about 13 hours and was collecting glasses. That’s when I was so exhausted and depressed that I don’t have any interest in Star Wars and hence aren’t as excited about my job as I could have been if I’d been placed elsewhere that I genuinely got tears in my eyes. On my break I texted The Guy as we’ve been texting all day every day since the first text a few days ago and he was so sweet being all, ‘Come on, it’s just because you’re not used to such long hours, you know you can do it, you’re strong, just push blablabla...’ It was very sweet. I was also texting Vikki and she told me that she was feeling the same about her job and that she’d had a massive Cry-Fest earlier on even to the extent of checking flight prices to come home, before she decided to get over herself. Bless her.
I get where she’s coming from, but seriously the worst part for me yesterday was knowing that I have so many more hours than everyone else. Like, seriously, if I hadn’t taken today off sick I would only have had one day off this week and 60 hours worth of work. I know people keep saying, ‘Oh, but you’ll be rich’, but it’s like, if I wanted to be rich I would have just worked at Fedex in the UK all summer like I did last year. I didn’t shell out nearly £1500 to get her because I wanted to be rich, I did it so I could have an amazing experience, which I simply can’t get if I’m working virtually every waking hour of the day: particularly when most of my friends are only really working about 40 hours five days a week. You can see how self-deprecating I am right now.
On the plus side I got to watch the Hollywood Studios 4th of July fireworks from backstage with this guy from Ivory Coast named Yanik... it was very romantic. Lol jk. Yanik’s really sweet, but it wasn’t romantic... I was all sweaty and wanting to cry from exhaustion. The fireworks were, however, amazing. No joke. The force of their explosions actually blew against my clothes and the stairs were shaking. It was epic.
Anyways, today I’ve been to the pool for a bit and just lay there. I’ve been drinking Lemsip and the like and just trying to be relaxed to be honest. Found out the other day that I passed my second year at uni which is great news, so that’s one less thing for me to worry about right now J On the other hand I still haven’t received my new DS-2019 so I’ve been calling Immigration Compliance at Disney all weekend and not getting a reply. Eek. My 30 days are nearly up and if I don’t get that document before my deadline then I’ll have to fly all the way home to little old England L Extremely stressful to say the least.
Vikki took today off too and Joe already had it off so maybe we’ll do something mellow tonight. Not sure... we’ll have to see.
Totally aced my assessment! Haha, win J And that’s in spite of the fact that my throat is so remarkably raw it feels like I’ve been swallowing glass. So happy that I now get to fly Star Speeders for a living, eep!
Plus my assessor, Steve, was really cool. Like he only really wanted to see me in each role for about ten minutes, so after the written assessment was over my day was just a series of rotations and breaks. Excellent day in all, which I should definitely anticipated as my day started when The Guy (which he shall be known as from now on) woke me at 7am with a text. Call me crazy, but I thought that was pretty cute! Especially as it was all, ‘Wakey wakey, sleepy head, good luck in your assessment’ or whatever. Already when I think about him I smile and just go, ‘Mmm.’ J
Once I’d finished at work I came back to the flat and did what I always do when I have a little time to spare... I took a nap. When I woke up, Joe and Vikki wanted some din-dins so we decided to head to DTD to get some Earl of Sandwich in us. By the way, Earl of Sandwich is one of the few quick service places which I would say is ACTUALLY worth going to. You get a massive sandwich for just $6 plus we get a CM discount of 20% there, which makes it totally good value for money, particularly if you aren’t a big pig and are able to save half of your sandwich for another meal. Naturally, I did not do this as my Hawiian-themed sandwich stuffed with turkey, ham, pineapple and barbecue sauce was JUST TOO GOOD TO SAVE. Nom.
After eating to the stage where I nearly wanted to vomit, we went to watch and participate in the kiddie dance party. Seriously, the American’s have a dance routine for virtually every song. I finally got to grips with the one for Cotton Eyed Joe... I think. Me and Vikki pounded it to Tik Tok by Ke$ha which was fun as we were dancing right in front of the sexy DJ man; quite hilarious as I was wearing incredibly inappropriate knickers considering the shortness of my dress, the enthusiasm of my dancing and the force of the wind. I spent most of the night clutching the bottom of my skirt and trying to make out that it was just part of a new dance move I was trying out. Also, I definitely took out a three year old with my aggressive dancing... woops.
Anyway, as usual, I am exhausted so I’m going to get some shut-eye. A good idea I reckon as I have an epic 15 hour shift tomorrow starting at 10.30am. Oh Lord. So my 4th of July will be great. NOT!
Definitely had the best couple of days ever! Yesterday after blogging, I napped for a couple of hours then once Vikki and Heather were ready we went to meet Kathryn, Lucy, Leanna, Kristian, Sexy Rich Elliot, Katie, Nisha and probably some others that I can’t quite remember at EPCOT. We did us a bit of World Showcase eating around the world... I have half a portion of fish and chips from England and a Werther’s caramel covered strawberry from Germany. Yum, yum, yum! We rode the little boat ride and took stupid sombrero pictures in the Mexican pavilion, so some of the others decided they wanted Mexican food, but when they realised that you can’t get fajitas at the quick service restaurant there, we decided to just head over to the Electric Umbrella in Future World. I kind of feel for them really as the food wasn’t very good... think rock solid burger bun with grim rubbery burger inside. Yuk.
We were able to just about catch Illuminations from the Future World entrance to World Showcase (again a great spot, particularly for seeing the video clips on the globe...) before deciding to head home as Leanna wasn’t very well and some of the others had work the next day. HOWEVER, once Kristian expressed that he wasn’t quite ready to go home just yet, I suggested we went over to the Magic Kingdom to hang out for a little while and whadya know, it was a good idea! We jumped on the monorail and actually managed to see Wishes while we were riding which was just amazing. I’ll literally never forget how beautiful the view was.
Once we got into the park, we managed somehow to convince Vikki to do Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (she’s scared of adrenaline rides) and I think she kind of enjoyed it. God knows I did. I spent the whole ride trying to make her laugh by hollering this ridiculous guttural scream from the back of my throat. Once I got off the ride, I literally could not get a single sound out of my mouth. On the plus side, Vikki laughed a ton which took her mind off the imminent death which people with speed-fears and the like usually cower from. Great success.
After all that jazz, we watched the Stupid Main Street Electrical Parade, as I fondly refer to it. I don’t like this parade as I much preferred SpectroMagic as the music was better and the characters were WAY more recognisable. Like, what relevance does Pete, from Pete’s Dragon or some nameless rabbit whom I didn’t even recognise, have in today’s society? None, so there really shouldn’t be a parade dedicated to it, even if it is to commemorate such-and-such-an-amount-of-years-of-Disney. I have spoken.
Vikki, on the other hand, went crazy for that parade. She likes the cheeky snails that make a bleeping sound. But again, I have no idea what these snails have to do with Disney. I’m sure they are there for a reason, but they really aren’t very iconic. Unless you are Vikki.
Seriously, the best part of the whole parade was getting a personal performance of Heather Marsh’s incredible miming skills, in the flesh. She mimed the entire opening segment of the parade and Kristian, Vikki and I were really rather impressed, especially as we have watched her miming videos on YouTube since she made them first available to view... it was like meeting a celebrity! If you haven't see the videos before, check it out:
After the SMSEP we came home.
Today was awesome. A Gabbi, Vikki, Kristian day to remember! We started the day off bright and early (well, it was like 10.30am, but you know how I like my sleep...) and headed over to Animal Kingdom. We collected Fastpasses for Expedition Everest (I still don’t know why Vikki agreed to it...), caught poachers on Kilimanjaro Safaris, rode Everest (and I did my screaming again... I really can’t talk much anymore), watched Finding Nemo: The Musical, got terrified on Dinosaur (especially Kristian... I feared he’d ACTUALLY pooped his pants when I saw the look on his face in the picture afterwards... he hadn’t as it turns out, HIGH FIVE), saw the wonderful Festival of the Lion King (really wish I could perform in that show!) and caught the Jammin’ Jungle Parade. Exceptionally productive visit to the park! Nearly got into a row with some fat pig, because he was stood RIGHT in my way. I asked him politely three times to move, when he didn’t, I shoved his leg and said something like, ‘Just because you’re a fat pig doesn’t mean it’s ok to blog everyone’s view.’ His mom shot me the vilest look ever and swapped places with him. Luckily, she was marginally less obese and didn’t obstruct my vision QUITE so much as her fat bap of a teenage son. Seriously, obesity is an epic problem in this country.
Once I’d finished causing trouble, we got the bus to Animal Kingdom Lodge to have a quick mooch around, as Kristian can’t decide where to stay when his boyfriend arrives here in September. I really love that hotel and so did the others. We made the decision to explore more of the resorts during our stay here as they are just as nice to look around as the theme parks!
When we’d had a bit of a relax we got the bus to Hollywood Studios (yes, four theme parks in two days, HOLLAAAAAAAA!) We didn’t do too many attractions as we were mainly going to see my favourite night-time thing ever, Fantasmic! But we managed to slip in a quick go on Star Tours and Tower of Terror before grabbing some very average ‘Italian’ sandwiches at Rosie’s All American Cafe. To be honest, I’m getting kind of sick of crappy quick service food. I mean, don’t get me wrong, some places (like Flame Tree Barbecue in Animal Kingdom where me and Vikki shared a pulled pork sandwich earlier on today) are amazing, really tasty. But seriously, most of them just have the same things on the menu... burger, pizza, chicken tenders, variations on a turkey sandwich and ceasar salad, followed by chocolate fudge cake, key lime pie or marble cheesecake. Boring. Seriously, if you could count how many quick service restaurants in Disney World offer those items, you would be shocked. I’m really craving a full-service Disney meal right now to remind me of the excellent quality and tastiness of the food. I just need more money, that’s all.
Oh, and you know the handsome guy I mentioned a few days ago? He gave me his number today! He wrote it on a Fastpass, bless him J I really like that he went out of his way to be brave and give it a go. I’ve already texted him and we’re having a bit of flirtexting right now. Mmm. This pleases me greatly.
After finishing our average sandwiches we followed the crowd to Fantasmic. The theatre was rammed, no joke, absolutely rammed. We were going to have to sit in the crap seats round the side when I spotted Jasper out of Jasper and Lobert! You know, they Dutch guys from my airplane! They both work Audience Control so he was able to hook us up with VIP seats RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE STAGE. No joke, I’ve seen that show about 15 times in my life, and never have I had such amazing seats. I am eternally in Jasper’s debt and I have texted him my thanks since. Bless his little sexy pants! J
Anyway, I am absolutely exhausted and I have my assessment tomorrow (well, today) which should be a lot of fun as I have NO voice whatsoever. My spiels are going to be a joke. Anyway, wish me luck J
