Puzzles and glass windows

SO I was working a dew days ago, and myself and two other CP's (college program cast members) had closed up the shop and were counting up the money in our tills. We close at eleven, but every night without fail someone tries to get in to just pick up a few more items. For instance, tonight we had to turn away one man who said he was desperate to buy batteries for his four year old kid. We would have let him in, but our tills had already been shut down and t was impossible for us to ring him up. Even after explaining this, he continued to push on. He said, and I quote "You don't know what it's like!" He started actually sliding open the door and walking in, so I went up to him and guided him back out and wish him a good night, letting him know we opened at 7:30 the next morning. As we continued counting our money, we heard a loud *Thunk* and thought someone might be knocking on the glass door to get our attention, as they have often done. I went out to investigate and discovered that in fact, a woman had walked headlong INTO the door and had banged her face against it, then quickly walked away while laughing it off. I made sure she was okay, and went back in the shop where my coworkers and I couldn't help but burst out laughing. She had actually left a facial imprint on the door where she had hit it! It made my night. I have had quite a few more opportunities to practice my french with some guests, most who are from Quebec. I met one lady yesterday who spoke no English and was from France, and when my coworker called me over to speak to her I felt so useful! I still start buzzing after every French conversation. I think my boyfriend and coworkers are getting sick of me telling the same story of how I got to meet french people over and over again :P Ah well, you've got to share with those who care, right? Yesterday, Jeremy and me had some free time in the morning, so we went walking to Dunkin Donuts for coffee and Dollar Tree for food. I had gotten him a Star Wars pin from work and had his Berkenstalks sent from our mom, and get this, when I gave them to him he actually HUGGED me. Twice! Then at the donut place he bought me a bagel and coffee. It was so nice. After finding two Star Wars puzzles at the dollar store, we upheld family tradition and brought them back to Jeremy's to put together while listening and singing along to Jack Johnson. At one point Jer's roommate, Pat, joined us in both puzzle-making and singing, and we belted out the chorus all together on every song until both puzzles were finished and I had to leave for work. Needless to say, I was in a great mood when I got there.

Rain, rain, and a still broken camera cord.

It was coming down in buckets all day yesterday... so naturally, Jeremy and I went to go play at the Magic Kingdom. Jeremy, being an outdoor worker, has a work-issued see-through rain jacket - and matching pants - which he put on for the occasion. We fought the exiting crowds through the torrents of water falling from the sky to get to the flooded Main Street and decided to relive our childhoods by jumping in puddles and splashing around without a care in the world. Our time was limited to 2 and a half hours as I had to take the monorail over to work, so we ran around Adventureland and played our Sorcerer cards (for those of you who haven't heard of them, you definitely need to try it if/when you come down!) We got sick of it after while, so we went to the bakery where I ate a very fancy bagel for lunch and then walked around the merchandise shops to waste some time. We watched a glass-blower make a vase in the style of Minnie Mouse, and traded some pins with the cast members in the Emporium. Finally, we headed over to the Contemporary where I bought some gifts and introduced Jeremy to some of my coworkers (one spanish lady named Theresa told me "ello es guapo como tu" meaning "he is attractive like you." I thought that was sweet, and it was fun talking about my brother in front of him without his understanding.) Apparently last night we had a tornado warning, which is scary, but I slept through any storms and was lulled by the rain into sleeping until 12pm, so it turned out alright after all. We are supposed to have constant clouds, wind, and rain until who knows when, which would usually be ideal movie-watching weather, but the Vista Way Library computers are down and I am left with no choice but to socialize. Woe is me. Perhaps Wednesday will be Universal Studios day!

Did you know some people call a bag, a sack?

I was cashing out a boy at one the Animal Kingdom Lodge, and he was just getting a couple of snacks, so I asked him, "Would you like a bag?". He then gave me the strangest look, as if I had started speaking some other language. "U-uh what?" he asked me. Having served people from all over the country, I used a term I knew he would know, "Would you like a sack?" He responded with "Um, yes please ma'am." and we went on with our way. I have to say, I think it's just the cutest thing when people from the southern states call me Ma'am, especially the kids. It's definitely not something I'm not used to hearing very often in Canada. Life is still moving down here in Florida - we're past the halfway point by about a day or two. I am continuing to get evening shifts, meaning I can't take the bus to Walmart as it starts going after one. Evening shifts also mean my social life is even further limited, as most of my friends work day shifts or have already made plans. It's fine with me though, I usually sleep in late in the morning, clean up the house a bit, then go run an errand before work, and I still have enough energy to visit the gym afterwards. Oh, but I have to say that coffee has been a big help. I am starting to have the need to shop creep up on me. I would really like to save my money for school, but Disney merchandise is really addictive! So far I have managed to contain myself and even work extra hours, but who knows how long that will last? I have already made up my mind to buy a polyester kimono before I go home, so thats 150 bucks out of the pocket. Anyways, not much exciting has been going on this week. Tomorrow is my day off and I'm hoping to get to the Magic Kingdom, so I'll be keeping you posted! Cheers!

What a week!

I have to say, I've been having a wonderful time in the past few days. I have gotten to talk with some loved ones from home, finally made some decisions on gifts for people, started making plans for the school year, and been working at the Animal Kingdom Lodge and having a blast doing it. Wednesday morning, my roommates and a few extra friends got dressed up for a ladies' breakfast buffet at the deluxe hotel the Grand Floridian. We were celebrating Vicky's birthday, the friend of my roommate Amy, and it was nice because she was given a celebratory cupcake at the end of breakfast (which she had no room to fit in her stomach of course.)The place we went is a character meet-and-greet breakfast, and so in one sitting we had the pleasure of making acquaintances with Pooh, Tigger, Mary Poppins, Alice, and my personal favourite, the Mad Hatter. That's one more achievement to check off my bucket list! I worked that evening, but Thursday was my day off and so I used it to satisfy my Disney park craving by visiting Disney's Animal Kingdom. It was my first visit! I went with my friend Val, and we of course went on Everest and visited all the well-known attractions. By the time the afternoon showers started, we were both tired and ready to head home. Val took a nap and I took a much-needed trip to Walmart to stock up on supplies. By the time I got to bed it was late, and I had an early morning shift today so I relaxed and eventually went to bed. Now, at the Lodge there are two different gift shops on either side of the huge complex, and today was my first shift at the smaller one of the two. I got to work just before the sun rose, but it was still quite warm out even while it was dark. My shift started at 6:30 and as I was there a bit early, I took advantage of the fact that you can watch the animals grazing just outside the window of the area I was in. How cool is that? This morning there were zebras out, so I snuck a quick pic and then went to punch in for work. I am used to sleeping in and then working until 12am, so today it was tough to wake up, even with the benefit of free coffee to the Cast Members at Johari (the gift shop's name.) I was granted an early release (don't worry mom, it was just an hour earlier than I was scheduled) and went home for a nap. At around seven I woke up just as Amy came in to settle down for her own nap. I think she intended to get up and waste some energy before going back to bed again, but it is currently 1am and she hasn't emerged. I'll probably go in and join her after this. Anyways, I got up and returned my movies as well as rented some more, cooked the sweet potatoes that I had bought last week (baked with butter and cinnamon - delicious!)and now here I am. Tomorrow is my last day at the Lodge, but I have applied to pick up a shift there next week on one of my days off just because I know I'll miss it! Last but not least are a few photos from our character breakfast, taken by the other girls. I finally bought a cheap SD card and am no longer limited to just 10 pictures a day, but of course I accidentally seemed to have dropped a chair on my camera cable, so it's now out of commission. I'll try to fix it by my next post. Until then!

The Animal Kingdom Lodge and Sibling time

So, this week I have been deployed (meaning my work location is temporarily moved to another area) to Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge. That means a new costume, and as the Lodge is done up in an obviously African-inspired design, I get to wear a westernized African traditional outfit as my costume. It is incredibly comfortable though, and the store that I work in - the Zawadi Marketplace- has some very cool decor. Today, an American man approached me and asked "Pourquoi est-ce que tu parles francais? (Why do you speak french?)" to which I replied "Parceque je suis Canadienne!" We then had a lovely conversation in French, and I learned that he was a elementary school French teacher. After he walked away, I turned back to my coworkers who exclaimed, "This girl speaks wicked french!" It was a nice moment for me :) This evening my shift starts at 6:30, so I had some time to get some shopping done. Jeremy and I met up on the bus to Cast Connections where we had fun playing with the leftover merchandise from Star Wars Weekends and finding great bargains. I got a nice summer dress and Jeremy, well he got a backpack that looks like a little Chewbacca(forgive me if I misspelled that) is getting a piggy-back ride with a matching T-shirt. We headed to the next store over and browsed around Property Control, where we found some neat costume pieces that have been retired. We bought matching waistcoats. After picking up the necessary foodstuffs, we took the bus home and met up again at the pool for some quality tanning time. It's the first time I have actually laid down to tan since I got here. It was a scorcher, and we called it quits after about an hour and a half in favour of eating ice cream and playing Magic in Jer's apartment. Guess who beat her teacher twice in a row? That's all that's going on for now. My roommate's friend is celebrating her birthday with a Character Brunch at the Grand Floridian tomorrow, so expect more photos to come!

Epcot (again) and Bed Bugs

Let's start with the most recent and disturbing occurrences in my life and make our way to the happier ones. My room is located on the ground level in the corner right beside a garden, and so when it rains, tiny little ants (that I was told are apparently in the spider family) make their way somehow through my wall and onto and into everything. My dresser, my drawers, my laptop screen, heck I went to go and fry some eggs this morning, and guess what started crawling out of the pan once I had turned on the heat? I have woken up with tiny bite marks on my arms too, so yep, they're in my bed. Just lovely. Now would be a wonderful time for the rain to stop. I went out yesterday and bought a ton of cleaning supplies, and as I was walking home with my broom in one hand and various soaps in the other, couldn't help but think that I was embodying the old stereotype for women. :P The last few days have been fun, I had the Wednesday and Thursday morning off so on Wednesday, met up with my friend Val to go to Epcot. We did some character hunting and rode some rides, and then of course it started raining, so we decided to seek shelter in the Captain EO show, which to all who haven't seen it, is basically a music video of Michael Jackson in Space. I'm not kidding. Our friend Carissa joined us just before Val had to leave for work, and she and I decided to go play pretend at the Grand Floridian hotel. We walked around and pretended to be one of the hotel guests, absorbing the music of the grand piano and walking in and out of the fancy shops. We started with a homemade soap shop, where we were encouraged to sample the lip scrubs, hand scrubs, and bath soaps. It was a real treat! After a while we tried to have tea in the beautiful lounge, but it was reservation only and we were too late. We monorail-ed it over to the Contemporary (my workplace!) and got ourselves some cheap snacks, then headed home. After a wet walk to the Walgreens for some groceries, it was almost dark out, so we found Jeremy and friends in the Clubhouse where we all finished our evening together drinking 30 cent hot chocolates and watching Disney's Tangled. The next morning before work, I was invited out to the Golden Corral for a breakfast Buffet, and so we ventured over and stuffed ourselves silly, then waddled home in time for work. I felt full throughout the evening!

Orientation (finally)

Today was my orientation day of the Contemporary resort. Usually, trainees have their orientation (where you learn the history of the resort and take a tour to learn about the amenities available to guests)before they start training, but there was a bit of a mix up for me and so I ended up having it rescheduled today, on one of my days off. It was a fun day, and I actually learned a lot about my work location (including the answers to quite a few questions I had been asked that I couldn't answer beforehand.)We started the morning at 9:30, in a Cast Member meeting room where we introduced ourselves and rereRE-learned some Disney basics that we had all heard during Traditions and our training. An hour later, we took a short tour of the cast member area of the building (costuming, break rooms, cafeteria, etc.) It was a bit weird for me since I had been working in the environment for about a month, so I did my best to stick to the back of the group. After a short break, we went outside to the pool area to take a group picture and start a tour. We got the picture printed out with a nice a contemporary background, to "remember the experience" - featured in my photo is me, the only merchandise person in the group, about four Cafe workers, a few custodial workers, a student in the culinary program, and a sous-chef who had been with Disney for 18 years. No idea why he was there, but he was a nice guy, and now I can say I know a sous-chef. We toured the docks where people can rent boats, go para-sailing, and even get picked up by a pirate ship for a mini cruise at night. Then we visited the top floor, where the California Grill and a spectacular view of all of Disney World is located. It was really cool to imagine dining up there, dressed up with a romantic atmosphere and the fireworks exploding into the sky behind me. Of course, it's extremely expensive. To rent out the restaurant, say for a business meeting or a wedding, would be $65,000- not including the food. We also visited the time-share (again I have delivered groceries, so I was familiar with it and zoned out a but. Which got awkward when my Spanish group leader was asking me about the proper way to pronounce "hors d'oeuvre" because she saw my french name tag.)After another hour of walking and touring, we took a 30 minute lunch break and I went to the merchandise floor to visit my co-workers. My manager, Eric, was in Fantasia and let me know there were ice cream treats in the freezer in the breakroom to reward the team for 90 days with an accident or major incident. It was delicious! After our final hour of review in the meeting room again, I was released to go home, and so instead I decided to get some food and discount shopping done at Cast Connections. I got from there some apples, bananas, and sweet potatoes, a Disney umbrella (it's been raining a lot and ponchos are like 8 bucks each), a pair of sunglasses for 50 cents, and a couple of presents for some kids I know. I'm back home, surrounded by my British roomates. A few new groups of CP's(college program) have arrived and as our room is on the first floor and in the building right next to the Welcome Centre, we have been spying on everyone who walks by. My one roomate, Charlie, has been squishing her face against the window to spook people. It's worked. Now, I have been singing along to some Bob Marley songs and making plans to go to Lonestar for dinner with some Canadians. Have a good evening! ----Later------ And so we had a blast at Lonestar for dinner! We were laughing our heads off (mostly at Jeremy) and ate delicious and cheap steak and were merry. Here's a few pictures!