#cep2014

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Seventy-Seven (July 27th)

    I was really excited about today because I had a reservation for one of my favourite restaurants and plans to hang out with Meg after work, so it definitely helped me suck up the really early start.     Both my friend Luke and I had 8:30 shifts today so I wasn't alone on the bus! ICPs often don't get scheduled for AM shifts so a lot of the time I wouldn't see anyone I knew on the bus to work. We were both exhausted from IHOP the night before but we each had our tea and were hoping it would get us through.     We both got placed at Music, and I was Lukes bump so we got to be at the big pool together. This was a bit of a tougher shift, it was really hot outside and I had to do the constant rove stand three times, and it's often in full sunlight. Luke did have to jump in once, but the kid was wearing a life jacket so I think it was more of a panic situation than actual danger. Luke also forgot to call his OA (operational alarm) over the radio, he just yelled OA! out loud and then jumped in. So I called it for him, trying very hard not to laugh over the radio!     Once my shift was done I got myself all purdied up and headed to Epcot, where Meg and I arrived at pretty much the same time! She'd gotten bumped off work early which was awesome. We went and rode Maelstrom, which had a painful 30 minute wait (I'm so used to a walk on) but we both love it and anything else would have been an even longer wait. We walked around the rest of the showcase to Japan for our Tokyo Dining reservation. I am so glad that Meg agreed to go with me, I was thinking I wouldn't get to go. She is a good friend!     I decided to splurge on an adult beverage, so I got the Mt Fuji, which had tequila, blue curaçao, pineapple juice and lime juice. It was really good, was a pretty blue green colour and came with a cute little umbrella in it. Then I got the Shibuya platter which had shrimp and chicken tempura, beef rice, cucumber and pasta salads and some tempura vegetables. Meg got the vegetarian platter, which had both sushi and tempura. The food at Tokyo dining is always so pretty, as well as delicious!     We then wandered around the showcase to France, where Meg got ice cream and I got another macaron ice cream sandwich, this time the vanilla one that I couldn't get before. The girl working cash recognized me from earlier in the week...oops!     We ate our ice cream and then found a spot for Illuminations. It was busy so it was hard to find a good spot, but I was just glad to be there. I may or may not have had a little bit of a cry at the end. I don't want to say goodbye to my beloved parks! We had to go back to the front of the park because I'd gotten a locker for my backpack, and we found a 2012 Tower of Terror fastpass underneath my stuff! It must be good luck, so of course I kept it.

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Seventy-Five (July 25th)

    Today was a bit of an early start because it's my last PM for a couple days, so I had some stuff I needed to get done! I grabbed a cab to Walmart because I needed to pick up another suitcase and/or duffel bag to take all my Disney swag home in! The bus to Walmart doesn't start running until 11 which would really take up the best part of the day. I got the last duffel bag that I wanted and I picked up a couple of makeup stuff that I was running out of. It's so cheap in the US!     Once I got home I packed a couple of things into my new bag, packed my lunch and then headed off to Magic Kingdom! When I got there a lot of things had pretty long waits but I got on Pirates in pretty good time, then did Haunted Mansion, and then managed to make it back to Adventureland in time to meet Peter Pan! It was probably the best meet and greet I've ever had with Peter, he called me Rapunzel because of my braid and told me I needed to find my frying pan, because I owe him pancakes!     I grabbed a Dole Whip just as it started to pour rain in the park and then ran out to the buses to get to work.     The storm didn't last so we weren't closed for all that long. I know it's starting to sound repetitive but I guess my job is repetitive: nothing happened tonight. I think maybe there was a crazy tour group situation at Fantasia but I was all the way over at Sports where it was fairly quiet. There was a short but intense storm in the middle of the night but it basically only lasted over my break. Boo. At least Tangled was the movie of the night at Sports and I got to work with a really awesome group.

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Seventy-Four (July 24th)

    Today was another day off, hurray! I decided to have a bit of a late start to recover from our late night the night before. I made lunch at the apartment and then headed over to Epcot to do a couple of things I hadn't done enough. I hopped on Spaceship Earth for the last time and did single rider on Test Track just because it was short and I'd only done it once. I still think the old version was way better. I also made a quick stop at the Epcot Character Spot, because I hadn’t met Mickey in his classic costume yet, and then I also got to meet Goofy and Minnie. I usually don’t get hugs from characters, I can’t remember if I’d mentioned that before, so I was so excited that I got a big hug from Goofy and he was super friendly. Goofy and I have always been pals it seems!     It was pretty hot out so I decided to go and get some ice cream from France. I meant to get the profiterole ice cream I'd had before, but then I noticed that they had a macaron ice cream sandwich and I knew I had to give it a try! I had wanted a vanilla one, but all they had was chocolate. It didn't really matter though because it was SO good. I think I may have found my staple treat at Epcot, though the cronut is up there too!     I wanted to take the boat from Epcot over to Hollywood Studios, but because of lightning the boats weren't running. The driver told me that I could catch a bus from Yacht and Beach, but when I got there there were no buses running to Studios. Thanks a million dude. So I waited in the lobby until the storm passed and then got on the boat.     I got over to Studios and did Tower and Great Movie Ride. My original plan had been to get a Turkey leg for dinner, but then I had spotted a lobster, shrimp and scallop roll at Beach Club that looked way better. So I grabbed a Frozen themed drink called Let it Glow (pineapple juice, ginger ale, grenadine) and then took the boat back to Beach Club for dinner. I'm really glad I decided to do that because the roll was AMAZING and I got to sit by the pool and look out over the lake to Boardwalk. I do miss the Beach Club a lot.     Then it was back to Studios where I did Star Tours and Muppets, then found a spot for fireworks. I may or may not have shed a tear during the fireworks. While I do miss home, I’m definitely going to miss my home away from home and it’s beautiful nightly fireworks displays!

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Sixty-Eight (July 18th)

    So I had an 8:30 shift this morning, but again I’m trying to write this mid-August so I really don’t remember what happened during the shift. It was probably hot, I was probably tired, and I was probably happy to be done at the end.     Instead of going out to the parks tonight, I decided to go to the grocery store, which sounds pretty boring, but I had decided that this would be my last shop before the end of my program. Laziness prevails! I signed a little cart out from security, which didn’t really make my life any easier because it was soooo heavy, but I stocked up on easy things to make for lunches and dinners, and some fun things to take home that you can only get in the US.     When I got home, as much as I didn’t want to think about it, it was time to book my flight to go home. It’s so crazy how quickly this program has gone by, and it seems like just yesterday I was saying to myself “Oh I have two whole months to do that!” Now we’re all scrambling to cram the fun in before we have to go home.     I did some blog updates and hit the hay early because I had another early shift the next day.

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Sixty-Six (July 16th)

    Today I had a full day off, but after the Universal day and work yesterday, I was still feeling pretty crappy. Katie texted me in the morning and invited me to hang by the pool, which sounded like a wonderful idea to me, so we chilled in the sun until a thunderstorm (typical Florida) started rolling in. At first I tried to brush it off as a truck on the highway, like at the cottage, but soon it was too loud and thunder-y to deny, so we ran for Katie’s apartment, where she had homemade popsicles! Nom. They were cookies and cream flavoured, and paired with some How I Met Your Mother, it was an awesome morning! (Despite the storm)     Katie had to work a PM, the storm was tapering off, and I was feeling a bit better, so I decided to head over to Cast Connection before it closed. Cast Connection is an area “backstage” at Magic Kingdom where you can get discounted Disney merchandise. I’d been eyeing a Dumbo pillowpet because they were so cute, but wasn’t super keen on the 32 dollar price tag. One of my roommates had mentioned, however, that they’d seen them at Cast Connection for 14, which seemed like the perfect price to me!     They did have my Dumbo at Cast Connection, and they also, surprisingly enough, had food, so I grabbed a couple of lemons because my friend Luke had recommended Earl Grey tea and lemon to make me feel better. Thanks Luke! I also bought a Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland pin for really cheap, which may or may not have started a pin problem. Only a minor one...     I also scoped out a trailer next to Cast Connection called Property Control, which is only for Cast Members, where they sell damaged merch for SUPER cheap. It was...actually kind of sad. I didn’t stay for very long, and I definitely did not make any purchases.     I was starting to feel crappy again so I hopped back on the bus to head back to housing, which was a good choice because the storm picked back up and it started to rain HARD. The bus ride home was a bit of a doozy, but when is the CP bus system ever boring?     I took it easy for the rest of the night catching up on blog stuff, so that I could do something more fun tomorrow!

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Sixty-Five (July 15th)

    Today it was back to the regular working world for this gal. But first, I knew I needed to get some more heavy-duty cold medicine. So after sleeping in a bit, off I set to Walgreens to acquire some of my usual Dayquil and Nyquil. I also needed to grab some Burt’s Bees lip crayons for my mom, they don’t have them in Canada so I needed to grab some ASAP.     It was stinkin’ hot outside, so by the time I made it to Walgreen’s I was quite the hot mess (literally). I grabbed my lip crayons and a combo pack of Day and Nyquil SEVERE, walked to the counter...and got asked for ID. Apparently here in good old ‘Murica they’re worried you’re going to make meth out of cough medicine and need to see ID before you buy it. I, unfortunately, was not expecting to be carded for cough medicine, so I had no ID on hand except my housing ID, which does not have my date of birth on it.     ...So I had to walk all the way back to housing. Which in my condition wasn’t the most fun of experiences. But I needed that cough medicine dammit, and so I walked as fast as I could there and back.     Once I got back to Walgreens, there was a different woman on cash who was very apologetic, said the other girl was new and that she shouldn’t have made me walk back to housing. Which would have been nice to know BEFORE I made the trek but what can ya do.     By the time I rolled back to housing I only had a very short time before I had to catch the bus, and thanks to cough medicine and illness, (and the fact that it’s now August 12th and I’m trying to finish this post...oops!) the shift was a bit of a blur. I’m sure you’re not reading for the shift stories though, so it’s all good.

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Sixty-Three (July 13th)

    Today I woke up feeling full on sick. So sick in fact that I considered calling in for the first time this summer. But by the time my shift rolled around I was feeling like I could probably make it through, so I got ready and hopped on the bus.     And immediately felt like I’d made a mistake. The whole bus ride to All-Star I felt like I was hacking up a lung, so when I got to base I decided to try to ER. Then was told there were going to be no ERs that night because the finale of the World Cup was on and they were worried that the results might cause a fight between the Brazilian and the Argentinian tour groups that were staying at the resort. (Apparently Brazil was cheering for Germany just because they didn’t want Argentina to win...)     So we were all prepared for the worst, and when the game ended...nothing happened. We actually had a weather closing right around when the game ended which probably helped keep anything crazy from happening in the pools. It stayed quiet for the rest of the night (I’m fairly sure), AND Germany won the World Cup!!!! My team! Woop woop!     Around 8 pm I was at the small pool at Movies when my coordinator Brad came around and asked if I still wanted an ER. Of course I did! So I just had to wait for an extra to get ready to take my stand and then I was in the clear! Then I just had to wait for the bus to arrive, then it was home to bed, because I had learned about some big plans for tomorrow!

[brynnedoesdisney]

Disney ICP 2014: Day Sixty-Two (July 12th)

    I don’t know what it is about the 12th of each month on this program, but once again it seems I can’t remember what I did this day. There are no pictures, I didn’t write anything down, at this point I can’t even get back on the Hub to see if I worked. I probably did though, lets be honest.     So it seems as though each 12th of my program is destined to disappear into some strange time hole never to be seen again.