LA Weekly article

CujoSR · Post by **CujoSR** » Mon Nov 03, 2003 10:06 pm

Met up with benji the other day. I asked him "so what are you doing here?" His answer? "I have things I need to do."

Then I mentioned how cold it was he said he had to go back to K Lot to pick up his Jacket. BS. (Reminder: He no longer works for Disney.)

Dante101 · Post by **Dante101** » Tue Nov 04, 2003 3:21 am

What's Benji's story? Did he work at Disney for a while? What did he do, and we doesn't he work there anymore?

LittleDollClaudia · Post by **LittleDollClaudia** » Tue Nov 04, 2003 1:22 pm

:shock: Wow my teeth are still chattering. I love Disneyland but boy, talk about delusional. :shudder: I agree with all of you. He needs to be taken out and dropped into the Rivers of America. Maybe the freezing cold water will finally wake him up.

CujoSR · Post by **CujoSR** » Tue Nov 04, 2003 7:36 pm

Dante101 wrote:What's Benji's story? Did he work at Disney for a while? What did he do, and we doesn't he work there anymore?

Well Benji, beyond his discription in the article (which is accurate) is a real nice guy. He worked with me over at the Train in DCA where he got the Spirit award 3 months from starting at DCA. He was for the most part a Coffee Roaster but sometimes bussed tables and cashed. The details are not exactly clear on his termination. He says it was attendance, I think he was fired for coming into the park when he called in sick. Knowing him, he probably did.

Something to note he is a pathological lair. He always trumped that he lived next door to Cynthia and had her personal phone number. Then why is he working at DCA when his true love is Disneyland. He lied about other minor things to make his life better looking than it was. The kicker is after he was fired he was always coming back to the park and visiting. He would say he was doing "secret" work for WDI. he would then take tons of turist pictures on a diposable camera.

So now you know y my post about K Lot is all about.

Wizard69 · Post by **Wizard69** » Wed Nov 05, 2003 10:47 am

CujoSR wrote:He lied about other minor things to make his life better looking than it was. The kicker is after he was fired he was always coming back to the park and visiting. He would say he was doing "secret" work for WDI. he would then take tons of turist pictures on a diposable camera.

So now you know y my post about K Lot is all about.

Like I said before, LOSER! I'm glad I never met the guy. Just reading about him creeps me out. Kinda like a guy I used to work with.. a total loser and nerd who is also 35+ and still living with mommy and daddy. He was creepy.

I do know Roger and Pat really well though. They're cool.

SpaceRanger · Post by **SpaceRanger** » Thu Nov 06, 2003 2:33 am

wow, creepy... I second the notion of dropping him into the Rivers of America

Freak · Post by **Freak** » Thu Nov 06, 2003 10:54 am

Nah thats not enough. Drop them in the RoA with some cement blocks on their feet.

BirdMom · Post by **BirdMom** » Sat Nov 08, 2003 2:19 pm

Benji's "secret work" reminds me of this other dork who used to work for the company a million years ago - he still might for all I know. I may have mentioned him before - I'm not sure. Anyway, this guy was a little twerp (maybe 5'2", very slight build, glasses - looked like your stereotypical geek) but every time he'd come back from some days off he'd have some fantastic story about how he'd been on some great adventure, military style - he said he was in the Army reserve. Anyway, nearly 20 years ago, there was this group of mountain climbers standed on Mt. Hood in Oregon, they had to dig themselves a snow cave to survive, and there was a big deal in the media about how the military resuced them. Twerp comes in and claims that he was flying one of the helecoptors that performed the rescue (it happenned on his days off). When they had the big earthquake in Mexico City, he claimed that he was part of the search and rescue teams digging out the survivors from the rubble (on his days off, of course). You just kind of took everything he said with a grain of salt. Anyway, one day I was lead giving a break in the hat shop when this guy comes in dressed in camalflauge fatiques. He asked if twerp was working and I said that he was around the area somewhere. So this guy starts going on and on about how they're such good friends, so I put on my charm and say "REALLY, where from???" and he tells me they went to St. Catherine's military academy together and they were in the same reserve unit. I was starting to think that his friend was almost rational when the friend asks if it would be possible for him to get on a rooftop across the way from the location where twerp was working and "observe" him. :? I told him that I would have to clear the request with management, and he didn't even flinch (hmmmmmm...). I was thinking that the two of them were far gone, playing Rambo... :Flame:

Anyway, I informed a long time supervisor about the request, and the information that I'd gleaned about this twerpy cast member (he was often a topic of concern at lead meetings - we were wondering if and when he was going to go postal on us). She found the friend and had him escorted off the property. In the meantime, she asked me to go into the area office and write a statement. While I'm tucked away writing in one supervisors office, I hear the twerp arrive and she (the supervisor) starts questioning him in the next office. He literally claimed to be a secret agent. Now this supervisor who didn't take crap from anyone or anything (higher ups included) started laughing. She was ex-Navy herself, plus she'd worked as a probation officer before switiching gears big time and going to work for Disney. She starts laughing at the twerp and says "you know and I know that that garbage is b.s. If you really were a secret agent, you're the dumbest one I've ever met in my life because agents aren't allowed to say anything to anyone about their work, and you've got the biggest mouth I've ever heard of..." It was wonderful sitting there listening to her dress this jerk down. He was rather subdued for the next couple of years that I was in merchandise, but to my shock, after I'd been in attractions for about a year I went into one of my old locations to gab with some friends and realized that they'd made the twerp a lead. They also made another flake that I'd had under my "leadership" a lead as well. That's when I found out that several people who'd been merch. leads for a long while had gotten fed up and quit and the department was desparate.

So - it doesn't surprise me that much when the occaissional loser like Benji gets hired in because the company doesn't have the same tough standards they did for new hires back before Eisner came along (not to mention the better pay scales). Losers come in all shapes and sizes with all kinds of obsessions. I feel like I should be more compassionate about some of these people, but there's something about the ones at D/L that get on my last nerve... :roll:

Dante101 · Post by **Dante101** » Sat Nov 08, 2003 10:03 pm

BirdMom wrote:...I hear the twerp arrive and she (the supervisor) starts questioning him in the next office. He literally claimed to be a secret agent.

Damn - I wonder just how pathetic his real life is that makes him delve into such a fantasy realm. I wonder if he's gone so far as to believe that stuff himself. And scary that he has a friend as looney as he is. They must have met during their psychiatric evaluations...

This world is a scary place. I think I'll only stick around 60 more years, then I'm outta here...

I'll come back as a raven. Fly around all day and nibble on roadkill...

BirdMom · Post by **BirdMom** » Tue Nov 11, 2003 1:50 pm

Dante101 wrote:I'll come back as a raven. Fly around all day and nibble on roadkill...

You've gotta at least hang around graveyards and try to unnerve people while you're at it... :twisted: