Stupid Guest Tricks

From the Washington Post.

Love Disney, hate Disney, sort of love Disney, really hate Disney: Travelers are generally of mixed opinion on the place. But man, what to make of this?

According to a report on Orlando's Fox TV affiliate, a woman named Aimee Krause has accused Alabama native Victoria Walker of beating her up after she was accused of cutting in line. With her kids. On the Mad Tea Cup ride.

Thanks to the pop-culture blog Jaunted for bringing this to my attention. According to the Fox report, the incident "could send Walker to jail for 15 years. The incident happened in May of 2007, but because the victim is now suffering serious after affects prosecutors are going forward with the case. . . . Court documents say Walker beat Krause because Krause supposedly skipped Walker in the Mad Tea Cup ride line. 'She came from behind just screaming,' Krause said this week. 'Next thing I knew she kicked me in my left leg, threw me to the ground and at that point I was pinned between the teacup and the saucer and she continued to beat up on my body.' "

Certainly can't condone her actions, if the allegations are true, but I feel Walker's pain. I dig the World, but man, those lines can go on forever (and FastPass can be a good thing, but you can only use a limited number -- on a busy day, there's just no getting away from the hordes queueing up). No word in the report whether Krause actually cut in line. And after a day of dealing with all things Disney, a lot of people are ready to blow their stack.

But haven't we all been in that situation in our travels? Mostly, I suspect, we stay tight-lipped to avoid a scene. But when the lips come unglued, watch out. A few weeks ago in the Antigua airport, I saw two women nearly come to blows when one of them sauntered in from the sidelines and jumped in front of everyone while we were lining up to board. A police officer finally broke up the shouting match -- and the line cutter still got on first.

And theme park lines can be the worst: thuggish kids pushing to the front, people smoking (ack), thuggish adults pushing to the front. But really now . . . those teapcups aren't worth waiting for in the first place.

Old news becoming new again.

I believe that they are actually going to trial now. The victim is quite a mess from the news report I saw a couple of nights ago.



Really folks, the teacups are not worth fighting over. If you really want to have fun and go around in circles, we will do donuts in a bus.

can you do bus donuts in Florida? I mean, without driving it onto an actual ice skating rink first?

Tara_Lee3 wrote:can you do bus donuts in Florida? I mean, without driving it onto an actual ice skating rink first?

Don't forget the parking lots are BIG! and sometimes wet and deserted.

OK, here's my take on the situation as a CM at Teacups (Though I was not there for this incident, nor do I know the CM that was):

The theme of the teacups is a MAD tea party. Thats how we run it. The queue is single file from the turnstyles to the loading pen. We encourage everyone once inside the pen to move all the way forward. here is how the pen works: When they get to the pen, we have everyone move all the way in and fill all the empty space. if we only have 1 CM there, then we open the first gate then the second and its a free-for-all to get a teacup. One packed pen is roughly 18 teacups (how many we have), so to keep the time in between each cycle short, we make sure we wont overfill or underfill the cups, because it takes longer to look around and spot an empty cup or get people back in the pen when there are no more cups left. Its much better when we have 2 CMs there and one can pack the queue while the other is starting the attraction, and if there are extra cups the CM can let the other one know how many extras are left.

Now, I've had guests at teacups be pushy, rude, and immature towards other guests. I've had guests bitch me out because they didn't get a teacup even though they were 'first in line' but because *I* opened the other gate, they didn't get one . At teacups, if you don't get a cup it is because you were too picky on what one you wanted or went to the other side. As soon as the ride stops, we open the pen (while everyone is exiting their cups). Best thing to do is just find a cup with people exiting and wait for them to exit rather than search out a vacant cup.

But BEATING SOMEONE UP OVER IT!?!? That is messed up. They took your teacup? Take another one. If you both were in the pen in roughly the same area chances are there would have been another cup unless you were at the entrance (back) of the pen. If there wasn't, just explain the situation to the CM nicely, and I'm sure most of us would have made sure to get you on the next teacup spin (and possibly got you a fastpass for another attraction for your worries, though it is not something we normally do for overloaded teacups). Could have saved yourself a lot of trouble.

What the hell is wrong with people today...

You can do donuts anywhere lol, just got to find a spot big enough.

This is sad because now it is a race issue and the race card has been flung on the table by the media.

If this had been white on white then nothing would have happened but now it is a news item, sigh, let it die.

I'm very suspicious of the lady doing the accusing. I googled the story and saw the original news report (and some interesting chat on Board X), and let's just say I'm suspicious (as were the people on Board X). The woman was blaming Disney for not calling Orange County right away, and when they showed her "horrible bruise" there was absolutely nothing there. The original news report made it sound like it happened in the line itself and she described it as happening after everybody was on the tea cup saying that it was just her and the lady in the line (pen?) and a bunch of guests behind them. Now she is saying she was pinned between the teacup and saucer and now she is saying that her children were also attacked. Ok, if her children were attacked, wouldn't she have reported that last year? In my experience, parents will take care of their children before they take care fo themselves.

I also find the story way off and believe the black lady. She dont look like a momma whomping a scrawny broads butt. Everything is just not right.