Stupid Guest Tricks

The last week of operation our park decided to be open on a Thursday evening. Why, I'm not sure. We had very few rides open since we were not expecting many guests. As my school was out for conferences, I agreed to come into work as the lead of one of the coasters. I am panel trained there, but my normal ride is a water ride.

Anywho, things are going well, we're having fun, when all of a sudden Ethan* called me into the panel. I thought I heard him say, "Jessi, come here, I want you to see this. There's a big bug." So I'm expecting to go in and see a rather nasty looking creepy crawly. Instead, when I enter the panel, there is a baby raccoon curled up beside in a jacket that had apparently been there for several months. He was just looking at me and blinking with a very polite yet bemused expression on his face. Completely surprised, I kind of danced out of panel saying, "Holy crap! There's a raccoon in the panel." My roommate Mitch* is on the other side of the platform working load and is watching this all with more than a tace of amusement.

I went back to panel and decided to keep running and told Ethan not to approach it. My logic being that we had been open for about 5 hours at that point and the raccoon had to have been there since we opened as we would have noticed it sneaking into the panel. I figured if it handn't attacked us yet, it wasn't going to anytime soon. I called the ops base, and while cracking up, I told them that we needed a supervisor because we had a raccoon in our panel. I got a call from the senior asking me what was going on and once again I explained about the raccoon. He asked me how it got there, and I told him I wasn't sure but I was assuming that he had been there since opening.

A few minutes later, Aaron (our supervisor) and the senior show up to evict said raccoon. They have Ethan leave panel and Mitch tell the guests that we are temporarily holding dispatch. Of course, they are all freaking out about the ride, and we're trying to explain to them that there's nothing wrong with the ride. Suddenly, this baby raccoon (which Mitch has dubbed Meeko) pops out of the panel onto the platform and Aaron and the senior come out of the panel with brooms. I'm holding open the gate, but they have it so spooked that he's on the ledge of the platform. The senior is yelling to Aaron "Push it off! Push it off!" and I'm yelling back "No don't push it off! It's a baby!" Meanwhile the other workers and the guests are cracking up watching this whole thing go down. Finally he shimmied down a support and ran off into the woods.

All in all, it was a rather memorable start to our last weekend.

Aww, poor Meeko! All in all, I'm sure that must have been a very interesting day

A few years ago, I was up before dawn to go into work for the morning shift for some reason (normally I work afternoon/evening).

Well, I sit down in the living room to put my shoes on, and a slight movement outside the sliding door to the balcony catches my eye... I look, and there's a fully-grown raccoon curled up in the corner of my balcony, just outside the door!

Yes, there's woods around behind my buidling, but I live on the 5th floor!

I got up and approached the door, he lifted his head and kinda looked at me, then curled up again. I had to get to work, so I just left him there.

When I got home that afternoon, he'd moved to the far end of the balcony, and was curled up asleep in the shadow of a table. (It was a bright sunny day) Whatever I had going on that day, I was only making a quick stop at home after work before heading back out, so I decided to give him until that night to leave on his own before calling the rental office or the city's Animal Control office. When I got home that night, he was gone.

Near as I can figure, since the balconies and support posts are all made of pressure-treated wood, he must've climbed up the posts from the ground like he would a tree. When he got to my top-floor balcony the overhanging roof kept him from going any farther, so he just camped out on my balcony all day.

I know I have a couple pics of him (mostly just a big ball of fur at mid-day) but it's too late to go hunting for them now.

-Rob

Animal encounters at our old apartment included a venomous snake (killed by animal control in an encounter I can only tell in person), a wild rabbit that I fed so often it would wait for me to get home, road runners, baby red ear slider that we rescued from the driveway (its siblings all died, crushed by cars), and our favorite was the beavers that moved into the small creek between buildings that took it from about 1.5 feet wide to about 30 feet wide.
We were driving one night and two coyotes were chasing a rabbit near some woods, the two coyotes stopped to look at us and the rabbit kept on going. Smart rabbit!

Had a raccoon trot across the road near me while I was stopped at a light late at night on the way home from the theater last week. I was a big one, too -- biggest I'd ever seen, at least 3 feet long. We get raccoons occasionally in our neighborhood, but rabbits are more common... and when I was digging our Christmas decorations out of our shed a couple of weeks ago I found a pair of opossums happily living among them!

I've had a few animal experiences at WDW, including:
*a snake that came into the store I was working in in Liberty Square

*a baby bird that was hopping around on the floor in the Utilidor outside the cast cafeteria

*a baby squirel that a guest found (and picked up) in the little garden in UK at Epcot (where British Invasion play)

*a bird getting stuck in one of the lanterns at the outdoor theater in AA in Epcot

I once saw a raccoon (alive and fine of course) stuck inside a trap in front of the Nemo show. It was just sitting there looking around calmly.

I never saw it, but I heard in one of the stores I worked in, there was a squirrel who kept stealing a piece of candy from the loose candy selection we had in there. It would come back throughout the day, take another piece and then leave. I'm guessing that there are a lot of little hands who take the candy without paying as well :p:

Sounds just like the squirrel that decided to attack our operator booth on opening day of the season. Pretty sure he and another squirrel made a home at the top of our station because later in the season we would see baby squirrels jumping/falling off the beams above our track and running around the station.

Those of you who know me on Facebook, you've probably seen the pictures of me herding an armadillo on the Monorail platform. It came up the ramp and was headed toward the resort beam when I stopped it from going that way. I really, REALLY didn't want to see what would happen if it fell in the trough. So I cornered it over in the Express area where guests used to wait for the cab until animal control arrived.

Good times.

My latest lil encounter was a white long billed bird at EPCOT. I think it was a White ibis.

Some crazed SG dropped a hunk of turkey skin out on promenade for bird. Bird grabbed the skin, but found he had no hope of getting it down.

Does he drop it? NO!

So....well here we come, chasing the poor thing into the seating area for AA trying to tell it to drop the thing. Does that work?? NOOOOOO!

Soooo, we kinda cornered it badly. Yeah, kept blocking his every turn until the poor lil guy finally dropped it and flew off. I think I have traumatized that bird for life. :(

I dispose of skin in trash as we get applause. *sigh*

Most asked SG question? Is it bad for him????
My only response, "It can KILL him".

I did mutter to my peer helping corner the bird, "If I end up on You Tube, I am gonna be pissed".

mapo