Check-In!

I am going to start off by saying that I know it's after midnight, making this officially day 2 of my program. But...since I'm just now getting to where I can slow down enough to blog and I haven't slept yet, I will still refer to this as today. And now, on with your regularly scheduled post. :p

Oh my word. Today has been insane. I am so overwhelmed after everything I went through today, and I am so glad that day 2 is an off day so I can get settled in and recover from the craziness that was day 1.

I was up at 4:30am....something I typically don't like to do. I met my 2 housemates (Tiffani and Cayla) and Tiffani's boyfriend Jordan in the lobby of the hotel we were staying at, and we drove over to Vista to get in line for check in. We got there around 5:30, and while we weren't the very first people there, we were still at the front of the line. We stood in line until right around 8am, and I'm glad we did. By the time they opened the gate and let us in, the line was freaking long. I took video, and I'll post it tomorrow. It was ridiculous.

So, they let us in, and that's when the craziness started. We pretty much ran to the back of Vista and had to go through this process of filling out some paperwork that wasn't related to the paperwork we had to fill out before today. This is where we found out where we would be living, who our roommates would be, and got our parking decals (which I still haven't put on my car. I need to do that tomorrow). We also got our program guide, which will basically be our best friend throughout the program. It has pretty much any piece of information we need to know about the program, from maps of the apartment complexes to phone numbers, to information about the Orlando area. We also got our housing ID. I hate mine. My picture looks horrible, and no, I will not be posting it for you to see. :p

And just so you know, I did get with the 3 girls (Tiffani, Cayla, and my roommate Izzy) I wanted to be with, and we did get the apartment we wanted. All went very well with housing. :)

After we got through all of that, we had about 45 minutes to kill before we had to board the bus to Casting, so we walked over to the parents' area and met up with my parents for a bit. Tiffani took the time to actually drive over to the apartment complex and find our apartment. When she got back, we boarded the bus and headed over to Casting so we could find out where we would be working and get all of the technical things taken care of so that we could officially become cast members at Walt Disney World. And yes, this included taking another picture for our Cast Member ID. So now, I have to carry 2 IDs with me at all times. This should be fun.

So, I bet you're wondering where I'm working. Well, I was hoping I would be in a resort, but I'm not. I'm in a park. However, I got lucky and ended up in my favorite park, which is Epcot. And I'll be working at Coral Reef. This excites me. I ate there back in December, and it is such an amazing restaurant. Go look up information about it. It's awesome.

We were at Casting for what felt like forever. We had to get our background checks (including fingerprints) done. We got to turn in our on-boarding paperwork (the paperwork we had to fill out prior to getting here), we got to set up direct deposit for our money to go directly into our checking accounts, and we got information about our Traditions class and training schedule for the rest of the week. Traditions is on Wednesday. I have the later session, which is at 2pm. I'm glad because those who have the 8am session have to be at the bus stop at 6:45am Wednesday morning. I won't have to be at the bus stop until 12:15pm. More sleep for me! :p All I know about Traditions is that it gets us acquainted with the Disney Company and Disney World, and we get our CM IDs. Once we get those glorious CM IDs, we can officially get into the parks for free and start getting our CM discounts! The parks are going to be overrun with CPs on Wednesday! :) I'm so  excited to get to visit the parks again. I'm just trying to figure out if I should visit MK or Epcot first. :p

I start training on Thursday. I have what is called "Discovery Day" at Disney University then. I think this is probably when everyone with the same roles get together and learn about their role and what to expect and all. Friday, I actually have orientation at Epcot. I'm not sure if it's just for my restaurant, or if it's a park orientation. I guess I'll find out then!

After Casting, we headed to get our cars and go to the apartment to start unloading and moving in. Of course, it rained pretty much the entire time we were moving things in (oh...and we're on the 2nd floor of a building with no elevators.) Pretty fun stuff there. :p I was completely soaked by the time I finished getting all of my stuff inside. We had a few hours before our housing meeting (which was at 3pm) to start unpacking, so we did. Then we went to the meeting, and that lasted about 2 hours. Not gonna lie, it wasn't the most exciting thing in the world, and a lot of it was just repeating information we had already been told. I was pretty glad when it was over.

I went out to eat with my parents because I hadn't eaten a real meal all day. I get the feeling that I will have more days like that. So....I'll probably (hopefully) lose some weight on this program. :p After dinner, they took me to Walmart, and then I came back to the apartment to finish unpacking and such. I'm still not done, but I do have most of the stuff unpacked. I can always finish tomorrow. :p

That was pretty much day 1. It was all very crazy and overwhelming. A lot of information was thrown at us today. I'm going to have to take some time tomorrow to sit down and go over all of it.

I think it's bedtime for me now. Hopefully I'll get my pictures/videos uploaded tomorrow so I can post them and show you how things went. I'll do an apartment tour once we're all completely settled in and everything. :)

Have a magical day....er...night! :)