Party of Four?......Right this way...

Today I received an email from Michele at Yummy confirming a BIG change to my WDW plans. I am no longer known as a Merchandise Hostess....I am now a Food & Beverage Hostess!

Rachel and I have swapped roles, a fairly painless task which involved little more than emailing Yummy and asking for their permission. They in turn contacted the Disney recruiting team who gave us the all clear and we are now switching.

In a way I am a little sad because I have made some good friends with merchies in the UK and I know that f&b is usually more challenging/stressful but I am also very happy because this is the role which I originally applied for and I think it will suit me better than merch. Also, Rachel really wanted to work in merch so I am glad to have helped her to get her preferred role! :o)

I've been looking around and found some info on the areas which I will now be working in. The f&b locations are still within the UK Pavillion of Epcot, just on the other side of the street.

Rose and Crown Pub and Dining Room - Fish and chips, bangers and Mash, Prime Rib and Sherry Trifle are among the regular items at Rose and Crown. The Rose and Crown is open for lunch and dinner, inside or outside.

Thirsty?? Sit at the pub and enjoy yards of Bass Ale, Guinness Stout, Harp Lager or Caffrey's Irish Ale. The Rose and Crown contains a varied history of pub styles, combining elements from three basic pub designs: the street pub, the waterfront pub, and the country pub. The exterior design was modeled after the Elizabethan period of the late 16th century. The interior decor was pattered after Victorian architectural forms of the 1890s.

Yorkshire County Fish and Chips - counter service

Here are some sample menus from the Rose and Crown Pub and Restaurant:

Starters-
Samosas - Indian-inspired pockets stuffed with spiced vegetables served with greens and tamarind and mango sauces $7.99
Rose and Crown Cheese Plate - Irish Cheddar, Mushroom Brie, and Stilton Pastry with individual accompaniments $9.99
Roasted Mushrooms - cooked with Cream and Garlic, served on a puff pastry $5.99
Crab Timbale - lump crabmeat mixed with peppers and onions with a hint of curry served with a fresh fruit salsa and watercress $8.99
Potato and Leek Soup - $5.49
Mixed Greens Salad - with spinach, bibb lettuce, tomatoes and bacon with your choice of stilton cheese dressing or mustard vinaigrette $5.49

Entrees -
Tamarind-glazed Pork Loin - served with roasted potatoes $20.99
Steak and Fish - Grilled Steak and Harry Ramsden's Battered fresh cod, green beans and mashed potatoes $24.99
Bangers and Mash - traditional English sausages, with braised cabbage and bacon, mashed potatoes and shallot gravy $15.99
Harry Ramsden's Fish & Chips - Battered fresh Cod served with English Chips $15.99
Herb-roasted Lamb - with Irish cheddar potato gratin and Guinness Barbeque Sauce $22.99
Marinated Chicken Breast - served with roasted garlic bread pudding and onion broth topped with onion marmalade $17.99
Vegetable Curry - fresh roasted vegetables in a mild curry served with grains and Indian bread $12.99

Side Orders -
Green Beans $2.99English Peas $2.99Mashed Potatoes $2.99English Chips $2.99

Desserts -
Chocolate Scotch Cake $5.99
Baileys Irish Coffee Trifle $5.99
Warm Apple Crumble topped with ice cream $5.49
Frozen Vanilla Custard - $5.49
Sticky Toffee Pudding - $4.99

I can personally recommend this restaurant as a FANTASTIC place to eat. We went there before I knew I would be working there and have a great meal with an amazing view of the fireworks, friendly service and very yummy food. It is also reasonably priced!

Oooh....I've also just found this comment about the UK Pavillion on a holiday planning website....Chat with the Cast Members in the UK, they are among the friendliest in World Showcase.

That's it for now :o)

Halloween and the swinging sixties.......

(Yes, that is a full sized tea-cup, from the ride, filled ENTIRELY with "candy"!!)



I've reached the 60s...

Well, there you have it, I've reached 68 days...and still have nothing new to say! Nothing really Disney related is happening these days as there's not a lot to be done just yet.

The girls and I will need to finalise our plans and book a hotel room and car hire pretty soon, I REALLY need to buy my medical insurance (just need the funds to do it!) and make sure I have travel insurance.

It's pretty scary that the XL company has now gone bust, I nearly booked my flight ticket through them but at the last minute wanted to change to Claire's flight so that I had someone to talk to. So it's pretty lucky I swapped as I would be hugely out-of-pocket if I hadn't swapped :o(

I was talking to one of my friends at the weekend and he will be coming over next October to visit me with a friend. He's determined to get me to go to the Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights :o(

As most of you know, I'm not a good person to go and watch a scary film with, mainly because I will flat out REFUSE to go with you! So trying to take me to this event is just silly. I'd be much happier to go to Disney's more tame version...Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party. The clue is in the title of that one! The Disney one is basically a night in the Magic Kingdom, with limited crowds because you need a special ticket for it, fancy dress (optional but fun!), trick or treating = LOTS of candy (notice the use of the American word there) and great fireworks, a parade and characters dressed up!

Here are some great links for both events in case anyone is interested:

http://land.allears.net/blogs/jackspence/2008/09/mickeys_not_so_scary_halloween_1.html

http://www.halloweenhorrornights.com/orlando/

They celebrate Halloween in style over there so it's quite a big holiday.

I think that's about enough rambling for now, hopefully I'll have sorted more stuff out by the end of next week so will have more to say! Oh I almost forgot, I made some large photo collage posters to hang up in my room in Florida, they are supposed to be here soon so I'll try to take pics of them when they arrive :o)

How many days.......?!

..........................................78 to be exact!! Wow, I cannot believe how quickly time is flying by. I thought that my 8 month wait would be a nightmare but it hasn't been at all. It seems even more strange that some of the friends I have made over the past few months have just started their programmes in WDW this past week. I can remember talking to them about how long they had to go and suddenly they're all there!

I have been having second thoughts once again about my role. I am currently placed in merchcandise but am thinking of making the move to food & beverage. There are a couple of people who would like to do the opposite, so a swap could be quite straight forward. I have been talking to some of my Disney friends, in both roles, to get a better idea of what it is that they do and which role they fell is best to work in. I still have a few months to decide so I am not going to rush into anything.

Other than that, I am still working as a temp. I have never had so many random and odd jobs as I have had as a temp! It's quite interesting but also I seem to be far too efficient as I am getting my work done too quickly. There are officially 3 of us on my flight now; Me, Claire and Sam. It's going to be so much fun, and meeting the others at the airport the next day will be great!

As you can tell I am still very excited about moving, but I must admit my first anxieties have started to kick in now. Firstly about one person in particular who I know I will miss more than I initially thought, and also I had my first Disney-related bad dream last night which made me feel a little worried. But I blame the fact that I am ill, drugged up and was sleeping in a room full of vapour rub fumes last night! It will all be fine in the end......................

Signed, sealed, delivered...I'm yours!

That's right, I have signed on the dotted line, sealed the envelope and delivered my confirmation of acceptance to Disney. I had another slight mix up with them in that they sent my a letter describing the role of the UK Food and Beverage Hostess rather than a Merchandise Hostess. I had to contact Yummy to check that they had me listed as a merchandise hostess, which they did, so the nice people working for Disney simply sent me out the correct letter and everything is a-o-k!

I have also now booked my ONE WAY flight....meaning I won't be coming back...EVER! Haha ok ok I will be coming back as my visa won't allow me to stay for more than a year : (
I'll be flying with Claire, from Aberdeen and possibly Sam, from Brighton and Kayleigh, from London. I hope that Sam and Kayleigh do manage to get on our flight, it would be so much fun to have a small group of us!

I've been looking into prices of transport from the airport and because we're leaving a day early, we will need to get to a hotel and then the next morning, from the hotel to the housing complexes. So I am 99.9% certain that I will hire a car with Claire, that way we can drive to our hotel, go and get food, got to Walmart etc and have loads of space. It also means (hopefully) that we can move into the Disney housing complexes first thing on our official start date and bag the best rooms in our apartments! Clever? Yes...we're geniuses!!

Nothing much else has been sorted yet. I can't do anything about my visa until October/November when Yummy send me my appointment info so I suppose the next thing is to sort out some medical and travel insurance? I also need to do loads of silly little things like enquire about my contact lenses and medical prescriptions. I mean, where do I get them from?! I'm thinking stocking up here and taking loads with me is a good idea...but I'll see what I can find out.

Oh I've also started working on my leaving book. I'm making up a photo book online comprised of my favourite pics of family and friends as well as some empty spaces for people to write me messages, a bit like a wedding guestbook. I'll take the book with me so that I can look at the pics and messages whenever I feel like it.

False Alarm

Well today, this evening in fact, I almost had a Disney related heart attack! I received an email from Yummy jobs stating that the dates of my programme had to be changed because of American holidays.

At first I thought that my programme had been cut short, leaving on the 2/12/08 and returning on the 12/4/09, rather than the previously planned 27/11/09. But then after a few moments of screaming like a banshee, I realised that I had to get into the American way of thinking and invert the dates. The result....an extra TWO WEEKS added to my year long programme! Woop woop. So I am now going to be there until the middle of December 2009 instead of the end of November 2009. RESULT!!

Next up, I will be booking my flights before they get too expensive and sorting out medical insurance. Oh and another bit of exciting news....Heather and her friend are coming to visit me soon, aaaaaaaand I'm going to visit the legend that is Matt! Next month has just got a whole lot better!

I am getting more and more excited now about going and cannot wait to leave this place behind for a year. Although I will of course be sad to leave certain people behind, but they will all be visiting me anyway.

Tonight I have been sitting in my garden full of candles, watching stars. The best part of my night? Thinking about the fact that I will soon be laying on a beach with some great friends watching the stars in the tropical Florida climate. It just doesn't get much better than that!

Birthday Shinanigans

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Well, I am now officially an adult, but that doesn't mean I'm planning on growing up any time soon! To celebrate the occassion I decided to make cakes which were appropriate for the next year of my life. So I made Disney cakes!

Here are some pics for you all...enjoy!

Creating chaos in the kitchen!

The finished product...Mickey and Donald

All About James

All About James
Apparently, people don't want to read about me and what I've been getting up to so this post will not be about the fact that I have received my uni results (a 2:1 woooohoooo), got a new job or had an awesome 21st Birthday outing last night...nope, instead this post will be dedicated to the legend that is James Hare.


"Some say that his blood group is Nitrous Oxide, others say he fought off the dinosaurs with Fred Flinstone's car...all we know is he's called James Hare."


James is a young man who lives in Teeside where he eats cookies, grows bonsai trees and spends all his spare time talking to awesome ginger haired girls on msn. Currently he is involved in a little project we like to call the CRP, the Cultural Representative Programme. That's right, one day, some time soon, James will be moving to Florida to work in Epcot. Special? I think so!


If you see this lad out and about, be sure to stop and say hi. There really isn't a nicer guy who you could talk to randomly. (To get into his good books though, make sure you are armed with a plate of cookies, Ben and Jerry's ice cream, a Disney dvd or a warm smile and a big hug!)

*James - you are priviledged!*