As we gathered around the mic, sipping water from our trusty cups, we couldn't help but share the colorful tales of our latest exploits. The conversation took us from the competitive antics at "Drunk Brother" to the warm fuzzies as we celebrated Bruce the cat's second whirl around the sun. Join us as we chat about these life's little moments, including a touching nod to Shan's podcast episode, and the strength of community that keeps us anchored even amidst the chaos.
Shifting from the intimate to the expansive, we take you to the heart of East Tennessee, where Dollywood's charm beckons. There's something about the clatter of the Dollywood Express and the evolution of Red's Diner that transports you to a simpler, more nostalgic time. We'll even let you in on Dustin's personal journey, from a guest at the park to the conductor of that very steam train, and how these experiences are woven into the larger tapestry of theme park magic.
In the final stretch, we take a deep breath and wander through Epcot's transformative landscape, discussing its balance of culture and character, education and entertainment. We even throw in some insider tips and anecdotes from our time at the park, from character encounters to hidden dining gems. Rounding out our journey, we share our latest book club musings on the poignant "What Mother Won't Tell Me," inviting you to ponder its narratives with us and join the discussion online. So, pour yourself a cup of whatever grounds you, and let's revel in the stories that connect us all.
As we gathered around the mic, sipping water from our trusty cups, we couldn't help but share the colorful tales of our latest exploits. The conversation took us from the competitive antics at "Drunk Brother" to the warm fuzzies as we celebrated Bruce the cat's second whirl around the sun. Join us as we chat about these life's little moments, including a touching nod to Shan's podcast episode, and the strength of community that keeps us anchored even amidst the chaos.
Shifting from the intimate to the expansive, we take you to the heart of East Tennessee, where Dollywood's charm beckons. There's something about the clatter of the Dollywood Express and the evolution of Red's Diner that transports you to a simpler, more nostalgic time. We'll even let you in on Dustin's personal journey, from a guest at the park to the conductor of that very steam train, and how these experiences are woven into the larger tapestry of theme park magic.
In the final stretch, we take a deep breath and wander through Epcot's transformative landscape, discussing its balance of culture and character, education and entertainment. We even throw in some insider tips and anecdotes from our time at the park, from character encounters to hidden dining gems. Rounding out our journey, we share our latest book club musings on the poignant "What Mother Won't Tell Me," inviting you to ponder its narratives with us and join the discussion online. So, pour yourself a cup of whatever grounds you, and let's revel in the stories that connect us all.
You're listening to Orlando, unplugged, celebrating life in living color with Dustin and Ashley. Grab a cocktail or a mocktail and let's get unplugged. Orlando, oh my God, we're back again.
Speaker 2:How you doing? Ash, I'm tired, a little tired, yeah, like really tired.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, what are you drinking today? Water.
Speaker 2:Me too.
Speaker 1:Thank you, gio. Did you notice, or I noticed this, which you can't tell in this light, but that picture and the words like are like sun stained, so they've turned from black to like a brownish color, but it kind of looks like blood. So I'm here for it, it's my spooky cup.
Speaker 2:That's not a spooky cup, that's a cup with half naked Halloween men. See, I just had the Stanley. I love her, she's the best.
Speaker 1:You gotta love that good old leg cup.
Speaker 2:Listen, I'm here for it. Okay, I honest to God, I now get the hype. Like I didn't get the hype and like all the OG listeners know that, like, obviously the iconic Shan got me a makeup, so, like I was never a Stanley fan, I thought they were just wildly expensive, and now that I have one, I don't think I'll go back. The only thing I hate, my only complaint about it, is the fact that, like, if I put it in a bag and it's not upright, it will leak and I. That has happened to me numerous times. That is my only complaint about it.
Speaker 1:I just wish that, like maybe don't have a cup so big.
Speaker 2:No, drink a lot of water. Get over it. I'm like a fish.
Speaker 1:Well, speaking of drinking, that was something that we participated in Well we participated in a game revolved around drinking.
Speaker 2:Correct. I don't feel like we participated in the drinking.
Speaker 1:I drink. That's all I got to do all night was drink because I didn't have anything else to do. You had a few jello shots.
Speaker 2:You had a few beverages but I did those were pretty good. Those were pretty good. Colton made those, so shot it to him. That was pretty good.
Speaker 1:I was also so, for those of you listening, we recently participated in a new event that we're going to be talking about fully in depth next week with our friend Geo, who's the mastermind behind it but it is drunk brother which is an adaptation of big brother, the TV show. Yes, and so essentially we all just kind of get together at a house and we go through an entire season of big brother in one night. So we had 15, was it 15 or 14? 13.
Speaker 1:No no no, no, no, no, no, no, no. How many weeks was this competition? We had 14, 14 contestants, so we had 14 weeks worth of competitions to get through and we did it in a little under 12 hours 15.
Speaker 2:There were 15 weeks, yeah, 15.
Speaker 1:It was long and gruesome for you.
Speaker 2:What week did you go into?
Speaker 1:One, but we'll go into all of that 110%, though not my fault, wait before we not go into it anymore.
Speaker 2:Am I allowed to be like I was?
Speaker 1:in the top three. We're just not discussing the whole thing. That's so fine.
Speaker 2:I'm going to ride that coattail for the rest of my life, because I don't know if I ever want to do it again, because I don't want to lose my third place status. I mean, you don't have to, I don't get anything for third place status. Listen, Gio's going to make me a key. He's making me an honorary key.
Speaker 1:Just because we invited him to be on the podcast. You're not special. Yes, I am. I'm top three.
Speaker 2:Listen, I made it further than you, I made it further than Jordan and as the first timer I'm pretty proud of myself. So I got to hang out with all the P friends and all the people and make new friends.
Speaker 1:And then you came home, had a snack and went to work. Literally Didn't go to bed at three in the morning. No.
Speaker 2:I got home at what, we got home at what 3.30? And then I immediately changed my clothes and went to the office at 5.30 in the morning, worked eight hours, and then came home and crashed until about what? Two hours ago, and then I woke up.
Speaker 1:It was close to seven when you got up. You actually yeah it was seven because you sat down on the table to eat and Jordan was like, oh, it's time for us to watch this documentary and it still wasn't out, correct?
Speaker 2:Nope, I was nice and awake at seven o'clock so yeah, it was pretty good. But we have so much to go over for today's episode and stay tuned for pictures from drunk brother for next week's episode and obviously with our interview with Gio. That's gonna be super fun.
Speaker 2:So but you know what I am excited about that everybody had such raving reviews about Shan's podcast last week. I love that for her. They were very excited. They were very warm and welcoming, which is great, because she was hella nervous, but I love it. It was good. It was great. Why are you looking really good?
Speaker 1:I'm trying to make a joke, but I just, my brain isn't braining, so I could really joke any who, but yeah, that was fun.
Speaker 2:It's wrong, brucey, wait, can I do it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, go for it.
Speaker 2:Yesterday? Well, I guess Friday, because today's Sunday Friday was Bruce's birthday Today will be Wednesday when this comes out. Friday was Bruce's birthday, guys. She's now two.
Speaker 1:Which we did the math.
Speaker 2:She's 14. So in cat ears or in adult ears is adult ears or human ears Human ears, I guess.
Speaker 1:Wait, how do dogs age? Is it every seven years for?
Speaker 2:I don't know. I'm not a dog person, I'm a cat person.
Speaker 1:Oh well, so I just did the life expectancy of most cats.
Speaker 2:The only dog I'm a dog person. Love is mercadies.
Speaker 1:The life expectancy of a cat is like 13 years, so I just assumed that most humans live to 100. They don't, and then by doing that math, they are like seven and a half years per every human year. So she's 14.
Speaker 2:So I get the terrible twos and the teenage years all in the same time frame.
Speaker 1:And she's already stealing your stuff from your room in the bathroom.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she's got a new addiction to. I have these like soft-tied ponytails and she literally will grab them off the counter with her cute little teeth and then carry them around and then hide them. So thank you for hiding my $8 ponytails for us.
Speaker 1:You're the best she says you're welcome, mother, all right, well, we've got some fun planned for today. We do. I know we've talked a lot about theme parks and everything over the last couple of times, and I think this is. I think we're just we've decided that we're going to chill on the theme parks for a bit at least, until food and wine is over.
Speaker 2:We say that and then we're literally episode today is about theme parks. When did we say that, that we're going to chill from theme parks?
Speaker 1:Talking on the podcast. We've done nothing, oh my. God, how much sleep did you get today? Because you clearly don't remember anything. No.
Speaker 2:I'm really tired, guys. No, this is our.
Speaker 1:This is our, our farewell to talking about theme parks, because we've done nothing to talk about theme parks almost every single episode.
Speaker 2:We have, and then we're going to do it today too.
Speaker 1:But that's because it's it's our social life. It's literally all we do.
Speaker 2:Well, it's also like literally the reason we live here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is also true.
Speaker 2:So yeah, but before we get into that, we do have some updates on a couple of like pre show topics that we talked about last week and the week prior.
Speaker 1:So oh, yeah, go for it.
Speaker 2:I'd like to do that. Is there no intro music for that.
Speaker 1:No, we are in the intro. Oh, okay, I mean, hold on.
Speaker 2:I always thought there was, there, it is.
Speaker 1:Take it away.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much. So what was it? Two weeks ago we spoke about the Madeline Soto murder case. That was it hit pretty home, pretty close to home for all of us, as this was roughly close to my, to my office. So we've got we've got some updates on this. So Steven Stearns, which was her mom's boyfriend, has officially been identified as the prime suspect and he is heading to trial in spring as he was charged with 60 counts of child sex crimes. That's disgusting.
Speaker 1:That's something.
Speaker 2:So, for those that do remember, we did speak about how he was arrested for having some child pornography photos and videos on his phone. Well, it was later released that those videos and photos were of Madeline, so they were actively videos of him doing just unspeakable, god awful things to this poor girl. It's pretty bad, it's, it's pretty, it's been pretty, pretty awful. So an arrangement is being made for him. He is going to appear in front of court against the charges and he will either plead guilty or not guilty. It is yet to come out, but he has waived the formal arraignment process because he does not want to appear in court. Instead, his attorney will submit a written plea on his behalf and his court appearance for a pretrial is scheduled for April 24.
Speaker 2:The prosecution and offense will appear simultaneously before a judge to proceed to determine if they will proceed with a jury trial. This is also the moment for any defense attorneys to submit a any various motions, like the motion to dismiss charges, things like that. It looks like the court has already set a record, a jury trial date, which is set for May 13. Obviously, that's if they decide to go to trial. He now this is. He has yet to be charged with her murder. Okay, this is only for the trial. Pornography videos and photos and sex crimes.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, they have no evidence to correct the only thing that they have.
Speaker 2:So far that links the two of them together is the fact that she was in his vehicle.
Speaker 2:There is a video of him throwing her backpack and her laptop for school into a garbage, and then there is another video showing him in the car with her, and the police believe that at this moment, when she's in the car with them entering the complex or leaving the complex of her, of where she lived, madeline at this moment is no longer with us anymore.
Speaker 2:Maybe at this moment he believe the chief deputy officer believes at this moment she had already been murdered, which is to me that's just absolutely disgusting, like not only did you brutally kill this girl, but you propped her up in this front seat of this car to make it look like she was still alive while you were driving her to school. Like this man is so disturbed it's not even funny. So according to the Kusummi police, the, there was disturbing images and videos that were discovered on his phone that led to 60 new charges, including sexual battery of a child, loot, enlistment, molestation and the possession of child sexual abuse materials. It found guilty of the sexual battery charges, which are capital felonies. He could face life in prison or even the death penalty.
Speaker 1:I didn't know Florida had that.
Speaker 2:Yep, and my favorite thing in the entire world is what David Thomas said. He's the professor of forensic studies at the Florida Gulf Coast University and he said, no matter what, he's not getting out of jail. And I love it.
Speaker 1:I'm here for it. It's where you have to stay, correct.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I'm a firm believer that I think people should go the way, especially in child cases like this. They should go the way that they hurt the child. So I'm here for it Rot or you know what. Let them hang. That's all I gotta say. Obviously, as we learn more and when it comes out, if, hopefully, mr Shurn gets charged with her murder, I will update you all as we go on.
Speaker 1:So for today's main topic, we thought that we would have a little bit of fun with it, and we know that we've talked a lot about individual theme parks. So today we thought that it would be fun for us to discuss what is our favorite theme park. So we're going to be jumping a little bit into each of our favorite parks and what makes them our favorite parks and all that jazz.
Speaker 2:I think it's so funny to me that you picked a park that's not here in Florida, because it's not my favorite park.
Speaker 1:This is not wait a minute. Okay, my favorite park is not in Florida.
Speaker 2:What's your favorite park in Florida?
Speaker 1:Oh, I don't know, I haven't thought about it.
Speaker 2:Really Wow, that makes me sad.
Speaker 1:Magic Kingdom is not yet Definitely.
Speaker 2:Magic Kingdom was mine. Like as a child it was mine.
Speaker 1:But here's my problem with these is None of the parks down here my favorite parks, because all of the stuff I like to do is spread out amongst all of them.
Speaker 2:That's pretty true. Like you're, like I like a little combo of a and a little combo B. Mm-hmm, you're like a good Chinese Meal.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's great. All right, who's starting?
Speaker 2:go ahead. Okay, I'll give it away to you. All right, you? You have the floor.
Speaker 1:All right, so for me personally, like I said, obviously my favorite park is not here in Orlando. My favorite park, my home park, is gonna be back in my hometown In East Tennessee and it is gonna be obviously.
Speaker 2:Dollywood. I feel like all should never be surprised he's saying this, as he's actively wearing a Dollywood sweatshirt sitting on my couch.
Speaker 1:I am because it's my favorite and this is my favorite sweater, but but yeah, so Dollywood is definitely my favorite park, but there's been many iterations of theme parks at that location, which is something that we can't say for the parks here in Orlando. So the property actually opened back in 1961. It was known as rebel railroad and then over the years it changed its name, through the 60s, the 70s, all the way up to the 80s it was Gold Rush Junction. It was simply just Gold Rush. For one year it changed to Silver Dollar City, tennessee, and then in 1986 opened as Dollywood Under the owner ownership of Hirsh and family entertainment and Dolly Parton.
Speaker 2:So when they were all of these names before they were Dollywood, were they owned by Dollywood?
Speaker 1:No Dollywood, they owned by Dolly and Hershey every name change was a different form of ownership got it Okay, I've always so art modell, who owned the Cleveland Browns. At one point owned the park, I believe, when it was either Gold Rush or Gold Rush Junction.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's pretty cool.
Speaker 1:And then it was sold to Hersch and family entertainment.
Speaker 2:Every time you say, every time I hear Hersch and I always, some house away, want to say Hershey.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know, I used to think that when I was a kid I thought Hersch and was Hershey chocolate. That's so funny but no with. It was purchased by Hersch and family entertainment. And then they opened their second park, which was Silver Dollar City, tennessee, to be the sister to Silver Dollar City Missouri. Missouri. Missouri, which both of those parks had, you know, an 1800s life in the Ozark Mountains, missouri, and then it's life in the Smokies here which I find it interesting.
Speaker 1:It was never life in Appalachia, it's always been life in the Smokies, which is why a lot of people didn't realize. But when Dollywood first opened in 1986 it was called the friendliest town in the Smokies because back at that point it was still heavily influenced by Silver Dollar branding. So Dollywood was known as the friendliest town in the Smokies and then you'll see, like in the 90s to 2000s they shift that, that change to the friendliest place in the Smokies.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's pretty neat, mm-hmm of it.
Speaker 1:And you know it's Silver Dollar City. In Missouri they're known as citizens of Silver Dollar, the town of Silver Dollar. But at Dollywood you're not known as Citizens, you're known as hosts. That's kind of cute. Do you know why Dollywood refers to them as hosts? No, tell me so in Dollywood Culture, their employees. So, like how Universal has team members and Disney has cast members, at Dollywood you have hosts and it's capitalized, and anytime Dollywood Formally refers to their guest, mm-hmm, the G is capitalized in guest.
Speaker 1:Why because they're placing importance upon those. There's a, there's a full thing for it. I know I'm not getting it correct, but in Dollywood culture guest is capitalized because the guests it's like their name, it's like it's who they are. It's a weird thing. It's cute, but at Dollywood you are a host, because you are hosting Guests in our home.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's cute and I.
Speaker 1:That's something that I've always enjoyed about Dollywood, but since it's opening, the park has more than doubled in size. It is larger than Magic Kingdom here in Florida. Wow. It has opened many first of its kind roller coasters in the country and in the northern hemisphere. It's created many festivals over the years, such as Festival of Nations, which was one of my favorite, which we unfortunately saw retire when the pandemic came. The newest, that I will always love you music festival, which was something that Dollywood did last year to celebrate the song I will always love you. They liked it so much that they've decided to make it a whole thing.
Speaker 2:He gets a new soundboard guys, and now he's taking it to a whole new level. You're the worst. You know I did that on the last podcast episode too. What I said yeah, I know you did, I'm gonna do it. Every single time it comes up, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1:Do you know what my two favorite festivals are? Dollywood, though. No tell me they are the harvest festival with the great pumpkin luminites. That's the, their Halloween festival, that is their version of Halloween and, I think, my favorite. I love the Halloween, but I still think that my favorite is Smoky Mountain Christmas.
Speaker 2:That's because Christmas is the best holiday in the entire world.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, when it comes to the Golden Ticket Awards, dollywood has been the only ever award winner for best Christmas event than any theme park in the entire world. No one else has ever won that but Dollywood.
Speaker 2:That makes me sad, because Grinchmas is so good, but it. I've never done Dollywood, yeah, but Universal's Christmas is. Careful their buster.
Speaker 1:That's a good place I know it is, but in my opinion, when it comes down to because you have to understand, dollywood is in the Bible, though, so it's all about Jesus and family.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So that's literally all Dollywood is during Christmas. It's Jesus, family and over four million Christmas lights. Hi, bruce. So Kind of like we were talking about earlier. So the park started as a city in the 1800s in Appalachian. It since turned to spread across the decades. So you see the 1800s, you see the 1920s, the 1940s represented in the park, and then now we're kind of seeing that hidden Grove, wildwood Grove at Dollywood, which is essentially the hidden Grove which is lost in time.
Speaker 1:I love that, and so they kind of got away from just the 1800s. And so I kind of joke, this has been my thing. Dollywood now is Modern. Paula Dean Food Network. Hmm when you look at the architecture of the new buildings coming in, like it's, it's, it's farmhouse, chic, essentially.
Speaker 2:And it's joining a game.
Speaker 1:Yes, it's chip and Joanna games and Paula Dean and Dolly Parton all mixed together into a big old cauldron.
Speaker 2:I don't know if we should add Paula Dean to it. That woman's hella controversial not anymore, isn't she still no?
Speaker 1:No, she was canceled and then uncanceled. I don't, we're not getting into that. But the next week's episode we dive into Paula Dean's life and then one of the things I like the most is Dollywood just recently opened their second out of five planned resorts. Wow.
Speaker 1:So they did that in. So they opened Dream more. I helped. I helped open Dream, or back in the day in 2015, and then in 2023, they opened Heart Song, which I Kind of want to go stay at. Maybe that's what we'll do when we go and then, so, yeah, so, hopefully, the rumor mill whispers that we're gonna see a Campground soon. I would like a campground. That'd be pretty cool. Yeah, why is it your favorite? Thank you for asking.
Speaker 2:You're welcome. So I like that history lesson, but I'm ready for more.
Speaker 1:I think that for me, dollywood is my favorite because I grew up going to it. Mm-hmm, it was my first roller coaster, it was my first water ride. It was your first coaster there. Blazing Fury, wow, which I was terrified. I was a child, really, I, so you know.
Speaker 2:I like. I know you're good.
Speaker 1:I grew up skipping school, in high school, to go to Dollywood, and sometimes I would.
Speaker 1:Well, I would just go by myself. High school was a good time for me I was fortunate but it was also a rough time. I was going there, a lot of personal things, so Dollywood kind of became a secret haven and it's a place that I just went to like people watch and and enjoy time and hear the coasters and hear the screams and all that and yeah, I got to, I got to watch it go from like a really small regional park that maybe had, you know, 3000 people in it a day To becoming a worldwide destination that families travel all around the world to go to.
Speaker 2:I love that. I think it's great. So is the yeah that coaster your favorite ride there.
Speaker 1:God no.
Speaker 1:You were just child terrified, never want to do it again. No, I've ridden it a million times and I love it. I think I think that Blazing Fury is iconic. I think it is a classic. I think that, you know, I don't think we'll ever see it Remove. I think maybe we may get the Silver Dollar City treatment where it gets fully refurbished and rebuilt, but they took out the water. It's a very old attraction. It's like spaceship Earth at Epcot. You know, it's all the old animatronics. But for me, I think my favorite ride is the Dollywood Express is not their train.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm. So it takes you on a train, is your?
Speaker 2:favorite ride at Dollywood Mm-hmm. Out of all the coasters, yeah, the train, mm-hmm. I love that. All right, tell me why the posters only last like a minute.
Speaker 1:Lightning rod. Once lightning rod crests the hill, it only goes 45 seconds. I know I love it, and then you spend most of your two minutes on that ride on the main break trying to go back into the station. All right, I love it.
Speaker 1:But I like, so I dollywood. The Dollywood Express is my favorite because it takes you on a five mile scenic journey Through the park and then out of the park and it's a genuine coal burn in steam driven locomotive. So it operates today the exact same way that it operated almost a hundred years ago and that is not something that almost any theme park in the country Can say that they have. Even the Great Smoky Mountain Railroad, which has a steam engine, has converted it to not run on coal, it runs on oil, Mm-hmm. So it operates exactly how it did and it was helped used To build the Alkent. Both of the locomotives that Dollywood has a Jim 192 and engine 70. They were used as a part of the United States Army in Alaska on the White Pass in Yukon Railroad. They helped build the Alkan military highway. So you know they got to help during World War two and you know we were worried about Soviet Russia invading through Alaska and that's like it. I mean that's like it. That's a hidden gem. No one knows about that.
Speaker 2:Isn't that also like you remember a while ago when we were talking about like all about us and like where we worked and stuff like that is not that same photo that we put up on our social media. Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:So when. I was a full circle moment when I left Dollywood in 2019 and then I just missed it. So when the park reopened from the pandemic, I went back part-time as a conductor on the Dollywood Express. I love that and I continued to work there until my tenure at Dollywood came to a close and that chapter had ended. But yeah, that was, that's my favorite.
Speaker 2:I like this new mic cover, cuz you can't hear me aggressively swallow my water. Mm-hmm, I'm here for it. You're welcome. Okay, so obviously this is my favorite Like spot about going to a theme park is the food. Mm-hmm. So like, give me your go-to. You're at Dollywood, this is. You have to eat this place. You have to eat this food. Where are you going?
Speaker 1:This is a hard one.
Speaker 2:Why.
Speaker 1:Because my absolute favorite used to be Red's Diner as a kid. It's the. It's the drive-in diner in front of lightning rod. Oh, yeah, okay, yeah, I know exactly where that is now back in the day when I was a kid, it was an actual drive-in. Wait, is this the?
Speaker 2:same place with the good ass milkshakes.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, then I know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1:So when I was a kid, this place was an actual drive-in, like neon lights on the outside, cars pulled up under the car port. No way it was it was like a drive-in diner. Oh it's pretty dope. But the, the restaurant over the years, just became so popular because it was one of Dollywood's largest. Yeah, it's huge, very few indoor Quick service restaurants. I didn't know that. Mm-hmm Dollywood, as you know. I know it was big.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I didn't know that, it was one of the few.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they don't. They don't have a lot of quick. Well, they're getting better, but they haven't always had large quick service. But it used to be flat top grills and that's how they'd cook your burger. Oh dope, but when they did the big remodel of lightning rod and or not of lightning rod. They did a big remodel of Reds diner sometime between 2014 and 26 or, yeah, 2016, and they they moved to conveyor belt burgers.
Speaker 1:So your burger goes into a machine and then it cooks on a conveyor belt and it flips it and cooks the other side. Oh and that has caused a lot of the burgers to get like burnt and charred, in my opinion.
Speaker 2:That's not an opinion, it's the truth. See, I think that some people like that. No, not me.
Speaker 1:No, but then it was renovated again when they opened lightning rod because they needed it to to be more accommodating the the way that they set it up Was not conducive to lines and this restaurant works like circus McGurkis at Universal Cafe, like it is sorry. It's like 13 registers across the counter but then they only had like 10 feet before they hit a wall to form a line behind them.
Speaker 3:Yep so it's like people are also waiting for their food, literally cafes.
Speaker 1:So yeah, so then they just they. They closed the restaurant during the offseason. They tore all the stuff out, made it even bigger. I feel like they had to and I mean it's a good place if you want burgers and fries and it's. It's on my list if I go to Dollywood. I mean never but, however, the best place to eat at Dollywood's is the front porch.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which has soared to it. Front porch didn't exist recently. It used to be the backstage theater Yep, and it was buffet style, and then it changed over and now it is a full-service sit-down.
Speaker 2:It's very nice.
Speaker 1:I think it's so good clearly aimed for a certain demographic of guests in the right, the families that have money? Yes, but the food is so good and just looking at what they're coming out with for the 2024 season looks great.
Speaker 2:To be honest with you, I'm kind of okay with the fact, though, that it is for the demographic with money, because I don't feel like, when I walk in there, that I'm eating at a theme park exactly. So I like that aspect of it because for me, especially with sit-down restaurants at theme parks, I want to feel like I've escaped the theme park world, at least for the duration of my meal, if I'm spending that kind of money. So I feel like they hit, they hit the nail on the head with that concept.
Speaker 2:I'm a big fan of it Big, big fan. So this feels like a question that could go on for like 600 hours, so you get a limited time frame.
Speaker 1:Alright, ask the question go.
Speaker 2:What is your favorite dollywood show?
Speaker 1:And why?
Speaker 2:all right, but go quick, cuz I know you and your rants on these things.
Speaker 1:We're gonna be here all night long. Oh this one. If you don't shut up and let me talk, we're gonna be here even longer listen. So this one just makes me start singing, sorry, so this one to me is kind of a difficult question. It's a tie between two. So my favorites are gonna be dreamland drive-in and Christmas in the smokies. So dreamland drive-in open in like 2006 ish in the Pines theater, which is the 1950s and 60s area, and it follows Danny Dugan, who was a radio jockey for WDLY radio. Get it WDLY.
Speaker 2:Do they have a like a catchphrase for that?
Speaker 1:East Tennessee radio WDLY 1430 love that, yep. And that's exactly what I wanted.
Speaker 1:Well, and that is an Easter egg, because dollywood actively used to have a radio Station inside the park called WDLY I digress so he thought he the show opens with him appearing on the stage and he's at a place called dreamland drive-in, which is a deserted and empty dime drive-in that's been abandoned in the current time. So if it was 2023, he's on that stage in 2023 and he's walking around ribbon-issing and you hear his past and he finds this bell on the ground and the bell was on the car that they would ring during their live radio broadcast. And at dreamland and he sits it on his car, because he has the same car that he had from the 50s, and he rings the bell and suddenly Ghosts from the past appear on stage.
Speaker 1:And you're transported back in time and then, like flash of light, and there's teenage Danny Dugan standing there With all of his friends in high school and then they relive high school, college, college, graduation, and then it ends in like the 70s, in their modern adult or in their adult life, and he joins the army okay, and he had lost the love of his life in the show, the girl in the green dress, if you know, you know, and Everything falls back into modern times and he's standing there at the car Holding the bell and you can hear the memory fade away. But then he opens the driver's side door and outsteps. The girl in the green dress Stop, still wearing the same dress, stop. And he walks over and he takes the for sale sign off of the diner and the show ends. Oh, and it's so good. And Unfortunately, the news had to be the one to break and tell us that dollywood has canceled the show after almost oh God, over, oh, over ten years.
Speaker 1:That show ran every summer, five shows a day, six days a week throughout the summer, so we don't have an opportunity to see the last show. It has already been shown. And then the other one is Christmas in the Smokies, which is one of the, if not the longest running show at dollywood where you get to go back in time and see Christmas what it would have been like many years ago. It's had many different renditions of the show. It's been in different theaters. Now it's in the dolly part in celebrity theater and it's huge. It is a Broadway musical. That theater has over a thousand seats and there are shows where they still turn guests away. People will line up two hours in advance to get a seat to see the Christmas show Because it's just, it's a family tradition and it's really good and it makes you think of home.
Speaker 2:Love it All. Right, your family. You've flown all the way over to Gatlinburg. You decided this is what you're doing. Why are you going to Dollywood? Why not Cedar Point?
Speaker 1:Like what makes you stand out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like why them? Why are you going to them? Why do you believe the family should go there instead of other parks?
Speaker 1:Because Dollywood gives you the thrills and screams of a Cedar Fair Park with the immersion and theming of Disney. Wow, it is the best of both worlds. When you go to a ride, you'll notice that Dollywood doesn't always have inversions in their ride. They really don't like to do inversions. They did that for a couple of years and now they've streamed away from it. But, like Big Bear Mountain, adults love to ride this ride. So they don't say let's make an attraction for adults and then let's make an attraction for the children and put them side by side. No, they create a ride.
Speaker 1:They say let's create a ride that the entire family wants to ride together.
Speaker 2:That's cute. Dollywood's about making memories. I know we touched base a little bit on this, but you worked.
Speaker 1:Hold on, what did you just say? Dollywood's making memories. Do you know what their motto is? Get out Making memories worth repeating, oh Jesus.
Speaker 2:Leave it to Dolly. So I know we touched base a little bit on the fact that you were a conductor for your favorite ride being the train Still can't get over that concept? Is that the only place you worked? I know we touched base a little bit on some of this in previous episodes.
Speaker 1:It's not, and we're gonna speed date through this.
Speaker 2:Speed date it. Give it to me Because there's a lot.
Speaker 1:So in 2014, I accepted a position as an opening team member for Fire Chaser Express and that was my very first job with Dollywood. I did that until Christmas of that year and then I went and I worked as a parade performer in the Christmas parade and I ended up doing work for Rudolph and Friends, which was the Rudolph experience that we had at Dollywood and I was friends with Rudolph and friends with Clarice, and then I worked I got signed off on a lot of the attractions and rides, like as a trainer, so I got to help on all the coasters. But then in 2016, I moved and became the opening trainer for Lightning Rod, the world's fastest and first wooden launch roller coaster. May it rest in peace. It's still there, but it's no longer the world's fastest or first wooden launch. Well, it is the world's first wooden launch, but it's not a launch anymore. Rip.
Speaker 1:And then that October I transferred into entertainment and was a lighting technician for it's a Wonderful Life, which was a stage adaptation of the classic Disney movie or not Disney movie, but classic movie.
Speaker 2:Look at you.
Speaker 1:Sorry, we've been watching Disney Channel original movies so they popped up in my head and then I went back to operations and went back to Lightning Rod for a little while. Then, oh, I also helped open Dreammoor in 2015. I helped open Dropline when it opened. I helped open Wildwood Grove when it opened and then I became the team lead for Tolls and Valley Parking so the Toll Booth where you pay for parking. It was my job to keep all the traffic off of the main highway. It was really hard some days and I oversaw the Valley team up until I left in 2019 to go back to Starbucks for free college tuition reimbursement. And then I went back to Dollywood as a conductor for a little while, oh, and I did VIP tours. I was a VIP tour guide at Dollywood.
Speaker 2:Look at you speed dating round, Yep. Okay, so this is my favorite question to ask people Any controversial or incidents that happen that you can share with?
Speaker 1:us. So I mean there are some. I don't have any from like any time that I directly worked there, but I know it. In one year a woman was sitting on the Dollywood Express and she either had a Coke or a hot chocolate. I don't remember which one it is, but the train sometimes can begin with a jerk because it's train cars you know, and the train started and she spilled whatever liquid she had on her lap.
Speaker 1:She jumped up, fell off the train. It was pulling out on the station. I mean, I'm not undermining anyone's injuries but from my understanding she was okay and it wasn't anywhere near as deadly as it could have been. Stop, I know a woman fell out of the swings in country fair and lived. But I later heard and I can't confirm this, I haven't done any research on it, but I heard that she released her restraint and was attempting to climb out of the ride while it was descending to the ground Idiot. And I heard someone say you know, they asked the ride operator like why didn't you E-stop the ride? And evidently he said well, it was on its way, it was lowering. So if I hit my E-stop she would have bounced out even harder, versus if I kept it running and told her to stay seated, it would get closer to the ground hopefully by the time she climbed out. And then I think I heard that she had said that she had been abusing painkillers or she was on painkillers and that she claims in the lawsuit that she slipped. But it's impossible to slip out of that if you have the little like seatbelt fastened so she had to take her seatbelt off.
Speaker 1:There was a tram accident, yeah, just recently, where one of the not a tram, excuse me, a trolley a resort trolley His windows were foggy and he was attempting to take guests back over to the park at the end of the night or back over to the resort. And there are these crossings that Dolly would use to have that were like parking gates, where the gate arm would come down if the tram needed to cross the road, and they have these concrete pillars separating the lanes, which is where the little tower sits, and he didn't see that he was actually over the center line and he drove headfirst into one of the pillars. And then, you know, there's been, you know, tram accidents where trams bump into each other and stuff. One thing I will say, though I know there was actually. There was one mystery, mine a couple of years ago where the partial facade of the attraction collapsed while there were guests walking under the trestle.
Speaker 1:I will say one thing, and you know I don't want to downplay any of those incidents, or injuries Like those are very serious, and I know I don't speak for the brand or the company, but in my time there I felt as though Dollywood took very much pride in guest safety. We were always taught it was our number one priority and I know I worked attractions where I let guests dead in the face and I said your safety is my number one priority. This ride is closed. Dollywood is one of three theme parks in the country, if I'm correct, where no one has ever died on the property due to anything other than natural causes like a heart attack. That someone? They had a heart attack or they had a hernia, not hernia. What is it Brain?
Speaker 2:and neurism.
Speaker 1:And neurism. There has been nothing that has a ride operator or an employee has done that has caused someone to die.
Speaker 2:Knock on wood.
Speaker 1:Yes, but that's I mean. I can't really think of any controversies.
Speaker 2:I love it, anything else.
Speaker 1:Oh, the note literally says anything else, correct? I mean they just opened for the 24th season, or no? They just opened for the 2024 season.
Speaker 2:You know we have the new.
Speaker 1:Dolly Parton experience coming soon. They've got lots of new food I'm excited for next year. 2025 is Dollywood's 40th year anniversary. They're only like 12 years behind Walt Disney World in Florida. Wow. So, and Dolly says they have big plans. We'll see. So we shall. Oh, they're getting a new restaurant, I hear, Up in Wilderness Past Plaza.
Speaker 2:I saw that.
Speaker 1:They're getting a brand new restaurant. I don't know what it's gonna be. I've asked some people that I know that work at Dollywood and they're like we don't know anything about it. But someone who's not a Dollywood employee told me that when they started digging up the ground to look like to start building the footers for the restaurant building that they had to halt construction for a minute because that ride is where River Battle, the water ride, used to be, like the new one going in at Epic Universe, and they hit track. So evidently when they got rid of River Battle all they did was throw dirt over the track that was there instead of ripping it all the way out.
Speaker 1:So whether or not that's true. I don't know. That came from someone that is not a not reliable source, but they don't. Yeah, I love that they don't speak for Dollywood, so I just thought that was funny, but yeah. So, ashley, yeah, what's your favorite theme park?
Speaker 2:I went opposite of you Because obviously I live here when I was born here, so I feel more of a connection to and Michigan didn't really? I mean, we were just getting adventure. But like I was pretty much about it. Michigan adventure is like and I know all my Michigander people all agree, so I'm not controversial in any of that aspect so I picked Epcot, epcot, epcot, epcot is my shit, dude. That's my park. That's like you skipped days in high school. That's the park that I would like escape from. I mean, when I worked for Disney the very first time, I would literally leave Magic Kingdom after working at Dumbo and then I would literally walk around Epcot for like hours on end.
Speaker 1:I love that. We have also spent the most of our time since I've gotten my annual pass at Epcot.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because for me, that's my comfort park, that's my go-to, that's like where I know where all the bathrooms are, I know where all my go-to food places are, I know where all my restaurants are, I know where all of my rides are, I know how to get from point A to point B. I don't have to look at a map, I don't have to ask somebody for directions or questions, like, that is the park that I am, like, so comfortable with because I spent so much time there. So, yeah, quick little well, give you a little history of the park. It's a tad bit of it, a small bit. So Walt Disney World's Epcot Center opened up in October 1st 1982.
Speaker 2:Epcot, which stands for Experimental Prototype, community of Tomorrow, was a personal vision of Walt Disney. It was one of his last great ambitions. It was actually a city where people would work, live and play, and the city would highlight the best of urban planning, new technologies, and it was to be the highlight of the quote unquote Florida Project, which became, as we all know, walt Disney World. Did you know, though, that Walt only intended to build a quote unquote Disneyland, which obviously became Magic Kingdom in Florida, to help finance Epcot, like that was the whole purpose.
Speaker 1:Well, I had always heard that it was he wanted to redo Disneyland, because he built Disneyland and then realized all the things he did wrong.
Speaker 2:Correct. Well, and Disneyland is much smaller than Walt Disney World, so it was OK, we only have this small bit of land where he bought basically the entire state of Florida and said, hey, look at all this expansion.
Speaker 1:Look at all this land, look at all those chickens, sorry, Womp womp, womp, do it.
Speaker 2:Womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp, womp. So worst joke ever. Just sit there and look cute.
Speaker 1:Oh, wait, wait, wait, Let me ask audience. Do I look cute, oh oh.
Speaker 2:Oh, oh, oh.
Speaker 3:Oh my god, thank you. I want to take the soundboard away from you.
Speaker 2:You're ridiculous.
Speaker 1:I guess we should. I guess people didn't know that we secretly have a full live studio audience every single week. No, we don't we say we only have one, we have a full audience.
Speaker 2:We always have one, it's Bruce Brucey, little Brucey Bruce, what is going on? Ok, the park's hot. You and your clapping, I can't get over you Now. The park has been highlighted as emerging technologies and a general sense of optimism in future world, which it's drew its main themes of. Epcot, the world showcase, is a permanent adaptation of the world's fair of sorts, which obviously was a very particular interest to Walt Disney. So I think that's why I love it so much, because it literally screams Walt To me. If somebody was like I want to go and see Walt's work firsthand, where would you send them? And my first thing is go to Epcot. That literally, to me, as of right now, is the only place that I feel like Walt Disney Imagineers have yet to really screw with and change.
Speaker 2:Well have you seen the construction?
Speaker 1:of Walt's.
Speaker 2:But to a point though, we've still kept with the same theme. You walk into Hollywood Studios it doesn't look like MGM did back in the day. You go into Magic Kingdom it doesn't look like it did back in the day. Animal Kingdom has fully, adaptively changed. Epcot, to me, is one of the ones that has yet to change Walt's vision, because I think but I also feel like Epcot is the one that's had the most amount of change.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 3:But I still kept with the original theme. That's exactly what.
Speaker 1:Walt will say to it that's exactly what Walt said. It's supposed to always show that future technology. Now I will say and I do love Epcot as well. I'm a little disappointed, though, in the direction that Epcot is currently heading. I love it. Because I like the fact that they put Moana where they did. It makes sense. It's an element, so it's over next to the Land and Sea Pavilion, correct, but it's an IP. It's just another IP that's going in there.
Speaker 2:For those that don't know, ip is Intellectual Property.
Speaker 1:Thank you. So, epcot, when it first opened, it was fully original All original concepts, original everything.
Speaker 2:But I think we have to get to a point, though. We have to accept those IPs Frozen Moana, you have read it to me these things are shaping.
Speaker 1:The point that I want to make is the world showcase has frozen now.
Speaker 2:Correct, because where did Frozen originate?
Speaker 1:I feel like Norway. That's not the point that I'm trying to make. The point that I'm trying to make for me is I wish the world showcase instead of it, because right now it's just walk into Morocco and buy some food and merchandise. I want to learn about Morocco. I want to see what's happening in Morocco right now. This is an opportunity for Disney to teach us about all of these other countries right now, not 100 years ago.
Speaker 2:No, because you know why.
Speaker 1:The world could be a better place, I'm just saying.
Speaker 2:But I think the thing is is I like the fact that I get to learn how it was then?
Speaker 1:This is Show me both.
Speaker 2:I don't want to know both. You know why I don't want to know both? Because I think at this moment the world has changed so much that it's not how it was. So I think we'd have to do pre-COVID, then we'd have to do post-COVID, because the world is completely different, how it was before a pandemic to how it is now. Morocco is different from how it was then.
Speaker 1:I'm talking about world tension.
Speaker 2:No, but I don't think we need to do that Because at the end of the day, you'd have to then hit cultural appropriation. Oh my god, are we going to offend somebody?
Speaker 1:Oh my god, disney doesn't do that.
Speaker 2:Correct, and I appreciate the fact that they don't. So I don't want to see what Morocco looks like right now. I don't want to know what Norway looks like right now. I just don't. I like the idea and I like the concept that I get a history lesson with Disney magic adept to it.
Speaker 1:Like.
Speaker 2:I like the fact that when I walk into Norway, I get to see a different version of Thor and Loki. I get to yes, I've seen all the Marvel movies 1,000 times. Thank you, Rob. So I know that Tom Hiddleston is my version of Loki. However, when I walk in there, I get to see the god that is. Loki is not obviously a Norse?
Speaker 1:Yeah, You're saying the Norse god, I am.
Speaker 2:And I get to see that. But then I also get to see how they decided to take Frozen and adapt it to that so that they teach kids the background and knowledge of Norway. So no, I appreciate the fact that we have yet to change all of those aspects. I like that, I really. For me, I appreciate the fact that Ratatouille is in French.
Speaker 1:That entire ride is in French.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, the ride itself is in French, because it's in France. Like I appreciate that.
Speaker 1:Oh, I've never noticed. I hate that ride though.
Speaker 2:I love that ride.
Speaker 1:So what about Epcot? Makes it your favorite.
Speaker 2:For me it holds so much sentimental value, like so much sentimental memories, like I mean as a kid we would go to Epcot more than any other park there because it was all the festivals that they had. My family was a big food and wine festival. Like massive member of food and wine. Like we would play on vacations specifically around food and wine time. It was. I had my first shot of sake yes, it was actually under 21 in the dark in the corner.
Speaker 1:You're not supposed to say those things, Listen.
Speaker 2:I'm here for it Do not drink if you're underage.
Speaker 1:We don't condone that.
Speaker 2:Especially at a theme park. But it was. It was my first time doing that, I loved it and it was many, many years ago. Yeah, I'm well, well over 21 now. Thank you for telling the world that.
Speaker 1:Well, I don't want to get blacklisted.
Speaker 2:I don't think we're going to get blacklisted. I think we're going to be just fine.
Speaker 1:Have you seen what have happened to YouTubers? They get full on fans from them.
Speaker 2:You can compare me Underage drinking To let me put my water bottle in a fountain that I clearly shouldn't do and then take a video of it.
Speaker 1:No, I'm talking about the ones that get banned from the parks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because these people do actively stupid things. At that moment that was like OK, any, who 13 years ago.
Speaker 1:Anything more on why it's your favorite.
Speaker 2:I think it was always one of those places where I feel like, no matter who I was hanging out with, you could always find something that made somebody happy there, because it always. There was always a moment that like, if it was a ride, if it was the food, if it was one of the countries, it was always, you always knew that there was something there that it would bring you happiness.
Speaker 1:So so, yeah, I was a big fan with EBCOT. They don't have the largest Demographics or the largest category what I'm looking for of rides. No so what is your favorite ride there, and why?
Speaker 2:It's the iconic ball that spaceship Earth is my favorite, oh.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. Did you know? When I was a child, I thought that spaceship Earth was a roller coaster, so I didn't go on it as a child.
Speaker 2:No way, okay, you want to know. I told you this too, and now every time we ride it, you make fun of me. You know there's a scene. So you get into a spaceship, earth in a rocket ship. You are, in theory, going back in time to learn about how our planet became our planet and Communication in communication, correct, so it's it's. You get an evolving of the technology. You get a little bit of all. You get to thank the Venetians for teaching you the alphabet.
Speaker 1:You get to do, you get to smell. What do you smell?
Speaker 2:Oh, wood burning. Library of Alexandria, burning I love it, I love it, and it's Helen Mirren right.
Speaker 1:The narrator yeah journey, I believe.
Speaker 2:so yeah is is so iconic and I'm so glad they never, ever change her and I swear To God, if they ever do, I'm coming for you, disney. I love that she gets to narrate that entire, that entire thing. But they're very foreseen. After you get your photo taken, you get to see cavemen Trying to attack a mammoth a woolly mammoth mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:I, as a child, was so terrified of that because I thought it was real and I never realized that obviously it's, it's a projection. So every single time we pass it, I would close my eyes and I would like shrink into my dad and be like which is funny because when we write it now, I'm like look, ashley, you can see the projection shining on the wall.
Speaker 2:I was so scared, shooketh I was literally. I mean, I think, if you ask, if you ask she and she'll tell you. There was a time that I Almost peed my pants on it, because I was so scared of it.
Speaker 1:I I love that. We have always made it a point to always write that ride.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because it's. It's one of the iconic and you know what? My second favorite is what? Living with the land Lutely listen, I I am a die-hard fan for boat rides. I love them. I think they're great. I love how disgusting the water is. I love how people try to throw pennies in that water.
Speaker 1:Do you remember? I don't, I.
Speaker 2:So I went to EBCOT once, like pre oh god, I've been going three, nine, eleven, seven.
Speaker 1:So glad on me my sister's middle school used to go and they stopped going after 9 11. So I hate that that is that's sad. Well, they, yeah, they stopped taking out of state trips.
Speaker 2:Well, we went and.
Speaker 1:I have. I have some memories of my time there. I wrote a track and things and I don't remember being on the ride. I don't remember the actual ride itself, but I remembered bits and pieces okay but evidently it used to be Listening to the land and there used to be a ride operator sitting on the front of her bow and they narrated correct, yes, I want to find video footage of that somewhere my I have photos of it, shan has photos of it because During the time frame they would actually shout you out.
Speaker 2:If it was like a core memory or anything like that and it was my birthday not the Disney.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like full-on. Listen, I am a I am an ex Disney cast member, so it's embedded in my head and there's a photo of me, my sister and my dad all standing next to this cast member that narrated the boat ride and shouted me out and said it like it was like how am I? I think it was like my Ninth birthday, 10th birthday, somewhere on there and they shouted out that it was my birthday. So after the boat ride was over, we took a photo of it.
Speaker 1:It was great, did you know? I just read this on the internet the other day and I had no clue. Do you know the reason why the boats have roofs on them?
Speaker 2:go ahead.
Speaker 1:Evidently, when you go through the rainforest section, at the very beginning it used to actually rain on correct.
Speaker 2:I did not know that the alligators actually also moved and tried to attack the ship or the boat the boat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember you telling me about that.
Speaker 2:Yep and there is still a Alligator that is underneath of the boat that would try to come out of it. And then, obviously, due to quite a few unfortunate circumstances where where Guests have been eaten, the child was not eaten but it's fine Vignant circumstances with the.
Speaker 1:Alligator attacks.
Speaker 2:Right, disney has decided to make them still moving and Not come out, and they sit very much far away from the boat. They do not come in contact with it anymore. But I was so terrified of that aspect so I would like tuck my feet under my butt and I would like refuse to sit on the end because I thought they were gonna come and try to eat me. I think the fear of animatronics has been long, long long, even before watching five nights at Freddy's. Thank you, julia.
Speaker 1:I Also love that they have the behind the seeds tour there.
Speaker 2:I've done that.
Speaker 1:I don't know tell us about that, because I know I want us to go with the podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I did that, though that was one of the last things we did when my dad was around. So it's it's 50 bucks a person and you get to during living with the land. The end portion of it is that you go through a science biometrics you go through greenery. Correct. So you get a full tour of their laboratory. So you get to see. You get to see it next to where the fish are.
Speaker 2:The hydroponic yes, and you get to like watch them feed the fish, which is so cool. I want to like I actively tried to feed my sister to them. You get to do that. You get to also during this time they obviously will like test to try to combine different fruits and stuff like that. So we got to try a genetically modified we got to try a genetically modified raspberry, which, at this moment, that was the first time they had ever done it the last crossed with anything a strawberry.
Speaker 2:It was the weirdest thing ever. It made my tongue feel fuzzy, but it was great, like it was so cool. And then you got to to get some history of all of it. We got to take some photos, which is pretty neat. We also got to help the cast member that was giving the tour make the iconic Hose, mickey head which is pretty neat.
Speaker 2:So we got to do that. And then we also got to see inside the lab, which is pretty cool, and we got to see what they were doing when it was scientists. So they got to kind of give Like a little bit of a speech of some feedback of what they do for the park, so they do use some of that food in the restaurant.
Speaker 1:They do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a good chunk of it. I want to say during the the tour they told us it was about 75% of the food that they grow there they actually Then use inside the restaurant, and we actually got to go. So behind the building, the red show building, is an entire Garden back and greenery back there.
Speaker 2:So we got to go through all of that, which is pretty neat. I think it's well worth the 50 bucks. It's the cheapest tour that Disney has and I, I love it. I think it's fantastic and it was one of my dad's Favorite, favorite things we did well, have to check it.
Speaker 1:I really want to check it out.
Speaker 2:I love it. Maybe next time, like I'm here for it, I think he would enjoy this and I'll do it, even with and without Gavin.
Speaker 1:I'll do it multiple times. I love it. Let's do it. So, moving on, what is your Favorite food slash restaurant and why?
Speaker 2:this is so difficult for me because I have Epcot is is has so many good, good places like I Think they have good, quick service. I think they I mean, obviously I'm a big fan of their festivals. I also love the fact that they change every year and they keep some of the the classics around. I'm also a fan of quite a few other sit-down restaurants, so it's very difficult for me to be like this is my, my only single place, like I cannot have just one. I feel like for a perfect day for me at Epcot.
Speaker 2:I start off and when I go into the Epcot, especially the World Showcase, I start in Mexico. I feel like if you start that other way around, you do an Epcot wrong. Sorry, I know it's controversial, but you gotta start in Mexico. And I hit up La Cava and I get a tequila flight with some sangrita, which is it's like a tomato salsa drink and it's non-alcoholic and you sip it after you take tequila shots. Obviously, we all know that my love for tequila is pretty strong and I literally want to bottle that sambuca, or I want to bottle it up and drink it with a straw. By itself. It is so good, I'll have to take you. It is so good. And then I have to stop in France and get a crate from my creepery. That's my home, so I stop and do that. And then recently I have well, I said recently, it's been like the past like three years. I am loving Epcot's new connections eatery spot that they have. They have a General Sals chicken salad. It's crispy chicken tenders that they drench in General Sals like sauce.
Speaker 2:And then they have a salad with like oranges and wontons and is not gluten-free. It is not good for you. I need a full nap afterwards. And then I kill it with a Belgian waffle, whipped cream, strawberries, chocolate sauce on top, from the same place. Well, that isn't like.
Speaker 1:And now I know where all your money goes, and popcorn.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love Disney popcorn, have you ever?
Speaker 1:eaten at Tapaneto.
Speaker 2:Yes, in Japan.
Speaker 1:Best $40 steak I've ever spent.
Speaker 2:Go right, and I would do it all over again. Yep, I'm a big fan. Have you eaten at Nemo's?
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:You have to eat there. That is fantastic. I'm also a big fan of where living with the land is. There is a literary eatery inside there.
Speaker 1:What is it seasons?
Speaker 2:Seasons. I think it's seasons, greetings or seasons, something it's something like that Not season greetings. No, no, no. I know it's seasons, it starts seasons and then it's a G Seasons gathering or it's something like that. I know it's something like that.
Speaker 1:It's right, yeah, but it's right beside living with the land.
Speaker 2:It's literally in the same complex and they have a Mexican or a Chinese dish. It's like beef and broccoli in a sense, but it's not. It's like a Mongolian beef and it's oh my God. And it comes with this fried rice. Oh, it is so good. And I think they have the best cuties I've ever had in that area too, because I think, for me, I just associate it obviously with the fact that it's all coming from that spot. I know it's not, but my brain is like oh my God, it's fresh.
Speaker 2:It just grew in the back and I love that place.
Speaker 1:I love their food. Here's an interesting one. I'm interested in hearing your take on this.
Speaker 2:All right, lean on me.
Speaker 1:What's your favorite show at Epcot and why?
Speaker 2:This is gonna be so controversial and people are gonna come for me. But I don't do Epcot's nighttime shows. I just don't like them Forever. I will always, always, always, always, hold happily ever after at Magic Kingdom as my elite show over any amusement theme parks. That's my favorite.
Speaker 2:But my favorite show is not actually a show. It's the Disney and Pixar short film festival that's over there by Figment. It's three shows. They do a cute adaptation of a black and white Mickey show and then they add in at the time that I watched it it was with the paper. It's the one with the paper airplanes.
Speaker 2:You can actually see it on Disney Plus and then it has my favorite, my favorite Pixar short out of the entire world, which is Feast, and it's about this couple that adopts a dog and you get to watch as they have a fight and they break up and then they get back together and it's all centered around a pet and it just I mean Bruce is obviously my best friend on the entire planet and it just like, yeah, it's pretty sad, but I would, literally, when I worked for Disney the very first time, I worked at Dumbo and I would leave Dumbo and I would go to Epcot because I at this moment was dating somebody that worked for Figment, so I would get Poutine from Canada.
Speaker 2:They had this cute little walkup spot. I would grab some Poutine and then I would go into the Pixar film festival and I would watch that show over and over and over again. I watched it one time, eight times in a row. I love it so much. It is my breakaway from this heat. It is just like it brings me, because it's all air conditioned, so it's nice.
Speaker 2:It just it was warm and fuzzy. It was like to me it was such a Disney moment, like because I got to see, you get to see Mickey, so you get to, you get that whole warm and fuzzy feeling. And then he ends with Feast. And no, it wasn't, it was Piper. It wasn't the paper planes, it was Piper. It was about a bird that was learning how to fly for the first time. It was, oh my God, it was so cute, it was adorable. I would cry. But Feast, like it, just holds such a soft spot in me and I love it?
Speaker 1:Where in the park can guests like if people are listening to this? Where in the park is this? It's?
Speaker 2:literally next door to Figment, like literally next door. You go to Figment, you exit Figment and then you take like three flights of stairs or three flights. You take three steps and it's right there.
Speaker 1:It's on the same courtyard with the like water fountains.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's literally connected to Figment.
Speaker 1:If you've ever heard of the jumping fountains at EBCOT it's in the same plaza there.
Speaker 2:But you got to stop and get popcorn right outside at the popcorn little stand. That's right there. We're going to Mickey Pretzel right across the street and then go see the show.
Speaker 1:So what makes this park stand out from other parks, in your opinion, if you are a family trying to decide where to go, to choose Disney World, dollywood, cedar Fair, where? Why? Why? Ebcot?
Speaker 2:I think you add EBCOT to your list, especially if you're coming down to Florida and going to Disney Parks, because it's a history lesson without it being a history lesson. I was always such a history buff growing up as a kid and I loved the fact that I got to, like get some hands on learning without feeling like I was learning things, like going into Canada and learning all about them when I grew up in Michigan, two and a half hours from Canada, and I never touched it why why, you know, like had no interest in it whatsoever. And then we went to EBCOT and I was like Dad, I want to go to Canada and we literally did. Like my obsession with wanting to go to France is because I was there. I felt like I was part of that culture. I was a part of it. I now know words in French because of it.
Speaker 2:I like Norway I, yeah, going and watching all the Marvel movies with Rob and then not just going, oh cool, like this is a Marvel thing. No, like actually knowing and realizing, no, these are like this is real.
Speaker 1:This is what these were based on, Correct correct.
Speaker 2:Like to me it was. It was so neat. I mean you walk into Japan and you get to see Disneyland Japan and what they're doing over there. Like that was so neat to me that you get little bits of their park in our park. So it's a history lesson without feeling like it's a history lesson and that's just in the world showcase. I mean you also have adaptations of Nemo. You get to hang out with Nemo and be a part of that, and then not just Nemo, but then I get to go experience in a full aquarium without having to smell like fish. Then it's, I get to go race a car where I mean, as somebody who has such an aversion with driving, I get to do that. I get to feel like I'm a part of that and a part of learning how my vehicle works without having to learn how my vehicle works. So, like I like the fact that we're educating without actually educating Okay.
Speaker 1:You've already answered this question like five times, but have you ever worked there?
Speaker 2:I did, I did, I worked at in France. I worked at the Le Creperie, the Le Creperie de France, and I I loved it.
Speaker 1:Give me a French word that you learned.
Speaker 2:I know so many.
Speaker 1:Just give me one.
Speaker 2:Obviously, there's a oui, which is yes, in French.
Speaker 1:Merci. How do you say my name is Ashley?
Speaker 2:Oh God, it's been a minute.
Speaker 1:Is it Jean-Mapel Jean-Mapel Ashley, jean-mapel Ashley which is?
Speaker 2:my name is Ashley.
Speaker 1:I loved it.
Speaker 2:I love. Go there and get the. You gotta get the salmon crepe, which is it's not a sweet crepe, it's a savory crepe, and they do it, I would hope, with cream cheese. They put like a thick layer of cream cheese and then smoked salmon on top and some green onions. Get that and then get the chocolate croissant over at the bakery that's over there Croissant, and then ride, ride a two-eat. Oh, and you have to stop in the little perfume store and get a sample of Zior and have all of those wonderful French women spray it on you, because they spray it a very specific way. And then my favorite favorite champagne is back in right before you get to the bakery, in the very back. So you stop and get a glass of la vue. Get a glass of that. It's a ridiculously overpriced and expensive, but do it because it's worth it. And you get a cute little champagne glass that you get to walk around in. And then ride, ride a two-eat, because I think your opinion of ride a two-eat is trash, garbage.
Speaker 2:It's a fantastic grind and it's in French and I love it, because ride a two-eat is one of my favorite movies. Well, no, I'm sorry, it is my favorite Disney movie. I know it word by word. I've seen it so many times. Oh, it's your transformers. It really is. It really is my transformers. I love it, so yeah.
Speaker 1:Any fun controversies that you know of.
Speaker 2:I do, do. I know a lot. I don't know how much of it I'm allowed to share, because I did sign a couple of NDAs. How?
Speaker 1:I know one I can share for you if that's the case.
Speaker 2:I know one that's not my story. Am I allowed to share that one?
Speaker 1:I don't know. Is that a part of your NDA? No, Okay then go for it.
Speaker 2:I had somebody very close to me work for an attraction was actively pushing for this guest to ride the attraction. The man was in his ECV heading to ride it and had a heart attack on the way to the ride. And died, but you don't die, disney World.
Speaker 1:You don't die. Magic Kingdom Time of death is off property life.
Speaker 2:Correct. No, like it's literally a thing Like you don't die Magic Kingdom, you don't die Disney World.
Speaker 1:Unfortunately, people have died.
Speaker 2:Correct. When I worked at the Creepery we've had a guest who she was drinking. So the Creepery sells, like a French beer, Crenenburg, which is a 1983 French distilled beer. It's fantastic If you can get your hands on it.
Speaker 2:It's a world of market guys and it's actually cheaper than I'd have got. Go there drink it. It's fantastic. They were pouring it into her glass and she went to drink it Somehow, some way. I don't know if she squeezed the glass too hard or if the glass that she just got was thinner than the other ones, but she squeezed it and cut up her hand pretty bad. She had stitches. It was very traumatic, like very, very traumatic.
Speaker 1:My poor French kids were terrified when I went to Epcot with Claire a couple years ago, before Ratatouille opened to the public, it was opened for like.
Speaker 2:It's soft open.
Speaker 1:It's soft open. So we were like, oh okay, maybe we'll get to do it, Cause it had started doing soft openings like three, two to three weeks prior. So we were there that day and of course it doesn't show up on the app.
Speaker 2:Nope, and I ran the corner and they had that's the thing. By the way, if you're ever trying to get a soft open, just walk past the ride. Go talk to cast members. They tend to do that all the time.
Speaker 1:They had planters blocking the entrance to the Ratatouille, the whole section of the park. Yes, they did.
Speaker 2:But they're not like little planters.
Speaker 1:You know, they're big planters. And that's where Like barricades. You know, I met the cast member and got to talk with her and I got to meet Remy and take a picture with Remy. Yes. I later found out that they had halted soft opening because two of the ride vehicles collided in with each other?
Speaker 2:Yes, they did. Do you know why they collided?
Speaker 1:No, can you talk about it?
Speaker 2:I can talk a little bit about it. So they run on a magnetic strip on the bottom and the magnetic strip didn't attach itself to the ride vehicle.
Speaker 1:Hmm, so sad.
Speaker 2:It was very sad because somebody got very hurt, so it was very sad.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I can talk about that one.
Speaker 1:It is what it is.
Speaker 2:That's pretty much about all I can chat about. I don't want Disney coming after me, Do you have anything else?
Speaker 1:Ebb Coutts related.
Speaker 2:Hmm, I say do it. It's probably one of the most I think it's the most fun I've ever had at a Disney park is go into them, because I think you there's not just rewind, you have art and-.
Speaker 1:You still have Disney characters too.
Speaker 2:You do you have a whole bunch of Disney characters you can meet. You can meet as a writer. You can meet Anna and Elsa over in Norway If you are a Disney visa holder. There is a secret Disney visa spot, a character meet and greet spot, over there, right next door to my favorite Pixar festival, where you can show your Disney ID and you can meet one of the fab five, which is Mickey Minnie Daisy Donald. I'm sorry, mickey Minnie Daisy Donald and Pluto, those are one of no Mickey Minnie. Donald.
Speaker 2:Goofy Pluto. I apologize, miss Daisy is not part of the fab five. You can meet one of those, which is very exciting. One of them which is very exciting. There's also moments where you can meet Jasmine over in Morocco. You can meet Mulan over in China.
Speaker 2:You know Rob had an experience with Mulan for the first time. He had introduced Rob to Mulan as a child and we were over in China and we were one of the first ones because he had just learned, he had just watched it and he was obsessed. And Rob goes through. Obviously, if you know Rob, he tends to watch things over and over and over and over and over again and for like that month I think we watched Mulan probably over 50 times. He was obsessed.
Speaker 2:So we found out you can meet her. We didn't tell him, we got in line. So we were one of the very first ones and she spent well over 20 minutes with us, hugged him, talked to him about the movie. He was like and you were on top of the roof, like, and you were there and you saved China and you did all these things and she like ran with it with him and it was probably one of like the best memories I have of watching Rob interact with a character ever. And she just went tenfold and the best part is, all these people behind us nobody got mad at it, like, everybody just like was so infatuated with the fact that she was so excited, that he was so excited and everybody's like, oh my God, this is adorable. And she took all the photos and she signed. He wore like a Mulan T-shirt.
Speaker 1:It was early in the day, people hadn't been under the beating sun, no it was in the afternoon.
Speaker 2:It was so hot too Like it was disgusting. We were there in the middle of July. Oh God it was horrible, but like it was great. It's such a moment I think Epcot is a very underrated park that people don't really think that it's gonna be that good. And then you go and you realize it's not just good, it's one of the best. So no, I think you add Epcot to your list. You go and you experience all the food and you ride all the rides and you do all the things.
Speaker 1:All right, guys, there you have it. Between Dollywood and Epcot, our two favorite parks. I will say Epcot ranks pretty high on my park list as well. It's the best. But yeah, we wanna hear from you guys what's your favorite theme park, shan, I know you're listening. If there's only one person listening, I know it's Shan. What is your favorite theme park? Tell us, let us know. And, yeah, I think that that's been a fun time and we definitely cut down on some time today, which is nice. I'm proud of us. Maybe we won't lose people halfway through the episode. We're gonna lose people because Shan's on this podcast, but yeah. So, with that being said, guys, we wanna thank you all for joining us today, and I think it's time for us to talk about a book. You wanna go talk about a book? Let's go talk about a book.
Speaker 1:All right, this week on Orlando Unplugged Book Club, what Mother Won't Tell Me, chapter 4. It's so dramatic, I know, but I love that, alright. So last week we read Chapter 3, and so to get on and just give a quick synopsis of that. So Juno stuck out of the house when Uncle Ul comes to pay a visit. Juno and Boy, their existence is not known to him. He doesn't know that they're living on this island, he doesn't know that mother and father have children, but he believes he sees a child outside the window, so she confronts him while he's on his way back to the boat To be like hi, I belong to mother and father.
Speaker 2:Please don't run out of my family.
Speaker 1:And he's like really confused but, he doesn't let her know that he's really confused because he was not aware that they lived here. So it ends with him taking a photograph and saying that we have to keep this a secret.
Speaker 2:Otherwise I'll kill your family.
Speaker 1:Yes, so fast forward to Chapter 4.
Speaker 1:So just a quick rundown of what we read through today. It's been two days since Juno confronted Uncle Ul. Juno hasn't told her parents about meeting him so they don't know. But her and Boy have been locked in their rooms for the past two days because they broke a commandment by not hiding. So on this particular morning Juno looks out the window and sees that the boat is gone and she thinks that Boy has left the island and has determined that she needs to hide.
Speaker 1:So when father and mother find out, they think that she left with him, which really doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me, other than the fact of like making anywho, We'll get to that. So before she can hide, mother comes in and Juno decides that she's going to tell her mother that Boy has left, and mother at that point reminds Juno that this is the day that father goes to the village for supplies, or he'd left the night before to go get supplies and she then questions Juno as to why do you think that Boy left? And then has a conversation with Juno about the dangers of leaving the island and that she understands that Juno is 16 and she's becoming older and that she had been afraid that Juno would eventually want to leave the island. So it kind of ends with mother trying to essentially scare Juno back into not leaving the island. So what's your opinion on this chapter? It was a fairly short chapter.
Speaker 2:We also kind of need to add into that, though. That mother did slap Juno in the face, yeah which is part of the reason why she came into the room for breakfast anyways was to apologize for slapping her. They cried, they wept. Juno was very shocked at the raw emotion and feelings, because I guess in this family they don't talk about their feelings, so she was very taken aback by it, which was weird for me.
Speaker 2:But it was also like I don't know this whole dynamic, but like the whole relationship between her and her mom doesn't seem like a normal relationship between, like a mother and a daughter. I don't know if it's like because there's an abusive aspect in that, because there is like a scared tactic that they're that they have, but I don't know. It just seems like it seems very different. And this was the first time that we got any sort of like. I don't want to say even back history, because we didn't get any back history. We got like a little a blurb of like the mother's life where she was like yeah, no, I was 15 at 1.2 and I had a rebellious phase and I wanted to do things too. But the difference between your want and my want is you literally could kill us if you left me Let me jump back real quick because I don't want us to get too far away from that point.
Speaker 1:Were you talking about the mother? You said the word abuse. I don't necessarily think that it's an abusive situation in that aspect More or less of if you go back to earlier times when you could beat your children and it wasn't an issue. I think that's just more like if you watch those older movies and like the village and stuff like that. Physical punishment was more normal.
Speaker 2:I don't think I'm going more so like that abuse. I think it's just more so like emotional abuse, like scared tactics.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I see what you're saying. I think that's more of the abuse I'm going for, not like the okay, your mother would beat you every day. Oh no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2:The point that I'm trying to make is I don't think it was like a scared tactic thing, I think it was just that's how she punished her daughter yeah no, I don't disagree, but I think she got a pink, and I think mom was taken aback by the fact that she allowed herself to do that too. Juno, though.
Speaker 1:She's still just a kid.
Speaker 2:I don't think she was prepared to go ahead and do that to her.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but that is I mean, and that's where you also find out? Boy is in his room. Yeah, mother, mother, she let us know that.
Speaker 2:But that's kind of the same punishment, but I also didn't like the fact, though, that this chapter ended very abruptly, like they were in the middle of a conversation. And that was it.
Speaker 1:It seems to me how a lot of these no, no, no, like this was.
Speaker 2:This was bluntly like there was a blank page in between chapter four, the end of chapter four and the start of chapter five.
Speaker 1:So I'm interested in, I'm interested to see where chapter five goes. But that leads us so moving forward. One of the things that Ashley and I did we discussed that we would be like, oh, we'll just do one chapter a day, or one chapter per episode, that way we can read it the day of so it's fresh on our minds. But this book is the chapters are fairly small. At least they have been up to the fourth chapter and we feel like it might take us a really long time to do it that way.
Speaker 2:I also feel like we're jumping. I feel like, in a sense, I'm jumping, I can't, I'm not going to speak for you because I don't know if you're on the same plane. I am, but I feel like I'm jumping to way far fetch conclusions. And then all of a sudden I read like the first two paragraphs of the next chapter and I'm like no, yeah, that's true. I feel like we haven't hit and I don't think I'm doing this book justice by doing that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, we haven't hit the action yet.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:So I think we're just kind of all over the place. So we're going to try to read several chapters before we talk about this again. So we'll either talk about this again next week or we'll wait two weeks out and do it then, at which point we may even be all the way through the book. I think there's 14 chapters. Something like that. So yeah, we've got like nine, 10, 10 or nine chapters left at this point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but yeah so far, I mean, I like her.
Speaker 1:I'm just I will say one thing that has been a little hard for me reading this, or while listening to you read it is. I tried to read one chapter but I couldn't because I had grew up with some learning disabilities. So sometimes it can be hard for me to read, but I feel as though some things are getting lost in translation, one of which is when they talk about the garden and they talk about there being salad, the vernacular, so this book of to preference, to piggyback off what you're saying.
Speaker 2:This book was originally written in German and then has been translated into English for all of us here in the US that obviously do not speak German. So there is that translation issue. I think that is causing a bit of some of the vernacular not to be smooth and transitional that we are used to when it comes to reading a book. And I I mean I can't. I don't know if you're on the same plane, I am, but like I said that twice now, but I don't, I don't know if you you actively read as much as I do. I go through like this past month I read 23 books. Yeah, no, I don't read that much. I read a lot.
Speaker 1:I've been reading the John Bene Ramsey case book for like a year and a half. Oh, I finished that years ago.
Speaker 2:But like I actively read quite often so I can fly through things pretty, pretty decently, this makes me feel like I don't know how to read.
Speaker 1:Well, I wouldn't necessarily say that it we come and it doesn't it's not the whole book and it's not every time I'm reading, but there are we'll come across like two sentences back to back where I have to read it, we're used to American authors and American writing.
Speaker 1:Like there's a, there's a and that word style and the sentence reads differently in the book than how I am used to reading something. So like we'll read a sentence but we put the emphasis on certain words or certain parts of the sentence where I don't like we should be putting those emphasis on. So then we don't understand what we read and we have to go back and we read it again. And I know there was something in this chapter about eyes, scrunching eyes. Yeah, you're my sweet on there.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry she goes. Ah, right, here I screw up my eyes, but it could only make out the edge of my bed and part of my attic window and I thought she meant I think the. The translation is to say I scrunched up my eyes like she. You know, she like squinted a little bit, but I had to like reread that sentence like three or four times because I was like okay.
Speaker 1:I'm not losing Correct, I think it's different than what we're used to, but because we're not used to it it takes us a moment to question, and this has happened with me in the past, because I have read other books that are in the same type of situation, where it's set in a different place, and it just it takes me a minute to process what I read, to understand what the author meant.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I mean to piggyback off of you in. When you made the comment about the the lettuce thing, about the salad situation, that was something that they put in there that I was like why are you growing a salad? You're growing cucumbers and tomatoes and croutons, and cheese Makes me want a salad. No, but um but like obviously we all know that she meant lettuce but, the translation, obviously, is that they were growing salad and my ADHD brain for the next like half a paragraph was just hooked on the word salad Salad.
Speaker 3:You were hoping for no reason but others in. I thought it was.
Speaker 1:I thought it was a funny. I thought it was a funny giggle for me because I was like you don't grow a salad, you grow lettuce, but but yeah it's, but any who. So I think that we're going to, from this point, we're just going to try to read three or four chapters together.
Speaker 1:That way we have more context to talk about and a longer conversation to have on it. And then again, I do still stand by what I said, that we may, at the very end of this, do a full episode where we just discuss the whole book. But yeah, with that being said, I think it's time for us to sign off this week. Until next time, stay safe, stay educated.
Speaker 2:And share our podcast with your friends, your family and, of course, your favorite bartender until next time. Bye guys.
Speaker 1:Okay, we're back. Hi guys. So I have this role that I cannot flip to the back of a book because it can ruin things. How? I actually just flipped to the back of the book. Actually, what'd you find? I don't have that role. I thought you just read the end of the book and that's why I was like don't you dare tell me I didn't do it, like I didn't do it on purpose.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I did, but there's a reading group guide and there's questions in the back and it says, like in the opening chapter Juno loves Mother's comfort bills. What was your first impression of them? What did you learn about the medicine? By the end of the story? However, that's the only one that you can read.
Speaker 1:Mr Manger, this was an amazing idea.
Speaker 2:But I need you to put it in the front of the book please.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I wish I would have read the whole book. If you wouldn't have done that, I would never have known.
Speaker 2:I also think that like you need to put the the chapters that that question goes with, because I was like, oh, cool, chapter. The second question must go with chapter two, because obviously the first question goes with the first chapter. I was wrong.
Speaker 1:Well, well, this is what we're going to do. We are going to read, we're going to finish, we'll talk, do whatever, but when we're done we'll actually go through and we'll read all these questions at the end of the book.
Speaker 2:We'll go through and read them and answer them, and I'll post the questions up on on our social media platform when we finish the book.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, goodbye for real this time.
Speaker 2:Bye bye.