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Episode 158 Voyage/Freespins Aren't Credits (w/ Drew the Intern)
222 Plays5 months ago
This week on the premier comedy roller coaster podcast, Ben and Zach are joined by In The Loop's Drew the Intern to talk about Mt. Olympus, Working at Cedar Point, Why Freespins aren't credits, why Voyage sucks and much more!
Actually, we're the worst roller coaster podcast.
Find In the Loop here: https://www.youtube.com/@IntheLoopPodcast
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Transcript
Creative Intros and Humorous Identities
00:00:41
Speaker
I'm Zach and I'm Zach, y'all. And I'm Zach, y'all. And I'm Zachady Zach and I'm Zach, y'all. I'm Ben and I'll keep mine shorter than that. I'm Drew at yes.
00:00:57
Speaker
The idea was to be shorter than Ben's who's been shorter than Zach's. Mine as long as hell. And that's what you're going to get sometimes. I just feel like I'm totally out of intros like There was a good role and now I just, it's like, I have, I know it's coming and I can't be clever and I'm just, it's always sad, but anyway, welcome. Yeah. Um, I feel the same way and that's why we let our guests go last. Cause then the pressure is off, right? Oh no, the pressure was super on, right? Like if I went first, then I would set the standard, but I had to like fit the theme, right? Yeah.
00:01:41
Speaker
Well, you knocked it out the park. and I said yes. I'm drew in. Yes. And, uh, welcome, welcome back to the show. It's been a while. has Yeah, it's been a hot minute. So are we drew the intern or we drew the full time? Are we drew the, um, yeah, I would say I'm still ah the drew the intern title. Just stick around forever, right? Like it just kind of fit. i I gotcha. It was a fun joke from years ago and I just kind of stuck with it. Plus, you know, like drew the intern was available on Twitter back eight or nine years ago, whenever that joke, God, it's probably even longer than that now started. And and so i s not I snagged that Twitter handle. And so now I'm sure there's other places that like want to name their intern, drew the intern. And they're like, who the hell is this asshole that drew the intern?
00:02:37
Speaker
Well drew is a good name for that name pairing. Cause, uh, it sounds, it sounds natural versus, uh, I don't know. There's a lot of other worst names. Yeah. like Fred, the intern, I guess any like one syllable would be great, right? Like if you if you were Robert, the intern, that wouldn't be so so good. That's that's like making copies. That's that guy. That's Robert, the intern. Don't fuck with that guy. Yeah, i was making copies. It's got to be monosyllabic, like you were saying, this drew the intern, Zach, the intern, Ben, the intern, and that all works.
Discord Community Dynamics
00:03:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:03:22
Speaker
So if your podcast and your intern has ah more than one syllable in their name, they need a new name. ah Promote them or fire them. Or change their name.
00:03:37
Speaker
Yeah, there's probably a monosyllabic re ah nickname available for almost any name, right? If not, whatever, just make something up. like Call them to by the first letter of their name, like D the intern or D is nuts. Everybody starts as an intern, right? Like the Vlad the intern?
00:04:04
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think you kind of, whether or not they title it or not, you sort of get interns with. podcasts from time to time. Just as, as like sites are growing, you just sort of need an intern. It's kind of funny cause I actually did like most of my intern work before I was drew the intern. And then when I like officially became drew the intern, and I was way more into like actual, like fully involved with in the loop than I ever was as actually titled drew the intern.
00:04:36
Speaker
Fun fact about podcast interns, um that's how this show works. Ben and I are full-time interns here, and we're waiting for the call that one day we'll be offered employment. Whatever your Patreon show. Do you still have a Patreon? ah We do, but we don't really upload enough to like, justify the handful of folks that are actually spending money over there. Oh, that's really nice of them, though. It's very nice. But we kind of we make up for it by having a really, really slick community on Discord. Ding. Go
Mount Olympus Park: Quirks and Safety Tales
00:05:17
Speaker
check it out. It's free to join. Link is in the description as always. I'm going to be honest, I don't really know what Discord is. It's
00:05:26
Speaker
like a fusion of a chat room and an old school forum. Yeah. yeah
00:05:35
Speaker
It's it's the, they're really cool. Yeah. I mean, it's like, um, I, yeah, it's basically like a chat room. It's literally a chat room in a forum without, you don't want have to hit refresh every minute to see if there's a new post.
00:05:57
Speaker
Yeah. And it kind of just is ongoing. It just sort of shows up as a post happens. Oh, so it's kind of like a group chat, but in forum forms. Yeah. There's like different topics. So like, but they're all basically like ah an ongoing chat room. Okay. That's cool. Yeah. So like, for example, on ours, we'll have like a roller coaster topic and like a whatever topic.
00:06:28
Speaker
But it's all the same people. And it's an ongoing chat. That's neat. And there's a ton of your followers probably like, how does Drew not know what Discord is? What an idiot. Well, Discord is used mainly as like a gaming. Like it's, I think it started off mainly as like a gaming app because you could pair it with like steam and other online games. So like, instead of keeping in touch with people in the game, people would use the voice chat or like stay in touch on discord through their games. And then it kind of is now become to open to like generalized, you know, for every kind of community. Um,
00:07:14
Speaker
Yeah, it's it was definitely like a newer one. I mean, I don't even remember when I first got it, maybe like 20. It was like 2017, 2018 before I actually like used it, I think. It's definitely a newer one. And it lends itself really well to the roller coaster communities, because at this point, you know, enthusiasts, it's a bunch of little sub communities. Yeah, that makes sense. So it works really well because like Ride, this one has one. I'm a part of that. And ah I think a lot of the the little sub communities have one, including ours and other friends of ours. But yeah, it's it's a really cool way to connect with basically your own community.
00:08:05
Speaker
So like it our Discord is active and that's where like I think most of our activity in terms of our community is based.
00:08:17
Speaker
I think that's really cool. I dig that. i Um, I don't think we necessarily it in the loop have a ton of like community as much as it's just, Facebook is blowing up because of our reels and our YouTube comments and whatnot, but there isn't really like that like discord kind of thing. But I mean, the old school, like forum communities, man, that was a lot of fun back in the day when you would like chat on forums and whatnot. So it's kind of cool to see like that life still.
00:08:50
Speaker
Still like going, I guess. Yeah, I mean, the cool thing about Discord is like we have a range in ours of like there's there's like and I'm not trying to call out any of our community. Y'all are awesome and we love you. There's a couple boomers in there not saying y'all bring boomer energy. Just not saying you don't either. otherwise
00:09:15
Speaker
Uh, all the way down to, um, I think 20. We got a, we got a strict 18 plus rule, obviously.
Maintaining an 18+ Community Online
00:09:25
Speaker
That means you guys must have dick pics in there. We do not. It's just safer to be like, there's no reason to really have blow. It's just easy to have an age line and you never know who comes into the community. And it's just, it's just, it just makes it easy. it It is true. This is the coaster community. So keeping things 18 plus cause you don't want any, like one of those weird scenarios that used to take place in the industry. Yeah. Yeah, we don't we don't want to accidentally find out that someone that we've been making, I don't know, adult jokes to is underage. Yeah, you know, well, especially like if it's even just like talking about drinking and even casual drinking and casual like.
00:10:16
Speaker
smoking weed is like, you should at least be of age. I don't know. like I mean, when I was 15, 16, I definitely remember listening to explicit stuff, but it's different when you're the one doing it now. And it's like, well, it's a little. It's going to be more responsible. You don't want to be like the cause of society is like downgrade, right? Like if you're participating in the downgrade, that's fine, but you don't want to be like the cause of the root cause of that. Like if you're under 18 doing illegal things, just keep it on Snapchat and, and not your story on Snapchat. Right. And don't come to our discord.
00:10:59
Speaker
ah But yeah, I figure this this show, everything that we do, not intended for nor made for anybody
Mount Olympus Management and Architecture
00:11:07
Speaker
under 18. So we we take every precaution we can to make sure that all of our community and avail accessibility to this show is strictly marked and filed away in the adults only section. So real quick, um, ah because I just posted something on discord, I found a random article of the Mount Olympus owner and their house that they built.
00:11:40
Speaker
And boy, it's so atrocious. Like that family has no taste. And it's very clear by how many motels that they are ruined in that town. But like, um, and apparently ever so they live on Lake Delton and their house is like on an aisle.
00:12:00
Speaker
And their house is like, I think they have a new one, too, but they had an old one and it was like on an island and it literally had like the columns and shit like the like it looked like that blown foam facade that they have in their park on their house. It's ah it was pretty and their house got struck by lightning and started on fire. So there's a news article about it. Years ago, I don't even remember how old that the article was, but I thought it was kind of funny.
00:12:30
Speaker
Oh, I see the pictures here.
00:12:36
Speaker
just ah Just so you're not left out, Drew, I'm going to post it in the chat here. I was going to say there's a chat feature. Oh, look at this. This is so fun. I don't normally record on Zencaster. I don't mind giving a little plug because they've really upgraded recently. They made it super easy if you are a lazy content creator like us, where you can record here and then have your RSS feed linked directly. So it'll do your editing for you and upload automatically.
00:13:15
Speaker
that house looks like theme park theming on the outside. Yeah. And it looks like someone who has no taste, but they have, it's almost like they have too much money to know what to do with your decorator. Right. Like they did. Like they just wanted to spend money. It was, it's kind of like a, I don't know, like a, like a, like a white trash family that falls into some money and they're like, blow it all on stupid shit. Like, Yeah, I was going to say it feels like they have a ton of money, but had the person who builds buildings for their theme park built this. Yeah. Like it's still, like it's still DIY. Yeah. Fucking gaudy ass chandelier.
00:14:05
Speaker
Even their patio, like their outdoor patio looks like a hotel patio. Oh yeah. It looks like furniture from their hotel too. It probably is. Well, they're like, it starts off here at our house and then we cycle it into the hotel when we get new furniture.
00:14:27
Speaker
We call it a room upgrade. yeah that That family is so cheap. Like they make, I mean, they, they make a shit ton of money at that park and they do not invest into any of it. I wonder, I don't know. Everyone hates him, apparently. And Drew, have you heard about the Mount Olympus owner? If only really from your show, right? Like it's all I really know about him is from your show. and Close your eyes for a second. Okay. And listen really closely. Just see.
00:15:12
Speaker
Yeah, I'm just conjuring up a mental image of some kind.
00:15:22
Speaker
Hmm. I just I can't quite describe it, but. It sounds like a puppy. it It does. Almost sounds like it's getting kicked. Huh. You did say on your show that they kicked dogs. I mean, look with that kind of house, that's a dog kicking house. That's dog kicking house.
00:16:02
Speaker
The house that dog kicking built. So that's a true story. That's not just like a joke. It's either that or the house that Hades built, right? I don't know. Um, allegedly.
00:16:18
Speaker
All right. Well, we don't want any slander where, uh, get you guys sued. I don't think they'd want to spend the money on the lawsuit. Do they have entertainment lawyers?
00:16:35
Speaker
Oh, I mean, man killed somebody before. So I'm sure they have lawyers. I think a couple people like my, I think the joke is justified considering their lack of like responsibility with maintenance and safety and just like general upkeep. It's, it's like, uh, I don't know. I, I, there's a lot of, have you, when was the last time, have you been to Mount Olympus? I went in, uh, 2010, 2010. Okay. So it was like, at that time it was still kind of like FEC, go Cardi water park fives. But the thing is, is that they kept expanding it without actually investing anything into like the rides or like maintenance. So they built this, they have like a giant parking lot now. Um,
00:17:25
Speaker
They, I don't know. It's just wild. Like I think they, their ticket scanners are still in like toolboxes that they just lock at the end of the night. It's a, and there's ah tons of stories about apparently Zeus is just like popping lap bars up but all the time and they don't fix them. I feel like I went in the end of the goodness at
Extended Ride Time Antics at Mount Olympus
00:17:52
Speaker
Mount Olympus. Granted, like the slide wheel slide looks pretty cool. Yeah. But when I was there Cyclops still had its buzz bars and it's old. It's old profiling. Hades was just regular Hades. It wasn't Hades 360. The wild mouse inside hadn't killed anybody yet.
00:18:14
Speaker
um So overall, I feel like I had a a good time when I was there. And I feel like now I think the park. There's a reason I haven't been back in years. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, he's got I got to come in real quick and say they got lawyers, but what they don't have is insurance. And also regarding Zeus. Um, they're like, that's what the seat belts are for. It's like you click it over the lap bar, so it holds the lap bar into place.
00:18:49
Speaker
When we were there, we were there for ERT at an ACE event in 2008, and the employee um was like sitting out front smoking a cigarette. And we walked up to her and we're like, because the ride was supposed to be on ERT with, with like Hades, I think. And so we just like walk up and then we were like, Hey, is this open? Can we ride this? And she just sort of like rolls her eyes, doesn't say anything. And then she walks up the pla she walks up the stairs super, super slow and then walks across the track and goes to the panel. And then we like sit down and she didn't even like pay attention to look at us. And then she just dispatched the train. I love that. And then um we were like, can we go again? And then she just like hit the dispatches again. And then after like the third time, she didn't even stop it in the station. She was just letting it fly through the station at full speed.
00:19:43
Speaker
ah like Which was fun. Yeah, but like the thing is that first turn out of this out of the station is not meant to take high speeds. So it probably did some track damage. Oh, I'm sure you saw. I'm sure you've seen the video of ah Outlaw at Adventure Land in Iowa doing this. Oh, yep, yep, yep. The David Jealous or Ellis video. Yeah. Which I'm sure also did a ton of track damage. Yeah.
00:20:16
Speaker
Yep. I mean, it's on par with things, but then apparently I was reading random every once in a while I'll read Google reviews. And one of them said that, um, basically there was like a train full of riders and I don't know how their panelists set up. They must have to like manually like hit the brake or like release it or something, or they may be the button got stuck or something. But there was a review that said the train flew through the station and like the mom's daughter's lap bar popped up and they didn't stop it or something.
00:20:48
Speaker
So it sounds like my Olympus. Yeah. Oh, and the at the same event, a tree fell down onto the track. um and damage some of the wood. And we were, I think we like went to the water park or something. We got dinner and we came back a couple hours later and then the ride was just running. So somehow they have met, they managed to like cut down a tree and fix the track and get the ride up within like a couple hours, just with their internal staff. Yeah. You think that'd be like down for the season. Yeah. Or at least like at least a weekend, you know, like, yeah I mean, it's track work. I, I mean, I guess if you're, if you do wooden coaster maintenance, I'm sure like they knew what they were doing, but the fact that they just like, didn't have to involve the state or do probably an incident report or anything like that, just modifying the track and then just opening it.
00:21:45
Speaker
The owner was like, take this automatic rifle and shoot at that log until it's off the track. Oh, the Hades lift was smoking, too. Like the operator. That's that's so cool. Was it wearing sunglasses and a backwards hat, too?
00:22:06
Speaker
But no, it just like the whole train or in the whole tree, the whole the whole chain up in the like the the chain track was just smoking. And then as a train would get closer to the top of the lift, the smoke would increase. And like what was kind of funny about it, no one wanted to say anything because they didn't want to stop the ERT. Well, yeah, obviously. They're like, it's running hot. That checks out.
00:22:37
Speaker
Like let it run until it blows and then you'll get a lift evac. Yeah. And, uh, that same day, my Opa, the wild mouse, my lap bar just opened on the lift Hill. Well, they sent me without a lap bar on that ride and I had to pull it down myself.
00:22:56
Speaker
Opa. The craziest thing I saw there too was, uh, someone one lost, oh no, it was our our friend Brandon. He lost his sunglasses on the ride and it fell on that bottom section of the track. And then the ride was running. They didn't even ride stop it. She just like walks down the brake run and then goes to the bottom of the ride, steps over the track and retrieves his sunglasses as the rides running.
00:23:28
Speaker
That was wild. Yep. I remember when I the first time I was there in 2005, when Hades was new, I was there with a buddy of ours, Ben, and there was like a rainstorm where like the skies just opened and like the operators left Haiti station and my buddy and I were just like hanging in the station. And I remember we jumped the gates and like we were like sitting on the rails
00:24:00
Speaker
And that was like a picture of me straddling the rails.
00:24:05
Speaker
Yeah, well, that's their closing procedure, too. They'll have a full line. They don't close the line off before the rides on. It's it's like when it hits 10 o'clock, they just stop running. And so they don't have any communication or announcement. They'll just like walk away from the ride and go down the exit stairs. And then there's just people like guests in the station waiting. They're like, I guess it's closed like.
00:24:36
Speaker
I love it so much.
Mount Olympus vs. Action Park: Charm in Chaos?
00:24:39
Speaker
Yeah. It's got that weird shitty charm. It's a lot like, it's not a lot like Indiana beach. It's, it's a way worse experience than Indiana beach, but it's kind of like the, if it wasn't a little bit sketchy, then I wouldn't be having as much fun. Yeah. It's kind of like a action park for the millennial generation. Mm-hmm. They're like, we got gulp carts and they've never, ever exploded randomly today.
00:25:15
Speaker
Yeah, Mount Olympus is a a shithole. They're like, they they're like, um what are you going to do? um Drive two hours to six flags?
00:25:28
Speaker
Yeah. When I was there, they were doing this weird like Mount Olympus after dark thing where you could then buy another ticket for like two hours after park close to then ride the rides, like two extra hours or some oh like yeah time afterwards.
00:25:46
Speaker
ah We didn't do it because honestly, we in our day we were there, we went to Timber Falls first, rode Avalanche a couple of times, then went to Mount Olympus, rode all their rides a couple of times, and then did Knuckleheads and rode Phantom's Revenge kiddie coaster. And um then after that, We like went back to Mount Olympus road, I think Cyclops and Hades one last time. And then we decided we weren't going to do the overnight, the late night thing. Cause we had written a lot and we didn't do it, but I imagine some people do do that or it wouldn't be an option that they were selling. Yeah, I did that one year. It was pretty cool. The only problem though, is that when I did it, like there was no real decrease in lines.
00:26:38
Speaker
It was like basically if somehow like everyone who went was like, they only, ah they also only had like Hades and Cyclops open. Um, so we only really got like two or three rides on it, but yeah, I don't know if they'd do that anymore. It was interesting to me cause like Hades had a line all day the entire time, but like Zeus and Cyclops were walk-ons the entire day. Yeah. And I'm like kind of surprised at that. Like you would sort of think that, Hades would clear out and like it wouldn't just, but its line was always the exact same no matter what time I was there. Yeah. Even when that ride is a walk on, it still takes like 20 minutes to get out and off it.
00:27:30
Speaker
They do that annoying thing when the park is dead, they'll just like sit there and they'll open the gates and then they'll just like talk. to each other and just like wait for no reason.
00:27:44
Speaker
It sounds about right. Now they got the tallest water slide in the world, apparently. Yeah, it's on that. They're like, it it it's feels like a taller version of the whatever's on the Royal car Caribbean Island thing. Yeah, I think it's a clone, but they made it a foot taller. They're like tallest water slide. This one won't decapitate a kid. Well, this is a body slide. It's like a spirally helix body slide. Again, no damage will be done to your head. No, you get you will survive this. ah We're not making that claim. OK, so we're just acknowledging the head safety.
00:28:34
Speaker
Correct. um Your head will make it out and in one piece. I feel that, I understand.
00:28:43
Speaker
our look Mount Olympus's lawyers won't let us make any claims about your your whole body's safety. No. Speaking of parks with a bunch of CCI coasters, did you see ah Indiana Beach ended up with two coast two trains on their lift on Hoosier Hurricane the other day? No. Is there a photo of it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. There is. um So like, did maintenance fuck up or what happened? Well, I think it's the same thing, like with the Zeus, right, where the train went flying through the station, but it runs two trains, so they like didn't stop the one in the station and it ended up going on to the lift hill. Oh, shit.
00:29:35
Speaker
Is there, um, where is there, is, so is there a photo posted on like Reddit or something? Uh, it's on Twitter. Altura Ryan tweeted it. Okay. Let me take a look. Um, yeah. So there's a couple of, uh, theories that one was that it didn't, It didn't stop in the station. Another one is like they were doing like a clear blocks from a downtime. There was one train on the lift and they messed that process up and sent the other train to a deadlift. I'm not 100% sure how that rides blocking and programming works. So I don't really know how it happened, but.
00:30:17
Speaker
As somebody who's operated rides a lot, I've always wanted to figure out if I could put two trains on the lift, so it is kind of fascinating to me. And if you're going to have two trains on in a block at the same time, the lift is the block you want to do that. Yeah, isn't there a fun aren't there arrows that can do theoretically to on the lift? Oh, yeah. um Well, something like Space Mountain in Orlando does do to two trains on the lift. Anyways, so it like just naturally operates that way. um But there's also I think the old arrow programming, if you did
00:31:02
Speaker
If you timed an e-stop correctly and restarted the ride ah with your train in the middle of the lift on a taller lift, I think you could successfully get two trains on the lift. ah Because the old school system of how arrows used to block trains was you had the photo eye at the bottom of the lift and the photo eye at the top of the lift. So then you take something that's like a massive Gemini sized lift hill, right? Like, and you stop the ride as soon as it passes the sensor on the lift hill. So it thinks that lifts occupied, but then you stop and then you restart the ride. It has this thing called a clear blocks delay, where then it's like learning where the trains are and it doesn't know the trains on the lift.
00:31:47
Speaker
and then you could restart the lift and dispatch and in theory you could probably get two trains on the lift never tested it out but like in theory in my head I think that could happen um yeah so I think it's plausible that CCI being that They're older and a company that doesn't really exist anymore. And you can clearly see you can do things with like Adventureland and Zeus holding dispatch buttons and them going flying through the station. um that I would guess it's plausible that you could slip block segments that way, if possible. Yeah, and um and which I was just trying to, Magnum's block is
00:32:32
Speaker
Isn't it like one train train links from the top is where the, the, I don't, I'm not confident where the top photo i is now, but also Magnum has a new control system now since then when you and I worked there. Okay. either Not that either one of us work Magnum, but it has a whole new control system. Now that doesn't run off the old arrow programming. It's got this new fancy consign panel and programming, which is way nerdier than I think anyone expected us to get to. Yeah. And I, I'm ahm pretty sure they can't control the trims anymore. No, they don't. And that's, that's why PLCs have died off. Thankfully.
00:33:22
Speaker
Um, but I mean, it doesn't surprise me that we have CCI problems. Cause you remember, I don't know if you guys saw the pictures. This was many years ago, probably four or five years ago at this point, but, uh, there was some coaster event was that, uh, Boulder dash. And it was the great Boulder crash where the two trains smashed into each other. Oh, right. Yep. I remember that. And then they created that like funky hybrid for the golden ticket awards. Like a couple of months later.
00:33:52
Speaker
um where they So obviously CCI control systems aren't aren't perfect.
00:34:04
Speaker
but I do love them. I think they make some great wooden roller coasters like Shivering Timbers, Cornball Express. um Honestly Cyclops is a lot of fun. Fucking New Mexico Rattler. yeah That one looks amazing.
00:34:23
Speaker
I wrote that one in 2012 and it was pretty good, but although you could tell on that one, it had a lot of like laterals with air time, but the park didn't really maintain it. So there was a couple choppy sections.
00:34:43
Speaker
Seemed to be kind of their problem is like they're their rides were too aggressive for their design for long-term maintenance. And so some of them got rough pretty quick. Well, I mean, I think that's your problem you have with almost every wooden coaster, right? Like, if you don't take care of it, like, holiday wear. Don't want a moorage period. It's really good. Ravine Flyer 2 and Waldemir. Like, your your wooden coaster is just anything built from, like, the 90s on just like go to shit because they have forces and airtime and all of this stuff. Yeah.
00:35:25
Speaker
And then you if you spend enough time ignoring them, then you got to do what like knots did with Ghost Rider and redo the entire thing. Did you? um Did you ride the mind blower with the what is that with the steel track with the bat transitions oh man so um i don't want to shit on mind blower but it used to be one of my favorite rides and
00:35:57
Speaker
I was in so much pain after writing it the first time, uh, after it had the new RMC like transitions that still like a year later, I can feel it in my back some mornings when I wake up where my spine compressed from that first transition. Yeah. I mean, the videos look pretty nuts. And also too, like, I remember when I first looked at it and from a non engineering Coaster engineer perspective, it's like, you can look at it and tell exactly why it does that. Yeah. So she compared to the GCI one where the tight has a nice, like gradual, like, you know, nice gradual current transition. And then they just basically like cut it off. It's like a right angle.
00:36:47
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, there's like a lot of flaws to it, right? Like Gravity Group gave Fun Spot the plans based on or gave Fun Spot the plans on this. Fun Spot gave RMC the plans on it. But these plans were based off of like a ride that in a couple of years has really like shaken itself into like a different position than it was. So like that's just the whole thing is really interesting. I can't wait for them to redo the entire ride and give the entire thing the steel overlay with that RMC track. And I think it would, it'll be incredible.
00:37:27
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, the first time I rode that thing in 2020, it was so good. And then I went back in 2021 and it was like a light switch, like so fucking rough. Stupid. I i've never hated it when it was all wood. Like even when it was rough, it was still like ridiculous, right? Like just everything about the ride didn't make sense. It was way too awesome and compact for its small footprint, but like it was awesome. Like, and I mean, I get it. Like it was the length of voyage. I understand why everyone would absolutely hate it because it's too intense for too long, but it was like a 35 42nd ride. So like, it's like balls to the walls crazy. Like, yeah, it was really rough, but it was fucking bonkers for that entire ride. Yeah.
00:38:15
Speaker
And I loved Old Mind Blower. I understand why like Fun Spot, a park that like sells like ticket rides. Like it's not a all you can ride park for the most part. It's based off ticket sales. Like ah it's like Morey's Peers. Like I understand why Morey's Peers redid their Vekoma Boomer or Vekoma SLC because they want to get people in the seats and riding the things. And as long as people aren't buying tickets for it, you got to do something about it. It's a waste of space. Yeah, right. So like, I get what they're trying to do here, but oh man, I mind blur. I used to ride all the time. Now I hate.
00:38:59
Speaker
Do you know, is, so there is plans to redo the whole thing. Like, is that near future? explain They definitely are retracking it, but they announced that a pre shift meeting in front of all their employees once, um, that they are waiting to make more money, and then they're going to retract the whole thing. Oh, OK. Because FunSpot doesn't buy anything on credit. they They literally pay cash for absolutely all of their additions. So I guess they're waiting to make more money to do the rest of that. Yeah, that makes sense.
00:39:37
Speaker
But speaking of FunSpot, man, their RMC up in Atlanta is so good. It is unnecessarily good for a FunSpot park. Yeah, it looks awesome. I haven't been on it yet.
RMC Coaster Investment at Fun Spot Atlanta
00:39:49
Speaker
It is crazy to think that they just built that there. I don't know if their attendance has been going up or what their plan was, but, um, I'm curious to see how how that does in like five years or unless it just remains, it's like a ah walk on coaster. I don't know. they could They can't be making money on it, right? Well, like that's the thing, right? Like every time I've gone,
00:40:14
Speaker
which I've been twice. I've used my annual pass that I bought here in Florida, got into the park, and I guess I did buy merch both times. so um
00:40:27
Speaker
But like, I think everyone is a pass holder that rides it. Nobody's going up there buying your day tickets on it. And it's, I went, ah, God, it was like a, what's the holiday, and was it is it President's Day? ah President's Day weekend. that I was up there and it was a walk on on the president's day weekend Saturday. Like sit on the train. I sat two rides in the front row, two rides in the back row, sat on the train. It's like, that's how dead this park is.
00:41:03
Speaker
Yeah, that's, that's nuts. I wonder if they regret that or if it's just like, they're, I don't know. Cause it doesn't seem like they've been adding anything else there. It has mean potential. I mean, it's a, I mean, Atlanta is a large Metro and I'm sure that there's enough people there to support it, but I just don't know what their marketing, what they're doing marketing wise or what their plan is. Yeah. I mean, I, I agree. I also don't know the answer to that. Um, But yeah, because doesn't that directly harm you make.
00:41:39
Speaker
Directly what, Zach? Oh, make them direct competitors with ah Six Flags over Georgia. I mean, so it's crazy because Atlanta is so big, they're like an hour apart from each other. The two parks. Yeah. Fun spot is in South Atlanta. um Not that. at Six Flags is North Atlanta. It's like West Atlanta, but um Yeah, it's crazy because the Fun Spot Atlanta Park is like in a neighborhood like you're just driving down like your normal strode that has like Chipotle, Mohs, CVS, Walgreens, and suddenly a fucking RMC. Like it's wild. Huh. So it is in like,
00:42:30
Speaker
the town it's not in like the city of orland city it but it's also like super accessible like it's it's 10 minutes off of 75 so like if you're ever doing like the road trip down and taking 75 like it's 10 minutes out of your way to get on to go to fun spot yeah i mean they had to have done they had to have known so Yeah, and they had to. It's like the whole thing. It's like they have to at least you think they would know what they were doing when they built it, but. I don't know unless they build other stuff like.
00:43:07
Speaker
So there was an article many years ago, right after they built Mindblower. um And it said something along the lines of, well, there's a couple of different wooden manufacturer companies. We got one from the one company, GCI. We got another one from the Gravity Group. So the only one left is RMC. And then they they wrote this in, I guess, 2017 in like a European roller coaster magazine. The only reason I know this is because Hyde um subscribes to that because he was part of that club at one point um and so like they've been kind of talking about doing this in some sort of manner since 2018 so it's just wild that it actually happened also have um but yeah no it's weird the whole park is way bigger than the other parks
00:44:02
Speaker
But I also feel like if they figure out a way to put this RMC in Orlando instead of Atlanta, I think it would have made them more money. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Like put the, I don't know which was cheaper to build, but like the GCI or, um, whatever it's called. white lightning Yeah. Like that's like the Atlanta park seems like the better candidate for the, for like white lightning and then put the RMC in Orlando. Cause you'd get way more traffic.
00:44:33
Speaker
Yeah, no, I 100% agree on that one. I was just constantly on board. the Atlanta Park's weird though. I went there a long time ago before it was Fun Spot.
00:44:51
Speaker
um i It is weird. it It's pretty much exactly the same besides that. Only they built a Fun Spot style go-kart track.
00:45:05
Speaker
Which is probably the second best ride in that park. It's so bizarre to me that they just decided to dump an RMC there like because like it's not like like it makes what their parks in Orlando and Kissimmee makes sense because they're like a low cost ah alternative. But like, it's not like Six Flags is like a Disney or Universal to compete with that way. And I get that Atlanta is a big market, but still.
00:45:45
Speaker
touch oriented Yeah, I think part of it has to do with the fact that they like to be within like driving distance. Um, of their parks, which is why they went Atlanta and that park was available. And I don't think they thought salt expanding a third location in Orlando, but they wanted a third location. Yeah. Which is just weird.
00:46:16
Speaker
Yeah, no, I get it. The whole thing is kind of, the whole thing is pretty bizarre. Um, but it's fun. It's one of the best RMCs out there. Um, at least that I've written, um, I would argue it kind of like broke my credit rankings because I didn't know what I was going to rank it, where I was going to sit. And I have, think it has such a stupid name that I was like determined to not like it as much as I do. And oh, it's, it's so good. What about the quad down? I hear mixed things on whether or not it's too intense. I mean, the ride is pretty intense. Um,
00:46:55
Speaker
I liked it better in February when I wrote it on cold day than I wrote it during an August afternoon. yeah um But either way, I only wrote it during morning rides. um I wrote it at like noon on a cold day in February, and I wrote it at like rope drop. on a hot day in August. So I don't think I've ever ridden the ride on. It's like full, like warmed up potential. Like I imagine if you go, if you went like tonight, which the park's open till like midnight or 10 a.m., I'm sure if you went like on a night ride, that thing would be like fucking flying and the quad down would probably be too much. Yeah.
00:47:37
Speaker
No, that's kind of my general thing or general opinion on a lot of the RMCs is that they're almost better when they don't run full speed. Um, I kind of felt that way about steel vengeance because I had like a very, very slow ride and then I had a like a really fast ride on a summer night and I kind of liked it running a little slower. When it goes too fast, it's just almost like you're not able to take in the elements. It's just, it feels like a, it almost feels more like a flat ride than a roller coaster, just like with the forces and things that it does to you. Yeah, no, I get that. um I would, I kind of think I agree with you, but the one thing that's really neat about RE Force One is it is not like your RMCs of like the previous era, where it was like element after element thrown at you in your face. Like you get a lot of weird things, right? So you go,
00:48:35
Speaker
You have your first drop, which goes into the giant like raven turn inversion. um And then you have the their largest stall or a giant stall. So just like your youre Goliath at um Great America. And then you have this like floater airtime hill that's very similar to like Magnum's floater airtime hill. but like off access. So it's it's this fun like floater but like to the side. So it it has a lot of like weird like large elements in the beginning that I feel like a lot of their elements like their rides don't do.
00:49:13
Speaker
Yeah. So it has like different pacing versus like, I feel like you take your RMCs, a lot of them, it's like maximize every moment on this ride. And this ride doesn't has like some places where it doesn't feel like it needs to maximize. It just does things because it's fun. Yeah. And it's also only ah someone might correct me on this, but I believe it's, one of two that aren't actually Shilky done because he's retired since then. So it's the new guy that's doing the design. This and Wildcat in ah at Hershey are different designers. And I think that it kind of shows.
00:49:54
Speaker
Yeah, that makes sense because I kind of felt like, um well, without riding Airy Force One, like Wildcat definitely feels different than the other ones. So I rode, like I rode Iron Gwazi and Wildcat this pretty close together. And yeah, I liked Wildcat a lot more. It just felt different because like Iron Gwazi is unique, but it still sort of feels like all the other RMCs. yeah Especially like the short ones, like like ah between Joker and the Kentucky Kingdom one and like, I don't know, the one at over Georgia, they kind of feel similar in a way. yeah And then Steel Vengeance is sort of just like RMC's greatest hits times two.
00:50:44
Speaker
It's their crown jewel for their crown jewel park, right? Tallest, fastest, longest at the time. um And then Zadra's the weird... The parker European wants to throw us a ton of money. It's kind of like the Saudi Arabia RMC, not that there is a Saudi Arabia RMC, but right. Like it's like, if like Saudi Arabia was building an RMC, it would be Zadra. It would be what they would get this just ridiculous ground up, large structure, full force balls to the walls kind of ride. Yeah.
00:51:18
Speaker
Have you been out to Energy Lane? Excuse me, high hiccups. Energy Lane, yeah. I have not. I'll eventually get there, right? But like there's so many places in Europe that I want to go to. And a park ah that has all of like four good rides and a bunch of crap isn't really like on my radar, right? like There's so many more interesting parks that I want to get to, I think, before I get there. Yeah, that makes sense. Like i I support anyone who that's their favorite and they really like Sadra and they really like Hyperia and they like their two Vekoma launch coasters. And maybe you could argue their Intamin splashdown coaster is good. But other than that, like you're talking to Vekoma Junior Boomerangs, an SLC and a bunch of kids coasters.
00:52:15
Speaker
It would have, uh, some insane coaster count. It's like, they're up to like 15 or something. Yeah. But if you look like 12 or kids, coasters, it's like puts magic mountains, kid, coasters to shame. Well, good. Somebody had to do it. Oh, they're up to 19.
00:52:39
Speaker
That's wild. Yeah, I'll get out there at some point. He's going to need like two or three more kids coaster. They do. I really want to get back to Europa and Fantasia land, which also is kind of a shame because I've done them and there's so many other parks in Europe that I want to go to. And yet I find myself like, yeah, but I really like Europa and I really like Fantasia land and I really want to go back to Oktoberfest and yeah.
00:53:08
Speaker
Yeah, right now my new my kind of my list of European visits are like I really want to check out Voltron. And I still want to ride fly. And um now Hyperia seems like I was I felt like without like just looking at the videos, I was kind of mixed on it. Like I thought it was going to be good, but apparently the reviews are coming back pretty positive, so.
Coaster Enthusiast Preferences: US vs. International
00:53:36
Speaker
Yeah, I want to wait till a couple more Americans go, I feel like, because I don't want to shit on international guests, right? But international guests and American coaster enthusiasts are like two different breeds. So like we like all like different things. like i My entire life, I grew up hearing like Nemesis was like this greatest like invert of all time. And I went and wrote it, and I was like, yeah, it's fine, right? But like really, it's setting of being in this like
00:54:06
Speaker
Quarry is by far the coolest part, but like it's basically a Batman the ride just buried half underground. yeah like it's not It's not the world's greatest invert coaster that everyone makes it out to be. Yeah, that makes sense. And like Smiler is way cooler, in my opinion. I like Smiler way better than I liked um Nemesis, but like you tell and British people that. They're like, no, Smiler's terrible. Yeah. I mean, like London, I mean, the whole like London region is a I mean, even the rides at Thorpe Park. I mean, they they seem good, though. I mean, I like Thorpe Park when I went. I had a great time. ah Colossus, the the Intamin 10 looper, like that's really cool. Saw the ride was rough, but pretty sweet. um My favorite wing coasters there in swarm.
00:55:00
Speaker
Stealth's a lot of fun, and honestly I think um Nemesis Inferno is also a pretty sweet invert coaster. So you're saying Nemesis Inferno is better than Nemesis? You what?
00:55:17
Speaker
Zach? Yeah, you're saying Nemesis Inferno is better than Nemesis? Um, I'm not sure I want to say that, but I think Nemesis Inferno is a ride that I thought was going to be on par with our weaker B and&Ms here in America. So like things like, um, Patriot or Silver Bullet, like that era of like boring and mild B&Ms. And it's better than that. And Nemesis, I expected to be on par with like your Alpenguysts, your, um,
00:55:53
Speaker
Montus your afterburns like our top tier category of inverts and I felt like it was below them Okay, yeah, so like one exceeded expectations one was Below expectation, but I still think nemesis is probably the better of the two But they're a lot closer than they should be Okay Have you I think you've been on any of the clone, like the 10 Looper clones? I've only been on the one at ah Thorpe. OK. I wrote the so I wrote one in this past winter in it, the one in Italy um outside of Rome ah that has it's so but it's basically the clone, but it has a ah cable lift with a like steeper swooping drop and in lap bars only.
00:56:46
Speaker
Um, I thought that thing was insane like the the four in like the four in line rolls With lap bars was nuts. Like yeah, basically just tinkers with harnesses. Yeah, like It basically you like pull like with the lap bars I get pulls your body to the like outside of the train, you know kind of like sky rush laterals where it almost seems like not unsafe, but it's like, because you know, you're on an intimate, you're like, Oh, like I could die. like Maybe. So it just kind of like pulls your body to the like outside of the train and you cannot pull your body back for like the entire duration. Um, it was pretty nuts.
00:57:30
Speaker
Yeah, no, they look sweet. Um, I wish sick existed when we went to Flamingo land, but obviously it didn't exist at the time when we were there. Oh, is that what it's called? Sick? Sick. S I K. Oh, I say, okay. Yeah. I think. Yeah. pretty sure that's right Okay. Yeah. It looks like the same one. I would guess there's like eight or 10 of them now. yeah there's Yeah, there's definitely a few of them. There's one in Russia that's meat processing plant two.
00:58:09
Speaker
but Interesting. I think you guys are the ones that broke that story. that the the ru There's a park in Russia that has one ride called meat processing plant and one's meat processing plant two.
00:58:24
Speaker
Um, then once an Intamin 10 looper and ones like a blue flyer clone, if I remember correctly. Okay.
00:58:33
Speaker
So interesting. So this one has, okay. So this sick has the newer lap bars. Like they basically have the sky rush lap bars. Okay. the the The one in Italy, it had no padding. It was just like the it was ba it was literally the um shoot the rapids lap bar. Huh? So it was super minimal. Which which was nuts. That is nuts. Yeah, they're fun. The only park I've been to in Italy was Gardaland, which honestly had an absolute blast at. But
00:59:15
Speaker
Not near Rome. It's on Lake Garda, kind of in between. Sort of ish, the closest major city to that is Venice, but it's not really near Venice. It's on Lake Garda. That doesn't have Catoon, right? No, this is the one that's named Melandia. Yeah, this is the one that's got Oblivion Dive Coaster. That's got the Screaming Squirrel, right? It had it standing, but not operating, and now it's gone.
00:59:46
Speaker
Um, I don't know if you guys saw the, you know, like, uh, Thorpe parks or not Thorpe park, Chessington's croc drop. The like kid, the family, uh, drop tower. That's got like the animal mouth that the the ride drops down into. Well, they replaced the screaming squirrel at a garter land with that. So the squirt screaming squirrel was standing, but not operating when I was there, but it exists.
01:00:16
Speaker
That shit look crazy. Yeah, like, I mean, I'm sure it's. All right. I mean, I think I guess I would rather ride an El Loco as far as. um Crazy shit, but that's not a fair comparison, though. I think a better comparison is screaming squirrel versus 40 free spin. Oh, well, I don't ever want to ride a 40 free spin, so.
01:00:46
Speaker
That's like slowly become part of my personality now, just not writing those. Like I'm now at a five different opportunities at parks where I could have written it for the credit and I didn't. I mean, it's basically a flat ride. Yeah. That's going to be my opinion. It's no longer a credit. It's a flat ride. You right you wasted your time. It doesn't count as a credit. That's I think those things could be cool if ah I want to see one in closed, like an indoor version of it where you would have different levels. So it was like you were dropping down from like, you know, like a hole in the floor, like level to level, put some lights in there, some fog.
01:01:37
Speaker
You could see all the phones on the floor.
01:01:44
Speaker
Yeah, it's the, the rotation is, it's like, I don't know if it's a combination. I don't know if it's a restraint thing or if it's like a, I don't know what it is, but I know like they're not, the, ro the flipping is a very violent. It's like not, I don't know how to describe it. I rode Green Lantern at ah um Magic Mountain, obviously the Intamin version of that. It was so bad, I was like, I'm never doing anything like this again. So then S and&S came up with their free spins and I was like, fuck that. This is not going to be a thing I will ride. I think i think the Green Lantern at Magic Mountain is like the most hated ride, it seems like. Yeah, which is wild because
01:02:25
Speaker
Magic Mountain also had flashback, which was also a very hated ride, but for a different generation of coaster enthusiasts. Yeah. See I heard it' but what's weird is like, I've heard so many mixed things on it. People said it was awesome. People said it sucked. Um, so I don't know if it was like good at one point and then it went rough, but. I can't imagine you can kind of just look at it until it's not very comfortable. Just with the, the fort, like the lateral forces of those restraints. But I wrote it as a kid and did not enjoy it. Um, and it's weird because I feel like as a kid, you really have terrible judgment on what, if a ride is good or not. Yeah. Because like, I really liked mantis cause you stood up on it and, um,
01:03:12
Speaker
I really liked the Togo Looper at Six Flags Great Adventure because that was really fun. um So you' like you you have bad judgment. And even as a kid, I thought it was terrible. So it's got to be awful as an adult.
01:03:30
Speaker
Flashback. I wish I could have rode that ride. Was it a great America at one point? The I think where I was open around. Well, yeah, but like still like I feel like it being like a defunct ride from your like home park makes it. Yeah, exactly. There's more lore there. Yeah, I mean, it was that over Georgia. So open that Great America and then went to over Georgia and then went to Magic Mountain.
01:04:08
Speaker
I'm pulling up the, the Rob Alvi POV right now.
01:04:15
Speaker
I'm twisting 90 degrees. I haven't seen him around recently. I mean, I got to give him a lot of credit. Like they definitely have figured out their brand and they seem to be doing well now. Drew, have you checked Starbucks? um I actually go to Starbucks like three times a week and have yet to see Rob at Starbucks. Well, have you tried during a hurricane? um No, because I know that Starbucks is closed during a hurricane. So um thanks to TPR, they pointed this out. But Starbucks is like the start of the Florida hurricane index.
01:05:07
Speaker
um This is a self-proclaimed thing that I use to like pay attention to how storms are going. um Prior to Starbucks closing, do not give a shit. Don't even notice the storm exists, right? Starbucks announces closing and I'm like, huh, I should probably pay attention now because this is a thing that might happen. um And then Sea World and Busch Gardens usually are the ones that close next so after that point you're like alright crap let me get some bottles of water or something like that. um
01:05:38
Speaker
pay attention to going on here and then you don't really pay attention until then Disney and Universal are in this like pissing contest where one of them has to close first for like insurance purposes and then the other one makes the call and ah so then after that once they make the call then the city starts caving down and closing and all that kind of stuff and then As long as Waffle House is still open, like you know like you're like, yeah, we can have a hurricane party. But then Waffle House is closed. You're like, oh, fuck, batten down the hatches. But it all starts with Starbucks. The Waffle House index is a real thing. well I know it is. ah But so this is.
01:06:20
Speaker
the index based on the index. um my ah My buddy, he yeah his family lives in Kansas, and he sent me a text that Kansas Waffle House is closed for a tornado. And I was like, oh, fuck. they have I was like, your parents need to get down, seek shelter immediately. And he's like, what do you mean? And I was like, look, man, art, star, art. our, um, waffle houses don't close unless all hell is about to break loose. So that means waffle house knows something about this tornado storm that's coming and your parents better be ready to seek shelter.
01:06:59
Speaker
Yeah. I thought that whole saga was funny cause they kept bringing up like when we were in Japan, like they didn't close anything for hurricanes. or typhoons or whatever. And then they were posting pictures like, look, it's us riding a roller coaster and a typhoon.
01:07:19
Speaker
That's stupid. Like, I don't know, safety is important. um I will say Starbucks jumps the gun almost immediately. Topgolf also really closes a little earlier, but they got to pull down all these TVs for all their bays that are outside and they got to make sure all the balls are out of the outside so they don't go like flying and everywhere because nothing would be worse than like a hurricane hitting Topgolf. All that. So they have a top golf has a lot to prep for hurricanes, but. I don't know, man, it's Orlando like it just. Shit stays open until the last possible second. We're here for the guests. We're here for the tourists.
01:08:07
Speaker
Makes sense. Mm hmm.
Hurricane Preparedness: A Floridian Humor
01:08:10
Speaker
and like your hospitality workers that need to put up with the bullshit need their caffeine. um So like someone who goes to the parks, yeah, sure. Like Starbucks can be closed for you, but I really need my hospitality coffee. So like, if that could still be open, that would be great. Like a play, just like, ah, we're closed. I'm like, yeah, but I work in theme parks. Okay. Nevermind. We're open for you. That would be great.
01:08:38
Speaker
Yeah. I've never done a, I've never been in a hurricane, but I do. Like my sister lived in Florida and it sounds like combination of like your stereotypical Florida person. I mean, cause like where people are like resailing reselling, like pallets of water and like two by fours and stuff during the the big ones. Um, I mean, not really. I mean, I also live in Orlando. So like Orlando is where you go to like seek shelter from hurricanes, right? Like that' true yeah through the coast, you come into Orlando. Um, so, or if you're coming, if it's down south, you come up to Orlando. So I'm in kind of the place where yes, we get hit by hurricanes, but it, it had traveled 90 miles through inland before it got to us. Yeah.
01:09:33
Speaker
So like, yeah, we do have some flooding and power allergies and stuff like that, but we don't have the, um, storm waves and all of this kind of stuff. So knock on wood here, but like it Orlando is kind of where you go to like seek shelter from the storm. Yeah, that makes sense.
01:10:00
Speaker
what my parents My parents live in Merritt Island now, so they um they've got like hurricane shutters on their house that you close up, and you so you don't have to board up the windows. They've got like the metal shutters that they close and all of that kind of stuff. um so like And they're hurricane-proof glass on all their windows. It's it's pretty crazy, like these coastal homes. I was in this attic the other day, my dad's attic. um And I was like, holy shit, like you have so much more roof support than I do. This is insane.
01:10:39
Speaker
like you You could like climb like monkey bars through like their roof structure, because it and like it's like so much support up there. like Unlike your average houses, it it does not have nearly as much support. And I thought that was kind of crazy. I know that's random, but yeah. You know, and now like insurance, I always hear about Florida getting crazy home insurance rates now. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Is that true? It is true. How crazy is it? Um, I,
01:11:24
Speaker
Honestly, I'm going to sound, this and sounds super irresponsible, but I just put mine on my credit card and I don't notice what it is. Um, but i it's, it, it is significantly more expensive than when I moved here in this house three years ago. Like we're already over a hundred dollars more a month. Damn. Yeah.
01:11:55
Speaker
Um, that actually might be a lie. It might be a six month. It's a hundred dollars more over a six month period. Um, but still more expensive. Yeah, that's not bad. I mean, like, um, I sister stand for their place. It went from like 5,000 a year to like 11,000 a year or something, but that was, uh, down closer to Miami, like on the coast.
01:12:25
Speaker
Yeah, no. ah She's right about that. I think I'm... I gotta do math, because I pay my i i pay quarterly.
01:12:50
Speaker
Yeah, no, I pay about $1,500 more now than what it used to be. Okay. Um, which is still like crazy, right? Like, and then our property taxes are going through the roof. It's just, it's, it's a mess. Florida's a mess.
Rising Cost of Living in Florida
01:13:05
Speaker
Uh, if you're contemplating moving to Florida, I just genuinely wouldn't recommend moving to Florida. Well, I mean, especially, I mean, DeSantis seems to be doing enough on his own, but yeah,
01:13:23
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, and even if that's like your thing and you're really into like his style of politics, I still wouldn't move to Florida because everything's really expensive. So people would be like, Oh, this is the kind of governor I want, which chances are does not overlap with the people who listen to your show. Um, but even if that is your thing, things are still really expensive here. Um,
01:13:48
Speaker
And like the only way to get around is sit in traffic or take toll roads and property tax is really expensive and homeowners insurance is really expensive. And you got to replace your AC unit every 10 years because the Florida heat just absolutely destroys it. Like I just put in a brand new AC unit, um, last week. So that was miserable. There was like three days without AC here.
01:14:19
Speaker
it' it's It's not a great place to live other than the fact that you can go to theme parks. But like what I'm actually like genuinely nervous about is the fact that there's a ton of people like me who moved down here to have careers in this industry. And like, I would argue, quote unquote, like made it in the industry. Like I'm at a point where like I make decisions at my attraction and like, could buy a house based off of my like salary made and like this industry, right? But like people aren't going to move down here anymore for this industry because they're like, you kind of got to like start in the bottom and like nobody can afford to be a ride host down here anymore. Like back in 2010, when I moved to Florida, like we would put, we put a bunch of people in an apartment together and we all moved down here together. But like,
01:15:13
Speaker
Now you just need to do that to survive because rents are insane. Like my two bedroom apartment was like $900 when I moved down here. A two bedroom apartment now is like $3,000 in Orlando. Oh shit. Yeah. Yeah. That was, I mean, I bet COVID had a lot to do with that too. That's just like what I hear. Like I literally always hear like Florida and rent and cost of living is insane. And like, in my mind, it's still kind of like a cheaper place to move. Like you always hear that like Florida and Texas are like more affordable, but now they're, they became the magnets of migration. Yeah. No, I mean, it's insane. Like the not that this is going to make any sense to you guys. Are you guys familiar with the villages at all?
01:16:02
Speaker
Is that like a yeah Disney employee thing? No. So it's like an old person town um that was definitely like in the middle of nowhere between Ocala, which is already like a town that's in the middle of nowhere and Orlando. Um, and now I would say from the villages to Orlando is now an hour. They're, they're an hour apart. And it is pure construction and infrastructure growth between the two of them. Like the villages is now definitely going to become a suburb of Orlando, which is just wild because it used to just be in the middle of nowhere on the turnpike. But what it is is um whether or not this is true or not, I don't know. Like it might just be like Orlando folklore. But the villages is like this old person ah retirement
01:16:56
Speaker
community neighborhood that has a bunch of things but they're all like swingers and they all have sex with each other and you put like lufas on your golf cart based on like what kind of sexual encounters you're interested in and um it's all old people so they all are in past meta-paws and everything so it's like STDs are like completely rampant in this out of control, like old people village. I mean, which is, it's a, it's a funny premise. I want to, I wonder if there's been any docs about that. I'm curious.
01:17:35
Speaker
I don't know. I mean, you can like search the village's loofah guide and you can get a guide to their loofahs. ah But yeah, no, that used to absolutely be in the middle of nowhere and now it's not. Now it's just down the turnpike and there are homes and neighborhoods and things in between them straight towards Orlando.
01:18:03
Speaker
I remember there's a Bob's burgers about that. I think that would be really funny to make fun of that. It was like, uh,
01:18:16
Speaker
One of their dad's is in a like balloons and they like go to a sex party and then like he's into balloons or something. Got to get them balloons.
01:18:39
Speaker
That sounds about right.
01:18:46
Speaker
So what's weird are balloons or furries? They're both fun.
01:19:05
Speaker
Yeah, um, they are both fun. I don't know. I'm not a furry. I don't really know a ton about balloons either. But I just, you know what is fun with the two of you and what I enjoy about your podcast is it's kind of like just hanging out with friends. um And most of the time Zach doesn't respond to me, but I tend to text Zach when I'm listening to your shows with like comments and things that I have to say about it. um because it's basically just people hanging out together uh talking about roller coasters and it just go with the flow and our conversation is kind of like naturally progressed from mount olympus to indiana beach to the villages and starbucks and hurricanes and how florida is not a great place to live
01:19:55
Speaker
Yeah. If there was ever a flow chart about the topics covered in each episode, like throughout the episodes, it'd be a mess. Like a storyboard. Yeah. That's why I don't even make a rundown anymore. Cause it's way more fun to just like start talking and see where things go.
01:20:18
Speaker
But we were trying to at least like have an orientation of picking one ride per episode to like as a focal point and just talk about why it sucks. Um, I think our the first one we did was banshee. Yeah. Now that's going to be part of your killer coaster segment. Sure is. Yeah. But what, what coaster do you think we should, uh, talk about today?
01:20:50
Speaker
as per the namesake of a coaster that I think sucks that like, so it's the argument, like it's a coaster that I think sucks that people defend or I think it could be anything really. Um, it could be a, uh, coaster that a lot of people like. It could be a coaster that you think sucks. Whatever. I don't know. I'm just, I'm, I'll admit I am not a huge fan of voyage and I think that's a controversial take, but I, same. I find voyage too long um and too aggressive for too long and everyone's like, Oh, you got to ride it. Holiday night, holiday Hollywood nights. So like this ride is only good.
01:21:39
Speaker
two days out of the year. Also like absolutely wild, right? You get a park called holiday world, you have all these cool, really cool special events where they're like, Oh, this is our fourth of July festival. This is our Valentine's day festival. This is our Mardi Gras festival. They're like, what do you guys want to do for a special event? Let's turn the trims off of voyage, right? Like it's just, it's bizarre. Well, the trims off don't really even make that big of a difference. Honestly. um I think what's more special about the yeah e ERT is getting night rides because it's a little bit harder to do there with their schedule. yeah You can only really do it during Halloween. Yeah. And like I think in August there's a few nights where they're open to like nine so you can get like a dusk ride. But yeah, like i I think, I don't know. I always thought the trims off was kind of overblown. Um, so yeah, my thing about voyage was,
01:22:35
Speaker
I liked it before when it was like more before like all the reprofiling, when it was like rougher and more aggressive. Cause I actually think that it's not, I don't want to say forceless. I just think it's not as forceful as it's hyped up to be. And it's just like, I don't know. I like, I prefer legend. I think legend is like way more intense. is My favorite coaster at that park. Yeah. And like, it took a while for it to, it took a while for that to swap, but like, I don't know, especially riding legend went back. When was that 2021? I mean, it was just running so well. It had crazy forces, good air time. Like, and then like in comparison to voyage, I was kind of like underwhelmed with voyage. It just, I don't know. It's long. It's good, but yeah.
01:23:26
Speaker
Um, and the other thing is I think it goes back to like that nemesis inferno thing, right? Like first time I rode voyage was 2010. Um, But it was the third of the gravity groups that I did, right? Like I already had ridden Hades and I had already ridden Ravine Flyer. And then so I went onto Voyage and I was like, eh, I mean, it's just kind of those rides, right? Like it was like those two put together. Like versus I think a lot of people do it in the opposite order and ride Voyage first and then everything else is like baby Voyage. Yeah. And so maybe it's my fault because I went in the opposite order, but
01:24:03
Speaker
I mean, voyage open to what? Oh, four or five, something like that. I think it was like, oh, six, of six, of six. Yeah. And like from that day on, everyone called it the best wooden coaster of all time. And so I went into it expecting the best of all time. And I mean, it was really, it was good, but it's, I don't think it's the greatest. It's, I'm not a super huge fan of it. Have you been on Boulder dash? Yeah. So I grew up in New England, right? So like I grew up with dash. I always thought that Bullardash does what Voyage is trying to do a little bit better. Yeah, no, I can see that.
01:24:41
Speaker
Although oddly enough, Dash, I've never gotten to ride at night. um I was supposed to, God, two, three years ago, but it was down the Halloween event I went to. Like we got there and they had a big A-frame outside that said Boulder Dash will be closed for the night. I'm like, well, fuck. This was like the reason I came all the way up to Connecticut. Yeah. And ended up going to Quasi and had an absolute blast riding wooden warrior at night. i really want both Have you been on so good? and
01:25:16
Speaker
Yeah and apparently it runs a little faster now they did it that they did that um steel track re-profiling in a few spots. Yeah. I gotta check with my brother. He just came back from a like a two week long coaster trip that involved ah Lake Compounce. That was like the last stop because where he lives in Rhode Island that's probably his home park.
01:25:45
Speaker
So I got to check with him at some point to see how he liked it because this was the first time he wrote it in a couple of years. What else? Oh, have you been on boardwalk bullet? I have not. Um, couldn't get the group to go. It was on the itinerary. Um, for our Texas spring break trip, a couple of God, I said about to say a couple of years ago, that was 10 years ago. Um, but we, after, Two days at over or an over or an overnight drive, a day at over Texas, a day at Fiesta Texas and a day at SeaWorld. Nobody wanted to then take the four hour drive to go to Boardwalk Bullet. Which was so stupid because we got as close as like Katie, Texas. And like so you're not really that far away on your drive anyway. But I think it was like an extra hotel stay. Nobody wanted to do. OK. Did you go on switchback?
01:26:45
Speaker
No. ah Switchback wasn't built the first time I was in Texas. And it didn't work out timing wise when I got back to the area. um
01:26:59
Speaker
big it Just timing wise, it didn't work out. Switchback is like everything I wanted Mindblower to be.
01:27:09
Speaker
Um, yeah, I almost wonder, like, you know, you remember when Dorny had the rumor that that was, they're going to be there. Edition was a switchback. Yeah. Yeah. I, I really feel like that would have been the right move for Dorny park. And I know a lot of people will tell me I'm crazy, but like Pennsylvania, there is not another state that has that many good wooden roller coasters that Pennsylvania does. Like every park there has their signature wooden coaster. And so I feel like Dorney Park, while its wooden coaster is Thunderhawk, Thunderhawk's not great. So I feel like that would have been like the right move for them, would be a switchback. Because Hershey Park's got Comet and Lightning Racer, and Canobals has Phoenix and Twister. and
01:27:55
Speaker
um God, what the fuck's that bobsled coaster? And then you've got Ravine Fire 2. And Kennywood's got its classic wooden coasters. And so there's just so many good woodies out there in that state of Pennsylvania. And you've got Oscar's Wacky Taxi at Seaworld or Sesame Place. So I just really wish Daugherty Park got on the ah the wooden coaster bandwagon um because there's so many of them in Pennsylvania that are really good. And I wish And it seems like that's what the Pennsylvania enthusiasts like. And they went with the dive coaster, which I would argue is like the worst thing on the B and&M catalog. Yeah, it is kind of random for them.
01:28:40
Speaker
Yeah. And like, why would you do that ah when like something like Monster at Adventureland significantly cheaper fits probably Dorney Park's capacity needs and is way better? Right.
01:28:53
Speaker
Like it, it just, the, the move didn't make any sense to me. Like, and I've heard mixed reviews on that too. Like nothing, yeah nothing substantial.
Dive Coaster Experiences: Griffin and Valravian
01:29:04
Speaker
Well, that's because it's a dive coaster, right? Has anyone ever ridden a dive coaster and went, wow, that was incredible. Besides maybe when she and Griffin opened in like the early 2000s when they were like brand new or like when a lip oblivion opened brand new, but like even like Val Raven opened up and it was like, Uh, uh, whatever. Yeah, but it's pretty popular.
01:29:32
Speaker
Yeah, I, I, I don't work at Cedar Point anymore. Uh, it's been years since I've done that, but I'm curious if Valravian is popular or its capacity just isn't very good. Yeah, that I can't really speak to. Because like Millennium Force pumps riders through. like Raptor and Gatekeeper like absolutely pump riders through. But like Val Raven's capacity is significantly worse than the better capacity rides at Cedar Point. like Its capacity is on par with like your top thrill dragster.
01:30:07
Speaker
youre
01:30:11
Speaker
like that era, like under a thousand riders an hour. So like I kind of think it's line is just based on the fact that it can't get the ridership through it. It could be popular though, because Cedar Point does get a type of thrill seeking type of audience crowd. So like I can see it being popular, but like me as like an enthusiast, I'm unimpressed by Val Raven. Well, I also think it helps that it's in the front of the park to Yeah. This is also going to sound weird, but I always fucking forget it's there. And then anytime I've been to Cedar Point since it's there, cause it wasn't there when I worked there. So like most hours of my life that I've logged in at Cedar Point, that was the good time theater. And so like, I'm like, Oh right. Val Ravens here. And I always forget about it. Yeah. i've Yeah. Same. Like I've, I've definitely don't even put it on my list of things to ride. ah And then as far as like dive coasters, like,
01:31:09
Speaker
I think it's one of my least favorites. Cause I rode, I rode Chicra this past ah summer and like I was actually kind of surprised by how good it was. And I don't know if I just like had in my mind, I like just push it down. So I had no expert expectation, but um Yeah. I like She-Gren. I'm like, man, I don't know. It could just be the restraints too. I hate the vest restraints. I hate the vest restraints, which is why like Banshee gets negative remarks for me too. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Sorry.
01:31:53
Speaker
sorry Iron Menace. It doesn't have a holding break. That kind of looks sweet.
01:32:01
Speaker
Um, that's kind of sweet. I didn't realize it didn't have that. I realized it didn't do it in the POV that they sent, they, they showed, but I kind of assumed their POV was based on their like first ever dispatch. So they didn't want to like hold it. I didn't realize that the ride total doesn't have one. Let me watch somebody else's POV. Cause that was like the park official loan, but like at least you'll get a really nice pop of air time there.
01:32:31
Speaker
Yeah. Um, the only, die yeah, no holding break. That's so interesting. Oh wait. No, it does.
01:32:44
Speaker
Why did they do that? So might so the the parks POV was filmed on their first ever dispatch. And like, obviously you want to make sure the train comes back so you don't, all your breaks are all wide open.
01:32:58
Speaker
But why they didn't, you know, release a new POV or whatever from that is beyond me. What also looks like it has a continuous chain. So there's, it doesn't go to a second chain. Interesting. It looks like, I'm not sure. I wonder if Baron does that too.
01:33:19
Speaker
I just knocked my microphone off my table and caught it. I don't know if you heard the noise. It's a classic move on the show.
01:33:30
Speaker
I've dropped my mic plenty. Yeah. Um, oddly enough, my favorite dive coaster is, um, oblivion, the black hole, the one that's in garter land in Italy. So fun. Um, it's a terrain coaster. So it's like in and around like mountain. Um, and, uh, it's got like, it's really snap. I can't place it. I gotta find the video.
01:34:01
Speaker
And because they're all like really short and they all are quick, but big fan of oblivion back black hole. It's by far my favorite that I've done. Does that one have like a, uh, like a fan or like a propeller or something on the drill? Um, nothing I'm aware of. But it does have a giant, it has like the hole that you like get sucked down. um And like the theming all also looks like it's getting sucked down that that hole, which I think looks cool. Yeah, I'll have to find a video of it.
Canada's Wonderland and Dive Coasters
01:34:39
Speaker
And then a lot of people say good things about the ah the one at Canada's Wonderland. But I sort of stand by my opinion about Canada's Wonderland. If it didn't have its two B and&M,
01:34:49
Speaker
It didn't have the B and M hyper and B and M giga coaster. Like the park would only be just okay. Yeah. Yeah. I mean that lineup of that pre like behemoth lineup, a fair lineup. Yeah. Oh, that's what I was thinking of. It has a, um, there's like a windmill that's looks like it's getting pulled into the, ah yeah Oh, it's not spinning though. Just a little head shopper. Yeah, it looks cool. And then the the the airtime hill was really fun. Um, there's airtime off of the dropdown. So like, I have big fan of that one. I really liked, so like, then I really thought I was going to really like the Fiesta Texas one. Cause I was like, Oh, I must like these smaller dives better, but the Fiesta Texas one, I did not enjoy.
01:35:40
Speaker
I found it slow. I found it rough. I was also a little hungover when I wrote it. So like that could very easily be my fault. It was first train of the day in a February cold day and I, it bounced around and I was hungover. So like, I don't know how much I enjoyed it. Is the, uh, is it, is a drop different? Does, does it feel steeper than the vertical ones? No, not at all. ah Yeah.
01:36:10
Speaker
like There's not like a tiny little bit more air time. No, I feel like apart from Maverick, I don't really feel like the beyond verticals really make a difference. And I think the only reason Maverick feels that way is because you hit it at speed. Yeah. I would say that the cannibal at lagoon is probably one that you feel it, but it's also like insanely steep. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, Like Iron Gwazi is beyond vertical, but you do not notice it's beyond vertical. Yeah. that But that one's only like what, 91 degrees? i I would have guessed 95, but I also don't know the answer to that.
01:36:55
Speaker
and Which is, it's kind of fun because like back in like the nineties, we couldn't even figure out how to go vertical. So like Oblivion and Alton Towers is 89 degrees.
01:37:07
Speaker
Yeah, I wonder I wonder what that why that was. Unless it was just. um Yeah, I'm curious, because like, yeah, you're right, like the. Unless it was just like a lack of, I don't know, the computer software that had couldn't do it or. It's hard to say.
01:37:32
Speaker
It's like, can you make it go 90 degrees and they're like, no. Eighty nine point nine is the best we can do. Well, like I bet if I bet Arrow is asked about or Arrow would have tried it at some point, but. What angle is X's drop? Eighty nine X two, I think. Yeah, the same.
01:38:00
Speaker
Yeah, that's it. Well, then, yeah, they were probably just like, OK, well, we wanted to go straight down and they're like, OK, well, look. We can get it close. We all want something, but. ah
01:38:24
Speaker
Yeah, I wonder why that was there had to have been a reason, like because it was a literal limitation.
01:38:34
Speaker
Yeah, no, because it was, it was like for a while. I mean, I, what, this is a serious trivia question. What was the first ever vertical roller coaster? Superman, the escape. Hmm. That seems like actually that's 89.9. Well, cause that would predate oblivion, right? Yeah, yeah, by like a year or two. So then there'd be no reason why B and&M couldn't do it. They're like, we're not putting a fucking trust structure.
01:39:15
Speaker
ah Other than that, I mean, past the like past the Intamin, you know, L-shaped coasters. um I'm trying to think, would it have been like deja vu, the deja vu clones? 2021 or 20, 2001. Right. So maybe tied with, well, actually no Superman or the V2, uh, the first one, Superman escape at Geauga lake. Yeah. Um, so yeah, something like that. So we weren't far off. We were 2000, 2001 probably was when we finally figured it out. Mm-hmm.
01:40:01
Speaker
And now we're at the point of where like, it's like every park has a beyond vertical drop and it means 122.5 degrees. Yeah. At what point is it just no longer like, and and I guess we're at the point now where like nobody claims the world's steepest drop, right? I'm going to bring it full circle here, right? Wouldn't the screaming squirrel be the steepest drop, right? It would have to be. But could you argue that it's not a drop because the turn into the inversion is like a continuous, you know what I mean? It's like a continuous radius from horizontal to horizontal. So it's not technically a drop.
01:40:49
Speaker
If it's not a drop, then it's an inversion. Yeah.
01:40:54
Speaker
Well, that's what it's classified on, at least on our CDB is classified as a saxophone and an inversion. Okay. But I take problem with that because that then implies that there's not a drop on the ride. Yeah. And so then it couldn't be a coaster because it needs some sort of drop that in part runs by gravity. Right. So then if we would say that that's not a drop, then we would say that's not a coaster, which then we would go back to the free spins, which is the new generation of it aren't coasters. They're flat rides.
Cedar Point Marketing and Guest Policies
01:41:30
Speaker
Oh, shit. Yeah. Brought it back. You fucking got us there, man. Free spins don't count. They're flat rides. Pretty sure that's the title of this episode.
01:41:47
Speaker
I also want to see a, I think what would be cool is a beyond vertical back spike. And I think, uh, that icebreaker icebreaker, that's right. It's really cool. It's actually, it's, I don't particularly care for swing launches, but icebreaker is probably my favorite of the swing launch coasters.
01:42:08
Speaker
Well, you know what? I lied. Pantheon is now my favorite cause I just wrote Pantheon a couple of weeks ago. That was a lot of fucking fun. Is that good? I, I, I've only looked at the POV and everyone complains that it like runs slow, but I had an absolute blast. Um, but man that it's so unthemed compared to the rest of the park. It like sticks out. yeah So like me, like the Bush Gardens fan, I really like PGW. It's one of my favorite parks. It's has like a six flags themed ride in a park that is well done.
01:42:46
Speaker
Are all the elements like fulfilling? Like, cause it look, I don't know. Everyone always complains about the outer bank running slow, but no, it was, it was fine. I was out of my seat.
01:43:03
Speaker
I have to look at a POV of it. Yeah, I mean, it looks pretty cool. I wish, nowadays Cedar Point could pull off some good rides with Intamin, but they decided to go with, like if Top Thrill 2 was just redone by Intamin, they could have done something a little more flavorful, but. Well, you got to think the whole package, right? Look how many Zamperla rides Cedar fair got the year before yeah in order to get that Zamperla contract for top thrill to like. They got the punch cards filled out. Yeah. Yeah. No, they, they like gave away the farm, right? Like it was this big, big multi-park multi-ride deal in order to get Cedar fair to sign up for this.
01:43:53
Speaker
And like at the end of the day, like it's going to work out eventually and it, it's reviews are really great. So like, I know it really sucks for Cedar Point this year and it really sucks for the like Cedar Point fan boys, um, that didn't get to do their ride this year or whatever. And it is wild that it's still closed in my opinion, but like it it will work out and it'll be great. Yeah I mean plus two, I mean the bar is pretty low for reli reliability compared to the last one. Yeah, like it yeah and it's it's funny to me because I had gotten used to calling it Top Thrill 2 and then it went down and then suddenly I'm like nope, I immediately reverted back to calling it Dragster again.
01:44:51
Speaker
I mean, I was kind of thinking today about it. And it was like, remember 2003 and you go to Cedar Point and dragsters closed. And like. Cedar Point just really knows nostalgia marketing, I think. Yeah.
01:45:15
Speaker
They've they've really honed in on nostalgia marketing.
01:45:23
Speaker
Yeah, Hyde and I were talking about this today in the In The Loop chat, about how I argue that Cedar Point isn't a worse place now than they were before. um Like, it it's based on Matt Wiemet made some comments about the the merger and how he wanted to step away because he feels like mergers are never good for the consumer and he was always guest focused. And so that's why he wanted to step away. And so he left his seat on the board prior to the merger. And I was like, I don't know, man, I think the park was definitely less guest focused when he took over than it was beforehand.
01:46:06
Speaker
Like. I feel like it was, the the parks were way more guest focused. Now everything is, there's up charges and stuff like that. Like when Dick Kinzel left as CEO, the only rides at Cedar Point that had lockers were Millennium Force and Dragster and they were quarter lockers that only cost a dollar. Now it's like $3 for two hours and Magnum has lockers and Rugeroo has lockers and Val Raven has lockers and Gatekeeper has lockers and If you want to put your bag in a locker, it's steel vengeance that costs money. But if you just to bring in your cell phone in line, then you can do that for free. And so there's just this locker like mess now of all of these things. And so like, that's a problem.
01:46:51
Speaker
and they got rid of their rides closing at 10 oh eight. Like that's not a thing anymore. They don't close eight minutes after park close. They have like dark days during the beginning of the season. Like there's just so many more unfriendly guest policies now that there just weren't before. Oh, so do they wait. So they closed ride lines at 10 o'clock now at ah park close now. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I always liked that eight eight after rule. Yeah, as it was just a fun thing that only Cedar Point did. yeah And so it like felt distinctly Cedar Point. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. And like apart from, I don't know, adding Steel Vengeance instead of Mean Streak, like are their additions actually any better? like I kind of wish kind of preferred disaster transport over Gatekeeper in the grand scheme of things. like Your fun indoor bobsled ride that steaming made no sense was like distinctively, charmingly Cedar Point.
01:47:48
Speaker
versus Gatekeeper, yeah, they redid the front gate, but like it's also like a stale concrete jungle queue along the water. Yeah, I mean, it's very, um like although, yeah, I mean, Cedar Point has always felt like very, They try to have that like uniform corporate image, but yeah, it, I mean, it now feels best of Cedar fair yeah versus before it used to have it. I feel like it used to, at least under Dick Kinzel, it was the best of the Cedar fair. Now it's just a Cedar fair. Yeah, right.
01:48:28
Speaker
I know that the situation for employees got better after Dickens left.
01:48:38
Speaker
Yeah. But, and then, but I mean, let's talk about what they're doing now, right? Like 2020 pandemic, they were paying people $20 an hour. That's now they're now dropped down to 15. Like imagine telling people you're coming back now, you're getting paid $5 less than you were getting paid the year before. Yeah. I thought
Working at Cedar Point: Then and Now
01:49:01
Speaker
about that too. I was like, God, if I was like, There's only, there's a very brief age where it would have been worth it. But like that age when I was still living with my parents, when I was like 19, 20 for like 20 an hour to work at Cedar Point, that'd have been sick. Oh yeah. Like when we worked there, if we made 20 an hour, that would have been amazing. Yeah.
01:49:25
Speaker
Especially when you hit like 60 hours a week. Hmm.
01:49:30
Speaker
Yeah. it's It's funny thing about that. Cause like, like inflation is different. Like it's way, way harder for cost of living nowadays than it was back in 2010 or 2009. But it also wasn't great though then either, you know, like we were joking, like it's like, yeah, you're working at like, well you work one hour and then you go to like seven 11, you buy a bag of chips and like a soda and that was your hour of labor just gone. Yeah. Like,
01:50:03
Speaker
Yeah. You go to Taco Bell and get a combo. You're like, that's two and a half hours of work. Yeah. I mean, shit, even in like 2010 at the cafeteria, um, I was probably spending like 12, $13 on lunch. Cause no, it wasn't that expensive, was it? I think so. Yeah. it would I think it was like six bucks for like a burger fries and a drink. I see. I always thought it was more than that. So I would, I always would got, I always got the sub, like the prepackaged sub, which was like six bucks. And then I think the drink was $2. I don't think it was a dollar. No, that's fair. I thought it was like, just the best thing and then I'd get like a bag of chips, a bag of chips was like a dollar. Or if you got the fries, the fries were like one 79. I think are like two 50, um,
01:51:01
Speaker
And then the like the breakfast special was like five bucks. And then if you get, if you get like a juice, it was like seven, eight bucks. So like, I just remember like thinking like, basically it was, I would have to work for two hours just to pay for my lunch. Yeah. You also ate in the calf. I always ate at stockade. Um,
01:51:24
Speaker
I mean, was it that much cheaper back there? I know the portions were bigger. Like you got well so like more chicken tenders, and more fries for your... Well, so at Stockade, you kept your cup in your backpack, right? So like you didn't buy a new cup every single day for your drink. You just kept the same one until it got funky and then you bought a new one. So yeah you probably went like a week. So you only bought a drink a week. Yeah, that's fair. But yeah, no, that is true. ah Well, there's also that um when we met came to town, the employee cafeteria sodas became 25 cents. yeah
01:52:03
Speaker
Well, everything was like a dollar. So when I went back to work in 2012, just for hollow weekends, um, yeah which ah yeah, that would have been the first year under his management. Like I remember buying like everything was so cheap. I was like, so like, I was so excited. I'm like, Oh my God, like the chicken tenders are like a dollar 50 and the fries are a dollar. And the drink is, you know, 25 cents. Like I bought all this food and it was like seven bucks. And then I was just thinking like, man, like we're getting ripped off for like. Yes. Um, the one thing though, that I don't know if you noticed, um, is he then made people clock out for their thirties. You used to not have to, you only clocked out for your 45 and it was just automatically taken out of your time sheets. Yeah. But then when he came in, they got new time clocks and you had to clock out for your 45 and for your 30. So when you worked all day, you had two different breaks taken out of your,
01:52:59
Speaker
shift, which to me sucked. I'm trying to remember. See, we didn't get 45. We only got one hour ah a single hour, whether we opened, whether we OC'd or whether we did a half shift. We only ever got one hour breaks. But you guys were also in the middle of nowhere. So like your, your trek back that kind of makes it, that kind of checks out, I guess. Yeah.
01:53:27
Speaker
But we definitely, we always have to clock out for that though. And then on Sundays we wouldn't clock out and then they would just round up to like balance out the budget, whatever. So occasionally we'd get like an extra hour or two. Yeah. Well that was cause time edits were on Sundays. Yeah. i me That's right.
01:53:48
Speaker
God, the good old days where it was F2 to clock out. Yeah. i It sucked our, our, so what we clocked out, are we clocked in and out behind, I think it was behind subway, the challenge park subway. So it was like a, I think it was like a three or four minute walk to our ride. So he always had to factor that in. It just sucked. Like I always remember like hitting, hitting the,
01:54:23
Speaker
Well yeah, um my favorite part is, you guys know that that photo of the guy peeing during Top Thrill 1's construction? Yeah. That's now where the Top Thrill Dragster time clock is. Or at least when they put one in in 2012, that's where the time clock went, is right on that thing where he peed. Nice. That's awesome. Yeah, it makes me happy when I see that image. I'm like, that was my time clock in 2013. Did he try to have one? Each ride got its own time clock okay back in the, uh, when under the new era, but that's because you had to clock out for all your breaks versus before you didn't clock out for your breaks, at least in rides. And it was just factored in. Yeah.
01:55:12
Speaker
You were in challenge park, so I can't comment on how challenge park did things. Yeah, it was, ah it was a little, little different. I think we could clock in seven minutes before the shift. And then like no more than seven minutes after our shift. Yeah. So I would clock in at the time clock right by the front of the security, right behind like games every morning, as soon as I got into the park. But I didn't actually get paid until I was signed in at the blue sheet at my ride. Okay.
01:55:44
Speaker
But you still had to clock in and out because it was easier to edit punches to the correct time than it was to add a punch because you forgot to clock in. So if you didn't clock in, they yelled at you, but they didn't care what time you clocked in as long as you clocked in early. Yeah. Yeah. I got, um, I got in trouble for clocking in at the wrong time clock once.
01:56:09
Speaker
I didn't realize it was a thing. I mean, they told us, but I was like, it can't matter. There's no way they know. And then like, I didn't immediately got in trouble. Yeah. So then myself, I took a year off. I took off 2012. I was there nine, 10, 11, and 13. Um, and the worst part about working at Cedar Point, I think more than anything else was the fact that you had to pick up your uniform before opening day. And. Where you get wardrobe now is at like the housing. It's like off property or whatever. It's a much more.
01:56:41
Speaker
fluid thing, but before you just have to stand in a long ass line to get your uniform or you like got up early and waited for wardrobe to open and then you stood in line. And this, and once you had it, like it was easy, but like everyone had to try on their uniforms to like make sure they fit. And then the wardrobe people were like, I don't know. It doesn't seem like it fits you. You might need to go up a size so or things like this. So, um, I always would make sure I was getting paid to do it. Um, so I would always wait till the last minute because it was always annoying and I wanted to be paid to do it. Well, I guess 2013, I didn't think about it and I just clocked in before getting in line. And so they had to pay me for it because they were no longer doing these punch edits. Um, and they just paid me to stand in this like two hour line to pick up my uniform, which now knowing Cedar Point really, they probably didn't want to pay me for it. Yeah. Right.
01:57:38
Speaker
So it's by, is it like by commons housing or yeah. Yeah. The swap, the swapping thing for us sucked. Like, cause if like I didn't have a clean uniform, like I'd have to walk all the way basically to like the cafeteria and then walk all the way back to the ride. Yeah. Um, versus my 20, 2012 season or 2011 season, I almost always didn't come into the park in a uniform and just picked up a shirt from wardrobe and put that on. And then I i got it from wardrobe on my way into my ride at dragster.
01:58:23
Speaker
Was it, um, did they change it? Do you still get two for free? From what I understand. Yeah. Also with wardrobe being not on point anymore, it's now by housing, you, um, can sort of wear whatever sweatshirt you want. You, there isn't, um, like the rule of like, you must wear the Cedar Point issued sweatshirt kind of thing. So like people were wearing like other Cedar Point sweatshirts that they just bought in gift shops because they
01:58:57
Speaker
don't go to wardrobe because wardrobes not on property. Yeah. So they can't just be like, Oh, I'm cold. Let me go run and get a sweatshirt. Yeah. I remember that. I thought it was, see, I thought I remember you could basically buy as long as it was Cedar Point branded or you bought it from the gift shop. It was okay. It is. yeah Um, but like, wardrobe had their own Cedar Point branded sweatshirt. So that's what like most people had, right? But now because wardrobe is all the way down in commons, that's not what most people have. Most people just wear Cedar Point hoodies. Gotcha. Okay. Yeah. My little, war my little wardrobe hack that I didn't do until my second season was I just bought plain black Dickies shorts since ours were the, the, the highlighter yellow shirts with the black shorts.
01:59:52
Speaker
Um, and I got away with it for probably like a good two months. But then some people on a ride were caught with phones in their pockets. And then like, it was one of those like, and your pockets. And I just like, I like pulled out like all my pockets. Cause we just had the ones that had like the one back pocket, you know? Yeah. I just like, wasn't thinking. and I just like pulled out my front pockets is like, are those wardrobe shirts shorts? I'm like, uh, that's what they gave me.
02:00:25
Speaker
the solid hack though. Um, 2013 when they switched the shorts and they switched to a darker blue, um, they cut the pockets out of it. So there were no pockets in the shorts. Yeah, that makes sense. I mean the phone issue. Yeah, that makes a bet. Everyone, but I mean, when I worked, everyone broke it, like everyone had their phone on them. Oh yeah. And so then we ended up having, them taken away and they got your pockets taken away. No pockets for you.
02:01:08
Speaker
No, no pockets for you. It was weird though, getting, um, working in rides. It was a good time. I thoroughly enjoyed my Cedar Point era, but I'm glad I worked there in the Kinzel era. I think I enjoyed the place versus now. I feel like if I were to go during like the Iraq era, I wouldn't have as much fun. Oh, for sure. Yeah.
02:01:33
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, some of the, Zach, do you ever wish you worked at Cedar Point? Yeah, kind of.
02:01:41
Speaker
I mean, it's like that ship is sailed, right? Yeah. No, you can't do it now. I mean, you could, but like it would be weird. I mean, like there could be a new, see, I always, I had this idea like couple of years ago, like if I was ever in between jobs, like I, you know, like resigned from a job and then, um, took a new job and I had a few weeks off. I always thought it'd be fun to like apply for Cedar Point. you know, go through the training, live in housing, work for like a week and then just like process out just as like a vacation. But, um, yeah, it's definitely probably a lot different when you're older. Although I don't know, maybe like that one week you get, you get your fill and you know, it's fun for that first week and then you move on. It's like, you don't have that feeling like you're stuck there or anything. I couldn't imagine working in open to close now though. Like, Oh yeah.
02:02:45
Speaker
be awful. Yeah. Even like, I mean, even when I was young, like, um, just like that, I always remember those feelings of like, especially during hollow weekends, like working all day and then coming back, being totally wiped. And then be like, uh, guess I'll go to Louise and just like getting drunk. And then just like that cycle of like waking up feeling awful.
02:03:13
Speaker
Yeah. Cause like,
02:03:16
Speaker
Cause like Saturday you would work like, Saturday was nice though because the park was 12 to 12. So like you were in, you had to sleep in a little bit. It wasn't like the 10 o'clock openings where you'd be in the park at like seven 30 in the morning. Well granted you were challenged park. So you always opened an hour later, right? Uh, first year it was 11. Yeah. And then my second year we didn't open until one. Oh, so that was actually pretty nice. Although it kind of sucked because that meant that we were driving into the park like after the parking lot is already mostly filled up. um So that always sucked. But um yeah, it was kind of nice. You guys have to park in the front or did you get to park it? So excited we were told we couldn't. It depended. It really would depend on the day. Like sometimes they would turn us around.
02:04:10
Speaker
Like they wouldn't cause you know, you had the employee sticker on your car. So like, yeah, they wouldn't even like let us get back there. Some days we could it really dependent on how busy it was. We weren't supposed to though. Like we always were told not to, but, um, you know, we would try and just kind of risk it. Or there's that Gemini lot that sometimes we wouldn't even, no one would really catch us going there. Yeah. Although sometimes like what, if we were the key though, you couldn't wear your your uniform because the, the, um, that breakers entrance area, like they would see us in our uniforms, like leaving our car and then like walking over to the ride. And so we got a truck. Excuse me. What? They'd be like, excuse me, you can't park here.
02:04:58
Speaker
Well, no, they wouldn't even like tell us. They would just call, uh, John Warshock and they'd just be like, they report us. And then he would like come over and be like, so, uh, where have you guys been parking lately? this
02:05:18
Speaker
Yeah.
02:05:22
Speaker
Well now in play parking lots on the other side of like blue streak across the Cedar Point thing right along the water. Like that's not, it's so far away now. Oh shit. Yeah.
02:05:36
Speaker
Good, good shoes. Yeah. ah Zach, you put a link in here probably like 20 minutes ago. What are we looking at? ah Well, we were talking about Intamin water rides at Cedar Point, and I happened to stumble across Intamin apparently testing ah the limits of a raft ride flipping. Oh, man, I think this thing is going to kill someone. this the ah The like Amazonia or whatever it is in at Bell Warday. Yeah, that thing is definitely going to kill someone.
02:06:09
Speaker
ah Well, raft rides in general, I mean, I was ranting about this on our last in the loop episodes. There's too much unknown and we keep making raft rides more crazy. And it's like, it's a boat that floats, but you are relying on water. It just. things can go wrong and when things go wrong, they go wrong very quickly out of nowhere. And I just, and they're all like, as far as rides that could kill people, raft rides have to be like the highest percent chance. Granted, the industry is very safe. It is way more likely you're dying in your car crash, going to the park. It's way more likely you're getting struck by lightning. It's way more likely that vending machine is falling on you and killing you.
02:06:55
Speaker
But when it comes to in the park, I feel like raft rides have to be the highest chance of death of that small percentage chance of death. Oh, for sure. Right. And even in like this absolutely in italy and this model, like the lack of the, you know, there's those like ah beams when it jumps off of the slide, there's like a lack of them. Like it seems like there's not that many beams for the raft to ride along. That's the, I don't know.
02:07:31
Speaker
You know, like when, um, back in like the forum days, whenever, they would, there would be like a new video, like a video of something. And then people in the comments would be like, that doesn't look safe. if That's going to kill somebody. And then there it is always the defenders of like, like they know what they're doing. You're not an engineer. Like I'm sure it's fine, but then like an accident ends up actually happening exactly the way that people were predicting. Yeah, yeah this looks like one of those situations.
02:08:01
Speaker
Yeah, no, I, uh, I don't particularly like raft rides anyway. I think I don't want to be soaked at a theme park. Um, I did when I was a child, but like now as an adult, there is never a time where I want to be absolutely saturated at a park. Oh, for sure. Uh, so I'm already like out for raft rides, like not interested in riding, but then now you get the like more advanced and more craziness. I'm like, uh, not great, not great, not great.
02:08:37
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's only a matter of time before that fucking thing kills somebody. Yes. Log flumes, big fan of log flumes, as long as it's like the acceptable amount of wetness. Right. Like once you get too tidal wavy splash, I'm not interested, but as long as it's like a spritz and you might get like a little splash on your leg. So like you have like, I don't know, like maybe like a soccer ball sized. size of wetness on like your knee or something. Like that's fine. Um, but not full saturation. I don't want to feel like I showered.
Splash Mountain Soggy Adventures
02:09:19
Speaker
Yeah. Uh, it can get the, that's the thing is like for me, water rides are a very delicate situation. Cause like, Hey, I'm just not a big fan of wet clothes.
02:09:35
Speaker
And that feeling of like walking around like an already super humid, sticky park and your clothes are just like. Stopping and sticking to you. Yeah. Pass hard pass. A log flume. I'll agree. They tend to not be quite that intense, although, um,
02:10:01
Speaker
Fuck back in 2022 at Disneyland, I got more wet on Splash Mountain than I think I've ever gotten on any water ride. Ruined my fucking day. I had to go back to the hotel and change. I did not realize I got fucking soaked. I was in the front of Splash. It was the the Laughing Place one. You come in from the dark and I just got absolutely annihilated. Same. That spot's wicked. You come around that corner and like there's like a ripple from the fucking water. Yeah. And it just splashes up and in. And like I realized like, oh my God, like my shorts are soaked through to my underwear, soaked all the way through that. I'm like, oh my fucking God. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I have now sworn off.
02:10:57
Speaker
ah Disney's Splash Mountain at Disneyland. I have will not ride Tiana's Bayou Adventure at Disneyland. It has nothing to do with my... And I am not a crazy save Splash Mountain human. i am a I got way too wet on this once and I do never want to ride this again. Yeah, I'm a save my pants person. Yes. I had to leave, go to my hotel, change, lost about an hour's worth of time at Disneyland because of it. um Never again will I be writing that log a log flume, whatever the theme is at Disneyland. Yeah, that was that was the most ridiculously wet I've ever gotten on any water ride period. Hey, you guys hear me now? Yeah. um My laptop crashed and now it my timer reset.
02:11:55
Speaker
You said offline for a minute, um but now it says you're back. Hopefully it's all good.
02:12:04
Speaker
um All right. We'll restart. It's only been two hours and 11 minutes. We can redo it. Or at least do a new, should we do a new recording and see if you can at least capture the old audio?
02:12:19
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, uh, motivationally, I would say we probably don't want to go too much further in case this is a lost episode. Um, cause it's been two hours of really. The only thing we solved is the fact that free spins aren't credits. They're flat rides. They're flat rides. Yeah. Which was, is a wild take, but I think, uh, I think I'm going to stick with that.
02:12:51
Speaker
I'm willing to start the trend. They don't have drops. It's just like, I don't know, man. Well, without the spinning, it's a screaming squirrel. Yeah. Or conversely, they have the steepest drop because unlike the screaming squirrel, it actually loops back up around. Yeah. So that would be in theory, right? Like that would have to be,
02:13:18
Speaker
Yeah, that's like a 270 degree drop. Yeah.
02:13:25
Speaker
There it is. There's these, it's either that's the steepest drop in all of existence or it's a flat ride. It's one of the other. Yeah. Well, I think your enthusiasts want to plus one because they want to count everything at credit. So I guess we're going to, they must have the steepest drop in existence. That's fine. I just really want to hear parks make that marketing argument.
02:13:53
Speaker
That would be pretty funny. No, I think we sort of gave up on that, right? Like Takapisha and.
02:14:05
Speaker
It's the steep drops that have the trims beforehand and like the holding breaks, they become less fun. Like Mavericks drop is a whole lot of fun because you hit it at speed. Um, I don't necessarily mind if like the drop has trims on it, but like, I really hate that you don't hit these drops with speed. And so you don't really get the benefit of the airtime. Yeah, exactly. But like, that's why Mavericks is so good is because you hit it at speed.
02:14:33
Speaker
Yeah. I mean the whole, uh, shell razor, Takabisha clone thing. Yeah. I mean the trims continue until almost past vertical. So at that point it's basically like the screaming swirl. And then with like a steep drop and you're holding, it's like held, held, held. And then slow drop. Yeah. It doesn't really do much. Mm-hmm.
02:15:05
Speaker
Except for spinal injuries. Yeah. Oh my God. I hate that ride so much. I was told to sit in the back row and it was not my least favorite ride that I rode that day. I much, I much preferred that over the spinning coaster or Sandy's bucking Bronco.
02:15:29
Speaker
Yeah. Well I heard, yeah, I didn't write it in the back row and I heard ah everyone tell me that, but every time I went up, they were like, Oh man, you want to sit in the front? I'm like, well, sure. I sat in the back row of Sandy's and oh my, it vibrated so much. I lost vision. My like vision went blurry.
02:15:52
Speaker
That's just from shit. Yeah. Something is wrong with those rides. Yeah. No, every, that's another park where like, you're like, I really don't think it's going to kill someone. But like, if it does, it wouldn't shock me. Yeah. Well, like I was, so when I was writing shell razor, I kind of got an, I never get anxious on rides, but I had a pretty, I wouldn't say anxiety attack, but I definitely had elevated anxiety just thinking about. um Cause you go through the first half and then you go up the slow lift Hill. And as I'm going up the lift Hill, I was like, just thinking, I was like, so I know that the rides are designed for the forces of the elements, but do they factor in extreme roughness like the Jack hammering? Cause that's excessive force. I know I'm just thinking like, man, is this going to like, like, is the chassis going to break and like,
02:16:48
Speaker
Are we going to like crash? Like that's literally what was going through my mind. And like, it just felt weird. Cause like the park is creepy and you know, the history around it and like, yeah, it feels a little evil. Never really thought about this until now. Right. But like they factor in the forces and all of that kind of stuff, but the roughness adding extra force. Like to the building structure, right? Like watch how's this work for the building? The fact that the whole thing is shaking around with roughness. Yeah, true. Well, someone told me destination four. Well, someone told me to that, um,
02:17:30
Speaker
normally when they build these rides outside, the support columns go like, you know, 50, 60 plus feet into the ground. And because it's in that mall, I don't think it's like, it's like built on the, like a scaffolding. It's not into the ground yeah or something like that. So I'm sure that adds to it. Well, yeah. Like these footers go into the ground, but instead these footers are just,
02:17:57
Speaker
the the tracks just bolted to the foundation of the mall. Yeah.
02:18:07
Speaker
I can see that as to part of why it's rough to plausible. Yeah. Yeah. They're like, it'll be fine. They're like in 20 years, they're like, um, it'll be fine. Yeah. It'll be fine.
02:18:23
Speaker
But man, Sandy's rough as shit. That spinning coaster way too long of a spinning coaster. Like I was just like, uh, do not need to be long. Like they do not need to be. Well, also just to the motions the of the track layout is a little weird. It's like not, it's not like your traditional like wild mouse kind of style coaster. It's like, it does these like big swooping turns and yeah, it's got like bunny Hills and stuff. It's yeah, I agree. It's definitely weird. It made me sick. And like they have the giant yellow trash cans off the exit. So like clearly people, too many people have thrown up that they've like created places for you to grow up now.
02:19:09
Speaker
Nice. And like Nick streak, right? The Nickelodeon coaster had like half of the train had broken lap bars. And so like there was just random seats closed off in each car. Quality.
02:19:30
Speaker
Yeah. And the legends of the hidden temple rope ropes course was closed when we were there. And at least all the roller coasters were operating. Cause I know a lot of people who went that don't get that experience. Yeah. I mean, Sandy's was down for a while. Um, yeah, when I was there, the like Sandy's was down and the drop tower was down.
02:19:56
Speaker
Oh shit.
02:20:01
Speaker
You're right. Yeah. Oh yeah. That's fair. Well friends, I appreciate you having me on your show tonight.
Episode Wrap-up and Future Content
02:20:14
Speaker
Um, yes, thank you for coming on. It's been too long, my friend. Yeah. Thought it was funny. Zach, you messaged me on Twitter and I was a little drunk. I think it was 4th of July. I was like, you have my phone number. Just text me.
02:20:30
Speaker
I think was yeah that's right to you. Yep. Yeah. Uh, typically I respond faster on via text than via my Twitter DMS.
02:20:45
Speaker
I think I had just tweeted you and I'm like, Oh, I'm already on Twitter. So let me just send them a message. That's fair. I mean, if you like look at our history of conversations, they always start on one platform and end on another. Yeah.
02:21:01
Speaker
I tend to go with with with whatever is most convenient in the moment. Yeah. Um, this is a random pet peeve of mine. This isn't something you do, but this is like, some people do this and it like drives me crazy where like they'll message me something that they saw on social media, but they'll message me it on a different social media platform. And I'm like, no, man. Like if you want to send me something on Twitter, send it, message me on Twitter. Like if you're showing me an Instagram, Rio, like don't put that in my Twitter DMS, like send it to me on Instagram so like I can see it that way. Cause it's really in like none of the platforms like cross do well with each other's DMS. I don't know if you guys have noticed that. Yeah.
02:21:43
Speaker
And then I don't have a TikTok. So when someone sends me a TikTok, I just completely ignore it. I don't even bother looking at it. Same. I'm like, oh, a TikTok. I don't know how to watch this.
02:22:01
Speaker
I made one TikTok ever about where you could find all the bathrooms at Great America. Do you have a favorite bathroom at Great America? Yeah, the one outside of the front gate. Yeah. Okay. Why is that? Cause it's a dead zone over there. So nobody's ever over there. Nice. Like I don't even, I'm not sure most guests know that that bathroom exists. Cause like it's behind the kennel and the ticket boosts that they know are the ticket building they don't use anymore.
02:22:39
Speaker
The kennel is also closed. So it's just two closed buildings and then like 150 feet back is these restrooms. And this is all like well to the left of the front gate. Oh, nice. Epcot's got bathrooms outside of the security checkpoint. um Like if you're facing the monorail station and the front gate, like far left. They've got bathrooms over there, like sort of by guardians of the galaxy, but like outside of the park, obviously. And like, those are great bathrooms that nobody's ever at either. Same idea. I'm sure that's the, uh, do your drugs bathroom. Yeah. Well, I, I mean, I was going to say we don't have that problem at Disney world, but like, I actually kind of feel like the more expensive a place is, the more likely there's drugs because drugs are so expensive in this economy now.
02:23:34
Speaker
in this economy? Are they not?
02:23:42
Speaker
No, I mean, you're right. I sell weed and ain't cheap. Yeah. Um, well, like, so I guess, uh, my experience on this is like private school kids, right? Or like way into like cocaine and stuff versus like your public school kids smoke weed. So like the more money you have, the like, just the more expensive drug you have. Yeah. I mean, I grew up in a really small town and you know, we had like cans of Pam and a towel. That was like our drugs cans of Pam and a towel.
02:24:26
Speaker
That's something like next level huffing. That it is. That is why this show is tagged as 18 over. Uh, it makes sense. cans of Pam and towels. Well friends, it was an absolute pleasure. Likewise, thank you so much for being here and joining us. Hopefully this episode recorded. Uh, if you guys got to listen to this, uh, you know, it worked. Um, that's the beauty of it, right? Like we were sitting there stressing out over it about like 80% through. And some people might never know because they never got to hear this episode because it didn't work. Or they were like, Oh no, it did work because we got that far. And they all get to be in on the whole ride. Yeah.
02:25:13
Speaker
or they don't. Well, they'll find out or they won't. i they won It either worked or didn't. Awesome. Yes. Killer. Uh, go check out in the loop on YouTube and podcasts and social media. Yeah. My co-host legend, he's going on a a big 18 day road trip. So there should be a lot of really cool content coming from that coming up here soon. You guys doing free RT this year? No, we, it, it, you kind of need to like special thing to be happening for free RT. If that makes sense. Like it's, it's gotta be like the right circumstances. Like lost Island opening was really why free RT existed that year. Granted it took place at adventure land, but now like lost Island is like well known and adventure lands kind of more mainstream, like.
02:26:08
Speaker
I feel like prior to in the loop and free RT, like most people hadn't been there, but now it's like a regular stop on like the coaster enthusiasts, like drive now. Um, oh, you guys are taking credit for that. I'm not taking credit for it. It's just, it is now more mainstream and modern. The only thing I will take credit for is the fact that lost Island's first operating year. They had one day of profitability and I will say it was the day that in the loop showed up and we killed every single one of their kegs and they had to redo their kegs a couple of times. Cause we kept tapping kegs.
02:26:46
Speaker
So you guys propped them up. So that's good. Yeah. But no, no free RT this year. It'll be back at some point.
02:26:56
Speaker
For sure. Well, um you know, go check out In The Loop, go support them. Well, we'll be on Twitter at Drew the Intern. That's where I am most of the time. Yes. Yes. And you're a good follow. So go fuck with him and tell him why 40 free spins are in fact a credit. ah you I mean, if you count as a credit, that's fine. now I just, I'm going to not anymore. Not granted. I've been on none of them. So it has not affected my coaster count, but anyone who's been on too many of them, man, that's like a big drop in your credits because they no longer count. Fucking to the to the one guy who's been on all 25 of them or whatever.
02:27:44
Speaker
Yeah, it sucks for that guy. Sorry, dude. All right. This has been fun. ah Thank you so much for being here, Drew. Thank you all so much for listening. And until next time, your favorite co-stars.