Halloweekends 2011

Being in the boathouse at Terror Island was some of the best years I had. A big challenge working the entrance and exit, but a huge thrill to be able to get out early on those busy Saturday's to help entertain the guests waiting. One weekend I did a pirate training class with a bunch of kids I pulled from the line and most of the other time I just heckled guests and kept it entertaining. Best part of this job is being able to interact with everyone that came through. Also being able to scare kids before they made it into the island to see if they were strong enough to handle the zone, so that helped in a way to make sure the zone wasn't faced with kids that were crying and parents yelling to not scare their kids. Always will consider Terror Island as part of my character, but Bayou is what I call home from now on.

what ended up falling off TTD?

I was working the boathouse the first night for a little bit and something flew off and almost hit a few of us that were in that area before opening...

hotboyalex250 said:
what ended up falling off TTD?

Obviously nothing important. The ride reopened. It was probably just a loose article that should have been in a locker.

CedarPtForever said:
I was working the boathouse the first night for a little bit and something flew off and almost hit a few of us that were in that area before opening...

Things fall that way all the time. Lighters, phones, cameras, glasses. It happens.

For sure...we've seen quite a few things so far lol

In the immortal words of John Bender, screws fall out. The world's an imperfect place...

@ zeek,

One of my favorite "new" changes they made was the sending groups of monsters to the front gate at the end of the night. I did that half a dozen times last year and that was a blast. Not scaring and just talking to people and screwing around and making people smile and feel good and still heckling guests. That was a great change. it gives people who are too scared to go in a chance to experience the event a little more, while putting a good face on the company because we were having fun, guests were, great photo ops, that was a great step in the right direction a nice touch on the event as a whole.

Yes I do enjoy that too. It's also a nice way to give those people in the zone a reward for putting in hard work by letting them go up and just have time to spend with guests. I know the times I was up there it was non-stop talking with people coming up to me and taking a lot of pictures. I look forward to that.

CedarPtForever said:
For sure...we've seen quite a few things so far lol

Yah, I forgot to tell you that the area is pretty much Dragster's loose article drop zone. :)

I agree about the photos up front as long as it is voluntary. It isn't for everyone, myself included. I love the idea but I never want to do it so I make sure I take volunteers for it, and have never had problems getting them either.

Ralph Wiggum said:

CedarPtForever said:
For sure...we've seen quite a few things so far lol

Yah, I forgot to tell you that the area is pretty much Dragster's loose article drop zone. :)

lol thanks for the after-warning captain ;)

dammie16 said:
I agree about the photos up front as long as it is voluntary. It isn't for everyone, myself included. I love the idea but I never want to do it so I make sure I take volunteers for it, and have never had problems getting them either.

I got assigned to it the first night they did it, I was sliding around FZ and got told take this person and go up front. I would have rather spent the last half hour scaring. But because we both had that attitude we said well, screw it, let's mess around and have fun and maybe they'll peg us to never go up again. The opposite happened. we had a ton of fun, people really like it the management up front seemed to like it, and that attitude kind of stuck. It's a nice wind down for the people who go 100% all night and don't take breaks, the times I was up there were 30 out of maybe 34 minutes worth of "break" time I take a night. I enjoyed it because I wasn't scary mean, but my heckling really ramped up and you really can just mess with people because you mix it with nice, funny, telling people to be safe driving, good monster.

^I agree, but again it isn't for me. For me it is more that I get bored staying put. I never last more then 10 or so minutes in a specific area of the zone haha.

And I remember that night when I saw you and the other walking to the front as I walked my people out there and thinking, "Oh god 'Name and Name' These two will put an end to this tonight," haha.

I also agree that if I was told to go up I would just not break at all and use that as my break time though. My 1-2 minutes to grab a swig of water here and there probably add up to about 20-30 a night if that.

I think they were understaffed this last weekend the wife and I went.. Are they still hiring? If so I would love to go there on the weekends and work! Also I agree, we enjoyed the group of monsters at the front of the park when we were leaving, we enjoyed taking pictures with them!

^ See my post in the other Halloweekends thread. They are still hiring for Screamster positions, at least as of last weekend.

might be understaffed but still with increasing numbers every year. They just keep raising the cap on the amount of monsters they want. used to be back in the day there were 20, I remember when we ended the season with near to or under a hundred, now we're getting up to 3 and 400. The problem is 150 of those 300 will quit before the end because of how tough it is. they don't stick it out or the job's not for them so they may end up hiring something like 400 so there is a reserve to replace the monsters that don't come back. I be next year they'll shoot for 500. they are really pushing the expansion of staff.

Sweet! I applied last night hopefully get a call this weekend..

Looking at the weather forecast I guess this will be a good night to check out the Halloween Hullabaloo and see the Edge of Madness, again!

Don't forget 'Sideshow' up at the Jack Aldrich Theater and 'Cleaver in the Clink' back at Palace Theater.