New Disney Roller Coaster - Part 2

Tweet

Before I get into the rest of the story, I need to let @DaddyEvil know that I am writing this from the confines of Disney jail. I expect to get released on good behavior sometime tomorrow. And the jail is not in the dungeon of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, it is underneath Cinderella's Castle!!!! Okay, just kidding on that part. Inside joke between DE and I. Back to the story. In part 1, I described how I had preview passes for the new roller coaster for me and my son, but not for my daughter. Disney had been giving me the run-around in my attempts to get my daughter a preview pass so she could ride the roller coaster with me. After visiting Guest Services and Guest Relations, my only remaining hope was standing in the long queue for Guest Experiences and hoping they could assist me. So, after standing in the line for about 30 minutes, I finely was able to explain my situation to the Disney Cast Member. He was very understanding (long story short, due to a glitch in Disney's online system, I couldn't book a ride reservation for my daughter). He said he would like to help, and if he had the power he would definitely accommodate my request, but because the ride was not "officially" open yet, he had no access to the computer system to make the necessary changes to allow my daughter to ride the new roller coaster. Disappointed, I started to turn away, when he called me back. "I just saw Sarah standing over by the entrance to the ride. I don't know for sure, but I think she is a high-level Disney manager, because she isn't in uniform. The ones that don't wear Disney uniforms are usually pretty important. Why don't you go talk to her?" He pointed out who she was, since she was pretty far off and had her back to us. I said thanks and proceeded to talk to Sarah, since she was my last hope. Approaching her from behind, I tapped her on the shoulder, and said, "Excuse me Sarah, can I speak to you about a dilemma I'm having?" Sarah turns around, starts saying something, and then stops mid-sentence. "Jeff....? Is that you?" And then I was like, "Sarah....? Is that you?" OMG!!!!! Sarah was a girl I dated about 10 years ago!!!!!! At first my face lit up in a smile. Then it faded quickly. Sarah and I were on good terms, but I hadn't seen her in like 8 years, and we would only occasionally text each other here and there. But about a week ago, Sarah had texted me and said she was passing through my city and wanted to know if I would come out and have drinks with her. I declined the offer, due to plans I already had, so now I was thinking that maybe she would be mad at me. But it appears she wasn't. She gave me and my daughter a big hug, and just started chatting away with me like we had never missed a day over the past decade. She then asked what we needed help with. I explained the situation, and she told us that was an easy fix. She asked to see our Magic Bands, she scanned them with her tablet, and then told us to go on in to the ride. It was about 2:30pm when this happened, and I told her that our reservations for the ride weren't until 4:00pm. She laughed and said, "Nope, you can go in now, and you can keep riding it as much as you'd like. I gave you unlimited access." What???? Did this really just happen? I couldn't believe me good fortune. Sarah then said "You owe me one for this! In fact, you owe me twice since you stood me up last week." I looked at her and said, "Sarah, I owe you like 10 times now for what you did!" We all laughed and then hugged again. Then my daughter spoke up, "Sarah, we're going to Hollywood Studios after this. All the rides have like 2 hour wait times. Can you help us out with any of that?" Sarah then grabbed our Magic Bands again, scanned them, typed out a few things on her tablet, and then said, "You now have Lightning Lane passes for every ride." I about had a heart attack. Lightning Lane passes are passes that allow you to skip the lines and go straight onto the rides. And they're not free, you have to pay about $8-$10 per ride to get them. But she just gave us unlimited Lightning Lane passes. I could have died and gone to heaven right there! Sarah then wished me a happy early birthday and told us she needed to get back to work. So, needless to say, my Disney nightmare situation turned into a Disney dream come true! My daughter and I got to ride the new Guardians of the Galaxy roller coaster multiple times, and we got to ride all the rides at Hollywood Studios without having to wait in line. What a day we had! And now that I know that Sarah is a high-level manager there, I'm going to keep in touch with her on a more frequent basis! And yes, I owe her big time! lol