I'm Too Old For This Shit

I hold a particular standard when it comes to beaches. To me, a beach is the sandy or rocky or general coastal area next to a large body of water. That body should usually be an ocean.

Now, being a former resident of Fayette Name, we had our own beach in South Connellsville which bordered on the Youghiogheny river. This is the same river that forks at one point and if you go canoeing or tubing down the wrong path, you’ll eventually have to pick up your flotation device and walk a bit. I don’t consider that a real beach. I consider it a lie we tell ourselves in order to feel better about not having a real beach around.

My wife likes to think that Presque Isle, in Erie, is a beach, complete with somewhat dirt based sand and rocks jutting up out of the water of a lake that, at one point in history, caught fire. I wouldn’t be too quick to take a dip in that. OK, actually, it was Lake Cuyahoga that caught fire back in the 60s, but as my one coworker put it, “Have your dog take a dump on your kitchen floor. Then have your mom clean it up, using the best possible cleansers and bleach. Once that floor shines , have her make you a sandwich and then drop it on the floor where that steaming pile was ten minutes ago. Would you still eat it?” Regardless of how much time has passed, that crappy, flammable water still ends up in Lake Erie.

So, going forward, Lake Erie does not have a beach. It has a shore. It has a park. It does not have a beach. END OF LINE.

Since we’ve settled that, I wanted to relate to you my trip to Erie over Labor Day weekend. Because we are perpetually procrastinating everything, my wife and I have been doing some spontaneous summer stuff to kind of break up the long haul towards next summer and the ‘REAL’ beach trip.

My kid’s been wanting to go to a water park and because of the weather, I came up with the glorious idea to go to Splash Lagoon in Erie. It’s an indoor waterpark which is open year round. Doing a quick search on their site, I was able to get a night’s stay at an adjoining hotel and two days worth of park passes for the three of us for $250.

We drove up Friday morning and spent the afternoon drowning at the water park. We broke for dinner and then hit the hotel pool for a bit before going to crash in the room. The next morning we checked out and went back to the waterpark for a few hours, cleaned up and then did Presque Isle and Erie Not-a-Beach.

My take on Splash Lagoon.
If you have kids I would definitely go there at least once while they’re old enough to ride the slides. If you have little ones, like I do and you do not plan on going on any slides, then it’s fine to go with small children. We’re in that period of flux where we are not exactly slide worthy anymore, yet our kid is not quite old enough to really tackle the slides on her own. That being said, I rode every slide to get my money’s worth and paid the price in injuries.

My wife only went on two slides out of embarrassment and risk of injury. My kid rode two slides and spent most of her time in the kiddie area. While my wife watched her, I rode the big kid rides and sustained many an injury.

The Rides
Splash Lagoon has seven water slides, three whirlpools, a lazy river, a pool for basketball and some obstacle stuff and the kiddie area.

Maui Wowie: Basic open body slide with circular pattern. It kind of hurts the back a bit, going over the pipe seams but my kid loved it. She rode it again and again all day long. I could only ride it a few times because it kept slamming my ankle into the turns.

The Black Hole: A similar ride to Maui Wowie, but completely in the dark.

Big Kahuna: This one is a tube ride that goes outside the building and then back in, ending in a splash pool connected to the lazy river. All three of us did this one, once. I could not get either my wife or kid to go on a second time.

Python Plunge: Another tube ride that seems to be a combination of Kahuna and Black Hole.

Shark Attack: Body slide that goes outside the building next to Python Plunge, has a longer ending due to speed.

Cyclone: A tube ride that drops you into swirling bowl that eventually plunges you down a slide into a splash pool that connects to the Lazy River. This one I liked going on a lot but there is a moment when you head towards the exit chute where you end up slamming into the barrier between the chute and the bowl which usually hurts. I usually dumped out of my tube at end, every time.

Hurricane Hole: Body slide, just Cyclone. I dubbed it the Pain Hole. You slide into a swirling vortex which ends in a giant hole that drops you into six and a half feet of water. It took some time to figure out how to not dump into the pool, head first. It’s also a bit jarring when you initially exit the slide into the bowl. I found that if you sat up you had better control and could actually maneuver yourself into going feet first into the pool.

Most of the slides where hard to gauge because there was no way to see anything. You managed to get water in your eyes and nose and mouth no matter how hard you tried. Because most slides insisted you ride with your legs crossed and hand behind your head you couldn’t guard against the splashing. So, telling someone that slide goes outside the building doesn’t do much for me because I can’t see anyway.

Probably the most notable part of the park is the Tiki Tree House which has various water cannons and buckets that you can spill on people as they climb. But at the top there is the huge bucket which spills its contents on everyone below roughly every ten minutes. An air horn sounds and like some Pavlovian response, people come running from every corner to wait for the deluge of water that drenches everyone and everything in its path. At first, my kid tried to get away from it. By the end, she was running towards it.

In all, it was fun. I guess they just opened an indoor wave pool, so we’ll have to try that next time. For me, it's hard to try and be the kid that didn't have these kinds of places around me, growing up.   I want to enjoy the rides and experience them with my kid but man I'm getting too old for this shit.   That's why I made that point about having kids of a certain age.  If you have more than one, close in age and over the minimum height requirement it's easier because they can ride together or at least run off and have fun, leaving you to lament the fact that you didn't lose that extra ten pounds over the summer.   And as a clumsy, 36 year old Mongo, it's hard to be graceful as you are being tossed about by water.  I gave Splash Lagoon the tagline:  "Every ten minutes they dump 1000 gallons of water and every fifteen minutes there's 1000 awkward dismounts." 

I felt the best part was going to a restaurant located in the parking lot, called Boston’s. I’d never heard of it before but it was pretty damn good food. My wife got an Italian sampler which consisted of chicken parmigiana, Fettuccine Alfredo, and a sausage lasagna.  How sad am I?

The only things we didn’t dare try were the family and adult only whirpools or hot tubs. I’d just assume not even go there. I know, consider how many germs were probably in that water, no amount of chlorine would make it safe, but it was probably safer than Lake Erie which does not have a beach. STEP OFF!

Queasy Rider Part Two

I recently spoke about how I have lost my edge as a roller coaster and amusement park enthusiast. I don’t know if it’s an inner ear thing or just plain age. It could be that becoming a father took away that desire to put my life and my lunch on the line in an effort to get the adrenaline flowing. I don’t know even know if I still have what it takes to stand in line for a ride that takes you straight up into the stratosphere and then plunges you head first into the ground like Mel Gibson’s career. Maybe I should just relegate myself to riding the train around the park and yell at kids for walking fast past me.

Last weekend, my wife had the spontaneous notion to just up and go to Kennywood. I reeled back in terror, not because she wanted to go to an amusement park but, because she decided to just do it as a spur of the moment thing. We don’t do well with spontaneity. We tried it once on vacation a few years ago when we decided to take the last day of our trip to Myrtle Beach and drive up to the Outer Banks to see the lighthouses. We didn’t realize we would end up in a Post Apocalyptic Pool Hall At the End Of the Outer Banks. It just seems that every time we try to do something on a whim ,we end up causing a rift in the space time continuum. Bad things happen. However, we realized that summer is flying by and our three year old should get to see Kennywood this year. So, I packed up our World Ending Survival Kits and got ready for a little spontaneity. To even out the odds of riding and babysitting, we included my wife’s niece on the trip and headed out.

First off, we picked the hottest day of the century to go to the park. Everywhere little red mercury thermometers were saying, “’Eff this! It’s too damn hot.” The high temperature was listed to be 93 but the heat index probably put it over 103. Now, why can’t they just say it’s 103? I don’t care what the temperature is and then what it feels like. Either tell me what the temperature is or tell me what the temperature feels like, but don’t say both. Pick one and stick with it. It’s the same with wind chill. Just say it’s the worse number in terms of hot or cold. It makes my life easier. I’m standing in my bedroom toggling between fashion choices. “Well, it’s 93 out there so let’s go with boxers. But, it feels like it 103, so maybe I should go with briefs.” Tell you what, that’s how we should report the weather. “Ladies in gentlemen, the temperature is going to be over 100 degrees. Better go with wet suit.”

Secondly, my daughter has no fear. I mean she will run at top speed towards a brick wall expecting the brick wall to move. The first words out of her mouth, upon exiting the Family Truckster and seeing the Phantom’s Revenge plummeting towards the parking lot with screaming and yelling passengers on it, was “I want to ride that roller coaster.” I informed her that she was still too small for it and she rebuffed my comments and said, “But, I’m a big girl.” Kids. We decided to start off small and rode the carousel. She got a kick out of riding the horses and felt that was all the prep work she would need and started picking out all the spin and puke worthy rides to try next. I told her we needed to get some lunch first but she was adamant about living on the edge.  Of course, wanting to eat and then ride spin and puke rides was pretty close to living on the edge for me.

With park food, you cannot go wrong if you get Potato Patch fries. I don’t care how hot it is outside, you can find the will to scarf down those awesome fries with cheese. One great addition to the Food and Beverage department was the presence of forks. While it’s nice to get knuckles deep into a basket of cheese fries, it just makes it easier when dealing with a little one. Midway through lunch, my wife had to take her to the Sierra Mist Misting Station to get cooled off a bit. Did I mention it was hot? That was pretty much the theme of the day. “It’s hot!” It was the kind of heat that negated the effects of drinking four or five soft drinks in a row. I would have done better with water but a medium Pepsi or Mountain Dew was $2.39 and a 16 ounce bottle of water, in the vending machine, was $3.00. I was hot but not that hot, yet.

Next up was the Turtles. This was another one of my favorite rides as a kid. It simply goes around in a circle and every so often goes over a hill. Not too thrilling, to say the least, but that whole grumpy man / inner ear thing was making me a little queasy. That and the fact that the seats were made of reflective metal had me wishing I’d worn longer shorts but the effects of the heat on the outside of my legs was nothing compared to the heat that was generated within the confines of my clothing. The relative humidity of my shorts was somewhere around 110%. Any longer on the length of the material in my short legs would have had me looking for that wet suit. Still, the little one got such a kick out of these rides.

After I regained my equilibrium we headed over to the Lost Kennywood section of the park and my wife, niece, and daughter decided to forgo the long line for the Pittsburgh Plunge and just stand in the observation area to catch the splash down from the boats. Me, I opted to stay as dry as possible since I was the human purse. I had to carry everything in my pockets, cell phone, keys, camera and wallet. I was like a cat. I did not want to get wet. Regardless of how hot it was, I maintained my “stay dry if at all possible” policy.

That’s another thing I’ve grown out of in my years.  Water rides. I used to love rides like the Raging Rapids and Log Jammer. On a hot day I found comfort in just getting completely drenched on a water ride in order to cool off from the heat. But, in my curmudgeon years, I’ve stayed away from water as if I was a Mogwai. It may not be all about age. The one thing that used to drive me nuts as an Amusement Park employee was when a soaking wet guest would reach into their sock and pull out a folded stack of money. They would peel the dollar bills away from each other, discard the hitchhiking lint, and hand me a few ones to play my game. I wanted to put on a biohazard suit and use tongs to take their money. Things worsened when you got their wet money and you put in the stack of money you had in your apron and then the wetness transferred to the rest of the stack. It just felt dirty. It would be like handing a twenty to a stripper and asking for change. Besides being impolite, it’s a little on the eww side. I don’t think I want the ones you just pulled out of your crotch. It’s nothing against you personally. I support single moms working their way through medical school. Not that I know anything about that.

Apart from my hang ups about getting wet at the amusement park it’s not just about me getting wet. In fact, if it pours down rain, I welcome the relief from the heat. It’s the water in the park that I don’t care for experiencing. It’s that poorly chlorinated water that smells of minerals and sweat that gags me. The water from wet rides consist of whatever base water is in the ride plus all the dirt, grime, sweat and possibly other bodily fluids it collects as it drips off the passengers onto the floor of the ride. It gets stomped around by their shoes and then falls back into the water and then gets recycled back into the ride, ready to splash the next guest. Standing in line for a ride along with tens of others who reek of "wet guest" is not exactly a lot of fun. I am just as to blame as I stand there with the crotch pot set to simmer. I should have chosen briefs for this.

After The Petri Dish Plunge, my wife took her niece to go try out the new ride while I braved the wilds of Kiddieland with my daughter. Now, I fully expected to find myself in the middle of my worst nightmare. I was all set to be amid a sea of rotten children, pushing and shoving their way around the rides. I was prepared to stand in long lines and watch as my little angel turned into a devil as she sometimes [read: often] becomes impatient. What I wasn’t ready for was the exact opposite. She was tickled to ride and was a perfect little doll. The ride operators were courteous and helpful. The other kids were very polite and while there was a little excitement over getting into the gates, they all pretty much took turns.  There were no Altamont or Riverfront Stadium reenactments, anywhere. The only time it even got a little scary was the revelation that I would have to ride the S.S. Kenny with my kid. I thought the S.S. Kenny was supposed to be a kiddie version of the Pirate Ship. However, that was a miscalculation. The Pirate Ship only goes back and forth. This was more like the Cosmic Chaos as The S.S. Kenny goes back and forth and then spins around as it sails. I might as well have been on the Edmund Fitzgerald.

Once my wife returned to tag me out, I booked it for the front of the park to ride the new coaster, The Skyrocket. The wait was almost an hour long, but I was willing to tough it out along with the other park water soaked guests. EW. I then noticed something a little amiss. Up ahead of me was this little whelp of guy holding an infant. Couldn’t have been more than a few months old. Beyond thinking, “Hey, get that kid under some cover, it’s hot and sunny out here,” I couldn’t help but wonder how this guy was going to pull this off when he got to the deck. There’s no way in all of Zelienople that they are going to let that kid ride and I didn’t see any mother around, either. Once we got up to the deck I saw the master plan. Momma was riding two cars ahead of him and when her car came back in, he was ready to get on after handing the baby over to her. Made more sense to me after witnessing it. Still, they handed off an infant over a gap in the floor which made me cringe a little. Yet, that all went away as I got ready to try out a new coaster.  In all, the ride lasted just over a minute and was pretty neat, save the hour wait.

By now, the late afternoon sun was blazing over the park’s horizon and was still very hot.  My wife snuck in another splash down cleansing and an hour long wait for the indoor coaster called The Exterminator while I rode The Whip and the Carousel with the munchkin. We stopped for some pizza and then I was back to Kiddieland while my wife rode the Aero 360 with her niece. Until now, we both looked at that ride like it was enough to make us yack. She rode it twice, though, loving it. I was still enjoying being a proud parent and wearing that badge of honor as my little one continued to ride her heart out on the miniature rides. Unfortunately, another spin and puke called the Dizzy Dynamo. It was a bit like a Tilt-A-Whirl but I felt more like it was a Tilt-A-Hurl. She got to ride the mini Turtles and a few more rides before my wife got back.

We decided to ride the carousel and the Paratrooper before getting ice cream. I was all set to spray the crowd on the Paratrooper while my daughter giggled and laughed all throughout the ride. As we stood in line for ice cream the flood gates opened over the park. It had been threatening to rain since before sunset and now we were caught inside the park. We all hopped up on the covered porch surrounding the cafeteria and ate our ice cream before dodging the raindrops back to the van.

That’s when it happened. We had one more ride to go on and it was the car ride home. This little angel, this perfect child, this kid who spent the better part of seven hours riding her but off didn’t make it out of the parking lot before crashing. So, I guess I can still find enjoyment and excitement at the amusement park at my age without having to wear black socks up to my knees or shake my fist at the “damn kids” who whiz past me heading for the roller coaster queues. I just have to spend some time watching my kid enjoy the hell out of riding the rides. I don’t have to worry about my tubes going all wonky or fear that my Potato Patch fries might make a reappearance. I kind of like it that way. I still like that car ride at the end of the day. That’s still my favorite.  By the way, I need a shower.  I've got some serious "wet guest" funk going on with my person.  Should have worn a wet suit.

Queasy Rider

Summer is officially here, at least that’s what those pesky Gregorians say. That means I can get to work earlier because there are no busses stopping every ten feet in front of me. It also means parents are going nuts because their kids are home for three months. For some of those parents it inevitably means trips to the amusement park. I am a big amusement park enthusiast and have even worked for two different parks during my college days. Of course, over the past ten years my enthusiasm has waned, probably because of my approach towards curmudgeon years. Yeah, I skipped midlife crisis and straight to UP in terms of “get of my lawn” mentality. But in my youth, oh my youth, I was a diehard park denizen.

It seems rather odd that I fondly remember my youth and recall a time when I was deadly afraid of even stepping near a roller coaster. My first memory of actually riding a coaster was The Big Bad Wolf at Busch Gardens. After that, I went straight to the Loch Ness Monster. After that trip, I was fully prepared to take on the sum of all fears back home, The Laser Loop.

Yes, The Laser Loop scared the pants off of me as a small child. The damn thing was a straight track that one way, and then back. But it had a loop in the middle that you rode through twice, once forward and then in reverse. I figured I needed to build up courage a bit so I tackled the rest of the coasters at Kennywood in preparation. That meant I had to survive the double dip popping out of your seat terror that was the Jackrabbit and the equally tension filled race to the finish that was the Racer. These were mere child’s play against the heart stopping Thunderbolt. I am of course adding a dose of exaggerated sarcasm to this posts. I had already passed the test by riding the Loch Ness Monster. These other coasters were pretty tame, but still exciting.

But that’s what Kennywood was to me as a kid. Each May we’d anticipate the joy of going to school to buy ticket books for the school’s picnic. Yes, I said tickets. In fact, I am totally piggy backing this post from another local blogger who just waxed on / waxed off nostalgic by mentioning the ride tickets in Pittsburgh Magazine.

In another, “get of my lawn” moment, a bunch of kids out there are probably saying, ”tickets?” Yes, you whipper snappers, now show me your damn ride ticket or I’m tossing you over the railing, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade style. For most of my life, going to Kennywood meant buying tickets to ride the rides. There was no “all day pass.” There was no wrist band and black light stamp at the gate. There was no metal detector, restrictions or Spanish ownership then either. Nope, just a pavilion, a goofy sailor hat with your name on it, and a quest for Potato Patch Fries or funnel cake.

Oh, yes, the sights, sounds, and smells of Kennywood, growing up.  I know it's a tad outdated but everytime Rick Sebak's Kennywood Memories comes on television, I have to watch it.  Even though it's from 1988 it still holds a lot of great history about the park pre 1990s. And to me, that's when the park was most fun.  The day I would go to school, armed with my parents' money to buy tickets was like going opening up that Wonka bar and finding the golden ticket.  I received my booklet and some older gentleman would usher me away from the hordes saying, "Run home, and don't stop till you get there!!!!"

After we got our ticket books and a day off from school, we would descend on the park in yellow busses. College students bemoaned the sight of that sea of busses pulling into the lots and soon the check-your-brain-at-the-gate-ask-any-and-all-stupid-questions mentality took over. First up, the Thunderbolt. The pre-coaster me would have needed a change of shorts but the new and improved thrill seeker wanted front car, hands up, loosened seat belt adrenaline. As we’d come around that first hill and get ready to plunge into the circular curves in the front, I could see that damned Laser Loop in the distance taunting me.

Next up, the Racer. Everyone would split up into factions, choosing opposite cars in an attempt for bragging rights. Only those who knew the secret could easily predict the winner, and it had nothing to do with color of car. Lastly, we’d hit the Jack Rabbit and nearly lose our stomach and seat on that double dip hill. By then, it was time to get some Potato Patch Fries, drowned in cheese and salt. The eleven year old body could handle two or three baskets whereas my more stout frame now needs to consider the seat belts on rides after eating. Still, that Laser Loop dogged me from behind. I could hear it laughing as it screamed past my head in the background.

In fact, I didn’t ride the Laser Loop at all that year. More to the point, I was still afraid to ride the Gold Rusher. Ok, I admit it, I was a wuss. The Gold Rusher was one of those in the dark, turn the corner and there’s the monster with loud blaring sounds and bright lights. The spider and the train really made me lose my bowels. Eventually, I laughed at the notion of being so scared of such a cheese ball ride. But that Laser Loop was still scaring me silly. Now, to be totally honest, the ride stopped scaring me about a year after I started riding coasters. However, even when I was ready to ride the coaster it would always be broke down. I never did ride it and I wasn’t about to travel to Mexico to ride it after they moved it in 1991. But the replacement was an upgrade. The Steel Phantom boasted, at the time, one of the steepest drops at 232 feet. Of course, this was going downhill along the landscape through the Thunderbolt. But even that ride was changed almost a decade later to The Phantom’s Revenge. No loops and no headaches. Those came from being in the park as an adult.

But as an adult, there are still reasons to go to the park. Unfortunately, for my cholesterol level, the main reason is food. Nothing beats good amusement park food and you cannot go wrong with Potato Patch fries, a funnel cake, or a Cyclone Cone from nearby Idlewild. Who can resist a waffle cone with vanilla ice cream, fresh cut strawberries and whipped cream? Now that I’m a parent I can safely say that I am not there for the rides as I will probably be in Kiddie Land all day long smelling the pizza stand just outside the archway. I also like to play the games. Not because I like to collect stuffed animals but because as a former games attendant in my youth, I feel the need to show that I can still take the Bowler Roller game for a huge prize without spending more than two dollars. However, I am out of practice these past few years. As an adult, I’ve traded in school picnics for company picnics. I’ve traded in trying to look cool for actually being cool as in temperature. It was always a fashion show, growing up, as we wanted to look good for that special girl or guy that we’d hope would ask us to ride the Haunted Hideaway. But now, I was just hoping to make it through the day without heat stroke or a pizza stain on my shirt.

Another year would go by and the park seemed smaller. The summers got hotter and the lines longer. My tolerance for crowds was lessening Also, my Eustachian tubes’ tolerance for going in circles or backwards was diminishing. There was a time, at the age of 15, that I could ride the Rotor five times in a row. No more. I can’t even ride the Pirate Ship without wanting to vomit.The park also seems a little less sparkly every year. You get that overwhelming smell of wet and sweat from people who come off of water rides onto the hot pavement. The proximity to the water and trees raises the humidity a good deal. Soon, I find myself trading in the thrill rides for the quiet and gentle ride on the train with the ever present Bruce Springsteen’s “Born In the USA” capping off the regional history lesson. As I hit the back nine of my 30s I feel as if the greatest ride in the park is the ride home.

It’s not that I have stopped loving amusement parks, it’s just I hate dealing with everything else at a amusement park besides the rides and attractions. I will ultimately be forced to make a trip to Disney World one day because my daughter will be old enough to enjoy it. It upsets me that I should be wanting to go there and have a good time. It upsets me that I know I will be my old curmudgeonly self yelling at the kids to pull up their damn pants and get out of my way. In a weird sort of way, I will become the Laser Loop, scaring kids who come near me. I can only hope I don’t end up being sold to a park in Mexico City. I don’t think they will have as good of French fries as we have here.

Kennywood's Open

Those words summon two ideas to the mind of a kid. One is that your zipper is down. That's a Pittsburgh area euphemism akin to "Your barn door is open." While that might not conjure magical thoughts, well perhaps it does, but in any case the other meaning of that phrase means that a local amusement park is open for another magical season. One that means cotton candy, funnel cake, and French fries are yours for the taking. Opening in 1898, Kennywood has become a familiar setting of schools' and businesses' annual picnics and just recently was a filming location for a new comedy called, Adventureland. As a kid, living that close to an amusement park is utterly awesome. There is something amazing about the sound of the coasters and the calliope music piping. Smelling the aroma of funnel cakes and cotton candy while you gawk at the amazement of the grandeur of the midway sends a child spinning in his bed the night before his trip to the park. Come sun up, you want to be at the park extra early so that you are first in line for your favorite ride. You have every intention of riding it again and again, no length of queue is enough to deter you from your task. You plan on eating your weight in junk food and spending every last dollar on trying to win a stuffed animal. And you can not leave the park before the lights come on at night. That's when the real magic happens as the midway is illuminated by different colored lights chasing each other into infinity.

Of course, something happens when you grow up. The park seems small and dirty. The food turns your stomach. You can't look at the Pirate Ship or The Enterprise without wanting to hurl. You want to leave five minutes after you arrive. The crowds that filled the park now become bothersome and the mentality of the average amusement park going person is reduced to that of a zombie from Night of the Living Dead. I should know. I worked at an amusement park for four summers in college and as employees we all thought the same thing. "When you enter the park, you must have to check your brain at the gate." In short, you are now an adult and the magic of the midway is now just a memory. You don't know when it happened but at some point in your maturation you turned into a recluse who hates to leave the house except for food. Gone is that child who once had the felt jester's hat that he won because he put three pounds of gravel into his pocket in order to fool the "Guess Your Weight" guy. Replacing him is the grumpy middle aged man who will hold a neighbor kid's wayward football hostage if it should land in his yard.

I guess, for me, the switch over came after I graduated high school. Every year I spent in school until that point was a year I went to Kennywood. We lined up in the gym of our school to buy tickets. The night before we had begged and pleaded with our parents to chip in another few dollars for ride tickets. You see, in those days, there was no such thing as an "All Day Pass." You bought a general admission ticket that allowed you into the park and then purchased tickets for rides. The more thrilling the ride, the more tickets it required to ride it. This was back in the day when you could take an entire family to the park and spend less than a hundred dollars. Now, even if you don't care to ride or if you are a parent who plans to take their child to "kiddieland" you must pay full admission. It's a bit of a scam, really. This is probably another reason why I'm no longer a die hard. Since graduating high school, I've managed to make a trip every so many years and since starting with my current employer I am willing to go for free every summer. Although, now I go to eat more than I do ride. However, in my youth I was a ferocious rider and at the age of 15, I once rode The Rotor five times in a row just because my girlfriend at the time wanted to. This premise of this ride is that you stand in a drum, against the wall. The room begins to spin faster and faster until centrifugal force holds the riders against the wall while the floor is lowered beneath them. Imagine that scene towards the end of TRON where all the programs spin around inside the MCP and you'll understand. If you haven't seen the movie, shame on you. Go rent it, now. I'll wait. Finished? Good, get it? At 33, that kind of assault on the vestibular system would have me hurling on the first trip yet at 15 I could withstand the urge to purge.

While Kennywood may have lost its luster in my mind, whenever I go to another amusement park I take full advantage of their rides, especially coasters. These behemoths of engineering and physics are to me what drugs are to rock stars. I wouldn't go to a park that didn't have one. I first became enthralled with coasters before the age of ten. Even though Kennywood was practically in my backyard, I had to go to Virginia to ride my first coaster. Until that point, I had been deathly afraid of the things. They were loud and fast and went real high, something I still have problems with in my adulthood. On a family trip to Busch Gardens I had decided that I needed to conquer this fear and picked an easy target to tackle, The Big Bad Wolf. Kind of fitting that I should face a fear that should be named after a fairy tale creature that embodies fear. The Big Bad Wolf is a suspended roller coaster that has the seats hanging below the track. This allows for a more suspenseful ride as there is no barrier between you and the ground or the river as the second lift hill drops you directly over the water for a 90 foot plunge. I was pumped. I wanted to take on the world or at least another mythical creature and so I graduated right up to the top by riding The Loch Ness Monster, next. The gimmick behind ole Nessie was the double loops that interlock allowing two trains to circle each other if the timing is perfect.

Returning home, I decided to feed my coaster addiction by going to Kennywood to hit all the coasters there. Knowing that these mean machines were no match for my new found bravery, I went right for the juggernaut, The Thunderbolt. The coaster itself maybe considered tame by today's standards, but it still provides a thrill as you immediately drop down a hill right out of the station. Following it was the Racer and The Jackrabbit. These coasters boast legendary merits as being the only remaining continuous track or moebius loop coaster still in operation and one of the few operational wooden coasters with a double dip hill. After these beasts were slain there was only one coaster left to tackle, The Laser Loop. This short track with one single loop in the middle shuttles riders backwards and forwards along its track and it scared me shitless. To this day I never got to ride it as was taken down and moved to Mexico in 1991 in order to make way for The Steel Phantom. Truth be told, I did intend to ride it but when I had finally found the stones to do so, it was always non-operational, constantly closing during my trips to the park.

When the Laser Loop's replacement opened during the 1991 season, I couldn't wait to try it out. The Steel Phantom, at the time, boasted the fastest max speed for a coaster clocking in at 82 mph, a record it kept until 1996. Even though the first hill was a dizzying 160 feet high, it was the second hill that rocked at 225 feet. It used the naturally hilly terrain of the surrounding area and plunged you underneath the first hill of the The Thunderbolt. I had to ride this sucker. I was a sophomore and still had to rely on other forms of transportation to the park. I am ashamed to admit that I rode the school bus for our class picnic that year but had a plan. My friends, who were a year older, had planned to go to the park in the eldest of the group's station wagon. Pete had borrowed his parents' Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser which we had dubbed, the "White Beast For Leprosy" since it was peeling paint rapidly. My parents had forbid me from going to the park with them since every parent in those days had horrible thoughts of their young teenage children being maimed in accidents, more importantly thrown from the back of a station wagon as depicted in old school crash test dummy commercials. If I didn't ride the bus, I couldn't go. What really sucked about that situation was that even though I could meet up with my friends once I was at the park, the busses left at 7:00 pm, nearly two hours before nightfall. I had a plan, though. Since the queue for the brand new coaster would undoubtedly be about an hour I could claim that I was in line for the ride and couldn't make it back to the bus.

It was a fool proof plan. We made plans for a cooler full of stuff the night before and I would synchronize my faux swatch with my buddies to meet them for our first ride at The Thunderbolt. Naturally, that was always the first ride. It was like going to a swimming pool on a hot day and just diving into the cold water as a shock to the system that got the adrenaline pumping. Everything was going like clockwork. I boarded the bus, I met up with friends, we rode our hearts out, ate our weight in food, and at 6:00 pm we got in line for the Phantom. As we boarded it was just past 7:00 pm and on our way up the first lift hill I could see the busses departing the parking lot. "Oops," I thought. We rode ourselves silly over the next two hours and made our way back to the wagon at nearly 9:30 pm. By now, the cooler was sloshing with very little ice and a lot of water after being in the back of the car for over eight hours. While we piled into the seats, all of our belongings were stowed in the back with the cooler up against the back door.

We made our way onto the highway and headed for home. Now, to say Pete was a horrible driver wasn't exactly a correct statement. He sucked at driving, but put behind the wheel of a less than optimal vehicle and his abilities degraded even further. Put simply, this was too much car for him. You almost needed naval experience to steer this boat. We attempted to merge onto a busy highway with numerous other park goers and nearly caused several accidents. Instantly, I had visions of those crash films that plagued my parents' nightmares while their children were out in the world where blood flows red on the highway. Soon, all of our knuckles were as white as the outside of the car. On the last on ramp we had to merge from, a passing truck caused Pete to freak and slam on the brakes. While we were smart and wore our seat belts, all of our belongings flung their way forward into the back of the bench seat. But, that wasn't the best part. The cooler full of ice which had been melting in the hot sun had been flew forward spilling a tidal wave of water up towards the front of the car drenching each one of us. Finding a safe spot to pull off to the side of the road we surveyed the damage. Coming around the back of the car we noticed water just spilling out from below the back door. The entire car was soaked on the inside except for a small spot that contained my backpack and a dry pair of jeans. I had packed them for just such an occasion, although I thought I would be drenched from a water ride inside the park. I changed into the jeans and we stopped at a local fast food chain and walked in asking for napkins and paper towels by the handful. There I was in the middle of May wearing jeans on a warm evening drenched from the waist up asking for paper towels.

By the time I got home it was now nearing 11:00 pm and I was in deep trouble. I came upstairs and could see the light on in my parents room and knew that she had been waiting up for me. I walked in and she asked what exactly had happened to me riding the bus home. Really, she knew exactly what had happened since all parents know what their kids do like it's some sort of extrasensory perception on their part. However, always looking for a good story, she allowed me to explain myself. I told her that I was in line for a ride and couldn't make it back to the busses in time and then went on to explain why I was so late. We both agreed that her early assesment of the scenario was in fact accurate because somehow she knew that a station wagon full of kids driving around the outskirts of Pittsburgh was a bad idea. Unfortunately, I did not have the benefit of her life experience, otherwise I would have shared her concern and avoided the upturned cooler incident. She spared me from a ground saying that I probably suffered enough for one night. I told her it wasn't that bad and that it was actually kind of funny. She understood but said that she wasn't speaking on my ordeal but to the fact that in my rush to get changed I forgot to pull up my zipper and had probably flashed my tighty whities to every single person in McDonald's earlier that night.

See, parents do have a sense of humor, even if they are grumpy.

Insert Coin. Valkyrie...is about to die!

Part Five of the series, All Your Free Time Are Belong to Us

As this series winds down to a close I just realized that I wasted a hell of a lot of time in my life playing video games. In 33 years, have I really played video games, that much? If it weren't for home gaming consoles, I'd probably have gone broke from one of my earliest and favorite of all gaming outlets, the arcade! Ah yes, the clinking of coins into the slot was music to my ears. I remember the early days of arcades where video games only cost a quarter. Now the most popular games cost as much as a dollar to play and that's nothing to say about adding more money to continue when you get the dreaded "Game Over" screen. Now, it seems like the arcade is facing a "Game Over" scenario with home gaming becoming a more technologically superior industry.

Actually, I feel bad for the "Arcade." In the 80's, during the Golden Age of Video Arcade Games, the coin operated game was the pinnacle of gaming technology. The few emerging home consoles such as Atari and ColecoVision couldn't come close to the technology needed to render the graphics you would get in your local bowling alley or bar. Somewhere along the line, though, home consoles caught up with and may have even surpassed the old stand up stalwarts leaving the last few working Space Invader cabinets to grumble, "Back in my day, you only needed 8 joystick directions and one button to have fun." Who can't remember going to Pizza Hut with their family only to leave the table and seek out that cocktail cabinet style Ms. Pac Man game in the corner? Some of my earliest memories include the phrase, "Mom, can I have a quarter?" My town even had a local legend about a guy named Chucky Moss who rode a bike around with a huge flag sticking off the back. He would go to the local Laundromat and play Pac-Man. Unfortunately, Chucky only knew two directions, left and up, which would ultimately leave him cornered with Inky, Blinky, Pinky, and Clyde free to chomp him unabashedly.

Growing up, there was always an arcade in the mall which could siphon the money from my pocket. It was like a magic trick. I never remembered putting more quarters in but always ended up broke. While my mom would shop for Christmas gifts at the Hills store in Uniontown, PA, I’d be in the lobby area firing quarters into the Castlevania game. When I'd run out of money, I'd go to the toy section and ogle over the Nintendo display, hoping that this was the year she grabbed one off the shelves. It never happened. I ended up buying one off of a friend.

Then, there was the skating rink in our town. For about three to four years of my childhood I spent Friday nights and some Saturdays there. During the mid to late 80's, a lot of kids had birthday parties at the local roller rink, so there was always a reason to go on the weekend. Most kids would put the few quarters they had on the edge of the pool table, just waiting to play. I would put them into the arcade games along the wall. Now, I did do my fair share of skating, but whenever Rudy, the old guy who ran the place, called out, "The next skate is for couples" I knew it was time to leave the floor and head to the Super Mario Bros. or Double Dragon game. This also occurred with the Backwards Skate and Shoot the Duck songs as I only knew how to do two things on roller skates, go fast in one direction and fall down hard. If I wasn't playing a video game at the mall or the roller rink, perhaps you could have found me in the arcades at amusement parks. Kennywood still has a couple of arcades in the park. Cedar Point has about three, the main Coliseum Arcade along the main midway and the Gemini and Jitney arcades towards the back of the park. On rare occasions, we may have found ourselves being treated to a night out at Major Magic's, a Chuck E Cheese clone. Our parents should be considered saints for allowing us to be plied with sugar, caffeine, tons of pizza while we spent countless hours playing games and watching dancing bears. Of course, none of the ill effects would kick in until it was time for bed.

If we went on vacation, I could always sniff out an arcade like a bloodhound. There were always a few arcades along the Boardwalk at Ocean City and around the downtown Myrtle Beach area around The Pavilion. One year we stopped at a campground on the way to our intended destination and I remember wandering down to where the general store was. Next door was a little room with about ten games. I can remember the place being perpetually empty and the silence would be pierced by the electronic voice of the pinball machine telling me to "Rack 'em." When we weren't on vacation, sometimes we'd visit friends who had a camper permanently set up at a place called "Cutty's" Of course; it hasn't been called that for years. It's now called Mountain Pines RV Resort and I think the activities geared towards kids are no longer around. In it's hey day, however, I always found some free time to play a few games in their arcade in between trips to the pool and hikes across the creek to the woods where a few lone remnants of buildings stood including a totem pole and a chimney.

While my brother was in college at The University of Pittsburgh, I remember visiting him and being extremely jealous that he had arcade games in the lobby of his dorm. They accepted tokens instead of quarters and if you spent a whole five dollar bill, you got four extra tokens. Of course, you had to use them or they didn't work anywhere else. When I attended Pitt, seven years later, I found myself skipping a few boring classes in the afternoon to waste time at the union. They had a huge room full of pool tables and a tiny little nook with about seven arcade games.

The arcade culture is something that can be boiled down into two concepts, fame and achievement. Those of us who ever spent time in an arcade always felt the basking ray of fame wash over us when we scored just enough points to plug three letters of our name into the high score screen. In the early days of the Golden Age of Video Arcade Games, games didn't have an end. Technically, they did, because most of technology for games during this era didn't allow for the infinity scenario and the game either became glitchy or unplayable. Famous instances are the "Split Screen" level of Pac-Man and the "Kill Screen" that occurs in Dig Dug. Even with the kill screens these types of games were designed to just repeat levels with increased difficulty giving more street cred to anyone who was able to rack up millions of points all on one play. When game technology shifted in the mid 80's games became less about the high score and more about "beating the game." While games like Rolling Thunder and Double Dragon offered a high score tally at the top of the screen, the ultimate goal was to successfully navigate through the whole game and beat the "Final Boss" at the end. These games attracted huge crowds and it was hard to get in close enough to slap your quarter(s) up on the cabinet securing your place in line. When the first player was finally defeated or, at least, ran out of quarters, they would move aside and the next person in line took their quarters from the cabinet and had their turn. A smart gamer would always hold one of the buttons down after they lost to quickly reduce the "Continue" count down to zero, ending their progress. This was a common practice to deny "cherry pickers" the chance to continue on your game, reducing their expenditure of quarters. After all, you poured your blood, sweat, and tears into that two hour marathon of gaming. Why should some rookie finish your game and get all the glory?

While my love of the arcade may be a lasting one, unfortunately, it's a rarity to find one these days. Not to mention, we've just grown up and old. We have less and less time for gaming, let alone a reason for going to an arcade with the sole purpose of spending countless quarters on five minutes worth of fun. Still, every year for my birthday, my wife indulges my need to be a big kid and we go to Dave & Busters. For those of you who have never been there it's a restaurant/bar that is on par with say Houlihan's in style and menu. However, in the back there is a huge arcade with tons of video games. They also have a bunch of games that give out tickets for redemption of prizes just like Chuck E Cheese. They don't use coins or tokens but have a prepaid card that you swipe to play. I can usually sucker her into a racing game or zombie shooter game but other than that she just stands by and watches this big old dork have fun.

Hopefully, one day, I can save her the anguish of being seen with said dork and privately geek out in my own game room with my favorite games and pinball machines. My pipe dream would be to have a room in my house dedicated to this. I'd have a pool table and a jukebox and a collection of the classics sprinkled with a few modern favorites. Now, these classics aren't cheap and they are very rarely found in good condition, but I'd still want to try. Even though I have the ability to play most of my favorites on my computer, there's nothing like having a full sized cabinet in your home. Emulators, such as MAME, have the capability of reproducing most video games and can be played on a PC. There are even eBay auctions and books dedicated to "MAME Cabinets" that act as a coin operated game playing hundreds of titles all on a dedicated computer inside the cabinet. While this isn't a cheap fix for your video arcade addiction, it's a cheap imitation of the culture it supports. If you're going to do it right, be a collector. Buy the games from other collectors or arcades that are going out of business.

For now, I'll continue chasing that dream like a power pelleted Pac-Man chases a blinking blue ghost, because Mongo needs food, badly.

Mongo's dream collection of Coin Op games

Galaga My all time favorite.
Gauntlet II The inspiration for the title of this post. Long hours were spent on this one.
Blasted A not so well known game from the makers of Rampage.
Xenophobe I loved this game at the Roller Rink. I must have spent $5.00 a trip.
Double Dragon I and II These two games at the rink took more money than a politician.
Super Mario Bros. One of the hardest games to get on in an arcade in the mid 80's.
Mario Bros. Not to many people found joy like I did in this game.
Rolling Thunder Cool music, spy theme, and all the KKK members you could kill.
Star Wars Trilogy I play this once a year at D&B's. Can beat it on one play.
Star Wars A classic that still poses a challenge
Out Run I could never get past the first checkpoint, but I loved tuning in stations.
Mr. Do's Castle One of those wacky games that still gets me.
FunHouse (pinball) Spent an entire week at Myrtle Beach playing this game. Frustrating.
Jurassic Park (pinball) One of the better pinball games out there.
Mortal Kombat II While working at Idlewild this game stole a lot of my break time and money.
Crazy Climber Who doesn't like being crapped on by a big bird or having a pot thrown at them?
Street Fighter II Another one of those quarter suckers.
Smash TV Another two hander that I spent a vacation playing.
Legend of Kage Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon has nothing on this game.
Shinobi Another hard one that I could never beat.
Rampage Classic smash em up as Godzilla, just don't punch the neon sign.
Eight Ball Deluxe Shoot the two ball. Another classic Bally pinball title.

Behind the lines: Theme Park Love Shack

Mongo, looking cool with folded arms....pfft!

That's me in 1997. It was my last day working at Cedar Point. I was so skinny back then. I was going to save this entry for a time closer to May but seeing as how the window of opportunity to secure a summer job is soon at hand, I figured it would be topical for today. By summer job, I mean the one you had when you were in college, perhaps even high school. For four straight summers, I worked in the Amusement Park industry. Two years were spent at a local theme park here in Southwestern Pennsylvania, called Idlewild. The last two were spent at Cedar Point. It's like going to a branch campus for two years of college and then transferring to main campus to get your degree. In essence, that's what working at a theme park is like, college without the books. But it is a lot more than that. Not to try and shine a derogatory light on the job set but knowing what I know now, I don't think I'd be alright with my daughter working there when she is of age. I will say upfront that I worked there in 1996 and 1997 and I'm sure a lot has changed since then. Whether it is for the better or not, I have no idea. Some things never change, especially the life of your typical college student.

I will forgo the years spent at Idlewild and focus directly on the big time. I got the job in April of 96 when it was apparent that I needed a summer job and really did not have want to work in the area of my hometown. I keep making the mistake of trying to get away from the area and it always comes back to haunt me. I was accepted and enrolled at Coastal Carolina University for all of one semester, running back home to the University of Pittsburgh. So, for some stupid reason, I thought this was going to be a different situation. Cedar Point is roughly a four drive from the Pittsburgh area, situated on the shores of Lake Erie west of Cleveland, Ohio. It is home to some 17 or more roller coasters and being a fan, I thought it would be an ideal place to make some cash for the summer. Since they employ around 4000 seasonal workers from all over the world, they provide lodging for those outside of the Sandusky, OH area. While, I'm not a boy scout, I thought it best to be prepared for any situation that should arise and insisted on packing my entire life into the back of my Dad's Dodge Pickup. That was mistake number one.

Employee Lodging

When I arrived, freshly dropped off by the turnip truck, in early May of 1996, I should have known I was in trouble. The main dormitory for men is an old hotel, built in 1915. While in its heyday it was probably luxurious accommodations, there has been little to no updating of the buildings since perhaps the 60's as it is promoted as a "summer camp style" facility by the company's website. In truth, this is a very accurate description. First off, there is no heat or air conditioning. My first morning waking up in my room was ridiculous. I could see my breath and the rooms were hardwood, throughout. Stacking four people in a room the size of a single dorm room did not leave a lot of room for furniture. Yes, they provide you with dressers and chairs. Nothing matches and looks like it was bought at a yard sale during the great depression. As a guy, it is recommended that you bring enough clothes for two weeks and do laundry often. Think what a normal teenage or twenty something girl would pack.

Keeping with the summer camp motif, bathrooms are communal and almost high school in nature. Nearly 400 employees are housed within the dorms and all share the same bathroom. There are about 10 bathroom stalls and 20 or more shower stalls. Finding a shower curtain, however is slim to none. There are bathrooms located throughout the buildings, yet the two or four that have a shower stall in them are usually kept padlocked, however, those of us resourceful enough found ways in and utilized the more private of accommodations to our own gain. I don't want to come off sounding like a typical knuckle dragging male and it's not like I have some fear of having to shower in a public setting, however, shower stalls with a curtain did get taken very quickly. Anyone who has worked there can tell you that there have always been rumors and some noted instances of the showers being used as a "bathhouse" meeting place. Usually, everyone will say that when a fire alarm was pulled in the middle of the night, it wasn't because there was a fire. That was called the "Cedar Dorms Shower Power Hour." Besides, the main reason I preferred to get a shower in one of the more private bathrooms was simple. The main hallway that led to the bathrooms took you past several windows. I didn't think much of it when I first moved in, but they appeared to be boarded up. At the end of May or early June, the boards were removed revealing screens and no glass. Again, because there was no air conditioning, they removed these boards to allow airflow. But on Lake Erie in the first half of June, the average temperature doesn't usually stay above 65 degrees. Because of the long walk, you took only the essentials, toiletries and a robe. When you were done and made the long walk back, you were still wet walking through a damp cold corridor. Not to mention you had no heat anywhere. From my dorm room, during my second year, there was a bathroom 20 feet away. Most people wondered why I got up and showered two to four hours before my shift. I did it so that I could beat the rush of those few individuals who knew we had a private shower.

The girls’ dorms, or Gold Dorms as they are called, were slightly better. They at least had carpeting in the rooms, yet it was no more than carpet you would find in an office. Again, they stacked four girls in a room which was considerably larger than ours and their bathrooms were centrally located on both floors giving them twice as many options. There was slightly better security attached to the girls' dorms and with good reason. Our dorm housed everything from an employee store to a medical clinic which saw a lot more traffic than a strict lodging facility. As we entered the dorm, we would have a color coded badge that designated which dorm we lived at. Simply flashing your badge or having it swiped identified you to front desk staff. However, the vast network of buildings attached by corridors and breezeways allowed for access to side doors and outside stairways that were neither manned nor secured. Sneaking someone into the dorm was child's play as my room was at the end of a hallway next to an open air connecting hallway complete with stairs to the surrounding yard. Not well lit and nearly invisible to everyone, it was easy to use this as a means to bypass security, especially if there was an ID check out front. This was sometimes commonplace to catch drunken employees who were underage. They had different IDs than those legal to drink. Kind of like a sobriety checkpoint for those on foot. In certain instances, they pulled your badge if you were really wasted as it was a violation of employee conduct. Whether in the park or out, you needed to be a model citizen who represented the ideals of the company.

My first year, I spent half of the summer in Cedars and half in the Commons Apartments. This was your deluxe apartment in the sky...or at least off point. The apartments were considered luxury accommodations and a there was a waiting list. I had the good fortune of knowing a guy who lived there and when a room in his place opened up, he reserved it for me and helped me move during my lunch hour, one afternoon. Apartment buildings were gender segregated by apartment which meant that once you were admitted into the complex, you had free reign between buildings. Each apartment had five bedrooms, two bathrooms with private showers, full kitchen, and living room for 16 people with cable and air conditioning. Yes, even though you are in an apartment, you still shared everything with 15 other people, usually four to a room. On occasion, housekeeping would take care of the kitchen, but I choose not to use it at all because of the sink that was piled high with dishes from day one of my residency. On one end of the complex there was also what we called the dungeons. They were strictly female at the time and mirrored the setup of the Gold Dorms. They were called the dungeons because of the gray cinderblock construction inside and out. These were the closest to college dorms you could get. All off Point accommodations required either personal transportation or employee shuttle to commute to work as you were not allowed to walk or ride a bike on the two lane causeway that separated the peninsula from the rest of the off park property.

Regardless of where you lived, you paid to live at Cedar Point. Dorms ran about $16-$17/week while the apartments were a premium at $24-$31/week. This meant that a single room in any facility with a maximum of 4 person occupancy generated anywhere between $259-$500 a month in rent. This was deducted from your paycheck and frankly, I think they made out like bandits. I figured, even if I was going to live in a hole, I would make it my own, which meant my whole world came with me. That first summer I came prepared with enough clothes for a month, a tiny fridge, television, radio, and the headboard my Dad built for my dorm room at school. The Park recommends you bring the following, a pillow, clip on reading lamp, fan, alarm clock/radio, and padlock for lockers at certain dorms. Boy, was I over packed. I ended up leaving all of my stuff at the dorms for another month until the Fourth of July when I took a week to come home. My parents were reluctant to say I told you so, but they had every right as they said I would be a fool for taking so much.

The Social Culture

While I could expound over several paragraphs the various jobs and duties which beset an employee working at the park, I won't. All I can tell you is that most jobs are performed while standing over periods of up to 12 hours, you don't get overtime, and for completing your "contract" you received a bonus amount per hour paid out sometime around October. It used to be that you were paid $0.50 for every hour worked up to 200 hours. After that it was $1.00 per hour. If you figured on a 600 hour summer, you stand to gain $500 in bonus money. At the time I was making $5.10 an hour so this was usually what amounted to another paycheck. I think the current rate is $7.00/hour and $.35/hour bonus. It roughly works out to be $1000 more now than 10 years ago. That's not much more considering inflation and cost of living increase. That is all I will say about the job. The nature of the environment and the mindset of your average employee are far more interesting.

Anthropologists could probably earn doctorates from study Theme Park Employee behavior. Just like there is a switch that flips on the normal, intelligent, human being, rendering them unable to follow simple directions or at least be aware that they are walking way too slow for people around them, the same can be said for the normal, grounded in good behavior college student who becomes a drunken dog in heat the moment they process in as an employee. The social nature of the park and the employees within promotes a camaraderie that extends beyond working hours into their free time. Some of the benefits of working in that type of setting were extremely attractive to someone like me. I am a self proclaimed roller coaster junkie. The opportunity to work in the park while spending my off hours with free access to all the rides is enough to make me a happy camper. While, you had to pay to play mini golf, or ride the go karts, the water park was in the bounds of play just like the rides. Still, being in the park meant I had to abide by the rules. I had to wait in line just like everyone else and at times it wasn't worth it to waste a day off waiting in line for a ride that would be there every other day of the summer. Ride nights were incorporated to give employees a break from the crowds. Usually set after hours, it provided us a chance to ride our favorite rides without dealing with snotty kids and your typical other park goer. Other activities such as movie nights, intramural sport events, and various group functions allowed a variety of escapism for the more demure and quiet park employee.

However, for every bright spot there is a dark and seedy underbelly of degradation that would make residents of Sodom and Gomorrah say, "Not in our backyard." While it is not often promoted, if you look you can find a world of vice and the occasional wet t shirt contest. In the summer of 1996, I had finally reached that milestone age where I was legal to drink. Directly off point and within walking distance of the dorms was a small bar with a fenced in courtyard. This was considered an employee only bar called Louie's Lounge, lovingly referred to as "Loser's" by most employees. From the moment you get your hand stamped "YES" for 21 and up, or "NO" for underage, you know what really happens here. Everyone crowds around a picnic table out in the courtyard while the one "YES" man heads to the bar and gets a open cardboard box, usually used for cases of cheap soda, filled with 12 oz. cups of shitty beer at $.25 each on quarter draft night. The "YES" man then takes the box back to the table where a bunch of "NO" people partake in the brew. Not bad for $6, huh? If you are good with your cash, you can spring for a 32 oz. Electric Lemonade or Long Island Ice Tea for $4.00. And for those who like doing a shooter from a test tube, there's the girl who is just hot enough to swindle you into paying twice as much as you would if you got it from the bar. The dance floor, cramped and crowded with sweaty bodies, moves as one to the music being pumped though the two big speakers that has caused me substantial hearing loss over my two years employed there. Elsewhere a fight breaks out over a questionable proximity in dancing space between a young man and someone else's date and both men are escorted out in accordance with the "You throw. You go.", policy. This also doubled for instances of not being able to hold your liquor and throwing up.

It's now 1:30AM and you have just a little time left to find that Ms. Right...or at least Ms. Right Now. You scan the dance floor for the one group of girls who have little sobriety left and make your best case as an object of beer goggles. Applying just the right amount of charm and additional alcohol, you score your date for the morning and make your way to the exit. Romance and foreplay are non issue as you find yourself dry humping your way to the car. Once you arrive at your dorm room destination you make the conscience decision to either just crash together with some light necking or test the limits of your roommates' ability to sleep through a nuclear explosion and go for the gold. After getting maybe an hour sleep, you have to shuffle yourself or your date out the door. You're mindful of the time because dawn brings out the catcallers all waiting for the walk of shame to begin. Everyone knows your business because they saw you the night before making your move. Rinse, lather and repeat, usually with someone different the next night.

While this is not earth shattering news to anyone who has ever gone to college, the microcosm of an Amusement Park environment lends itself to looser moral standings than that of its university counterpart. For one, it's summer break. Yes, you have the responsibility to run a multi-million dollar piece of machinery that has the capability of shooting human beings into the atmosphere at 60mph, but it's not like you're being graded on it. Mom and Dad aren't paying for you to work there. Think about that next time you get on an inverted roller coaster, like The Raptor, and you notice that the ride crew is in bad need of visine. Second, you are a seasonal employee. That means that for 12-16 weeks you will be thrown into the mix with 4000 other college age students who may never see you again. It's like Las Vegas mentality. You hook up and you leave. There's no sense of accountability. In three months, I'll never see these people again, who cares how I conduct myself. We even had a system by which to measure the hookup. I'm not even talking about the look or performance of the person. I'm talking about the distance. We called it the Shack Scale. This was a couple years before the term, "Hooking up" became the standard lingo for one night stands. Besides, "hooking up" doesn't give you a clear picture on what happened. It's too vague. We had the scale to give the degree of "shacking" that occurred. You would overhear a conversation in the employee cafeteria or around work areas that included the phrases "Yeah, I heard he picked her up at the bar and it was a Shack 1?" "That guy is such a skeeze. He had a 4 with three girls from my team in one week."

Shack Scale of 1996

Shack 1 = made out and spent the night
Shack 2 = heavy petting with exposed flesh
Shack 3 = Latin terminology....uh, oral sex.
Shack 4 = The Deed

By my second summer, we upped the ante and added an additional point for every person present in the room at the time of the shack. This only counted if you reached a four as it was harder to be quiet on a metal bed frame. 10 was the highest ever awarded as you could have roomed with 3 guys and they could have all had girls with them that evening. However, if you left before 7AM, none of it counted. This was the equivalent to crossing your finger behind your back when you swore to do something. It didn't negate the actual act but if you left before 7, you could beat the walk of shame and deny it ever happened. There have a lot of us that have secretly set someone's alarm for 6:50 once we sobered up enough to realize what or more to the point, who, we were doing.

Employee Health

Apart from the obvious health concerns outlined in the preceding, the ability to maintain good health was a harder than getting that stupid metal rod all the way to the bottom of a Wacky Wire game. In January of 1996, I weighed in at 214 pounds. At 5'10" that puts me a little on the pudgy side....ok more than a little. I did nothing out of the ordinary to lose any weight and as far as I knew it, I still weighed 214 pounds when I went to work at the park. In July, I weighed 177 pounds. I didn't exercise or change my eating habits. I got sick. In late May, I was working at an exposed game stand and during an especially damp day had gotten sick. I remember only wearing my uniform which consisted of a shirt and shorts. If available, I wore a windbreaker or pants over top, but at this point, I only had the windbreaker seen on my coworker in the picture at the top. The wind whipped down the midway at me sending me into an hour long shiver fest later that night. Run down, malnourished, and continually damp conditions when walking to the shower (The boards were gone from the windows allowing cold and wet air to breach the dorm hallways) caused me to contract walking pneumonia. I had no idea I was sick as I could still function normally. My mini vacation home in July confirmed my illness as well as the fact that I had lost 37 pounds in two months time. I was a strong antibiotic which made me extremely sick and I decided that it was in my best interest to quit early to fully recover before school. It may sound like a wuss move, but my health was directly related to my area of study and I needed to be on top of my game in order to handle the long hours.

Even those of us who took the most basic precautions to stay healthy would notice that within a couple weeks of employment we would lose our voice. It was almost like clockwork. Most employees sought out the medical clinic to be treated for pharyngitis. Until I worked there, I had never heard of the ailment, but I ended up with it my second year. When your job requires you to talk to guests, constantly, it is worst condition to have. It hurts to swallow and anything acidic, like orange juice or tomato sauce, burns like the hinges of hell. While no one is completely certain why the illness is a prevalent one among employees, most of us will claim that the number of cases diagnosed could be a direct result of the poor air quality in the area. Anyone who has been there can attest to noticing a foul smell in the air upon entering the Sandusky region. Do a search on Google for "Sandusky Quarry Smell." You'll see what I mean. Of course, it could be the fact that everyone and their brother is snogging everyone else making the park a very large Petri dish. I stand by my assertion as there is evidence that pollutants or chemical substances can cause the infection.

The Not So Bad

Debauchery and doctor visits aside, we did have a lot of fun toiling away our summers for little pay. One of the local movie theaters reserved some Monday nights as Cedar Point employee only nights allowing us discounted rates and complete availability to the joint. I remember going in a group of about 20 to see Independence Day on July 8th and then going back again the next Monday to see it another time. Otherwise, the workday for us consisted of working nearly a 12 hour shift in the park, going directly to the bar until last call, a sobering, grease filled meal at Denny's, then on to Meijer, a Walmartesque market chain, where we would spend three hours finding one or two items we needed while playing football in the aisles until way after 4AM. After that, we'd return to the dorm to crash for a couple hours and then start the whole process over. At least once a summer, we'd all schedule a day off and make trip to Put-in Bay. You could tell when park employees were there as most of the locals weren't prone to having demolition derbies with golf carts. Hey, as long as you had friends, you could never say it was boring. The friends I made at the park were some of the best I ever had. I still keep in touch with a good friend, who I consider like a brother. He was even a groomsman in my wedding and makes a trip once a year or so to visit. Because of our friendship, most people at the park would confuse the two of us with each other.

Sure, I endured a lot working there. After those two summers, I continually got bronchitis every winter from the damp conditions. Later, I found out I had developed asthma and began treating it and have been bronchitis free. Still, if I was that age again, I'd probably work there as would my friends. It was one of those experiences that defines your being, it ultimately makes you hate people who go to an amusement park. I've learned some like skills from my time there, like how to properly win at Bowler Roller without going broke. Since we were not allowed to play the games as employees, we'd clean out competing parks during a road trip. In the years that have passed, perhaps the things discussed here have become commonplace and accepted to the point where I'm just not in touch with the youth of America. Maybe it's better, maybe it's worse. Who's to say? One man's bedlam is another man's Babylon. One day, my own daughter may seek to work in an amusement park for the summer and I have no right to deny her the experience. However, if I ever hear her refer to anything with the word "shack" followed by a number, I'll ground her till the only income she can get is social security. I'm as serious as a heart attack on a roller coaster.