Mr. Tim's Wild Ride

Can’t really write a travel blog when you can’t travel. I’d write about fitness but I’m about to hang myself with my own resistance bands so that won’t work. This space is prepaid though so, lets just talk about the random things you never knew you needed when the world is ending.

To Guy Fieri, Casey, the guy who goes to carnivals and eats literal garbage, fire food bro and all of you over at The Cooking Channel; I just want to say thank you.

I never realized how much I enjoyed going to the grocery store on a daily basis. I’m not a leftovers guy so I stopped in at Publix or wherever after the gym everyday and picked up what I wanted to eat for dinner for that day. Maybe it was pork, maybe chicken, maybe lettuce (I miss you most of all fresh lettuce). I took fresh ingredients FOR GRANTED and much like the ability to walk after my knee surgery I swear (if my wife ever lets me leave the house again) that I will treasure my trips to the grocery store from here on out.

Why be thankful for The Cooking Channel though? They help me ESCAPE. I live VICARIOUSLY through these folks. 5lbs of Frito pie? Fuck yeah lets go. Smoking an entire pig by burying it in the ground for like 2 days? You son of a bitch I’m in. Aromatics??? YOU’RE SPEAKING MY LANGUAGE.

So thank you Triple D, Man vs. Food, Burgers, Brew and Que, et al. because without you, I couldn’t close my eyes and imagine what it’d be like to be able to consume a 5lb lobster roll half naked and sweating on the beach.

It’s our dreams that give us hope.

Can’t really write a travel blog when you can’t travel. I’d write about fitness but I’m about to hang myself with my own resistance bands so that won’t work. This space is prepaid though so, lets just talk about the random things you never knew you needed when the world is ending.

Oh Shop Vac, this isn’t the first time you’ve been there for me. You were there when I flooded my apartment. You were there when I flooded my house. You’ve been there every time the job has called for 6.5 HP of suction. Now here we are, at the end of the world, and you’re there for me again.

Have the rains come? Will I vainly attempt to vacuum up the torrents sent to wash away the world of man?

No. My kid is home from school for I don’t know how long and I’ve resorted to following him around with a Shop Vac because it’s just easier than sweeping all this stuff up. That and I’m pretty sure he hides the dustpan.

So I salute you, Shop Vac, and thank you for riding shotgun as we careen toward a preschool-free hellscape littered with discarded cereal boxes and rain the color of blood (I think its blackberry juice).

I’m declaring war on Pinterest. I’m only doing this because Pinterest (using my wife as its vessel) declared war on me a long time ago. You see, every time my wife shows me something she found on Pinterest (or any other social media platform for that matter), I take it as personal attack. I feel like she’s saying “Look what THIS PERSON did. Why didn’t YOU think of this??” She doesn’t actually say/think this, but it doesn’t make the attack any less real (or does it).

So a few weeks ago my wife leaned over and said “HEY LOOK AT THIS THING YOU CAN’T BUILD!” (no she didn’t). It was a Disney toy monorail playset suspended in an artificial Christmas tree. Feeling personally challenged, I decided to attempt the build. I (about midway through) decided to chronicle the process in picture form because A) maybe someone else would want to do this and B) I paid upfront for 3 years of this blog space and I need content so here you go.

Something to remember real quick before we get started: I consider most projects I attempt for the first time to be just a proof of concept. What I mean by this is that I try to construct them quickly (so as to not greatly impact what little free time I have) and inexpensively (because I’m not rich). I start with inexpensive materials that I feel will work for what I’m trying to do. Sure you could start with Oak or stainless steel or platinum or whatever, but why? I do quick, rough cuts with minimal finish to maximize my time. I typically dispose of or give away the proof of concept with the intention of building a finished product with everything I have learned at a later time.

So lets put a monorail in a tree.

Materials I used:

• 48″x48″x1/4″ underlayment from Home Depot (like 12 bucks)
• 1″x2″ x 8′ common board from Home Depot (like 3 bucks)
• Wood glue (like 4 bucks)
• Green Spray Paint (around 4 bucks)
• Fake snow wrapping (2 bags at about 6 bucks each)

So materials wise were just under 40 bucks. The example my wife showed me used a repurposed HO train kit designed to put a train in a tree similar to this. My way appears to be less expensive but you could make the argument that re-purposing the train kit is easier and thus a better value if you can pick up a used set. I guess here is where you have some thinking to do.

Tools I used:

• Pencil
• 1 screw
• screwdriver
• string
• 2 washers
• Jigsaw
• Hammer
• Chisel
• POWERED Staple Gun
• Drill
• holesaw or flat bit for drilling larger diameter holes in wood

You could potentially drop the jigsaw (if you don’t have one) and use a razor blade/shop knife with a simple materials change but I’ll touch more on that later.

Total job time (not including the dry time) was about 60 minutes.

The Build

Step 1) We need to draw some BIG circles. Find the center of your underlayment/support material and run a line the length and width intersecting at the center. Using the screwdriver, place the screw in the center. Take your assembled track (mine was 48″ in diameter) and lay it on your support material; centering it. Tie one end of the string to one washer and drop it over the screw. Take your string out past the track and affix the second washer. Remover your track and, using the pencil slid through the washer, trace your outer circumference of your support. Once you’ve finished that, shorten the guide string about 4″ or so and trace your inner circumference.

Step 2) Now that we have our track base traced, we need to trace the struts/supports. I used struts that were pretty much 4″ across, so find the lines you traced to identify your center and mark 2″ to the right and left of each of these lines. When you’re finished all your tracing, it should look something like this:

Step 3) Now that everything is marked out, its time to cut. You want to cut out/off everything marked in red.

Leaving you with:

Step 4) Now we need our cross braces. To get these you’re going to take that 8′ of 1″ x 2″ board and cut it in half. You’re then going to find the center of both and, using the chisel and hammer, cut out slots so you can fit them together like Lincoln Logs. It should look something like this:

Step 5) Lets glue everything up now. Lay down some beads of glue, fit your struts together and affix them to your support base. Clamp/lay heavy stuff of the whole thing and wait for it to dry. It’ll look like this:

Step 6) Now that everything has dried, find the center of this contraption and put a hole in it. Before doing this, you’ll want to find out the diameter of your Christmas tree support pole. Don’t eyeball it. Why shouldn’t you eyeball it? You may end up selecting a bit that’s just a tad too big because why would the manufacturer go with a 1 1/4″ support pole? You’d obviously just use 1 1/2″ because that’s a pretty typical support pole size (or at least it was in my mind). I was wrong.

Step 7) Provided you got the diameter of the hole right the first time, we can move ahead to painting the interior struts green to blend in.

Step 8) Now lets get the fake snow tacked on. This serves 2 purposes: 1) It looks pretty and 2) it helps to secure that lighter than literally the air monorail track to the support structure without having to permanently affix it with glue or something. I recommend using a POWERED staple gun because I love POWERED things. Sure you can use a regular staple gun I guess but you’re having less fun.

Step 9) Once the snow is tacked on, layout your track. Using a knife or razor blade, cut slits under the center of each monorail track support beam. Tuck the foot of the beam inside the snow.

Step 10) You’re done my dude/dudette! Drop this puppy on the tree, put your tree back together and proceed to wow children and adults alike. Nice job.

A couple observations for next time/your first time:

• On the advice of my father I opted to save ONE WHOLE DOLLAR by going with a less expensive 1″x2″x8′ stripping. This was a bad idea. The stripping was pretty green (wet) and warped a bit causing the support structure to be just a little wavy/uneven. You can’t really tell once its on the tree and wrapped, but being that it isn’t PERFECTLY level its secretly eating me alive inside. This doesn’t affect the overall performance of the monorail however.
• Instead of using wooden underlayment, you could probably get away with using a lighter, thinner cardboard composite peg board and cutting it out with a knife. As I said, the monorail track itself weighs virtually nothing and I feel like you’re never going to have enough load in one spot to cause an issue. If you’re looking for a forever piece though, it may not hold up as well in addition to potentially making the snow harder to affix.

I love POWER. I love RANKING and being RANKED. It makes total sense (to me anyway) that I would love POWER RANKINGS so much. Lets POWER RANK some parks.

1. Hollywood Studios– What a difference 6 months can make. 6 months ago you couldn’t get me to come to this park for a half day let alone have it at the top of my POWER list. Why is it at the top? First things first I’m a huge fan of overlays. I think every park should be decorated for every holiday. Christmas, Halloween, Easter, Independence Day, Arbor Day, My birthday, etc.. Hollywood Studios has some great Christmas decorations that remind me of my grandmothers decorations and really what says Christmas more than grandmas. Next, we have Galaxy’s Edge/Batuu/Star Wars land. Now, Batuu doesn’t seem to celebrate the holidays (yet I can only hope) and initially I wasn’t even that huge of a fan of the land (even though I love the Star Wars). There’s something about it though that keeps me coming back and wanting more and more. I find myself making an excuse to get to DHS to hang out in Galaxy’s Edge every time I’m out in Orlando now. The land has an incredible amount of atmosphere and detail that just sort of draws you in. That and the green milk. And the blue milk. I don’t even like milk but the milk on Batuu is legit. Last but not least, DHS has the Baseline Tap House which I love.
2. Magic Kingdom– The only thing better than the Magic Kingdom at Halloween is the Magic Kingdom at Christmas. I’m pretty sure you can see Cinderellas Castle from SPACE when its lit up. It’s something else.
3. Animal Kingdom– I haven’t been to AK in months but it still has to be better than Epcot right now.
4. Epcot– What have they done to my boy? Epcot, for the longest time, FOREVER, was my favorite park. Now it’s been reduced to an overpriced after hours nightclub only its not after hours at all its noon on a Tuesday. How many different variations of “drinking team” can you put on a T-Shirt?

Here’s a sweet visual representation:

It is my firm belief that all reviews should have a ratings system that can easily be broken down into a sweet acronym. I’m not 100% there yet, but we’re getting close. The T.R.A.V.E.L. system is going to be the guideline I use to review accommodations in the places I find myself in. Each letter represents something that is important to me (to an extent, like I said I’m working on it) when selecting accommodations. I do a pretty even mix of personal and business travel as well as traveling solo, with my wife, alone with my son and the 3 of us together. I use the same rough guidelines regardless of party make up, so I feel pretty good about being able to apply this in a variety of different situations.

Transportation- Transportation to and from a hotel as well as during my stay is a big deal for me as I’m sure it is for most people. In addition to just getting myself around, I need to consider my son who requires a car seat. Also, I like to use my own two feet when possible so walk-ability is important as well.

As far as transportation is concerned, the Sheraton Universal offers some solid options. To and from LAX (the airport we flew in to) we used Uber. The ride cost roughly 50 dollars and at a around noon pickup time took about an hour to reach the hotel. This probably could have been achieved in about 30-40 minutes, but our driver insisted on hitting max fuel efficiency for the trip. This resulted in a whole lot of two foot driving and a constant speed of about 44 miles an hour. Such is the ride share life. You also have taxi and Super Shuttle options. Like I said, we flew in and out of LAX, the largest airport on the West Coast, so providing you’re willing to pay, you could probably catch any kind of ride you can think of to the Sheraton.

Once at the Sheraton, you again have a variety of options for getting around. Ride shares were our preferred method of transport around LA/Burbank as I’d expect would be most peoples. There were cabs stationed outside the hotel at all hours as well. There is a single Zipcar option for this hotel and while picking up my Zipcar I noticed there were spots for other vehicle sharing services available. The Zipcar pickup location is pretty close, a well lit and elevated walkway away taking about 12 minutes to walk to from the 14th floor. There is a subway/train system available from the Metro Station across the street and if you were into it you could probably get all over the city with it. I’m not big into public transit in unfamiliar locations, so we skipped it.

While vehicle transport options are decent, walk-ability is pretty much zero (with an asterisk). Coming from Florida (where its all flat all the time), it felt to me like the hotel was situated on the side of a mountain. While I’m pretty sure you could roll down the hill with ease, getting back up could be challenging for some. Even if you were willing to trek shirpa-less back to your room, the fact remains that there isn’t a ton to do within walking distance. You have a few dining options and a shop or two within what I would call a reasonable distance (less than a mile) but that’s about it. Like I said earlier though, walk-ability comes with an asterisk because the hotel lies at the entrance to Universal Studios which has Universal City Walk. If you consider everything City Walk has to offer, you could argue that the walk-ability is actually extremely high. My walk-ability rating revolves around getting out and exploring the locale; eating, drinking and shopping local. Even though Universal Studios is literally right there, I have a tough time considering it local. The majority of shops and restaurants I’ve seen before and could get back home, so it wouldn’t be a place I’d want to hit when out of town.

For the first time in a long time my son didn’t make the trip with us. Even without him being there, I still found myself sizing up the situation as if he were and man would it have been grim. Adding a car seat to the mix would have made everything but the Zipcar a nightmare and even then you’d still have to carry the car seat down the mountain to the car. At 50 dollars a night for overnight parking, a rental car would be out of the question for me as well. If you’re only planning on visiting Universal Studios and maybe making a day trip to Disneyland, you could probably get by on walking and Zipcar. If you’re looking to explore LA though, good luck.

Room- Rooms matter to me wayyyyy more than the resort they are in. You could have the nicest resort with the biggest pool and the best bar around, but if the room is small with a bad view and an uncomfortable bed, Imma head out

The room we had at the Sheraton Universal was great. The second time. The first time we were tired and just took what was available, a unit on the first floor of the hotel. It was still a nice room, but it was much smaller than what we ended up with. In addition to the size difference, the first room had an exit that lead straight out into a publicly accessible parking lot. I need unnecessary levels of lock down to feel comfortable (both because my son is Harry Houdini and I have an irrational fear of home invasions) , so this was a no go for me.

Our second room was beautiful. It was nice and spacious with a good size shower and bathroom. I felt there was a good degree of closet space though drawer space was lacking. It came with a good size fridge as well which is nice. There was a desk with a chair should you need to do some work, USB ports for charging phones, etc. and a couch. The bed was ideal for me, a bit on the firm side but soft enough with good sheets and a down comforter. I always find myself picking up toys so out of habit I check underneath nightstands, etc. and I can say that those areas tend to be filthy in a lot of the places we go. This wasn’t the case at the Sheraton Universal though, the room was exceptionally clean.

The view was phenomenal. I couldn’t stop looking out the window every moment we were in the room. If I had wanted to look at something else, a nice size internet enabled TV was available. Like I said though, I had no need for it, this view was great.

Area- This one is kind of a no brainer. I want the area around the hotel to be RELATIVELY clean and safe.

The area around the Sheraton Universal felt nice and safe to me. I didn’t have any issues walking to and from my Zip car after dark nor did I have any issues getting up and going for coffee in the morning.

Value- I’ve always felt like value is a sliding scale. Value means different things to different people. To me, value is try to hit that price to everything else ratio as close to even as possible. I don’t need the cheapest room but I also don’t want to overpay for something that isn’t important to me.

We got a rate of about 209 dollars per night plus applicable taxes due on arrival through the group booking associated with the wedding we were attending. When booking, I also saw that I could have gotten a similar rate using our Marriott Rewards number but needed to pay that amount up front. I’ve had a couple trips cancelled at the last minute due to LIFE over the years, so paying on arrival is a value add to me. Based on these figures, I feel like the Sheraton Universal was a great value. As I’ve said, transportation options were decent, the room and view were nice and the area was great considering its proximity to Universal Studios. Beyond these points, the hotel as a whole was very nice. There is a restaurant (while we didn’t sit down to eat there, we did have at the bar what was promised to us as THE BEST QUESADILLA ON THE PLANET. It was quite good) and a nice pool area. Factor in the proximity to Burbank, Hollywood and Disneyland and you have a great location with which to base a weeks worth of activities out of.

Exercise- When I’m out in the world I want to sample everything a place has to offer and I feel a lot better about doing that if I can get up and get the blood pumping. You can find a good workout in more places than just a gym, so having options available is always a good thing.

Eh, I was kind of a lazy bum this trip and didn’t even make it to the hotels workout room to check it out. I didn’t bother trying to locate a gym in the area either. What I will say though, is that the area immediately surrounding the hotel could offer some pretty strenuous hill training if you’re into it. I’m not sure what the grade is on Universal Hollywood Dr., but it seemed steep to me. Couple that initial hill with the steps up to City Walk and the grade leading to the back of the complex and you have yourself a pretty good workout I would think.

Libations(?)- This one may change. I had a tough time coming up with an L word and my wife suggested libations (she has a more robust vocabulary) so we will go with that for now. I’m not an alcoholic I swear.

I had the chance to try out two breweries new to me on this trip, Gordon Biersch and Karl Strauss Brewing Company. Gordon Biersch is a brew pub with 25 locations across the United States. The location I visited was in Burbank and I liked it a lot. I had their Marzen and Schwarbier and felt they were quite good. I like beer but am in no way a beer connosiuer so you’re not going to get descriptions of complex flavor profiles and hints of notes from me. What I had I liked and would have it again.

Karl Strauss Brewing Company is a California brewer with locations from San Diego to LA. I visited the location at City Walk and had the Aurora Hoppyalis IPA which I really enjoyed. We attempted to go back on a different day but unfortunately they were having issues with their taps.

Overall, I really enjoyed my stay at the Sheraton Universal hotel. With solid transportation options, a nice room, safe area, good value, some exercise opportunities and decent beer options, we were really happy we elected to stay here over a less expensive Air BnB.

But….

The elevators. The elevators ALMOST ruined this trip and had I known about the issues with them ahead of time I may not have booked here (I definitely would have taken the 1st floor room over the 14th floor room). I’ve been stuck in elevators before, it happens. I have NEVER been stuck in an elevator TWICE, for 15-20 minutes each time, in an HOUR. What really pissed me off was that, after the first time I got stuck, I went immediately down to the front desk to inform the hotel manager of the issue (an issue that the hotel was clearly aware of as they had crews working on the guest elevator bank upon our arrival and during our stay). The first time I was stuck with two other guys and after 15 minutes of dead air with no response to the emergency call button, the door was wrenched open by the one among us who had clearly never seen a Faces of Death video in his life. The second time, I’m ashamed to admit, was the same elevator. In my defense, it was the elevator I informed the hotel manger of and (being that it was in service) I figured whatever issue it had encountered before had been corrected. NOPE. This time I was with my wife who is claustrophobic so the situation deteriorated rather quickly. Using the call button this time, we were linked with an operator who either couldn’t understand us or couldn’t hear us or a combination of both. We were in the elevator roughly 15 minutes before a maintenance supervisor came to inform us our rescue was underway. After another five minutes, we went up 5 floors and were released. We were on our way to an event with a hard start time on the other side of LA and had zero time to address the situation with the manager. In hindsight, I’m grateful for this. In our room later that evening, we were delivered a nice cheese tray with a note from the hotel manager apologizing for our issues.

The service elevators were available for guest use during our stay and I can only assume it was due to the issues with the guest elevator bank. We didn’t even attempt usage of the guest elevators after our experience and every time I noticed someone waiting for one I let them know about the service elevators. I could only help thinking about two things though every time we used a service elevator and they were “This is an interesting combination of smells” and “Man the staff must HATE this”. Imagine you’re just trying to do your job, taking a cart of food to the 10th floor, but you have to share that elevator with a family of 5 loaded down with luggage. Half the time the staff couldn’t even get in the elevators as the were always full.

We got some conflicting information about the elevator issues. The problems weren’t mentioned to us at all on arrival. Talking with different guests I was told that their was an issue with a power outage in the previous weeks that had led to issues. When I related this story to still other guests, I was told that the issues with the elevators had been encountered by them months before hand. Who knows.

Edit: My wife heard back from Sheraton

If my wife isn’t happy with you, you’re getting a letter (or an email). Sometimes we hear back, sometimes we don’t. This time we did and it went like this:

“Dear Ms. Wild Ride,

I am glad you were here to spend some precious time with your close friend who you haven’t seen for years. I wanted to reach out to you and your husband to personally apologize for the elevator challenges.

We had two guest elevators that became inoperable as of 6/15 due to an area power outage. When the power came back, the surge damaged the controllers (brains) of those two elevators beyond repair. The parts are not manufactured any more. We had to have those custom-built which took 2 months to be delivered. So the guest was absolutely correct when he mentioned the elevators were down 3 months ago.

What we did not anticipate was the malfunction during your stay. After 3 long months, we finally had those two elevators completely re-done and passed city inspector’s thorough inspection the week you were here. We were celebrating having them back up and running. Little did we know that a few things needed to be adjusted after the elevators sat idle for that long. The safety device on the elevators are very sensitive and shuts it down whenever it senses any abnormal signals. We were never release the elevators for guests to ride on if we had known any potential risks. Please accept my sincerest apologies for causing you and your husband discomfort and anxiety due to the problems.

I wasn’t on property at that time. The hotel contacted me to let me know so I instructed Ernesto to prepare something on the hotel’s behalf to acknowledge the incident. I saw front desk manager credited your Marriott Bonvoy account 35,000 points and applied a $30 discount on your room rate for that night. I think we can do better than that. I am having our accounting department to adjust off that night entirely and issue a refund to your Visa Card ending XXXX. The process usually takes 5 to 10 business days, depending on the bank. You should see a credit of $207.10 on your statement when it goes through to your bank.

Once again, I am terribly sorry for your experience. But I do hope you will be back for us to better serve you.

Sincerely,

General Manager
Sheraton Universal”

Thanks Sheraton Universal! Aside from the compensation, I am really happy with the fact that the GM took the time to explain the situation to us. While I still have some questions, I feel more than adequately compensated for the issues we experienced. Beyond that, I look forward to staying at Sheraton hotels going forward knowing that this is the type of follow-up I can expect.

For some, photography is a hobby where they can display their artistic vision or capture precious moments. For me, photography is a stress inducing obsession with making sure I capture every single moment/action/object and painstakingly cataloguing them only to never actually look at them again. This series will be an attempt to actually share some of this stuff finally.

With all of the changes Epcot is currently going through, it got me nostalgic for the days of giant wands, topiary dinosaurs and monoliths in their heyday. Below are a few images I took (on what in some images appears to be a poorly functioning potato) of Epcot during a trip sometime in 2005. I fully understand not a one of these images is worthy of a watermark, but I spent good money on Adobe Photoshop Elements and I have to use it for something.

Hope you enjoyed them!

I don’t know what it is, but something about a gauntlet and a few stones that can alter reality as we know it speaks to my humble aspirations. Whether it be shirts or mugs or Funko Pops, I can’t get enough Infinity Gauntlet.  About a year or so back I was drinking coffee out of my Infinity Gauntlet mug when I noticed a red Magic Band sitting on my desk. Looking at the band then back to the mug, I had an idea. I went through my office and found two more bands, a blue and a purple. With 3 of the 6 stones in hand (a better start than Thanos had) I began my quest to complete the aptly named: Magic Gauntlet.

The build (dwarven space forge not included)

Hey kid/adult kid do you want to build your own Magic Gauntlet?? It’s super easy (and if you can bring yourself to build it by just buying the bands instead of insisting they all had to be obtained through trips to WDW/Annual Passes) its relatively inexpensive!

Let’s start with a list of materials.

First you need the gauntlet. If you, like me, find yourself in a TJ Maxx/Home Goods on a biweekly basis then you’ve probably seen this big foam gauntlet at some point on clearance. Hopefully you bought it then and if you did, good for you. However, if you picked it up and put it on and played with it a bit and made snapping noises then put it back and walked away, you, like me, have to find it on eBay and pay 4x what it was at TJ Maxx.

Next you’ll need the Magic Band 2.0 pucks. You can get the bands by purchasing them directly or staying at WDW/having an annual pass and selecting the colors you need when redeeming them in My Disney Experience. I only had three of the required 6 pucks when I first got the idea and I wanted to complete it naturally so it took me another few months to get the other pucks I needed. I also wanted each of the pucks to be linked to my account so I could use the gauntlet at the parks; so no getting them from my wife or anyone else.

I wanted to be able to remove the pucks so I opted to secure them with magnets. I went with 18*4mm magnets I picked up off Amazon. You can find them here. Not only did the magnets fit perfect and hold great but it also made the whole assembly process way easier than I thought it was going to be as you’ll see below.

Finally we need some tools and adhesives. You’re going to want to gather:

• Pliers
• Hair dryer (not pictured)
• Philips head eyeglass screwdriver (not pictured)
• Super glue
• Hot Glue and a hot glue gun
• A dremel/rotary tool with a 1/2in sanding drum mandrel (this is what I used, you may be able to find something that works just as well)

Now we’re ready to assemble!

Let’s start with removing the bubble stones from the gauntlet. I did this by heating the bubbles with a hair dryer, gripping them with the pliers, and rocking them gently back and forth until they came free. I don’t have any pictures of this part of the process as I got rid of the bubbles immediately after I took them off (choking hazard for my boy) but it’s pretty straightforward. You want to be careful not to melt or rip the foam surrounding each bubble.

Now that we have the bubbles off, let’s get the pucks. Use the eyeglass screw driver to remove the two tiny screws on the back of the band and pop the puck out.

Now it’s time to create the sockets for the magnets that will secure the pucks. It is really easy to make a big mistake here if you use the method I did so just take it slow and be careful.

Start your rotary tool with the sanding mandrel in place and slowly drill into the center of the existing socket. You’re going to go about 8mm deep (the depth of 2 magnets). Make sure you’re wearing some type of dust mask/safety glasses as this will create a good bit of foam dust.

Next, using the hot glue gun, put some hot glue in the bottom of the socket. Take 2 magnets attached to each other and press them into the hole. Let it dry for a bit.

Now to secure the puck. This is where the superglue comes in. Put a tiny bit on the puck itself and press it onto the magnet you have secured in the socket. Having the magnet already in the socket helps to ensure that the puck looks to be sitting correctly even if the pitch/placement of your magnets is a bit off.

Repeat the process five more times and that’s it! You have successfully created a Magic Gauntlet to impress men, women and children the galaxy over. Thanos would be proud.

Now only if you could use it to snap the wait time for Smugglers Run in half…..

There is (was???) a hurricane bearing down on the state of Florida. I’ve seen a lot of people asking “Hey if there is a hurricane that wipes out central Florida; what happens to my fastpass for Smugglers Run???”. Well, potentially life altering catastrophic event aside, I was curious to find out what the answer to this question was.

The world isnt actually ending but its Florida at 4pm on a Tuesday in the summer

Heyyyy so welcome to Florida in the summer in the afternoon. Its going to rain and with rain comes lightning. Lightning tends to shut a lot of rides down so what happens to your Splash Mountain fastpass?

Good news! Your fastpass doesn’t just disappear! We were in the parks recently (Magic Kingdom with a fastpass for Jungle Cruise) and for whatever reason the ride wasn’t running. We were informed by both the cast members at the entrance and the My Disney Experience app that we were being given complimentary replacement fastpasses for almost any other ride in the park for that day. NICE (with some exceptions)! We couldn’t just moonwalk into Seven Dwarves Mine Train( there are limitations), but it was good for most other rides at any other point in that day.

BUT THE APOCALYPSE

So you’re in Florida during hurricane season for a major park addition opening and you have a fastpass for the premier ride of said land and it just so happens a hurricane shows up and the park closes; what happens? I’ve seen this question asked A LOT. Is it insensitive to be concerned about a fastpass when a potentially catastrophic weather event is looming on the horizon??? Yes, probably, but I FEEL YOU. You’re not a jerk, you’re just curious. I can understand that, I was curious too, so I did what I tend to do when I have a question I want an answer too, I went to find the answer.

I figured the easiest way to do this was just call (407) WDisney and just ask so that’s what I did. After an awkward explanation as to of why I was asking what I was asking (I mean I am sensitive to catastrophic weather events, I live here) I was told simply “You lose it”. O-ok my dude, I get that. Obviously I cant use my Smugglers Run fastpass during a hurricane, but if that’s a once in a lifetime fastpass for my family and now I cant use it, what do I do? This is a real concern for a lot of people and natural disasters aside, what does happen? Well, when I pressed my man on the other side of the line, I was told that this is a newer ride so avenues of replacement fastpasses haven’t really been explored so its best to get with Guest Relations upon your return visit to discuss options.

So that’s it, get with Guest Relations.

I understand this was a jerk question to ask this guy and I don’t know what I expected to hear when I asked it. Like I said, I live here. If you ask me if I think the beach will still be around for your vacation 3 days after a hurricane is slated to come through my back yard; you’re not going to get a pleasant answer either. That being said, I was a little disappointed with the answer I was given. Being told “You lose it” isn’t what I expected to be told. Currently (as you’ve seen above) when a ride closes due to weather or whatever other reason, you’re given a fastpass to use for a different ride elsewhere in the park later that day. You’re informed of this by both cast members at the entrance of the attraction you expected to ride as well as the My Disney Experience app. With this being a new attraction in what is expected to be the busiest addition to a park basically ever, I thought I would be given something else in addition to just “Go to Guest Relations and work it out with them”. Weather and all that not withstanding, what if the ride just breaks and needs to be shut down? That happens, it happens a lot. I figured I’d be offered a bit more information to as of what I could do to recoup that ever so precious fastpass but it turns out, NOPE.

So that’s it. If you’re in the park and your scheduled fastpass is impacted by weather or some other event, you can expect a notification and a replacement of the affected fastpass in your My Disney Experience app. It may (the replacement fastpass) or may not be usable for the attraction impacted by the closure. If your fastpass/reservation is for something along the lines of the Smugglers Run attraction though, be prepared for a visit to Guest Relations if you’re expecting some type of compensation.

Good luck and stay safe (dry)!