"What Is This, a Crossover Episode?"-HHN 29, Universal, & A Little Disney (Sep 2019)-Completed 1/6-New PTR Link

lol...….tv movies are so dreadful, but you can`t stop watching them!!! And drunk convention folks are the worst....so loud and overbearing!

The resort does look beautiful at night......
 
lol...….tv movies are so dreadful, but you can`t stop watching them!!! And drunk convention folks are the worst....so loud and overbearing!

The resort does look beautiful at night......

Lol yes! (And yes about the convention folk too!)

It’s a lovely resort! I wish we had time to explore more of it.
 
Rookies in Batuu
September 17th, Part 1

Originally we were going to go to Food & Wine this day, but it was so hot out I couldn't really picture eating a bunch of food outside. So we made a last minute change, and decided to check out Batuu since crowds were nowhere near as crazy as we'd feared while planning.

After lunch and Samantha winning some TSMM:


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We reconvened at our favorite place to go in HS, tipsy or sober, which is apparently this poster from The Rookie.

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(I do have to say, I really like this show though especially this new season).

After getting a selfie with Nathan Fillion in and securing a promise from Samatha that she "wouldn't make me be in a Star Wars" we headed to Batuu.

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As many of you might know, I'm not a Star Wars fan. I've seen the first 6 movies, but I didn't care for them, (or retain much from them). Samantha does love Star Wars though, and I love Disney Parks so I did want to check it out. I just didn't want to be involved in some of the more interactive elements of this area, and I figured it wouldn't have a lot of appeal to me. (Also I was not planning on calling bathrooms, refreshers :laughing:).

I will try my best to describe what's going on, but for some of it I'm not sure. :rotfl:



So when we first walked in it was a bit of a walk till we got to anything. Samantha was Facetiming her husband (who's also a fan), and for the first bit there wasn't much to show him, and she ended up waiting till we got further in to call him back. The crowds were much, much lower than I ever anticipated. In fact there didn't seem to be very many people in there at all. The walkways were big, and there was a lot of room to move around in. Generally we saw relatively low crowds across our trip (aside from some nights at HHN in the beginning), so it doesn't seem Batuu's opening had the effect everyone anticipated. (Though I do wonder if some of that is because so many people anticipated the crowds, that many decided to stay away).

Shortly after entering we sought out some Blue and Green Milk. We had mobile ordered in case of case of crowds, but there was no line so we hadn't really needed to. We found some shade to drink them in, and I stayed there for awhile while Samantha interacted with a passing Stormtrooper.


Hollywood Brown Derby & Milk Stand in Batuu Review

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We found the Millennium Falcon.
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There was a PP spot across from it, and I like how these all turned out even though they did make us do the sassy twin pose at one point. :rotfl:

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#ThanksPhotopass



We didn't go to Oga's (we'd ended up canceling our reservation), but the part I thought was coolest was the Marketplace. (Figures I'd like the mall even on another planet :laughing:, although the shopping here wasn't really to my taste).




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Samantha bought some of those knitted looking Star Wars characters in a shop outside (they were pretty cute) while I stood in front of a large fan, and then we decided to head out because as the day before it was very, very hot out, and Batuu isn't too shady of a place.

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Overall I didn't really expect to be wowed by Batuu because I'm not a Star Wars fan. I see where it's impressive and immersive for fans, but it probably won't be a place we visit too often. (Josh isn't really a Star Wars fan either). Due to my motion sickness I'm not sure if the ride would be okay for me (we didn't try to go on it because Samantha wanted to ride for the first time when she came back with her husband, but the waits were lower than we'd thought all week).

I would like to try Oga's someday, but most the food places don't really appeal to me either. I will say, I know it isn't supposed to be much different than the DL one, but I would like to see that one. I watched a lot of the DL opening coverage (because it opened first), and t I remember seeing the drone footage from that one and being pretty impressed by what I saw. I know there isn't any major differences, but I'd like to see it in person.

Back in the room we saw this very strange commercial multiple times while watching another Lifetime movie. :laughing:


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Next Up
We go to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party!


 
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I will try my best to describe what's going on, but for some of it I'm not sure. :rotfl:
Batuu stuff :rotfl::

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:rotfl2:

#ThanksPhotopass
Bringing back an old fave: #ThanksPhotopass :laughing: Honestly, the majority of my PP photos could use that hashtag :laughing:

Ideally it'll be April 17th-25th
Awesome! And you won't have to worry about snow storms or hurricanes this time around :thumbsup2

Would you pick the first week it's running or the second?
What do you think the differences will be crowd-wise? That would play strongly into my decision, but I also get the appeal of your other considerations, too!
 
Bringing back an old fave: #ThanksPhotopass :laughing: Honestly, the majority of my PP photos could use that hashtag :laughing:

Mine too:rotfl:

Awesome! And you won't have to worry about snow storms or hurricanes this time around :thumbsup2

Haha, well I thought that last year and then Baltimore had a tornado and we got stuck in Denver for the night :laughing: But hopefully that was a one time thing.


What do you think the differences will be crowd-wise? That would play strongly into my decision, but I also get the appeal of your other considerations, too!

Opening weekend is probably more crowded, but we’ve done both before and it just depends on the day imo. The last few years Fridays have been the most crowded I’ve seen. We also are considering getting the every night EP ticket so we might not have to worry. I did just find out a Supernatural convention is in the area the first weekend, and I’ve always wanted to try going to one so that’s pushing me towards that weekend. (Although then I get to figure out how we’ll do both haha) If we can leave on Thurs instead of Fri we’d have the same amount of nights too.



 
Guess who decided to show up to this party??

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This is the first time I've been back on the Dis since getting back from this trip...two months ago?? I just couldn't bring myself to do it, I don't know why. I think it's because for the first time in like six years I don't have a trip planned :sad::sad:

From the vlogs I've realized that nothing about me looks good when the camera is below me looking up, LOL. They are all bringing back fun memories though, and I feel like I'm out of my "avoid all things trip" mood.

You have officially got me onboard the Horror Nights train, and I find myself missing it a LOT and often. I am still surprised by how many people had babies and little kids with them. That was weird.

While watching the first day of Disney vlog with the safari :rotfl: I think the first thing I told Matt and the boys about when i got home was the lady on the safari exclaiming over every.single.thing.she.saw. And then I am watching and I hear, "ooh look at that" while the flamingos are on screen and I died. It's 100% how my grandparents would be if they were there.
 


OMG! I was so far behind!!!!!

Next we were checking into the Gran Destino:

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I have a version of this as my screen saver on my phone. So beautiful! I didn't quote your comment about checking in but we had a rough check in there as well. I hope they work out there issues.

And we decided to head to Three Bridges Bar & Grill to finish off our Food & Wine-ing:

Three Bridges Bar & Grill Review

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I have to hop over and read about how you guys liked 3 Bridges. We loved it BUT we were there early, so there was NOT a lot of drunk conventioners.
 
Guess who decided to show up to this party??

kramer.gif

Yay! :cheer2:

This is the first time I've been back on the Dis since getting back from this trip...two months ago?? I just couldn't bring myself to do it, I don't know why. I think it's because for the first time in like six years I don't have a trip planned :sad::sad:

It's kind of weird to me that we probably won't be back before HHN, we've been doing Christmas trips the last few years. I know you'll plan a trip soon!

From the vlogs I've realized that nothing about me looks good when the camera is below me looking up, LOL. They are all bringing back fun memories though, and I feel like I'm out of my "avoid all things trip" mood.

Lol, I was watching some older ones the other day, and I was like is my voice really like that? :rotfl: The one I have coming up has a hilarious moment in it.

You have officially got me onboard the Horror Nights train, and I find myself missing it a LOT and often. I am still surprised by how many people had babies and little kids with them. That was weird.

I know I miss it sooo much :sad: That was weird, I haven't felt like there were as many in previous years, but I saw them everywhere this year. When I was watching Marathon of Mayhem a second time with Alyssa and Zack the woman next to us was holding a crying baby.

While watching the first day of Disney vlog with the safari :rotfl: I think the first thing I told Matt and the boys about when i got home was the lady on the safari exclaiming over every.single.thing.she.saw. And then I am watching and I hear, "ooh look at that" while the flamingos are on screen and I died. It's 100% how my grandparents would be if they were there.

That lady :rotfl:

I have a version of this as my screen saver on my phone. So beautiful! I didn't quote your comment about checking in but we had a rough check in there as well. I hope they work out there issues.

It is! I hope they figure things out soon, I was surprised because it seemed like she really didn't want to even try to help, just wanted us to drop it and go. And if we thought it would've been complicated we would've tried to take care of it beforehand.
 
MNSSHP
September 17th, Part 2

So something I forgot to mention earlier was that when we got to the elevators to go back to our rooms, a lady (just another guest), randomly asked us while we were waiting for the elevator if we needed her to show us where anything was. he was definitely a guest, as I think she even had luggage with her. We didn't take her up on that strange offer.
Anyway when we last left off we were on our way to MNSSHP. Here we are in our matching shirts:


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We decided to take a Minnie Van to avoid the same mistakes we made with Villains After Hours.

We had arrived!


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I like to imagine we're in Halloweentown when I see these. Not from the Nightmare Before Christmas movie, but from the DCOM movie Halloweentown.

We were led down a little side path with candy, PP spots, and statues of the characters in Halloween costumes.

Things hadn't really started up yet so we decided to try some of the snacks before lines got crazy.


MNSSHP Snacks Review

On the way there I got this picture of the castle. :lovestruc

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The vlog is a little out of order because I split it into two parts, but after that we decided to go towards Pirates, because we wanted to ride Haunted Mansion when it was dark out, and the party was in full swing. The Halloween music had just started and the sun was still setting so we weren't quite there yet.

My favorite guy in the Pirates queue was the guy that :rotfl: screamed when he saw this man's light up necklace and said that it was sorcery.

There were more characters throughout the ride than there had been for the Villains After Hours Event, and it was really fun. Samantha's favorite "the man who needs a key but could easily walk out of the room" was another returning character.
Though you cannot tell at all from this PP picture that we were having a good time.


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#ThanksPhotopass

Not only do all of us look incredibly bored or unhappy, (one guy looks mildly amused) but no one is looking at the camera. It looks like the entire boat was in a terrible mood when this picture was taken. :rotfl: I think this picture belongs in a museum of bad PP pictures.

With that misery over :laughing:, it was time to head back to the Haunted Mansion.

Lady Carlotta was hilarious as always.

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Again we look offended and maybe a little confused, and I seem unsure of my hand placement which I should be, because whatever I'm doing with my hands looks weird.

#ThanksPhotopass

But my very favorite #ThanksPhotopass moment from the night (and the Pirates one is hard to top) goes to this moment....


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AHHH scary...air?

THEY NEVER PUT THE GHOST IN!!!:rotfl:

They were having problems with the camera, and we probably held our pose for like 5 mins straight, and it uh didn't pay off.

We had to check out the Mad Tea Party overlay.

Shortly before the fireworks we slipped into a pretty good spot. The hard part was keeping it as people kept trying to squeeze in where there was no room. But we banded together with the family next to us, and we all made sure we stayed in place. :laughing:

I liked the Jack puppet:


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But honestly I liked the former firework show better. I think the music/show just flowed better, and it had more energy. And like 2 months out, I find this show to be kind of forgettable, and not one I'd go out of my way to watch again.

We figured now was the time to get our spot for Boo To You so that's pretty much where we spent the rest of the night. Before the parade some PP people came around, and we took these pictures that we thought would come out really cute....


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I promise you we were happier than we looked! #ThanksPhotopass



As always Boo To You was a lot of fun, and I love the song. We shopped a bit on the way out, but didn't get anything, and with that MNSSHP was over! When these parties end it always feels like we got a lot done, but that there was so much more we could've done.

Especially when you want to see the fireworks and parade. Overall we had fun at the event and the snacks were great this year. The only downside was I wasn't a huge fan of the new fireworks show. But everything was an improvement on the Villains Event, even the ride overlays. Samantha and I always have fun together though, and we have all those weird PP pictures to remember the night by. :rotfl:



I wrote that we got back around 1 am, and also I'm apparently repressing the memory of a near death experience, because I don't remember this but my notes state: "Bus driver almost killed us, went the wrong way, and stopped abruptly."

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Next Up
Our morning in Magic Kingdom


 
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Love your Disney Halloween Party pics.....it looks so beautiful and yes, I’m sure you were both happier than the picture shows.......lol......

But the Pirates boat.....oh my.....it was funny it looked like you all agreed before hand to look not very happy....well, apart from that one guy.....there’s always one!!

Very odd about the woman asking if you needed help.......

As for HHN.......I’m a fan of the opening weekend.....although you’re right about the first Friday‘s being mobbed out!!! That was among our busiest nights last few years......but.......I’d still vote for it.......there’s something about the firsts of the event......and over the next nights you see it progress......but if you do go with EP for all your nights, it’ll be fine......:thumbsup2

Enjoying your report a lot!! You do both look like you’re having a blast with some lovely pictures.....
 
As a result of this I'll probably be vlogging less in the Disney parks when we go
:sad: I totally get it though. I'd have the same reservations and concerns. I can understand the desire to make content safe for kids, but... the new policies also don't seem flawless to me by any stretch. I don't like the inability to search aspect at all. I guess we'll see how it all plays out.

But I also figured a Disney channel name might get me flagged as a kids channel.
Good point.

However fear not @Tracy161 my into will stay the same! (With the addition of my new channel name).
Phew! :thumbsup2 THANK YOU!
 
Love your Disney Halloween Party pics.....it looks so beautiful and yes, I’m sure you were both happier than the picture shows.......lol......

Thank you! Lol, I don't know why we look so unhappy in every photo it wasn't even as hot as some of the other nights. :rotfl:

But the Pirates boat.....oh my.....it was funny it looked like you all agreed before hand to look not very happy....well, apart from that one guy.....there’s always one!!

I love that picture :lmao:

As for HHN.......I’m a fan of the opening weekend.....although you’re right about the first Friday‘s being mobbed out!!! That was among our busiest nights last few years......but.......I’d still vote for it.......there’s something about the firsts of the event......and over the next nights you see it progress......but if you do go with EP for all your nights, it’ll be fine......:thumbsup2

It's true. One of the things I was most disappointed about this year was not being able to go for opening weekend. I believe I requested our week thinking it'd be the first without knowing. Having that extra Wed night was nice, but I ended up requesting the first week. Both for HHN's opening weekend, and because there's a convention I want to attend in Orlando that weekend. Now hopefully I'll get that one, and maybe I can request the Thurs it opens on too.

Enjoying your report a lot!! You do both look like you’re having a blast with some lovely pictures.....

Thank you!

:sad: I totally get it though. I'd have the same reservations and concerns. I can understand the desire to make content safe for kids, but... the new policies also don't seem flawless to me by any stretch. I don't like the inability to search aspect at all. I guess we'll see how it all plays out.

I'm hoping with the backlash that maybe there'll be some clarification or changes before it actually goes into effect, but I'm not sure. It's really confusing, and I feel really bad for people who made a living on Youtube since this affects so many different little niche communities and hobbies. I feel like I shouldn't be upset because it isn't a huge deal to me if people can't find them (since I don't make any money off them), but it's just really disappointing since I put them up as a hobby/for fun, and now it feels like I have to take everything super seriously and make sure I don't film certain things and think about how to classify each video. (Because each video leaves me with different questions. Like when I'm at Universal would Harry Potter make it a kids video? Or no because it's not animated? What happens if in the same video I have a character meet but also drink a margarita? Do more PG13 movies like Star Wars and Marvel movies count as "for kids"? Do firework videos count because those songs are "familiar to children"? etc )

I also don't want to take down videos, but I will if I have to. I don't really care about some of the missing aspects, but losing the search or even have people see them in their feed without looking for them and then not being able to interact with them is the worst for me. I had some review videos get relatively popular (I assume because of the search function), and though it wasn't the intention it was nice to think maybe they helped someone else plan. I'm seeing a lot of worse case scenario stuff about it and someone even said that private videos would be subject to penalty too? I'm hoping it's not as harsh as they say, since people are already deleting their whole channels because of it. None of my videos got marked by Youtube, but I'm not sure what that means since I'm sure small channels aren't their biggest priority. But there's quite a few with character interactions that I could see falling into "for kids" with the new rules.

Good point.

I'm trying to take "Disney" out of a lot of titles too which idk if that would actually help. Honestly, it'll probably just make videos harder to find when searching too even if it means I don't have to mark them "for kids". :confused3

Phew! :thumbsup2 THANK YOU!

:thumbsup2

Sounds like a fun Halloween party! It's always so hard to do everything you want at these events but sounds like you got a good amount accomplished!

It was! I think I would've tried some more snacks if we had time :rotfl: But I do think we got to all the good ones, and we got pretty much everything we wanted too accomplished except meeting the Gravediggers.
 

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:



I wrote that we got back around 1 am, and also I'm apparently repressing the memory of a near death experience, because I don't remember this but my notes state: "Bus driver almost killed us, went the wrong way, and stopped abruptly."

I remember this! He missed one of the bus stops at the resort and almost ran over a curb/bushes which is why he slammed on the brakes and then backed up to go the right way, LOL.
 
I remember this! He missed one of the bus stops at the resort and almost ran over a curb/bushes which is why he slammed on the brakes and then backed up to go the right way, LOL.

I definitely repressed this memory :laughing: But now that you say that I do kind of remember that. We ended Mickey's Not So Scary with the scariest bus ride ever. :rotfl:
 
I was super far behind and quoted like a billion things so sorry for this marathon reply lol.

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I don't know either. Was he hoping despite being on my way to a theme park I'd be like "You know what sir you're right, I am too old for this!"

Thank you sir- I have seen the light and will immediately cancel this vacation and go home.

Paper straws and Butterbeer work terribly together btw.

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Ugh that is the most accurate thing I've ever seen lol

Most importantly....Halloween decorations!

Super far behind here but I love them.


Oo I love this!

I promise you we didn't cause any mayhem :rotfl: that's just the name of the lagoon show at HHN

:rotfl: :rotfl:

I liked the little show, but wished there was more little things like that in the scare zone.

I agree.

I know they have a "zombie kill of the week" show that rotates characters, but somehow that was never going on while we were there.

We never saw it either. :confused3:confused3

For some reason they gave us these little arcade looking tickets when we got in line this night. They served 0 purpose whatsoever but I guess I felt the need to document them.

They gave us those last year at the Halloween house and were super serious about us giving them back. Then this year we didn't get them at 1000 corpses but they asked us for it when we got near the front and when we said we never got one, they just said ok. I don't get it either lol

I love the Killer Klowns part, but honestly the whole show is good, and it was never crowded.

Agreed. It was great!

then she told us we couldn't add him... just no. Like she was hoping we wouldn't ask again if she said no. The flat out "no" to what I thought would be simple thing kind of surprised me.

So strange. I would've expected that to be a pretty easy thing.

Then we went on a safari that featured a commentary by the woman behind us. She would exclaim to her family anytime she saw anything at all, and then repeat something the driver had just said.

Oh my lol. That would drive me nuts.

My favorite thing they had added this year, was the Appleseed Orchard Cider Bar so of course I took the most terrible picture anyone's ever taken and then didn't take any others to show you how nice it was .

Mine too and my pictures of it are also awful lol.

Also I was not planning on calling bathrooms, refreshers

:rotfl::rotfl:

Also a little poll for our HHN trip (because I'll have to pick the week for that too):
Would you pick the first week it's running or the second?

This is late so I'm not sure if it matters anymore lol but I say the 1st week especially since it's an anniversary year!

a lady (just another guest), randomly asked us while we were waiting for the elevator if we needed her to show us where anything was.

:confused3:confused3 How strange. I could see my DBF saying yes and then coming up with the most random things for her to show us lol.

My favorite guy in the Pirates queue was this guy :rotfl: He screamed when he saw this man's light up necklace and said that it was sorcery.

:rotfl::rotfl:

Samantha's favorite "the man who needs a key but could easily walk out of the room" was another returning character.

:rotfl::rotfl: I thought that guy was hysterical also.

THEY NEVER PUT THE GHOST IN!!!:rotfl:

:rotfl::rotfl:We have one from HHN where they didn't add the zombie in so we look completely ridiculous lol.

Also a Youtube Update

Thank you for the explanation. I was watching a Tim Tracker video today where they briefly mentioned it and I wasn't really sure what they were talking about. I get why youtube is doing it but I feel like there's gotta be a better system.
 
Thank you sir- I have seen the light and will immediately cancel this vacation and go home.

You are right sir they are not for adults, which I am. I have now grown up and must leave :rotfl:

Ugh that is the most accurate thing I've ever seen lol

I hateddd all the paper straws, so many gross mushy messes and wondering if it's even worth it to finish a drink.

Super far behind here but I love them.

Thank you!

We never saw it either. :confused3:confused3

I've heard they were every 10 mins, but also don't know anyone who's seen it so did they even happen? :laughing:

They gave us those last year at the Halloween house and were super serious about us giving them back. Then this year we didn't get them at 1000 corpses but they asked us for it when we got near the front and when we said we never got one, they just said ok. I don't get it either lol

Lol same here.

So strange. I would've expected that to be a pretty easy thing.

Me too! I was very surprised by her reaction, and almost wondered if she didn't feel like looking into it further. When we continued asking/explaining what we were trying to do she called someone and suddenly it was possible.

Oh my lol. That would drive me nuts.

It was so funny but so annoying at the same time.

This is late so I'm not sure if it matters anymore lol but I say the 1st week especially since it's an anniversary year!

I ended up putting the first week, because we found something else we want to do that week too, and I'm hoping I could get an extra night in by getting Thurs off too. So I submitted it, and I find out next month ish which week I got.

:rotfl::rotfl:We have one from HHN where they didn't add the zombie in so we look completely ridiculous lol.

:rotfl:

Thank you for the explanation. I was watching a Tim Tracker video today where they briefly mentioned it and I wasn't really sure what they were talking about. I get why youtube is doing it but I feel like there's gotta be a better system.

No problem! It's something I've been a little stressed about even though I'm a smaller channel. Frankly, with their content I thought it'd affect the Trackers channel more, and felt like they didn't really go into it enough. I know they were trying to remain positive, but I would think they would have to make major changes because they do character interactions a lot, but I also realize with the baby coming they have more on their plate than just that. I was kind of hoping to hear what they planned to do because it would help me decide what to do.
 
You are right sir they are not for adults, which I am. I have now grown up and must leave :rotfl:

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hateddd all the paper straws, so many gross mushy messes and wondering if it's even worth it to finish a drink.

Yeah before we went, I kept seeing posts on facebook about people bringing their own straws and I was thinking it was dramatic. Then suddenly I was wishing I had my own straws lol

I've heard they were every 10 mins, but also don't know anyone who's seen it so did they even happen? :laughing:

:rotfl: :rotfl: I feel like they were a lie lol. We sat in that scare zone for like 15-20 minutes at one point and it definitely didn't happen.

No problem! It's something I've been a little stressed about even though I'm a smaller channel. Frankly, with their content I thought it'd affect the Trackers channel more, and felt like they didn't really go into it enough. I know they were trying to remain positive, but I would think they would have to make major changes because they do character interactions a lot, but I also realize with the baby coming they have more on their plate than just that. I was kind of hoping to hear what they planned to do because it would help me decide what to do.

Yeah they brushed over it so briefly which surprises me after your explanation cause they clearly make their living on youtube. Maybe they already know something we don't?
 

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