Musings of Me

Six Flags Over Georgia

Approximately two weeks ago, my brother-in-law’s sister moved in with us. This pretty much guarantees some entertaining, sit-com worthy moments, while further demonstrating the kind and generous nature of my sister and her husband. The good will of my relatives is even more obvious in that my sister had to move back to Michigan to care for my mother for four weeks.

Poor Matt is therefore stuck here in Atlanta with his sister, and me. He jokes rather good-naturedly about how the hell this happened, and how much it sucks. (He and Laura jokingly refer to us as “my slave and your slave.”)

About three days after Lisa moved in, we decided to go celebrate her arrival and the last open day of Six Flags where we could use our season passes. Luckily we are all rollercoaster junkies, so we didn’t take long to pile into Matt’s Aztec (he also doubles as a chauffeur).

The day started off well.

“Jill, if you are dressing in shit clothes I will too!! But remember we are going to Church first!” -Lisa is good with remembering the order of things. As a result, we stormed the Church bathroom after service and tried sneaking out the side door so nobody would see how grungy we appeared.

It didn’t work. Blanche (I kid you not, that is her name) saw all of us and asked if we were going running. “Nah,” I replied. “We are going to Six Flags!!”

Having successfully begun our journey, we determined our plan of attack and undertook the necessary sunscreen applications. We sang to hip hop music, behaved like juveniles, and instructed Lisa on how to avoid the gauntlet at the gate.

(I should mention at this point we arrived at Six Flags parking. No joke, we drove down EVERY ROW in search of the closest parking spot. This wasted 20 valuable roller-coaster minutes, and I can’t say it is a guy thing because Lisa and Matt were rabidly intent on their search. I was in the back pointing out visible good spots 30 yards away, where we did eventually end up. My only criteria in parking is under a working street lamp, away from most bushes and shrubs)

“Sis, when you enter the park, there is an army of employees standing arm-to-arm. Every other person has a camera, and people dressed as Tiny Toons characters try to pose with you for a fee.”

I added, “Breaking through is like the Red Rover plan of attack. We split and aim for the weakest points. These are usually Babs Bunny and Daffy. When we break through, head right and we’ll meet by the Ninja.

“The Ninja? Is that a roller coaster?”
“Yeah, but there is a statue of a Ninja as well.”
“You know, Ninjas developed to fight the Samurai!”
"Sweet!"

Eventually we made it to our first coaster. As we were waiting in line, we read the signs comparing its height to Godzilla, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and other attractions. I was revved to go, yelling “We will ride them all until we puke!! No leaving until they kick us out of the park!!!” –This is a popular battle cry, as cheers began erupting from around us in line.

At the entrance, we had to divvy up who would sit by whom. After Matt and Lisa realized I hadn’t shaved for 3 weeks (I work long hours. In slacks) Matt generously offered to sit by himself. Lisa and I laughed. I like Lisa, who jokes “sometimes I go for four weeks without shaving! There are times it just doesn’t figure in, you know? Screw it, it gets cold!”

After that ride, we trekked to the next, a large tower that drops you. The rides are weak compared to Cedar Point, but they are still fun. It was after this second ride we realized we needed carnie food to continue (well, we could have gone all day, but we like carnie food).

In Miss Dixie’s Depot, I had what happened to be the most powerful Sweet Tea ever made. Sweet Tea is a southern drink, where they brew tea with sugar in it. It is good stuff. In any case, this tea must have steeped for 4 hours, and was mighty strong. To cover up the tea taste, they subsequently dumped 2 pounds of sugar in the canister. This overpowering combo of sugar and caffeine has what Matt dubs, the “southern crack” effect, and I went looney. I stayed that way for 5 hours.

To make a long story short, I ran giggling around the park, jumped up and down clapping my hands, pointed at all the good rides, and insisted we ride the Batman coaster in Gotham City twice because it was the best (I should mention I hummed the theme song incessantly). Later on we rode Monster Plantation which is essentially a bunch of muppets in an old plantation house. This ride is older than I am, and reminiscient of “It’s a Small World” at Disney. We all agreed it was the most frightening by far. The mold smell contributed to that.

In part due to my gregarious plan to conquer every roller-coaster at Six Flags, and because we all shared this dream, the day was really, really fun. While I was overly wired, I never reached the ‘annoying as hell’ point*. I was even told I was the most entertaining person to stand in line with. :-)

We only missed one coaster, and that was because they kicked us out of the park.

*the Annoying as Hell point exists and has been observed in individuals on a caffeine high. The exact amount of caffeine is varying, as individuals react differently. The most notable case of a person reaching the ‘annoying as hell’ stage occurred my freshman year when some idiot handed out caffeine pills in the dorms. The girl EVERYBODY adored was so wired she was singing and dancing through the halls at 4am.
Nice? Yes.
Funny? Yes.
Annoying as Hell? Yes.

posted by Jill @ 10:47 PM