Jarrett
Most Obnoxious Member 2016
Have any of you ever wondered what happens when you meet someone, can tell right away they're a bit cray-cray, and decide to befriend them anyway just to liven things up?
Rewind to last July's #NE2k16 trip, specifically to the day we did the ACE event at Six Flags New England. At lunch Emily and I sat with a group of other ACE members our age, including a young lady named Celia that was doing an internship at Hershey at the time, which naturally made Emily gravitate right over to her. Later that year when we did Hershey and Six Flags America, Celia wanted to meet us at the parks one of those days but couldn't because she got sick, but luckily her and I swapped contact info on Facebook.
Emily, Celia and I can all be seen on the left side of this group photo
Celia and I eventually got talking on Snapchat and the next thing I know, our hilarious Snapchat conversations are absolutely killing me. Later that year, she invited me to go meet her and a friend at SFGAdv while she skipped her graduation to ride coasters. That fell through due to rain so I went to Kings Island while she sat at home watching Rocko's Modern Life, but told me to try again so we could do a few other parks.
I could tell she was a nice girl but a bit nuts from her Snapchat, but little did I know that this was going to be one of those trips...
(Someone remind me again why this TR wasn't just called "Silver Dollar City Part 3?" Weird stuff always happens when we go there!)
Day 1
I was up at the crack of dawn on the first day of the trip (which also happened to be my birthday) to get the rental car and motor on out of there. It was an 8 hour drive to meet Celia at SFGAdv as we planned and I needed a cred there, so I had the whole lead foot thing going on. I broke the drive up into four 2-hour blocks, so it went by pretty fast.
Celia and I, in addition to coasters, share an odd obsession with Snapchat's geofilter feature. It's not uncommon for us to both go around just to find more geofilters, I have roughly a hundred saved to my phone.
Found quite a few on the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
It rained that morning and completely washed the park out so it was beyond dead when I got there. However, before we had even met up, things got weird. I snapped Celia to tell her I got there and instead of "where are you?" I get "I wanna see if you can pick me out of a crowd, you'll have to find me!" So here I am combing the park over for like twenty minutes nervous as hell to meet someone as usual before she asks for my location, comes to find me, and finally meets up with me. So we said hi, hugged, and then I get "you know I like to mess with people!"
We kicked the trip off power lapping El Toro five times without getting off in my favorite seat, and found two dudes wearing RMC shirts who told me where to buy them! So riding El Toro with three other big RMC fans was wonderful.
As nice as that was, I still needed this credit after years of seeing it without being able to ride it, so we went to go grab Green Lantern! I drove past this numerous times as a kid when it was Chang and was excited to finally get it last year but knowing my luck, the thing was down last year. But it was operating and we got on! And it actually wasn't bad! It's certainly smoother than Mantis was when it was still Mantis and I liked that second corkscrew. It's no Riddler or Georgia Scorcher but it's still pretty awesome. But the key thing? I've now ridden every operating B&M standup after completing the set with this one!
On the lift hill we saw Nitro was going back up from a breakdown, so we made our way over there after a little Dippin Dots pit stop. It's Celia's second favorite ride at the park but I personally find it to be the weakest hyper. It certainly was running better after the rain than it was last year, but it still isn't the insane ride people make it out to be. It barely got me out of my seat over the hills but it still got me out.
Batman was next! It was pretty standard, it's a Batman clone, still my least favorite invert, but the reason I now have a special hatred for this coaster is because it did THIS...
We sat down, I'm securing my crap, when I look to my left to take Celia's phone and wallet in my cargo pockets when I noticed she somehow disappeared. So I got up to see where she had gone off to. RRRRIP!!!!! The next thing I know I felt that little knob on the side of the seat grab my back pocket and rip my shorts wide open! After the ride I was smart and tied my button down around my waist (sadly there's protocol for this, I've done this on KBF's boomerang once and once on GateKeeper) but Celia just pointed and laughed like the sadist she is.
Dark Knight was next! We were forced to sit through the entire preshow but it was still fun. The jump scare at the end actually got me. But this is our first Snapchat photo together!
We were GOING to go to Wawa, but Celia missed it so she just sent me her address and I got on the road back to her place in the suburbs of New York City. On the way back I had to make the first gas stop on the trip (gotta love the Nissan Altima!) so I snapped this just to get the geotag. Some dude came up to me and finished the job for some reason, not sure why but I let him be nice.
Both of us got home around the same time even with my pit stop to change shorts and pump gas, and she bought this "Miss Heart Eyes" as she calls her at SFGAdv. So I got in and had a TV dinner and a beer at her place when she opened my snap and asked why I got out of the car. So I told her I did it to pump gas and she just laughed at me. Apparently that guy that helped me was supposed to, that's his job, and come to think of it, I was the only one who got out of their car and she just hardcore pointed and laughed at me. That's actually where the whole "Jersey Girls don't pump gas" cliche comes from and she said she's actually had people assume she didn't know how to do it herself. After a small discussion on whether or not emojis have a gender or not at one in the morning, we both decided we were whipped and went to bed...and she was awesome and had a whole guest floor for me that was like having my own penthouse.
Day 2
We were SUPPOSED to go to Six Flags New England today with both of us needing Joker and me needing Goliath, but with them closing at 6, we knew there would be a bit of a time crunch. Well the delay started when I found out that it can take Celia up to two hours to get ready for some reason, then things got really heated. Backing out I heard a loud grinding sound to see that Celia, who I knew was kind of a crazy driver, had backed into their rusty gate that was open and scratched her car in two places. So she and her mom got into it and she had to call her dad as I tried to be a supportive friend with her. We ended up leaving her car behind because it had bad headlights and we weren't even supposed to be taking it and took my rental car. By then it was way late so we went to Quassy. I had that park cleaned out but she had never been and I wasn't going to say no to some more Gravity Group love. Driving over the Tappan Zee was really cool too, Celia called me out for geeking out over the structure.
Upon getting to a cold, rainy Quassy we noticed four school busses lined up in the parking lot and knew it was going to be one of those days. So we made a dash for Wooden Warrior and saw the line was backed up with obnoxious middle schoolers. And just when it couldn't get any worse, about twenty of them shoves right past us and waltz right up to the front of the line when another group stopped them. The two of them argued intensely and started shoving each other as we just watched laughing before the line jumping group finally got out of line! So we got up there and got assigned a middle row and sat down in those lovely Timberliner trains. And it was awesome! Cold, but awesome! The airtime on this thing is just as good as I remember and Celia loved her first ride on it, with special attention to the tunnel. And guess what? It overshot those horribly designed brakes it has so we got to go again! We double rode Wooden Warrior!
Getting off we met up with Travis from Australia and Steve from Canada that I knew from Facebook! Both of them are also big believers in #RMCitorWreckit and both have awesome accents!
Reverse Time got stuck, I blame an E stop on a kid with a fidget spinner.
We made the rounds to do flats and got a sketchy yo-yo swing, paratrooper, and pirate ship but it started POURING, like giant rain drops pummeling the park. We got drenched and went into the arcade to dry off. After we did the carousel and got on the road to get home...both of us dripping wet and tired. Like, Celia actually fell asleep in the car.
We got home and went to IHOP for lunch and Celia unsuccessfully tried to dry herself off in the bathroom. She got the smiley face pancakes, I got the Nutella and banana crepes. We got home and both of us tried to take a nap. I managed to sleep some, she got stuck up trying to fix a virus on her laptop. Later that evening we both had dinner from her fridge and watched Rocko's Modern Life. Emily called us and told us the scoop on the latest Hershey drama. The three of us chatted for a bit and Emily warned Celia about the dangers at eating at her loathed Steak 'n' Shake. Afterwards we both went to bed.
Day 3
I woke up on time, Celia took forever to get up and then had to do a call for a background check on a friend of hers. After taking two hours to ready herself she told me we were going to Knoebels because neither of us had been in a while and it was a handstamp day so that would mean having the place to ourselves while it was dead.
First ride of the day and the only credit Celia needed: Impulse! I have to admit, it rode better this time than it did last I was here. The drop provides some nice ejector and the layout flows very well, this might be among my favorite traditional seating loopers. (Photo credit: Celia Drew)
Next up was their legendary Flyer and boy did I snap it! I felt like the cables were going to break with how much tension I was applying all of a sudden! Those lovely little bounces you get when you do it right were there but they were more like spine-shattering vibrations that shook the bucket!
Next up was Twister, which Celia tried to enter through the exit, and HOLY CRAP it surprised me! I had ridden this coaster before and I liked it, but after this ride I LOVED it! Man the sense of speed on this thing and the pops of airtime made it feel kind of like a classic wooden Cheetah Hunt! This is another great example of laterals done right!
Then we went to Phoenix and sadly...it wasn't nearly as good as I remember.
It got me out of my seat but it was about as strong airtime as Nitro, I don't think I even touched the bar the whole ride. And the entire first half of the ride flat out sucked and was certainly #RMCitorWreckit. Yeah it's okay, but I think I have a new favorite on the block at Knoebels! And a new second favorite, Impulse was actually better than that little floater fest we got.
Walking to Black Diamond, Celia and I ran into Logan from Koaster Kids and his parents, who also happen to be Ohioans! This kid is absolutely amazing, I love the mission of his YouTube channel, and he's done so much for autism awareness! By far the most metal 8-year old you'll ever meet! We even filmed a little bit in which we introduced ourselves for a Koaster Kids video that'll be up when they get home, watch his channel for it!
Afterwards we did Black Diamond finally and it was as wonderfully done as I remember, it felt like a classic dark ride but with a modern twist. Might actually be my favorite dark coaster around, not gonna lie. That or Exterminator.
After this we did another paratrooper when we weren't frozen to the bone, their Cosmotron (which is probably a lot better when you're really stoned), and their swings (Celia's favorite flat happens to be swings)
Kat, a local friend and now regional ACE rep, told me that if I ever went back to Knoebels and didn't do the carousel she was disowning me. So I did, and got four iron rings! No brass one sadly but I still thought this was loads of fun! If more carousels had these ring machines they'd be among my favorite flats just because this made it so fun!
Obviously there was no cramming either of us into this thing but I loved the lighthouse on it!
After this we did the drop tower. Now, I had been giving Celia a hard time for being a smart aleck on this trip if you couldn't already tell she is one (I mean, what kind of sadistic psycho makes their friend that can't tell people apart find them in a park they haven't been to?). Well we rode their little drop tower, and I actually love the little ones, but this one was special. For some reason, it stopped WAY later than I expected it to and it scared the living #$%& out of me. So I yell "#$%&!!!!" and had a mini heart attack, it stops, and all the screaming goes to silence as I heard Celia's snarky little laugh to my left, flat out pointing and laughing at me and telling me how she's telling all of ACE that that little drop tower scared me! Not cool!
From there we did one more on Phoenix with almost no change in ride experience, one more on Impulse, and met up with Travis and Steve who were there the same day as well. We toyed with the idea of going to Hershey but Celia forgot her pass so she and I just got in the road and headed home. We stopped at a Sonic on the way, where Cel hadn't been since she was 8, and she gave me crap for eating "ANOTHER hot dog!" and snapped a photo for Emily. On the way home she told me about her childhood friend she called "Crazy Katie," despite having no right to call ANYONE crazy! From there we just headed home, got in late, I had a Peach Ale and got kind of tipsy to Celia's amusement for the third time on the trip, called Emily, and then we went to bed so I could head home the next day.
Sure, it was one of those trips where it's just a bunch of weird crap happening but when you sign yourself up to go running around the East Coast with a straight up psycho, it's to be expected. Yeah, she's a little crazy, she's a smart aleck, but all in all she did do me an awesome favor and she's super cool so she makes a wonderful friend for me. It certainly kept things interesting, and I got to go back to two parks I might not have headed back to otherwise, not to mention getting an elusive credit to me and effectively cleaning out a whole set. This wasn't really a credding trip but it sure as hell was fun! Can't wait to take Celia around Ohio later this year!
Rewind to last July's #NE2k16 trip, specifically to the day we did the ACE event at Six Flags New England. At lunch Emily and I sat with a group of other ACE members our age, including a young lady named Celia that was doing an internship at Hershey at the time, which naturally made Emily gravitate right over to her. Later that year when we did Hershey and Six Flags America, Celia wanted to meet us at the parks one of those days but couldn't because she got sick, but luckily her and I swapped contact info on Facebook.
Emily, Celia and I can all be seen on the left side of this group photo
Celia and I eventually got talking on Snapchat and the next thing I know, our hilarious Snapchat conversations are absolutely killing me. Later that year, she invited me to go meet her and a friend at SFGAdv while she skipped her graduation to ride coasters. That fell through due to rain so I went to Kings Island while she sat at home watching Rocko's Modern Life, but told me to try again so we could do a few other parks.
I could tell she was a nice girl but a bit nuts from her Snapchat, but little did I know that this was going to be one of those trips...
(Someone remind me again why this TR wasn't just called "Silver Dollar City Part 3?" Weird stuff always happens when we go there!)
Day 1
I was up at the crack of dawn on the first day of the trip (which also happened to be my birthday) to get the rental car and motor on out of there. It was an 8 hour drive to meet Celia at SFGAdv as we planned and I needed a cred there, so I had the whole lead foot thing going on. I broke the drive up into four 2-hour blocks, so it went by pretty fast.
Celia and I, in addition to coasters, share an odd obsession with Snapchat's geofilter feature. It's not uncommon for us to both go around just to find more geofilters, I have roughly a hundred saved to my phone.
Found quite a few on the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
It rained that morning and completely washed the park out so it was beyond dead when I got there. However, before we had even met up, things got weird. I snapped Celia to tell her I got there and instead of "where are you?" I get "I wanna see if you can pick me out of a crowd, you'll have to find me!" So here I am combing the park over for like twenty minutes nervous as hell to meet someone as usual before she asks for my location, comes to find me, and finally meets up with me. So we said hi, hugged, and then I get "you know I like to mess with people!"
We kicked the trip off power lapping El Toro five times without getting off in my favorite seat, and found two dudes wearing RMC shirts who told me where to buy them! So riding El Toro with three other big RMC fans was wonderful.
As nice as that was, I still needed this credit after years of seeing it without being able to ride it, so we went to go grab Green Lantern! I drove past this numerous times as a kid when it was Chang and was excited to finally get it last year but knowing my luck, the thing was down last year. But it was operating and we got on! And it actually wasn't bad! It's certainly smoother than Mantis was when it was still Mantis and I liked that second corkscrew. It's no Riddler or Georgia Scorcher but it's still pretty awesome. But the key thing? I've now ridden every operating B&M standup after completing the set with this one!
On the lift hill we saw Nitro was going back up from a breakdown, so we made our way over there after a little Dippin Dots pit stop. It's Celia's second favorite ride at the park but I personally find it to be the weakest hyper. It certainly was running better after the rain than it was last year, but it still isn't the insane ride people make it out to be. It barely got me out of my seat over the hills but it still got me out.
Batman was next! It was pretty standard, it's a Batman clone, still my least favorite invert, but the reason I now have a special hatred for this coaster is because it did THIS...
We sat down, I'm securing my crap, when I look to my left to take Celia's phone and wallet in my cargo pockets when I noticed she somehow disappeared. So I got up to see where she had gone off to. RRRRIP!!!!! The next thing I know I felt that little knob on the side of the seat grab my back pocket and rip my shorts wide open! After the ride I was smart and tied my button down around my waist (sadly there's protocol for this, I've done this on KBF's boomerang once and once on GateKeeper) but Celia just pointed and laughed like the sadist she is.
Dark Knight was next! We were forced to sit through the entire preshow but it was still fun. The jump scare at the end actually got me. But this is our first Snapchat photo together!
We were GOING to go to Wawa, but Celia missed it so she just sent me her address and I got on the road back to her place in the suburbs of New York City. On the way back I had to make the first gas stop on the trip (gotta love the Nissan Altima!) so I snapped this just to get the geotag. Some dude came up to me and finished the job for some reason, not sure why but I let him be nice.
Both of us got home around the same time even with my pit stop to change shorts and pump gas, and she bought this "Miss Heart Eyes" as she calls her at SFGAdv. So I got in and had a TV dinner and a beer at her place when she opened my snap and asked why I got out of the car. So I told her I did it to pump gas and she just laughed at me. Apparently that guy that helped me was supposed to, that's his job, and come to think of it, I was the only one who got out of their car and she just hardcore pointed and laughed at me. That's actually where the whole "Jersey Girls don't pump gas" cliche comes from and she said she's actually had people assume she didn't know how to do it herself. After a small discussion on whether or not emojis have a gender or not at one in the morning, we both decided we were whipped and went to bed...and she was awesome and had a whole guest floor for me that was like having my own penthouse.
Day 2
We were SUPPOSED to go to Six Flags New England today with both of us needing Joker and me needing Goliath, but with them closing at 6, we knew there would be a bit of a time crunch. Well the delay started when I found out that it can take Celia up to two hours to get ready for some reason, then things got really heated. Backing out I heard a loud grinding sound to see that Celia, who I knew was kind of a crazy driver, had backed into their rusty gate that was open and scratched her car in two places. So she and her mom got into it and she had to call her dad as I tried to be a supportive friend with her. We ended up leaving her car behind because it had bad headlights and we weren't even supposed to be taking it and took my rental car. By then it was way late so we went to Quassy. I had that park cleaned out but she had never been and I wasn't going to say no to some more Gravity Group love. Driving over the Tappan Zee was really cool too, Celia called me out for geeking out over the structure.
Upon getting to a cold, rainy Quassy we noticed four school busses lined up in the parking lot and knew it was going to be one of those days. So we made a dash for Wooden Warrior and saw the line was backed up with obnoxious middle schoolers. And just when it couldn't get any worse, about twenty of them shoves right past us and waltz right up to the front of the line when another group stopped them. The two of them argued intensely and started shoving each other as we just watched laughing before the line jumping group finally got out of line! So we got up there and got assigned a middle row and sat down in those lovely Timberliner trains. And it was awesome! Cold, but awesome! The airtime on this thing is just as good as I remember and Celia loved her first ride on it, with special attention to the tunnel. And guess what? It overshot those horribly designed brakes it has so we got to go again! We double rode Wooden Warrior!
Getting off we met up with Travis from Australia and Steve from Canada that I knew from Facebook! Both of them are also big believers in #RMCitorWreckit and both have awesome accents!
Reverse Time got stuck, I blame an E stop on a kid with a fidget spinner.
We made the rounds to do flats and got a sketchy yo-yo swing, paratrooper, and pirate ship but it started POURING, like giant rain drops pummeling the park. We got drenched and went into the arcade to dry off. After we did the carousel and got on the road to get home...both of us dripping wet and tired. Like, Celia actually fell asleep in the car.
We got home and went to IHOP for lunch and Celia unsuccessfully tried to dry herself off in the bathroom. She got the smiley face pancakes, I got the Nutella and banana crepes. We got home and both of us tried to take a nap. I managed to sleep some, she got stuck up trying to fix a virus on her laptop. Later that evening we both had dinner from her fridge and watched Rocko's Modern Life. Emily called us and told us the scoop on the latest Hershey drama. The three of us chatted for a bit and Emily warned Celia about the dangers at eating at her loathed Steak 'n' Shake. Afterwards we both went to bed.
Day 3
I woke up on time, Celia took forever to get up and then had to do a call for a background check on a friend of hers. After taking two hours to ready herself she told me we were going to Knoebels because neither of us had been in a while and it was a handstamp day so that would mean having the place to ourselves while it was dead.
First ride of the day and the only credit Celia needed: Impulse! I have to admit, it rode better this time than it did last I was here. The drop provides some nice ejector and the layout flows very well, this might be among my favorite traditional seating loopers. (Photo credit: Celia Drew)
Next up was their legendary Flyer and boy did I snap it! I felt like the cables were going to break with how much tension I was applying all of a sudden! Those lovely little bounces you get when you do it right were there but they were more like spine-shattering vibrations that shook the bucket!
Next up was Twister, which Celia tried to enter through the exit, and HOLY CRAP it surprised me! I had ridden this coaster before and I liked it, but after this ride I LOVED it! Man the sense of speed on this thing and the pops of airtime made it feel kind of like a classic wooden Cheetah Hunt! This is another great example of laterals done right!
Then we went to Phoenix and sadly...it wasn't nearly as good as I remember.
It got me out of my seat but it was about as strong airtime as Nitro, I don't think I even touched the bar the whole ride. And the entire first half of the ride flat out sucked and was certainly #RMCitorWreckit. Yeah it's okay, but I think I have a new favorite on the block at Knoebels! And a new second favorite, Impulse was actually better than that little floater fest we got.
Walking to Black Diamond, Celia and I ran into Logan from Koaster Kids and his parents, who also happen to be Ohioans! This kid is absolutely amazing, I love the mission of his YouTube channel, and he's done so much for autism awareness! By far the most metal 8-year old you'll ever meet! We even filmed a little bit in which we introduced ourselves for a Koaster Kids video that'll be up when they get home, watch his channel for it!
Afterwards we did Black Diamond finally and it was as wonderfully done as I remember, it felt like a classic dark ride but with a modern twist. Might actually be my favorite dark coaster around, not gonna lie. That or Exterminator.
After this we did another paratrooper when we weren't frozen to the bone, their Cosmotron (which is probably a lot better when you're really stoned), and their swings (Celia's favorite flat happens to be swings)
Kat, a local friend and now regional ACE rep, told me that if I ever went back to Knoebels and didn't do the carousel she was disowning me. So I did, and got four iron rings! No brass one sadly but I still thought this was loads of fun! If more carousels had these ring machines they'd be among my favorite flats just because this made it so fun!
Obviously there was no cramming either of us into this thing but I loved the lighthouse on it!
After this we did the drop tower. Now, I had been giving Celia a hard time for being a smart aleck on this trip if you couldn't already tell she is one (I mean, what kind of sadistic psycho makes their friend that can't tell people apart find them in a park they haven't been to?). Well we rode their little drop tower, and I actually love the little ones, but this one was special. For some reason, it stopped WAY later than I expected it to and it scared the living #$%& out of me. So I yell "#$%&!!!!" and had a mini heart attack, it stops, and all the screaming goes to silence as I heard Celia's snarky little laugh to my left, flat out pointing and laughing at me and telling me how she's telling all of ACE that that little drop tower scared me! Not cool!
From there we did one more on Phoenix with almost no change in ride experience, one more on Impulse, and met up with Travis and Steve who were there the same day as well. We toyed with the idea of going to Hershey but Celia forgot her pass so she and I just got in the road and headed home. We stopped at a Sonic on the way, where Cel hadn't been since she was 8, and she gave me crap for eating "ANOTHER hot dog!" and snapped a photo for Emily. On the way home she told me about her childhood friend she called "Crazy Katie," despite having no right to call ANYONE crazy! From there we just headed home, got in late, I had a Peach Ale and got kind of tipsy to Celia's amusement for the third time on the trip, called Emily, and then we went to bed so I could head home the next day.
Sure, it was one of those trips where it's just a bunch of weird crap happening but when you sign yourself up to go running around the East Coast with a straight up psycho, it's to be expected. Yeah, she's a little crazy, she's a smart aleck, but all in all she did do me an awesome favor and she's super cool so she makes a wonderful friend for me. It certainly kept things interesting, and I got to go back to two parks I might not have headed back to otherwise, not to mention getting an elusive credit to me and effectively cleaning out a whole set. This wasn't really a credding trip but it sure as hell was fun! Can't wait to take Celia around Ohio later this year!
