back with the mouse

I suppose it has been a little while since my previous post. At least has only been an 8 month gap and not a whole year from my old site. A lot has been going on in my life and I'd like to recap on what has happened as well as plans for this website moving forward.

Grad Life
In May, I received my B.A. in Electronic Media and joined the High Point University class of 2014 as a college grad! I was ecstatic to be done and luckily everything fell into place the last month of my academic career. I had been applying for multiple professional internships with The Walt Disney Company (see giant graphic above). After a few rounds of interviews I was lucky enough to be signed on as the Disney Gift Card Projects professional intern. My position began mid August so I had a bit of a gap from graduation to my start of employment that I need to account for here.

Florida Sunshine
My move to Florida happened just days after my graduation and am literally behind Cinderella's castle. Every night at 10pm my house is hit by the distant boom of the Wishes fireworks show and Mickey is basically my next door neighbor. I love the location but living near all the tourism makes it difficult to find normal necessities and it is a 30 minute drive to get anything I need for the house. To provide for myself for the summer, I turned to a company I didn't think I would ever be employed at. But, I'm glad I did and the experience was interesting to say the least.

Chef Geary
Since I still needed to provide for myself for the summer and Disney would not hire me for another part time position, I decided that I would work for Universal Studios and actually became a Chef at the Three Broomsticks restaurant in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter (WW). There were some serious differences between working for these two competing Entertainment companies, but also similarities. Both companies strive on being a part of the show and my position at the WW had me wearing a "tea" stained name tag as opposed to the regular white name-tag because it fit the appearance guidelines set forth by J.K. Rowling. As well as the fact that I was paid to take an eight hour class all about the universe of Harry Potter and received a "wizard certificate". As for actually being a chef, my experience was a little lackluster. As a "chef" all I mainly did was bring food out of the ovens and create the plates that were already predetermined. But it was still fascinating to see all aspects of the theme park industry, even if I have no interest of going back.

Back with the mouse
Beginning in August I started working as the Professional Projects Intern with Disney Gift Card Services, Inc. It has been an amazing experience to be a part of the team and learn about the vast world of gift cards. My role has me working in the logistics business with our 3rd party vendors but also on various special projects such as many technology and creative projects. I hope my experience with the team will broaden my skill set so that I may be more versatile in my roles in the future.