June is Testing My Sanity: Six Flags

For our little vacation this year, we went to Six Flags Magic Mountain! I hadn't been there since I was 14 and Dan was jonesing for some roller coasters. We originally were planning to go in late August, once everyone was back in school so things would be less crowded, but Dan's best friend Jim and his girlfriend Abby wanted to go as well. Since they have a little one going into second grade (I think, I can't ever remember these things, sorry Abby!), we shifted things up a bit. And since June is apparently insane for everyone this year, only one weekend worked. So, we booked our hotels, planned our route, and off we went!

A nine hour drive later, this is what we saw! A blurry Six Flags sign!

Side note: we bought tickets for two days, but by the end of it, if you have a weekday to visit the park, you can adequately go on basically every ride a couple of times in a day and a half. If you want to go on the insanely popular rides a TON, maybe two days would be a better idea.

Something you should know about me: I can be very easily peer pressured into going on roller coasters. I don't really enjoy them, but I go on them. I feel like I'm having an anxiety attack the whole time and will most likely have my eyes closed for 90% of it, but somehow I end up on every ride. I was a good sport the first day, but the second day, I was more than happy to sit on a bench, people watch, and read books on my phone while they went on some of the more ridiculous rides.

Besides, when did roller coasters becomes a one-up contest? It has to be the tallest, the fastest, the most dimensional for it to be good? Some of the best ones are the simplest ones. Take that to the bank, roller coaster engineers!

I went on every roller coaster except Tatsu. It was too crowded the first day and by the second day, I knew better. How did I know better? I went on X2. If you haven't heard about X2, it's the ride Satan designed. Imagine a regular roller coaster, but the first drop is completely vertical. 90 degrees straight at the ground. Maybe you're brave and it doesn't sound so bad, but it gets worse. It doesn't have normal roller coaster cars. The cars rotate. And not willy-nilly rotate due to gravity. No, they are programmed to rotate to make things as scary as possible. Just watch.

After the ride was over, I told Dan that he better run because I was going to punch him in the crotch. That boy was very lucky I was restrained. I've learned that I don't mind being upside-down momentarily, like in loops on normal roller coasters, but I HATE being held upside-down. And vertical freefalls. Stupid X2.

Of course Dan loved it so he went on it a total of three times. Boys. We went on the carousel instead.

Pretty Abby on her white horse

And then, we bought the greatest thing ever: funnel cake covered in ice cream! Specifically, it was a regular funnel cake, topped with chocolate syrup, then soft-serve vanilla ice cream, surrounded by whipped cream, and another layer of chocolate syrup. Dear lord it was good. Good thing we walked an estimated ten miles each day around the park.

Don't worry, we shared it. The boys caught up with us near the end and Dan inhaled the last quarter of it.

It wouldn't be one of my trips if I didn't have a celebrity sighting, right? Well, this one is random and involves Dan almost getting beat up by bodyguards. OK, so we were standing in line for Batman, one of Dan's favorite rides. We were next in line, but it seemed like they were having some technical problems because the queue gates kept opening and closing on the previous train. Our train arrived and, at the same time, a bunch of park officially came onto the platform through the back door. I just stood there, watching them, but apparently Dan didn't notice them shooing people away from the gates because the gates opened and he bolted for the car to strap himself in. I tried to call him back, but he couldn't hear me. Immediately, park officials were all over Dan, telling him to go back in line. Poor guy was so confused.

Then, through the back door, a bunch of skinny teenage guys walk onto the platform. After a couple of seconds and some analysis of some bad hair, I realized it was the new it band One Direction. Dan, Jimmy, and Abby had no idea who they were, which was odd given that they are Abby's ringtone. My pictures aren't that great because of the poor lighting on the platform and the amount of security, but trust me, that's One Direction strapping themselves in. My sister pointed out that, since we were on the next train, we were on the roller coaster at the same time as One Direction. That's got to count for something, right? Not something remotely important, but something, right?

One Direction is in there somewhere

See the bad hair? Maybe the roller coaster wind helped...

Afterward, in a move that makes complete sense in my head, I pretended to be Superman in front of the Batman ride. And to clear up any awkward questions, no, my boobs aren't that massive. It's a floppy shirt that was catching an unfortunate breeze.

Also, did anyone else know that Six Flags had parades? While the others were on a ride, I was walking to a shop and almost got run over by a small parade. I asked the clerk in the shop about it and she didn't even know that there was a parade.

The tail end of the parade, which was also the front of the parade, too.

It was a really fun, really exhausting little vacation. I was sunburned in weird ways. I spent a lot of time with some people that I need to make more of an effort with, I went on a lot of rides I didn't think I would have the guts to try. It was great, but Dan and I definitely agree that our next vacation will involve a lot of sitting, looking at pretty views, and being waited on hand and foot.