Armchair Anonymous: Cedar Point

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Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous.
I'm Dan Shepard, joined by Lily Padman and Aaron Michael Weakley. Hello, baby.
Hello, baby. This is a long time coming.
Crazy Cedar Point stories. Mm-hmm, cedar point stories aaron do you have a crazy one a crazy one yeah i don't have a crazy one i just have my the wet butt cuts i mean that story lives on forever i've and we will never not remember wiping my butt with that brown paper towel yes that you take out of out of the big machine.
Yeah. I would make a piece of it and put it between my butt cheeks.
To stay in there. Yeah.
Yeah, you have to. I never had that any other place in my life other than Cedar Point.
I've been to Disneyland a bunch of times and I've never gotten a wet butt cut. It turns out it's not a good fix either.
No, that rough recycled paper just tears up. Yeah.
Yeah. Well, we don't have any wet butt cut stories, but we do have four crazy Cedar Point stories.
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How's it going? Good. Now you have the Mandalorian and Stranger Things posters behind you, but they don't look issued by the studio.
It's an artist I found on Etsy. And so I have a collection of Stranger Things, Mandalorian, and I have a Ted Lasso one.
My whole office is filled with all kinds of nerdy stuff. I love comic books and superheroes.
You can kind of see over here, there's a whole bunch of Marvel and DC stuff. The Hall of Justice kind of photo there, it seems.
We got Superman in the mix. Yes.
You know, like the famous picture of the construction workers on the beam?

Yeah.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

So if you look over, it's Marvel and DC guys.

And then you can see I got Ninja Turtles and everything over here.

Oh, this is so fun.

I like this.

Where are you at?

I feel like I need to ask you to guess.

I weirdly saw some graphic when you signed on.

It would be a cheat.

Did it say Wyoming?

It did say Wyoming, but my shirt might help.

We got a Michigan shirt on.

That's a great start. I didn't even know that.
You didn't know that was Michigan? Monica. I'm sorry.
Actually, we should have been able to guess based on the prompt. Well, but that's a three-state area, minimally, and folks from Ontario, probably even Canada.
All right, where are you at in Michigan? I work for the city of Wyoming. Wyoming's just outside of Grand Rapids.

I run the Wyoming Senior Center. Oh, my gosh.
For the ones that didn't make it down to Florida? We actually have all of our snowbirds coming back right now. Everybody's showing up and telling me all their stories about warm weather and no snow, and it makes me envious.
Okay, so you've got a Cedar Point story. I do have a Cedar Point story.
So being from Michigan growing up here, Cedar Point was a regular vacation spot for us.

I have a couple of stories.

I could have told you how I got engaged at Cedar Point.

Oh, wow, wow, wow. I would have liked that.

Romantic.

I could tell you a time when we went in high school.

And Dax, are you familiar with the ripcord ride there?

No, what's the ripcord?

It's kind of like a bungee jumping thing.

Oh.

We have that at Six Flags. I have a story about how you have to be 18 and older to do that.
And so we were on this family vacation and my mom and aunt and uncles forbid all of us from going on it. And my dad, who can be a bit of a rascal, signed off on the waiver for all of us to ride it.
Oh my God. At what age? We were probably 16 and he got caught and he got the silent treatment.
The rest of the trip from the family. Oh, okay.
But nothing from the brass at Cedar Point? No, no, nothing from that. But this story actually is about when I survived three tornadoes that hit Cedar Point.
Okay. Okay.
Set the scene. What year? What month? The year is 1998 and it's summer.
This particular trip was with my aunt and uncle, my sister, and four cousins. At the time, my sister was 11.
Two of my cousins were 13. Me and another cousin were 14 and my oldest cousin was 17.
So the plan for this trip is my aunt and uncle are taking all six kids to Cedar Point. The first day they take us to the park, they are not ride people.
So they're like, Hey, you guys go off. We're going to do the shows.
We're going to eat some food, meet up with us at these times and don't get into too much trouble. So the second day it comes around, my uncle have decided they don't really want to do Cedar Point for a second day.
So they say, Hey, we're just going to drop you guys off at the park for the day. Are you guys staying at breakers? Where are you staying?

We're staying at a campground outside of Cedar Point.

We're not even on property.

Oh, OK, OK, OK.

Yeah.

So their plan is we're going to drop you off in the morning.

We'll pick you up at night.

I mean, it's the 1990s.

Parenting was just a little different.

However, I have a 10 year old son now and I'm like, there's no scenario where I would just send him to Cedar Point with people a few years older than him with no parental supervision.

And cell phones weren't a thing in 1998.

We did get just dropped off.

Yeah, and it worked out.

Six flags, much safer.

We do what boys and girls do at that age.

We split off.

We're like, hey, the boys, we're going to go get into trouble and the girls are going to go do their thing.

So it's about lunchtime and we decide we're going to ride the power tower. Is that the old demon drop? It's kind of like the demon drop on steroids.
One side of it will shoot you up really fast and then drop you down and keep shooting you up and dropping you down. The other side takes you up slowly and then drops you really fast like the demon drop.
Okay, wonderful. So we're getting ready to get on that ride.
We had rode the side that shoots you up really fast the day before, but today we're like, we need to get on the other side. The line's always longer.
That's got to be the better ride. I do remember it kind of being overcast.
We're getting strapped into the ride. The whole time when you're in line, you're trying to figure out when they drop.
So you're counting. You're like 1,001, 1,002.
Do they drop on four? Do they drop on five? Yeah, yeah. We're talking about this the whole time.
So we get launched up on the ride. We're starting to counting.
We're looking at each other. And all of a sudden, we all look over at Lake Erie, and we just see three tornadoes coming off the water.
Oh, no. Oh, wow.
And we're like at the highest spot in the park at this point. So we're like, this is probably the worst place to be for this.
They're technically called water spouts because they're tornadoes that form over water. They're not far off.
So we're at the top. We see these.
We're like, oh, this is bad. And then it drops us.
So we can't see them anymore. And then it shoots us back up and we see them again.
They keep getting closer. And this goes on like three or four times.
So everyone else is cheering because of the ride. And my cousins and I were freaking out.
We're going to get hit by tornadoes. We've seen Twister.
We know how this goes. And then what do you do? Because everyone's screaming.
This is like a comedy sketch. Everyone's crying wolf.
Yeah. I imagine those rides could take a pretty good tornado.
It might be interesting to be up at the top strapped in because you can't get sucked into it. You're strapped in.
And if the ride's not coming loose, this could be the one way to experience the eye of a tornado safely. The wind would kill you.
It was cool to see. I mean, I'm not going to lie, but also terrifying.
Yeah, sure, sure. We get to the bottom and we're just like, we need to get out of these harnesses.
The guy unhooks us and we run over to the ride operator and we're like, hey, there's tornadoes coming off the water. You need to alert people now.
And the guy's like, keep the line moving. Sure, good.
This is the commitment you get at Cedar Point. You got to keep those lines moving.
We know what's coming, so we just take off running. And by the time we get just outside the ride, all of a sudden, all the sirens go off.
They come over the intercom and they're like, seek immediate shelter, inclement weather, take cover. Where at Cedar Point are you going to take cover? Bathrooms.
Bathrooms. That's all you have.
So we knew the one bathroom wasn't far away. So we just take off on like a dead sprint.
And I mean, winds are picking up. It starts raining crazy hard.
You immediately are seeing garbage cans. I mean, they're getting tipped over.
Umbrellas from picnic tables are flying around. Picnic tables are like it lifted up.
It gets really intense, really fast. We end up in the bathroom.
Everybody's kind of like panicking and we're a bunch of boys. This is awesome.
We're safe. Oh, I already forgot you were separated from the girls.
Yeah. Yeah.
Who knows? They're being blown all about the area. And no cell phones.
So we're like hoping they're okay. So things calm down.
We come out of the bathroom, we come out of the men's side. And then just about the same time, my sister and cousin come out of the girl's side.
Oh my God. Cause Monica Cedar Point is huge.
I cannot put too fine a point on how big it is. Okay.
Wow. That worked out.
So my younger sister, she was very upset, obviously. So I was working to calm her down through this whole scenario.
The whole park is now shut down. It's flooded like crazy.
The drainage system can't keep up with how much rain hit and it just didn't stop raining. We're walking around in like ankle-deep water all day, and I had these green Nike skateboard shoes on, and they dyed my feet green.
Oh, sure, sure, sure. I had like incredible hulk feet.
I didn't wear sandals for the rest of that summer because my feet were just bright green. But yeah, so we spent the rest of the day walking around, and we couldn't call anybody.
We couldn't leave the park. You just had to go to the assigned pickup time that evening.
Right. So we had some money in our pocket and we saw the one thing that was open and there was a guy drawing caricatures.
My cousins and I all got caricatures drawn with tornadoes in the background. So I actually sent that picture to Emma.
So I think you guys have a picture. Oh, let's take a look.
Oh. Oh, yes.

You were such a sweet young man, it seems, from this character.

I have braces and a pretty epic bowl cut.

Yeah, and they went profile.

My parents love that so much that they actually framed it and hung it in my childhood bedroom, so it's still there.

That's nice.

Yeah, there's some debris flying through the air.

They really took their time on this. We were the only people at the park at that point so he had all the time.
Was the food still open? Very select food still open so we were kind of scrounging for the rest of the day just to get by and then the day went on and night hit and all of a sudden things dried up so all the rides opened back up. Oh what a blessing.
You just have to wait it out. Probably 90% of the people had left the park at that point.
So we just ran ride to ride and got on every single ride that evening. And finally, at the end of the night, my aunt and uncle come to pick us up and they're like, why is the parking lot so empty? Where the fuck were they when the tornado hit? How could they have not been aware that the tornado had hit? The campground was probably like 20, 30 minutes away, not really by the lake at that point.
They said, yeah, we noticed some rain. I mean, they weren't watching the news at the campground.
No, definitely not. I think they were rolling around in that tent a little bit.
Well, we don't know. Yeah, I mean, what else are you going to do all day long in a tent? Right.
Wow, Chad. Well, I'm pretty jealous of that.
I certainly feel like I wish I would have seen a tornado at Cedar Point. You're combining two of the most exciting things in a young child's life all at once.
Natural disasters and roller coasters. If someone's top had been ripped off in the middle, that would have been like triple whammy.
Unexpected nudity and a tornado. And poop pants.
You think people poop their pants? Yeah, you love that. Oh, I would love that.
Yes, yes, yes. Not me pooping my pants, though.
Well, Chad, thank you for that. Makes me want to really watch the Doppler radar and plan a trip when I think there's a high probability of a tornado.
That's probably a good strategy. But could I give a couple of shout outs? Yes, please.
Shout out to all my family that were involved. So my sister, Sierra, my cousin, Todd, Brian and Katie.
And then also my cousin, Joe. So unfortunately, he just recently passed away from cancer.
Oh, yikes. That's too young.
Young age, he had colon cancer. He was a storyteller and a jokester.
He would love to know that so many people are hearing this story because whenever we got together, we always talked about our Cedar Point stories. Yeah, of course.
Oh, that's sweet. And then also, like I told you, I run the senior center here in Wyoming.
So my coworker and my wife are guarding the door and they wanted to pop in to say hi real quick. Yes, of course.
I like that the door needed to be guarded. Hi, so nice to meet you guys.
I'm Kelly and this is Josh. Hi, Kelly.
Hi, Josh. I'm a therapist and I just love what you have done for so many of my clients.
You guys being so open, transparent and creating just an awesome avenue for people to just be more open and share their story and struggle. So I love that.
Oh, well, thank you. Thanks for listening.
Big fan. My wife is actually a bigger fan, so she's going to be super jealous today.
Good. That's always the goal.
Lord it over. Nice meeting you guys.

Have a great day. Big fan.
My wife is actually a bigger fan, so she's going to be super jealous today. Good.
That's always the goal.

Lord it over.

Nice meeting you guys. Have a great rest of your day.

Thanks, guys. Appreciate it.

That guy looked like Will Hunting a little bit.

Oh, sure.

The other guy, the friend.

You thought he looked like Matt Damon?

No, Will Hunting.

Specifically, not the actor.

Yeah, like the vibe was kind of Will Hunting. Sure.
Secret genius. You got a genius vibe? Secret genius.
Okay, listen, I had a thought during that. Yeah.
Obviously, I checked out because this was a Cedar Point story. Yeah, sure.
You're not going to be with us for most of this. Do you think that people were more religious pre-cell phone? Because you had to just pray.
Instead of checking in on your sisters. Or calling for help.
Or calling for help. You're like, Jesus, take the wheel, you know? It's a great theory, but I will say I've just read, there's a bunch of articles came out in the last few weeks about belief in Christianity having plateaued off and increased even a little bit.
We had been in this really steady decline for a long time. And weirdly now, it's kind of back, they're saying.

Okay.

But for a while, it had decreased.

Yeah.

Since phones.

So probably right, yeah.

Wow.

But I mean, it had been decreasing long before phones, of course, but also, yes, because of phones.

And then a steep decrease.

Yeah, it fell off a cliff.

Hockey stick curve.

I'm a secret genius.

You are.

I'm a Willie.

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We are curious. And we always want to give our arm cherries the if-you-know-you-know tips.
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from 2006 to 2025. Here's Julie.
Rob, that's you. Do you think in the future our faces will look like that? A purple square? Yeah, with the letter in it.
I sure hope not. I think in 100 years, that's what faces will look like.
When the robots and the humans start having sex. Oh, okay.
Like Tower Bible. I don't see that.
Having sex with angels. Oh, wow.
Yeah. Hello.
Can you hear us, Julie? I can hear you. Can you hear me? Yes, wonderfully.
Look at your shirt. Oh, cute.
Oh, it looks so cute. It really does.
I just got it yesterday. It was very SIM.
I came back from an international trip and it was waiting for me at my door. Oh, a welcome home present.
Are you in Michigan? I am in Ohio. Okay, just as good.
Where in Ohio? Northeast Ohio. I'm going to be a little bit vague.
Sure, sure. Oh, good, good.
We like that. And did you grow up in that area that you're currently in? I did not.
I grew up in the Baltimore area. So I'm a transplant, but I've been here the last three years.
Oh, so this Cedar Point story took place in the last three years? It did. Oh, exciting.
Hot off the presses. Please tell us.
Let's hear it. It took place almost two years ago in the summer of 2023.
My husband and I have two little girls. They are now six and seven.
So they were four and five then. We decided to take them to Cedar Point for the first time.
He had never been to Cedar Point. I had been once.
I remember going on lots of fun roller coasters and we got there, did the check-in. My five-year-old is very tall for her age, so she met the height criteria for some of the bigger roller coasters.
Oh, wow. That's lucky at five.
It's about four feet. So she just met the height requirement.
So we were like, okay, yes, let's go to a roller coaster. She'd never been on one before.
She said, yeah, I'll go. And I said, well, why don't you go on Millennium Force? I remember going on that one.
I think I was there in 2011. It's really fun.
You're going to love it. So she's like, okay.
I would have started on the Blue Streak or Gemini, but I don't know millennial. That must have been after his time.
Yeah, it might be past my time. He thinks he knows everything about Cedar Point.
It ends in 99, probably. So Millenn Force is the 10th tallest roller coaster in the world.
Oh, now we're talking. Yeah.
Looks like you're basically in the clouds when you're up there. They didn't rename the Magnum to that.
I have no idea. Okay.
I won't get bogged down in that. I do know that I rode it when I was there in 2011.
I don't think it has any upside downs, but it has the big drop. It goes straight up.
Yeah. and then drops.
That's what I like. I don't need loop-de-loops, but I like a nice tall drop.
And Six Flags, they have both. In one ride, they have both.
Anyway, go on. So she was waiting in line.
I think she got out of line once or twice. She kind of got freaked out, got scared, and we convinced her.
I was like, no, no, you'll be fine. Just go on.
It'll be great. So she went on with her dad.
I stayed behind with my four-year-old because obviously the four-year-old wasn't going to go on. So we just kept watching for them.
I kept looking at all the rides, seeing if I could spot what she was wearing. Never saw her.
It's kind of taken a long time. What's going on? Finally, we see them coming around the bend and she just looks ghastly white.
Oh, no. And I asked her, did you like it? Was it fun? And she was like, it was scary.
That's kind of all she said. I just looked kind of dazed.
And her dad just said she passed out four or five times on the ride. No.
Four or five times. Oh my God.
In this like minute ride. Yeah.
So he said, I kept looking over and she was just slumped over like eyes closed. Oh, this is scary.
Wow. I was kind of freaked out because I was like, does she need medical attention? But she was fine.
She perked up, gave her some juice. Cheese on a stick.
Went to look at the photos. You know, they take the photos that you get to look at after.
You can see him. He's there.
And then there's nothing next to him. Oh, my God.
You can't see her little body at all. She's just kind of slumped.
Oh, no. This is horrifying.
Maybe they need not only a height limit, but maybe a weight minimum. So I think what happened was the G-forces just kind of overtook her body.
Oh my God. I think it was every time she went on the up, her blood pressure probably dropped and all the blood drained from her head.
Yeah. This is what happens when you're in the back seat of an F-16.
You get a ride with like the Blue Angels. Everyone in back passes out because the pilots have developed their leg muscles so good.
They force the blood up into the upper body.

She needed a G suit is what she needed.

We got to get her back.

She doesn't need to go back.

Does she get lightheaded when she stands up?

Doesn't seem to.

I asked her yesterday in preparation.

I said, what do you remember about it?

She said, I just remember that I passed out a couple of times, but I remember being scared.

So I think it's the combination of the adrenaline, the G forces.

And I said, would you go on it again? She said, yeah, I want to go. Let's go.
Oh, wow. She's a trooper.
It might be a few years before we go back on that one. No, I think it's time this summer.
She needs to be bulked up a little bit. I also love that your husband is looking happy in the pictures, knowing that the daughter is like passed out.
He was not scared. No, he wasn't.
Kudos to him for maintaining his cool and remaining calm throughout the ride because I would have been freaked out. So that trip was our last to Cedar Point so far, but we will go back.
The younger one needs now to get on that. Yeah, we need to get her passing out on some rides.
Yeah, yeah, rite of passage. Later that day, we kept going through the park.
And then at some point, it's just started pouring down rain. And then the power went out.
We went into the store. We had promised the girls we would buy them stuffies on the way out.
And so none of the cash registers were working. We didn't have any cash.
So they might have walked away with a stuffy. Uh-oh! As for our shoplifting prom.
Yes, they did, we didn't know about it. Wow.
The power went out. Yeah.
Power was out the whole park. Did she hit any other coasters or that was it? That was it for the day.
Yeah. That's smart.
I would hit the Gemini if you go back. That's a great ride.
The big wooden roller coaster. The G's are very manageable.
I think we're going to try that. So we have not gone back to Cedar Point, but we did go to Disney World.
She did, I think it's like the Barnstormer or something, one of those smaller roller coasters. And that was fine.
She stayed conscious throughout that. She stayed conscious.
Oh, congratulations. She's ready.
Well, Julie. Yeah, thanks for telling us this story.
You've got to go back, Dex, and try the Millennium Force. It is really fun.
I was just at Disneyland with my recently turned 12-year-old. There's a Guardians of the Galaxy ride, and it's like the demon drop, but it bounces up and down.
It goes up, you step for a second, then it drops. That I did one time.
She talked to me and did a second time. I said, I don't think it's a good idea.
I went a second time, and midway, I was like, nope, this was a big, big tactical blunder. Yeah.
And then about 40 minutes to shake that off where I just didn't feel right, you know? I can't do it anymore. I have trouble.
I did a scopolamine patch. Have you ever used those? No.
Is that like dramamine? Kind of. It's just a patch that you put behind your ear, but it's anti-nausea, anti-motion sickness effect.
Okay. I will do that before my trip.
I did it before Disney and I was able to go on the Avatar ride without a problem. Without it, I know I wouldn't have made it.
Okay. Wow.
That's a great idea. I even talked about taking Dramamine, but I didn't.
All right. Well, Julian, there's a lovely meeting you.
You too. Thank you so much.
I hope you have a wonderful summer with your chilies. You too.
Hopefully no more passing out on rides. Yeah.
All righty. Bye.
Bye. Dax.
What is it? I don't know how to tell you this. Well, go ahead.
Wooden roller coasters are out. No.
Monica, you're out of your depth right now. No, I'm not.
You're not an aficionado. Let me talk.
Okay, okay. Yeah.
We have wooden roller coasters at Six Flags. It's part of it.
You got to ride them. It's nostalgic.
But it's not the one you tell people to go ride. It is.
In the same way, Monica, I'm going to compare it to like a 60s Mercedes. Yeah, it doesn't perform like the new one, but there's a nostalgia.

That's a nostalgia.

There's a feel to those wooden roller coasters that is very specific.

Yeah.

I maintain it's probably the best wooden roller coaster ever made.

Oh, my God.

Yeah, it's not painted like the Six Flags ones.

It's a nice natural wood.

You'd like it.

Here is Catherine.

Could be Catherine Hahn, Ohio native. Hello.
Can you guys hear me? Beautifully. Is this Catherine? Yes.
What state are you in? I'm actually in Santa Monica. Oh, my goodness.
My old stomping grounds. You guys always make jokes about the west side.
I don't agree. Yeah, tell us.
We're happy to have pushback. Make your case.

Well, I'm just more of an outdoorsy person.

And so I like the closeness to the beach and the bike path is nice.

Obviously, it's not a great time to go to Malibu right now, but I like the closeness to that area.

The congestion of the east side really stresses me out.

Yeah, it's just more for me.

That's all.

I got it.

I got it.

Do you ever eat at Frito Misto?

It's Italian. That's the only place I crave when I go back to Santa Monica.
Yeah, I've been like one time. It was good.
Oh, get the pink pasta, add some goat cheese and pine nuts. I love goat cheese and pine nuts.
Oh, it's incredible. And the gargonzola salad.
Don't miss that. So how did you end up at Cedar Point? You must not be from Santa Monica.
No, I'm not from Santa Monica. I actually ended up at Cedar Point.
I was on a mission trip with my youth group, which is not what you guys were expecting, I'm sure. Well, I do see a ton of church groups there when we go.
So we basically were going to Cleveland and we were helping a church plant and we were doing city beautification, like picking up trash, planting trees. And I was in high school at the time.
And so our reward day, our off day was we're going to take all these high school kids to Cedar Point. Yes.
And I was not looking forward to it because I am terrified of roller coasters. Oh, OK.
I hate heights. So it wasn't for me.
And I just remember my friends were like, oh, come on, Catherine. Don't be scared.
You got to face your fears. Like, just go on some rides.
And I really, really didn't want to, but I'm also a teenager and

was easily peer pressured into everything. We get there and I go on my first ride.
I remember it.

It was green. It was called the Raptor.
Oh, okay. Do you know it? No, I think most of these that

we're going to hear about were built after my tenure. Do you know about the Gemini?

I don't know about that one. It's wooden.
That's probably why. Oh, okay.
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For three orders in 14 days, excludes restaurants. But I go on this ride called the Raptor, and it's intense.
It goes upside down, and I'm not feeling so hot after the first ride. And I'm like, okay, this is not great.
I just got to get through the day. Well, then I got peer pressured again to get on a stand-up roller coaster.
Oh, I love those. It's called the Mantis.
And I don't even know if they still have it. I don't know if it's safe.
So I go on that ride. And after that ride, I am feeling very, very, very bad.
I was like, this is not good. You need to like stand up for yourself and say no.
Yeah. We take a break.
We're hungry. Because I'm an idiot and 17, I order a burger, fries, and a milkshake.
Oh, yeah. Fill that tank up.
I was like, oh, I'm starving. Like, I'll eat.
It'll be great. When we were at Cedar Point, it is the dead of summer.
It is 93 degrees, not a cloud in the sky, sweaty, gross, not a fun time. So after lunch, I'm like, okay, mentally, I'm done.
I'm not doing this. Well, can I ask a quick question? Did any of the boys on the trip complain of a wet butt cut? Did you hear any murmurings of that? A lot of people were complaining about their thighs rubbing together and just general back sweatiness.
Yeah, the wet butt and the preceding wet butt cut is pretty common for the young men. I don't know about the church group talking about wet butt cuts.
Well, you never know. You never know, but I guess it's good you asked.
I just knew that was in the stew here, Monica. It's trying to paint a full picture of what they're dealing with, with the heat, the nausea.
Very, very hot, not feeling great. So after lunch, we're walking around and I get in a group of people and my crush, and he's like, let's all go ride Millennium Force.
Oh, we just heard about Millennium Force. I'm like, okay, I have to do this because I can't embarrass myself in front of my crush.
I have to go ride Millennium Force. Oh, the pressure on young people.
This is really upsetting. I get on the ride.
I'm sitting there. My entire youth group is in the line behind me.
I'm one of the first groups to go. My friend Reagan is sitting to my right.
My friend Emily is sitting in front of me. My friend Natalie is in line.
As soon as the ride takes off, I'm like, oh no, this is bad. Where's the crush? He's in line.
Not behind you, luckily. No, he's not on the ride with my friends.
Oh, thank goodness. So I don't even scream during the ride because I'm just so terrified.
And usually I'm like a big screamer on roller coasters because I'm scared of them and don't like them. I'm afraid to open my mouth.
I make it through the ride and I pull into where they load the people on and off. And as soon as we click into place, I lean over and just puke everywhere.
All over the platform? On the ride itself. Like I lean over my legs and puke everywhere.
Oh, you filled the floor of the millennial. Okay.
Yes, I did. The whole youth group is in the line and sees this happen.
My friend Reagan is trying to comfort me. My friend Emily is like, what's going on? Because she heard it but didn't see me because she's in front of me.
She can hear the retching. Yeah.
So then I asked Natalie, I was like, well, what happened? What did you see? She was like, well, I just remember you being scared and being really proud of you. Like, oh, she made it.
Like, she did a good job. And then she sees me throw up and she's like, oh, no.
I start like hysterically crying because I'm just so embarrassed. I'm like, you guys made me do this.
I didn't want to get on these rides. Like I hate you guys.
I was guilty of them. OK.
You did not want to take a puke, a bawling and then a lot of accusations. This guy must have wanted your number so bad.
Irresistible. You think the story ends there.
It doesn't. Oh, I get off the ride and I'm like having to be comforted.
And meanwhile, in the corner of my eye, I see the summer high school worker coming with like the broom and the sweet pan. Also, that's not going to do it.
He needs a mop. He doesn't get paid enough to do that.
I'm getting off the ride. I'm so embarrassed.
I'm still crying. And our adult leader, her name's Miss Kelly.
She came over to comfort me. I'm just trying to get out of there.
I make it to the front of the ride. And reminding you guys, it's a 93 degree day.
And I had just thrown up all of my fluids, all of my food I ingested that day. I collapsed right outside the front of the ride.
Oh, my. Oh, this is a really bad day.
Bad showing. It's probably the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to me.
I pass out. Okay, millennial force.
Yeah, you got to be a bad motherfucker to ride millennial force. There was another passing out situation.
Yeah, it's common because it's a crazy ride. So I pass out in front of the ride.
I don't remember a lot of this part. I had to, like, ask my friends, like, can you fill in the gaps? They call, like, an emergency cart.
And I was out for most of this, but I just remember waking up and I'm on this cart and I'm very confused. And I look out the back and I just see my friend Emily running behind the cart to keep up with me.
And I was just like, that's a friend. She's not letting me go through this alone.
And Miss Kelly is in the front of the cart being like, I'm here for you. We've got you.
You're going to be okay. She thought maybe you were going to pass.
Yeah. To be honest.
Well, it was bad. Yeah.
Yeah. I get taken to the roller coaster hospital at Cedar Point and I'm in this hospital makeshift bed.
They're feeding me Gatorade and saltine crackers and water. And they let me call my mom.
And my mom's like, Catherine, what is it?

Why are you calling me? And I'm like, mom, I passed out and I threw up on a roller coaster. I'm so embarrassed.
I had to take an hour to recover because I was super dehydrated. So they had to like give me fluids.
Any person in my situation at that point would have been like, I want to go. It's been a bad day.
But again, because I'm with a youth group and there's a hundred of us, I have to wait for the bus to take us all home.

Sure, sure.

So I'm with a youth group and there's a hundred of us, I have to wait for the bus to take us all home. So I'm just stuck there.
My friends had to take shifts to be with me. So they had to like miss time at the park to just babysit me and make sure that I wasn't passing out again, which is so humiliating.
And long story short, I made it through the day. I got put back on the bus.
They put me in the back row, had me lay down, fed me some Dramamine, and put a trash can right by my seat, just in case. Very thoughtful, actually.
Yeah, but the crush is there. Yeah, well, that's over.
That ship has sailed. Yeah, yeah.
And it was like an hour drive back to our hotel. Oh! Did you marry your crush? Could this have been a meet you? No, he's a great guy.
He married some other girl, and they're very happy. Someone could keep her food down.
Could handle her roller coasters. Someone that didn't throw up at Cedar Point and pass out in front of Millennium Force.
Now, am I wrong? I feel like you can get out to the beach at Cedar Point. You wouldn't know.
I would have gone and tried to hang out at the beach. but I'm not sure if you can exit or not.
They also never were going to let her go off to the beach on her own, just part of a youth group. Rob, will you Google if you can access the beach from Cedar Point? This would be a TBD.
Don't worry. I'm not going to make Catherine hang around to find out, but that would have been a great place to recoup on the hot day.
Get some fresh air. Yes, fresh sea air.
I'm so sorry. What

a terrible trip. So you don't love Cedar Point, I can't imagine.
I don't. I've never been back.

And honestly, after that, I've never been on a roller coaster since. Yeah, they're not for you.

That's okay. You knew it.
I did. That's why I was so frustrated because my friends just thought I

was scared. When in reality, it's like, no, I feel physically ill.
And you know, you're really

susceptible to peer pressure. So you really can't put yourself in the situation again.
We learned a

I'm physically ill. And you know, you're really susceptible to peer pressure.
So you really can't put yourself in the situation again. We learned a lot of things on this day.

Yeah. But I will say I was 17 at the time.
I've grown a lot since then. I'm a big fan

of boundaries now. If it's a no, it's a no.

Yeah. These are hard lessons to learn.

Oh, well, Catherine.

Thanks for sharing that.

Yeah. But it all worked out for you.

Yeah. Thank you guys so much.
I was so excited. You guys were the first podcast I ever listened

And These are hard lessons to learn. Oh, well, Catherine.
Thanks for sharing that. Yeah, but it all worked out for you.
Yeah, thank you guys so much. I was so excited.
You guys were the first podcast I ever listened to back in like 2019. And I loved the honesty and the vulnerability that you guys have.
And now I work on a podcast. Oh, incredible.
What a story. Yeah, full circle.
Thank you guys. Have a good one.
Okay, bye-bye. There is beach access.
A mile long beach is a perk for all park visitors. I was right.
She could have gone out to the beach. She could have.
Put her toes in the water. Cooled herself down.
Okay. That would have been great.
She has a time machine. She goes back.
I'm not going on the Millennium whatever it was. Yeah.
Falcon? Force. Hello.
Hi. Where are you at, Bill? I am on Long Island in New York.
Oh, nice. Oh, there's a popular Netflix murder doc about girls that were abducted in Long Island.
Oh. Oh, yeah.
The serial killer. Oh, my God.
What if it was you? No, Bill's a good man. What if it was right in if you're a serial killer? Right in.
And are you from Long Island? I am. And how'd you end up at Cedar Point? That's quite a hike.
My cousin and a close buddy of ours heard about Millennium Force opening. Everybody's going to talk about Millennium Force.
Three out of four, yeah. It's been great because Dax doesn't know that one.
I don't think that was around in my era. Yeah, it opened in 2000.
My last trip there was around probably 2001. It seems like you would have remembered this ride.
I guess so. I'm going to have to look at some photos.
At any rate, you heard of the grand opening. And at that time, was it the tallest or something in the world? Yeah, that's what they were talking about.
So we were like, all right, we got to go out there. And we were planning the trip.
It opened in spring. We're like, all right, we'll go in the summer.
It's a 10 hour drive. None of us had a car big enough that could fit the three of us, our camping gear, everything we needed.
So we borrowed my aunt's minivan. That was nice of her.
It was a Dodge Caravan, had the sliding doors on both sides. I do all the driving.
We find our campsite, we get there, we set up. A couple pulled up and they started setting up.
They had Canadian license plates. We're like, oh, these guys seem cool.
So we start talking to them. They're there for the same reason as us.
So we decide, all right, why don't we just all go together, hang out, drink, and having a good time the night before. My buddy Kenny, who was with us, he's an electrician and there was a light right above our campsite.
And he's like, oh, let me just go in there and I'll disconnect it so it's not too bright here. Sure.
Normal. We make it through the night.
Next day, we all decide, all right, we're going to drive together. It was a little overwhelming.
We get there. There's a lot of people.
We walk in. You know how they have those photographers that snap everybody's pictures, try to sell you little souvenirs.
The five of us, we get a group picture. We go around the park, ride a bunch of different roller coasters.
And then we're like, all right, we right we're gonna end the day on millennium force we're waiting about a half hour or so as we're boarding it they have somebody on like a bullhorn like all right everybody ready to ride the biggest roller coaster in the world everybody's like yeah the fastest roller coaster in the world yeah the tallest roller coaster and then they're like well then you have to go to Japan. Because one just opened yesterday.

That's two feet bigger.

Three miles an hour faster.

Why would they tell you that?

Oh my God.

So everybody like lets out this sigh

and then they send us right off.

That is so cedar point.

You want to ride the second highest?

You want to ride the second fastest?

Basically.

So it was fun. It was a great time.
We leave and we're driving back to the campsite. How far away is the campsite from Cedar Point? 10 minutes, if that.
The caravan we were driving with the doors on both sides, they lock open and it's hot. So we're like, oh, Jeeps drive around with doors off all the time.
Let's just lock these doors open and we'll drive. We hit a bunch of traffic and then I see a car wash and I'm like, oh, it's my aunt's car.
Let's go get it washed before we hit the road tomorrow. And I pull down the center turning lane of the road and a little Chevy Beretta turns right into us.
With the doors open. The passenger door open.
My cousin's sitting right next to that door. We ripped like the whole front end off this car and the door goes flying off my aunt's van.
Oh, boy. We come to a stop.
The door sliding on the road behind us. Oh, boy.
Cops show up. They know the other car's at fault because they turned into the turning lane without anything.
But they're like, we have a bunch of witnesses saying you were driving with your doors open. They write me a ticket.
And I asked them, I'm like, can I at least get the car back to the campsite and try to get the door back on on our own? So they're like, yeah. So we throw the door in our new friends, Ford Explorer, go back to the campsite.
After an hour or two of wrestling, we get the door back on the van. It's all bent.
The gaps in the door are huge. We duct tape the gaps on the door.
We're like, all right, well, tomorrow we got to drive 10 hours with it like this. And that night it rained really hard.
The campsite was right on Lake Erie. All the sites but ours flooded out.
So our new friends who are right on the lake at an air mattress was literally floating. Oh my goodness.
The next day, you know, we all help each other pack up, dry out, and we head home. And the duct tape held up on all those highway speeds? Yeah, it held the whole ride home.
Fortunately, it didn't rain. What did your aunt have to say when she saw the vehicle? We called her from the site.
Well, my cousin did since it was his mom. She took it really well and then when she saw the van, it was a little harder, but in the long run, she was just happy we were all okay.
That's what she's got to do. I know.
Okay, wait. I think we have a photograph.
Oh, this is the gang? The Canadians? The Canadians, their names are Curtis and Kelly. We never heard from them again after that.
25 years later, we still talk about them. The little guy in the front is my cousin.
And the guy on the right Is basically my Iron Weekly Oh, lovely I'm sorry you didn't get to go to the tallest Fastest Yeah, you have to go to Japan for that, I guess This year they're opening up another one That's supposed to be the biggest in the world At Cedar Point So we're trying to plan a new trip Oh, great Reunion Okay, well that answers question. You're definitely up to go back.
Oh, yeah. Absolutely.
Yeah. Takes me back borrowing an aunt's van and the whole nine.
Shenanigans. Yeah.
My poor aunt. Yeah.
All right, brother. Well, nice meeting you.
Take care. Have a good rest of your day.
All right. You too.
Thanks so much. Bye.
All right. Well, so I'm just going to say that after this, I stand firm.
I position on Cedar Point. Do you remember how offensive it was when David Ferrier did a whole episode on Disneyland with all of his judgments and he had never been? And I said, how could you do this piece and not go? And we went and what happened? He loved it.
He loved it. One of the favorite places he's ever been in his life.
Well, he didn't say that. All I got to say is before you levy your verdict, you need to go to Cedar Point.
I can't promise you that because I like to stick to my promises. We just talked about bucket lists.
Maybe you should add it to your bucket list. Oh, my God.
Is that what I want to do? A place you don't even want to go. Exactly.
Add something to my list that I don't want to do. That should be the requirement of any well-rounded bucket list.
Is there something on there you don't want to do, but you know you should? Okay. Right? Do you think that's a good rule? That's more like volunteering at a hospital.
Or going to Cedar Point in this case. Okay.
All right. All right.
Love you. Do you want to sing a tune or something? We don't have a theme oh okay great we don't have a theme song for this new show so here i go go go we're gonna ask some random questions and with the help of our cherries we'll get some suggestions On the flyer I'm Dish On the flyer I'm Dish Enjoy on the fire rhyme dish on the fire rhyme dish enjoy

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