How To Get Put on the Disneyland Watch List - or - Another Good Reason to Quit Smoking

 I quit smoking on May 8, 2009. I was in Disneyland the week prior, hiding out behind the House of Blues with cigarette in hand, creeping in the bushes, a dirty, filthy smoker. I was defiling Disneyland with lung cancer.
         Disneyland Jail.
[Technically, I was in Downtown Disney but still. It's still Disneyland. Disneyland is Disneyland no matter which part you are in; even if you're drunk and puking, the kind old security guard with the Mickey Mouse name tag will escort you away from the kids and families, lightly chastising but in all ending up like a kindly old grandfather, scolding a misbehaving kid. Like you got lost from your Mommy and need to find her. Except you're 28 and have vomit in your hair.]


      



As I crouched behind the bushes in the dark, drunk on tequila and sucking on a cancer stick, I slunk back further and further behind the planter trying to hide from the families 200 yards away, keeping my secondhand smoke as far away from kiddies as I could.  Next thing I know, there's a flashlight in my face, and a kindly voice asking me what I'm doing hiding.  The only way I could feel worse about smoking in Disneyland was getting caught smoking by a little old man with a Mickey Mouse pin - and I freak out for a second, giving myself the drunk hiccups.  

"I'm smoking...?"  (hiccup)

"Why are you hiding behind the bushes?"  He's staring at me, quizzically. 

"I'm trying to stay away from the kids so they don't smell my smoke."  (hiccup.)  (burp.)  (hiccup.)

The little old man was tiny, about half my size.  I'm not sure what type of security weapon he wore, but unless he was a magic black belt or had a can of spinach handy, there was a good chance that I could have sat on him and he would have squished.  Of course, being drunk and embarrassed at getting caught at Disneyland doing a deviant act, I was shaking in my boots at the sight of this little man.  Totally scared he would haul me away to Disney jail.  (Like I was in high school again, buying alcohol for Prom from the suspicious Asian man at the gas station, embarrassed because he knew I was underage from the amount of mudslides and Zimas I was buying.  Convinced I was going to jail at 17.)

 

 "Well Miss, let me recommend you come out from behind the bushes.  You look mighty suspicious hiding back there.  Why don't you walk over here" - he led me away from my hiding place - "and finish your cigarette."  He walked away, waving goodbye.

(hiccup).  Immediately I snuffed out my smoke, realizing that oh my god he thought I was a pedophile hiding in the bushes, waiting for kids to walk by.  Thinking "holy crap, if I was a guy I'd have been arrested probably thrown in real jail, not Disneyland jail".  Thinking, "this is what I get for defiling Disneyland".  Thinking "holy shit, this is the first time in my life someone mistook me for a pedophile".  Thinking "Dear god, I hope it's the last".  Thinking, "Jesus I need another tequila shot.  Or bed".  (burp)

Apparently there is something worse than getting caught smoking in Disneyland while drunk:  Security guards thinking you're a pedophile in Disneyland is infinitely worse.  A lesson to all the dirty smokers in the world:  Don't try to hide your filthy habit from kiddies by hiding in bushes.  You just look like a pervy creep instead of just dirty,and Mickey Mouse don't like pervy creeps.  Mickey Mouse will eat you.  He's hardcore.