Snot monitor at Disney World (and you thought your job was terrible)

I was reading yet another of those 'be afraid, be very afraid' articles on the H1N1 pandemic - my throat scratchy, my neck glands aching, through every last word. (Did that person on the other side of the street just cough? Thoughtless bastard should be wearing a surgical mask and staying the hell home.)

This one was in the NY Times, scheduled for this coming Sunday, but through the miracle of modern technology, available in the now. It talked about how theme parks just might be breeding grounds for the flu.

There are, apparently,

Disney fans’ discussion boards are buzzing about the fears of transmission and whether some people are putting their fellow vacationers at risk.

Fear and hang-wringing - once those hands have been cleansed with Purell - are not limited to Disney. All theme parks are viewed as germ vectors of the highest order.

Bad enough that there's a recession on, but having to worry about catching your death on "Pirates of the Caribbean" or a "Flying Dumbo".....

No wonder that theme park management is all over this.

Disney has ordered over 200,000 hand sanitizers for Disney World, which will be located throughout the park. Probably a reasonable precaution. I went to the 60th b-day party for an old friend's husband recently. It was held at a roller-rink, and there were quart pump-jugs of hand sanitizer all over the place.

Disney is, of course, pretty high on cleanliness to begin with. Forget the happiest place on earth, how about the most clean-compulsive place on there. I remember my first trip to Disney Land, and the amazing number of employees walking around with dustpans and brooms. They almost seemed individually assigned to stalk each "guest".

But there are more important things to focus on than whether some cad drops a gum wrapper.

...visitors who display serious symptoms can be referred to a park’s first-aid center for medical assistance.

How'd you like to be the person charged with approaching someone displaying "serious symptoms" and referring them on. Why do I smell law suit here? ("We paid a kabillion dollars for this dream trip, and I don't need some smiley-faced, snot-nosed kid pointing out my snot nosed kid. My Hortense, in fact, suffers from chronic runny-nose-itis, and she's no sicker than the guy in the Goofy costume.")

And, speaking of the guy in the Goofy costume:

If a sick child uses, say, Goofy’s costume as a tissue, a handler (one of the employees who act as the eyes and ears of the characters in costume) can instruct the character to change into a fresh costume.

Now there's a job I wasn't aware of: handler for the costumed character. Wonder if they take turns, or whether someone always has to play the straight guy. Wonder if they get to work with different characters, or whether a handler develops a specialty: princess-only; Donald and Daisy, but not Minnie and Mickey.

Personally, I'd rather be the handler, on the outside looking in, than a character. As a handler, my character preference would be another story. Would it be better to work with a smiling, simpering, princess, or have to put up with Mickey, Donald, or Goofy voice in your ear all day?

And to think that one of the handler's job responsibilities is checking whether some kid blew his nose into, or smeared her ice cream all over, Mickey's shorts or Snow White's pretty little vest.

Of course, germ vectors move both ways, and, as much as theme park patrons may beware walking into a perfect flu brew, how about the workers. Especially those in costume. (That handler job is looking better and better, isn't it? At least no little tyke is trying to hug or kiss you.)

A "travel health expert at the C.D.C." - now there's another interesting specialization - thinks that worrying about theme parks "might be overblown." Dr. Phyllis Kozarsky siad:

“To single out Disneyland and Disney World is not appropriate with regard to transmission of H1N1,” she said in an e-mail message. “There are too numerous to count opportunities for people to be in close spaces together, whether in movie theaters, in crowded shopping malls, on public transportation as well as during most individuals’ daily activities.”

Those daily activities - those are the ones that'll get you every time. Especially if your daily activities include donning a Cinderella costumer and hugging a couple of hundred enraptured pre-schoolers. Yes, that handler job is looking better and better all the time. Better to be a snot monitor than a snot monitee.