THIS LOOSE ARTICLE IS NOT PERMITTED AT SIX FLAGS
BINGHAMTONREVIEW.COM
This Loose Article is Not Permitted at Six Flags By Matt Gagliano
B
inghamton Review is back! Did you miss us? Admit it, you missed us. I guess I should start off this article by saying welcome back; hopefully this semester is the start of things returning back to normal. Although, they’re still making us wear masks indoors, so maybe not. Either way, I’m getting off topic. You would think that now that I’m Editor-in-Chief, I would go on fewer tangents and write about more serious topics. Jokes on you, though, because now there’s no one above me who can tell me no! All of my articles will be page-long tangents about random shit, and there’s nothing you can do about it! I’m drunk with power! Anyway, I hope that everyone had a good summer. As I’m sure many of yours were, my summer was filled with a balance of work, seeing old friends from high school, and the traditional, once-per-summer pilgrimage to Six Flags Great Adventure. While I was at Six Flags, however, I unintentionally
“Like, how did he know that it was my phone in my pocket and not just my enormous penis?” uncovered a massive scam that’ll make you go, “yeah, that’s kind of bullshit, but I don’t care enough to do anything about it.” So strap in, empty your pockets, and keep all hands, arms, feet, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you’re about to embark on a wild ride... This article. This article is the wild ride. In case you didn’t pick up on that. First things first, what scam am I referring to? The fact that all the carnival games they have there are rigged? The fact that they charge $5 for water bottles? No, because water bottles actually cost $5.50 at Six Flags. Also, because the scam I’m referring to makes those look like Binghamton University’s meal plan; still a scam, just a minor one that only affects a small group of people. The scam I’m refer-
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BINGHAMTON REVIEW
ring to is the locker system. Anyone that has ever been to Six Flags, or any amusement park for that matter, has probably seen the rentable lockers that they have outside of some of the rides. The idea behind these lockers is that if you have a bag or something that is too big to bring on the ride, you can rent a locker to put it in. “What about these lockers makes them a scam?” you may be asking, like a naive, smooth-brained moron. Well, let me tell you a story about my most recent trip to Six Flags. Toward the beginning of this summer, I went to Six Flags Great Adventure with my dad, brother, and step-brother. None of us brought any kind of bag, because we’re men, and therefore our pants actually have pockets. We went on a few rides without any problem, until we went to get in line for El Toro. El Toro is an old, rickety, run-down, wooden roller coaster that has a few sudden drops, but no loops, corkscrews, or any other kind of upside-down segments. That’s probably why all of us were surprised when there was an employee who stopped us from getting in line and told us that we were not allowed to have any items in our pockets on the ride. Fucking dick. As a proponent of cargo shorts, I came prepared. I moved my phone and wallet into the buttoned pocket on my shorts, assuming this would be acceptable for Mr. Phone Police. Oh boy was I wrong. The employee pulled out his gun and shot all four of us on the spot. Alright, that didn’t actually happen, but can you imagine? Instead, he simply told us that it didn’t matter if it was in a buttoned pocket, we had to
put everything that was in our pockets into a locker to go on the ride. At first, I was just a little annoyed that this guy wasn’t letting us on the ride. Like, how did he know that it was my phone in my pocket and not just my enormous penis? But after some thought, I realized that this “rent our lockers or else” policy didn’t make any sense. I started to keep note of the rides that had signs relating to “loose articles” before you got on the line, and here’s what I found: The only ride with a Phone Police officer preventing you from getting in line was El Toro. There were some rides with a sign that read “loose articles are not permitted on this ride,” such as the Joker and Superman rides, and some had a sign that said loose articles must be put into a buttoned pocket, such as Bizarro and Nitro. When I saw the sign on the line for Bizarro, my first thought was “that makes sense, this ride goes upside down, so they don’t want anything falling out of your pockets.” Unfortunately for me, at this moment I was the naive, smooth-brained moron. After thinking about it for the next 10 or so minutes of the hour-long line, I
“Without the lap bar, you might be able to actually feel like Superman. At least for a few seconds, then you’d get to feel like Superman if he were hit by a Kryptonite train.” realized that putting all of your loose articles into a buttoned pocket didn’t make any sense at all. If you’ve ever been on a roller coaster that has an upside-down segment, you probably noticed that during that loop, you are pushed back into your seat. If you didn’t notice this, either you were too busy pissing your pants and vomiting, or you broke the laws of physics. Either way, I’m sure that made everyone around you go “dude, what the fuck?” so good job. The reason you feel this
Vol. XXXIV, Issue I
