We had a 6 am call at Culver, which is a good thing - it's before the traffic and I can make it from my place in about half an hour (a 7 am call and it's 45 minutes, an 8 am call and it's an hour. Fucking traffic), but the day I chose to cut it close because I wanted that extra 10 minutes of sleep is the day I got nailed by security - normally, everyone working at Culver parks in an off-site parking area and then walks onto the lot, and most of the time you can just wave at the parking guard and drive on without being stopped. I guess they figure that if you're pulling in at 5:45 am, you're there to work.
Sometimes, though, you get a parking lot guard who demands to see your pass. This means driving over to the main gate of the lot, waiting in line of cars because everyone else tried to sneak it too and got busted so you all had to come over at the same time and are now sitting there waiting like jackasses because if you'd just done this the right way to begin with you'd be at work now and not on the phone frantically trying to call your boss to tell him where you are (whew), then having the main gate guard make 50 phone calls because your name's not on his little list (because the boss didn't call in drive-on passes for the crew, and why should he? We're parking off-lot and don't need them), then being issued a parking pass for the lot you just left, then having to drive past the very smug parking lot guard while waving the hard-won parking pass.
The whole process takes about 20 minutes, so of course I was late.
Once I actually got to work, we spent the whole day pulling out the lights and cable from the perms (nice, happy solid wood 48' perms that don't scare the bejeezus out of me) above the set that's being torn down. They're constructing another set on the same stage, so it was a day filled with paint fumes and worries about whether or not I have enough brain cells left to huff fumes all day without ... wait ... what was I thinking about?
The Madonna dancers in the next stage spent the day rehearsing with their elephant door open, and the disco-ish beat mixed oddly well with the 80's classics coming from our construction crew's boom box.
I'm off tomorrow.
7 comments:
Weekend work at Fox meant getting a parking space right next to Stage 16. Yes, it was almost worth having to work on the weekend to get that space...
Paint fumes? Hope they weren't using lacquer. Of course you were wearing proper breathing gear, right? Afraid of falling? You were wearing the proper safety harness, right? Glad all those Contract Services Safety classes finally paid off.
Um... yeah, which stage was it that the Madonna dancers were practicing on? Is it, y'know, kind of in the neighborhood of Culver and Overland? (Not that I think you're going to post it, but just in case you wanted to e-mail me... ;))
Meg - nice, plus on the weekend you can get past security in less than 40 minutes!
Anon - lighting folks don't have to wear safety harnesses in the perms, as we don't go out into the 'o-zone' (the part that's off the walkway).
I had a mask (the only ones the paint guys had), but I still felt funny.
Email me and I'll give you the production's name so you can drop a dime on them, should you so desire.
Carly - Madonna wasn't there - it was just her very, very hunky and very very gay dancers rehearsing.
Dammit, why are gay guys so hot?
Because they're not available.
No, they're just hot.
Maybe it's the lack of beer bellies and back hair (not that all straight guys have that).
Oh, I don't care if she's there or not, I'm just curious to see the rehearsals for exactly the reason you stated - 'cause her dancers are typically hot, and though I may be taken and they're gay, I'm not dead and they're still pretty to look at.
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