My new love/hate relationship

Ah, my not-quite-as-beloved-as-before Buffalo Wild Wings. We once relished each other’s company and felt that the world was at peace while we were together, even when the New York Yankees were in town. That’s when I would order my wings with the Caribbean Jerk sauce, which is indeed quite yummy. But now, whenever I see your logo on a store or a commercial—especially a commercial—I suffer from a horrible flashback of Thursday. Horrible, horrible, horrible…

In a way, it’s reminiscent of being on Beauty and the Geek. Various people across the nation loved Richard because they thought he was funny. Lemme tell ya, he’s a lot funnier when you only get a 20-minute dose of him every week. If you’re there all the time… it gets aggravating after a while.

Similarly, if you’re an extra for a 30-second commercial, people might love to see someone they know right behind one of the main actors. Lemme tell ya, that’s a lot funner (yes, I said funner) when you only see the 30 seconds. If you’re there for the entire filming session (this one in particular)… it gets way more than aggravating after a loooooong while.

I saw the initial casting notice from an “Extras” mailing list from Walden Entertainment. You can get messages for “Actors”, “Theater”, “Comedians”… I think the “Furries” list was removed due to high traffic, but there are still plenty of others. Directors and other recruiting-types will send a message to Walden with a “Please please pleeeeease send this to everyone because we need people NOW!” The message gets sent to a bazillion people… okay, maybe half a bazillion, but a lot of people get the message and can respond and say, “Yes, I’ll spend an entire day at the Target Center for $50!” In most cases, extras are lucky to get food, so with a cash incentive, people would normally come in droves.

I say “normally” because I disregarded the notice initially. Maybe it was because I didn’t want to drive downtown, maybe it was because I thought I’d be busy, maybe it was because I planned to spend the entire day surfing for Internet porn. In retrospect, I couldn’t tell you. What I can tell you is that I changed my mind when Jordan, one of the interns at Walden and a buddy of mine, gave me a call and asked me to show up. It’s one thing to make your decision, but it’s a lot more difficult to tell someone on the phone, “Sorry, can’t help out for fifty bucks—a website with girl on girl on girl on guy on sheep is calling my name.”

But like I said, getting into downtown was a bit of a deterrent. Given that I live in the southern suburbs, I’d need to drive many miles through rush-hour traffic… basically, call time was 8:00 and I would have had to leave the house at 4:30 to ensure my prompt arrival. Thankfully, Jordan lives relatively close to Target Center, so I crashed at his place for the night. The couch I got to use was nice and comfy and I would have slept better if it weren’t for a phone call at about 5:00, which was when someone wanted to tell Jordan he wouldn’t be at the shoot. And since it was a two-day process, Jordan was burned out from Wednesday and slept through it. I did not. Thankfully, I was able to roll over and sleep for a little while longer before it was time to get up.

Not so thankfully, getting up when we did meant we didn’t have time to grab breakfast before going straight to the site (and because Jordan was working for Walden, the casting agency, he needed to be there at 8:00). Thus, a bottle of Sunkist became my liquid breakfast and had to tide me over for many hours. And by “many”, I mean “until after 2:00 in the afternoon.”

Jordan had warned me ahead of time that the director was… not a very nice person and everything tended to be disorganized. He was right. Everyone was supposed to bring five shirts and at least two pairs of pants for them to choose from—a girl would wander around, picking out a good outfit for each person, then wander around some more. She seemed to be doing a pretty good job, but before she got to my clothes, someone came to tell her that we had too many people and not enough time.

Instead of making decent choices, we were told to walk to the side of the room and line up so she could make quick “yes” or “no” decisions. As soon as I heard that, I blurted out, “Time to head to the Gulag!” and she busted out laughing. Trust me, laughter was at a premium that day. So I got into line, she went down and gave my clothes the official “okie-dokie”, at which point I walked into the main area and then onto at the Timberwolves basketball court. Woo hoo!

The rest of the day was pretty much just moving around the stadium and cheering. Not so woo hoo!

My contract simply stated that Buffalo Wild Wings is allowed to use my appearance however they want, etc., so if you don’t want me to spoil the plot of the upcoming 30-second production, you better stop reading now. If you don’t care (which is the point I reached with a few hours left to go that day), then keep going and find out how this turned into a love/hate relationship.