The Day After..

Sunday, October 30, 20052:51:00 PM EST
Feeling Happy

Sometimes life hands you the pits (in my case, most of the time) but once in a great while it decides you deserve the fruit too!! Now, ask me if that happened yesterday! O-O-O-O-O-O-H YEAH! (Bowing head with as much gratefulness as one can have).

Indeed, yesterday was my long awaited autograph show. The rain held off, for which I am most grateful, however, it was a tad on the cold side for standing in lines outside for hours. Of which, (someone was looking over me) I did NOT have to do!! But many, MANY I watched standing in lines for 2 and even 3 hours (I saw more then one red nose from the cold) just to have a chance to get a long awaited autograph of a favorite actor.

Now, you might think, “Heck, I’d never do that!” Well, I’d bet money you wouldn’t, unless of course, you were an Autograph Collector who had waited months, or years, or even most of your life for a chance to get the autograph and to have a few short minutes of that actors undivided attention. Of course, it doesn’t have to be an actor. You might be someone who admires a sports figure or an astronaut or someone in the political life. But no matter who it is, the feeling is the same, “this could well be my only chance to see this person”.. and so… you wait in line.
There are times you do everything you can to make things work out and still they don’t, and then again there are times all your effort pays off. I had one of those days! I had read on the website that advanced tickets were sold out and the sale of tickets at the door were going to be (in their words) EXTREMELY LIMITED. Panic set in my stomach as I let out a huge discouraged sigh. “Once every 6 months (if that) I get an opportunity to do something I enjoy, somehow I’ve got to make this happen.”

The first thing I did was to be at the hotel where the show was going to be at by 6:30 AM. Tickets were not even going to be sold until almost 11 AM! Would you believe I wasn’t the first in line? Well, I wasn’t! But I was 3rd in line! Ok.. so.. at least I was assured a ticket! (but ohhhhh, that long wait was hell on my back since I suffer with bulging disc’s)

Then something wonderful happened, totally unexpected but ooohh so gratefully accepted! They began to sell the tickets a tad (not much) earlier. Ok, I’ll take that! I guess I need to tell you at this point, that out in front of the hotel was a HUMUNGUS line of people who bought the “pre-tickets”. The line I was in was for those who had no ticket. They were supposed to sell our tickets when they opened the door for the pre-tickets to rush in and run for yet another line in front of the tent in which the multitude of guests were seated to do their autographing. As they began to sell our tickets someone asked where “we” (the new ticket holders) should go? The man thought a minute and said, “They can go line up at the tent”. I didn’t stick around for him to change his mind!! I went! It meant I was “front of the line” for the tent! It was only minutes later when I saw the “pre-ticket” folks begin to filter out and get in line. (they weren’t happy that others were in front of them.. but to be honest, maybe 7 or 8 of us got there before they did, it wasn’t “major”, but I well imagined how they felt!)

Minutes later the tent opened it’s doors to a “limited amount of people at a time” due to fire restrictions. I headed down one side of the tent looking for the few people I was interested in and wanted to obtain autographs…

Ohhhhhhh heart be still!! Kevin Sorbo! YESSSSS! I’ll take him “to go” please! LOL! I’ve seen him before so he’s not really a surprise to me, just ohhhhhh so pleasant to view!! Haha. What is it men like to say? “I may be old but I’m not blind!”, oh wait, or is it, “I’m allowed to look at the merchandise as long as I don’t buy any!” Actually, I’ve heard them both lol.

The old song “So Fine” went thru my mind as I approached his table. He greets you with a great big smile and handshake waits a moment and then says, “which picture would you like?” (Hits hand on head) Ohhh, right.. a picture! Heh.

Anyway, that was my first sight of Kevin, but not my last.

I left his table and walked around looking at many faces, admitting I didn’t know a lot of them as most were people involved with “horror movies” of which I don’t watch much. Eventually I came upon someone I knew and had enjoyed more than once, Warwick Davis. He played “willow” in the movie of the same name; also numerous other movies, most recently he’s been cast in each of the Harry Potter movies. Yes, he’s a dwarf, one with talent. And he’s not that bad looking either. I remember he was only 17 when he played Willow, now he’s 37 and married. He looked exactly the same as when he was 17 .....sometimes I hate men!

In the short time it took me to get two autographs a new “line” had formed of those wanting to get Larry Hagman, Barbara Eden, and Bill Daily’s signatures. (“I Dream of Jeannie”) I asked one person, “is this the line for Larry Hagman and Barbara Eden?” The man just pointed in back of him. I began to walk until I came to one of the tent doors and looked outside.“Umm nope, I think I’ll skip these autographs, thank you anyway.”The line outside went so far I couldn’t see the end of it! So, suffice to say, I skipped them! (you weren’t even allowed to take your own pictures of them unless you were getting an autograph, therefore, you will see no pictures of them in this journal)

After some mulling around I found Geoffrey Lewis, a fine character actor. You may recognize him from the Clint Eastwood movies, especially “Every Which Way But Loose” (the one with the orangutan). I always enjoyed him, so we got into his line. (which did NOT extend out into the parking lots!)

As I looked around more I saw a familiar face so I walked over to see the photo’s she had. “Well I’ll be darn! It’s her! She was in one of my favorite episodes of Star Trek” I stopped and began talking to Antionette Bower. If you ever watch the original Star Trek, she played a character name “Sylvia”, who was at times, a black cat. She wasn’t the nicest person in that episode lol She even held a miniature of the Enterprise over a flame making the crew very uncomfortable lol. We talked a long time, for she knew DeForest Kelley, which made our talk go off into other directions. Anyway, she had a nice picture taken just a few weeks ago with Bill Shatner (Kirk) and I thought it was so nice I asked her to sign it.

No matter where I walked I “somehow” always wound up back by Kevin.. heh, imagine that! I have to say, I’m not really used to just walking around for autographs, generally I am working with/ helping one of the guests. Which of course meant old habits don’t always die. I asked Kevin and the 2 helping him if they’d like me to go to the hotel for any drinks or something to eat for them. His two helpers said yes, and off I went.

A bit later there was a lull in people for Kevin’s line, which surprised the heck out of me. Obviously, it surprised him too. We began talking, all 4 of us; Kevin said he had half a mind to “walk the outside lines of people” since they had to wait so long to get in, but he didn’t want to create a scene either. I went and found the person in charge of the whole shebang and told him what Kevin wanted to do. I found out quickly that the people doing the show didn’t much care; they just wanted the “money”. I went back and Kevin said “let’s do it then”. The three of us picked up his photos and his pens and went out to greet the people. The folks in line were shocked to see one of the guests outside, “coming to them”!

Quickly Kevin was signing all sorts of things and posing with anyone that asked to have their picture taken with him, even if they didn’t buy from him. He turned no one down. (how can you not like this guy?) We stayed out there nearly an hour and were quite cold before we decided to go back in. Things inside picked up for Kevin and the 2 that were helping him decided to head out if “I” wouldn’t mind staying with Kevin. (oh, yeah, right…. I mind..NOT) So then I was on my own helping him for the next few hours. Yeah.. tough job, but someone had to do it! Hahaha. I totally enjoyed working with him. When he had a few quiet moments he whipped out his digital camera and played “proud papa”.. he showed me pictures of his 2 sons and his new born (2 wks old) daughter!! Beautiful children, he’s going to have his hands full when they are teenager’s lol.

So.. that’s the short of it (short?). The day was great (with the exception that by the end of the day my back was really painful. But if you ask would I do it again.. hell yes!)

Since it is Halloween weekend, I did think I should end this on a Halloween Note…So here’s the last photo I took while there… least anyone is of the age to remember, This is Zacherly! He had a long running “creep show” on television where he came out of a coffin and introduced “creepy movies”.. I hope everyone has a fun Halloween!!


Only those who attempt the absurd, achieve the impossible