Portland trip report
Christian Kane announced last month that anyone coming to his June 12th show at Dante's in Portland would have a chance to be an extra in the music video for his song "The House Rules". Oh, and the video would be directed by Tim Hutton.
I'd already been debating driving up for just the concert, so that announcement decided things for me. No way was I passing that up!
I also decided I'd be dragging rcampuzano with me. Not that I had to drag very hard. As soon as I mentioned it, she said, "YES!"
Originally I'd decided to make the 16 hour drive in one day in each direction, planning to just take Friday off and get home really late on Sunday.
Ruth convinced me that this plan was, frankly, insane. And I'm so glad she did. Because, frankly, it is. So we decided to take two days in either direction. Thursday and Friday up, Saturday in Portland, and Sunday and Monday down.
It was a hell of a trip.
The driving was, thankfully, all uneventful! Thursday started off with my forgetting the concert tickets on my fridge, and only realizing it when I was two blocks from home. Then I forgot the pain meds for my back, and only realized that when I was already at work picking up my paycheck. I was very happy that I didn't need the medication all weekend, but you can bet if I hadn't turned around and gotten them, I would have definitely needed them. So that added an hour to our trip from the start, but we still got into Sacramento around 6:30 or so.
Ruth picked up a couple of audiobooks from the library, which worked out great. It kept the drive from being completely mind-numbing, and gave us something to focus on.
The weather in Sacramento was gorgeous. (The weather everywhere was gorgeous, actually!) We had a lovely dinner with Karla, a good friend of mine who lives in the area. We sat out on the patio at the restaurant where her man works, and we chatted and ate and drank, and it was fantastic.
Friday was all driving, definitely the longest day of it. We started early, around seven, and didn't get into Portland until about 11 hours later. We stopped for lunch in Ashland, and in retrospect, a pasta lunch was a bad idea. The carbs made us so sleepy! And the audiobook, while entertaining, can sound sort of monotonous when you're sleepy. Bad idea when you’re driving!
We also found a used bookstore in Ashland, and spent a very enjoyable half hour in there. Trust us to find books wherever we go!
It happened again that night in Portland. We wanted to go sightseeing while we still had a little bit of light left, since we knew we'd be busy all day Saturday with the video shoot and the concert. So we drove around downtown Portland a little bit in the fading sunlight, when on the corner appeared Powell's. I'm surprised there wasn't a sudden shaft of sunlight and a chorus of trumpets. That place is huge. It's like four stories and takes up a full city block. We only looked around in there a little bit, because if we'd looked longer, it would have been very bad for both of our budgets.
We got up early on Saturday to get ready, because we wanted to get to Dante's with plenty of time, even though our call time wasn’t ‘til 11. We weren't really sure how long it was going to take us to get across the river, because their Rose Parade was scheduled to start at 10, and the route was directly between our hotel and the club.
Portland has an awesome public transportation system, and the light rail worked perfectly for us. Two blocks from our hotel to the stop, 3 stops along the line, 2 blocks from the stop to Dante's. Took us 15 minutes, even with parade traffic. And it was free!
Of course, that meant we got to Dante's like an hour and a half early. So we wandered a few blocks until we found a cafe relatively free of parade attendees, and we had breakfast.
When we got back to the club, the security guard directed us around to the side to the front to check in. Just as we walked by the club's side door, this guy in a red ballcap came barreling out the door and bumped right into me. I absentmindedly said sorry and kept walking, looking ahead for the check-in line.
"You know that was him, right?" Ruthie murmured in my ear.
"Who?"
"Christian!"
So of course, I craned my neck back around, and sure enough, there he was, red ballcap, talking to the security guard.
I kept staring, and the woman behind me laughed. "Don't worry, you didn't break him," she said. "He's still pretty."
Literally ran right into the man and didn't even recognize him. Sigh. I fail.
We got checked in, got a Kane stamp on one arm and a cool black wristband that has Christian's name, "The House Rules" and the date on it. Fun souvenir.
Then we sat, and waited for them to be ready for us. And waited. And waited. And waited.
Tim Hutton arrived (or maybe just walked through -- I don't know when he actually got there), and thanked us all for being there. A little bit later, Aldis Hodge wandered through, and a little bit after that, Chris Downey showed up. I kept seeing crew members and going, "I know these guys! Why do I know these guys?" And then I realized I'd seen them in the gag reel on the Leverage S2 DVD set. So all that was kind of cool.
They were raffling off stuff to keep the extras entertained. CDs and t-shirts, and pics and posters. I was sort of hoping if I won anything, it wouldn't be a t-shirt, since I knew it wouldn't fit me. Then they raffled off an autographed picture of Christian, and I won! :-)
I collect autographs, for those of you who don't know, so that was awesome. That makes two times I've been an extra, and two times I've gotten an autograph out of it. I got David B's autograph when I went to be an extra for Mr. Fix-It. So, between the wristband, my ticket stub, and the signed pic, I got some pretty great souvenirs of this weekend, even if I'm only a tiny red blur in the background of the video in the long run. I just wish Ruthie would have won something too!
In and around here, I got to finally meet gilesgirl, whom I've known online forever! So that was really cool. I'm just sorry we didn't get to spend more time together, with things as crazy as they were. I'm sure I'll get up to Portland again soon, and we'll have to meet up again!
Finally, around 1 o'clock, they were ready for us. We grabbed our props, which were plain, unlabeled brown beer bottles that were supposed to be full of water. I'm pretty sure mine held real beer, though. Looked like beer, smelled like beer, and when I danced around while holding it during the filming, it foamed up all over the place. I can’t tell you how many of those bottles got spilled or dropped or broken around us during the day.
They split all the extras into two groups, and our job was to move through the two doors into the club as quickly and quietly as possible, basically running over each other to get everybody inside in forty seconds, but to do it "safely". The group at the other door was in the shade, and they got to hang out in the tents and sit and relax between takes. We stood in the hot sun.
It was tedious, hot, and tiring, and I'm so freaking glad I did it. *g*
Part of the scene was Christian and Steve coming around the corner in Christian's truck (with the backseat full of hot chicks, of course). They stopped in front of the club and did some sort of scene (I couldn't tell what, 'cause I was toward the back of the line). They had the right lane blocked off during filming, and opened it up when they weren't filming. At one point, this dude in an SUV totally cut Christian off and then had to slam on his brakes 'cause the lane in front of him was blocked off. The entire line was glaring at him and shaking our heads, and Christian looked pissed. And then on another take, a cyclist almost took a header. He was about to ride right through the shot, and he got so surprised when the guard told him to stop, he almost went right over his handlebars. And during one of the takes, Christian and the girls came around the corner and the passenger seat was empty. Steve hopped in right in front of the club. Not sure if he missed his cue, or what.
The rehearsals and takes all sort of blended together, so I'm not even sure anymore how often we did that. Four times. Six times. Something like that. Minutes of movement and excitement separated by twenty minute stretches of roasting in the sun. It was so hot in the sun, and even hotter in the club. At least outside there was a little breeze! However long it was that we did that part, it was definitely long enough for the song to cement itself in my head for the next twelve years or so.
After that, they set up a crane shot, so those of us whose places were in the back sat in the holding area for a while, since the crane was set up where we would have been standing. Beth Riesgraf, who had been taking photos the whole time (as unobtrusively as possible, so as not to draw attention from the band and the shoot) came outside, and was gracious enough to talk to fans and pose for pictures. Ruth went and got her pic first, and I wasn't going to, but Ruth encouraged me to, and I'm glad I did.
Beth's so sweet! I told her I loved her work -- both her photos, and her work on screen -- and she got this huge smile and said thanks, and when Ruth told her that Parker is her favorite character, Beth laughed and said she promised not to tell the others.
There was one more shot that they needed everybody for. Since the crane was still set up where we were supposed to be standing, they moved us toward the front, way off to the side. While they were setting up the shot, Christian was like a foot away from me, so I snapped a quick picture, but it was mostly his profile, with his hair in the way. He looked pretty tired.
They went through the whole song once more, and then we were done. They released us about 6:30, and the show was at 9, so Ruth and I decided to go rest for a while. Hot, tired, and sunburned, we trudged back to our hotel. It gave me a chance to dump all my stuff so I didn't have to carry my backpack in for the show, so that was good.
We got back to the club around 8:30 and got in the line, which was all the way down the block and starting to turn the corner. It was pretty easy to tell who'd been there all day -- we all looked exhausted, and hot, and sunburned. *g*
Right when we were at the front of the line, a cab pulled up and Christian popped out. He was standing right there, so I got a couple of pictures (funnily enough, almost exactly the same angle as the one I got inside the club earlier). He didn't look my way -- probably 'cause I had a camera aimed at him, and I realize it's kind of a dickish thing to do, to have the flash go off that close to him, but he was right there! How could I not!?
The multiple flashes irritated the bouncer though, and he growled at me that there'd be no flash pictures during the first two songs or he'd break my camera. I promised I'd behave and there'd be no need of that.
It was so hot in the club, and the heat, and the fatigue, and the fact that I hadn't eaten anything but a granola bar since breakfast meant that the two drinks I very quickly slurped down (and then the one I had a little later) went straight to my head, with the result that, while I remember the show, it's kind of pleasantly blurry around the edges. I have some fuzzy pics, and some clearer (but still kinda shaky, due to the intoxication of the camera operator -- that’d be me) video to remind me, though.
They sang “The House Rules” twice in a row at the very beginning, still filming for the video, and then the crew put their cameras away, and we brought our cameras out. Christian went and changed his shirt (I don't blame him; it was hot, sweaty work the whole day), and the real show started.
It was so much fun, and it passed so quickly. If I concentrate, I can probably remember most of the songs they played. I know he forgot a verse in "American Made", which is funny, 'cause it was fairly early in the show. Maybe the heat and fatigue and alcohol got to him earlier than usual, too. He got kinda emotional when thanking those of us who'd been there all day for our hard work (probably the alcohol again). I also remember that at one point, Aldis walked right behind me and Ruth, and right through a group of people, and no one noticed him.
After the show, we debated hanging around to see if they'd be signing or taking pics, but we were so tired, we just decided screw it, and headed back to the hotel. So I didn't get any pics with him, and I didn't get my Kane CD signed, but even without that, it's a trip I'll never forget, and that's even before I find out if the camera caught me in any of the scenes!
Sunday was so uneventful I don't even remember it. *g* Driving, and driving, and driving.
Monday, we stopped first in Corning, which I guess is the olive capital of... I don't even know. The state? The country? The world? The universe? Whatever. We stopped at a store that sold everything you could possibly do to an olive. It was like Bubba in Forrest Gump and his shrimp. 900 types of olive oil, plus pepper stuffed olives, garlic stuffed olives, cheese stuffed olives... I think I could go on forever.
In Lathrop, Ruth pointed out a store we'd noticed on the way up and decided we'd stop by on the way back. Ghirardelli chocolate outlet and ice cream shop.
I spent way too much on chocolate. But again, I say -- Ghirardelli. Outlet. How could I not? And besides, I gave a lot of it away to coworkers when I got back.
I was terrified we'd be arriving in LA in the midst of rush hour, and we did, but all the traffic was going north. What I'd feared would take me two hours to get through took like 15 minutes. Ruth's brother Kendry had dinner ready for us when we got back to her place, which was fantastic.
I hung around for a while to let the traffic dissipate some more, and I finally -- 107 hours and 2130.7 miles from when I started out -- got home at 9 pm.
It's now Wednesday. I'm still exhausted (I knew this would be the kind of vacation I'd need a vacation from), and I have a cold. I'm miserable, but it was worth every penny and every second and every sneeze!
I still can't believe we decided to take this crazy trip, and then we followed through! For those of you who know Ruth and me, you know that we're not really big planners. This is a big deal for us. *g*
The only regret is that the timing of the travel meant we didn't get to go to either the Portland or LA screenings of the Leverage S3 premiere, but we'll get to see it this weekend, so it's not too much of a hardship.
So that was our trip!
Sorry for the ginormously long trip report, but I want to be sure I don't forget any of it!
I'd already been debating driving up for just the concert, so that announcement decided things for me. No way was I passing that up!
I also decided I'd be dragging rcampuzano with me. Not that I had to drag very hard. As soon as I mentioned it, she said, "YES!"
Originally I'd decided to make the 16 hour drive in one day in each direction, planning to just take Friday off and get home really late on Sunday.
Ruth convinced me that this plan was, frankly, insane. And I'm so glad she did. Because, frankly, it is. So we decided to take two days in either direction. Thursday and Friday up, Saturday in Portland, and Sunday and Monday down.
It was a hell of a trip.
The driving was, thankfully, all uneventful! Thursday started off with my forgetting the concert tickets on my fridge, and only realizing it when I was two blocks from home. Then I forgot the pain meds for my back, and only realized that when I was already at work picking up my paycheck. I was very happy that I didn't need the medication all weekend, but you can bet if I hadn't turned around and gotten them, I would have definitely needed them. So that added an hour to our trip from the start, but we still got into Sacramento around 6:30 or so.
Ruth picked up a couple of audiobooks from the library, which worked out great. It kept the drive from being completely mind-numbing, and gave us something to focus on.
The weather in Sacramento was gorgeous. (The weather everywhere was gorgeous, actually!) We had a lovely dinner with Karla, a good friend of mine who lives in the area. We sat out on the patio at the restaurant where her man works, and we chatted and ate and drank, and it was fantastic.
Friday was all driving, definitely the longest day of it. We started early, around seven, and didn't get into Portland until about 11 hours later. We stopped for lunch in Ashland, and in retrospect, a pasta lunch was a bad idea. The carbs made us so sleepy! And the audiobook, while entertaining, can sound sort of monotonous when you're sleepy. Bad idea when you’re driving!
We also found a used bookstore in Ashland, and spent a very enjoyable half hour in there. Trust us to find books wherever we go!
It happened again that night in Portland. We wanted to go sightseeing while we still had a little bit of light left, since we knew we'd be busy all day Saturday with the video shoot and the concert. So we drove around downtown Portland a little bit in the fading sunlight, when on the corner appeared Powell's. I'm surprised there wasn't a sudden shaft of sunlight and a chorus of trumpets. That place is huge. It's like four stories and takes up a full city block. We only looked around in there a little bit, because if we'd looked longer, it would have been very bad for both of our budgets.
We got up early on Saturday to get ready, because we wanted to get to Dante's with plenty of time, even though our call time wasn’t ‘til 11. We weren't really sure how long it was going to take us to get across the river, because their Rose Parade was scheduled to start at 10, and the route was directly between our hotel and the club.
Portland has an awesome public transportation system, and the light rail worked perfectly for us. Two blocks from our hotel to the stop, 3 stops along the line, 2 blocks from the stop to Dante's. Took us 15 minutes, even with parade traffic. And it was free!
Of course, that meant we got to Dante's like an hour and a half early. So we wandered a few blocks until we found a cafe relatively free of parade attendees, and we had breakfast.
When we got back to the club, the security guard directed us around to the side to the front to check in. Just as we walked by the club's side door, this guy in a red ballcap came barreling out the door and bumped right into me. I absentmindedly said sorry and kept walking, looking ahead for the check-in line.
"You know that was him, right?" Ruthie murmured in my ear.
"Who?"
"Christian!"
So of course, I craned my neck back around, and sure enough, there he was, red ballcap, talking to the security guard.
I kept staring, and the woman behind me laughed. "Don't worry, you didn't break him," she said. "He's still pretty."
Literally ran right into the man and didn't even recognize him. Sigh. I fail.
We got checked in, got a Kane stamp on one arm and a cool black wristband that has Christian's name, "The House Rules" and the date on it. Fun souvenir.
Then we sat, and waited for them to be ready for us. And waited. And waited. And waited.
Tim Hutton arrived (or maybe just walked through -- I don't know when he actually got there), and thanked us all for being there. A little bit later, Aldis Hodge wandered through, and a little bit after that, Chris Downey showed up. I kept seeing crew members and going, "I know these guys! Why do I know these guys?" And then I realized I'd seen them in the gag reel on the Leverage S2 DVD set. So all that was kind of cool.
They were raffling off stuff to keep the extras entertained. CDs and t-shirts, and pics and posters. I was sort of hoping if I won anything, it wouldn't be a t-shirt, since I knew it wouldn't fit me. Then they raffled off an autographed picture of Christian, and I won! :-)
I collect autographs, for those of you who don't know, so that was awesome. That makes two times I've been an extra, and two times I've gotten an autograph out of it. I got David B's autograph when I went to be an extra for Mr. Fix-It. So, between the wristband, my ticket stub, and the signed pic, I got some pretty great souvenirs of this weekend, even if I'm only a tiny red blur in the background of the video in the long run. I just wish Ruthie would have won something too!
In and around here, I got to finally meet gilesgirl, whom I've known online forever! So that was really cool. I'm just sorry we didn't get to spend more time together, with things as crazy as they were. I'm sure I'll get up to Portland again soon, and we'll have to meet up again!
Finally, around 1 o'clock, they were ready for us. We grabbed our props, which were plain, unlabeled brown beer bottles that were supposed to be full of water. I'm pretty sure mine held real beer, though. Looked like beer, smelled like beer, and when I danced around while holding it during the filming, it foamed up all over the place. I can’t tell you how many of those bottles got spilled or dropped or broken around us during the day.
They split all the extras into two groups, and our job was to move through the two doors into the club as quickly and quietly as possible, basically running over each other to get everybody inside in forty seconds, but to do it "safely". The group at the other door was in the shade, and they got to hang out in the tents and sit and relax between takes. We stood in the hot sun.
It was tedious, hot, and tiring, and I'm so freaking glad I did it. *g*
Part of the scene was Christian and Steve coming around the corner in Christian's truck (with the backseat full of hot chicks, of course). They stopped in front of the club and did some sort of scene (I couldn't tell what, 'cause I was toward the back of the line). They had the right lane blocked off during filming, and opened it up when they weren't filming. At one point, this dude in an SUV totally cut Christian off and then had to slam on his brakes 'cause the lane in front of him was blocked off. The entire line was glaring at him and shaking our heads, and Christian looked pissed. And then on another take, a cyclist almost took a header. He was about to ride right through the shot, and he got so surprised when the guard told him to stop, he almost went right over his handlebars. And during one of the takes, Christian and the girls came around the corner and the passenger seat was empty. Steve hopped in right in front of the club. Not sure if he missed his cue, or what.
The rehearsals and takes all sort of blended together, so I'm not even sure anymore how often we did that. Four times. Six times. Something like that. Minutes of movement and excitement separated by twenty minute stretches of roasting in the sun. It was so hot in the sun, and even hotter in the club. At least outside there was a little breeze! However long it was that we did that part, it was definitely long enough for the song to cement itself in my head for the next twelve years or so.
After that, they set up a crane shot, so those of us whose places were in the back sat in the holding area for a while, since the crane was set up where we would have been standing. Beth Riesgraf, who had been taking photos the whole time (as unobtrusively as possible, so as not to draw attention from the band and the shoot) came outside, and was gracious enough to talk to fans and pose for pictures. Ruth went and got her pic first, and I wasn't going to, but Ruth encouraged me to, and I'm glad I did.
Beth's so sweet! I told her I loved her work -- both her photos, and her work on screen -- and she got this huge smile and said thanks, and when Ruth told her that Parker is her favorite character, Beth laughed and said she promised not to tell the others.
There was one more shot that they needed everybody for. Since the crane was still set up where we were supposed to be standing, they moved us toward the front, way off to the side. While they were setting up the shot, Christian was like a foot away from me, so I snapped a quick picture, but it was mostly his profile, with his hair in the way. He looked pretty tired.
They went through the whole song once more, and then we were done. They released us about 6:30, and the show was at 9, so Ruth and I decided to go rest for a while. Hot, tired, and sunburned, we trudged back to our hotel. It gave me a chance to dump all my stuff so I didn't have to carry my backpack in for the show, so that was good.
We got back to the club around 8:30 and got in the line, which was all the way down the block and starting to turn the corner. It was pretty easy to tell who'd been there all day -- we all looked exhausted, and hot, and sunburned. *g*
Right when we were at the front of the line, a cab pulled up and Christian popped out. He was standing right there, so I got a couple of pictures (funnily enough, almost exactly the same angle as the one I got inside the club earlier). He didn't look my way -- probably 'cause I had a camera aimed at him, and I realize it's kind of a dickish thing to do, to have the flash go off that close to him, but he was right there! How could I not!?
The multiple flashes irritated the bouncer though, and he growled at me that there'd be no flash pictures during the first two songs or he'd break my camera. I promised I'd behave and there'd be no need of that.
It was so hot in the club, and the heat, and the fatigue, and the fact that I hadn't eaten anything but a granola bar since breakfast meant that the two drinks I very quickly slurped down (and then the one I had a little later) went straight to my head, with the result that, while I remember the show, it's kind of pleasantly blurry around the edges. I have some fuzzy pics, and some clearer (but still kinda shaky, due to the intoxication of the camera operator -- that’d be me) video to remind me, though.
They sang “The House Rules” twice in a row at the very beginning, still filming for the video, and then the crew put their cameras away, and we brought our cameras out. Christian went and changed his shirt (I don't blame him; it was hot, sweaty work the whole day), and the real show started.
It was so much fun, and it passed so quickly. If I concentrate, I can probably remember most of the songs they played. I know he forgot a verse in "American Made", which is funny, 'cause it was fairly early in the show. Maybe the heat and fatigue and alcohol got to him earlier than usual, too. He got kinda emotional when thanking those of us who'd been there all day for our hard work (probably the alcohol again). I also remember that at one point, Aldis walked right behind me and Ruth, and right through a group of people, and no one noticed him.
After the show, we debated hanging around to see if they'd be signing or taking pics, but we were so tired, we just decided screw it, and headed back to the hotel. So I didn't get any pics with him, and I didn't get my Kane CD signed, but even without that, it's a trip I'll never forget, and that's even before I find out if the camera caught me in any of the scenes!
Sunday was so uneventful I don't even remember it. *g* Driving, and driving, and driving.
Monday, we stopped first in Corning, which I guess is the olive capital of... I don't even know. The state? The country? The world? The universe? Whatever. We stopped at a store that sold everything you could possibly do to an olive. It was like Bubba in Forrest Gump and his shrimp. 900 types of olive oil, plus pepper stuffed olives, garlic stuffed olives, cheese stuffed olives... I think I could go on forever.
In Lathrop, Ruth pointed out a store we'd noticed on the way up and decided we'd stop by on the way back. Ghirardelli chocolate outlet and ice cream shop.
I spent way too much on chocolate. But again, I say -- Ghirardelli. Outlet. How could I not? And besides, I gave a lot of it away to coworkers when I got back.
I was terrified we'd be arriving in LA in the midst of rush hour, and we did, but all the traffic was going north. What I'd feared would take me two hours to get through took like 15 minutes. Ruth's brother Kendry had dinner ready for us when we got back to her place, which was fantastic.
I hung around for a while to let the traffic dissipate some more, and I finally -- 107 hours and 2130.7 miles from when I started out -- got home at 9 pm.
It's now Wednesday. I'm still exhausted (I knew this would be the kind of vacation I'd need a vacation from), and I have a cold. I'm miserable, but it was worth every penny and every second and every sneeze!
I still can't believe we decided to take this crazy trip, and then we followed through! For those of you who know Ruth and me, you know that we're not really big planners. This is a big deal for us. *g*
The only regret is that the timing of the travel meant we didn't get to go to either the Portland or LA screenings of the Leverage S3 premiere, but we'll get to see it this weekend, so it's not too much of a hardship.
So that was our trip!
Sorry for the ginormously long trip report, but I want to be sure I don't forget any of it!