Talent Show

Talent Show

Was p. much the worst couple months of my life last year. My grades got worse, my eyeshadow got blacker, and I spent most of my time either dead on the floor or in a corner giggling in a high, maniacal voice and muttering nonsensically. For some reason, I decided to do it again this year, thinking it might get better.





When in reality









Yeah.
I also don’t know why I am sticking to my job. Also a love hate thing, I guess, otherwise why would I rather waddle around, taping mikes to people’s faces than do something important? Secretly, I think it must be that I actually understand the directions “tape this to so and so’s face and stick this in their pocket” rather than “the SOMX36 cables go under the PATC-67 box 4 in the rigging section coil”. Which is a sad reason, but, seriously, LAVing is where the party is, as demonstrated previously.




So LAVing. I also p. much have this pride in me for this job to be done well.




Also, it’s not like I have a lot of competition for the job. Luckily last year I had people to help me, but this year, notsomuch.





Talent show is like a final, or exercise, or a really choice piece of asparagus. You tell yourself it’s not going to be that bad, and then you actually get there, and you’re like, WHY.
It seemed like a good idea at the time, and it’s probably good for you (stressing the ‘probably’ here), but the middle of it is agony. But at the end, everything usually turns out okay, and you can even see the daylight of spring by the end of it.

FAILSAUCE McAWKWARDPANTS

Miking people is an unusually awkward job. There are so many choices of situations for the techie to make things awkward. There's a whole lot of bras and skin and face-poking and really tight man-pants involved. Then, there are situations that happen every day (and some that don't.) Usually there’s the whole ‘under-shirt’ conversation, which usually goes like this:

ME: Mmmkay now, this has to go under your shirt. (It has been this way now for seven days.)

ACTOR: **Blank stare**

ME: Um. Do you want to do this, or shall I?

ACTOR: Oh, let me. **Struggles, leaving poor techie to awkwardly stand there and occasionally brush shoulder of actor or randomly feel up mike box under shirt**

Of course, from here, there are two kinds of actors: The suave, usually younger, ones who can handle it all by themselves during costume changes, and then the older, helpless ones, whose skin I see entirely too much of. The women I’m okay with, because it’s women, and they’re easy to talk to and stuff, even when they randomly decide to take their shirt mostly off in front of an entire theatre. My brain basically goes, okay, bra. Okay, clip. Awesome. and then it’s done for the day and has a tea party, unless said actress is a little girl, which is another thing entirely. Then I feel like I’m assaulting them. This is not good for your self esteem.

But men. Jeez. This gender really does not work well with mikes. First of all, they’ve got icky skin. I’m sorry, but they just do. I really do not enjoy being the face-sweat bitch and carrying around alcohol swabs with which to attack faces with, which is awkward for both parties. Excuse me, but your glands are interfering with my mike…and then I feel bad because they look at me all condescendingly like, woman, when is it your place to be all up and wiping my face like I am a baby butt? Go back to your corner, foo’. Then I’ve got to tackle the tape-placement: Too close to eye, or on part of hair? Because surgical tape is fricking surgical tape, and it doesn’t want to stick to anything BUT hair, so basically I cringe internally while taping guys, because I’m gonna have to be the one to rip their whole sideburn off later.
Then there are the people that it’s just awkward to mike, even if they can handle their own mike box placement and everything. Like one certain person at a play I’m working: let’s just call him Gorgeous Man. Generally I don’t have to mike him, but the two times I have in the past two days, there have been some super witty conversations.

ME: **tape tape**

GM: **stares off into distance**

ME: Eww. Your hair is gross.

GM: Sorry, it’s just water.

**Silence**

ME: *thinking* There is no friggin’ way this is just water. What the hell is this??? It’s all sticky and gross….okay….not gonna say that out loud…but seriously. Is this bacon grease? Or lard or something? Do men still gel their hair with that? Or is that just in Kentucky? Why do you ruin your hair with bacon-lard, oh Gorgeous Man?

In the end I settled for, “Okay, you’re done.”

Returning to the helpless older ones, let me just tell you. I have a story that can only be played out in pictures, it was so…well. It played out like a bad movie.















…So yeah. Add that to Charlie dying on Lost (But being miraculously revived!!---but he still died, which was traumatizing) and I’m in hysterics. Add THAT to a conversation on man-nipples, some drawings of naked stick-figure ho’s, a lot of unnecessary tech love drama, and I start to wonder why I take this every day.