mary j blige and wwe

man, where has june gone?  warehouse work has been punctuated by doing large show calls, work for my july gig and other odd jobs.  ahh summertime.  there have been long days and nights but also quiet evenings, gentle mornings, and serene weekends.

the mary j blige show was awesome, even though the two days of rehearsal leading up to it were less than awesome.  highlights include taking several of the band members to guitar center and rocking out to 80's herbie hancock, no sleep, and dancing my ass off to 'real love'.  i worked with people named huggy, puff and cheeto.  good times. 

i have been to guitar center so much over the past months that i've started getting emails from their sales associates asking me if the gear i bought worked out and how they can help me in the future.  rockstar.

i worked the wwe tv broadcast a couple days later.  there is a wrestler that everyone has said i look like over the years: sheamus o'shaunessy.  here is what he looks like:

 wrestlingandwrestlers.blogspot.com

i've been in the grocery store and the checkout ladies tell me i look like him.  i was at a UR basketball game and a bunch of kids yelled 'sheamus!' at me.  i was in downtown philly at a less than savory bar and some dude told me i looked like sheamus and bought me a beer.  bus drivers for other shows I have worked called me sheamus.  so i get to the production office at about 8am and everyone immediately starts calling me 'short sheamus'.  all day i was short sheamus. 

in the beginning of the day things were kind of slow so i did what i usually do: pull out a book.  within a few moments i felt a big mitt on my shoulder, which belonged to the head of production.  "short sheamus," he said, "you are in the world of professional wrestling.  there will be no reading of books."  right then, don't have to tell me twice.

catering was amazing.  i ate steak, mahi mahi with a chipotle aioli sauce, marinated grilled chicken and many other delicious animals.  there was also a bomb ass caesar salad.  dega was the catering company and they are incredible.

i get these runner gigs because i am familiar with things the carpenters may need, gear the sound guys and guitar techs may need and other random junk.  like where to find a particular flavor of monster energy drink.  the ladies i work with usually handle grocery shopping and those sorts of things while i am out buying multiple sheets of cdx plywood and machine-threaded screws with finishing washers.

so everyone wanted me to meet sheamus and it happened at the end of the day.  i'm there to work and i ran into a bunch of famous people.  i don't know wrestling.  i had a conversation with a wrestler about how their show prep diet was similar to victoria's secret models.  i was told that this particular wrestler was john cena and is apparently quite the big deal.  he was a nice guy.  anyway, we're sitting in the office settling out our petty cash and 'ol sheamus comes in.  production boss tells him to say hello to his twin and points at me.  sheamus points  a massive finger attached to a massive arm at me and growls 'nice hair!' and then disappears.  everyone in the office was exceptionally entertained.