"Even if I got rid of all my problems, I'd just go out and get new ones..."

TV. Not quite so showbiz.
11:33 a.m. on 2003-11-29

I am so tired. THis might be because I've been working 13 hour days all this week, for no money, and only got to bed at 4.30am last night due to the wrap party.

Heh. Wrap party. Sounds showbiz but it really isn't. Not when you're in a Ye Olde Worlde Inne and the production manager keeps telling you how everyone who works in entertainment is busy snorting coke to get them through the day.

To explain, for the past week I have been doing some work experience with a tv company as they film a weeklong OB (Outside Broadcast) at a local cathedral. Several services, culminating in one, big, celebrity laden Xmas Eve extravaganza on Friday.

I say celebrity laden. The ladies in the canteen were thrilled when Aled Jones gave them a signed copy of his new album, but I couldn't really care. And I see Sue Nicholls more often in B&Q than in 'Coronation Street.' Now if, as was mentioned on the script, Brian Blessed had actually turned up for his own little recording thing, that would have got me gushing in a fan-like manner (it's BRIAN BLESSED!!) ... but sadly it was not to be.

It was a good week though. Knackering. But good. The team who looked after me were lovely, and each had a very different personality. Perhaps standing out was the floor manager, S., who is lovely but very bossy. Well, she needs to be given her job, but I imagine she snaps out orders 24 hours a day, no matter what she's doing. In bed, she'll be the one on top, shouting "No, not that way! Touch me there! Higher! What are you doing? Quick as you can, please!"

For my part, much of the week was spent supervising old ladies in and out of the cathedral doors and to their seats while the director tried to rehearse. Not the easiest of tasks, and on Friday there were 1000 of the "old dears" (or "old bats", depending on our stress levels) who were very lovely as they walked through the doors, and were perfectly amenable about the lack of visibility in the cathedral. Mind you, when we were 90 minutes over time and still not finished, there was slightly more whinging.

Oh yes, there were a few disasters. The generator exploded several times on Monday, descending the scene into darkness and forcing the director to give up filming entirely. Various sound problems plagued the shoot. And then last night one old lady fainted during a hymn, cutting her head on the floor. The production team leapt into insane action, calling out an ambulance, while the director desperately tried to shoot around the rushing people, the blood, and the paramedics. Rather British of him, I think. It was only when a second woman keeled over just as the paramedics were about to drive away (prompting cries of "get them back! Flag them down!") that we began to wonder whether the show would ever be finished.

But it was. And then we went for drinks. And... things overran. And now I'm very sleepy, slightly dazed, wondering why I don't have a pair of headphones on and missing the constant voice of the director in my ear. "Cut to camera One. One to five. Oh god, we can't use that shot, that person's chewing. Pan left, pan left, that guy's either asleep or praying and I don't want to know which!"

Listening to: Buffy OTS

Quote: "If it isn't too blasmphemous, I wish Mary hadn't had a bloody baby!"

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