My antlers hurt.

Today, we filmed a commercial. We have a local ice hockey team here called the Jackalopes. If I'm remembering correctly, they've been shooting a series of commericals where the mascot goes out and does various things unrelated to hockey. In this case, getting beat up by wrestlers. The guy who typically wears the suit was not a part of it. So guess who got to put it on and get beat up? (Editor's note: insert picture of me holding up two thumbs at myself later.)

It was hot as hell, but this is not the first mascot costume I've worn. Third, actually. The idea was for me to take big moves from everyone, that will be cut and spliced together into a series. The first move I took was a corner splash. When he did a trial run to show the cameraman how it would look, I immediately knew the mascot head was going to hurt me. The place to see out of was his mouth. There was no padding; straight up hard plastic grating. I was gonna bust my nose and mouth if I took the move, so I asked for padding. They cut a small piece of ring padding and shoved it up the front. It was great for protection, but limited my visibility to roughly 0%. I was hit by a blind splash. The only indication I had that it was coming was "action!" and then footsteps. I basically had to guess when impact was coming. The padding helped, but not knowing exactly when it hit was the worst. And, since this wasn't exactly live and in real-time, we did several takes for everything. Kinda glad to get the worst part out of the way.

Second spot was the spear. As always, I took it like a champ...so well, in fact, my head flew the fuck off. On every take except the last. If they can cut it so you don't see my face, I bet they'll keep it that way. It looked great. I also took: Vader Bomb, top rope frog splash (first take ended with Cash's knee in my gut,) cattle mutilation submission, being choked on the ropes, a chairshot to the back (the mascot's padding really helped out here,) and ending with the champ standing over me with the belt and turning my head 180 degrees to face up at him. Now, I wanted to be in this thing too, so I got out of the costume and Cash put it on. He whipped me off the ropes and I came back with a flying cross body. I laid on top of him and gave the old Rick Rude pin while a ref counted to 3. Cash ended up taking quite a few other moves: a top rope elbow drop, a big kick from a spring board, a side slam, a body slam, and a clothesline. I may have missed a move or two in all this; but when the commercial is fully finished we've all been promised copies. I will make sure to get it posted.

The ending to the commercial is all of us in the ring, standing around the downed Jackalope, stomping the shit out of him. In the foreground is an announcer, grinning in a tie while he talks about the team or something; I don't know for sure, couldn't hear him. A lot of the guys got some footage on their phones of me and Cash taking these hits, and I gotta say they look pretty brutal. I cannot wait to see the finished product. We all had a lot of fun doing it. Me being the bump bitch and taking all these hits is kind of a way of breaking me into the business. We all gotta pay our dues. Some people work a squash match where the opponent intentionally breaks a nose or makes them bleed. Some people don't get to use a locker room. Some people have to carry the vets' equipment for them. Some people sleep on the floor in the hotel room, or just get embarassed in some way. I apparently get to wear a costume and get fucked up on camera. Personally, I'll take it.

Next practice is Sunday, and then we're taking Tuesday and Thursday off for the holiday. Then there's the next Sunday practice after that; which I will likely miss. That's my birthday weekend so I expect to be in Abilene for it. I think they might be watching footage of last Sunday's matches and critiquing it, and possibly getting the raw, uncut footage of this commerical, so I may need to get my ass back here regardless. Those are both things I need to see.