People have been asking about our impromptu trip. so here is a little summary:
Late last week, my friend Roxanne asked me to help her on a project. She needed a video done to submit as an application for the Biggest Loser reality TV show. So we talked about it for a while, and it was going to take some time to do including following her around in different situations, all of which I'm sure would take a lot more time than we would think. In our discussion, she also mentioned that she would rather really go to a live casting call, but she had missed the Chicago one and the next one was in Detroit. Always up for a roadtrip, and always looking to lessen production time, I said; "Hey, how about we drive to Detroit and go to the casting call." Yes, somewhat a self-preservation step, but hey, why not? And being a candidate for the type of show would never hurt either... so we packed up the Element and headed out Friday afternoon for a Saturday event in Detroit. The casting call description says that people should not arrive more than three hours before the event, which was to start at 10am. We drove to the Detroit area and decided to go and scope out the place to see where we were going to go. It was actually a "Homemakers" type of furniture store in a North suburb of Detroit (of course it couldn't have been a far West suburb...). We looked around for hotels in the area and found the location. We drove into the parking lot and Rox looked out and said "Hey there's a fat guy, let's see what he is doing out here." Sure enough, people were already lining up at 9pm. In fact, one group had a tent and had set up camp. I think that was actually the best approach. Rox got out of the car and went up to talk to some people staking out a spot. She said the first thing they said after looking at her was: "What are you doing here, you're not big enough for the show." So right from the start she said that she felt discriminated against. She was too plump for thin people, but now the fat people were saying she wasn't big enough. They talked for a bit and we found out that last year the line had started to grow about 3-4am. I was very tired, and we went to a hotel to crash for a bit. We decided that we would attempt a 4am approach, if we were doing this, we might as well go all out. We got up and got ready to go and headed outside to find... rain. Great. At least it wasn't freezing outside, but rain didn't help. We stopped at a Meier got some rain ponchos and off we went. We put chairs down in a roped off line, and were about 50th in line, seeing as we estimated the morning line at 800+, that wasn't too bad. The goal was to not end up waiting there all day. We talked with others to find many had done this before, one woman seven times... which prompted Rox to think that perhaps this woman might be better served by a different dieting approach. It was certainly and interesting group, that made me feel more like I was on the smaller side of the scale. It started to drizzle and I went back to the Element to rest some more. Once the chairs were there we really had staked out our claim and the Element was warm and dry. Rox stayed and chatted with the potential Losers and learned a lot more of what we were to expect in the morning. Though we were never really sure. A few hours later, the sun was up, but it was still off and on raining on a cloudy Michigan day. A news truck had shown up and so had a few hundred more people. At around 9:45 they opened the doors and the line started moving. We were greeted in the store by the producers and they handed out a one page simple application. Mostly stats and why you were there. We also had been told to bring a picture. Thankfully we were in the store now, so we could get out of the ponchos, though Rox kept her down winter coat on so she could appear "bigger". Milling around the crowd were people that the crowd recognized. At first I thought it was the main producer, but we found these people to be past participants and winners of the show. They were talking to people in the crowd. Rox and I figured that there must be a clause in the contract that says if you win and keep the weight off, then you get to come back and do what we called: "Motivate the fatties." Every once in a while you heard a loud cheer. That was the person running the line getting people to get their energy up right before the entered the room where they were conducting the interviews. The line moved forward one group at a time. We thought it was odd that amongst all of this were.... people shopping for furniture. "Hey does this couch come with that 600 lbs guy eating an Egg McMuffin?" When it was our turn we counted off, did our little yell, and walked into an area where there was a big table surrounded on three sides by a total of ten chairs. On the other side of the table was a producer and a mother daughter team who had won on the show. We each grabbed a chair, and said hello. We basically went down the line introducing ourselves and saying something about ourselves and handed them the application one by one. There were a few stories in the mix. One lady had a picture of her sister who had passed away after bariatric surgery, and that was her motivation to be there. That was the most powerful to me. Another wanted to lose the weight to gain a husband, and another was just unemployed and thought it would be something to do. I realized that each of these people had a story. I thought that might just be a show in itself. After the introductions, they threw out a few questions to start a discussion about health and workouts and which trainer they would want. Ironically, most people chose Jillian, though of what I've seen of the show, she wouldn't be my pick. And after the ten minutes they thanked us and said that they would be doing call backs that evening for interviews during the week. We walked back out past the ever growing line and I was tempted to yell to them "Hey I was just chosen to be on the show!" On the way out we also saw the seven time applicant and she said it well: "Hey it's a show, you don't know what they are looking for and chances are they have very specific things for a good mix, but you never know." We drove home and no, neither of us have gotten a call. But it was a fun and different thing to do. An adventure as it were. Through this experience Rox has been motivated to create her own program and not end up like the seven time applicant lady. So she is motivated and will be starting a blog to cover her progress. I've been walking a lot since I could in the Vegas weather and am continuing that trend too. So one does not need a show to make it happen and that's a good thing. I will leave you with this question. Our trip was 325 miles from Glenview to Detroit, however, even though we took the exact same route back, the total mileage was 755 miles. The question is: "How could this be?" And I will give you one hint.... Roxanne drove for a bit of the drive back. So that's my little summary of a couple of Losers and their drive to Detroit.
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