Back in 2003 I spent a few months working as the promotions assistant for the NBC/WB affiliate in Sacramento. The job wasn't great and I didn't have the best attitude. I had just left a pretty awesome "big fish in a small town" job in my hometown and was feeling pretty big for my britches. To be micromanaged and carry so little responsibility was a huge blow to my ego at the time...not to mention I basically watched TV at my desk all day because I had so little to do. (There are only so many episodes of Blind Date that a person can watch before they go bananas...)
There were a few cool things that happened in that job though. I got to work with the news anchors a bit and one time I interviewed Nicole Scherzinger (pre-Pussycat Dolls) through a video feed, which was awkward, but kind of cool. I also got to do prize fulfillment for the station. This was usually pretty lame and just entailed calling people on the phone to let them know they won a prize or meeting them in the lobby with the gift card, etc.
But one time...we held a big contest to meet Chris Pratt at Great America. At the time he was one of the stars on the WB's Everwood. He played kind of a douchey character and he wasn't that famous, so I wasn't super excited about him. I ended up getting to be part of his "handler" team for most of the day at Great America. He met the prize winners (there were some from other WB affiliate stations as well) and we all stood in line for them to go on the Medusa rollercoaster together.
I hate rollercoasters and wasn't planning to go on with them. Chris Pratt made me go on the ride with them, sit next to him, and let me squeeze his hand really hard through the whole thing. I survived and probably got way more attention from him than the prize winners did. Oops. We hung out with a few other promotions people in a trailer for awhile afterwards and he autographed a photo for me that said something about losing feeling in his hand because I held it so tightly on the ride. It didn't mean much to me at the time, so I threw it in a box somewhere and LOST IT.
Now he's pretty famous and has been in some hit TV shows and movies. It was never that cool of a story for me to tell because for years no one really knew who he was. Now I see his picture and name more and more and that memory comes back and it makes me smile. I'm very visual when it comes to memories. If I don't have a photo of an experience it's almost like it didn't happen. This is one of those memories that threatens to be forgotten without documentation.
Man, I really wish I had that autograph.
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