Deal or No Deal

Well, I finally did it. I have been watching Deal or No Deal all season. Addicted. Feeling like I’m at a table gambling myself. Feeling the highs, the lows, the risk, the chance. Did I mention addicted? I want to be on that show so badly. A few months ago, I decided to submit my application… but while filming my 5 minute video, I came to the conclusion that I looked and sounded like a dork, and that I would be much better in person. One day, when I was casually stalking the NBC Casting page, I noticed that DOND is doing a casting tour around the country, and that they were holding an open casting call about 30 miles east of San Diego just FOUR days later. That was the closest stop to San Francisco.

So I got on a plane and flew to San Diego, picked up a lawn chair at WalMart, slept a few hours at a hotel in Alpine, CA, got up at 3:30 am, and was waiting in line by 4am, with an estimated 900 people in line in front of me. Somehow I envisioned a nice sunny line, where I could relax and read my book while waiting for the interviews at 10am. I somehow overlooked the fact that there is no sun at 4am, so I sat shivering in the dark for a few hours, Luckily, there were thousands of people all around me in the tent, and I had a fantastic time chatting with everyone while we were waiting, and later shuffling along (moo!).



Casting began at 10am. By 11:10 I was up. They wrangled 10 of us at a time into each of the tents. Inside the tent there was an NBC casting person. Each one of us had 20 seconds to tell him what makes us unique and why we want to be on the show. 20 seconds!!! I was so excited, my mouth hurt from the permagrin on my face! I was in the tent with a super cool truck driver who is studying to be a nurse, a lady who is famous for her chicken dance, and a young woman who loves to waterski naked and breast feed. She breast feeds as often as she can, she loves it so much. Did I mention that she doesn’t have any children? Three of us had the opportunity to do another 20 seconds (which I was TOTALLY unprepared for!). We won’t know until the day when (and IF) they call us for another round of interviews. Worse case scenario, I passed a very spontaneous, exciting and adventurous 24 hours with 8,000 other people who each came ready to present their very best selves. Wish me luck!