Some perks of being a tour guide

They're getting very close to shooting some of our favorite shows again. This means that some of the soundstages that we've had some access to, we now have better access to. For example, The Big Bang Theory has been, up until today, completely covered in black and dark blue tarps, so that even if you go into the stage, there's really been nothing to see.

That changed today. Today, the furniture in the apartments was covered in canvas, but you could see all of the dressings on the walls. Meaning Penny's apartment is appropriately dressed. All the stuff in Sheldon and Leonard's apartment is where it should be. There was lots of equipment in camera alley, including a few cameras on dollies, covered loosely in their protective coverings, just waiting for the rest of the equipment to leave their space. There was still plenty of equipment in the stage areas, blocking the audience view of the stairwell that heads down from S/L's apartment. But overall, so much more to see!

No one's ever allowed to take pictures, and my tour that I took into that stage was very well behaved. But because of the rule about photography being in place, I haven't ever wanted to take groups into that stage, simply because you leave there with a memory of dark tarps. Not today, kids. Not today.

... During the week, our touring schedules get very busy. Everyone goes out, for the most part, for all of the tours we're scheduled to do, during the week. On the weekends, things slow down a good bit (probably because most tourists either don't realize that we do tours on the weekend, or they're hoping to spot celebrities, and they expect better chances on weekdays). A lot of tours get cancelled if they don't get booked. No sense sending a driver out for two hours with no one on the tour cart, right? So when we "single out" (get cancelled), we have to do our very level best to find something else productive to do, to help out another section of our department, or if it's the last tour of the day, just go home.

Today, I traded my first tour slot with someone else who was hoping to single out so he could help out the dispatch department, and since I'm still considered a "newbie", I really like being assured of a tour. So I gave my first tour; I gave my second tour; I went to lunch. There was no one to trade my final tour slot with, as all of the tours that ended up going out were guided by newbies who did not want to go home. So once I had officially singled out, I went over to our new attraction to increase my education. I'd already been through the "tour" part of that attraction once, but more as entertainment than education, so this time around, I paid closer attention to the finer details. I learned stuff. I walked slowly through the gift shop at the end so I could learn stuff about what we've got available for retail purchase. I discovered I get a nice discount, if I ever want to buy

expensive tchotchkes.

And I held a real Oscar. :)