Sidewalk Superheroes

Well, we’ve finally made it back out to the boulevard, now that the rain and Oscar-craziness is over. I still want to hear Batgirl’s version of this week’s adventures, but I figured since I just don’t write much, I’d say a little something.

I got word on Wednesday that Captain Jack Sparrow was back in town. so I bounced up and down a little, and then I told him we’d be there the next day. Not because he was there, we had already planned to be there. But we caught up with Jack a bit, admired his new hand-made hat (if you want a Jack Sparrow hat, let me know, I’ll hook you up. He can also get you some gold teeth to complete your look, if you’re serious about it).

That day, we EACH got a $20 tip froma generous tourist. Woohoo! It’s nice to be appreciated. And then later in the evening, the three of us went to enjoy drinks with the Zannel.com crowd. It was interesting to meet some of these people in person. We got some of the cookie guy’s cookies, and the Captain enjoyed a lot of rum.

Fast forward to Friday, Batgirl and I decided to try the evening shift. We met on the boulevard, but I arrived first. The first thing to catch my eye was – a really buff Superman! Immediately I knew this wasn’t Chris. So after walking up and down the boulevard to see if the Captain or Batgirl were around yet, I came back and introduced myself. Turns out he’s a really, really, super-nice guy. (Get it? Super?) We hung out with him, and earned a decent amount for the what, hour and a half we stayed? lol. It gets cold in PVC! And spandex. Superman left before us, but he’d been out for a while. Gosh. We need to think of a nickname for him now… Before he left, we did take some photos with him. He also got a group photo with us and the Jokers, and promised to email it at some point. I look forward to seeing him again. 😀

Finally! The Oscars came and went, and after tomorrow, the boulevard will be back to normal. Well, as normal it can be for being Hollywood Boulevard. I’m actually not sure how long it takes them to pack up all those giant styrofoam statues, but the lightboard signs put up all around that block had said that the roads would be closed through Tuesday. So maybe Wednesday we can start making up for lost time?

In the meantime, I started making a pattern for the Mystery Costume out of newspapers, though I just now realized that I might have goofed and have to start over. Curse my unclear sketches! I knew this would happen, but I did it anyway. Boning always trips me up. At least I didn’t get very far, and I can pretty much use the two pattern pieces I did sketch and cut out to make the proper pieces. *sigh* It’s just so hard to make a corset on nothing but sheer luck. (Oh yes, there’s a corset.)

I’ve also been working on the site behind the scenes. Over the summer I geeked out and borrowed a Joomla! book from the library, and now I have it again and I’m using it. So far it’s a little weird, though I am really rusty on what little CSS I did know, but it’ll work out. This site will be so awesome! One day. 😉

P.S. Can I just say: Finally!

<3

Since Zannel was nice enough to gift me a Flip camera to capture superhero life firsthand, I thought I should put it to good use. Otherwise, they might want it back! Unfortunately, I got it just in time for the Oscars to throw all of us off Hollywood Boulevard, but thankfully something else has come up: photoshoots.

While I can’t really film or snap while I’m being snapped, I’ve tried to videotape the in betweens, befores and afters as much as possible to show everyone what it’s really like. Being a superhero isn’t glamorous, as you’ve seen, and now you can see firsthand that being a model isn’t so glamorous either. It does have its moments, though, as you can see from these clips from Wednesday’s Long Beach shoot and Friday’s Los Angeles shoot:

P.S. I posted this video on Zannel before I uploaded it to YouTube, and Zannel does have some added goodies that aren’t on this site. I don’t like to just copy and paste from place to place, and they allow mobile updates, so I send pix messages and texts from the scene that you can’t see here. Just an idea, if you’re really addicted to the superhero life.

I don’t think Batgirl has seen this yet… 😉

Catwoman and Batgirl accepting their Oscar

Today, early in the morning, Catwoman and I had a photoshoot in downtown Long Beach. I’ll probably be a hot mess in all the pictures, but I have a good excuse: I have a new nephew! Not that there was anything wrong with the old one, but now I have one for each arm. I watched my older nephew overnight Monday, after getting the call at 2 am, and then did double duty by being a coach in the delivery room for the other kid Tuesday. So yes, I’m really wiped out and look like shit on a stick. I’m counting on the awesome skills of Photoshop to salvage this. 😉

Seriously, though, the shoot went great and the photographer and his ceramic coffee mug-toting assistant were great. We all had fun wandering around on foot (I recognized one of our locations as a place I’d passed when lost, because I always tend to get lost in the same area of LB), crawling around freeway underpasses and dreaming up surprises you will thoroughly enjoy. It was great, and we actually ran out of time before ideas. We may work with this guy again — and maybe sneak on the Queen Mary? I love that old boat. What’s even cooler is that while we were shooting at our last location, some guy who lived across the street ran out and offered to buy the pictures for $50. Cool! We also slowed traffic when we weren’t covered in coats, and a lot of guys slowed down to whistle and yell at us. *sigh* Welcome to Long Beach.

There’s something to look forward to for ya, since the Oscars wrecked this weekend for us. 🙂

P.S. If you’re a photographer and would like to snap us around your fair city, contact us. We’d love to cover as many as possible.

If it sounds like we’re everywhere lately, well . . . it’s because we are. For your enjoyment, a quick roundup of the latest superhero news, from blanket coverage of the violence on Hollywood Boulevard across the state to Batgirl and Catwoman splashing the pages of LA Weekly:

Channels 2 (CBS) and 9 (KCAL) on the violence. (They’re owned by the same parent company, hence the cheap coverage.)
ABC channel 7 on the tensions.
Channels 11 (FOX) and 13 (UPN/KCOP) chime in as well. Again, apparently owned by the same company.
MSNBC also jumps in for some Internet love.
And even the SF Gate gets involved with an article and a quick picture blurb.

Lest you think it’s all depressing, here’s us being charming social butterflies at Twiistup, courtesy of LA Weekly:

caught in the act!

I also know we’ll be featured on LAist, but they have yet to post their writeup and photos. Keep an eye out, though. I also have a funny picture of Demon Guy on the front page of the LA Times’ California section, but I’m too lazy to upload it from my camera, resize, then upload it here. Give me a break, it’s 2 AM!

Edit: Here we are on the Synched Up Show (at the 1:44 mark, as our good friend George from Zannel was quick to point out):

And here’s Demon Guy in the LA Times:

will he melt?

I use the word ‘random’ a lot, huh? This is boulevard related. I’m just up late, and I saw that Superman updated his Myspace photo album, and then I remembered – he got new teeth! Superman has been excited lately, because he found some fake “Hollywood” teeth online, and ordered them. Superman doesn’t have the greatest teeth in the world. There’s a large gap right in the front. So because he wants to be more authentic, and he doesn’t want to spend the money on veneers, he got some fake teeth. They’re like the hill-billy teeth you see in the costume stores – except they’re straight, and white. They don’t look too bad, and you’d probably just think he was wearing Invisalign or something (like me!) unless you knew about it. But if you look close, he’s got two rows of upper teeth. hehe. Like a shark or something. But that is my random thought in the middle of the night. Superman’s fake teeth. Now, I wonder what I’ll dream about tonight…

*kiss

From your two favourite superheroines.

This has absolutely nothing to do with anything. But it’s just funny. The world’s smallest car. hehe. I can imagine that stuck to the wheel of a Hummer.

World's Smallest Car

Wow. I don’t know if it was just a lucky day, or the planets aligned, or if the rest of the world stalks us, but yesterday was crazy busy and totally made up for the past two weeks’ worth of rain, illness, and crap in general. It was our first time working in, what, a week? And while we didn’t work too long on the boulevard, we had a spokesmodel gig last night as well and there’s just so much to talk about! There’s also loads of pictures, too, and a quick video I took with my new Flip camera:

courtesy of Zannel

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