The series was the Swedish "Vår tid är nu" (Our time is now) and it was a quite normal job, being one in a crowd listening to a speech. The recording was from one til eleven so quite long. The slight detail? It started 03.00 and finished 13.00 on Monday two weeks ago. "I always fancy weird things and I certainly have time so why not?" is what I told myself when I signed up for it three days before. I am quite good at mixing up day and night whether I want it or not, meaning that I can go to sleep very late and then also wake up very late. The slight problem for the rythm was that I was going to my cousins sons baptism at 10.00 on Saturday. It was great fun to see the little guy, Oscar, sing along as well as he could to the psalms (or perhaps just get impatient and complain very timely) and it was also great fun to meet some relatives that I usually only meet during midsummer (which I missed this year as I was in Amsterdam). Still, it forced me to have a quite normal day rythm. On Saturday I went to bed at 22.00 or so, then another two hours earlier on Sunday but it isn't exactly easy to fall asleep at a time that your body isn't used to. Nor is it easy to get out of bed at 01.00, another time I'm not used to.
But if I take a job I do it. My strategy was to go for a strong breakfast, instead of my usual sandwiches I went for some pasta that was more like a midnight lunch. It worked well enough, I was tired when I got up but on the bus to the meetup place I felt surpringly fresh and awake. When I arrived I got to swap to my sixties outfit, great fun. I also met some nice people to talk to while waiting for the acting. Unless you have a main role it is usually a lot of waiting included in long days of acting and this was no exception, to be honest it was even longer than usual. Still, I had a book and company so passing time worked fine.
The tough part was the actual listening to the speech, it started raining more and more. Remember, this is night in Sweden so it isn't very warm and apparently shoes in the sixties weren't very thick. It didnt take more than an hour outside before I started to have trouble feeling my toes and I was seriously worried, not for my life, just for that the chill that I hadn't been able to completely get rid of for two weeks would get worse again. but I've been through worse things. Some long hours later the bus took us back to the meetup place where we swapped back into our normal clothes and said our goodbyes. Some people also went for the next day - well, night, it started at 01.00 - but that was too much for me. I fell asleep when I got home at three as soon as I could throw my clothes off, then pretty much slept for fourteen hours or so, I can't remember ever sleeping that long even if there has been moments where I needed it. Man, what a day ... ehm, night. Man, what a night.
I have applied to quite some journalistic jobs, so far without success but I have found something meaningful to do meanwhile. At the site Meetup there are many events in Stockholm, one of them is language cafés for learning Swedish and the crew was apparently looking for volunteers. I send a message telling them I was willing to be one yesterday evening, no reply yet but hoping to get one soon. It might not give me any cash but it is something meaningful to do and might be good for my CV. Of course it's also fun to meet people from different countries. When I can live abroad I do and when I can spend time with internationals in Sweden I do, I guess I'm just an international person. I actually went to a pub meeting with internationals from Meetup last week which was also very nice. I got to practise some German and Spanish as well as laugh about country stereotypes. It was a great evening and night. Man, what a night.
The picture is not a new style that I hope will attract more employers - would it? -, it is from the 60s series. I look quite different from how I usually look, barely recognisable if you don't look twice according to some. Enjoy :)