My Encounter with the GH Stars - Day 2

I had been so excited about meeting my idol, Mr. Tony Geary that it had been hard for me to sleep for the past week or so, but luckily for me, I was asleep when my head hit the pillow this particular evening. I woke up around 9:30 AM with the remains of a dream that had something to do with Tony Geary, the Macarena and Donna Summer, so sue me, I have odd dreams... Anyway, I was completely refreshed and ready to get a start on the day, so I went about the normal beautifying rituals of everyday life and decided to go to the event today wearing casual clothes rather then getting all dressed up like I had been the night before. I was a little low on funds, so I couldn’t get my hair professionally done again, so I did the best I could with my somewhat limited hair styling skills. Then I went to the local drugstore to buy two more rolls of film for the upcoming day, after returning home, I grabbed my GH Scrapbook and out the door my father and I went. There was hardly any traffic and we made good time, we arrived at the Expo Center around 11:30 AM, there were people at the gate charging $4 for the parking, so my father just told them that he was just dropping me off and then going out again, which was true and they let us go. There were a LOT more cars there today than had been there last night, probably because tickets to get in today were only $7, while they were $100 the night before. With my GH Scrapbook in hand I got out of the car and headed into the Expo Center.

The show with the GH stars didn’t start until 12:30 PM, so I had some time to look around. Personally I try to avoid places with large crowds like this, but I figured I’d be able to endure it if I just kept reminding myself why I was there. The people at the booths were even ruder today, giving me looks like “This is an event for women, what are you doing here?”, I just kept repeating the name “Tony Geary” over and over again in my head, kind of a mantra. I was getting tired of carrying around my GH book so back I went to the Nailco Salon booth to buy some more brushes, so I could get another bag. I went to another booth were they had various samples of drinks (non-alcoholic of course, I’d learned my lesson from the night before), I got a cup of some sort of fruit smoothee that was absolutely delicious. I finished off my smoothee and went over to the stage area to see if I could find Cathy, Beth or the mother and daughter team that I had been hanging out with the night before, but unfortunately I couldn’t find them. I went over to one of the booths to buy some raffle tickets for the day and by the time I returned the show was about to start so I went over to the right hand side of the stage area and just then it happened...Tony Geary came out from behind the black curtain on his way to the stage and he danced a little, took a bow and then hurried on his way. I was just getting out my camera at the time and I was desperately fumbling to get a picture and I think I managed get one just as he was bowing. I then positioned myself so I would have a good view of the stage.

The Nailco Salon dancers came out again and did their thing, as far as I could tell they didn’t make any mistakes this time around. Then they brought out the MC for today, the lovely Rebecca Marshall, a member of the radio morning show that I listen to practically everyday on Q95.5. She talked a little bit and then went on to announce Maurice Benard, who came out with the female dancers and had a seat on one of the chairs that had been brought out. Rebecca went through all his stats, his eyes seemed to glaze over as she did that. Then she asked him a few quick questions and brought out Steve Burton, who again walked down stage and did his butt shake and went back and sat down. Rebecca went over his stats too, he was about as interested as Maurice had been. One funny thing is that they kept referring to Steve’s character for all of the events as Jason Quartermaine, nice to see they were paying attention to details... :-] She asked him a few questions too, really basic stuff. It was now time to bring out THE man, Mr. Tony Geary. He came out with the dancers and was all smiles and let me just say, for a 50 year old, he is still damn good looking! He was wearing a black shirt and vest and some form fitting black jeans. He sat down and as Rebecca read through his stats, he smiled and waved at the people in the audience. Rebecca asked him what it was like to be back on GH after all this time, I felt like shouting, “He’s been back for four years now!”, but I’m a shy person, so I didn’t... He didn’t bother to correct her, he just said that it was great to be back. Steve read his great poem again and then it was time for the audience Q & A...

Pandemonium took over. People were rushing the stage from all sides, it’s a wonder no one was trampled... Rebecca went down to the end of the catwalk type thing, knelt down and started taking question from the audience. The next part of this report is in no particular order, just various things I remember being asked. I wish I had taken a pen and pad of paper so I could have jotted down things, I guess it’s a little late to think of that now... Like always, there were the loser girls who ask either Maurice or Steve to go out with them, as if they’re going to say yes... The GH stars were all up out of the chairs by now and stooping down to sign autographs for some of the fans at the side of the stage and they kept doing that throughout the whole Q & A even though they were continually told not to. Someone asked Luke if Norma Connolly (Ruby) was well, and he said that she had been having some health problems in the past, but she was doing just fine now. One of the most memorable moments from the show was when an older woman asked if Tony Geary would please give her a hug and he went down off the stage and did just that, it was just so sweet. Someone asked all three stars if they were on the bone marrow donor list after the story they did about Lesley-Lu having leukemia (Which is wrong because Lulu had aplastic anemia), Tony Geary said that he’d been on the list for over 20 years now, Maurice and Steve had no idea what she was talking about, so I’m guessing that they’re not on the list. People kept wasting time by asking the GH stars to sign things for them, even after they had been told many times to keep the questions about GH or the actors themselves. Tony made some sort of comment about how much he absolutely hates Foster Spencer that caught me off guard, but I guess we can’t all be animal lovers. Someone asked Maurice to take off his outer shirt and he did for a quick minute, then Steve Burton pretended like he was going to take off his shirt, but didn’t, Tony said something about how he couldn’t even compete with Maurice or Steve, so he wouldn’t be removing his shirt in their company. Someone asked Maurice to dance, so he grabbed Steve and they slow danced for a minute, which was kind of cute. At one point, Tony Geary pulled out a cigar and asked people in the audience if they had a light, some lucky woman got Tony to light his cigar with her lighter! He continued to smoke for the rest of the show. That pretty much sums up the first show.

Once the GH stars got off the stage, out came the president of Nailco again and he started raffling off prizes. I got out my raffle tickets and went over to wait in line for the private session in the Adell room with Mr. Geary. I finally met up with Beth, Cathy, Barb and Sandy again, we chatted a little, but not much. They organized the private sessions a lot better today, they were letting only five people in at a time which is much better than cramming 100 people into a room with the stars. I said to Beth, I bet they’ll call my raffle number just as I’m about to go into the room and sure enough, right when we were near the front of the line, they call my number. I wasn’t really listening to what they were giving away, just the numbers, so I get up on stage and they hand me a set of jewelry (necklace, bracelet and earrings), one of the female dancers said to me as I accepted it, “I hope you like you’re mother.” and I just smiled and went to stand at the back of the stage with the other winners. I was staring impatiently over at the Adell room, just hoping that I’d get off the stage before Tony leaves, now there wasn’t much chance of that, but I was panicking anyway. After what seemed like an eternity, they finally let the winners get off the stage and I rushed back over to my spot in the line and one of the women running the event said that it would be all right for me to get back in line where I was before rather than go to the end of the line. The next five people went in, Cathy and the others were in that group. Another of the women running the event came to the door to tell us that we weren’t going to be allowed to get autographs because it would take too long, I told her in no uncertain terms that we were promised both pictures with the stars and autographs and she backed down and said that if Mr. Geary was willing to sign autographs then I could get one... Then the moment I had been waiting for finally came, I went into the room and I was in an utter daze, my heart was pounding so loud it was deafening and my hands were even shaking. I was about five feet from Mr. Geary and someone said to me “You’re next.”. I walked up to Mr. Geary and shook his hand and he smiled, I said “I think you’re an amazing actor!” and he thanked me. I asked him if he’d please sign my GH Scrapbook and he said sure, so I put it up on the pedestal and he flipped through it and asked where I’d like him to sign it and I said the first page would be fine. He turned to the first and asked me my name, I told him and he wrote, “Scott Best Wishes from “Luke Spencer” & me - Tony Geary”. By this time I was shaking even more and I think he noticed because he asked me if I was nervous and I said that it was just such an honor to meet him and he thanked me again. I stood next to him and he put his arm across my back and said to me “It’s nice to have someone my height, so I don’t have to kneel down to take the picture.” In that moment, I came to a sudden realization that my idol had just complimented me, I was in complete shock and it showed in the picture. I thanked him with what little speech I could muster and said again what an honor it was to meet him and wandered off. I was completely disoriented, I didn’t know the difference between up and down or left and right, I was flying blind, I’m surprised I made it out of the room without slamming into something. I exited through the back way and met up with Beth, Barb and Sandy and I think we were all impressed with Mr. Geary, Beth pointed out that I was still shaking, it was a good thing that I didn’t have to operate any heavy machinery in the near future... We chatted for awhile and then I headed outside to go in search of a place to buy some more film because I was almost out.

As I was leaving, my father was just pulling into the parking lot. I got into the car and we headed over to the mall across the road, there weren’t any shops that sold film though. I rolled down my window and asked a woman in the parking lot if she knew of any place around here where I could buy some film and she pointed us into the direction of another mall about a mile down the road, so off we went. I entered the K-Mart there and found the film pretty easily, unfortunately it was incredibly expensive and it only came in packs of two. I didn’t have enough American money on me, so I went over to the other place in the mall that I figured would have film and it was the same there, expensive and two rolls per pack. I went back to the car and asked my father for some more US money and he gave me $10. I bought the film from K-Mart and then we got back into the car and headed back to the Expo Center. My father said that he was only going in to drop me off again, but he had planned on staying in the lot, but there was no way we were going to pay $4 bucks just to park... I went back into the Expo Center and went straight to the fruit smoothee booth and had another one of those. I went to see if I could find Cathy, Beth, or the others, they were sitting in the first few rows near the stage, there were no open seats, so I just stood at the right side again waiting for the GH stars to cross over to the stage area, this time they didn’t stop or even look over in my direction, they just went straight over to where they were supposed to be.

The 3rd show was just starting and out came the dancers again, the act was getting kind of old by now. Rebecca came out next and introduced the guys the same as last time, there eyes all glazed over again as she read off their stats. She asked them the same remedial question that she had asked last time, then Steve read his GH poem again. Before the Q & A started, I went over to Maurice’s wife, Paula who was standing on the sidelines and I politely asked if she’d mind if I took her picture, she told me to go ahead. I told her how lucky she is to be married to such a talented man and I thanked her for the picture. Then the Q & A started, they actually organized it this time around, the security kept everybody from storming the stage and the actors stayed seated for the most part. Rebecca went down into the audience to ask the questions. Again, these questions are in no particular order. Another of the touching moments was when a woman thanked Maurice for being open about being a manic depressive and told him what an inspiration he was for her teenage son who was also manic depressive and wants to be an actor. Maurice looked on the verge of tears and Tony reached over and patted Maurice’s back to comfort him. Tony answered the question by saying that a lot of the truly great actors were disturbed people (he was a little more articulate, but that was the main gist of it), Steve agreed with Tony and they both named a few great actors who had emotional problems... Someone asked the stars who their role models were when they were young, Tony said that he had really admired Montgomery Clift and Spencer Tracy, I forget what the other two said. Someone asked if the actors had any input on there acts at the Nurses Ball and they said they didn’t, Steve said that one year they wanted him to do a magic trick and he said no. Tony showed a few of his dance moves really quick. Someone asked when Luke was going to fry Carly and everyone cheered (except for me) and he said that the last scenes that he taped on the Friday were with Luke knocking on Carly’s door after Bobbie tells him that Carly is pregnant, that episode will air on October 3rd, Luke’s first airdate is the 2nd. Someone asked the stars if they could trade places with any other character on the show, whom would they pick. Steve said he’d like to trade with Sonny and Tony said that he’d like to be Lila because he’d get to sit down all day. I believe it was Cathy that asked Mr. Geary if Genie would be coming back to the show and he said that he was hopeful that she would. The actors went off stage and the final show of the day was over.

I went to take one last look around the Expo and had one final fruit smoothee that was just as good as the last two had been. Then I looked around for Cathy, Beth, Barb and Sandy so I could say good-bye to them, but they were nowhere to be found. I went out to the parking lot and got into the car where my father had been waiting for the past little while and we headed out of the parking lot, we went out the other way so we wouldn’t have to pass the people that we’re collecting for parking. We went to the Big Boy restaurant nearby and had a nice dinner. We got back on the interstate and began our journey home. And so it ends, I fulfilled one of my greatest dreams, met some great people and I’ll have the memory of this weekend to treasure forever. Thanks for reading! Any comments or questions are welcome!

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