Got work on Prison Break on Wednesday.

Fun times.

It was in Long Beach, so it was about a 60 mile schlep. I suppose, technically, it wasn't a schlep, because I headed out at 445 and got there at 545...which is an average of 60mph. In Los Angeles that's miraculous.

I grabbed some breakfast and hung out, waiting for check in time (630). The cool thing was that the production had rented what are called "Lunchboxes" for the extras. They're maybe 50 foot trailers that pop the sides out like campers they can fit at least 70 or 80 people at tables. It was literally a cool thing, because the little heating/air-conditioning generator (formerly known to me as a reefer unit) wouldn't really make heat...so the temperature was 59 degrees, and it was set to 68. Beside making it uncomfortably chilly in that particular trailer, it's notable because I actually had a decent idea of what the problem was. Other folks tried to adjust the set temperature upward, but I knew, from trucking experience, that if the system won't make heat, nothing helps. Life experience for the win!

So I hung out outside.

630 arrives and Jack, the guy checking in the mob of extras calls for the Miami Cops, which is what I was scheduled to be.

He says, "Hey, I have to apologize, but there was a miscommunication with central, you're not called until ten."

I say, "Hey, thanks for telling us." He could have made us wait in line.

So I got to sit around for three hours or so. There was a small kerfuffle about whether the eight of us would get paid for being there at 630, which I tried to avoid as diplomatically as possible. It wasn't worth getting pissed about, but it was something that was easy to get pissed about. It was the kind of thing I would have gotten hocked off about just a few months ago.

So I just watched the sunrise in a cloudless Long Beach sky.

When 1000 rolled around, Jack had (very awesomely) worked it out so that we got paid from 630.

I got to wardrobe and the girl said, "How tall are you?"

I said, "6-3."

She looked at Jack, "Jack, we asked for no cops over 5-11, we haven't got the shirts bigger than that." Which meant wardrobe had requested of Central that no one over 5' 11" be booked as a cop. Not my fault, not Jack's fault.

"Nothing I can do," Jack said.

Wardrobe got a little miffed and gave me a suit. I'd been converted to a convention goer, and they were in a fluff trying to recruit a shorter cop from the conventioners.

When I came back to the wardrobe trailer to finish up the approval on the suit, there was another guy standing there getting finished up in a cop uniform. He was taller than me. It didn't upset me, but it didn't make sense...especially since it was going to be really hard to figure out how to get a conventioner back from the Hyatt (where shooting was) to the Arena parking lot three blocks down the road.

"Hey, if he fits, I'm pretty sure I can make it work," I said.

They looked at him, looked at me, and looked at the rack, kind of gave a what-the-hell shrug and started digging.

I was a cop again.

The rest of the day went something like this: get bussed to the Hyatt, wait in holding. Talk to three of my fellow cops, get bussed back to "base camp" for lunch, get bussed back to the Hyatt, wait in holding, talk to my fellow cops, have a generally fun time, get called onto the set at about 1730, set up a chaotic group shot post-somebody-getting-shot, run a rehearsal, shoot it three times, and we're done.

Now, if you didn't catch that, let me boil it down a little more. I got paid from 630 to 1915 yesterday to do three takes at the end of the day. How ridiculously awesome is that?

Plus, it was an episode wrap, so I'm recalled for Friday, because the next epi picks up where this one leaves off. Only in the pictures.

On the down side, I've got a pinched nerve or strained muscle or something in my shoulder, which has made today less than productive.

But, really, I can't complain.