Diary of a Cub Contestant at International Bear Rendezvous 2010 part 6

As we arrived to the Eagle that sunny Saturday afternoon, I felt the lack of sleep begin to affect me. It slipped my mind about the importance of selling raffle tickets to judges and once again, we had 13 contestants selling raffle tickets to less than 80 people- if that. Orlando called out, “Raffle tickets get your Raffle tickets!” while I undid one more button to show off the bright red lace jock strap. The jockstrap was a gift from porn star Patrick Montana. Despite the meager crowd we were selling them nearly the entire time that we were there. I didn’t see any judges so I didn’t sell to them. There was one cantankerous old fuck who hollered at Orlando, “Hey Bag Bitch-get over here!” This jack ass was off to one corner and didn’t look all that friendly, so I didn’t approach him when we first walked by. He decided that I meant otherwise. “You saw me sitting right here for fuck’s sake! What the fuck? Am I too ugly for ya?” I didn’t answer him truthfully because a contestant is always warm and friendly. “Oh I’m sorry, you just didn’t look like you were in the mood to make a purchase.” instead of yes you are Ugly and Mean and you can go to hell. He grumbled to Orlando and addressed him the whole time “ You gotta keep this guy in line! He’s gotta hit Everyone up if he wants to win!”  Orlando politely chuckled and then the old fart bought one dollar’s worth of tickets from us.( That’s one ticket btw.) He actually just wanted to get a closer look at Orlando’s chest judging from the way he couldn’t stop staring at it.

George Hains and I passed each other and bought $3 worth of tickets from each other. Yes, the contestants were selling to each other again. We should’ve gotten MAJOR points for this but our score was not actually based on quantity but quality of sales. From what I can tell there was no judge to take notice of this. This was rough going and I had to sell one way or another so I went for the $1 sales. Quite a few were balking at the $10 sales because they had been asked a minimum of 4 or 5 times BEFORE I asked them. I changed my method. Instead of “Raffle tickets?” I greeted them with, “Hello, My name is P.A. and no I don’t have one.” (For the uninitiated, look up Prince Albert Piercing on Wikipedia.)  I made a game of learning as many names as I could. Then I asked questions, “Where are you from?” “Are you enjoying IBR?” “How did you find the Bear Community?” “Do you consider yourself a big part of the community?” “Wow it was great talking to you! Give me a hug big guy -oh and before I go,  would you be at all interested in buying some raffle tickets?” Then I would sell 3 or 5 dollars worth. So it was slow going, but way more fun and I accomplished far more than just titillating them by touching their naughty bits. I actually made friends! Rick, Dave, Bo and James and Ken!  Orlando’s social skills are very good so it really helped to have him as my wing man. If you asked him I am sure he would say that he made some friends too. Now that we had a groove going we were pretty focused-despite the Peppermint schnapps shots I had at the bar. I don’t care -call me an alcoholic. My minty breath managed to net me a kiss or two. Since we had spent so much money on IBR between my clothes and Orlando’s gold pass -we opted for beer since it was part of our Gold Pass. Unfortunately there was a coupon in our Gold Pass Goody Bags that was required to get the Beer Bust cup that we would use to consume the beer. We had left these coupons in our bags. When we informed the BOSF members of this they suggested we go ahead and pay the $10 for the Beer Bust that day. It didn’t appear to make a difference that we were both working our tails off that day trying to convince Eagle patrons who didn’t want to buy raffle tickets to buy them. Hmmmmm there was a bad taste building in my mouth and it wasn’t from the Schnapps.

In order to keep my mood from souring completely we decided a quick nap was in order. We had been fortunate enough to have a couple we know let us use their room at the host hotel. I used their closet for my contestant outfits and they said we could crash whenever we needed to. I was eternally grateful to them as I shucked off my clothes and crawled into the comfy bed next to my Lando Bear. I was out like a light but snored like crazy which prevented Lando from getting 30 winks. When I am particularly exhausted... I snore. I needed more than 30 minutes, but it wasn’t available-so I splashed some cold water on my face, changed into my hanky dance outfit (IBR t-shirt, Boots, Jeans and Title Vest)  and then we headed to the nearby Mall for dinner.  More raffle sales awaited us afterward at the Hanky Dance.