Wednesday, June 25, 2008

My friend, the shark.



The above picture is of a very good friend of mine who also happens to be Rippy, the mascot for the LA Riptide.

While I've certainly seen mascots my entire life, I was unaware that being a mascot entails an enormous amount of dedication, responsibility, and . . . well, ability to deal with boiling hot temperatures in a very large suit.

First of all, there are no mascot "costumes." Apparently, they are always "suits" rather than "costumes," and using the term "costume" is actually a bit of an insult.

Secondly, training to spend hours on end in the suit is probably one of the most intense workouts that I can think of off-hand; my friend dons sweats, a sauna suit, more sweats, a wool beanie, and a hoodie, pulled up, to go running. This lets him prep for the temperatures in the mascot suit -- and he does this in Southern California when it's at least 80 degrees out. If you're not sure what a sauna suit is (I wasn't at first either), it's essentially vinyl or plastic so it traps all of your body heat in. It's often used by wrestlers, I believe.

Third, there are more aspects to being a mascot than I ever really thought of. When you're talking to someone with a giant head on, for example, rather than looking at them, you have to drop your head further down so the giant head that you're WEARING is looking at them. On top of that, you have to make sure you don't react to children jumping on you, punching you, berating you, yelling at you -- whatever, you have to be the stoic mascot, particularly if you're an animal mascot who can't, in theory, talk. Make sure you entertain the crowd, make sure you keep moving, make sure you hug all the little kids who want to hug you -- man, it's crazy when you think about all the stuff that he has to remember.

However, my favorite thing about his job is what he had to do today -- he went to another mascot's birthday party. See, apparently it was Rocky's birthday, Rocky being the Palm Springs Power mascot. Even though Rippy (my friend's character) is a lacrosse mascot and Rocky (the birthday boy) is a baseball mascot, it is apparently a tradition that all of the mascots try to attend the games that mark the mascot's theoretical birthday -- since Rocky's was today, apparently around 17 or so mascots all went to Palm Springs to celebrate it. I am highly hopeful that he will return with pictures; if he does, I'll put them up. Otherwise, you'll just have to remain content with the knowledge that watching someone you know walk around dressed up as a giant shark with a lacrosse stick in hand is a pretty amazingly fantastic experience.

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