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Monday, November 18, 2013

More words than I've read total about wrestling anywhere

Jules Bentley stood in line in the rain with some people trying to get Wrestlemania tickets Friday.

Sir Saint, Gumbo the Hound and a few smiling, harlequin-attired stilt-walkers roved through the thinning crowd— and when I say crowd, I mean the five different lines waiting to meet wrestlers. It was dark, it was raining, and everyone not standing in a line had left. The lines weren't moving, because the wrestlers we were waiting to meet hadn't shown up yet.

Meeting the WWE wrestlers was the only activity at this Party that didn't cost a bunch of money. The T-shirts ("I'm Going to Wrestlemania!") started at thirty dollars, the beers at five. "The newspaper said free food and drink," grumbled one of the women behind me in line. For the hungry, there were food trucks. The On-Sale Party was quintessential WWE: a festival the whole point of which was everybody giving WWE money. Even the few non-WWE vendors, like the food trucks, had paid WWE to be there. As the rain intensified, a local band came onstage. They were called Band Camp and played rock music.

A few of the Pelicans Dance Team wandered by. I asked them dumb questions about Pierre— what his favorite foods were, whether he was bothered by the team's Chevron and Shell sponsorships— and the Dance Team very politely responded they couldn't give interviews unless cleared in advance by the office. Band Camp played a Def Leppard cover.

There's more.

Sorry... fixed the formatting

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