Alright, we're not going to lie to you guys- we do hundreds of videos every year, and coming
up with fun, interesting topics is practically a full time job.
Sometimes we take inspiration from what's trending in the news, or perhaps science,
and other times, well, other times we get inspired by a weekend classics movie watch
party.
That's right, we're getting all Freaky Friday on you today with our brand new challenge,
Switching Roles With The Girlfriend For 48 hours!
Pre-Challenge: Welcome to my very own Freaky Friday, no, none of the terrible remakes,
talking about the original with Jodie Foster and Barbara Harris.
Although, the 1995 remake with Shelley Long and Gaby Hoffman was no doubt the best, with
Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan coming in at a semi-distant second.
To be honest, Lohan was great in it, until she... well, went all Lindsay Lohan on us.
Ok, so my Freaky Friday is just switching roles with the girlfriend, not one of my parents-
and I instantly regret saying that because I'm sure someone at Infographics is furiously
jotting down me switching with my parents as a future show idea.
Seriously, you have no idea how hard it is to brainstorm new episode ideas- low hanging
fruit is out bread and butter.
This challenge took a bit to coordinate, because I have to do her job as well now too.
She has had breakthroughs in her modeling career that have allowed her to focus on that
over her acting, which we decided was a good idea as it allows her to stay home here in
LA more often.
We both agree that's a huge win for our relationship, and she's happy with the choice.
This obviously presents a bit of a problem for me doing her job, as in modeling.
Luckily she pulled a few strings and got me a gig working with one of her photographer
friends on a men's wear catalog shoot for one of the big retail stores.
No, I'm not talking about Guess or something where I would have to have flawless washboard
abs and cheekbones so sharp you could cut a steak with them, I'm talking more... well,
Wal-Mart, K-mart.
You know, something more realistic for me.
I'll have to take over her role around the house too, which spoiler alert, means I won't
be doing much of anything around here.
I'm a stay-at-home boyfriend, most of my work is writing or photographing so I'm home a
lot which means I take care of the place.
Plus she's a disaster at domestic life, and would probably burn water if I ever allowed
her to cook.
Not gonna lie, it'll be nice to kick my feet back around here.
Alright, I'll talk to you guys at the end of my first official Freaky Friday challenge.
Just kidding, don't sue us, Disney.
End of Day 2: I am exhausted.
Listen, I know that it seems like being a model is a pretty easy, cushy job where you
just sit around and be handsome while people fetch you water with cucumbers in it, but
holy crap.
It is so not that.
Well, the cucumber water part is real, but man you earn that water.
My first day started at 0430 hours, because that's what time the girlfriend has to wake
up for her daily workout if she has a shoot that day.
I never really had an issue with waking up early, I can thank years of getting one or
two hours of sleep a day while downrange in the military for that, but I really hate running
and I hate it even more when it's early in the AM.
I was up and at 'em, while the girlfriend gave me a sleepy grin and rolled over, and
I realized that's what I do every morning... and I missed it.
Two and a half mile run, followed by a whole mess of calisthenics, some freeweights, and
like a billion crunches- I followed her routine to the letter and it reminded me of my days
in training.
Except I guess we did do more running than that, but still, I have a new respect for
my girlfriend doing hardcore early morning PT every morning, five days a week.
Now for breakfast I typically have a huge bowl of raisin bran or smacks, but I'm Freaky
Friday'ing my life which means cantaloupe and a yogurt.
Cantaloupe by the way is like 98% water, and my stomach was howling as I left out the door
for my first day as a fashion model for the type of stores soccer moms frequent.
Call time to be on set was 0700, and I got there with minutes to spare.
I'm not completely oblivious to what goes on on a film or photo shoot set, though I
do work on more fine art projects and definitely nothing catalog, so I wasn't completely sure
what to expect.
Well, the moment I arrived I was immediately taken to wardrobe so that the wardrobe people
could coordinate what outfits I was going to model.
There were other guys and a few girls too, and they definitely looked like they belonged
in catalogs.
Everyone was assigned several dozen 'looks' that they would be shooting for the day, for
me it was mostly casual clothes like jeans and sweatshirts or t-shirts- stuff like that.
But, a ton of it.
Like a lot.
I think they put together like thirty outfits for me.
Immediately after that I got rushed to hair and makeup, and had to sit perfectly still
for a half hour as they prepped me.
Yes, even guys get makeup, mostly to accent cheekbones and smooth out skin tones, stuff
like that.
For my hair, the hair girl had some trouble figuring out what to do.
I practically invented the messy bed-hair look, and the girlfriend thinks it's both
adorable and hot on me... but it's also apparently way out of style.
I guess the messy bed-hair look went out in 2015- I had no idea.
And I really don't care, don't plan on changing my hairstyle after this challenge.
But for the sake of my shoot, the hair girl had to wrestle down my naturally messy hair
with half a bottle of hairspray and generous amounts of gel.
Then they had to blow dry it so it didn't look like it had pounds of product in it,
which it totally did, because as I've mentioned, my hair is naturally extremely messy.
Wearing makeup and having your hair full of product is the most uncomfortable thing in
the world, especially because they overdo it on both.
The rule is that for film or photo, you typically use much more makeup than you would in normal
life, because of artificial lighting and what-not, so it feels like you're wearing a seven layer
cake on your face the entire time.
To make things worse, even the best ventilated set gets extremely hot because of all the
lights needed for shooting.
Modern LED lights can cut down on that heat, but when you're lighting up a big set for
those cutesy group shots you see in catalogs all the time, that's a ton of heat being outputted.
And you can't have doors or windows open, letting the wind blow stuff around- like the
model's hair- so the entire set turns into a huge oven.
So I threw on the first outfit, and rushed to the set so I could do my solo shots, only
to be assaulted by hair and makeup people once more for last looks.
I guess there's a trick to putting on tops while doing as little damage as possible to
your hair and makeup, and I definitely did not master that over my two days taking over
my girlfriend's job.
I made a mess every single time, and I'm pretty sure those makeup and hair people hate me
by now.
You'd think modeling was as simple as standing in front of the camera, smiling, striking
a little casual pose, and that's that.
Take some pics and voila it's over.
Oh no, it's so much more than that- especially when you've never been in front of the camera.
To say that I had no idea what I was doing would be an understatement.
I was the worst model in the history of modeling- have you guys seen that scene from Taladega
Nights with Will Ferrel, where they're interviewing him after he wins a race and just holds his
hands out all weird asking what he should do with his hands?
Yeah, that was me, every single shoot, both days.
I just sort of stood around, literally not knowing what to do with my hands, while the
poor photographer did his best to try and coach me.
Thing is, they're on a time crunch, and so it's kind of a super fast process- they have
to fire off each model's looks as quickly as possible, and while you're shooting another
guy or girl is prepping for their shoot.
It's like an assembly line, and I was jamming the whole thing up because I didn't know what
to do with my hands in each shot.
They give you instructions like, “just look casual!”, and I was like... wtf does casual
look like?!
Then I started feeling like maybe I was smiling weird, which in turn made me actually smile
weird- which the photographer and his assistants all pointed out.
They were all shouting corrections rapid-fire after every single click of the camera- it
honestly reminded me of my drill instructors in basic getting in my face, only instead
of telling me how worthless I was they were screaming at me to be prettier.
After a blistering photo session, it was immediately back to wardrobe for the next look, and immediately
back to hair and makeup for touch ups, then immediately back in front of the camera.
Bam, bam, bam, one look after the other, the only time I had for sitting down was on the
makeup chair.
Even if you get a short breather, you're not allowed to sit while wearing the clothes you're
going to model because nobody wants to risk you creasing them or getting them dirty.
And this went on for hours, I was already exhausted by the time our one hour lunch came
around.
Worst part is I was yelled at not to sweat in the clothes I was wearing like ten times...
how in the world are you supposed to not sweat?!
Like, how do I stop myself from physically doing that?!
I sweat.
I sweat a lot, and I got yelled at a lot.
Honestly, my two days working on set as a model reminded me a lot of my military training
days.
Of course the more experienced models didn't get yelled at, because they knew what they
were doing, so it was just me the dumb greenhorn that couldn't figure out what to do with his
hands in front of the camera.
I did make a friend, it was another guy who remembered me from some Halloween party we
went to.
The girlfriend and I had gone as Archer and Lana Kane from the show Archer, because well,
she looks a damn lot like Lana Kane even though I'm pretty sure I look more like Cyril than
Archer.
Just kidding, the girlfriend hates that joke.
Anyways, this guy recognized me and we actually got along really well, which is strange because
I don't make friends easily.
He was a huge help though and really helped give me pointers throughout my days, causing
the photographer and his assistants and the hair and the makeup people to all yell at
me less.
Hooray!
I got off set both days at 2300 hours.
Yes, you heard that right- 11 pm for you civies out there.
That means I was working 16 hour days, and spent nearly the entire day on my feet.
On day two I still had to get up at 4:30 in the morning, because long workdays are no
excuse to fall behind on your physical fitness routine when your body is literally your money-maker.
I was beyond exhausted when I got home, and much to my girlfriend's credit, she actually
had dinner waiting for me.
Bowties and broccoli, because hey, even she knows how to make that.
So, like I said at the start of this, I know it seems like modeling is a totally cush job
and easy, but let me tell you: no.
No it isn't.
It's insanely hard, physically demanding, and exhausting.
It's a gift to be able to stand in front of a camera and act all natural, modeling everything
from swimsuits to ridiculous outfits if you're into high fashion, instead of acting like
me and wondering what in the world to do with your hands.
Being on a live set is itself exhausting.
The lights are going the entire time, generating a ton of heat, and naturally you can't have
doors or windows open to let in outside light or wind to mess with stuff.
The temperature climbs to the high nineties, though being in the hundreds is not unheard
off.
And somehow you're supposed to not sweat all over the clothes you wear.
Yeah, never figured that one out.
I always respected the work that the girlfriend does, but man, I respect her so much more
now.
I guess it makes sense why she makes like ten times the amount of money I do, even if
I pull a healthy salary from all my writing work.
You know what?
After two exhausting days of living her life, I'm perfectly fine with her continuing to
be my hot sugar momma.
I'll gladly stay at home and cook dinner like a good house-husband.
Beats getting yelled at all day because you have no idea what to do with your stupid hands.
Want to see more great challenges?
Check out No Underwear Challenge next!
Or click this other video instead!