The best part of the night was meeting Matt Lauria (Luke Cafferty). Sarita and I finally decided to approach Matt. I was so nervous, shaking inside, blushing, and trying to breathe correctly, because Matt is without a doubt my favorite. I couldn’t be the first to talk because I was so nervous and afraid I would say some non-sense. Therefore Sarita said hello first and then I stated, “Hi! I’m Amy.” After greeting each other, we chatted away. We talked for a long time and got along really well. We talked about how we loved him on Friday Night Lights and how I’ve been watching The Chicago Code as well as I’ve come to enjoy it. Sarita mentioned she’s from Chicago, so instantly they started talking about the windy city and I was just busy looking at him. I couldn’t help myself. He’s cute, handsome, and so kind, just as we see him on TV. Matt noticed me staring at him and I babbled, “Sorry. You’re just my favorite actor, and to actually finally meet you, is pretty awesome. I’m freaking out in the inside!” Matt said aww as he gave me a hug. I felt like I could have died a happy fan as he hugged me and couldn’t believe I was hugging the Luke Cafferty.
We continued our conversation about Chicago, and Matt asked me if I had ever been there before. I told him I hadn’t but it was on my list. He told me I had to see the bean. He wouldn’t tell me what it was and told me it something I have to see for myself. (Although, I still haven’t gone to Chicago, I now know what the bean is, ha.)
“Where are you from?” he asked.
“Texas.”
“Sweet! What part?”
“I live in a small town called Pharr, which is about a 4 hour drive from here.”
Matt’s reaction was like almost everyone I’ve ever met who’s never heard of Pharr. “Far? Why would the name a town Far?” he asked. I explained it was spelled differently. I also described my town is about fifteen minutes away from the Mexico Border. He liked how I was from South Texas but asked how Sarita knew each other if we’re from different states. Like we told Stacey Oristano we stated our story of how we met on Twitter and this was the first time we met in person.
“No way! Weren’t y’all scared? I mean what if one of y’all were like a serial killer or something?” Matt said.
I lightly laughed as I said, “it is scary at first but then we kept on talking, exchanged emails and emailed each other every day, which only made us better friends.” He was truly amazed by our story.
From there he comment how pretty we looked and how some people here were way over dressed. (Some people dressed up like it was prom. I kid you not.) He told Sarita that she had a pretty Sunday dress, and that people should have worn jeans like me and him. At that moment, the event photographer came up to us, Matt said, “Come on, let’s take a picture together.” The photographer didn’t want that and wanted us as we were and to act normal. Matt started busting out doing robot moves. I couldn’t stop laughing because he was honestly being himself. “Come on guys, join me,” he said. Sarita just looked at each other in laughter. Looking back at it, I wish the guy had caught that on camera.
“I’m just kidding,” Matt said as he stopped with the robot moves, “anyways back to our conversation.”
I figured now was my time to as him to sign my Luke Cafferty jersey. “I don’t know if you remember, but I tweeted you asking if you could sign my jersey…” as I pulled out the jersey.
“You’re that Amy?! YES! I remember you!!!” he nearly shouted.
Inside, fireworks went off. I was so freaking excited he remembered me from twitter.
“Of course I’ll sign it for you.”
He was so amazed by the jersey and asked me where I had gotten it and where I got it done. As he took my marker, he was about to sign it. “Where do you want me to sign it?”
“Anywhere you want,” I said.
“But it’s your jersey, so you call it.”
“But in a way it’s also your jersey, so you pick.”
We both laughed.
“Alright, I’ll sign it right here.” He was about to sign it and then asked, “Do you want me to just sign it or do you want me to personalize it?”
“Well… if you wanna write a little something, something you can,” with a big smile on my face.
He laughed, and asked how to spell my name and I told him with a y.
Next we took a few pictures, and then gave me a hug after Sarita and I decided to let him go talk to other people. Trust me I could have stayed and talked to him all night, but I didn’t want to hog him from everyone else, ha.
Boom! In comes Connie Britton. First thing I said was, “her hair is always so damn perfect.” She had a crowd swarming her because she came in late and everyone wanted at least a picture with her in case she left early or something. So Sarita and I just got a picture with her, and didn’t get a chance to talk to her because everyone wanted a chance with Connie, and she was willing to give everyone a few seconds of her time. Looking back at it, it’s was such a huge bummer I didn’t get to talk to her, but a picture with her is better than not getting anything seconds with her at all. Hopefully someday if I get a chance to meet her, I’ll tell her about this experience and lucked out because I had no clue what to say to her.
Minutes later, we heard Kyle Chandler had just arrived, but we couldn’t find him. Sarita and I were expecting to find him in a suit or at least well dressed up, which is probably why we couldn’t find him at first because he was in total Coach Taylor wardrobe. Tennis shoes, faded jeans, and a polo shirt with a cap. I have to say without a doubt he was the best-dressed man in the room. Like Connie, he was crowed with people, so I took a quick photo with him. Then some guy offered to take a picture of the three of us. I wanted one just like that with my camera, so I asked the guy to take it and Kyle said, “The second one will cost you.” I couldn’t help but laugh, as I didn’t know what to respond as my fan girl radar was off the charts. Turns out Sarita was just in total shock about meeting him and didn’t realized she was suppose to be in the picture. I didn’t want to hold him up trying to get another photo, so thank goodness Sarita emailed me the photo a couple of days after the event.
Photo Credit: Sarita
At this point, a man was announcing the winners from the silent auction, and about to perform a live auction, as I looked over at the entrance door my mouth dropped. Sarita had asked what was wrong, and I told her the lovely and handsome Scott Porter just walked in. I wanted to approach him, but he also arrived late and he was saying hello to all the important people, said hello to his friends/cast mates and then got a plate to eat. At the time, I wanted to meet him, but I got my chance later on in the evening, which you’ll find out about in my next blog post.
Jesse Pelmons arrived shortly after Scott Porter did, but I only saw him walk in, chatted, took a couple minutes, and then left the VIP Party. Bummer!
To be continued….
Tune in next week for the last chapter on attending the red carpet, a little bit of the screening premiere, and meeting the rest of the cast at the end of the evening.
Traveling with Amy Lillian 