From: cg@cbnewsf.cb.att.com (charles.gavinelli)
Subject: Weekend of Champions Part III
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 17:26:54 GMT

	Pictures were for sale of each of the wrestlers: $5 for color
and $3 for Black and White. You could get a Polaroid with the
stars for $6 (Sat.- it became $5 Sun). You could get the pictures
autographed by the wrestlers.

	Once back at our tables, we noticed commotion out front -
Sammartino had arrived. The crowd cheered him and gave a couple of "Bruno"
chants. There was little doubt that he was the guy that people wanted to see.
He arrived at the table and Pete and I were introduced to him. Pete told Bruno
that he would be Bruno's "body guard" for the next two days. Hearing this,
Bruno raised his hands and told Arezzi that now "he had nothing to worry
about." We saw immediately how "down-to-earth" Bruno is, despite his
legendary status in pro wrestling. Pete then told him that he was a personal
friend of Georgiann Makropoulos, and that he wrote a feature for the
Chatterbox every month. When Bruno replied "So you're the clever guy who writes
the poems - I like them very much",  I thought from the look on Pete's face
that he had died and went to heaven. He later told me that this made his
whole weekend.

  Bruno wanted to know how this "reunion thing" was supposed to work. He
said that he had not seen Larry in many years (I think that was a work).
Larry had not arrived yet. Pete and I set up the Bruno and Larry tables in such
a way that they were side-by-side separated by five or so feet. We decided
that we would switch wrestlers at Noon.  Pete got Bruno first, and I got Larry.
Since Larry had not arrived yet, I worked the other wrestling room as a
photographer while Pete stayed with Bruno. The doors were then opened to
the public at about 10AM.

	Albano came over to talk to Sammartino. Bruno was apparently
offered a part in a movie with Robert DeNiro and Albano was giving
him advice. The way the two of them were kidding around with each other,
you could tell that they are good friends. In fact, Captain Lou came over
several times during the weekend to "visit". On one of these visits, the
following exchange occurred:

Captain Lou:  "Look at this guy (Bruno) - he looks like someone has been
               smackin' him in the face with a 2X4"!

Bruno:  "Why don't you get back into your cage, Lou? I didn't come here
        for two days just to sit next to you"!

Captain Lou (to us and the fans): "Usually Bruno likes to sit near me,
         because I'm so ugly, I make him look good"!

	Pete then said "Captain, tell us about your girl friend from
New York City." The Capper replied, without blinking an eye, "I know a
girl from New York City - she's got a great big pimple on her ..... NOSE!"

	I chimed in with "How about the girl on the hill, Lou?" Lou fires
back instantly with "I know a girl who lives on the hill - she won't,
but her sister will!" Bruno was just shaking his head, grinning, as if to
say "Do you fans believe this guy - he's a nut!" Lou went on to tell us that
he's not hung very well - "If they cut an inch off it, I'd have a one inch hole
in my stomach!" The two of us couldn't believe it - we were joking
around with Bruno and the Captain - "these are the things of which dreams
are made".

	SIDE NOTE: Bruno said that he had been talking with Bill Watts, and
that WCW is interested in signing him up (not "hookin' him up) as a commentator.
He said he was going south to meet with Bill, and if and only if he liked
the deal, he would agree to it. As we are writing this report, it's a day
after the Clash - anyone who saw it saw Bruno being interviewed by
Jim Ross, extolling the brand of wrestling in WCW.

	In the other room, I was doing my Volkoff impersonation to
Volkoff. "Aye Niggoli - dis ugly-Amerigan vants to take picture vith you".
Between pictures, he told me that he now lives in "Baldy-more" (Baltimore).
I hope he got an unlimited mileage agreement with U-Haul when he moved
because those miles really pile up in that Moscow to Baltimore trip.

	Koloff, referred to as "Uncle Ivan" by some, had a bit of a
southern accent. He lives in Charlotte.  He sells some weight loss foods
with his wife Victoria. He gave out flyers with a phone number on it.
I guess that is his home phone. Pete told him that he might be giving him 
a call, as the Captain Lou "high-protein, low-carbohydrate" diet which he
has been following for the last eight years just isn't working. Besides,
Pete is having a hard time finding unborn virgin goats that need to be milked.
He says they are scarcer than Hulk Hogan wrestling holds!

	Wendi Richter was there with some kind of a championship belt. It
was mentioned that she was a former Dallas Cowboy cheerleader. I don't
know if that is true, but she sure looks good enough to be one in our book.

	Larry Z showed up at 10:30AM. I left my area and went to join Pete
at the Bruno and Larry tables. Pete said that Arezzi had been around earlier
and talked with Bruno as to what was to take place at "the reunion". John
would bring Larry into the room, over to Bruno, and the two were to approach
each other slowly, and then shake hands, giving the photographers who were
present plenty of time to snap away. John must have also queued Larry on the
way down to our area. When the two met and shook hands, we could sense that
they were definitely uneasy about the whole situation - maybe it wasn't a
work after all. A dozen or so photographers crowded the two of them. Famous
wrestling photographer and editor Bill Apter was there with his daughter.
She has a striking resemblance to her father in that they both have a camera
growing out of their right hand. Pete and I also got some great shots of
this historic moment.

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							Charlie
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA