If you tuned into the Ellen DeGeneres show on Tuesday, you may have seen the smiling face of a Drumheller woman having an awkward game of Twister on national television.
Valley resident Jen Olsen and Drumheller resident Amanda Swain, along with two other friends, made the pilgrimage to Los Angeles over the Thanksgiving weekend to attend the hit talk-show after Swain received tickets.
“While waiting in line a lady came up to us asking us to take a survey,” said Olsen, “and said there might be a chance you’d get called up to play a game.”
Olsen was chosen to play “Twister Hoopla”, pitting teams of two to hold coloured rings in between each other’s bodies, the first one to drop a ring loses.
“It was a little awkward, especially doing it with someone you didn’t know,” Olsen laughs. “I felt really nervous.”
Her team went on to win an iPod Touch and $100 iTunes gift card.
Before playing the game, Ellen asked the guests where they were from.
“Because of the long weekend, half the audience was Canadian and everyone just screamed when I said I was from Alberta.”
“I have twin two-year-old boys, and I waved at the camera ‘Hey Paxton, hey cooper!’, and they ended up cutting that segment out because one of the other contestants plugged the company she worked for,” Olsen said.
Olsen admits Ellen is as down to earth as she appears on the show.
“She looks as good in person as she does on TV, but she’s shorter than I thought.”