Newnan Library Show

The library show was last night and it was a blast! They had 409 people show up, which they told me was crazy big - especially for a weekday night in a school week! So I was delighted. I suspect that might have been the biggest audience I've ever performed for!

Everything seemed to go really well and I heard a lot of pleasant comments afterwards, so that was pretty nice. There were a few things I usually get adults to do (like take a polaroid picture of the levitation to give to the person I float in air!) but I couldn't reach any - but fortunately for me there was a really nice young man in the front who helped out every time, so I appreciated that quite a bit!

It makes me think maybe I should try to do more library shows ... I normally stay pretty busy doing birthday parties and I really like doing those so I haven't tried to book library shows very hard. But ... library shows are a heck of a lot of fun, so maybe I will!

Library show!

I've been booked to do another library show, this time in Newnan -
http://www.newnan-coweta.org/
The show will be on Thursday, Oct 11th, at 7:00 pm. It's free to the public, so I would love it if lots of folks came by!

I finally got around to another round of armor/R2-Q5 repairs. There was a lot of chipped paint on R2, so I did some repainting there. My shoulder bells occasionally fell off, which was very annoying I can tell you! While it's not a big deal, I really don't like having things like that happen. So I completely reworked how they were hung. I've replaced the fabric straps with leather straps, and replaced the velcro holding them on with heavy-duty snaps. I'm counting on this being a permanent fix - they'll be getting a trial this weekend as I'm doing two shows, so we'll see what happens!

R2 progress

I've been doing some more tinkering with R2 - with a second baby, it sure is tough to find time, I'll tell you that! But I attached the skin, and have been adding some details ... then I got together with some friends, and I decided to temporarily attach the legs and feet and just see what it looked like. I was really happy with it, I'll tell you that - and he seemed to be quite a hit. Especially with my toddler! So you have to bear with my son being in all the pictures, just enjoy the R2 shirt. He was fascinated with it. I'm so proud!

People

I was driving to a show yesterday and got a reminder of something that's hit me before. I looked over and saw a family in the car next to me. They'd gotten something to eat, and were having lunch while driving.

So a very minor flash into someone else's life ... but what interests me so much is that every once in a while I see something and for some reason it really reminds me that over there is another interesting set of folks, with their own life, their own concerns, their own interests and I'll never meet or talk to them. But they exist and are just as important as all the folks in my own life.

It ties into a quote I heard, and while although I no longer remember the actual quote or who said it I remember the gist of it. Look at any movie scene - say a cowboy shootout in a saloon. There are the two leads, hands over their guns, about to enter a life or death fight. Now look at the background. There is a guy, no lines in the movie, his only job is to hide behind some scenery. Remember, to THAT guy, he is the most important character in the movie. To everyone else, he's an extra - but to HIM, he is the most important character in the room. This is an episode of his life, and everyone else is just extras to him.

I try to remember that. I try to treat everyone else appropriately to that thought - and I have to say, that when you talk to folks and treat them with respect, it's just amazing how nice everybody is in return. Most folks will bend over backwards for you - as long as they know you'll bend over backwards for them as well.

So this is a bit rambling, but it's one of those thoughts that is fun to think about. So I thought I
would share it.

New baby!

My wife and I have a new little baby girl! We've named her Piper, and her 20 month old brother seems to think she's pretty cool so far.

I scheduled some time with no shows so I could have more time at home for the first few weeks. This turned out to be a good thing - my wife and I were at BJ's with the kids and it rained quite heavily. BJ's has a large sign in the parking lot, and the sign blew down on our minivan and did quite a bit of damage. The car is being fixed, but it's been several weeks and it's still being fixed! The really bad part is that this is the only vehicle I have that I can get R2-Q5 into. So for the first few weeks that was OK as I had no shows scheduled, but I've had to tell a few Star Wars shows that I couldn't bring R2-Q5 after all as I currently don't have a car that I can put him in! Hopefully I'll get my minivan back soon!

Cake!

I had to share this picture ... I did a Star Wars show a little bit ago. The mom really did a fantastic job setting the room up and making a great environment for the party. The crowning touch was the cake - she had a cake made up with me and R2 on it!

I love this woman!

Clone Wars cartoon

There is a sneak peek of the upcoming Clone Wars cartoon on starwars.com -
http://www.starwars.com/video/view/000478.html
It looks GREAT! My wife and I don't have TV - we have a set but we just never watched much television so we just turned off the connection. When this comes out we may have to reconsider that. :-) Or visit some friends once a week!

Stories

The forum went quite well. It was outdoors - I just entertained folks as they went by. I had one lesson to learn - I planned to do about ten minutes for folks. In my mind, I figured they'd be moving on and I'd get a new crowd and do about ten minutes for them. I was limited to stuff that could be done surrounded and had no reset time so that I could just keep performing without having to stop, so I could only bring certain tricks with me but that fit with my plan.

So I gathered some folks, did my ten minute set and I discovered the flaw in my plan. No one left. :-) I suppose that's a GREAT problem to have, they liked what I was doing, but ... I ran through all the routines I brought with me, ran through some I brought that I hadn't planned on doing, and then just just warned them I was going to start repeating and went for it. Fortunately that went pretty well!

Another public show!

The library show went wonderfully - there are even pictures of it on my site now, under the Star Wars section. Everyone was in a great mood and laughed and was really responsive - so I was very pleased with how everything went.

I'm doing another public show on Saturday May 19th at the Forum, on 5155 Peachtree Parkway in Norcross. That will not by my regular show, it'll be closeup magic. As folks walk past I'll gather a small crowd, do some effects, and repeat. I'll be there from 1 to 4.

If you're in the area ...

Library Show

Want to see my show for free?

I am doing a library show Saturday at the Fayette County Public Library at 1821 Heritage Parkway, Fayetteville, GA (maps.google.com will tell you how to get there - http://tinyurl.com/2s9eng ) at 2:00 on Saturday. They are doing a Star Wars day and called me up and asked if I would do the Star Wars show, so … I recently found out there would be more Star Wars stuff after my show, but I have another show afterwards and can’t stay to see it. I’m a bit disappointed about that, I wish I’d known about it before I booked something else!

Card Trick

This was a very interesting card trick ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voAntzB7EwE
Someone sent me the link. I watched the first half and thought "Cheesiest trick EVER!" But then the second half ... well, that part made it worth sending the link about.

Babies and plots

My new provider is working GREAT - I'm very happy! My old one was fine until about two buyouts in a row happened, so I was sorry to see that go away, but it's nice to be stable again.

My wife's second pregnancy is going well, and I'm very excited about it! Babies rule. Our first child is now a toddler, and it turns out that toddlers rule too - he is so much fun! He can say a few words now. One is "shoe". If we ask him to get his shoes he will get all excited and run as fast as he can to get them because he knows he's about to get to go play outside. Yesterday he ran all the way up the stairs (with me right behind him to make sure he didn't fall) which is a laborious process for a little guy - but the whole way up he was excitedly saying "Shoe!" So needless to say my wife and I were pretty much wrapped around his little finger.

So that's my personal news! Show wise, I have a routine with a rope that gets pulled through a coat that a volunteer wears - I love the routine but it always seemed to have an anti-climactic ending. So lately I've been rewriting that routine - it's got a similar structure, but now it has a plot and some new props. I'm going to try the new script out tonight and see how it works. That makes me nervous - I get comfortable with a routine and completely shaking it up always leaves me hoping I remember to do everything I've planned out! But I think it's a really good change, so ... we'll see what the audience thinks of it tonight!

Web changes

Well THAT was fun! My ISP got bought out and seems to have been shuffling things around a lot...I wouldn't mind, but I keep finding my web pages down, or email no longer working, etc, and they keep not bothering to tell me until I call to find out what's changed this time. So as a result I've just finished moving everything to another provider. I'm blogging about it because if you've emailed me in the last few days and never got a response, or if you saw my pages down, that'll be why! (I think I lost a days worth of email in there somewhere!)

Hopefully everything will be smoother from this point on ... I have some other pages hosted with my new provider and they've all been fine. So it's nice to have everything with one provider.

Copelands

I'll be performing at Copelands tonight, Feb 20th, for Mardi Gras - from 6 to 8. I haven't been doing much public restaurant work lately, so come on out! It's a good restaurant and I've got some cool stuff to show! It's at 3131 Cobb Parkway in Atlanta.

I'm going to see the Thrasher's play hockey Saturday night ... that's the one funny thing I found when I started performing magic. If my wife and I make plans, I have to make sure I make them well in advance, put them on my calendar, and not take any bookings that afternoon! I'm looking forward to seeing the Thrashers play, though - my wife actually got me into it. So I'm relatively new to hockey, but I've really been enjoying it!

New personal record!

I've been doing two shows on most Saturdays lately, which has been quite interesting. I originally would stop between shows in a parking lot and reset things for the next show, but as I did this more I started changing things so that I could reset the show while packing it up, so as I left the first party I'd be ready for the second party. (That now works easily for everything but ONE trick ... so I don't always do that one, even though I love it!)

So last Saturday I had two shows, and got a call about a third show. It just worked out, it was right after my second show and in the same area, so I took it. That's the first time I've done three shows in a single day - I was quite pleased!

The other interesting thing is that they were all totally different shows - one was a birthday party, one was a Boy Scout Blue and Gold, and the third was a corporate event. They all seemed to go quite well, though - I certainly hope that everyone had a good time!

R2!

I got a lot done! The middle foot is in, and raises and lowers electronically (so it's set to be hooked up to a remote control later.) Then I got curious, so I took all the bits I've been working on and hooked them all up. The legs move from two leg to three leg position electronically fine, the only big piece remaining is to figure out how to have the foot hinge to the leg - the hinge has to lock in both two and three legged mode, so it's not as easy as one would think. But check this out!