Part 3 - Explosion, Reflection, Epiphany

After the focus groups had met, our friend Bob put together a document detailing the information he had gathered.  A few comments he made from that experience still resonate with me - one was that he was surprised the amount of energy that the focus groups had opened up.  I think Bob was actually a little overwhelmed and somewhat taken aback by the magnitude of the energies.  The other was Bob's insistent suggestion that we (the SAK Leadership) respond quickly to the SAK family.  As we were processing the wealth of information, I remember even getting several reminders from Bob with the final one being "Hey, it's been 11 days since I delivered that information to you - folks are eager for your thoughts."

Of Bob's many suggestions and encouragements for moving forward, the core thought was 'Tell them what you heard, then go big."

We scheduled a day to respond to the SAK family and let them know that we heard them and what we intended to do about it.

I gave a lot of back ground information regarding the history of SAK the company and our mission as much of that information we unknown to a number of our people.  I was actually surprised how few of our people knew what the SAK Mission Statement was.  I will include some further information on those subjects in subsequent posts.

The most looming issues / wants were: More transparency, better communication, more leading, less managing.  These issues are actually not uncommon to many businesses.  Letting everyone know all that is going on and why and how decisions are made is a mountainous task, but surely one that needs to be done.  I realized we were not hitting the mark on those fronts.  The other resounding energy was "change or be changed," as Bob put it.

One of the focus group participants put it this way: "We aren’t frustrated because we dislike SAK in any way. We are frustrated because we love SAK and want it to succeed. We don’t need to be placated somehow. We need to be empowered, encouraged, and unleashed."

Near the end of this session is when the EXPLOSION hit.  After going through the "what we heard" and "what we're going to do," there was a challenge from several voices for more.  Our response was not as "BIG" as several had hoped.

After an emotional outburst from yours truly in response - (I had thought what I was offering was indeed some great steps), I pushed that challenge forward with a specific "Let me sit with you, and you, and you and you (the several individuals who were identified in Bob's summary as the most trusted and admired at SAK), to discuss how we can "Share the Wheel."  I am (we are) ready to do that.

[Incidentally, from the information tallied and compiled in Bob's report, my name was not on the Most Trusted and Admired List - a real eye opener that was, and frankly, a pretty heavy gut slug]

It was clear that not only did I need to make some radical moves to include those individuals and energies into the moving forward of SAK - I also needed to really step up as a Leader at SAK - as the Artistic Director - and lead more than manage.  I had gotten buried in the day to day Management junk of SAK and was not offering vision and leadership on creative and artistic levels, as well as not empowering others as much as could be to contribute in those areas.  I need to be there.  I need to lead.  I need to listen.  I need to share the wheel.

SAK has always muddled through the challenge of Artistic and Management Directorship.  With our tight finances and shoestring budget, SAK could traditionally not afford to pay a Managing Director and an Artistic Director.  I served in both of those capacities for a salary less than either would command in the market.  Of course, as many artists and creative types know and have known - we do this because we have to.  We make it work.  We do what needs to be done.

But now it was clear this model could no longer serve SAK.  From this day forward, SAK would be very different.  I did not realize how different it would be at that exact moment.  I had my version of how it would be very different, but on subsequent reflection and self-realization - the truth is SAK was going to soon be very, very different indeed.


This post was supposed to go from Explosion, through Reflection and Epiphany, but holy cow, it's already too long for a single post.  Reflection and Epiphany will have to be the subject of the next post.

Part 2 - It all Comes to a Head

In the fall of 2011 it had become more and more clear that discontent was brewing in the midst of our continued efforts for the show to go on. In December, my friend and co-improviser Mary Thompson-Hunt was embarking on a thesis project for her Masters degree. She was assigned to do a project involving leadership and she approached me with an idea to utilize her knowledge and experience of improvisation and love of SAK. She asked me what were some of my thoughts towards leadership and asked about how I lead and run SAK. That conversation led to a question about what does SAK need most right now and my answer was - More audience. For her thesis and project she chose to center on that topic. Her project was entitled: An Assessment of Improving Audience Attendance at SAK. I let her know that as part of that question, I'd be interested to know both from the perspective of our audiences and the perspective of those who work and perform at SAK what we should do or need to do to build more audience. Mary administered an extensive survey covering that topic and several others.

Again, this exercise revealed more levels of discontent, unhappiness, disenfranchisement and lack of creative fulfillment. I fancy myself as someone who can work well to bring joy and inspiration to groups, but it was clear there was a growing gap between the leadership of SAK (for which I was ultimately responsible) and those who were tasked with making the funny happen on a daily and weekly basis.

In addition to that I received around that time an anonymous email. It was sent from a generic not-identifiable google email address, obviously made for the express purpose of writing to me in an untraceable fashion, which basically said "I'm not a fan of your leadership style," and included a link to a video tagged with "I think you should watch this..." It was a tongue in cheek talk about leadership entitled: "How to de-motivate your people."

Although I took umbrage over some of the viewpoints, thinking I do a lot of what the speaker was suggesting as the "right" way(s) to lead, I did recognize that I was, by many of my choices, inhibiting creative freedom, innovation and joy for many of those on my team.

So my choice was to grab the bull by the horns and dig deeper into the discontent.  This was like the Arab Spring - an Improv Spring if you will.  People were looking for change and advancement and opportunities for growth and joyous fulfillment.  How can you not want them to have that.  I chose not to crack the whip and crack down on the protests, however.  I chose to have lunch.

During a lunch with my friend and awesome associate Bob Kodzis, I spoke of my desire to find out more about what was missing or standing in the way of our forward progression. I shared with Bob the results of Mary's survey findings and he suggested a gathering of several focus groups made up of the different clusters at SAK - our Ensemble, Front of House, Lab Rats, Gen S, Staff, Leadership, etc. Thankfully Bob offered to facilitate those meetings which asked some deeply probing questions including: What do you love about SAK? What needs improvement at SAK? Who do you consider the Most Trusted? The Most Admired?  What needs to change?

From these meetings we were able to distinguish where some of the most toxic areas of discontent were centered.

There were a lot of questions and concerns about how the company was run as well as concerns about artistic stagnation. There was a great desire for more transparency in choices and policies made and instituted and an even greater desire for artistic and creative innovation and as individuals to be more a part of that process and decision making.

In fact, those sentiments were so strong that if left unattended, there would undoubtedly have been a large chunk of the SAK performing family uprooting and seeking creative fulfillment elsewhere.

Something HAD to be done about it, and fast!

End of Part 2

Next Post: Part 3 - Explosion, Reflection, Epiphany

Part 1 - How Did We Get Here?

This is the first in a series of several posts to offer some insight as to how to got to where we are today - Dave Gives the Car Away.

This current transition and opportunity for SAK actually goes back several months and begins with a restless creative energy at SAK. Over the course of time and even beginning in our new and awesome space at the CityArts Factory, a growing energy has been present at SAK to explore new creative thoughts and ideas and expand our creative horizons. Of course this is the dream and vision of every theater, so SAK is really no different on that front. Also, in that time, a core of creative energy has formed among the ensemble we feature in our performances - this core energy exhibits an interest to sow creative oats, if you will. A challenge develops when you have a dynamic like this, especially when paired with the challenges of running a business such as SAK.

As some of you may or may not know, I wear two big hats at SAK - Artistic Director and Managing Director. With the tight and unwieldy budget at SAK this has been an unfortunate necessity, as each position should be a separate individual. However, to make tights ends meet (that doesn't sound good), I made the choice to serve in both capacities for a salary below what either one would command in the marketplace.

Over time, philosophical differences have grown and become more pronounced and it has (had) become apparent to me that I'm like the dad and the core of creative energy is like the kids. The kids had their own ideas about how things should go and many times those did not mesh with how dad was doing things, especially on the business side.

Well, when these kinds of things happen, the family experiences problems and challenges - how do we reconcile these things? SAK has been working through many of those challenges for a number of months.

While in the midst of these challenges, however, the show must go on if we intend to keep our theater doors open. So, despite differences of vision, style and opinion, the SAK family has hung in there to get the job done and continue to entertain the audiences - which is one of the things everybody agrees on - we love our audiences.

End of Part 1

Next Post: Part 2 - It all comes to a head.

Dude, Where's My Car?

As many have already heard, I have decided to step aside as Artistic Director and Managing Director of SAK Comedy Lab. I have further decided to give the "car" to the "yutes." By "car" I mean the artistic reins and operational management of SAK. By "yutes" I mean a group made up of the most trusted and admired improvisers at SAK.

As this transition progresses, I will blog about the changes and challenges from my personal point of view, and will hopefully explain and discuss all the multi-faceted details of this radical move.

At the heart, I am very excited about the potential and future of SAK Comedy Lab and very eager to see what the next several months holds. Stay tuned here for updates, clarifications and blatherings.

Cheers!

Well today marks a milestone for SAK. We have finally secured a beer and wine license. The process was not as complicated as I had expected, although the hurdles to overcome still took us a couple of months. In fact, it was several months into our first year that we were finally able to concentrate on the effort to get the license. Now more hurdles to make sure we are as compliant as we need to be in order to serve and sell legally at the SAK Concession stand. I think we have all the ducks in a row. This will certainly test our core audience and clientele. We do not know for sure if our regulars will still be regular for us if we have beer and wine available. we hope they will still come, but the move seemed more than necessary to attract more folks to the SAK Comedy Lab. I am surprised how many people do not come to SAK simply because we do not have beer and wine available. If we lose patrons who are upset that we now serve beer and wine I will truly feel sorry. If we had enough of those folks coming on a regular basis, filling our seats to the projections we laid forth when we moved in, we would probably have not needed to consider it as we did when we did. We shall see. I think if nothing else if will be kind of nice after a show to enjoy a beer with my fellow performers without having to gather at one or other of the bars in downtown. I don't want to avoid those places completely, but it will be nice to have a beer right in our own place.

Parking "Whoa's"

Seems like every move forward has its complimentary setback, minor or major. SAK is very fortunate to enjoy the ability to offer parking validation for our guests at the Cinema Plaza Parking garage, which is conveniently located right across the street from SAK. There are other parking possibilities, but the Plaza is the most convenient. It seems also, however, it is the most confusing and complicated of the options - or at least until you learn how to navigate it properly.

We have recently learned that the restaurants at the Plaza no longer validate your parking ticket - but SAK still does!! The best news is if SAK is a part of your evening's entertainment you only pay $4 to park. Even if you go to a Magic Game on Friday or Saturday and see the 11:30pm show at SAK you will only pay $4 at the Plaza. This is GOOD NEWS we need to spread!

It is unclear who designed the engineering marvel, but chances are the designers and engineers all drive nothing but Smart Cars (or have lived in Manhattan all their lives). You have to be an expert driver to maneuver through the windy spirals and tight curves and corners your first time. Then there's the labyrinth of elevators, floor letters and numbers and payment options.

We have found through extensive research (and parking there every day) the following best best bets, hints and tips:

• If you're going to SAK or other downtown location park on levels 3 or above. These levels are reserved during the day but at night they are the best bet. The elevators on these floors will take you directly into the Plaza common ground level (plaza) area.
• NOTE:  Levels 2A, 2B and 2C will take you to an elevator on Church and Court and you will undoubtedly feel lost.
• When you exit, you can conveniently get to your car from the same plaza level elevators.
• Always return to the same elevator you arrived on.
• When exiting, if you're paying with credit card - bypass all the payment machines! You don't have to hassle with them unless you're paying cash for your parking. We recommend credit card payment. Not only more convenient but you get a receipt.
• Credit card payment can happen easily and conveniently from your car as you are exiting. Put in your parking ticket (validated if you've been to SAK and you only pay $4), put in your credit card, wait for your receipt after your credit card comes out and you're on your way!

Quantum Improv Back in Session

A new session of Quantum Improv begins this weekend, October 23rd at SAK Comedy Lab. Looking forward to moving forward with Quantum Improv and the Quantum Vision. The class filled to capacity in just 2 hours - very exciting. As the class start approaches I realize I feel like a little kid going back to an old toy box as I feverishly try to remember where I put all the pieces and materials for the Laws of Motion demonstration.

My handy visual aid (I'm now recalling in the 11th hour) takes a good bit of time to set up - and I'm still looking for ways to streamline the process and the demo so it can pack up easier as well as travel more easily. I can't wait to get back into it. I'll be doing a more condensed version this time around to make sure we get done with the class well before the Christmas holiday rush of things begins. This will be a 6 week course.

Bloggy Blog Backlog

What? A blog post? Haven't seen one of these in a while... I am chock full of great excuses though. First and foremost, we've moved the SAK Comedy Lab to a great new location! We're downtown at the CityArts Factory on the corner of Pine and Orange. In addition to that, they changed the rules at blogspot.com and I had to migrate my blog from the SAK site where I was hosting it to another place. They did do a good job helping to make the migration somewhat seamless and painless, but it took a while for me to get all the ducks in a row. Having said that, I hope you will enjoy the new look and feel of MeBloggyBloggy!

Incidentally, I have launched several other blogs along with the MeBloggyBloggy migration, all about the Quantum Vision - which is the other thing that has been taking up my time. It all began with Quantum Improv and has grown since then. Feel free to check out the links at the top of this blog or use some of the other links for MyBlogs, etc.

Fagzilla

Tonight - what a wonderful awful rainy night. Tonight featured Princeton Elementary's "Evening of Excellence," a night of recognition of Princeton Elementary students. Both Marina and Walker were invited to take part. Both kids are on the Principal's Honor Roll meaning they've received A's on their report card for each of the grading periods this year.They both also were honored for reaching their AR goals (Accelerated Reading) for all three grading periods. And if that wasn't exciting enough, they both were honored with the distinction of Writing Wizard for their class. Great job kiddos!!

Afterwards we go to Jade Bistro on Edgewater avenue for a celebration Asian fusion dinner. While we're ordering, Walker is drawing on the back of his sushi form and Marina is writing on the back of hers. Suddenly Walker holds up his drawing and announces "Look what I drew - it's Fagzilla."
"What? We responded, embarrassed and surprised.
"It's Fagzilla." Now our minds are reeling, wondering how our writing wizard has bolstered his vocabulary with this word.
"How have you come to know this word, Walker?"
"Well, he's fat, and he's Godzilla, so that's Fagzilla."
"Oh, of course. Fagzilla." In our relief we didn't really realize how comfortable we'd now become with this new and wonderful name. So for the rest of the dinner we had a wonderful time saying Fagzilla over and over without any shame or remorse. Thanks Walker.


Oh, and this one is his follow up drawing - King Pong - it's a ping pong reference. See how he's shaped like a paddle?

Another Blog to Get Behind On

Hey, now I have 2, count em' 2 blogs I can struggle with keeping current. With that, I officially introduce my Quantum Improv blog to the world. If you get a chance to check it out, be sure to look at the foundation posts - they are easily bookmarked at the top.

Quantum Improv is a new venture that is be becoming a major part of my life, not to mention my improv teaching. The basics molded in Quantum are shaping a philosophy, process and program that will continue to grow. I call it the Quantum Vision and it has wonderful applications past even Quantum Improv. But improv is where it starts and improv is where it will always have a base.

I am currently writing the book Quantum Improv and plan to have the first published copies available by the end of the year. I'm excited to be entering a publishing agreement with a firm that will be a combination I guess you could say of self-publishing and mainstream publishing. I'm talking about a co-publishing arrangement which will allow me to keep my book rights while the publisher (having limited trade rights) will do all the marketing and promotion of the book to retailers like Barnes & Noble, Borders, Amazon as well as retailers such as Target, Wal-Mart, etc. All the things I have no earthly idea how to do. I am very thankful for such an arrangement. My part of the deal will be to order an initial printing of books that I will sell myself through SAK, the Quantum Improv website, etc.

It is all new to me so surely I will post the victories and the defeats along the way.

Be sure to check out the Quantum Improv blog. Onward and Forward!

The Hammer Comes Down at Disney

Well the several weeks of nervous Disney employees is pretty much over. And how things can change over just a few months. Although I have served as a contract Show Director for the past several years and not an actual Disney employee, I was not really on the chopping block, as they say. But, the current climate has affected me as well. Last September, 2 of the shows I looked after closed - Comedy Warehouse and Adventurers Club. Luckily I still had Turtle Talk, Monsters Laugh Floor and World Showcase Players. And last week, I was informed that Monsters and Turtle Talk have been reassigned to one of the full time Show Directors at Maingate. I don't officially know at this time who has them, (althought I think it is Jason Surrell), I just know it isn't me. So the hammer has come down on my wee little head. I do still have responsibility for World Showcase Players so fortunately I get to keep my parking pass and still have a reason to stroll through Maingate from time to time. But my goodness - 8 months ago I was looking after 5 shows, and today, I have one. This represents a 90% decrease in my Disney responsibilities.

So like many others, I eagerly await the next chapter in my life. I bet you'll be seeing a bit more of me down at the ol' SAK Comedy Lab, that's for sure. I'll be teaching more classes I think, especially Quantum Improv which is steadily growing. Two semesters under the belt and looking forward to more of that.

As sad as it is to lose the Disney shows, I'm still amazed that I had so many in-park shows to look after in the first place. It is very unusual for a contract (outside) show director to look after even one ongoing show. For awhile there I had 5. I'm pleased to say I have really enjoyed every one of them very much. It was very sad to see the Island shows come to an end. Obviously the Comedy Warehouse is especially near and dear to my heart. I really loved the Adventurers Club too. Somehow the closing of those was dignified and I felt we really celebrated the legacy and history of what those shows were.

My wife pointed out what a special and wonderful surprise that was - to have a chance to close the shows with a little celebration and fanfare. Usually, (as it was with the current layoffs), Disney likes minimal (if any) fanfare and quick closure. You don't even get 2 weeks if laid off. You're immediately escorted off property. What a great and wonderful opportunity we had (because someone leaked the plans to the press), to close the Warehouse and Ad Club as we did. Morgan said I was able to bring a nice balance of celebrating the legacy and maintaining the dignity of all those who lost their jobs.

For some reason - there is a deeper sadness to having Turtle and Monsters reassigned. I understand it is a better fit to have them looked after by the full time Show Director staff, but I have marshalled those shows from their infancy, after being birthed by WDI. It is with a great deal of sadness that I say good bye to those wonderful shows and especially the wonderful actors who made/make those shows what they are.

Good Bye my lovelies. I wish you all the very best.

Mad Disney Week Over

It has been a very busy couple of weeks with work on the Walt Disney World Resort Showcase. Several events culminated last week, each as part of the Resort Showcase. Since there has been little time to consider what to write - I have pulled something from the archives. Enjoy the following movie short. It was created 5 years or so ago when the Houseful of Honkeys performed a show called Hooray For Honkeywood!

Each week we had a show built around the game the Honkeys developed called "My Movie, My Movie, My Movie..." In our version, each week found one Honkey at the end of the show, riffing improvised movie titles one after the other until the current week's Producer proclaims - "Make That Movie!" That Honkey then had one week to create, write, produce, shoot, edit and premiere a movie using that improvised phrase, word or sentence as their title. The movie would premiere for our Honkeywood audience the following week. I think I got the call the second week. That title was "I Got A New Shirt." I eventually followed with several other titles, "Seething Biscuit," "Help! I'm Yearning For A Pale," and "Cinderheart."

I'm proud of them all for various reasons, but one of the wackiest ones was "Seething Biscuit." I made this little movie about 3 months before we heard of a movie being made for the big screen - "Sea Biscuit." It's mind boggling and a little scary how this improvised title could parallel what would eventually come to the theaters.

Mac Ingenuity at its Finest

I gotta admit I'm a Mac fan. As a proud owner of a MacBook Pro and an iPhone, both which I love, this video hits my funny bone rather well. In fact, I must say I have been enjoying very much comedy videos from the Onion. I am impressed with the level of production they are able to obtain. They score extremely high on news parody - they did so in print and now in picture.



Very funny.

The Christmas Lights are Still Up

This post is made after our neighbor comments to my wife Morgan - "Hey, what's up with the Christmas Lights?"

Disney Dollars Hard at Work

At this time of year I usually work on the Disney Media Resort Showcase and that is in full swing again this year. It takes place in Feburary but this year things are starting early. My work on them is generally to create characters the radio broadcast media can interview - they usually carry the current marketing / branding / PR messages from the Resort perspective in an entertaining way.

This year is all about affordability and value of the Resort Benefits, plus a new vacation package plan. So Penny Pinter (she's nicknamed Penny Pincher) and Val Eugenio (she's a Value Genie-us) help deliver that message. They're neighbors and friends and have started a club for Mom's across the country - Bargain Reconnaissance And Savings Hunters - they're BRASH Mom's. You see how I did that - clever clever - that's how I make those Disney dollars - with a ton of those wacky word play characters.

Today, as well as being Inauguration Day we had a high level review with the Walt Disney Entertainment executives. All went well, and luckily the work continues. I have done this project for the past 4 or 5 years, but somehow it seems to be much busier this year, taking up much more of my time. I remember in the first years the job was creating the characters and prepping them for the interviews.

Last year they added an element called the "Dream's Player" where each broadcast media partner has a Disney site customized for them that their listening audience can check in with to follow their journeys. We schedule the radio personalities for various segments that can be played and viewed later from their respective site. The characters I develop will have an interaction with each radio personality that is loosely scripted. All that development and scripting is added into the mix.

Every night there is some or other themed dinner or dining experience we send them to. One of those for this year seems to have blossomed into a large scale dinner event. The theme is What Will You Celebrate? - one of the current promotional themes at Walt Disney World this year. I am floored with the amount of production and money that flows through Disney events such as this. As a Show Director at Disney I get to live an alter ego life compared to my SAK life. As is often the case, however, the SAK experience is closer to my heart, and ultimately more fulfilling. So this week I hurt my head concentrating on how we can find a thousand dollars for 2 LED light instruments for our SAK show, and I unveiled a vision for the What Will You Celebrate dinner event with a team of 5 designers from different departments all eager to bring that vision to life - for only $60,000!

A collision of 2 completely different worlds.

Resolution Held

Okay I'm two weeks into my resolution and luckily we're still holding. Seems there's so much busy work - the weeks go by so quickly. It's been almost 4 months since the Pleasure Island clubs closed, which made up about half of my Disney work, but there is no shortage of work to be done. 4th Quarter of 2008 had me very busy with SAK stuff. Keith moved to Nashville and we're looking for an in-house Sales person. In between all the interviewing and getting set for that transition I've been the Sales person, Production Coordinator and Production Manager. Lots of layers of business.

This weekend is Robyn Pedretti's (one of our SAK ensemble) wedding. That's the good news. The bad news is she's invited the whole SAK ensemble to the wedding. The good news is I've scheduled a Comedy Warehouse Reunion Show that Saturday. The bad news is I might have to hang back and be at SAK to be a conduit of familiarity for the Comedy Warehouse peeps. We'll see. I'd sure like to be at the wedding if that is possible. I'm also trying my best to plan around what promises to be a very hectic traffic night down at SAK. These are the times that try our patience and test the fortitude of our audience. We've got Riverdance at the Bob Carr (which I'd really like to see sometime) and Ringling Bros. Circus at the Amway Arena. Now those Ringling cats is some hard working folks. They've got 3 shows scheduled on Saturday - 11:30am, 3:30pm and 7:30pm. Wow. I guess for the acts it's an okay schedule - just do your act 3 times in a day but my goodness, circus folk work it. The epitome of cross-utilization. If they're not swinging from the trapeze 40 feet in the air, they're holding the flaming hoop for the zebra to jump through. (Incidentally the zebra's not a zebra, it's a white-haired horse who's just gotten charred from the flaming hoop over time. I think they switch them out every couple of performances.)

Finally - a Christmas lights update. This year I was fortunate enough to have the time to put up extensive Christmas lights on our house - thanks to PI closing. they look great - best on the block - and I love Christmas lights. They are still up and I'm not sure when they will be coming down. If it was up to me I'd have them up all year long. The only downside is the electric bill. But it seems like we just got them all up and now it's time to take them down? I'll keep an update as to the date they actually come down. It will be a sad day for me.

Resolved for 2009

Forgive me Father for I have sinned. It has been 4 months since my last blog entry. Holy Samoli! What's the use of having a blog if you never write on it? Well, this is a new year, old habits are off, new ones to begin. I am resolved in 2009 to blog more regularly. In fact, my resolution is to write on my blog at least weekly. What has kept me generally from blogging more often is that I think too much about what this or that entry will be and then go about trying to make cute graphics to go with it so it doesn't look like just a bunch of words. To make this resolution come to pass I may need to sacrifice some of that. I believe I am prepared to do so, although even the thought of just writing words makes my stomach churn a little bit. Surely this will be a good growth experience for me. I did however, in preparing this post, make a little slide show of our end of year/holiday times. What a great time of year. I just love Christmas and the holidays. This was our first holiday season in our new house and we just love it. We bought this house at the end of last year - closed on the 17th of December and moved in Christmas Eve night, so we did have our Christmas here last year. But this year we were all settled in for the whole Christmas season. I had some extra time on my hands this year what with the closing of Pleasure Island at the end of September, so I got to do one of the things I've always wanted to do but never really had the time - put up Christmas lights. I like that very much.

So this is the beginning of a more regular output schedule as far as my blog goes. You can expect posts at least weekly. Keep in mind, however, without much forethought sometimes the posts might get a little boring, be very brief and have no pictures or graphics. Who knows, that might be better in the long run anyway.

Summer's Out for School

Summer over already??? And now it's time for School??? My goodness time flies when you're having kids. This summer blew by like a real hurricane, not that imposter Fay. (Well, for us in Orlando anyway). All it meant for us was an unplanned extension of summer vacation with no child care and no opportunity to swim in the pool. At least it's Mom's birthday. Happy Birthday mom.

We were supposed to drive down to Miami today (just Morgan and I), celebrate her birthday and do a SAK seminar on Wednesday for Brown University. A free date night on Mom's birthday with an overnight hotel stay in Miami on someone else's dime? AND a per diem covered meal? Are you kidding? Awesome way to spend her birthday. But alas, Fay had different plans. The gig postponed, the county closed the schools. We are relegated to Jade for dinner. Don't get me wrong, we love Jade - Asian/Fusion delicious. Our neighborhood favorite. But we were planning for something a little more - um, not with the kids.

So the children had one day of school and then a hurricane day now to be made up in October. And only gentle winds and light rain so far for us in Orlando. The kiddos looked great for their first day. Marina proclaimed - "I'm excited, Walker's nervous." Indeed she was. What a delight to see her in such a mood. Indeed Walker was. Not sure why, maybe just first day back jitters. He did fine once on school grounds.

Marina is not with her best friend Abbey for the first time in their elementary and preschool history. They both seem to be adjusting okay. Well, here's to another year of school fun.

Have fun kiddos. Mommy and Daddy love you.

From the Archives

Saw this video on my old hard drive. This was from almost a year ago, doing a show with Wayne Brady at the Venetian in Las Vegas. It was actually a very fun audience environment scene. When you're in Vegas, you get audience volunteers like this lady who's wearing close to nothing. At SAK, not so much. And, I also get to make a wonderful racist reference to an old Chinese Woman who works in a laundromat. Hope you enjoy this blast from the past.

We're now in official summer vacation mode with the kids out of school for the next (90?) days. We look forward to many fun hours in the pool. I guess I never mentioned on this blog - We got that house we were looking at late last year. We closed on the 17th of December and that night we all camped out on the wood floors and made S'mores in the backyard fire pit. We then moved in on Christmas Eve and had Christmas morning in the new house. Yippee. We still have our other house which we didn't sell.

We've done some fixing and now we're renting it out. House to our good friends Tim and Alice Bass and the apartment to wonderful Denna, our SAK House Manager. We did a good deal of work on the house and apartment in the first part of the year, stepping into the uncharted territory (for us) of home remodeling and general contracting. I guess I would say it all went pretty smooth considering what it might have been, especially knowing as little as I do about renovating. New roofs, new AC/Heat, electric and plumbing updates, new cabinets and some additional remodeling in the apartment as well as redoing the floors. 3 months of time and $45,000 later - whew!! Now we've got to sell it in the next 3 years so we can avoid Capital Gains taxes on the transaction.

Wild Abandon Walker

What's this? Six months since the last post. It better mean a lot has been going on!

Well not really. We moved to a new house on Christmas Day. Since then we've been slowly getting settled in there, and it might take a little longer. Less than 10 days until summer vacation for the kids. Woo Hoo!!

On to today's post. My son Walker recently performed in his school's Variety Show. He fancies himself a dancer - a break dancer not less. This is the video of his performance. Click the play button when you're ready, it's not a photo. What amazes me most about his performance is his utter and complete abandon. He has absolutely no fear. He practiced his moves in our currently unfurnished living room on the wood floor. We convinced him to only try those moves with some sort of padding, so he had us lay out a small carpet. (We actually brought the same carpet to the school for his performance.)

In improv (especially at SAK) we really encourage our performers to play with wild abandon. Obviously we have to consider our own safety. My son hasn't quite got to that point yet. I guess it's going to take a boo boo or two to learn his own limits, but right now he sees stuff on TV, etc. and he just goes for it.

As much as I want our SAK performers to be free enough to flail about we have to be so everlovin' cautious. Of course I don't want our performers to get hurt but when you flail about sometimes there's a bruise, sometimes there might be a little blood. I am so nervous about every little mishap because of Worker's Compensation Insurance. Even the slightest ding, trip or scrape could result in hundreds of dollars in increased Worker's Compensation Insurance costs - not to mention an actual injury. We have to ride a very fine line between "Go for it! Pedal to the Metal! No holds barred!" and "Oh be careful, you might hurt yourself, don't jump on that. Watch out! Eek. Don't do that!" In many instances I have to just put my hand over my eyes and pray.

I've got at least one guy at SAK - Benji Hurlburt - who exhibits much of the same abandon as Walker. (What a great name for a guy who throws himself about - Hurlburt). I love to watch him throw caution to the wind on our stage - the audience loves it too. But I have to say I cringe sometimes and feel that tightening in my intestines when he does. Will he break something or hurt himself? (Benji Hurlhurt) Will he hurt someone else? Will he break our set or our microphone? I'd love to have the freedom and resources not to have to worry about it. The other night on David Letterman, David dropped his Jamba Juice Smoothie. A few minutes later Kevin Spacey came out for an interview and purposely emptied his Jamba Juice all over the set. Was that good or bad? Surely they can clean it up - even put in new carpeting on the set if they have to. Was it worth it for the emotion of surprise we felt or the "Oh my Gosh! Can you believe he just did that?!?!"

Back to my beloved little Walker. I love the concentration he shows on his face. As soon as it's done, you can see the concentration break as he begins to wave. All he needs now is to end up in his underwear or with his shirt off and he'll be just like his old man on the SAK stage.

I believe most of us would do well to take back to at least a portion of that abandon we've lost or given up tucked away due to fear. Throw caution to the wind. Look silly! Do something a little dangerous! Don't worry about what others might think of you. Yesterday on Oprah a therapist took OCD sufferers to a healing boot camp. Part of their journey was to go into a downtown Philadelphia back alley, put their hands inside an old smelly dumpster, run their fingers through their and even lick their fingers. When was the last time you did something insane, wacky, wild, unexpected? Holy Cow - when was the last time I did!!!???

Great job Walker Russell! You're awesome!