Puppet Up Down Under 2014 – April 7, 2014 – Day off
Today was great as it was a full day off. No Puppet Up responsibilities at all. Though I love the show and would do it every day for the rest of forever (or until I could not longer keep my hand above my head), I enjoy a day off here and there. And if there’s no traveling, that’s a plus.
We had hope to get in last night and just settle in for our two week stay here but the hotel had other plans. The room type we were supposed to have was not available last night so we stayed in a different room and would have to move into our long term room today. A minor inconvenience but not insurmountable.
I slept in a bit and when I awoke I realized I was just in time to watch Wrestlemania via the WWE app. It was a fu, relaxing way to spend the morning and it was cool to be watching from Australia, in bed in my corner hotel room, curtains pulled back with an amazing view of my new favorite city…Melbourne.
Side rant, thanks to the WWE for allowing their app to stream to Australia. Netflix, Hulu and HBO GO are all blocked here. I understand WWE owns the rights to everything on their app and the others need licenses. But I’m an American customer paying for a service and it should work wherever. I’m not selling tickets here in Australia for people to come watch stuff on my ipad. I just want to watch shows. And no, none of the ip spoofers will work for me.
Dan joined me for a bit of Wrestlemania. I think it was his first time watching the big event. He will always remember where he was when the Undertaker’s streak was broken. In my hotel room. In Australia.
After Wrestlemania was over, I got cleaned up and Dan and I walked out to get some lunch. It was so great to be back in Melbourne. I enjoyed Sydney,Mobutu there’s something about this city that just makes me truly happy. After lunch it was back to the hotel to move to the new room and settle in a bit. After moving in, I answered some email and generally just relaxed.
Was saddened to hear of the passing of both Mickey Rooney and John Pinette. I was a fan of both of them and they will be missed. Never met John, but was a big fan of his comedy and did see him live once. I met Mickey once at Dragon*Con.
Around 5:30 PM, Dan and I set out to go see one of my favorite comedians Sèan Cullen who is performing here as part of the same comedy festival we are. Dan had never seen him, so I was glad he was coming. Huge thanks to Rosie, our handler, from the Melbourne International Comedy Festival for getting us tickets.
Sėan was amazing, as always. So inspired by his ease of improv and the way he seems to effortlessly go off on amazing tangents that are simply hilarious. Also fun to hear him sing some of his songs including Kacheevo and Wheay. Just a fun way to spend an early evening.
After that we went out to a company dinner. It was all the cast, Pateick, Dan, Sean our stage manager and Bec our puppet wrangler. It was a lovely time and the restaurant, Trunk, was fantastic. All the food they brought out was amazing.
After that it was back to the hotel to do some more writing.
So, no major puppet fun, but a nice day off. Tomorrow we get back to The Princess Theatre and back to the puppet anarchy!!
Puppet Up Down Under 2014 – April 6, 2014 – Last Sydney show.
It’s almost fall in Australia. That means that Daylight Savings. That means that we lose another hour from the United States. But it also meant our 11:00 AM hotel check out time was not till ‘noon.’ An extra hour to sleep.
As soon as I woke up I went to the gym and ran on the treadmill. Then, after showering and packing for that impending check out, I walked to get some breakfast. There was a small grocery store near our hotel that has a deli-like counter and they had a nice selection of breakfast items. I had sourdough toast with peanut butter and a fruit salad. Really nice.
Soon it was check out time so we all met in the lobby and hopped cabs down to the Opera House. Our show was not until 5:30 PM so, arriving at the Opera House at 11:30 AM, we had some time to kill before our 3:45 PM call. All week I had been eyeing Luna Park, a small amusement park across Sydney Harbor, so I decided I would spend the time before call there. Patrick and Peggy agreed to come along.
Earlier in he week I had bought a public transportation pass. $60 for a week of unlimited rides on the busses, ferries in Sydney. So it was no sweat to hop a ferry over to where Luna Park was.
Luna Park is a classic amusement park. Based heavily on Coney Island. There’s a slew of carnival type rides. Ferris wheel, carousel, spinners and a classic wooden roller coaster. I didn’t have intentions of going on any rides but once I saw them I bought a pass to go on a few. I also filmed a lot of fun Uncle Interloper bits that I will cobble together once I am back. I rode the roller coaster, the Tango Train and went inside the amazing Coney Island building that had a giant slide and one of those spinning turntables that fling kids off in all directions. It was a fun afternoon but soon it was time to take the ferry back over to the Opera House and get ready for our final Sydney show.
And what a show it was! The crowd was fantastic and their suggestions were just as fantastic. We learned about the dangers of twerking, we had a film noir in a submarine, a news report about a dog showing up at a cat show and a talent show that featured a magician sawing someone in half, kung-fu fighting and the Alien Barbershop with the topic of Cannibalisim.
I practice cannibalism.
It’s habit forming
It keeps the populations down
And helps with global warming.
After the show we had 15 minutes….15 minutes, to get changed, get our stuff together and meet the car to the airport for out flight back to Melbourne.
Now, we’re all checked into our room and ready for a day off tomorrow then a full two week’s worth of shows at the Princess Theatre here in Melbourne. I cannot wait.
Creative Mondays #014 – The Magic Spreadsheet
Back toward the end of 2012, I heard about a thing called ‘The Magic Spreadsheet.’ I heard about it on Mur Lafferty’s podcast I SHOULD BE WRITING which is a podcast that, if you have any sort of passion for writing, you should be listening to. Mur Rocks. Anyway, she spoke about how the Magic Spreadsheet had helped her write more than any other tool or practice she had found.
In a nutshell, The Magic Spreadsheet, created by a colleague of Mur’s names Tony Pisculli, is a simple tool that helps you get into the practice of writing everyday. The starting goal is 250 words per day. Roughly one page of typed text. It should take you about 15 minutes. On the first day you write 250 words you enter that number on the Magic Spreadsheet and you get one point. Now the next day if you write 250 words and you enter in that number, you get one point for writing 25 words and then another point because you’ve created a link in your chain by writing two days in a row. The next day you would get one point for the 250 words and TWO points for two links in a chain and so on. There’s more ways to earn points, but those are the basics.
Since I discovered The Magic Spreadsheet, I have written consistently, only missing one day when I was in the backwoods of Oregon and realized after being in bed for 20 minutes that I’d forgotten to write. Despite that small break in my chain, I have written a total of 122,885* words and, except for that day mentioned earlier, have written every single day since. It has been the most consistent I’ve been at writing and working on my writing and I have turned out a lot of words. Not all of those words were fantastic, but it doesn’t matter as much as the learning of the discipline of sitting and writing.
Now I know you may be asking, “So…you get points? That’s it?” And the answer is, yes. That’s it. There are leader boards where you can see how your word count of chain length compares against others, so there is a small ‘competitive’ factor that can play into it. Outside of that however, you don’t ‘get’ anything. I will say that it really works for me.
Everyday I have it in my head, “I have to do my words. I can’t break my chain (again).” And when the day is done, I have done my words. I have even been pushing myself to do more than the 250 words, usually going over 500. Somedays it’s very, very hard to get the words done. I lack energy to do them, I feel I have no good ideas to put down on paper or eleven other excuses pop into my head, but I get them done because I don’t want to break my chain again.
The other thing about The Magic Spreadsheet is if you, unfortunately, miss a day…nothing happens. You just start back up the next day and, if you’re like me, you will be doubly set on not breaking that chain again.
Now The Magic Spreadsheet may not be your thing or it may not work for you’re art and that’s fine. But you can do something similiar. Make a goal for yourself to do something creative everyday. Something easily obtainable (250 words a day, 10 sketches, 20 minutes of instrument practice, etc.) and then give yourself a point, or an X on a calandar, or a gold star each day you do it. After a week or so of practicing this, you may just get into the groove of doing so and you’ll keep up your creative habit because you want to get those points or x’s or gold stars.
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What motivation tools do you use to motivate you to get things done?
*This post was written some month ago. Despite a few more breaks in the chain, as of February 28, 2014, I have written a total of 282,248 words. All thanks to The Magic Spreadsheet.
Puppet Up Down Under 2014 – April 5, 2014 – A tour on a tour
This morning I got up and went and ran on the treadmill. Then I did, quite possibly, the most Australian thing I could think of. I went and saw Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
I really liked it. I’m really a sucker for any of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies (and Fox, just give Spider-Man. Amazing Spider-Man is awful.) This is a Puppet Up blog, so I’m not going to go into a movie review, but I thought the film was great.
After the movie I grabbed lunch then headed back to the hotel to relax a bit and hang out with Brian. After a bit we left early for the theatre because today we were getting an exclusive tour of the entire Opera House.
After a short bus ride we were standing in the lobby of the Opera House ready for our tour. I don’t think we really went anywhere where the public wasn’t able to go, except the backstage loading dock areas, but we’ve been able to walk through there with our passes we just haven’t. But our guide was super knowledgeable and he really impressed upon me how difficult it was to build this world famous landmark.
We got to peak into the Concert Hall right after a performance by an orchestra. We were unable to see inside the actual main Opera hall, but perhaps we can sneak in there tomorrow before we leave.
After our tour, it was time to soundcheck our show, which went smoothly. Patrick informed us that he was mixing up the structures and casting for the show tonight even more than he had before, so that always makes for and exciting show. After soundcheck we went up to the green room to get a snack. Then it was back to the dressing room to get in our blacks.
The show tonight was a ton of fun. The crowd had really great suggestions and we had a blast. The Hot Dogs acted out Bravehart Porno (you had to be there), we heard a news report about Australian Road Rage, had a really great audience member puppeteer session and I both hosted the talent show and sang the alien barbershop, the topic of which was Chernobyl.
I survived Chernobyl
I did not die
I came through just fine,
And I love my new third eye.
After the show, some of the gang went to a bar/restaurant near the Opera House. Dan and I just took the bus back to the hotel.
We have one more show tomorrow in Sydney and then it’s back to Melbourne. I’ve had a lot of fun here and it is truly mind-boggling that I been set foot on a stage at the Sydney Opera House. I will be glad to get back to Melbourne though. There’s something about that city that just clicks with me.
So, one more show, then back on the road for a long, two week run, at the Princess Theater in Melbourne!
