Happy New Years, Take-Meisters!!

Hope you all stay safe and relatively in control this evening. I'll be working late , prepping books t sell so we can buys books for the children at the Library. For the children.
Over/Under on who's gonna puke first tonight?

I'm back and stuff

Folks:

I am back. In case anyone is wondering where I am "back" from . . . no where, really. This last show-weekend I was in Iowa for a funeral, and then got snowed in down there until Sunday morning around 11am. Definetly not as fun as watching ya'll perform, but I made do (ie. drinking with my family around the hotel pool.)

And more importantly than white-out road conditions and dead great-grandmothers (well, not MORE important, but more relevant I guess, since she's dead and all) I have a job. A good job. A 9-5 Monday-Friday job. So no more weekend work. No more wondering if I can afford to pay Jason his $10/week stipend for passing knowledge unto me. And no more not coming to practice because I'm selling portraits to church goers at inflated prices. Whoo hoo!

So Merry Christmas to you all (and a somber Ramadan to John) and whomever is not gone I'll see this Saturday at 10am.

Thank you, and good night.

Woooooooooooooooooooolhouse

The Island of Misfit Toys...

So Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer was just on, and I was reminded that when I was a little kid, that Abominable Snow Monster of the North was one terrifying Bumble. Seriously, with the teeth and the King Kong-esque sound effects, the shift was scary. And it didn't help that the Burl Ives voiced snow dude would get freaked out too. Thankfully this time I was able to make it through without hiding under a couch pillow... for the most part.

But then I remembered the conversation I had with Jason, and later Larry, about Cloverfield. That movie freaked me out primarily because I thought I was going to puke because of the jerky camera (Of course Jason took the opportunity to point he watched it on a 50 inch screen TV and was just fine. I think that was just an excuse for him to tell me that he [presumably] has a 50 inch screen TV).

Of course that Cloverfield monster was one seriously huge frickin' Bumble. Holy crap! So I didn't cover my eyes on this one (again, for the most part). BUT, as much as I loved Godzilla movies growing up, this movie made it abundantly clear just how much a giant monster attack would REALLY suck. Yup', the shit would be uncool.

So here's my question all of you, what films/TV shows from today, or from your youth, or from any time for that matter, really freaked you out and/or made you a little nauseous?

Discuss!

Oh, and let's try and keep this as frivolous as possible okay?

And whatever you do, don't start exchanging e-mails on this!

Holiday Fun

I encourage all of you to go elf yourself! Ha!
If you make an elf be sure to send it to me. I think it's hilarious!
www.elfyourself.com
I'm off to Iowa tomorrow. I'm going to bring back It's A Wonderful Life for those of you that haven't had the pleasure of watching it. : ) I wish the Goonies would have made a holiday special. Picture Sloth dressed like Father Christmas. Nice...
Check ya later gators!

The Lunchbox.........

Hey Everybody. When the lunchbox idea started I told a couple of members my thoughts on it. I had hoped it would just disappear, but since it hasn't I wanted to share my thoughts with everyone. The Outtakes, dysfunctional as we are, are a group. When awards are given to an individual instead of the group as a whole, it becomes, or will become, divisive to the group. If it continues, eventually it will get down to one or more people who never get this thing. Think of it as being the last person picked in dodge ball. Do you remember that feeling? I'm sure it wasn't a fun experience. It's not any different now.

While I appreciate the idea, Vic, God knows we don't get much positive validation, my strong feeling is that we end this now and return the box to Vic so he can put it in the Indiana Jones warehouse. I'd like everyone to give their opinion on this.

Meditation Article

I just read this article and it seems helpful for the group so I am posting it.

Work should be considered as play, not as work. Work should be considered as play, just a game. You should not be serious about it; you should be just like children playing. It is meaningless, nothing is to be achieved; just the very activity is enjoyed. You can feel the distinction if you play sometimes. When you work it is different: you are serious, burdened, responsible, worried, anxious, because the result, the end-result, is the motive. The work itself is not worth enjoying. The real thing is just in the future, in the result. In play there is no result, really. The very process is blissful. And you are not worried, it is not a serious thing. Even if you look serious, it is just pretending. In play you enjoy the very process; in work the process is not being enjoyed -- the goal, the end, is important. The process has to be tolerated anyhow. It has to be done because the end has to be achieved. If you could achieve the end without this, you would drop activity and jump to the end. But in play you would not do that. The businessman is not playful. And if you are not playful, you cannot be meditative. Be more and more playful. Waste time in play. Just playing with children will do. Even if there is no one, you can jump and dance alone in the room and be playful. Enjoy. But your mind will go on insisting, "What are you doing, wasting time? You can earn something out of this time. You can do something, and you are just jumping, singing, and dancing. What are you doing? Have you gone mad? Try it. Snatch whatsoever time you can get out of your business, and be playful. Whatsoever. You can paint, you can play on a sitar, anything you like -- but be playful. Look for no profit out of it, see no future in it, just the present. And then, then you can be playful inside also. Then you can jump on your thoughts, play with them, throw them here and there, dance with them, but not be serious about them.

I have books

I thought I would throw this out there in case any of you want to borrow a book. I have Improvie By Mick Napier, Improvising Better by Jimmy Carrane and Liz Allen, The Improv Handbook by Tom Salinsky and Deborah Frances-white, and Process by Mary Scruggs and michael Gellman. I am presently reading the last one but all of the others are open.