Bite Night and other movie roles

Well, maybe the title is slightly misleading, but it is likely. I have been offered one of the leading roles in an independent film called Bite Nite, a vampire spoof. I am getting the full script tomorrow for that one and we’ll see how it goes. Someone had to back out at the last minute so now I am getting the part of Father Fangulous, a Catholic priest. certainly no type-casting there.

And I am auditioning for a second film, also an independent local shoot, but there isn’t even a working title yet. (at least as far as I know)

Thirdly, I am doing another show at Reading Community Players called Take Me Out. It’s the story of a major league ball player who comes out of the closet. (not my character) I’ll probably end up playing someone who has a beef with that sort of thing. I was trying to phrase that to not sound like I was making a pun. First thought was “I am probably playing someone who has a hard time with that” but that seemed worse. Where’s the Beef? Cora’s dead – showing my age.

Anyway, there’s all the news that’s fit to print

the Ripple Effect

Don’t underestimate your impact in this world. The slightest thing you do can change the course of many many lives.

Example:

About ten years ago I was working with a guy named Todd. Todd and I got along really well and had many interesting conversations, some deep, some shallow, most I don’t even remember. One conversation we had was about fitness. I wanted to get in better shape, and I was uneducated on how to go about it.

Todd recommended a book, Body for Life, by Bill Phillips. It’s a book for entry level fitness folks. If you know almost nothing, it’s great. If you think you know a thing or two, you may be educated a bit. Some things in it may not be totally accurate, but it can and does give you diet guidelines, workout schedules and inspirational stories.

I read it and entered the “Body for Life Challenge” 1999. So did Deb. We made progress on our physical and mental selves and met an entire new online community, the Yahoo Body for Life group. That group got us involved in Wishlifts, which are weight lifting events to raise money for the Make a Wish Foundation. At one of those lifts we met Bob Doyle (from the movie The Secret – before the movie was even thought of) and we organized an event where he presented his Create Your Own Reality workshop. That was his first experience in that direction. His first workshop.

Then I took Bob’s Six Figure Streams course a year later and we started down the path of having on-line internet careers.

The body for life also got Deb excited about fitness and she got certified as a trainer and eventually got a job at Body Zone, which introduced us to Jim and Toni Reece. Meeting them helped start the Get Inspired! Project.

All this from a brief conversation with a coworker on fitness.

We both have new careers and mindsets and have an expanded new group of friends.

Q What tiny thing have you said that has changed lives?

A: You have no idea, but think about that a bit. When you are in a poor mood or a good mood, that’s contagious. When you make a suggestion, someone may listen and follow through. Words are like knives. They can cut through flesh and change lives.

New Year 2010 already?

It's been an eventful year, getting laid off from my job and working with the PEOPLE Academy now, mostly writing articles for them. Great company and fantastic products. Our Experience plus your experience = An Amazing Experience for your clients or something like that.

Still doing the Ghosthunting, http://www.GhosthuntersPA.com and have applied to be a sister unit to TAPS.

Doing improv comedy with http://www.DutchBlitzkrieg.com Things are moving along there, doing monthly shows, and getting some audience. Not as large as we would like, but at least some people are showing up.

I am getting back to the musical and working on my book, OneTree Down. 2010 has got to be better than 2009, at least moving forward again, instead of stagnating.

Work Life Balance

I wrote the other day about having balance in the gym routine. Lots of people tend to work the muscles they feel are seen; guys work arms and chest, women abs and legs. But a very important part of the gym workout is making sure you have symmetry and balance in your appearance.

The same can be said of life. Some work hard for appearances of wealth and neglect other aspects of their lives. I am not saying that wealt is a bad thing. Far from it. Wealth makes many things possible. It also makes life more enjoyable. But if that is your main focus, and other parts of your life suffer, you are in a losing situation.


I have tried through the years to keep a balance and to keep things in perspective. I got a yin yang tattoo many many years ago (before the surge in popularity of that sort of thing, and the whole Asian influence explosion) That tattoo was placed to remind me to keep things even. In my mind it is the mental and the physical that needs balance. And then in those groups are the sub-categories.

Mental can be broken down into learning and growing mentally and into spiritualism. you can continue to break these down as you will. Spirituality can be religion or it can be communicating with nature, god, goddess, the universe, a tree, whatever you think is the right thing at the time. Mental growth can be school, a mentor, a book or surfing the web.

Physical can be broken into your living state (house, car, money, family) and into your physical well being, basically meaning your health. Health can be how your body is functioning as a unit of sustaining your brain, and how you are maintaining that state through physical activity, sustenance and such. I take sustenance one step further (and I think it is a needed step) that you are not only eating properly, whole food as close to nature as possible, but that you are also supplementing your diet with things it does not contain.

There is a lot that I have just written on in a short few paragraphs, but these are things that some people forget as they try to ‘make ends meet.’ There is so much more to life than that, and if you stay in a perpetual state of worry over making ends meet, you are holding yourself and those around you down to that state. I really have found that by focusing on positive aspects, even in the most negative situations, thing turn the corner. Without getting to deep into it, my life took a serious downturn about six months ago, and we could have decided to focus on the worst, but we didn’t and have come out of all of it stronger and in a better place, I think both physically and mentally speaking.

Don’t ever give up. Balance your life through doing the things you need to do to survive and also doing things that are going to take you to a higher place.

Life - Changing in an Instant

This morning I was filming some workout tips for another blog that I maintain. Interestingly enough (or perhaps ironically enough, as I don’t know how totally interested you will be) I managed to twist my back just a tiny bit and now I am bent over double in pain. Why was it ironic, you may ask. I was doing a piece on working out and talking about avoiding injury during a work out. Nice, huh?

The injury occurred before I began filming. I was moving the bench that I was going to be lying on for the lifting portion of the demonstration. Unbeknownst to me my son had a few dumb bells on the floor by the bench and when I went to move the bench there was an extra 25 pounds. An unknown obstacle and an unsuspecting force…and down I went. *groan*

Why do I share my pain? Not to gain sympathy, although that would be appreciated, but to say, we never know from one moment to the next what is going to hit us. So if you are putting things off until tomorrow, remember that tomorrow may not come, or it may find you in an entirely different state of being.
Quite a feather in her cap

Quite a feather in her cap

One of my favorite quotes from Janis Joplin is “Tomorrow never comes man. It’s all the same f*ing day” There was something in there about cats, too, but I’ll leave that to Janis. She was a person who embraced life and didn’t give a crap about what people thought. She did what she thought she ought to do, and if you didn’t like it, well, too bad.

She also had a lot of issues, but I’ll also leave that alone. The point is my back spasms, a temporary thing, could have just as easily been something different. Situations arise and some of them we have no control over, so you know, don’t put things off until tomorrow. It’s all the same day, and we need to take care of things now.

This is rambling a bit, and that I’ll admit, but if there is something you need to say or do, take care of it. Appreciate what you have and what you could have if you would just reach out and bridge that gap, hold out a hand to someone that you know and let them know you are there, and you care.

Appreciation and gratitude are two of the biggest pieces to the mindset of success.
My "Other" Blog

Laid Off - Heading to a New Day

Thursday I got laid off. This came as a total shock to me, although probably it shouldn’t have. I was told, don’t know if this is true or not, that I was just the first of a small group that was being let go. I was talking a vacation day (comp time) Friday, so I was first in line. Everyone who gets laid off, gets laid off on Fridays, or so I am told. Except me. So when is a three day weekend, not a three day weekend? When it’s the start of an extended lay off.

Not extended, because there is going to be no recall. Now my side efforts are building, but not making money yet. We are close to breakthrough on a number of projects, so I can hope that perhaps soon, I won’t need a traditional job at all. Time will tell.

The funny thing about the layoff is that I had joked with Deb about quitting and going to the unseminar in Texas with her. I said let’s live on the edge, I’ll just quit and go with you. I also had a dream that I was going to be laid off. I should trust my instincts.

I was already putting in applications prior to getting laid off, so perhaps I did know that it might be coming. I had been handed the job of safety manager, which I had emphatically told them I did not want. I told them that when I was hired. I told them that at my review. Then they gave that position to me, on top of the training job. Same pay, of course, as they said and others have said to me “You’re lucky to have a job.” Well, that’s done with now.

I don’t have sour grapes. I offered to do training for them as a consultant, and I think they are going to take me up on that. Of course it depends what they are going to pay me whether I do it or not, but the bridges aren’t burned. Walls turned sideways are bridges. Have you ever heard that saying? It’s a quote from Angela Davis. I am looking at this as a bridge for sure. A bridge to a life I’ll be more happy in.

It’s also said that when a door closes a window opens. I have always been a glass is half full kind of guy. How many more clichés can I throw in here?

If anyone knows of any training gigs, let me know. I can teach OSHA stuff, Forklifts, Cranes, Communications, MS Office. Most of those I have certificates to teach, with the exception of office, but that I have been using effectively for many years and can teach basics of it very easily. I am mostly looking for consultant type work. One time or repetitive gigs, and I am also open to a ‘real job.’

Life is good.

$4500 in dental bills?

In an article on CNN it was stated that 7 in 10 Americans think the health care system needs major restructuring. No shit. And I mean that as, no shit it needs restructuring.

I am employed, at least for the time being, and have to pay into the system for medical and dental insurance for me and my family. Any given trip can turn our whole financial status into a juggling act. Example, my youngest daughter had some issues and needed to get blood work. The doctor decided that, not me. So we take her to get blood work and then we get a bill for $400. Ouch, WTF? What am I paying for health insurance for, if not to cover things the doctor orders? To add insult to injury, the results were borderline, so they order another batch. You know the people ordering another round of tests aren’t paying for the tests.

I go to the dentist. Studies have shown that dental infections actually have huge impact on overall health. I personally know two people who were sickly, and had all their teeth removed, got dentures and started enjoying a vastly improved state of well being. So dental care is important. As if you didn’t already know that.

I go to the dentist and get an exam, and afterwords they take me into a back room where I meet with a financial consultant to figure out how to pay for around $4,500 worth of repairs and stuff. $4500 dollars? And my teeth aren’t in bad shape. What’s wrong with that picture? They offer multi-year financing packages. Mind you that $4500 isn’t for my family, it’s just for me.

I had a co-pay there plus an up-front fee, totally around $200. That was for my exam. Then they sent a bill for another $100. I did mention I have dental insurance, right? I pay for a premium plan, which covers almost nothing whatsoever.

The point is, the system is broken. I can’t really afford to go to the dentist and the extended doctor bills prevent any sort of savings, or drain any savings I may have had. The punch line is that I have health insurance. What the hell do all the people do who are unemployed, employed part time, disability or whatever do?

There is debate if we as a country need to change things. I see people holding signs at right wing rallys saying “keep your change.” Well, for 8 years the Republicans didn’t do a whole lot to address all this. Now the shit hits the fan as the new President tries to do something to take care of this. People say we can’t afford it, but we don’t have an option. We pay for healthcare through insurance premiums and taxes anyway, we need to define it, and make it so everyone can afford to get the care they need.

Here’s the link to the article, if you’re interested.