Monday, November 06, 2006
It’s a bit past seven in the morning. I’m feeling both an adrenalin rush and a desperate need to crash. I arrived home late last night following a two-day road trip talking to groups in the Camden-Philly suburbs only to be up at 5:30 this morning for a 6:00 radio interview with a Denver station. Now, with the interview over, I’m looking forward to a bit of a beauty sleep and then a noon interview with a Washington DC station.
Yesterday, believe it or not, I watched alpacas being auctioned. I had a day to kill between my two talks. One of the facilitators from the Camden-area group, Karen, drove me to her farm in southern Jersey. Karen is a wonderful host, and we bond instantly. We sit up with her husband Doug, dipping chips into delicious homemade salsa made from produce fresh off the farm. Next morning I experience the therapeutic joy of waking up to a splendid and restful pastoral vista rather than my customary view of the parking lot to my apartment complex.
A farm breakfast (real eggs!), then it’s off to a place called Cow Town, where farmers and locals congregate to buy and sell and socialize. Did you realize that hay is not just hay? Karen explains to me there are more varieties than Heinz. I can see how a poor ignorant city boy like me can easily be conned into buying the overpriced gourmet stuff.
We enter a shed and proceed along a raised catwalk and arrive just in time to see a guy below in a cowboy hat auctioning three alpacas. The animals are sort of a cross between a small camel and a feather duster. Two or three handlers with plastic paddles herd the sold livestock down a chute. The auctioneer, incidentally, talks just like Porky Pig.
This is definitely so cool.
What am I doing here? A week before I was in Chicago receiving master classes in how to speak in public. Tom Wootton, author of “The Bipolar Advantage,” had invited me to join him on three speaking engagements. First night out I’m basically an author reading from a script. Next day Tom sits me down and works with me. Tom had a very successful career on the corporate speaking circuit, and now he is applying these skills to delivering very innovative and powerful bipolar workshops. He is a master. He patiently works with me on my presentation. We tear my talk apart and retool it and practice speaker fundamentals. His wife Ellen joins us, and I do several dry runs before them, constantly tweaking the talk as we go along.
Next night, I venture out into the Chicago dark without my notes. I know I’m going to screw up, and sure enough, two minutes into the talk it happens – I forget what I am going to say next. I have a microsecond to decide whether I’m going to look like a deer caught in the headlights or go for divine intervention.
Divine intervention is the way to go. Amazingly, I relax, confess what’s going on, and turn it into a humorous story. Now my audience is with me. I proceed to the next part of the talk I remember, and make it through the remaining half-hour with only a few minor screw-ups.
Yesterday, believe it or not, I watched alpacas being auctioned. I had a day to kill between my two talks. One of the facilitators from the Camden-area group, Karen, drove me to her farm in southern Jersey. Karen is a wonderful host, and we bond instantly. We sit up with her husband Doug, dipping chips into delicious homemade salsa made from produce fresh off the farm. Next morning I experience the therapeutic joy of waking up to a splendid and restful pastoral vista rather than my customary view of the parking lot to my apartment complex.
A farm breakfast (real eggs!), then it’s off to a place called Cow Town, where farmers and locals congregate to buy and sell and socialize. Did you realize that hay is not just hay? Karen explains to me there are more varieties than Heinz. I can see how a poor ignorant city boy like me can easily be conned into buying the overpriced gourmet stuff.
We enter a shed and proceed along a raised catwalk and arrive just in time to see a guy below in a cowboy hat auctioning three alpacas. The animals are sort of a cross between a small camel and a feather duster. Two or three handlers with plastic paddles herd the sold livestock down a chute. The auctioneer, incidentally, talks just like Porky Pig.
This is definitely so cool.
What am I doing here? A week before I was in Chicago receiving master classes in how to speak in public. Tom Wootton, author of “The Bipolar Advantage,” had invited me to join him on three speaking engagements. First night out I’m basically an author reading from a script. Next day Tom sits me down and works with me. Tom had a very successful career on the corporate speaking circuit, and now he is applying these skills to delivering very innovative and powerful bipolar workshops. He is a master. He patiently works with me on my presentation. We tear my talk apart and retool it and practice speaker fundamentals. His wife Ellen joins us, and I do several dry runs before them, constantly tweaking the talk as we go along.
Next night, I venture out into the Chicago dark without my notes. I know I’m going to screw up, and sure enough, two minutes into the talk it happens – I forget what I am going to say next. I have a microsecond to decide whether I’m going to look like a deer caught in the headlights or go for divine intervention.
Divine intervention is the way to go. Amazingly, I relax, confess what’s going on, and turn it into a humorous story. Now my audience is with me. I proceed to the next part of the talk I remember, and make it through the remaining half-hour with only a few minor screw-ups.
