"Lessons in Productivity from Ralph Waldo Emerson"

Source: ZenHabits
Post: "Lessons in Productivity from Ralph Waldo Emerson"

I am nowhere close to where I want to be in terms of productivity. I never want to feel satisfied. Is there anything worse than apathy and complacency?

"Emerson eliminated distractions by limiting the amount of books he read, streamlining “lower duties” like household chores, and avoiding relationships with people whose nervous temperaments upset his focus. While today there are many more distractions than in Emerson’s day, we too can reduce our information consumption. Put Haiku Productivity in practice by limiting the amount of stuff you own, RSS feeds you read, and times you check email. By doing so, you’ll create an environment"...

and

“Ah!” said a brave painter to me, thinking on these things, “if a man has failed, you will find he has dreamed instead of working. There is no way to success in our art, but to take off your coat, grind paint, and work like a digger on the railroad, all day and every day--RW Emerson” ... (keep reading)

Today's Related RSS fodder: "The Howard Roark of Engineering"
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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
Stagekid

Video Vault: WineLibrary TV

I'm a huge fan of Gary Vaynerchuk (hat tip to my brother). Expect his new videos to pop up here every once in awhile:

"With a wealth of knowledge and an entrepreneurial spirit, Gary spent every weekend of his college years at his parents’ store, rebranding the family business as Wine Library and establishing himself as a respected expert. As the store’s only wine buyer, he sampled every wine that entered the store. Customers depended on Gary for his advice and within a five year time period, Wine Library grew from a $4 million dollar business to a $45 million business:"




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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
Stagekid

An Ode to Declarations

What I love about blogging is that you can make declarations (e.g. my last post) and change your mind the next day.

I realized last night there was no way to put restrictions on the content of this blog. My last post therefore, is more of a rant. The root: I need to write more: I need to blog more. I've always had an appreciation--a passion--for film, literature, and theatre/acting; it's not surprising that I came to the conclusion yesterday that these topics needed more of my attention. Attention they will get, but to confine my efforts to express, is the wrong decision--at least for the purposes of this blog.

Thanks for keeping up :)

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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
Stagekid

Blogging Evolution

It's time to (at least temporarily) evolve the blog. While I enjoy posting on anything that interests me (technology, politics, social networking, etc.) the noise is beginning to distract:

Politics: It's been exciting for me, this past year, to follow the presidential campaign. I had no idea how hungry I was for politics: it's been life-changing, in a sense, to take a stance on issues that will effect not only my life, but my kids' lives as well. Consider me hooked (especially during the next eight years of the Obama presidency).

Technology: Web 2.0 is the immediate future. There will be no escaping it and for those who think it won't affect their lives, they're wrong. Embrace the potential, people.

Contributing to online political and web 2.0 discussions will continue in a major way (Politico, FriendFeed, Twitter, other blogs, etc.), but for the purpose of this blog, it is time to get back to, and focus on, what I am truly passionate about: film, literature, and theatre.

Film: With the introduction of Apple's iTouch, I am watching more movies and documentaries than I ever could have imagined. I am finally getting to that usually unattainable"Oh, thanks for recommendation: I will add it to my must-see" list. I want a place to track and comment on what I watch. Working at the University of Washington, I have free access to an unlimited amount of movies: I grab the documentary or film I want, take it home, iTouch it...all for free. I am finally able to watch all those PBS documentaries: building the Brooklyn Bridge; biographies of FDR and Eugene O'Neill; the birth of NYC's subway system; the history of Broadway. AFI's top films of all time--bring em on: from Chaplin to Brando; from It Could Happen One Night to Schindler's List. Finally I can watch those films that seemed to sneak in and out of the box office without my even realizing they were there: from A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints to Fast Food Nation.

Literature: I won't even get into what will happen when I finally get the yet-to-be released, v.2 Amazon Kindle, but books for me have always been my escape. The written word is unrivaled in terms of expression and emotion. Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms or The Sun Also Rises, Graham Greene's Heart of the Matter, Ondaatje's The English Patient, Chabon's Kavalier and Clay--these are perfect stories and perfected prose; they, and many others, are beautifully written. This blog will be where I capture the emotion--the confusion--I feel when confronted with the story or character I come across.

Theatre: The stage is where our life--our culture--is at its best. The script, the preparation, the story, the actor, the stage: there is nothing more powerful in terms of emotion and in terms of the human condition. My credits are one (Our Town: George Gibbs)--but those three months of complete transformation changed the way I look at life. The final curtain closed, the production had ended--but a passion for the stage had just begun. I may never get back onto that stage, but I will certainly find my way back to the theatre. This blog will chronicle that journey.

I gave myself 60 seconds to write a personal tagline of what this blog will now represent within the online space:

"Film, literature, and theatre: just another triple-treat connoisseur (and often times fanatic) of skilled acting, depth in prose, and anything theatre."

It might stick.

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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
Stagekid

Seesmic Unboxing: Camping Recap

Seesmic- Join the Video Conversation:



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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
StageKid

Casting Call: Right Place Needed

Source: The Next Stage-A Magazine About Talking About New Theatre
Post: "Your City and You: When Ambitions Collide"

One of the better blog posts I've read in awhile (accompanied by Graham's piece)--The Next Stage poses a few questions about the city you live in and the influences it has on an artists' perspectives and motivations.

Tangent of Randomness: Could it be that purpose and place are the leading influences in our stories--at least for those smart enough to embrace the drama they invoke? To understand why and where (or at the very least, to try) may lead to understanding the script better. Are you in the right setting for your story? If not, why are you not changing your setting instead of carelessly trying to change your self to fit a false setting? Where you wake up and go to--where you fill the minutes--matters. Each place is a different character, so might it be important to cast for the part a bit more effectively?
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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
Stagekid

Morning Coffee: Interview with Sam Shepard

Source: New York Magazine
Article: "How the West Was Lost" an interview with Sam Shepard

After reading Shepard's Buried Child. I have to agree with the masses that he's one of the best artists we have today: actor and writer. I came across this article today (RSS source) and was particularly interested (but certainly not surprised) with the comparisons to Beckett:

"It turns out there’s a real craft to building a dead horse you can believably kick around onstage. Sam Shepard, who recently had to bury his own horse, made it clear what he was looking for in the stage directions for his new one-man, one-horse play, Kicking a Dead Horse, which begins previews at the Public June 25 and stars Stephen Rea. “The dead horse should be as realistic as possible,” he writes, “with no attempt to stylize or cartoon it in any way. In fact, it should actually be a dead horse.” (full article)
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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
StageKid

Photo Vault: First Day of Summer 2008

Took a cruise, today, around Seattle for Lynn and Steve's wedding (friends of Mil):



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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
StageKid

Video Vault: CBS News Correspondent on the John Stewart Show

Source: lessons in brevity
Post: CBS News Correspondent: "I'd blow my brains out"

Recap:



Full episode of this John Stewart Show

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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
StageKid

AFI Announces Top 10 Films in 10 Classic Genres

Source: American Film Institute (AFI)
Post: 10 Top 10

Films from the 10 lists I plan on seeing this summer:

• City Lights
• It Happened One Night
• Roman Holiday
• Philadelphia Story
• Laurence of Arabia
• The Hustler
• Bonnie and Clyde
• Kramer and Kramer
• Ben-Hur
• Schindler's List
• Spartacus

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A frothy Guinness to you for stopping by and another for coming back,
StageKid