I can’t say enough great things about Ignite Lansing 3.0. It was a spectacular event that blew away my highest expectations. The crew was amazing. The venue was amazing. Everything was, at the risk of being repetitive, amazing.

I arrived on scene at 6:00 PM as the speakers were told to do, the interior of the Knapp’s Building was a buzzing hive of activity. Lights. Lasers (yes, laser). Cameras. They were all alive.

I had my pre-show briefing with show runners (Nick, Ben), the MC and the stage manager, Melissa. I was happy to see I could use a hand held mic, as I wanted to be mobile during my speech.

Around 7:00, the floodgates opened and attendees started arriving. It was energetic chaos (I mean that in a good way). Dozens filled the line for the Cravings Popcorn bar (my LansingNext co-host Julielyn helped as a volunteer).

The evening was pretty much a blur for me until I had my cue to head for the stage around 9:00 PM. I was in Group C, the last of the three groups of presenters. The crowd had thinned a bit by this point, but it was still very much a packed house.

I was pumped, primed and ready.

I took the stage and killed. My choice to go for the silly, crazy presentation worked. Had a lot of great crowd reactions (although my spork joke at the open didn’t seem to go over that well). I’m glad I decided to wear an eye-patch and to do a “character voice,” the crowd ate it up.

Five minutes later, it was all over. I received scores of compliments afterward, both in person and online.

Better still, I took First Place for my group. Bam.

I think I had third place overall. I don’t know when the video will be on YouTube, but I will post that asap once it becomes available.

Thanks to everyone at Ignite Lansing for putting on a great event!

This scene from ERNEST SAVES CHRISTMAS inspired my presentation a bit.

I am one of the presenters at tonight’s Ignite Lansing 3.0 at the Knapp’s Building in downtown Lansing.

For those unfamiliar, the Ignite events are held around the world and the idea is you get people together and share ideas in five minutes.

That’s right, five minutes.

Five minutes, 22 slides, 15 seconds a slide. That’s a lot of information to cram into such a brief amount of time.

And of course, being the crazy person I am, I signed up to be a presenter. Visitors to the Ignite Lansing website voted on which presentations they wanted to see. I was fortunate enough to be chosen.

I am equal parts nervous and excited about this opportunity. I’ll be speaking in front of a group of hundreds in the building, as well as being streamed online. Afterward, the presentation will be archived for all to see on YouTube. The presentations can be watched at video.ignitelansing.com (I go on at 9:15 PM EST).

So yes, I’ll be speaking in front of a crowd nearing 600, not to mention many more watching online. This is quite a bit of pressure, but I’m up to it.

My presentation is called How to Survive Writing a Novel.

Now, I do not plan for this to be a five minute promotion of the Magic of Eyri, I am not that shameless of a self-promoter. I do list myself as the author of it on my title slide, but I felt it was necessary to show the audience that I actually wrote a novel.

I am taking a very funny, zany approach to this and I don’t want to give too much away ahead of time. Although I have been dropping hints here and there, especially on this week’s episode of LansingNext.

My goal is not to be boring. I am treating this as more of a performance piece than a presentation, if that makes sense. I’ll be digging into my improv comedy toolbox a bit, and just having fun.

If I can share information and entertain at the same time, awesome.

I shall post a link to the YouTube video once it is online. Wish me luck!

Hey Kids, here is this week’s episode of LansingNext.

If you aren’t in know, it is a weekly talk show I do with Julielyn Gibbons. It streams each Wednesday at 11:00 am (EST) at TalkLansing.net.

To Listen: click on the gray play button below.

 

 LansingNext 3-3-10 [59:59m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

To Download the MP3: Right Click on the Download link, choose Save Target As or Save Link As from the menu and then choose where to save the .MP3 on your hard drive.

Here’s a quick breakdown of each of the segments.

Segment 1
-Downloads, fans, feedback.
-Olympics and Ryan Miller, pride of East Lansing.
-Google fiber follow-up.
-Knock out JL as Mayor of Cravings Popcorn by March 28th and win popcorn for a year.
-JL and pay it forward (no, not the movie).

Segment 2
-We talk to Kelly Steffen about Eve of Ignition, Spotlight Campus and the Hatch.

Segment 3
-We talk to Carla McWherter about Lansing Give Camp.
-Carla and JL talk about how much they adore Daniel’s hair.

Segment 4

-Ignite Lansing 3.0
-Daniel presenting at Ignite.
-The lolrus. Seriously. Kthxbai.

Segment 5
-We Rick Roll our listeners (per another’s request).
-”What’s on Your iPod?”
-Shout outs.
-MI Entertainment Oscar Party this Sunday at Lansing Mall Cinema.

2010 is the year I’m trying different things and kinda going wherever life leads me. With that in mind, I agreed to sign up for the Lansing Race for the Cure 5K run in April.

There is another reason I opted to do this: my mom is a 20-year breast cancer survivor.

Both my mom and my sister have been very involved in the Detroit Race for the Cure for years. I’ve helped out here and there, such as (in)famously offering to be stage security for former-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick a few years ago.

A group of friends here in Lansing started chatting about the Race via Twitter a few weeks ago, and I decided “oh, why not?” Thus, Team Thanks for the Mammaries was born (if you’re in Lansing and wish to join, search for the #LoveLansing “company” name on the race website).

It hit me last week that I actually needed to train for this thing.

I am not a runner. We tend not to get along. But, some members of my team pointed me to the Couch to 5K training program and sang its praises. After looking over the schedule/routine, I decided “hey, I can do this.”

While studying the routine, I quickly realized why I never had much luck running in the past–I was doing too much, too soon. I liked that this routine has you starting out with a “jog for 60 seconds, walk for 90 seconds” plan.

Thinking back on the past times I’ve tried jogging I remembered that I did nothing like this at all–I just ran and ran for the whole time, without working up to anything.

No wonder I felt like I died each time doing.

Yesterday was my first training run and it was, as the they say in Italian,”non ce’ male.”

Yes, it was cold and I hated having to wait for traffic lights, but darn it, I survived. Better still, I didn’t feel sick afterward.

The only problem, training for running in winter is going to be a challenge (read: snow and/or ice) around here, but I’ll make due.

I opted for the fancy race registration where they give you a chip (not potato) to track your time. So, I guess I am ‘competing.’

Yikes. Wish me luck.

Here it is kids, the first episode of LansingNext — the Internet talk show I co-host with Julielyn Gibbons for TalkLansing.net. I talked about the show in a bit more detail in a previous post.

To Listen: click on the gray play button below.

 

 LansingNext 2-17-10 [59:43m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

To Download the MP3: Right Click on the Download link, choose Save Target As or Save Link As from the menu and then choose where to save the .MP3 on your hard drive.

We talk about Smoke Free bars/restaurants in Lansing, urban chicken farming and Foursquare. We also talked about Ignite Lansing 3.0 with Nick Kwiatkowski and Lansing’s global appeal with Suban Nur-Cooley.

Keep in mind this is very much a work in progress, so things are a bit rough around the edges. I also apologize in advance for all my horrible jokes.

Heads up, there are commercials with our sponsors (and PSAs) and, full disclosure, Julielyn and I do get a cut of that money.

Lastly, unlike the Magic of Eyri Podcast, I was only the “talent” for this show–I didn’t do any of the engineering or production duties. I gotta say, it was nice not to have to worry about any of that for a change.

Make sure to become a fan of the show on Facebook.

Today at 11 AM, the first episode of LansingNext will be online.

LansingNext is an Internet talk show I am doing with my friend Julielyn Gibbons for the brand new TalkLansing.net

TalkLansing was started by a few local radio personalities as a way to go after the “iPhone Generation.” All of the shows will be streamed online (and available for download eventually).

I was honored when Julielyn approached me to co-host the show with her and I’m excited about this unique opportunity. Our slogan is:

A weekly Internet talk show focusing on the people, issues and events affecting Lansing’s next generation.

That gives us a bit of wiggle room when it comes to topics, and we’re already having a lot of fun. Julielyn and I are quickly developing a great on-air (…on-net?) dynamic, with me already falling into the comic relief role (which is fine by me).

The shows are pre-recorded (as I can’t do a live show on a Wednesday morning) and while the first one was a bit rough around the edges, we are getting the hang of things at a blazing speed.  Parts of the first show took me back to my college radio days when I actually had a co-host.

We also have a Facebook fan page.

And speaking of such things, I made one for myself a couple days ago. More on that later, as I plan to blog about it.

So tune (click?) in to TalkLansing.net today at 11 AM to give us a listen. Feedback appreciated, as this is very much a work in progress. Once I get an .MP3 of the episode, I’ll see about having it available to download from one of my sites.

Our first episode will feature a pair of guests and we’ll also talk about Foursquare, the iPad and smoke-free bars around town.