June 2016

I was inspired to write this song titled "Why do you do what you do?". I worked on my video house project (e.g. DVD labels) for the guy I've been doing this since almost the beginning of the year. On the 7th, I helped my renter with more of his college writing paper by editing it. I attended this community mentoring (Kinship) fundraiser information meeting, which I biked in hot steamy weather Thursday evening (9th). The following day, I did more biking as it was my Friday "off" from my ft-job. I went biking over 6+ miles or so with my pastor (Pat) despite my pedals breaking off mid-point of the ride. We then went to Don's Café for breakfast.

The 2nd weekend of the month (11th), I took Caio & Luciano (ESL students visiting from Brazil) to Glacial Lakes State Park, which I had fun kayaking-great upper body workout!..

I continued my bike-workout by riding to the local grocery store carrying 2 empty gallons and would fill it. Then rode back with one in each side of my handle bars. I was part of my local church worship team on Sunday (12th), which is always a faith building growing time for me.

On Tuesday (14th), I attended our annual "Defensive Driving" in-service, which is always a great life-application review (e.g. just take your time and not speed!). I worked more on my health-fitness blog (15th) as we didn't have any ESL classes. A "friend" on facebook mentioned about TMJ, so I decided to share my personal experience on how I deal with my TMJ.

I went to the cities for my monthly visit on the 17th, which I spent time with parents as my "fathers' day" weekend. I helped my dad (along with my younger brother) replaced a leaky toilet.

The Morris Kiwanis Talent Show was only 2 weeks this year due to lack of participants, so I would take pictures and videos of the last 2 Thursdays of the month. It was a great time to get-together with people in the community and hangout with Caio & Luciano-introducing them to some friends that were present.

The last weekend of the month, I rode with 4 of my ESL students to Benson's outdoor water park, which we had a great time. We ended up going to DQ for a cool treat and then went back to Morris to this "Hog Roast Fundraiser" for Options for Women...

The next day, I took the guys from Brazil to the annual "Vikingland Band Festival Parade" competition in downtown Alexandria. It was the biggest and longest for this annual event, but we stayed till the end and met this cool guy that took our picture..

During work, my co-worker asked for a prayer request for this kid that was missing from her family's town in South Dakota. We would find out later the kid was found..praise the Lord!

Current Bike Challenge Stats as of 7.24.16...

6,002 (out of 42K in the Nation) National Rank (this Challenge) 1,667 Points (this Challenge) 286.9 Miles (This Challenge) Points Impact 25%Recreation 75%Transportation 2.5 miles This week 1 Active day this week

My first theatrical experience (Aladdin the Musical at the Park)

It's the morning (Sunday, September 13th 2015) after our last of two nightly theatrical performances. I wanted to share my thoughts of my first experience in theatre while it's fresh in my memory. First, I can say I can cross this off my checklist of my "bucket list" in things I always wanted to do in my life. I was too shy growing-up, but got more "social" during my college years due to many factors (e.g. small college campus community and mostly because of my new growing "faith" (see personal testimony).

I decided to audition for this particular performance because I'm a huge fan of musicals overall. I love singing..."I try". Since growing-up, I somehow just love the movie musical ("Sound of Music"-Music: Karaoke-"Edelweiss"). If anyone that reads this and knows of any auditions for this, please let me know :)! In fact, it's coming "locally" (St. Paul's Ordway Theatre this winter-Christmas season). I first heard about these auditions from the local paper (Morris Sun Tribune (Community invited to join Plays in the Park By Kim Ukura on Jul 18, 2015 at 5:13 a.m.) , which I regularly read online almost nightly to read "whats happening" in my local community. I got very excited and clicked on a link on "Plays in the Park". I immediately started practicing the lines of Aladdin's song "One Jump". I thought after competing in the Kiwanis Talent Show the month prior (June), I felt confident to do this. However, my original intention in auditioning for Aladdin was to get a "minor" role with this being my first theatrical experience. When I auditioned the second of two days on Friday (August 7th 2015), I didn't know what to expect. It was my first auditioning experience. They asked me to sing one of the character's songs. I decided to choose Aladdin's "I Can Show You the World" since I've done this song many times. I even told them I know it by heart, so I didn't even to bother to use the song lyric sheet. However, I would realize I really didn't know the lines as I was "messing-up" mid-way of the song. I felt very bad and they told me that was it for auditioning. I felt really bad as I wish I could've shown more. However, they did ask me to fill out an application, which I shared my "resume" of musical performance experiences (e.g. playing the trumpet back at middle school, doing some video recording skits for work (e.g. training videos), etc..) . I wrote down about my participating in the month prior "Kiwanis Talent Show" when I performed "Somewhere Out There" (also a Disney song).

The next day, I checked my email to see if I passed the auditions. I would find out later in the evening and I got a part and was very excited. I kept it a secret from family and friends until weeks later when the topic came up. Our first practice started immediately since the first performance will be a little over a month. We started on Monday (August 10th), which was somewhat an ice breaker and wasn't intense. We had to read the lines of our characters together and got to know each other briefly. However, the number of lines for Jafar was a little overwhelming. It was more than I thought I could handle. I even pondered about quitting because I was thinking this was too much for me. At the time, we didn't have anyone to play Aladdin, so I decided to stay. In fact, I looked around, and I was like the only guy there for the major roles. I decided to stick with it and help out. I believe 2-3 practices later, we found our Aladdin (David), which I even asked Joe earlier if I should advertise around for this missing role. I even emailed and texted a couple of guy friends. Also, I placed a post on one of our facebook groups (Community Needs) . Then the director (Joe) gave us our schedule of rehearsals. I was able to make to most of them except two due to scheduling conflicts. I really needed as much practice as I can, so I decided to skip one "schedule conflict" (annual A.B.E. Consortium "training" meeting). I'm glad I took voice lessons earlier this summer because it helped sustain my voice. I remember the first week of rehearsals, I left early to be part of my local church worship practice. I started to lose my voice this early, so I did a lot of voice exercises my voice lesson teacher (Kurtis) taught me. Also, the necessary "natural remedy" tips (e.g. moisten your throat frequently). On August 26th (Wednesday), I was asked to drive the work bus to Chanhassen Dinner Theatre for our annual trip. I asked my boss if I can have someone work for me because we had rehearsals for the whole of Act 1, which I needed as much practice as I can. Unfortunately, there were no co-workers that could. I wasn't totally disappointed because I was somewhat anxious to see Mary Poppins, which I looooove musicals! I'm glad I was able to go since it gave me some inspiration and ideas to go about doing my theatrical performance with Aladdin!.

During the time of our practices, I decided to do a parody of "I Can Show You the World" from my character's (Jafar) perspective. Here is what I came-up with => Music: Parody-“Creepy Old Cave” (originally from “I Can Show You the World” from Aladdin) by Jafar. Also, I took sometime to reflect on my character and how all of us can be a "Jafar" in life-> Disney Character: Jafar-"Why M-E?"

Our last week of rehearsals were moved from indoors (St. Mary's) to outdoors at the actual performance site..

East Side Park

Related:

Plays in the Park presents Disney's Aladdin from morrissuntribune.com

It was somewhat a challenging transition, but it was good to have preparation on the actual site of our performance. During our practice outside, after repeatedly rehearsing the scene where I sing and tease "Prince Ali" being merely "Aladdin". I started to feel sorry for Aladdin while singing. It was one of those moments where I just got out of character. It was one of those interesting acting experiences. On Wednesday (September 9th 2015), our director (Joe) shared about how the local paper will be coming and that we might need to bring sharpies to sign autographs. One of the kids from the ensemble team replied softly to me, "Wow, wee are going to be famous!". I then thought to myself, "I don't want to be famous, I want Jesus to be famous" (I thought of this song rancesca Battistelli - He Knows My Name (Official Audio)) . I responded softly back..."yeah..like Hollywood", but wasn't too excited saying it. During the performances, I would pray-"Lord, help me do well, so that I glorify you!". I want to use this opportunity in this blog to thank my Creator for giving me these "creative gifts, talents, and skills to do what I was able to do during and after these performances.

The day of the performance, I would create a blog to record my list of Theatrical Performance Tips? for future reference and help others that might go through similar challenges in preparation for a similar or bigger performance. When I got to the park an hour before our performance, one of the kids from the ensemble gave me his autograph after I gave him mine (signed "Jafar...keep shining")

My biggest tip would be getting yourself spiritually prepared. I would meditate on a Bible verse (Psalm 121) the morning before my first performance, which would help me during the performance. I somehow felt "down", so I remembered this particular verse and prayed. I asked God to give me strength to finish this show. Despite missing some lines (one obvious one in the last scene if you watch the video below :( ), I thank God for helping me get through this first one.

Here is a pic from a scene from our 1st evening show..

Plays in the Park: Aladdin the Musical-1st (Sept 11th 15) Performance Pt 1of2

Plays in the Park: Aladdin the Musical-1st (Sept 11th 15) Performance Pt 1of2 from Sal Photo Biz on Vimeo.

In the second show (Saturday, September 12th 2015), I continued more of my preparation tips. While doing some errands Saturday afternoon, a couple of young teenage boys shouted "great job last night" while biking back home from Thrifty White to develop pictures. One thing I did differently was standing up while practicing my lines earlier and later in the day. I found this tip through a google search too. I then wrote down the lines I missed during the 1st show, so I can get it really on my head. Then I did some meditation (after biking -a pedestrian shouted "great show last night" on my way back home-to the local fitness center to wake me up after a power nap) by listening to some worship song (from Real Ministries last Saturday evening) while putting on my character outfit. I was still a little nervous during our 2nd performance. Another additional activity that helped me was just praying for my fellow cast members when they were performing. Even during the middle of one of my performances between lines, I started praying blessings for the audience in attendance. This somehow helped me get through the nervousness. All this made the 2nd show a lot better. I missed one line and didn't say of my last lines clearly, but thankful I finished! We ended the last night by having a Cast get-together at Pizza Ranch, which we stayed till 10:20ish that evening.

Overall, it has been a great 5+ weeks getting to know some of my fellow cast members and it was fun overall. It was a lot of work memorizing lines, our dance routines, etc... It was definitely a great experience and willing to do this again..hoping for another fun musical!

Good News Theatre
https://www.facebook.com/groups/676072462404186/

more.. http://liberalarts.goodnewseverybody.com/performingarts.html

June 2015

I started the month doing more auto body work (putting primer paint) , which I would work on it for the first 2 days. On Wednesday (3rd), my workplace took some clients to Benson for our annual movie outing. I never heard of the movie, but it was great. I ended up “searching” it online and found out the movie didn't do as well in the “big screens”. I personally thought it was such a good movie, I even made a blog (Movie: Musical-What was Your Favorite Song or Scene in "Strange Magic"? creativemusicartsy.wordpress.com) to remember the songs (soundtrack list) and twittered it.

It was the first of four of the weekly “Morris Kiwanis Talent Show” on Thursday (4th). I went to watch the remaining of the 6 performances after my local church “worship team” practice. I'm not playing our men' summer softball team again this year for the 2nd year in a row due to “physical injury”. My right arm is “healing” after arm wrestling with a “friend” that made an illegal move (stood up and used both arms to “try” to put down my arm, which made a “tearing” noise :( ). However, I wrote down on (Friday 5th) that I was able to curl 25 lbs, which is the 1st time to doing any type of this arm exercise since prior to my injury.

On Saturday (6th), I made my every other month trip to St. Cloud to pick-up a “friend” to visit our “friend” in Moose Lake. Unfortunately, it had to be canceled, which I wouldn't know till the “last minute” when I got to my “friend's” house and he told me he thought he contacted me by phone that he wasn't feeling good (e.g. stroke recovery). I took advantage of my time in St. Cloud by visiting my favorite eatery (N.Y. Gyro). I then went to Menards to pick-up more landscaping material.

I continued my on-going driveway project (rubber pavers) on Monday (8th). I'm buying a bunch a little at a time as I was hoping the price will go down, which it has (almost $1-2 cheaper now). On Thursday (11th) after picking-up the Morris Talent Show signs , I went to Willies and didn't realize I lost my wallet until a guy (Kermit, who told me he has seen me around when he used to drive the Morris Transit) came to my front door to drop it off. I was very surprised and was very thankful (Praise God)!. May God bless him :). He told me he found it in the parking lot of the grocery store. This is the 2nd time that a guy in Morris found my wallet since I've lived here, which shows the blessings of living in a small town like this one :)

On the 12th, I went home (St. Paul) for my monthly weekend trip, which is the first of my “Friday-off” 3-day weekend. My parents took me to their favorite restaurant (Cambodian) and then I went biking around Battle Creek Park. The next day, on our (mom and I) way to downtown St. Paul, a car was driving in the wrong lane (our turn lane) and nearly had a “head-on” collision. Thank God, that drive swerve backed to his own lane...thank God! I did my regular outing with my mom to the Asian grocery store (Dragon Star) and while driving, I saw a U.S. Postal Service “mailman” and I drove to catch-up with him and handed him my postcard I was going to drive further away to a postal office. Talking about..God's timing, huh?! :) After going to the St. Paul Cathedral with parents, I went bike riding again in the evening before sun set. I then did my longest bike ride since this local-national competition the next day (Sunday 14th). First, I went around the path by the pet park at Battle Creek Park before church and then to Battle Creek Mountain Bike Trail - Mounds Park after wards. I was hoping to go all the way to downtown, but the path was detoured due to a bridge construction on Warner Road.

On Monday (15th), I released another parody on youtube called "Rip It" (“Push It” by Salt N' Pepa). I had Mohr plumbing come to my house (Tuesday 16th of June) to clean my sewer pipe and use a camera to see the condition of it too. I had a "good" report, which made me decide to finish my landscape project after hints for me to finish it now instead of next year. This was big savings for me too! I had a funny incident at work too when I was “trying” to help a client by bringing her “safety belt”. I asked her if I can help her put it on, but she replied -”I'm going to have a staff help me” as she walked away ;).

On my Friday (19th) off, I also took advantage of my day off by working on my kitchen siding and driveway paving project. The following day, I went with "family friend" to visit his son at Moose Lake. It was supposed to be our last visit in this every other month long drive, so we were happy this could be the last. As I write this, the certainty of his situation is not fully known yet..please keep praying! We then stopped at Molitor's Quarry to watch the Minnesota Twins game and had my favorite sweet potato fries..yumm!

I continued on Sunday (21st) adding to my bike challenge by going 5.4 miles around the local (Morris) bike trails. Then I finished my rubber siding project in my kitchen. The next day, I went to the driving range with a friend (Micah), which I would have probably my best golf driving in terms of hitting it far and close to the flag number of times (w/ the help of the wind) ;)..

I practiced more of my lines for the up-coming performance (Kiwanis Talent Show) throughout the week as a "last minute" decision to enter in the local competition. I wanted to sing another song (Alladin's "I Can Show You the World"), but my duet partner didn't know this song. She suggested this other song, which was Disney also. I told her I'll do it depending how well I can memorize it. I decided to go all out on Tuesday (23rd). Wished we did this during the "adult competitive" round last week, but the number of participants (#14) made it more fun and meaningful (wider and larger audience) on Thursday, June 25th 2015...

On Friday (26th), I met with my local pastor at his house as he wanted to show me the newest bathroom project. We were about to go biking to Starbuck, but was postponed due to this project. While I was there, I saw a song bird (Cardinal)! I would bike 6 miles on Friday (26th) despite the postponement of our bike ride to Starbuck. I did more of the rubber paver project (2 rows at a time after a sale of $2.99). The following day, I decided to finish connecting the drain pipes in front of my house after waiting since last fall. It felt good to finish filling the hole with dirt.

I would continue the landscaping project for the next week as I did little by little. I was able to put mulch that I stored from last fall on top finally on Tuesday (30th). Praise the Lord..thank you for giving me the strength to finish!