Wasp Busters!

I wish I still had my Ghostbusters costume with me up here in Blue Ridge to use as we battle the wasps and flies that are invading our rented cabin. Due to the height of the loft windows I had to create a long vacuum pole to help me reach the ones that weren't in the lower windows. Luckily the owners added a pole for reaching and I rubberbanded the vacuum hose to it. The inside of the vacuum tank is now filled with wasps and flies and all we have to do now is figure out how to dispose of them without getting stung!

The 100 Project

Starting this morning I am working through a self assigned project to get myself in balance and better my physical, mental and spiritual health.

I am calling it the 100 project based on the name of the hundred pushups website and the number of days that I am giving myself to get in a balanced place mentally, physically and spiritually before I re-open my one man show MixTape in August.

The following is a breakdown of what I am doing and then how it has affected my life so far...

Physical:

• Eating better - Adding more fruits and vegetables. Drastically reducing soft drinks and sweets. Source: http://www.mypyramid.gov/


• Drinking more water - min 1/2 Gallon. Max 1 Gallon. Source: http://stronglifts.com/how-much-water-should-you-drink-daily/


• Core Strength - Working myself up to 100 pushups, and 200 situps and squats. Source: http://hundredpushups.com, http://www.twohundredsitups.com/, http://www.twohundredsquats.com/


• Cardio - Adding jump rope, bicycle and dance.

Mental

• Eliminating our cable television.


• Reading more.


• Playing board games at home.

Spiritual

• A Reading program of the bible split into days of the week and a cool category for each day. Source: http://www.bible-reading.com


• Going to church on Sundays and small group on Wednesdays. Source: http://freedomlive.net


• Writing out my prayers to help stay mentally focused (I tend to lose focus during prayer. I will have an idea and end up focusing on the new idea v.s. praying.)

This morning I woke up half an hour earlier than normal, went down to the living room, drank a large glass of water and proceeded to do today's breakdown of situps, pushups and squats. It worked out to be a total of 25 pushups, 28 situps and 33 squats. During the rests in between sets that are required I straightened up the livingroom. I then went back up to the bedroom at the time I would normally be getting up and headed to the shower. Because I was now awake from the workout I found I spent half the time in the shower I normally do. This is good for the environment and good for our wallet! I then got dressed, had time to eat at home instead of the office and drank 1/4 the amount of oj I usually drink and drank water for the remainder with my oatmeal.

The idea of all of this is to make choices that will get me more balanced while at the same time giving me the energy I need to get through my long days of Day Job + Teaching nights at jackpie.

I am currently at 185 lbs. Let's see where all of this takes me!

Sad News...

To all of our Friends and Family,
Mary and I wanted to let you all know that sadly, we lost our little baby girl last night due to an unforseeable and likewise unpreventable issue with her cervix. We are still at the hospital but will be going home today. We are both making it through and though we are grieving, our faith is seeing us through this hard time.

Her name was Sarah Katherine. We named her that just Tuesday in fact when we did the ultrasound that shared the good news that she was a she! That name is hers and we will love her always as our first child.

If you are asking the question "what can we do to help" the answer is to please pray for us and for the first day or so please do not call as we will be trying to enter back into our lives and catch up on some sleep.

Thank you all so much for being so amazing in our lives!
-----

Jim Karwisch
Artistic Director
The JaCKPie Theatre Workshop
jim.karwisch@gmail.com
http://www.jackpie.com
(404) 272-1212 (txt preferred)

Michigan the Mitten

Michigan the Mitten, originally uploaded by Jim Karwisch.

Last night in class I watched someone use the hand technique to show
where they used to live in Michigan. Everyone was a bit lost as to why
they were showing it using their palm as reference. I have attached a
picture so you can see how much Michigan looks like a mitten. Natives
of Michigan hold up their hand palm out and show others where on the
"mitten" they live.

-----

Jim Karwisch
Artistic Director
The JaCKPie Theatre Workshop
jim.karwisch@gmail.com
www.jackpie.com
(404) 272-1212 (txt preferred)

Steve Capps to do next MixTape!

Friend and JaCKPie Member Steven Capps will be creating the next MixTape to be performed on February 21st at 9:30pm!

Adding older Journals to this blog...

I decided to go back and look at myself as a teenager to see myself through my now adult eyes for what I was back then. I was so insecure and awkward that it is almost painful for me to read. I decided as long as I was sifting through those memories I would add them to my blog so others could read them as well if they were so inclined.

They start back in 1991...

Why I love Damian Dunn...

I was bouncing around the net today and landed on the Babies mit Bearden blog. I love reading what Damian Dunn writes in his blog entries... seriously... they make me smile. Most of the time Damian writes about food. He apparently spends a majority of his free time making food, pickling food or turning it into alcohol. He is usually excited about whatever he is cooking and usually gives some detail about how great it is going to taste (even if the description makes you think it would taste like wet shoe.)

What's with the puppets?

I have made mention of building puppets in several posts across the web and the common question from friends now is "what's with the puppets?"
 
My theatre company (JaCKPie.com) is working on adding a puppet improv program.  At its inception I had zero puppeteering experience and relied on a good friend of mine Raymond Carr to do all the puppet work while I played a human character. We did this in a show called Ninja and Jack and it ran for about a year before Raymond got the opportunity to tour with Walking With Dinosaurs. Now I am training as a puppeteer and building puppets as well as teaching puppeteer Amy Strickland how to do Long-form Improv. Soon we will co-teach a class on puppet improv and build a team of Improv Puppeteers and begin production on some shows.
 
I will be posting some pics of some new designs I am trying out as well as video of Amy and Myself workshopping the new stuff. 
 
Posted via email from My Redundant Posterous blog

Presidents, Puppets and Pie!

Had a FANTASTIC weekend. Mary and I got to spend a lot of quality time together coming off of a week where I think we saw each other twice in 5 days... We even went on a doctor visit where we got to see the baby moving around in there... arms and legs were going to town. Definitely a ballerina or a soccer player.

A few things I learned over the weekend:

• Just because you knew how to use a sewing machine 10 years ago, does not mean you will be able to hop right back on and get a puppet made in 2 hours. As Mary put it, "Sewing machines are not bicycles."


• I am really excited about our new president. I am really inspired.


• Pumpkin Pie is my favorite of all sweet treats ever. If you want on my good side, bring me a pumpkin pie.


• If you are lucky enough to be married to someone who "gets" you, then you stand a far greater chance of making it in this world. Thank you sweetie for "getting" me.


• Mike Abdelseyed is a blast on stage. He came into town with Titanic Players this Saturday and we did a late night set. We didn't really talk about what we were going to do and we didn't even get to warm up together but had a very natural and fun two man show that I was proud of. When he comes back in April for a wedding we're going to make him play here again!


• There are apparently only 24 hours in a given day. I have been operating on an understanding that there were 29. Time to carve some stuff OUT.

Getting ready to write an article for Fuse Box Theatre's website and finish the concept for a new puppet long-form show we'll be doing in 5 or so months.

Back to the grind...

Hawks Game. Floor Seats.

I didn't blog about this event at the time it happened, but after revisiting it on Flickr I just had to share...

Jim Dewberry was able to procure tickets to sit on the front row at the Hawks game and asked if Brad Kloth would like to accompany him and his girlfriend Shelley for dinner and a game. We dined at the richest and most expensive buffet I have ever seen and enjoyed tons of attention from the staff as we sat in $800.00 seats! Several times during the night I heard Shelley say "I don't deserve to be here!"

It was a great night top to bottom! Click the picture to see more from that set. They are camera phone pics but they are enough to get the idea.

Thanks again Dewb!

Charlie Adair and shannonjenkins.com

I like to take time each week on Flickr perusing pictures taken by my friends. This, combined with reading status messages on facebook and twitter, keeps me involved and up to date with the people I care about at times when my schedule just won't allow for a phone call or a visit. The picture in this post was missed somehow on my previous trip down flickr lane. It was taken by Shannon Jenkins Photography (You can also find him at shannonjenkins.com.)

The picture (besides being breathtaking) is of another friend of mine Charlie Adair. He is one of those guys that inspires... great looks, great attitude and amazingly talented. He is also a great friend. He calls me up sometimes to encourage me in my work, grabs dinner with me before a workshop and will stand with me at a party when I get socially anxious... Yeah... He's one of those guys...

So a quick raise of the glass to Charlie Adair and to an incredible photographer Shannon Jenkins! Hazzah!

Crazy big weekend of improv...

What a great weekend for improv this is going to be. Einstein Meets Elvis is going to represent JaCKPie at the North Carolina Comedy Arts Festival, Mike Abdalsayed and the Titanic Players from Chicago are coming in and mixing in our 8:00pm show and I will be doing a two man with Abdalsayed opposite Mize and Fratkin's official Debut in the late night slot. Whew!

I spent the day today doing scheduling for February, putting out small fires and trying to figure out the logistics of turning our spare bedroom into the soon to be baby's room. In the midst of all of this I want to laugh, cry and shout for joy all at the same time! The only thing harder than trying to balance all of this at once would be not having anything to do... Bordom vs. Chaos? I'll take Chaos.

This week is a Marathon... Monday? Class. Tuesday? Class. Wednesday? Rehearsal. Thursday? Class. Friday? CRASH...

Had a great time last night catching up on movie talk with @swestdahl and he was nice enough not to bring up the fact that I spammed his cell phone yesterday when I combined the MixTape blog with the Karwisch Blog (apparently I have very polite friends) Looks like I sent a twitter update for each individual post from the MixTape blog as they were imported... Yikes!

Signing off now... time to run across town for a rehearsal... Deep breaths everybody!

Pulling it all together...

Happy New Year! I'm back to my blog after a whirlwind of activity at the end of last year... I have dealt with family illness, a sinus infection of my own, produced our annual holiday show at JaCKPie and found out that we are expecting!

Today I decided to officially return to my updates and came to the resolution that 3 blogs are just TOO MANY!  I have now pulled all of my blogs together here at http://jackpie.com/karwisch.

MixTape by Bran Peacock - 01/10/09

1. Overkill – Colin Hay
2. Shadrach – Beastie Boys
3. We’re Gonna Move – Elvis Presley
4. That’s Life – Frank Sinatra
5. Born, Never Asked – Laurie Anderson
6. Places – Scruffy the Cat
7. Screenwriter’s Blues – Soul Coughing
8. Some Keeps Moving My Chair – They Might Be Giants
9. Detox Mansion – Warren Zevon
10(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville – R.E.M.