I am swamped today! Between grocery shopping, catching up on my e-mails, trying to promote my workshop, and trying to figure out what to do next — using the knowledge I received at Armand Morin’s Big Seminar #9 workshop — my brain is just running in circles.

I have photos of much of what I have to tell you about…. but I’ll get to that later (as I mentioned.. there’s a lot to do today). Here’s the breakdown though!

I arrived on Friday morning… 8am, one of the 1st ones for registration.
I sat down at the 1st row that was not reserved, Center, of course. Rozana found me. We’ve met before… but only briskly. She works for my very good friend’s advertising agency, Argiz Advertising. She sat next to me, and we had a blast. I was doing the whole comedy thing. The whole seminar really was the same thing: presentations, eating, and networking. I paid a lot for the seminar, but it was well worth it. I met a ton of great people, ate a lot, and learned a ton. People seemed to love the idea of what I’m doing, and so Rozana became Couch #31. Eric Farewell had also offered to be Couch 31 (or 32), and a few others had asked, but I said I was already taken . I was out late every single night, networking till 3 or 4 am. Some of it was with site attendees, some with site-staff. Drinks were often involved…

Saturday night was quite hillarious. They had a nice dinner, and during the eating portion, they had a giveaway section. They gave away a ton of Ipods / Ipod Nanos / and even laptops. The way the giveaways work is that you get a ticket, and you must be present, and must have your ticket on you in order to claim a prize. They called Rozana’s number, but she didn’t have her ticket, “I can have it in two minutes!” Armand: You have 10 minutes! *WOOSH* Rozana wasn’t even back to her seat yet, and I was off sprinting (she gave me my own key-card)- I hauled ass to get to the elevators, to the room, to her folder, and back to the dinner… I was wearing heavy dress-shoes, but that did not prevent me from running fast enough that people had to dive out of the way! She got the Ipod Nano, and I was out of breath for a while. The thing that’s funny, is that she ended up giving me the Nano later anyways, as she already has one. I pretty much love that thing, for the record… great screen (although my images look pretty weak in that low of a resolution), great sound quality, and it’s light as heck.

Here’s the funny part (well.. another one) – The post-dinner entertainment was a hypnotist…. That needed volunteers, of course. Rozana had told me that she always wanted to be hypnotized, so when Christine got chosen right behind Rozana, and the woman with the microphone was telling Christine to choose the next person (and Rozana was looking in their direction, not at me), I was quite avidly pointing at Rozana, and Christine chose her. Later they were looking for more volunteers, and the lady finally saw my hand up. Short version: I was told for the next 30 hours that I was the funniest thing up there. The kicker is that I was not even hypnotized! I spoke to some of the other people, and got different stories. One guy said he couldn’t remember. One girl said she could hear everything, but just didn’t care. One girl said she couldn’t open her eyes, even though she wanted to. There were a few funny skits, and some of them I couldn’t see (some guy dressed as Shakira… some people doing a scene where one’s a martian, one’s a translator, and one’s a sign linguist), where I wanted to peep but didn’t want to ruin the effect. There was a dating show skit that I was in. It was easy to entertain the masses, as I was the 5th contestant, so could hear what everyone else’s answers were. Oh yeah- the joke is that we were supposed to give answers to turn the girl off… not to win her heart. So… when she asked “Where would you take me on our date?” I quoted (those in the audience, probably didn’t recognize the quote) that movie ‘With Honors’, “A leper colony in Bali” (Joe Pesci had said it though, because he’d be the best looking person there….. After I saw The Motorcycle Diaries, I realize that a leper colony is not the most appetizing place). For the “I want someone who my parents would like… what would you say to them when you meet them?” I retorted “Wow… well.. that explains a lot!” For “What is your occupation?” – some guy gave a great answer… he said that he picks scabs! The crowd loved it… heck… I loved it. Well… that’s the great thing about being witty and last… My reply was “I eat scabs for a living!” The crowd lost it! (yay) – For “I want a guy that will let the world know he loves me… what would you name your domain that is a tribute to me?” the answers were pretty funny “Leave me alone.com” “don’t come here.com” and so on… My reply was a 2-part joke, but the 2nd part was lost in the crowd… too bad, I would’ve thought at an internet-based seminar, people would appreciate it. My answer was “Herpes-infested-cum-bubble.info” So… you see, it was a .info, not a .com… but everyone was harping on the 1st part. Was it a brilliant retort? The crowd seemed to think so… but I was just remembering a name my buddy Joe would call people in 6th grade. Funny the things you remember… even funnier, the applications you find for them. If you had told me in 6th grade, that I would be using that line at age 30, on stage, in front of some of the world’s top gurus in internet marketing, I would have thought you were crazy! Especially since I wouldn’t've known what an internet was Back to my performance– “I like a man who’s an animal in bed… what animal would you be, and why?” I was amused at one guy’s “Sloth” answer… Mine, which again tripped the crowd out “Amoeba…. so you couldn’t find me!” When they asked the crowd who should win the date…. they were all chanting “Five!” – there was no contest! I thought it would come down to a vote… but it was a landslide! The bad thing, is that I was supposed to try and not-win, of course Various skits included dancing. He told me to go front and center for Riverdance… I wonder if I’m a good riverdancer Never really tried to do the jig or anything like that – especially before 300 people… Did I mention I have stage fright? No? Well… that’s ’cause I don’t :p There was the “You’re all ballerinas” part.. Not only do I not know how to be a ballerina, but there was not enough room on stage for all of us to be trying at once… so… upon almost colliding with Christine, I just picked her up in the air. That was pretty easy.. she’s light – I’d guess 100-110… and thank goodness I’m strong. There was the “You’re Victoria Secrets Models” – easy enough… take shirt off.. pose… I’m a model / photographer.. the posing is a piece of cake. The last thing though… the one that made networking easy for the rest of the seminar… was the “You’ll forget these instructions, and go back to the audience, but when you hear me say ________ you will come on stage, and think that you are __________” – and he tapped various people on the forehead and gave them different personas. I was in the KISS group, as well as the Chipendale’s group. My favorite performer was the one that was Richard Simmons… he was awesome!! He did the speaking right, the excercising, the facial expressions… it was just awesome! Funny thing is that I met him before, in a workshop in Orlando. I was doing the worm, I was shaking my stuff, I took my shirt off, and then…..(muahahhaha) — I figured I want to eventually be on the speaker circuit for marketing… so… until I figure out how, I might as well have the person with the power to grant me that position remember me…. so– took my shirt off, and threw it on Armand Morin’s face… I then took my pants down… shook my ass a little (boxers still on)- some girl even ran up to the front, and stuffed a $5 down my boxers – and then I jumped off the stage, found Armand’s wife, and gave her a lap-dance. Bet they didn’t see that coming! Remember that Eric guy I mentioned earlier? Well… I had given him the room key, and he had gotten my camera, and was doing photography for me. I gave the photos to the seminar, but of course, I have a copy of them here.

Networking was really easy the rest of the night, as everyone knew me, and was approaching me. I ran into that girl that stuffed the $5 down my boxers.. I didn’t realize that she had… I thought she had kept the money. She told me, at the bar, that she had done that, and I didn’t believe her. So… I checked (looked like I was picking my ass), as she said to check my crack. It wasn’t in my crack… what I had to do was to turn the other cheek! There it was! So I got an Ipod Nano AND $5 that night! We got all these funny pictures of her grabbing my ass. That was my joke for the night “Next 20 people to opt-in will get to touch my ass!”

The bar closed at 1am. Some of the marketers working the show had managed to snake 4 bottles of wine (and later more)- so we just stood in front of the hotel, hanging out, networking, hanging out, and drinking lots of wine. I bailed at 4am, as I had to be at the seminar by 8:30am. Thank goodness for caffeine pills, eh? Sad but true– I keep a bottle of them in my camera bag, just for such an occasion. Lunch was delicious, and huge. Funny stories from Sunday? Well.. I sat next to the hypnotist I got my photo taken with him, and I was lifting my shirt in the photo. Rozana and Jackie saw that I was getting up for some more prime-rib, so asked if I could bring back desert. What do you want me to bring? *shrug* Something. Ok… so I bring a big plate filled to the brim with deserts! I had stacked stuff! People didn’t believe me that it wasn’t for me, of course! One gentleman was cool enough to approach me and tell me that he has some video of me! I was pretty burnt out by the end of the seminar, as I had not wanted to take any more caffeine pills. I was about to leave, when he called me from the 2nd floor, asking if I want to see the videos. Of course, I said yes, and what do you know? It was on a point and click camera, already digital… so I copied it to my laptop! I just need to edit it down, and post it here… woo hoo!

So.. I got home (Couch 30′s) – called Zana to wish her a great flight… and passed out! 8pm-5:45am (then back to sleep on a matter of principle).