That’s what I rambled on about today. To wit :

Perhaps I am learning to recognize what is and is not part of what I am trying to say.

What’s next? Writing a script?

Nah. I speak my mind and mean what I say. I am expressing myself when I am talking to the camera, and I can’t be sincere if I have rehearsed it all.

Still, I’ve been doing a lot of brooding on the subject of raising the production values of my little videos. They are going to need a cosmetic makeover if I hope to get my words and my feelings in front of a larger audience.

And I do.

One thing I think I will return to doing in the future is editing out every little um or stutter or y’know. I stopped doing that in order to cut down the workload of making my videos to something that seemed less onerous and more natural sounding, but now the little imperfections are bugging me again and the popular YouTubers I follow and admire certainly don’t leave them in, so that’s something worth doing.

Plus I notice that the popular YouTube and TikTok stars put a lot more little edits in between phrases to break up the monotony and I will look into that, too.

It’ll be like, “Trump is a fascist (edit) He’s destroying America (edit) We have to rise up. (edit) ” and so forth.

Seems silly on the surface but it actually makes things work better. It keeps the viewer’s nervous system from learning to tune out the repeated stimuli of your speech and thus keeps them engaged.

And modern media is all about the engagement. Keeping their attention is worth $$$.

Not that I am looking to go super commercial or anything. At least not with my little talks. Those are all about expressing myself and exercising my oratory skills and if they happened to gain a big audience, great. It would be nice to make $.

But that’s not what they are for.

On the other hand, there’s the eternal question my shrink, Doctor Costin, brings up often : why don’t I make something funny?

I know I am a brilliant and hilarious comedy writer. I know that I am capable of making wacky, hilarious, amazingly fun stuff.

I even know a bunch of tricks for making that kind of thing “on the cheap”, so to speak. I could steal the format from the CBC show Wiretap and just slap a phone filter on one half of a comedic conversation and pretend I am getting a phone call.

The other person could be represented by a photo or picture.

And of course, in this creepy but convenient era of AI voices, I could have any celebrity or fictional character I wanted on my “call in show”.

Could be a lot of fun.

Or there’s the “one person skit” thing I see folks doing. My main concern there would be that I don’t own enough different kinds of clothes to represent different characters.

A trip to Value Village might solve that, though. Get myself some hats, some junk jewelry, some cheap sunglasses..

But I would only be able to do Value Village if I get a superior mobility device. I am not going to make it around that place with the walker.

Makes me realize why people like me get those electric scooters. At least those who scoot can go to stores almost like a normal person.

I haven’t shopped in person for over three years.

I miss my independence.

More after the break.

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I must relate unto you my tale of nerd glory.

It involves an episode of Um, Actually, and this game from it :

I take slight exception to the opening statement, though.

I don’t enjoy correcting others.

I just don’t feel like I have a choice.

ANYhow, the game in question involved naming as many dragons from a 5×4 grid as possible, and I found glory in the fact that I um, actually, did quite well in it.

Here is the grid :

And I knew :

1. Um, the one Sean Connery voiced in the movie
2. Dunno, pass
3. Falcor the Luck Dragon from Neverending Story
4. Haku from Spirited Away
5. Spike, my crush from My Little Pony
6. TROGDOR! from Homestar Runner
7. Dunno, pass
8. Dunno, pass
9. KING GIDORAH from the Godzilla movies
10. Fin Fang Foom from Marvel Comics
11. Dunno, pass
12. Pete’s dragon from Pete’s Dragon, who has a name but I dunno it
13. Mushu, as voiced by Eddie Murphy in Mulan
14. Toothless, the star of the REAL How To Train Your Dragon movies
15. Dunno, but I kicked myself when I found out it was Paarthunax from Skyrim, who is AWESOME and I played through that game SO MANY TIMES
16. Dunno, read the book a number of times as a kid but don’t remember a dragon
17. Dunno and was horrified to learn that supposedly THAT is the Jabberwock? UM NO IT AIN’T.
18. Dunno, pass
19. Dunno, looks vaguely familiar, but pass, and…. drumrolls please…
20. LOCKHEED, Kitty Pryde’s pet dragon from X-Men!

I was so stoked when I saw Lockheed after all these years. I adored him in the comics, who wouldn’t? – but hadn’t thought about him in years and so when I saw him in the grid it was like reuniting with an old friend.

Oh. And I am the only one who identified him. None of the contestants showed even the slightest glimmer of recognition.

And THAT is my moment of nerd glory. I knew something they didn’t!

Normally I am very hit or miss with the game. More miss than hit. I just don’t have that mental encyclopedia so many other nerds do, plus there are so many nerd franchises that are now core, like Harry Potter, that I know almost nothing about.

If it wasn’t in the first movie, I dunno.

So when I got 9 of them (9.5 if you count #1) including my beloved little Lockheed, I was ever so pleased with myself.

And that’s why I just had to share it with you, so you can bask in my glow.

Don’t worry, I’ll get over it.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.