The Little Green Book

Monday August 13th, 2007 - Lake Villa, IL

Back to basics today. Everything around me is in turmoil and every part of my life is out of whack. I’ve been this way before but the older I get the more it bothers me. I am trying to get in sync with the universe and when I’m not there it can be overwhelming at times. It feels like I’m trying to find the end of the fresh toilet paper roll and I can’t and it bugs me.

I tried to do some little things to get back on course. Trying to fix everything in a day is a sure recipe for failure and that would make me feel even worse. There is a pile of papers I’ve allowed to get bigger than it should in my room. Some of it is receipts and other stuff like comedy notes and old newspaper articles and who knows what. It’s not out of control but it could easily get there so I focused all my energy on just getting that pile sorted out.

It took about an hour to do it but I felt a lot better. I threw much of it out and put all the rest of the things in order and as I was doing it I found an uncashed check for $200 from a gig I did back in May up in Door County, WI. If there was ever a time in life when I could use an extra couple of Franklins it’s now. I don’t know how I overlooked it but I did. This will come in handy in paying my dental bills and gives me another reason to get organized.

There are a lot of things coming at me in a lot of directions and I let things pile up. I was meaning to get at that pile but it just kept getting bigger and bigger. I am glad I decided to tackle it today because it made me feel like I accomplished something. Plus it was an extra two hundred bucks. But I didn’t stop there. I also had some papers piled up in boxes from my move and started to go through those too. Much of that was stuff I’ve compiled over a period of many years and ranges anywhere from radio bit ideas to comedy articles to cards and letters I’ve saved from the mail. I even found my Passport and other odd ball papers.

One of the oddest things I’d forgotten I even had was a copy of Jeffrey Dahmer’s police report. Back in the day that was a hot item because nobody could get it. I was working on the radio in Milwaukee back then and we had a guest on the morning show who had given us a copy. Soon after the police department put a freeze on it and nobody could get one so I started selling it for as much as $15. I took out ads in True Detective magazines and lots of people called me a ghoul but I did make a few bucks when it was all over. It was nuts.

People are ghouls and want to see stuff like that. I even copied it on blood red paper for effect and also so they couldn’t just make copies and do it themselves. For years I had lots of people ask me if I still had those and once in a while I’ll get a request for it even today.

This isn’t what’s going to put me over the top though. All these years I’ve had my little schemes and ideas like this and while they’ve been fun and interesting I haven’t found my niche yet. I’m still searching and that’s what troubles me. I thought I’d have found it long ago. Ray Kroc didn’t start his first McDonald’s until he was 52 so I guess I’ve got time. I need to find my McDonald’s pretty soon. Drifting around like a stray dog looking for my next bone all the time isn’t what I need to be doing right now. But what do I do? I have a unique situation in that I have a lot of interests and could hit on any of them at any time.

I just wish I had a clue as to which thing to focus on. There are no guarantees and that’s what is driving me crazy at the moment. If I knew I could count on the radio job to come through I’d do that. I would pour everything I have into it and make it my main priority. It would be a good home base in many ways and I could still get back to comedy eventually.

But when standup comedy appears to be ’stable’, I know radio isn’t my main career. It’s a definite long shot and I knew that going in. I just wish we’d hear SOMETHING so we’ll be able to move on one way or another. Max has a family and businesses down where he’s living in Springfield and he has to make plans in his life too. It’s getting to be a time issue.

I didn’t want to think too much about it so as not to feel even more overwhelmed than I already do. I can only work one day at a time and I wanted to make today a building block to start getting me where I want to go. Sorting all my paperwork was a really good start. I didn’t want to stop there so I asked myself what the next thing I could do today to get my positive energy started again and I decided to sort out all the books I want to read soon.

I’ve bought some in the last few weeks and rather than let them sit I really do want to be making a dent in reading them. I’ve been good in the last few weeks but still have a pile of things to get to. If I didn’t buy another book for a year I’d have more than enough to read.

That still wasn’t enough though. I sat and thought what would be the best thing to do to get my mind started in the right direction and I got out a composition notebook I bought a while back with a green cover and decided to make that my list of money making projects. I have so many ideas and half baked schemes that I will in all likelihood never get to every one of them. Rather than continue to be frustrated I sat down and made a list of projects I have been thinking about or meaning to do or dreaming about and listed them in an order of the degree of difficulty I can see in getting them done. That took two hours to lay out.

Putting them down on paper was very productive. I sat there and thought of what I need to do for each one and which ones were more important and it helped me put my priorities in order as to what’s realistic. I know I can get more products to sell but only if I get them finished. It’s easy to have a half baked idea in my head but getting it completed is a totally different story. At least I am starting to make a physical list of things to turn into reality.

Wayne Dyer talks about the power of intention. If the mind actually focuses on a thing it can be turned from an idea into a reality and that’s what I started today. He talked about if he was thinking of a new project he’d make up a cover with the title of his book and wrap it around a different book and look at it every day until the new one was completed. I like that idea and I have some blank CD jewel cases and can start doing that with my stuff too.

I feel like I’m starting out all over again but in many ways that’s exactly what I’m doing. Getting my head straight and making a plan is the first order of business. Today was a big step in doing that but I still have a long way to go. I have so many things going and don’t have a clear picture of where my life is going right now but that should change in the next 30 days or less. Either I’ll be on the radio in Chicago or back doing comedy on the road.