A Balancing Act

For the second live streaming session, I give myself a 5/10.

I felt much more comfortable and was way better prepared than when I did my first session - and that's why I went from 3/10 to 5/10 in my system of self-awarded rating - but my attempt at 'live' humor fell rather flat I think and I had some technical difficulties with the live streaming itself.   So I believe 5/10 is fair and leaves lots of room for improvement.

As far as my attempt at humor is concerned, you guys must understand that my mother has always told me that I was very funny and throughout my life she has supported my every attempt at being funny with a heartfelt laugh.  And I can make my kids laugh (almost) at will.  As for my wife, I have about a 50% success rate; sometimes I will get a laugh, sometimes she will roll her eyes.

I also made a clown of myself (video) a few years ago with quite a bit of success.  

This mostly positive feedback from my loved ones and past experiences as a clown gave me just enough confidence to try my humor with an audience of engineers, thinking that maybe I could improvise myself a stand-up comedian.

To my defense, not getting any real-time feedback makes it challenging.  In a real setting with real people, a presenter can adapt from the crowd's laughter (or lack of).

In any event, this is all still very experimental and a process for helping me find my voice and the best way to interact with you.  For those of you watching and following my progress, thank you very much for your patience while I improve my delivery and find a better balance between useful content and entertainment.

I will now skip a week to re-group, brainstorm, soul-search and get some work done. 

Thanks to Mark Browne for his Public speaking article, you tips have been helpful and will continue to be for future sessions.

And no, I do not usually drink beer with a straw.  The idea was to possibly attract reactions and it worked.

Cheers!

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