Presentation Slam

I recently returned from the Avnet Conference in San Antonio, my second computer conference in two weeks, only this time, my friend, this time I was GIVING a presentation.

Boy, if I could bottle the sense of doom and foreboding I was feeling going into the conference, well, if I could just bottle it and sell it as a perfume, anyone who dabbed it on would never get another date for the rest of their lives.

Now I do have some experience giving presentations, or at least performing, only this was from my past life, my writing life, and the presentations I had to do were terribly nervewracking, as it was with The Moth Storyslam, where you have five minutes to tell a story, and you can use no notes and you don't even know if and when you're going to go on, you just put your name in a hat and wait (that is if you can keep breathing).

And here I am, a writer in New York City, trying to make it big in the Big Apple, and as an old writing teacher once told me, if you make a life where you have to succeed, then by God, you WILL succeed. So to do that I cut away all my support lines, and if plan A, writing, didn't work out, hell if I knew what plan B was, so I had everything riding on writing, and with some of the more up-and-coming as well as outright famous folks involved with Moth Storyslam, you better believe I was nervous as hell performing at the Moth. That and the fact that once you finish your story, three judges picked from the audience give you a score, 1 to 10.

And boy, have I heard some great stories at the Moth. One lady told a story how she had a phone affair with Warren Beatty (while in his current marriage). Another guy, working for one of those cable prank shows that quickly got cancelled, well he went to Yankee stadium unannounced with a camera crew and a not-very-good Michael Jackson impersonator. He told the Yankees he was with Michael Jackson, and that Michael wanted to throw out the first ball. Later, there they were in the dugout, with the not-so-good impersonator cowering in a corner, trying not to let anybody get too good a look at him, when the Yankees ask, instead of throwing out the first ball, why doesn't Michael Jackson sing the national anthem instead (the impersonator was a non-singing version). The prank ended with this guy in jail.

One last story was a girl who got an internship at Nickelodeon, and when enough kids didn't show up for a certain event, she, because she looked so young, was volunteered to take part in one of their events that involved crabwalking backwards through one of their gooey concotions. Well, she hadn't planned for this, nor had she dressed for this, so Nickelodeon hooked her up with some kiddie clothes that didn't quite fit, and, as she's crabwalking backwards through the goop, she feels her pants pulling down. Oh my oh my, what to do? If she lifts an arm, she topples into the muck, but the question quickly became irrelevant as her pants did pull down revealing to the studio audience that she wasn't such a young girl after all (also revealing a very private piercing).

I myself told two stories at the storyslam, not nearly so interesting, but both were very well received, and after I was through (the first one truly felt like an out-of-body experience), I thought I would never feel that much pressure on myself again...WRONG!!!

Because for some reason, the Avnet conference really had me freaked out. I guess it was the fact that it was only my second computer conference ever, and not only was I going alone, this time I was going to PRESENT!!! And it wasn't just a calm cool easy relaxed presentation, each presenter only had three minutes, and anyone who went over got the GONG.

So there I was, standing on the third floor balcony overlooking the Marriott San Antonio Riverwalk, the clock about to strike 1, the start time of the conference, and I think to myself: If I were to follow the path of least resistence here, instead of going and giving my presentation I would actually just hurl myself down the three floors to a broken-neck death.

Tune in tomorrow to find out what I do. Hint: I'll give you long odds if you want to bet I'm dead.