The Geek Armando

Return of the Natives

Last week I saw Return of the Natives, a really cool improv at the Blue Door Theatre. They did a show based the Armando, a form where a monologist tells a story and then the improvisers improvise on the story, the monologist tells another story, more improv, each feeding into the other until they run out of time. In this show, the monologist was a standup comedian and she started out with a bit from her show (she now lives in LA), the improvisers where originally from Spokane but have moved away to places where they could get paid to do improv.

.NET Rocks #300 and others

In DNR # 300, Richard Campbell tells geeky tales of his early hacking as a kid in the 1970s and 80s. He told stories about how he built an Electronic Rocket Countdown Timer at 10, fixed computers for grownups, solved a difficult hardware problem by replacing the hardware, built a server farm in his house, etc. He even tells “The Goliath Story” (I can’t give it justice, just listen to it). I’ve heard Richard geek out on other podcasts on other podcasts like Hanselminutiae. I’ve heard other geeks tell tales of great geekdom on blogs, podcasts, the speaker’s room at code camps, at work, etc.

Improv in the workplace

Years ago I learned that Infusion Development offers improv classes to their associates. They even have a video on youtube. This knowledge is one of the factors that lead me to start taking improv classes at the Blue Door. Ted Neward gave an improv session at the 2012 Seattle Code Camp. There are countless articles on the business benefits of teaching improv to your employees from sites like businessweek.com, foo.com & careerbuilder.com. I’ve written about my experience with improv.

Fantasy – Putting it all together

I would like to see an Armando style show based on the monologs of a visionary/character of our industry with improvisers who are geeks. This performance could take place at an industry conference, code camp or such.

Richard Campbell would be an excellent choice to be the monologist, but there are others out there who could tell great stories. I’ve heard other geeks tell tales of great geekdom on blogs, podcasts, the speaker’s room at code camps, at work, etc. The monologist must be someone who can get up there and talk and tell good stories. There could be a dialog in the form of an interview in place of the monolog; a good interviewer can help bring out the character if the principal is otherwise shy.

Infusion Improv would be an excellent choice for the players. I hope there are other companies that offer improv training, one of those companies could send their improv all-stars or the geek improvisers from the host city. If a company provided the improvisers, they could get some recruiting PR points.

My Play

In this week’s This Developers Life, they discussed Play. Not to be out done, I thought I would write about my own play patterns. It was fun to hear about the race car driver and the home manufacturer, I want to hear more. To promote dialog, I am presenting my story.

Improv

Almost 2 years ago, I started taking Improv classes at the Blue Door Theatre in Spokane because I heard about some consultancy in New York City that provided Improv classes to all their consultants. The local NPR station announced the class on their arts calendar and I just said what the F# and I took the class. At that point I had never even seen live Improv.

Like many programmers, I have an Aspergers personality. This serves me well when I am actually doing my core job; for the rest of my life, not so much. Improv gives me a chance to play at being in the world where everyone else lives. It gives me the opportunity to playing at being an extrovert.

Through something we call “Yes, And”, I am learning to accepting the current situation and adapting to the current situation. And I am learning to do it quickly. As a programmer, I like to work carefully and look for the perfect solution; in Improv I just don’t have the time. (The programmer in me is telling me that this blog post isn’t good enough; if it wins, no one else will ever read this.)

Am I taking Improv to become a great actor and become famous? No. My chances of ever performing Improv in public: about 50/50 (based on the fact that most of us underestimate our own talents). Do I really care? Do you take Kung Fu to fight? If memory serves me right, Cane was able to avoid fighting as much as he fought. I have presented at Code Camps 5 times since I started Improv.

Technology

My work project is frozen to the technology that existed when it was started. I like to play with the new stuff. I have Windows 8 installed on my laptop. I am slowing working my way through WPF 4 Unleashed. I am looking into writing for the Android Tablet. No, this is an extension of work.

Music

I have a guitar, a bass and a keyboard that I attempt to use to make sounds with. In the past I found that the guitar to be a great stress reliever. On second thought I haven’t really even touched these things since I started Improv. Since classes don’t start up again until next year, I would take out an instrument and …

Christine

I have a 1982 Supra that I have tried to keep alive for the last dozen or so years. Due to some poor financial decisions on my part, I haven’t done much with her for the past couple of years. My dream is to restore her on YouTube. Yes, her name is a reference to the Stephen King book.