My Guild Experience Part Three: Monday and Tuesday

           Monday evening we were introduced to the 'special guest' we had heard so much about. All afternoon Mr. Hamby walked him around the Mohonk grounds, disrupting whatever classes he passed. We were asked not to speak to him all afternoon, and told instead to wait until that evening when we would be formally introduced.

       Yeah... yeah... He does look like George W. Bush. I was taken in, too. I fell for it to the last. I was tricked, fooled. But it isn't actually him.He's a George Dubblyuh Bush impersonator. (A really good one...)

      He was so funny, though. I laughed so stinkin' hard. He wasn't bad on the guitar, either.

      That evening was also the first of the Voice-Over coaching with Curt Morse and Allen Hurley. Of the one-hundred students attending the Guild, sixty of them wanted to be coached in the Voice-Over Sessions. When I found out about that, I kind of started to freak. I mean - that was the entire reason I came to the Guild! Would I not get an opportunity to get coached? Obviously not everyone would be able to get that opportunity... So they put together a raffle. If your number got called, you got to get your voice recorded. So, for an hour and a half, I heard other students get their numbers called and get their voices recorded. When the final raffle was announced, I figured my number had been a dud and that I should have dug around more for a better one. But when Curt Morse called the number, no one stood up to take their place. He called another. Nothing. He dug around in the can, shook it a bit, called another number. Nope. I began to despair. I wasn't going to get called. Maybe tomorrow. He called another number. I glanced at mine. They were the same. ... I leaped up, out of my seat, and marched up to the microphone. It was so much fun standing behind that mic'. It's a feeling that I doubt I will ever forget.

      Anyway - we were supposed to record the voices for a commercial. Curt Morse played the commercial for us so that we had an idea of what it was supposed to sound like, then we got right to recording. Everyone before me tried their best to sound as close to the voices in the commercial as they could... I decided to take a more original route (Who am I kidding... I'm a ham, and it was an opportunity to show off and impress people.). Once I opened my mouth, the room erupted in an explosion of laughter. Even the people who were trying to record with me lost control and couldn't help but to laugh. It was quite the difficulty recording the radio-spot with me. I was just so funny. Hilarious, even.

      You can check out all the radio-spots at the Guild's official blog. Guild Voice-Over Blog Post (Mine's the fifth one.) It was the Guild favorite. Everyone laughed their heads off when it played, and it got played a lot. Heck. After that whole experience, I had people walking up to me all week, requesting that I use my accents. It was quite entertaining.

      Tuesday morning they showed this incredible video. Such a powerful video with such an important message. I was very much impressed by the quality of the video, too.

      That afternoon I had some free time, so I went canoeing with Alex, one of the many awesome people that I met at the Guild. Such a wonderful time, rowing about the lake like a couple members of the fellowship in Elven boats (That's the whole reason we chose a canoe... silly, nerdy us!).

      After returning to shore, we still had some free time, so we decided to try to reach the tower that could be seen down on the Mohonk Mountain House's porch.

Up there... On the left... up high...

      The climb was absolutely exhausting, but far more than well-worth it. The tower was built out of awesomeness. Oh! And between that awesomeness was more awesomeness! So it was all win.

      Inside was almost as awesome as outside. And up on top was awesome-est of all. From up there the Mountain house, which I should be continually referring to as massive, looked like a tiny little thing.

Alex (Frodo) and Me (Barbarian)...

      It's so good to think of the times I had at the Guild. I already miss all my new friends. I hate goodbyes of any kind... And this whole trip has been full of them. My next post will allow me to think more on my awesome time at the Mohonk mountain house, so I look forward to that. And I hope all you readers of mine look forward to it too...