Self-Care and the Traveling Storyteller: Touring Like a Beast!

Yes, I do have a broomstick

I have had a lovely, slow couple of months. I slept late, went to the gym on a regular basis, had lovely home-cooked meals, and spent time writing, playing with my pets, and reading to The Mister.


February through May is just around the corner. I'm about to put some serious mileage on the broomstick.


I'll be in multiple states doing multiple venues - sometimes two or three in a day- until the school year comes to a close.


Touring can be like this sometimes. Self-care becomes a huge problem when you are going six days a week or more. Here is my checklist for getting ready to tour like a beast.



1. I keep a travel bag at the ready - If you don't have one of these and you tour regularly, I highly recommend it. It is just one less thing to think about.

The Travel Bag

2. Sleep - This is a great article by Kevin Kulp about the importance of making sure you get enough sleep and why.

3. Maintaining Your Voice - Your voice is an important, finite resource. Make sure you are doing your best to keep it healthy!

4. Maintaining Your Car! - If you don't have the skills or confidence to do this yourself...I don't, then make sure you get your car into a local shop or to your mechanic or to a dealership and have your chariot tuned and tightened.

Happy Car

5. Maintain your Stress Level - Even if you don't feel like you are stressed, if you have been touring, telling, driving, dealing with trains, planes, and automobiles, meeting tons of people, expending tons of energy, then you need to make sure you are stopping to smell the proverbial roses. Make time!

6. Snacks - I keep some snacks in the car to prevent from getting the munchies and buying things that are going to cause me headaches. I have a snack stash of nuts - usually pistachios, chocolate - I get interesting, fair trade chocolate bars and break them into snackable chunks. (If I don't break the candy bars up and separate them, I will just eat the whole thing.) I snack on orange segments, dried fruit, some kind of jerky, and chewing gum. I tend to bake myself some kind of lovely, gluten-free cookie.

7. Water - Make sure you are staying hydrated! Dehydration will cause all sorts of problems that will make you think you are ill! Drink enough water!

Bibliophiles Do It With Books

8. Books - I am an unabashed bibliophile. A personal preference, of course, but I always travel with at
least one long series and three stand-alone books. If I ever look to be in danger of reading them all, I can always swing by an independent bookstore!

I am sure you have other things you like to do. If you have ideas or suggestions, please share them. We do better when we support each other and reinforce best practices!

Happy Touring!

Stories Entwined With Life: My first Guest Blogger of 2015 - Kevin Kulp

Last night, I laid out under the stars after midnight with my husband, my eighteen year old son, and my fifteen year old daughter.  We were looking for meteors.  We saw a couple.  Last night was one of the moonless evenings when the Perseid Meteor shower was putting on a show.  It was just happenstance that I realized we could watch it.  I'm glad we did.

I'm hyper aware of how we spend our time together right now as both of my children prepare to go off to school.  My son is going to RIT up in Rochester, New York, and my daughter is headed to NCSSM, the North Carolina School of Science and Math.  It is a boarding school.

Sparklers on the fourth of July

I am finding that with all of the change going on this summer, it is hard to focus on my non-fiction writing.  I've spent lots of time submerged in reading fiction, and even reading non-fiction.

I highly recommend Salt: A World History

I've had some pretty great experiences this summer.

I worked with a small company using storytelling as a team building exercise.

I gave one of the keynotes at the National Storytelling Network annual conference.

Gwenda Ledbetter and Dr. Milbre Burch

Charlotte Blake Alston and Queen Nur

Queen Nur, Me, Lynette Ford, Diane Ferlatte

Michael McCarty and Joanna Demarest

I did some fun work with the dependents at Pope Air Force Base.

I did a lot of Summer Reading all over the east coast.

As much fun and challenging as my summer work has been, all of it was framed against the background of knowing that both of my children would be leaving within days of each other.

My equilibrium is always a bit shattered when there are huge life transitions going on around me, and when I am right in the middle of them, it is much, much worse.

I am both incredibly proud of my children, and sad that this part of our lives together is ended.  Oh, they will come home, I will see them, we will spend time together, and who knows, they might actually choose to come home a couple of summers in the future, but it won't ever be the same.

That's good, of course, because our stories have to grow and change.  Our children have to grow up and move on in their lives.  That's how stories work.

I knew I would be consumed with all of the transition this summer, but I didn't realize just how hard it was going to be to carry on with my work...especially the writing.  I'm in knots when it comes to writing and despite having things to say, I haven't been able to write a thing.

This weekend is going to get dicey!

My daughter moves into her dorm on Saturday morning at 9 am.  

I will be performing at United Arts at 11:50 am.  It is in Raleigh, about 45 minutes from my daughter's school.

When we get back from United Arts, we load up the car with my son's things.  Sunday morning we head to Virginia to spend the night with my parents, and then we head to upstate New York on Monday.

My son moves into his dorm on Tuesday, we have two days of family orientation, and then we drive home.

My summer will officially be over then, and I will begin working feverishly on all of the projects I laid out for myself over the last few months.

As for this space?  Well, I have good news.

For the next three weeks, I will have guest bloggers while I readjust to my new situation.

August 20th, Kevin Kulp will be in the driver's seat!

Dragging Performance Into Play: a quick look at storytelling games

Kevin Kulp is a Boston-based writer, game designer, and storyteller who develops both video and pen and paper games. He helps run the independent RPG site enworld.org under the username Piratecat. His recent work includes the TimeWatch RPG (successfully Kickstartered through Pelgrane Press), Disruptor Beam's Game of Thrones Ascent on Facebook, and the fantasy western game Owl Hoot Trail from Pelgrane Press. He can be found on Twitter at @kevinkulp.

Kevin uses storytelling to create interesting family games, and video games.  He also reviews games. 

His piece is for anyone who likes game nights with family or friends, or anyone who works with teenagers, and would like to trick them into learning story structure, vocabulary building, and writing while they are being distracted by having fun.

So, off to have one of the craziest weeks of my parenting life, afterwards I will surf through the fallout, but you who come here will be in capable hands.  

Happy Telling!

Wynken, Blynken and Nod: Reboot with Kevin Kulp

This here be Kevin Kulp

After I posted about drowsy driving, my friend, Kevin Kulp who spent some time doing in services for shift workers about staying awake, posted an incredible set of  tips.

Kevin programs games.  This is his newest project.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kevinkulp/timewatch-gumshoe-investigative-time-travel-rpg

You can follow him on Twitter

He loves to Bar-B-Que!

He is a mighty fine person, a storytelling colleague and an all around great guy!

Here are his tips about driving sleepy.


Thank you Kevin!



So, considering that my "real" job was as a sleep and alertness expert (I designed shift schedules for round-the-clock companies), I thought it was worth mentioning a few things about sleepy driving. With luck, maybe I can save someone from having an accident.

For people driving on short sleep:

1. Most people need 8 hours of sleep to be well-rested. When you're getting less than that (as most people do), you're far more likely to suffer from something called "microsleeps." The less sleep you've had, the more likely it is that you'll experience these.

2. Microsleeps are periods when a wave of sleep washes over you, for anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes. Often times, you may not even realize that you've been technically asleep; these can happen while your eyes are open. Don't remember the last five minutes of your drive, or your attention is wandering to things that aren't the road? You're suffering from microsleeps.

3. At these times, your reaction time absolutely sucks. If you're on a flat straight empty road, you'll hopefully be okay. If the guy in front of you hits his brakes, though, you'll never be able to react in time. It's incredibly dangerous.

4. When you feel this starting to happen, pull the car over off the road and take a ten minute nap. Cold air, a blasting radio - these provide only momentary (and miniscule) boosts to your alertness. A short "power nap" is the only thing that will raise your alertness in the short term. Ten or fifteen minutes of shuteye will help you stay awake for the next 1-2 hours. Even caffeine isn't a great solution, although it can help in the short run. If you're falling asleep during a game, a 5 minute break with your eyes closed can help, as well.

5. Remember, sleepiness comes in waves; you may be fine, then 20 minutes later you're ready to keel over. Sleep-related accidents are much more likely to occur with folks who have been up all night, then who drive farther than 20 minutes. The presence of daylight helps a great deal with your alertness, which is why the vast majority of fatigue-related accidents happen between 1am to 6 am, especially right around dawn.

6. Regarding reaction time and the ability to reason logically - studies have shown that after 20 hours without sleep (assuming a morning wake-up time), your performance is equivalent to someone with a .08 blood alcohol level. After 24 hours with no sleep, performance and mental acuity is equivalent to .10 - legally drunk. See, there's a reason you make stupid decisions when tired! And you don't want to know about how you do when you're tired AND drunk. If you're sleep-deprived, keep this in mind when thinking about what you're doing, especially if you have to drive.

7. Short naps (10-15 minutes, 20 minutes max) are great for short-term alertness boosts. Long naps (2-3 hours) are even better; they give you restorative sleep and can keep you going another 6-10 hours. Stay away from 1-hour naps. Due to the way your sleep patterns run, a 1-hour nap will often leave you feeling groggy and tired, when a shorter or longer nap will not. Neat, huh?

8. The amount of alertness you gain after 5 hours of sleep is significantly higher than the amount you gain after 4 hours. If you have a choice, you'll be a lot happier with that extra hour.

9. More than 3 cups of coffee (or doses of caffeine) doesn't make you any more alert; it just makes you more anxious, irritable and prone to stress. Keep your coffee intake spaced out, don't overdue it, and remember that caffeine stays really active in your body for roughly four hours after drinking it. If you try to sleep when caffeinated, your sleep quality will stink; for that reason, try to time your caffeine intake so that you stop drinking caffeine 3-4 hours before your anticipated bedtime.

There a ton more information that may help, but this is a decent fast primer. Be aware of your drowsiness when driving, and watch out for that mental sluggishness - recognizing it in time may be the best thing you can do.