Allergy Testing and Ventriloquism

I am very happy with the allergist. I was referred by my primary care doctor, and as I had no preference, I took whomever had an opening.  The nice lady told me to go off all my allergy medications if I wanted to be tested, and I was tested, and to my surprise I have a LOT of allergies. More than I remember from the testing 20 some odd years ago. So we have an initial plan of saline washes twice a day, allergy nasal spray twice a day, anti-swelling spray twice a day, and see how my voice and … Continue reading

My Voices Are (almost) Back!

I am grateful for being able to go to the doctor and get an antibiotic. I don’t know what the problem was but the antibiotic has helped considerably.  Oddly enough the swab showed nothing, but I most certainly was not well!  Oh well, it is behind me and hopefully I will soon be all the way up for making a practice video. My main voice, Goody Goodfellow, is almost himself again. Been struggling with Luther but Calvin seems to be settling in OK. Kleetus is glad to be whining away again and I am still not sure what he is … Continue reading

Enter Goody Goodfellow

HAPPY NEW YEAR! We begin a full year of daily blog posts, and hopefully lots about puppets and ventriloquism. Goody’s creator is THE DUMMY DOCTOR, Alan Semok. I looked at a huge number of figure makers online, starting with the amazing list of makers found on Cybervent, a website that I have found useful. I read the comments, reviews, and studied the websites of the dummy builders. Nothing really clicked with me until I ran across the comedy, DUMMY, staring Adrien Brody. I liked the dummy in the movie, and scanned the credits to find out who made it. Along … Continue reading

Returning to Puppets: review of progress

Last year around October I found myself signing up for five free days of lessons by Tom Crowl titled, Learn-Ventriloquism.  By the fifth day I was hooked and did something I never do–I dug out my credit card and PAID for an online course.   Lessons were incremental, each one a manageable bite, and sent out one a day. Every morning I logged into my next lesson. Between lessons I practiced. I read everything I could get my hands on about ventriloquism and ventriloquists. I purchased every documentary I could find (I’M NO DUMMY is fun and informative). I haunted … Continue reading

Vent Haven International Ventriloquist ConVENTion

THE best time of my life–EVER!  I attended my first Vent Haven International Ventriloquist ConVENTion.   I was privileged to meet several famous ventriloquists. Here is one of the photos of me with a famous ventriloquist–Darci Lynne Farmer this kid is fabulously good and won America’s Got Talent.  She performed at the conVENTion and was on a panel with several other ventriloquists. I also got to meet Jimmy Nelson.  My toy ventriloquist figure was a Danny O’Day. I was totally in awe! We had a huge group picture, and that link broke so I am unsure how I can show it … Continue reading

Puppetry and Ventriloquism

Ventriloquism is to Puppetry as Square is to Rectangle.  A Ventriloquist IS a puppeteer, but not all puppeteers are ventriloquists. I am irked when ventriloquism and puppetry are separated out as if they were two different things. They are not. The misunderstanding comes from the time when the popular ventriloquists of the day used the hard figure or ventriloquist dummy exclusively, but ventriloquism is not limited to the use of these traditional style instruments. Shari Lewis’ Lambchop is a ventriloquist figure but is not a hard figure. These days ventriloquists talk of hard figures and soft figures to differentiate between … Continue reading

Apology for my lack of posting

I note that I am neglecting my blogs, there are several reasons, all due to being quite busy!  I attended a Society for Creative Anachronism event called Gulf Wars in March, which was a blast. I also decided a few months back to begin updating my skills in puppetry and add ventriloquism to what I knew. It seems there are now some excellent resources for ventriloquism online, so this has been a great boon to me. AND I have been working on ONE song playing it on each of my autoharps in an attempt to learn to play something.  I … Continue reading