Come here and sit down. Today I want to do a “traditional” (in a tradition that began circa 2002) “Weblog” (’blog) entry. Just impart to you what’s going on with me. Not a story from the past, but the story of today.

On the ultra-personal front: I recently finally realized I need help with my issue. My issue is chronic and severe rejectophobia. So I’m seeing a therapist now. She thinks I might be Jewish.

Also, my “sister” KP, of “When’s Etta Coming Down?” story fame, gave birth to a beautiful, healthy baby boy in Switzerland last week. Her first. So happy for her and proud too.

I plan to be a nightmarish Stage Uncle to both KP’s Luke aka Li’l Dub and to my real nephew, MC Shrake. Kids + talent = money. Let’s get ’em onstage sooner rather than later. And I’m keeping 20% of the $.

On the professional front: My storywriting and -performing career continues to continue. I’ve been on 5 different stages in 3 cities in the first 6 months since the birth of SM Shrake. And next week I’m sneaking up to Philly again to see if I can tell a story, because otherwise this month would be stage-free. And we can’t have that. Next month I’ve got two performances on my calendar: The Mortified “Back to School Special” at the 92Y Tribeca in NYC on 9/16, and the Moth GrandSlam at the Gem Theatre in Detroit 9/23. All my travel arrangements are made already. So I can relax about that and focus on practicing the tales to tell. In New York I’m doing a slideshow about my science class project trying to prove gnomes are real (when I was 11 years old!), and in Detroit the story topic for the competition is “When Worlds Collide.”

Because I am the hardest-working man in the story business. It’s starting to solidify. It doesn’t feel like I’m just an impostor faking it till I make it. The processes of writing every day and getting up on stage as much as I can are starting to become second nature.

I’ve organized a story club here in D.C., with our first meeting being next month on the 23rd. I have help from my friends Sarah and Cathy, and I’ve already enlisted some of the best storytellers in the area. The impetus was: I have only been able to tell one story for the local existing story club, in March, but as usual, once I do something everyone wants to do it, so there hasn’t been an opportunity for me to perform with that club again since, because too many people have signed up since I started doing it. Their monthly open-mic nights are very popular, but all told it adds up to only 8-12 storytelling “slots” per month in Washington, D.C. I mean besides the Fringe and assorted little shows that the same five storytellers appear in around town from time to time.

So I figured I — we — needed more onstage story opportunities in this town. So I’m doing the work to make that happen. Story League, as the nascent group is called, will be more like a guild. No classes, no open-mic, no nonsense. Just a small group of people who are serious about performing stories worth telling. Helping each other out. I’ve devised a whole schema for how it will work that borrows a few things from the traditional writers’ group, some other bits from existing story groups, but is geared differently. If you are interested in joining us, email me at smshrake at storyleague.org.

Wow, that was BORING! I’ll get back to writing real stories now.