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Monday, December 7, 2009

Inside the Magic Kingdom?


dinner tables

Tonight we attended a nice dinner, given by our church, for all volunteers. I'm not doing much these days, but hubby is, so we were invited. Let me first say, that this is not our church building. The dinner was hosted at an assisted living home in our town. I'm not sure why, but it was a nice building.

violinists

We had live music to eat by!

Pastor Jeff said a few words based on the book "Inside the Magic Kingdom," which explores the seven keys to the phenomenal success of the Disney enterprises. One of those keys is in the way it treats employees. Basically the idea is positive reinforcement, with no feedback being just as bad as negative feedback. Thus, they decided to say a very nice "thank you" to volunteers. After dinner the program was some improv comedy by a group from Grand Rapids called River City Improv. Two of their skits were very funny.

improv

This skit called on two volunteers from the audience. The audience supplied a work place idea (in this case, an office). The girl in green and the guy were from the improv team. They could talk, and they made up a discussion on the fly. This one had the girl as the guy's manager and she was calling him to account for losing a ream of paper. Well, that was all immaterial, and pretty much lost to view, as the part that made it hilarious was that the team members could talk, but not move. The two from the audience (ladies in the red and pink shirts), had to move the team members as if they were jointed dolls. So they had to follow the fast conversation and try to move the improv's bodies into positions that made sense with the dialogue. It was hard to get a picture that really captured it, but this was the best one I shot.

improv

Another funny skit was set up by asking the pastor to pick some ordinary thing he had done in the course of the day. He said "I went home to feed the dog." So the skit proceeded with the team doing a breaking news broadcast of the scandal just reported about the pastor feeding the dog. It went on and on about dogs all over the city being fed, and paparazzi gathered on his lawn to try to catch pictures of the dog being fed. Then they did an interview with the "pastor's parents" as to how they felt about the dog being fed. So that is what is happening in the picture above. Well, Jeff's parents were there, and I managed to catch them during the "interview." Jeff is on the left, then his oldest son, and his parents are on the right.

Hackert family

Just a fun evening.



11 comments:

Rick (Ratty) said...

That sounds and looks like a really good time. I've only seen improv things like this on TV, but everybody involved always seems to have such a great time with it.

Jean said...

awww...evry1 is so happy..

A smile from SJ =)

VanillaSeven said...

Wow, Ratty really steal the show here :) Thanks for the award Sharkie :)

wenn said...

fun time..

Anonymous said...

Sounds like you had fun!

Secondary Roads said...

What a great idea! Looks like fun. If we had a dinner for volunteers in our small country church, just about everyone would be included.

RNSANE said...

Simple things are the best - you don't need to spend a fortune and dress to the nines and drive fifty miles to have a wonderful time!

Grampy said...

Sounds like you had a fun time.We love that sort of thing.Enjoy.

Ann said...

Sounds like a very entertaining evening. Nothing better than getting out and having a good laugh.

Glynis Peters said...

What fun! Thanks for sharing.

Sharkbytes said...

It was the first time I'd seen live improv too. They started slow, but it got better.

SJ- Yes, it was a happy evening.

Vanilla- You are welcome! Thanks for visiting.

wenn & Icy BC- I think everyone really appreciated it.

Chuck- there were a good portion of this group too, but that's the way Jeff wanted it.

Carmen- You got that right!

Grampy- I really like the live music and entertainment. We have gotten so used to the perfection of TV or movies that we forget there are real people doing these things.

Ann & Glynis- The laughing was very good.