If you want to master a sport, you have to consistently practice the skills to excel at that sport. If you're going to master an art form, you have to consistently practice the skills to excel at that art form. If you want to master happiness, you need to consistently practice the skills to excel at being happy!

Yesterday was Doug's and my first wedding anniversary. We have been stressed getting another condo ready for Airbnb, so we decided a weekend getaway would do us some good.  

I had to put down our glo betta fish, Macauley, Monday night. Doug and I found him in an abandoned house two years ago, floating around in a dirty little aquarium. Doug was listing the house and was so busy taking pictures that he didn't even notice the aquarium sitting on the kitchen counter. I did, looked in, and saw the sweet little neon yellow guy with big black eyes staring back up at me. I don't know how long he'd been there.

2024 is looking amazing! I was selected to teach my Comedy Writing for Stage Hypnotists at the Performing Hypnosis Summit in February. In July, I'll teach my first 3-Day Certification of The Hilarity And Hypnosis Approach (HAHA!). This class is truly the culmination of my life's work as a comedian and a hypnotist.

Add my "perfectionist tendencies" to this mix, and now I'm cooking with a recipe for disaster. It's easy to tell myself, "You're never going to learn all that music." "You don't have the piano-playing chops you had in college, what makes you think you can play this now?" "These pieces aren't that hard. Why are you having so much trouble getting them?" "You can sing for comedy, but can you sing seriously?" "Your voice after that thyroid surgery 10 years ago isn't the same.

My to-do list at any given time has 150-200 items. With the holidays approaching, this goes up exponentially! My body needed a break. My husband, Doug, turned on the TV, and we were binge-watching Christmas movies before I knew it. We watched A Christmas Story Christmas (sequel to A Christmas Story with Peter Billingsly), Four Christmases (Vince Vaughan & Reese Witherspoon), and Candy Cane Lane (Eddie Murphy).

Thanksgiving is a holiday that has become synonymous with gratitude. But how did this happen? The tradition of Thanksgiving dates back to the 17th century when the Pilgrims celebrated their first successful harvest in Plymouth. They invited the Native Americans, who had helped them survive their first year, to join them in a feast. This was a time of giving thanks for their blessings, thus setting the stage for Thanksgiving to be associated with gratitude.

I just completed my 54th trip around the sun last week. This birthday was a "simple pleasures" birthday. I took the day off of work and spent quality time with my husband, running errands. One of our "errands" was a trip to the Pinball Museum in Tarpon Springs. I love pinball! We played pinball for hours, did window shopping, and then headed home for a lobster and shrimp dinner. We had friends over Friday evening for a birthday party and cocktails. It was just perfect.

Earlier this year, I found myself with 2 pianos. I tried selling one, but no one was interested after 6 months on the Facebook marketplace and another online dedicated piano listing service. I decided to keep it and moved the second piano to my home. What, exactly, does one do with two pianos when one can only play one piano at a time? You make musical lemonade.

I returned last night from Hypnothoughts, the largest hypnosis conference in the world. I was there to teach three classes: Yoda-Nosis, Psycho Patterns, and Comedy Writing for Stage Hypnotists. I was also there to take two courses from David Snyder; Identity by Design and Vibrational Healing. It was an action-packed two weeks.

I’m wrapping up a tumultuous few weeks that have been nothing but GO-GO-GO. I’m tired and unable to get caught up because I've been at Hypnothoughts this past week. Hypnothoughts is the world's largest hypnosis conference, and I'm teaching and taking classes there. I'm having a great time, but at the end of the day, my body tells me I'm doing too much. I need to start saying “NO.”

My first “exposure” to a nudist community was in January 2009 when I was hired to do a comedy show at a clothing-optional resort. I had no idea how that one show would change my life. That one show sent me down a road that would allow me to develop a comedy show that would eventually introduce me to some of the coolest people on the planet and send me to perform comedy worldwide. However, in the early days of my comedy career, I had to keep my shows at nudist resorts and swinger events on the down low.