Episode 3: Michael talks about how to throw a good sleeper, the trapeze, and the Cold Fusion. We also drew the winner of the Dark Magic yo-yo by YoYoJam that was donated by Alex Jacobs. (Thanks again you rock, Alex!)

P.S. Don’t forget the question of the week, who or what got you into yo-yoing and what was your first yo-yo?

Episode 2: Michael talks about the forward pass, the sideways world tour, and the McBride Roller Coaster. We’re also going to be giving away a Dark Magic yo-yo by YoYoJam that was donated by Alex Jacobs to help out with the show, Thanks again you rock, Alex!

If you’d like a chance to win the Dark Magic all you have to do is subscribe to the newsletter on the right side of the page before Tuesday, March 9th, 2010. On Tuesday I’ll put all the names of people who have subscribed in a hat and draw one out on camera for episode #3. Don’t forget the question of the week: What’s your favorite yo-yo company and why? Leave your answer in the comments

Episode 1: Michael introduces the Learn to Throw Yo-Yo Show, how to hold and throw a yo-yo correctly, and the trick Montgomery Twist.

Hey everyone! The Learn to Throw book just arrived and I wanted to share the unpacking with all of you! Thanks to everyone who helped me along the way with this project, Cameron Rosenthal for taking the pictures, Erika Harmon for editing it, Adam Haroun for making the cover REALLY pop! You’re all amazing and really great people! If you’re interested in buying a copy of the book it will be available on Lulu.com shortly. I’ll be posting a link to it here on my website, most likely in the right hand column.

For a long time now I’ve been wanting to start my own online yo-yo show, I decide it’s time to stop thinking about it and just do it! Right now I’m putting together a show schedule, I have the first episode planned and will be taping it Tuesday, February 23, 2010 and releasing it on the following Wednesday (24th).

This video shows the intro I came up with, nothing to special, basically staking my claim

If you have any questions about yo-yoing, me, etc please let me know via comments and I’ll answer them in the first episode

Thursday was my hard working day. I woke up, spent an hour focusing on personal development (some audio books I stumbled across thanks to Russell Yermal), and then got dressed for business and headed down to Moxie Java with my laptop. I figured if I was going to be working on my book what better place than a coffee shop to keep me awake and get me into a groove. (My friends think I was being too cliche, I think they need to try and write a book without easy access to coffee.) After seven hours (got there at 11) I left Moxie Java for a Ren Faire Committee meeting (I’m behind on putting together their website, opps!) laptop in hand. Everything I wrote down on Wednesday that I needed to do to feel I was finished I had checked off except for the Acknowledgements page, the copyright page, and the index pages. Today I finished all of that except for the index page which I’m pretty sure I don’t need anyways.

One of my more recent decisions with this book is to publish it initially as an eBook but allow myself the option of selling physical copies if people want one (or two, or five). So I looked around and have been considering using Lulu.com to get started. I am also considering Amazon but considering how I can’t find any links on their website on ‘how to publish your book on amazon’ and how Lulu has a big old button on the top left side that says “publish” I think they’ll be getting my attention first.

Learn to Throw Sneak Peak

There are a few things I’d like to do before I publish it though; I have a friend at the Messenger Index here in town, Erika Harmon, who is their editor who offered to edit the book for me when it was done (she actually edited it as a transcript last year). I’d like to get her the current pdf and make sure I’m not overlooking some idiotic error. Another friend of mine, Adam Haroun who is brilliant with graphic design offered to help me out if I ever needed it and I’d like to see if he can make the cover really pop (since I’d be printing the book too, I want it to catch eyes on shelves ). He’s amazing by the way and he’s got his own graphic design business started, you should check it out if you ever need help with graphics, I’m pretty sure you can find it through his site http://www.adamharoun.com/.

I do have a few pictures of me in the book that I didn’t take that I need to ask permission to use and I would like to add a few ‘title pages’ introducing different sections of the book and lastly an updated bio that will make clear who I am, what my mission and vision are, and how to get a hold of me for help and such. After that I’m done! I can move on to writing book two for the intermediates and possibly even recording video to go along with the book. I’ve even been told by Justin Burns who I was on the Go-Giver Tour with to record an audio version of the book, he says it’s huge these days. I’m still not sure… Yo-Yoing is a rather visual hobby… I still think video would work better. What do you think?

I’ll be letting you guys know more about the book as I get closer to publishing it, it’s over due, should have been done last year, but I’m happy that I took the advice I’m always getting to ‘just freaking do it’ and that I did it. If you’re interested in buying the book at all let me know, I’ll make sure to email you when I have more info on how to get a copy for yourself or your sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, grandsons, granddaughters, etc Have a great weekend folks!

Just wanted to share the video of my Freestyle (which I got Tommy to record, thanks again Tommy! ).

Also decided to start showing DTIstore.com some love; it pales in comparison to themikemonty.com and I don’t think it should, in my opinion it should make theMikeMonty.com pale. But that’s what I’m going to be doing, getting the site tuned up and ready to fly. I also have a lot of plans for the company to, started a mailing list for the monthly newsletter, member of the list get a chance to win a free shirt once a month. We’re gonna start doing a monthly yo-yo video contest too, we tried it out back around june of 2009 and had a few entries and people seemed to really enjoy it. And the final three irons in the fire for now are yo-yo related. 1) We’re in the process of manufacturing our very own yo-yo that will be called the BaseBoost. We’re looking for quote on production and are moving towards prototyping. 2) We are starting the process of making one yo-yo related shirt per month. and 3) I’m going to be publishing my how-to yo-yo book as an eBook to raise funds for physical printing as well as the yo-yo manufacturing. The book will “published by” DTI.

That’s it for now. Later folks!

Well gonna go and focus on the audio reading Later!