I survived no PC... but can I be an ultimate survivor?

Hey, neighbors, it's your buddy next door, Mason Stewart, I'm so excited to be back in the booth with you, like I'm beyond excited. And the reason for my excitement is purely this, my computer is back up and running, I was working off of a laptop that was extremely so I didn't have memory for it. Like it's just kind of like an old relic of a past time, you know. And so I wasn't able to make my videos like I wanted to wasn't able to do my posts like I wanted to. And so I took the time to refine a few things, different things like that. And now we're here, computers fixed, they gave me a brand new motherboard, they gave me a brand new graphics card. So we're living the high life right now we've got a computer back in working condition, everything was able to be installed, everything's running perfectly. It's a dream, I can't even tell you how much of a dream it is. So we're going to kind of do a quick recap of everything that's been going on in my life over the past a month ish, and talk about kind of things for the future and what I'm seeing. So first thing to report on is I'm still doing that class with Jennifer Hale. As a reminder, she's a big name in the voice acting industry, especially in animation and games, she's probably most well known for her voice acting as the playable character, the female version, in Mass Effect. So Shepherd, if you choose the female Shepherd, she plays that character. She's the main character you play with the whole time. I know her best from Overwatch, because I play that game probably too much. And she plays ash in there tells Bob do something. So yeah, the class has been going really good. The inner, something interesting happened to me during these classes. So the main point of these classes is to focus in and really find what we're trying to focus on for 90 days after this class is done. We're picking one lane of voiceover. And my first impression was, I don't know where my voice fits. I have all of these different demos. I've sent stuff out. I've gotten a few jobs, but I've never gotten consistent jobs in one category. And so during one lessons q&a, I was able to ask Jennifer, this question. I said, I don't know where my voice fits. I know what's a good fit for voiceover. But I don't know where I fit into the voiceover community. I don't know what to focus on. I'm being drawn to all these different areas. And she said, Okay, what's your driving motivation? And I told her the truth. And I'm going to tell you guys the truth right now. The entire reason I got into voiceover touching the money. It's a very lucrative career. That's, that's like the main driving reason I decided to start pursuing it. And she said, that's totally fine. Like, if you don't have the artistic drive, that's fine. Talk about the different jobs you got. So I mentioned I've done like, a couple of commercials. I've done an elearning. I've done audiobooks, all those different things. And she said, Kay, which one did you have the most fun doing? I sat there and I thought and I said, probably the audiobook? And she said, Okay, which one did you have? Which one did you make the most money with? And I stopped, and I thought, and I said audiobook? And she said, Well, there's your answer right there. If you enjoyed audiobooks, and you made the most money with audiobooks, then that's what you're going to focus on for these 90 days. And he hit me and it was like I was overcomplicating things so much. And so it was such a good reminder to me, that sometimes when we're looking at something, and we're trying to be objective, but it's something that impacts us directly, whether that's work, relationship, different things like that. Sometimes it's very hard for us to see the glaringly obvious, and in this case, the glaringly obvious for me was that I enjoyed audiobooks, and I made the most money doing it, so why not continue on that trend. So I'm going to still do my auditions for all of these other different types of voiceover, you know, animation commercial when those auditions come in, but I'm not going to actively, like seek them out and do anything like that. But I'm going to be like going hard into audiobooks and really kind of trying to hone that because after the 90 days, we get a one on one with Jennifer. And we get to really dive in and see how that process went, what went well what went poorly and kind of get her feedback on it. So I'm very excited for that. Next week is our last like in person zoom class.

So yeah, that should be good. Outside of voiceover for the recap going on. Not a whole lot. Just doing voiceover stuff trying to get my PC fixed. Trying to Jerry Rig, you know my studio They'll set up so that I can get it taken care of and still do voiceover auditions, different stuff like that. But outside of that didn't really do a whole lot had a fun football party, I don't know what to call it because not Super Bowl, fun football party to celebrate some big games, my team lost horribly Utah State versus Alabama don't look up the score, it was not pretty. Did that with my brother. So it's really good time to spend time with him get some good food, all that jazz. Outside of that, you know, not not a whole lot going on. Outside of that, you know, just go into church doing all doing all the normal stuff, right? That's what it boils down to. But jumping into something that I'm excited I'm looking forward to. So I'm taking a different six week class. That is called booking basics. And it's being held by a guy named Scott burns. Scott Burns is a very talented voice actor and voice director and producer. So he's been on both sides of the glass, so he knows what producers are looking for. And he knows how to treat voice actors. In fact, he was one the original North American voice of Bowser in Super Mario Sunshine, one of the only times boys boys or Bowser ever had a voice actor. So really cool. I'm very excited for it. We're going through like a lot of different ways to be, you know, bookable in different areas of voiceover. So I'm very excited for that. Let's see, what else do we have? I think that's it on like, on the recap stuff and stuff that's going on. In the world of Voiceover The big news for me, and like I've talked to you guys before and I'm going to continue to talk about it here is Overwatch two is on the horizon. I don't know if it was out. The date was released by the last time I recorded a vlog I don't remember. But October 4 is now the official day that Overwatch two is going to be launching. And what that means for you hear that, watch my videos. Read my blog, listen to the podcast, whoever, whatever. I am definitely going to be doing a lot more streaming when I'm not doing any of this. Any of this voiceover work. I currently don't have any small children. I don't have any children. I have a cat. I've got a wife that streams so my evenings when I'm done with VoiceOver stuff for the day. I don't have a lot going on. So expect a lot more streams make sure you head over to twitch.tv/solar pancake, S O L r p ANCKCAKE. I know how to spell pancake. Yeah, so solar without the A so S O L R and then pancake slash? Yep, twitch.tv/solar Pancake calm and check it out. Have a good time. The first week that week of Overwatch two, I have an abundance of paid time off just kind of sitting in my bank at work. And I thought you know what I'm going to do. I'm going to work Monday and Tuesday, Tuesday's the day the game comes out, so I'm going to miss the morning time of it. But that's fine. Allow all the servers to crash all the all the issues right get resolved. And then as soon as I get off work, I do my voiceover stuff. We're going to jump right into streaming and then Wednesday through Saturday, I'm probably going to be streaming every single day. Because Overwatch too is out. I'm going to stream it. Granted. Please keep in mind, I'm not just some degenerate living in my own basement eating pizza rolls, Doritos, Mountain Dew, although I probably will have all three of those things. When I'm playing because Easy, easy gamer food, am I right? Am I right? But I'm still going to be doing voiceover stuff, I'm still going to be providing you guys content as well. I don't want to leave you guys out to dry. I don't want to leave myself out to dry with my business. So I'm still going to be making sure I take time to do all of that. But I'm also taking time away from my job from my day job, taking a break and really focusing on just voiceover and just streaming Overwatch too. So I'm very excited to make sure you tune in starting October 4. And we're going to be having some great new content there.

But other than that there's not a whole lot going on. I didn't want this video to be super long because there's so much that has gone on in the world in voiceover in my life. I didn't want to like burden you guys down with all these different things. But really, the one thing I want to leave you with as we get into kind of our thinking part of the podcast vlog blog. I'm gonna I don't know if I'm gonna call it Mason's thinking time or Mason's moment who I like Mason's moment, get that double M going on. So that's what we're gonna call it. It's time for Masons moment and maybe I'll put a little graphic right here Masons moment. Anyways, Masons moment, really what it's going to be it's going to be some kind have mental outlook or thought that really struck me this week. And we've kind of done this in the past, I've talked about it. But over the course of this last little bit doing, you know, not having my PC not being able to do all the voiceover stuff I want. Really, I was struggling with depression. I felt like I wasn't good enough. I felt like maybe I was wasting my money with these classes that I wasn't doing anything that I needed to do. Part of these classes that Jennifer is having us do is we have homework and part of that homework is every day, we do this thing that takes about five minutes. It's called a make it so. And Jennifer recorded this for us. It was a guided meditation. And I encourage each of you to find either a way to record yourself, you could always give me a call, I'll maybe do a quick one for you for a small fee, wink, wink, nod nod. But a guided meditation of what your goal is. So my goal is as a voice actor to be a voice actor, right? So you start and you breathe, you know, and you're getting yourself into a very Zen state. And then she describes being in a studio and the the quietness of studio, if you've ever been in a recording studio, there's kind of a mystical client about a recording studio that you really can't find anywhere else. And talking about how you feel good about the performance you've done. And you can see the people on the other side of the glass and they're telling you Good job, you know, in my case, good job, Mason, that was perfect, exactly what we needed there and stuff like that, and you're visualizing this in your brain. And then you fast forward and you're going out to your mailbox, and you open the mail, and there's a check in, it's a really good check. And you realize you did it with your voice, because that's what you do, this is who you are. And that has been so powerful for me. There have been so many times this past month, where I have felt downtrodden, distraught, I'm a very anxious person when it comes to things not going like according to like my vision of it, or where I feel like I should be on my path. But having that headspace and knowing I'm putting in the work, I'm doing the things I need to do getting good feedback from Jennifer and these other coaches knowing that I'm on a good path. And to take myself to the next step further. That's what it's about. And that was able to help my mindset. So I highly encourage you guys, even if you don't have a specific goal, take some time, find an app, there are lots of apps and YouTube videos of guided meditation, just to help you release from all the stress and everything is truly helped me out. So I want to I want to issue that, that challenge to you all find a time to do some guided meditation because it is magical what it does for you. Well, that's going to be it. But as you all know, that's not the end of the vlog. We move on to probably everybody's favorite part. And that is our food adventure. And today's food adventure is very interesting for myself. I grew up eating a lot of, you know, like, kind of like our treat our treat. thing is we would be able to go to the frozen section and get like the banquet TV dinners, or like a little pot pie. You know, the little banquet pot pies come in like the tinfoil thing. Well, I was going through the store, the week that my computer died and I was supposed to record a video and I had this all planned out. But we still have it. And apparently I don't know when they started to do this. I don't know how long it's been maybe I've just been out of the loop. But banquet doesn't just make pies. They also make like pie pies. I don't know how to say fruit pies. I guess there's a better way to put a traditional pie. So I'm trying out one of their furrows in peach pies today. So

I'm going to go and make sure that that's all ready to go and I'll be right back to show you that magical peach pie. All right, neighbors, we're back. Excuse my hair. It's been a little bit crazy day. But we're back. We've got our pie. We'll do that. See if I were to tell you that it was a normal pie. You probably wouldn't believe me. You think that is a banquet pot pie right there. That's a frozen pot pie. But this is a peach pie. So we're gonna give it a try. There's our food adventure for the week. I hope to have some better food adventures going on in the future for you. But this is what I had on hand. It was For a previous one so hope you all are excited. Let's give it a shot. I'm going to kind of open it up. Give you guys a look so you can see you got Oh Lindsey you got some peaches there you got your peach juice. You got your crust so let's give it a taste Shall we

y'all surprisingly pretty good. I'm not saying it's like amazing. This this crust was always not been my favorite but like the actual filling inside really good peaches you get like a hint of cinnamon. A nice little sweetness. I'm gonna take another bite here. That's how good I think it is. Goodbye

Yeah, that was solid. And it was like it was like a buck 10 If you need something sweet, you're craving a little peach pie action. You don't want a whole pie, frozen section, banquet it up. Got yourself a nice peach pie. They also I believe they had a berry and a cherry one as well. I went with the peach because I love good peach pie.

One last thing before I take off for this week, I have entered the Ultimate Voice Over Survivor competition. I have entered in every category and I would appreciate it so very much if you could visit getmicd.com/UVOS and find my entries and rate them and leave a comment if you’d like to as well. Thank you all so much for your support! That's where I'm going to leave it today, folks. I hope you guys enjoyed and I'll catch you guys on the next one. We'll see you then.