Tag: pattern game

How to do a pattern game

The pattern game is an improv exercise and an opening for Harold. Use it to map out a network of words and ideas which all connect to the suggestion.

A pattern game is an improv exercise. Take a suggestion and through associations, map out a web of words, ideas, memories & thoughts which all connect back to the original word. Historically it has been used as the primary opening for Harold. The pattern game has evolved and changed over the years. Here is how it was taught to me, 25 years ago, and how I’ve taught it ever since.

Continue reading “How to do a pattern game”

Life is a pattern game

Last Spring, I listened to Freakonomics on CD as I drove from Illinois to Arizona. In the appendix, the authors have a short article on Seth Roberts and his strange idea that drinking sugar water can lead to weight loss.

A month or two later, frustrated with my inability to lose weight on my own, I looked up Seth’s scientific paper online about what makes food fattening and tried his method. It worked! I started losing weight again.

After a few weeks of sipping sugar water and drinking olive oil, I spent a week in New York for the Del Close Marathon. I was explaining it to a friend and he responded, “Oh you mean the Shangri-la Diet.”

Continue reading “Life is a pattern game”