Well, THAT went surprisingly well

I spent the better part of the last week convincing myself that I wasn't going to have stage fright.  Working on the theory that, hey, it's a mental thing anyway, so I was just gonna make an active decision not to do it.  (There was a small moment of concern that I was spending too much time thinking about the concept of stage fright that I would actually talk myself into it.)  But, basically, I stuck with the "just deciding not to put up with that stage fright crap" thing, and it largely worked.  OK, sure, the first award I presented --

-- perhaps I didn't exactly mention that this was our annual Theatre Awards show.  Put on by the Critics organization of which I am a member.  (But not, thankfully, co-produced by me this year.  Much happiness.)  --

So, the first award I presented, yeah, OK, I messed up on reading the name of the theatre for the first nominee.  But I wasn't wigged out by it or anything, and just plowed on.  And by the end of that first sequence of three awards, I was actually having some fun with it and (and I really love this part) mentally in that "meta-" place where I could actually judge how well it was going over and make the occasional adjustment.  So, yeah, really good, and either I'm actually getting more comfortable on stage, or I can highly recommend the whole Mind Over Stage Fright method.

The more difficult award, though, was one I did later in the evening.  The award presentation was the sign language thing I'd been working on.  We were giving an award to a wonderful ASL interpreter, so we thought it would be nifty if I signed the presentation.  And this actually went over very well.  Got through the presentation with my hands misbehaving only once (well, ok, twice, but it was on the same damn word), earned a couple laughs (only one of which I was actually expecting), and, most importantly, totally pleased the dude who was getting the award.  Because, sure, while for the past month or so, it was all about me learning to sign this thing, what it all REALLY came down to was doing this to convey my admiration for the dude's work.  And I did that.  So I am totally pleased with the evening.