Stage fright. I think at some point, everyone has had it. But Miyamoto has more reason to be afraid than most. She has actually screwed up on stage before. Her fear is justified by experience.

It’s even worse because, in the era of the Internet, her humiliation has been posted online for the whole world to see, even a year later.  When I was in high school, if you screwed up, well, that sucked, but no one would remember by the next week. Miyamoto’s screw-up wasn’t even really that bad. I’ve had situations where someone did the same thing but with a drum, cymbal or trumpet. And everyone had forgotten that by the next day. Plus, it doesn’t seem like many people are attending this recital anyway.

I’ve had stage fright with playing the trombone, with singing, and with giving presentations. My fear of presentations was especially severe. I would start dreading them months in advance. But practice really does make perfect. For the past few years I’ve given a ton of presentations, and I’m not afraid anymore. I hate preparing the presentation more than I hate giving it now.

I don’t think there’s any secret to it, like the pumpkin patch strategy. It’s just that people are afraid of what they aren’t used to. Become accustomed to giving presentations and it isn’t scary anymore. To get practice, sometimes you need a little help from your friends:

I thought when she raised her hand we were going to get a Bright slap. This seems a lot more humiliating somehow.

It’s Over?

This episode delivered an epic buildup when the club doesn’t have a sponsor to take them to the concert venue. Our club members spend the next hour running all over town on their own so that they can have a sponsor be present at the school event. The teacher driving them there doesn’t count, of course, nor does the vice principal herself, since they are not the club sponsor or assistant sponsor. The fact that their sponsor just had a car accident will garner them no sympathy. Protocols need to be followed, you know.

The choir still doesn’t make it in time, since they are incapable of delaying the sparsely attended show by thirty seconds so that the rest of the club can arrive. So Miyamoto and her assistant have to sing the song by themselves as the rest of the club watches from the sidelines.

Tari Tari made a much bigger deal of the sponsor trouble than it needed to. No one cares if their sponsor is there except the vice-principal, who is a prude. But we already know she is a prude. This entire conflict added nothing to the story except to kick all the supporting singers in the choir out of the picture. Miyamoto quit the choir because she wasn’t going to be allowed to sing at the concert. Now the new choir can’t sing at the concert either. Great.

So our heroine has overcome her fears and achieved her dreams! She sings lip synchs as the credits roll and the show ends. The show’s over. It was a good ride.

Oh wait, it’s only the second episode. What?

Further Thoughts

Clearly this teacher has a lot to learn from Miyamoto. If you can’t bring joy to yourself, how are you supposed to bring joy to others? This teacher sure isn’t bringing joy to her students.

What the hell? Regardless, awesome character. Too bad he’s been incapacitated.

Just when I thought the hobbies in this show couldn’t get any weirder than horseback riding, archery and badminton.

The usual shower scene is much more entertaining when the genders are reversed.