Oh wow, what a game. Total nail-bitter down to the end. No, no, I’m not talking about the actual play on the field. I’m talking about the commercials. I watched them all, hoping to be impressed. I was less than impressed. Sure, the Doritos time machine ad was clever, the Budweiser puppy and horse ad was cute, and the Stephen Colbert pistachio ad was funny. There was one ad, though, I knew would irritate a few people when it aired.

Coca-Cola ran an ad in which “America, the Beautiful” is sung in a variety of languages. I believe it was done to showcase the melting pot that is our country. However, others took it another way, and you can check out some of their social media responses over on UPROXX.com.

My co-worker and I were talking about the commercial this morning, and we got into a discussion about learning languages. Okay, sure this intro is a roundabout way of getting to my point, which is that learning languages is beneficial to your brain. For one, learning a foreign language can help your brain grow.  It can also help with your memory and change the way you see the world.

Learning a new language can be fun, too. I’m currently learning French, and there are two websites that offer free language learning courses—Memrise.com and Duolingo.com. Both offer smartphone apps, and Memrise goes one better by offering an app called CatAcademy. Yes, it’s exactly how it sounds. Cats will teach you a new language (see video above). Currently, the cats only teach Spanish, and the app is only available for iPhones (which rankles my Android hide). More language lessons are forthcoming, along with Android accessibility (I hear the cats have a fear of robots).

See, this blog post wasn’t so bad. We started off on a serious note and ended up talking about cats. That’s pretty much how the Internet operates anyway.

IAVM’s 2014 Performing Arts Managers Conference is just weeks away. Since time is winding down to register, we want to remind members to make plans to take advantage of the conference and Kansas City’s vibrant performing arts scene while they are in town. Not only will you be inspired by the conference’s the great education and networking opportunities, but you’ll be energized by the rich array of venues and performances you can experience during your stay.

We will visit a few of these great venues as part of the conference, or you can plan to attend the following performances during your free time:
Kansas City Ballet’s Dracula at Kauffman Center
Kansas City Symphony with Indigo Girls at Kauffman Center
Kauffman Center Presents National Geographic Live at Kauffman Center
Kansas City Repertory Theatre’s When I Come to Die at Copaken Stage
Kansas City Irish Center Presents Paul Byrom at the Folly Theater
Carlsen Center presents David Finckel and Wu Han
Sprint Center Presents PBR: Professional Bull Riders at the Sprint Center

We’ll go back stage for behind the scenes tours during the conference and from 1:30 to 5 pm on Tuesday, February 25, so plan your departure flight accordingly.
Music Hall – an art deco theater that hosts Broadway tours
The Copaken Stage – a theater inside the HR Block headquarters
Midland Theatre – a Loew’s movie palace from the 1920s now manager by AEG Live
Starlight Theatre – an outdoor venue for 8,000 with a climate-controlled stage
Olson Performing Arts Center – performance home to the University of Missouri-Kansas City music, dance, and theater programs

Performing Arts Managers Conference
February 22-25, 2014
Kansas City, MO
Register today.

(photo credit: greenzowie via photopin cc)

There was a lot of news this past week you may have missed. Here are some headlines that caught our eyes.

Organizing a Safe Court-Storming Celebration
—Athletic Business
“The issue of court-storming in college basketball was thrust back into the spotlight last spring after Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski criticized the handling of the situation after an upset loss to Virginia, claiming his players were endangered by onrushing fans.”

Boston Data Theft Protection Summit Slated
—EXPO
“The Massachusetts Convention Center Authority will host a conference designed to help protect trade show and convention attendees from credit card information theft.”

Centerplate’s Hague is on Top of His Game
—Stamford Advocate
“Hague, 46, knows all about the pressure and pride of creating an exciting Super Bowl experience. His company has hosted 12 Super Bowls, including three of the last four—New Orleans, Miami and Indianapolis. It has also serviced 20 World Series and 15 U.S. presidential balls.”

What’s Keeping Fans Out of Stadiums
—FOXBusiness
“Most professional sports teams rely on filling stadiums as their main revenue source, but that’s not the case for football. Ironically, it’s the league’s biggest revenue source, TV, that has become its biggest competitor for getting fans in stadium seats.”

Carolina Panthers Running Back DeAngelo Williams to Make Cameo Appearance in Broadway’s Rock of Ages
—TheaterMania
“Broadway’s Rock of Ages has announced that All-Pro running back DeAngelo Williams of the Carolina Panthers will join fellow NFL superstars Randall Cobb of the Green Bay Packers, Joique Bell of the Detroit Lions, and four-time Pro Bowler Ahman Green in making his Broadway debut in a special cameo role at the Helen Hayes Theatre.”

(photo credit: jmcmann via photopin cc)

Ripping open that bag of Kettle Maple Bacon chips at the end of the day isn’t due to a lack of self control. It’s because you wanted to eat those delicious, tasty, bacon-flavored chips.

“It’s not that people cannot control themselves, it’s that they don’t feel like controlling themselves, at least on certain tasks,” said Michael Inzlicht of the University of Toronto Scarborough.

In a paper published in Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Inzlicht, Brandon Schmeichel from Texas A&M University, and Neil Macrae from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, show that self-control is not a limited resource and that people should find pleasure in productive activities.

“In short, when people are ‘depleted’ or fatigued, they experience a change in motivational priorities such that they attend to—and work less for—things they feel obliged to do, and attend to—and work more for—things they want to do [and] things they like doing.”

It’s a long-standing belief that self-control is a resource that can be drained and that when it’s exhausted we are powerless to our urges and perform duties less optimally. However, Inzlicht, Schmeichel, and Macrae suggest that our decline in performance isn’t due to a lack of self control. It’s because we shift our priorities.

Inzlicht says that we increase our self-control by changing the ways we relate to our goals, changing “have-tos” into “want-tos.” And if that doesn’t work, you should plan for the inevitable changes in your motivational states by taking breaks.

“Breaks and vacations are not antithetical to productivity, but may actually boost it,” Inzlicht said. “Some smart companies already realize this.”

Changing a “have-to” to a “want-to” is not impossible, either.

“If someone wants to eat healthier, they should think of the enjoyment that they can get from eating delicious, yet healthy, foods; in contrast, they should probably not frame their eating goal as something they feel obliged to do because their doctor or spouse is trying to convince them to do so,” Inzlicht said. “The key is finding a way to want and like the goal that you are chasing.”

(photo credit: coldpants via photopin cc)

Severe weather can occur at any time of the year, although many areas across the country see the majority of their severe weather from March through August.  As our venues approach the busy spring event season, we thought it would be good to remind our venue managers about severe weather preparedness. We encourage you to sign up for IAVM’s Severe Weather Preparedness taking place March 4-5 at the National Weather Center in Norman, Oklahoma. In the meanwhile, here are some amazing lightning facts that might inspire you to take action.

Lightning Facts 101

Lightning takes many forms: cloud-to-cloud, cloud to ground, or the reverse, as ground-to-sky discharge. Regardless of the direction of the lightning stroke, a great deal of energy is released as the electrical charge balance of the earth’s atmosphere is restored.

There is an average of 25 million lightning strikes each year. Each day the earth is struck by lightning about 10,000 times so that’s about 100 strikes per second.

Top 5 States                                      Strikes per Year      Strikes per Square Mile

#5 South Carolina/Oklahoma (tie)            451,841                                             14.6

#4 Alabama                                                824,171                                            15.9

#3 Mississippi                                             856,384                                           18.0

#2 Louisiana                                               942,128                                            20.3

#1 Florida                                                    1.45 million                                       25.3

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