Episode XIII: The Fallout Begins

Whelp, I went and did it. I told myself and my readers that I would not do this, but here I am, head hung low, in the very situation that I did not want to be in. It’s June 6th, 2010, which means that it has been exactly 3 months and 9 days since my last blog. I said that I would not put a post off that long, but, being the procrastinating and lazy person that I am, I did. I am deeply sorry. I hope I did not ruin anyone’s schedule, or drive anyone wide eyed and crazy, waiting day in and day out for the next episode to pop up in their email or rss feed. I have this vision of thousands of people waking up and running to their computers, turning them on, eagerly awaiting and salivating through the boot-up process, clicking the bookmark to my page, which of course is the only icon on the entire desktop. Then my graphic finally pops up, and they breath in, and grasp their chair to brace themselves for the exhilarating jolt of delightful perturbation that runs through them when they read the title of my next episode in this stirring and zestful story…but again…it’s not there. They relax their grip, their shoulders slowly drop, and they look down to one side at the floor, and stare in disappointment. Then, after a few moments of coming to grips with this bring down, they get up, and shuffle back to bed. Just before leaving the room, they take one look back with a bit of fond hope at the screen…just in case. They nod a bit, in acceptance, because they knew it was going to look just as it did before, with the same old episode they have already read. Back then, when that episode was fresh and novel, things were good…congenial. The expectation of another episode to come within a reasonable amount of time passing was the way of things. Not now. Now it’s just…well…it’s just time to go back to sleep. And they do.


Anyway, all apologies. Did ya like my little story of the forsaken readers? Can ya tell I have been reading a Thesaurus?

Well, it has been quite some time, so enough messin’ around. Let me tell ya what happened next.

Oh, by the way, first thing. I forgot to include one person who helped me out in the weeks leading up to the event. A great article about the upcoming show was written on November 23rd in The City Weekly by Marq Manner. Thanks, Marq, your help in many projects that my friends and I have been involved in over the years has been invaluable. A toast to Marq Manner!

Here is a link to the article at City Weekly's website, and a clip of the actual article as it appeared in the magazine

.http://www.omahacityweekly.com/article/2008/11/12/local-tunes

The first media outlets to respond after the conference were local. They were broadcast that very evening after the record breaking ceremony at Capitol, and before the benefit concert. Channel 3 Live at Five and Channel 7 News at Six both did a story on the record, and plugged the benefit concert still to come later that night. Of course, that was the plan, but they didn’t have to do it. It’s not like we held a gun to their head. None of the other local channels were there. They just did it because they thought it was a good story. Also, Todd Murphy from Universal had the right connections for the local media, and brought more validity to the story. So a big thanks to them, it was way cool of them to show up.






Now, during the weekend after the event, three very important things were happening. Wayne Brekke was putting together the footage and sending it to CNN’s I-Report, Alex Bond was sending his pics and story to wherever he could, and I was updating my sites and spreading the word in the social media realm, and putting together the evidence to send in to Guinness.

The first thing I did when I woke up on Saturday November 15th was write thank you e-mails to everyone involved in the project. I knew I had to get that done before I went on the Internet, otherwise there was a good chance that I would never get it done, and that is something I felt was very important.

Then I hit the information super highway and my e-mail to see what kind of results, if there were any, had popped up or creeped in.

Wayne had e-mailed me a video link. He already did the post production stuff and had the video up on You Tube the very next day! OOO I was GIDDY! I clicked the link and watched it for the first time. I was completely stunned! I watched it again and again. Wayne did a freakin' INCREDIBLE job on this video. I mean that sincerely, it gave me the chills. As I watched it, I knew it was gonna be a hit on the Internet. I posted it on my Myspace site and went straight to e-mailing everyone about it, and put links to it wherever I could. As of this writing, it has been viewed 127, 349 times.

The story was starting to pop up in places here and there on the Internet. To my surprise, AOL.com had already picked it up in their "Weird News" section. It was the pic of me in the dryer chair that Alex Bond took, and I think a link to the local Channel 7 footage. That's where it started on most of the big sites like AOL, in the "What's New With Weird", or "Antic of the Day"  type sections, which was fine with me.
Then I found it on Newsvine, The Examiner, Digg.com, and MSNBC. Those are some heavy-hitting websites that I was on already! Also, I was on the front page of local media websites, channel 3 and channel 7, and the other local media had me on their sites now, too. I was delighted!

Sunday, November 16, 2008.
I had talked with Lindsay Baker of The Reader a couple days before, and we had set up a telephone interview for today at noon to talk about how the events went and things like that. We had a great conversation. Lindsay was fun to talk to. I felt like I was just bullshitting with a high school friend the whole time. She ended up writing a wonderful article that appeared in the following week’s Reader that I will post here soon.

Alex e-mailed me the pictures he took, which turned out great! He gave me a link to a little gallery he created, and told me that his pictures and the story were up on AOL already. I told him that I had seen that, and I was very grateful. Here is the link to his gallery:

http://www.alexpaulbond.com/eric%20haun/

I also got the CD of pictures that paparazzibyapointment.com took. They turned out awesome, and I was organizing them and putting them up on Myspace. I got some pretty good pics from my brother and my mom, too. Then the pics from Sarah and AL, and the video, I was backing it all up and putting what I wanted on my site.

I remember thinking at some point on Sunday that maybe this is about how far it's gonna get. I knew that it would get picked up by a few more media markets, and some other websites were bound to pick up the story from AOL and MSNBC, but that may be about it, and I was alright with that. My story was up on the front page of most the local media websites, I found it on a few other media sites from other cities like Denver and Des Monies, and it was on some national media websites from the top of the heap. Pretty damn good, I thought! It was enough to get me in the record book. I had a great time, learned a lot, helped out some charities, made some new friends and contacts, did what I told the sponsors I would do, and brought an intangible idea out of my mind and into the world to follow it through to a successful conclusion. Yea, I was alright with that.

Then Wayne called. He said CNN’s I-Report wants to do an interview with both him and I over the phone. I was floored.
Wayne had already done this a few weeks before with the Zombie Walk, and I thought something like this may happen, but I also thought they might not want to do an interview with Wayne from Omaha about something in Omaha one right after another. Guess I was wrong. They wanted to do the interview the next day, Nov. 17th.

Kick ASS!!!

I could not sleep Sunday night. I was up late, just as I was Saturday night, posting, searching, reading, responding, e-mailing, working on my videos for You Tube, bookmarking, and conversing with tons of people from all over the world via blogs and social sites.

Monday, November 17th.
I went to work. The first voice I hear is Bobbi’s, the administrative assistant and also the person who created the banner for the event.

“You’re on the front page of AOL! C’mere, c’mere!”. She pulled on my arm and walked me to her computer and there I was. Alex Bond’s picture of me in the dryer chair and the story was right there on the front page of AOL!

A couple hours later, BAM! Wayne’s video was on the front page of MSNBC! It was starting to roll, big time!

Since I work at Universal Information Services, they were helping me by monitoring the media all over the country. Maggie would send me an email every so often to let me know where the story was going. It started popping up in media markets all over the place.

Then, at noon, it was time to go over to Wayne’s house for our interview with CNN’s I-Report. When I got there, he set me up with a phone upstairs, and he went to a phone downstairs. We both had CNN on, because it was a live interview, and waited for the call. It was SO surreal! They were running spots for what was coming up in the show, and they would show a pic of me, and say things like,
“Coming up, a hair-raising experience! What’s it like to break the record for World’s Tallest Mohawk? Well, we’ll be talking to Eric Hahn, who did just that, and I-Reporter Wayne Brekke who was on the scene!”
It was incredible! I cannot tell you how interesting, weird, surreal, scary, and exciting it was to watch commercials for an upcoming LIVE interview… with ME… on NATIONAL LIVE TELEVISION!

Then the phone call. I heard Wayne mumble downstairs. Then he yelled “Ok, pick up the phone!” There was a calm, professional male voice on the other end. He said to hold on for one segment, then commercial, then we will be on. I don’t remember the segment, or a single commercial. Then he came back. “Ok, you guys are up”.

Wayne had told me before pretty much how it was going to go, since he had just done this same thing a couple weeks before. I was nervous, but I knew what to do. Just be myself.

“And here on the phone live with us now are Eric Hahn, and Wayne Brekke. Eric, we’ll start with you. What kind of hair store was it?”

Ya know how sometimes your mind can think a million miles an hour and ask ten questions and answer them within a millisecond? Well, that’s what happened next. She didn’t just ask me what kind of hair store it was, did she? Does she mean Capitol? That don't make sense. No, she did not ask that. I don’t know what she just asked me, I cant think of what it sounds like. Don’t say What or HUH, just repeat what you thought you heard, I guess, cause there is no time to think.

“What kind of hair store?” I asked to clarify.

“Hair SPRAY”, she said.

“Oh…”

Yup, that’s how it started. It’s ok, though, it went fine after that. You can see what I mean at the beginning, and watch the rest of it right here:



Whew! It went by quick! I was kicking myself a bit immediately afterwards, because I did not get hardly any of my sponsors in there. I mentioned the charities and got some band pics, but didn’t get a chance for sponsors. I goofed it up for them, and I thought a couple might be a bit upset about that. As it turned out, I had a few more opportunities to make it up, and I learned not to let the interview be controlled by the interviewer so much after that little experience.

Anyway, I didn’t let that bother me. It was fun, and one hell of an affair! Wayne and I were on a high after that, laughing and talking for a bit. We checked out some of the comments about our video on You Tube, talked about some of them and the reaction this whole thing has got so far. Then I went to collect the interview recording, and put it up on my sites.

On the drive home, I remember thinking about some of the comments we got on You Tube. I don't respond very often to comments. I don't know why, but i just don't. It seems to steer the conversation too much towards me, I guess, and I just want to sit back and see what people think, without getting involved. I also prepared myself for the onslaught of negative feedback that always seems to come with any kind of fame. Just from reading responses to videos on You Tube of other record breakers, I saw that the Internet was full of dip shits, haters, jealous wannabes, negative naggers, and nitpicking nincompoops who have nothing better to do but to try and tear down other people to make themselves feel better. Poor bastards. OH… and I DEFINITELY got my share of those. It started immediately. When Bobbi showed me my picture on the front page of AOL.com, she covered up the comments with her hand at first because she didn’t want me to see them. I thought it was funny. I convinced her to move her hand, and she was right! A lot of the comments were just horrible and mean, and there was a good portion of them. I just let that shit slide right off. Some of it is even entertaining. The better part of the comments that were left, however, at least in this experience, were positive and intelligent. Those are the ones I focus on. Another thing. Ya know, as I write this, I am getting the feeling that I should get involved in the comments more now, become part of the conversation more. I think I will, from now on. It may be a little late now, but given the chance, I think I am going to throw my hat in the ring next time.

When I got home, an e-mail from Alex let me know that he was the one who got my story on the front page of AOL. He used some contacts he had there to push it through. He also got it on the front page of Asylum. com. Awesome!

Then it just blew up. I typed "Worlds Tallest Mohawk" into Google, and it was all over the place. Most of the websites were pointing to AOL, MSNBC, and Asylum. It was as if once it hit the front page of those websites, it got picked up by hundreds of other sites. It was also being broadcast on local media outlets all over the country.

Here is a few links from the ones that are still there. (not on the front page anymore, of course.)


http://blog.oneriot.com/content/2008/11/worlds-tallest-mohawk-gets-taller/

http://www.asylum.com/2008/11/17/worlds-tallest-mohawk/

http://www.mikeandmandy.us/?p=4276

This one is my favorite:

http://www.sodahead.com/living/worlds-tallest-mohawk-is-he-a-douchebag/question-191761/

Here are a few videos from some markets it was in. I thought to record all the video I, but I didn't think to save the pages the right way. I bookmarked them, but they disappear. In order to save a web page forever, you have to save the whole web page as a file, with all the links and pictures and video in a folder. Oh well, I still got more than enough memorabilia.
Anyway, here are a few news feeds I got:









So that's where I was Monday night, at the beginning of the media fallout. I knew it was just the beginning, too. I went to bed that night wondering what was going to happen next. Who was going to call? I sent my story to the Ellen Show, Glenn Beck, Adam Corolla, and a few other places. Anything could happen now, and I was ready for it. I was full of confidence, and willing to take this as far as I possibly could.

So come on back and I'll answer that very question for you...who called next?

Episode XII: The Benefit Concert

The last stage of the day was to get ON the stage. It was time to rock for charity, celebrate the record, and have some fun! I showed up at the Waiting Room with the Hawk tied back. Elliot and Katie were to put up the Mohawk later one more time for the show. There was already a good amount of people there when I showed up, and I was thankful to see that. The first band to go on was Cordial Spew. As usual, they tore it up. Their guitarist, Kevin McCLay, surprised the crowd when he took off his hat and announced that he had broken a record, too, for world’s smallest Mohawk! This was a shaved head, and a marker stripe down the middle of his head. I wish I had pictures of the other bands, but I did not think too get someone to take pics during the whole show. If anyone has any, please feel free to send me some.


Next to go on was Bloodcow. It was time for me to go to the back room and put up the Mohawk again, while Bloodcow rocked the place.

Then, it was time for my band, The Filthy Few. I had the Mohawk up, and my friend Conrad Hinz had painted purple flames onto it. It looked bad ass! I wish I had a pic of Conrad for ya, but alas, I do not. Here is the work he did, though. Thanks Conrad!

Then the Filthy Few hit the stage. I thanked everyone, and let Stephanie Murphy from Project Nightlights say a few words, and we went to work! The Mohawk stayed up for a couple songs, but then fell over from the strain of jamming.

 

 

At the end of the set, some of the Hot Tail Honeys and the crowd joined us on stage. Thanks to Sarah for these shots:

Here is a video of our song Opiodo, when everyone came on stage:

After the Filthy few, Live Wire and Somewhere between Heaven and Hell crushed the audience for the rest of the night.

Speaking of the Audience, I gotta say, they were great. I could feel the energy in the room, and it was fun and positive. Thank you to everyone who showed up.

Here are a few more random pics from that night:

After the show, I was exhausted! As the place was clearing out, I remember reflecting on the day’s events, and being thankful that it was such a success. There was only one more task to be done, before I could finally call it a day, and get some much needed sleep. It was one of the most difficult things I did all day…wash my hair! It was a long, painful process getting multiple cans of hairspray out of my hair. I was in the shower so long, I got too tired and had to quit, even though I still wasn’t done. I still had some crunching going on when I laid down to rest. It took a few more days worth of showers to finally get it all out, but it was definitely worth it!

So the deed was done. After months of preparation, ups and downs, doubts and re-assurances, I had broken the Guinness Book of World Records category for Tallest Mohican, and with the much needed help of many others, I made the biggest spectacle out of it that I could. Now , it was time to sit back and see what happens next, if anything, see what kind of reaction I get. I knew there was going to be some local news on the event, and I had a feeling it would go beyond that. So I gathered up my evidence for Guinness and sent it in, and watched, and waited. I did not know how far this thing would go, but I would soon find out!

Off with the Hawk!

Well, i finally did it. Today, I went and cut off the Mohawk! Yup, it was time. Here are some pics from my little adventure:

The World Herold was there taking pictures, so it will probably be in the newspaper in the next few days.

Episode XI: The Measurment

The first person to come meet me was little Dougie, a handsome young man with a kick-ass Mohawk! He has been a fan of Mohawks for a long time, and when he heard The worlds’ta tallest Mohawk record was gonna be beat here in Omaha, he asked his mom to come down and check it out. I am glad he did, he’s a great kid.

So I made my way through the crowd, people taking pictures and shaking my hand. I had to walk slowly and carefully, I did not want anything to happen before I broke the record. Most of the people who worked at Capitol showed up with Mohawks, too. It was totally cool!

Sitting down at the conference table was exciting and scary. The television cameras were set up, and the crowd was bigger than I thought it would be. I could feel the great energy in the room from everyone, so I was confident it was going to go well.

I answered some questions from some people, handed over the sides of my hair to be donated to Locks of Love, and we did the measurement. Elliot grabbed a yardstick, measured, and yelled out, “it’s exactly 27 inches, a new world record!” Then the crowd erupted in applause. The measurement was officially done, and I felt great!

After the measurement, I did a couple interviews, talked to some people, and took some pictures with paparazzibyappointment.com.

.

 The day was far from over. I had to go to do an interview with Tom Becka later, then the benefit concert in the evening. So, I decided to go home and take a little nap. I had to keep the base of the Mohawk in form, so the drive home was interesting. I was stuffed in my truck with the Mohawk bent over! Oh yes, I got some strange looks. Then, at home, I sat up in my chair to take a nap, it was definitely challenging, I wish I had some pictures.

After a few hours, Elliot and Katie came over to my house to put up the Mohawk again. Then, Pete Lochren came over to pick me up in his chalkboard truck. It’s one of his art cars, and the only thing I could think of that I might fit in for the ride to the radio station.

It was a bit windy that day, so the walk from the truck across the street to the radio station was a bit difficult. I held up a piece of cardboard to block the wind and keep the Mohawk from falling over. I was wondering if wearing the Mohawk was going to translate very well over radio. I think it went great. Tom Becka was a gracious host, and made the interview go wonderfully. Everyone there was nice. Here is a recording of that interview:

After the interview, Pete and I went into a bar on Underwood street and freaked out a few people with the Mohawk. While I was drinking a pint with a few patrons, a funny moment happened when my Mohawk got caught in the Christmas decorations above the bar! It took a minute to untangle the lights from the Hawk, and we all had a good laugh at that.

Pete then took me back home, and I had a few more hours to kill before the show. I made some phone calls, and did some final preparations, and went early to the venue to make sure everything was ready to go. I had the base of the Mohawk still put up, and the rest of it was pulled back in a tail so I could maneuver around without doing any damage.

And that’s where I will leave you today. Here is the video that Wayne Brekke did that ties the whole conference together:

We will continue with the Record Breaking Show in the next episode, with som very cool pics and video!

Cheers!

Episode X: The Day The Hawk Stood Still

The day before the press conference, Todd Murphy and I went to Capitol to hang the banner and get everything ready. Thanks one again to Bobbi Lovejoy, she printed out the wonderful banner at the last minute, and it looked great!

In the evening, I went to Home Depot and got the boards I needed to prop up the Hawk in place. Of course, that night I could not sleep. I was so anxious about the next day’s events. The plan was this: come in to Capitol at 730 in the morning and meet up with Shawn, one of my witnesses, and Wayne Brekke, who was to record the whole thing. By the way, I need to give some thanks to Shawn here, he became my witness at the last minute. I found out a couple days before that I needed one witness to oversee the whole thing from beginning to end, and I had nobody lined up for that! I frantically called everyone I knew, and Tom Davis, another friend of mine, let Shawn out of work to come be a witness to the event.

Then, I was to go upstairs to start on the hair. The press conference was set for 10 o’clock, and Todd was to came in around nine thirty to make sure everything was ready and help the television crews set up. All I had to do was lay there and let them work on my hair. Then at 2 o’clock the stylists were going to come to my house and re-style the hawk for my interview with Tom Becka. Pete was to pick me up in his chalkboard truck and bring me to the studio. Then, the benefit concert at night. I was to go in the back room at the waiting room lounge during Bloodcow and get the Mohawk put up for the third time that day, and get it spray painted with purple flames by Conrad Hinz. It was going to be a hell of a day.

And it was finally here. I made sure to wear my Filthy Few t-shirt, get some breakfast, and look my best, which is not very good at seven thirty in the morning. I showed up at Capitol schools, ready to go. Clarice was there, Wayne rolled up, and Katie and Elliott, and everyone else was present. We got a before shot with the video, and upstairs I went to get started. As I laid down, people were calling me already to see how it was going. I had my phone in hand half the time. Katie and Elliot went to work.

Everything went as smooth as it could. Wayne was there videotaping the whole thing, Shawn was there as a witness, and we were chatting and having fun as Elliott and Katie constructed the hawk. I Remember hoping to God that this thing stood with no problems today. They scraped my hair that was glued to the bottom board off. Elliot took one side and Katie the other. On the count of three, they propped me up and I was sitting with one board still a little glued to the right side of the hawk. With a little tug, it came free, and there it stood!

It felt perfect, sturdy, and sharp. I sat for a minute to gain perspective and balance, and then stood up, well, crouched up to go downstairs. The ceiling upstairs was not quite tall enough to contain the Hawk. I waddled on over to the elevator, and down I went. When I got downstairs, it felt good to stand up. The ceilings in the main area at capitol were nice and tall. I turned the corner to a cheering crowd. There they were, all waiting for me.

I'll never forget this walk. After all the preperation, I was finally about to go in front of the cameras and set a new world record.

Well, I think this is a good place to stop fer now. I have a pile of homework to do. I will try not to make the next episode take so long, so...

To be continued...

Action News 3

I am going to be on Action 3 news More in the Morning at 6:30 this Wedensday morning Oct. 7th.. They are doing some Guinness stories and called me up to be on the show!

Episode VIIII: The Final Lap

On November 5th, 2008, I contacted Sophia John at the 89.7 The River, and told her about my plan. I was not really asking for anything specific, in fact I wasn’t sure what I was asking for when I emailed her, I just knew that Sophia is always kind and would probably want to help. She replied that of course she would help, and put me in contact with a girl named Stephanie to get working on a public service announcement for the whole week of Nov. 14th. I was floored. The spot started on Monday, Nov. 9th, and played for the week, and then a different one for the day of the event was made as well. I was extremely happy with what they came up with, and was so grateful when I first heard this PSA:

The last week of October and the first week of November I was making phone calls and stopping by businesses around town to get a couple more sponsors. I had to get the flyer done as soon as possible. I called an old friend of mine, Ed, who owns Paradigm Gardens. He was happy to help. Another friend, Mark was ready to pitch in with his company United Services of America, and Sean from Capes Comics was in as well.

That was it. Time was up. That was all the sponsors I could get, which was about twice as many as I thought I would end up with! I was so excited to see the finished flyer with all of the sponsors on board! Not to mention the bands, almost at last minute I got the bands I needed for the benefit concert as well. With the flyer finished, the Reader put up a full page black and white add in the Nov. 6th issue for the show, and the River spot was playing.

It was all ready to go, looking good! I was getting nervous as the date came close, but I knew I had it perfected.
That reminds me, I went to capitol for a couple more test runs, and one word of advice to anyone who wants to break a record for the tallest Mohawk: pee first! I was drinking water on the last test run, and I had to go so bad in the middle of them putting up the Hawk, but I could not get up. I asked them for an empty water bottle, and was going to use that. Just when I was getting ready, they suddenly remembered that there were security cameras in the room! Well, I did not want that to get on tape, so I had to hold it. Let’s just say that was the longest two hours I had in my life!

That covers most of the events leading upt to the Record Breaking Day. I know this was a bit short, but school is starting to take up a lot of my time. I think I will start the next episodes with the big day. I want to go slow through Nov. 14th in as much detatil as I can, so it will take a few episodes. So...until then, cheers!