Regular readers may be wondering where the entire roderickrussell.com domain and all of its subdomains went this past week and a half. Here’s the story:

As I sit writing this article – surprisingly at my kitchen table for once and not an obscure cafe or bookstore in a far-flung location – I am experiencing a complete communications meltdown. My primary email is down, my cell phone is busted and I’ve had to resort to a backup address and the woes of Skype. In truth, my Skype experience hasn’t been bad at all, but my attitude is, shall we say, in the toilet since my domain name was stolen – yes, stolen.

How, you may be asking, was my domain stolen? A combination of registrar error and an unscrupulous cybersquatter is to blame, and it all begins with Namesecure – a misnomer if I’ve ever heard one.

Almost a full three weeks ahead of the originally scheduled date, the new Ripley’s Believe It Or Not: The Remarkable… revealed book is now on bookstore shelves everywhere.

I popped in to a Borders Books to see if I could sneak a peek at my own entry in the text, and sure enough, there on the shelf was a stack of at least 15, face-forward, fresh copies of the book.

A quick look revealed that my full-page pictorial complete with full text entry appears in the section entitled Fantastic Feats, and as the editorial staff promised, it’s a great looking layout to accompany a great looking, extremely visual book.

My thanks go to the Ripley’s staff for featuring me this year, and to all of the readers and fans who continue to encourage the work. And a thank you to my good friend Scott for taking the extremely candid and casual photo of me in the bookstore.

Last year while browsing at my local Borders bookstore, one new release leaped off the shelf and caught my attention: Eat This Book A Year of Gorging and Glory on the Competitive Eating Circuit.

The title and design alone are enough to make anyone take notice – what an odd subject – and though I wouldn’t normally consider myself interested in the topic, I nevertheless found myself interested in this book. A later interview with the author by Jon Stewart on The Daily Show further increased my interest in the work.

Little did I know (it only took me a year to get around to reading it!) that the author, Ryan Nerz – a freelance journalist and emcee of competitive eating events – actually cited me in this text! It’s always fun to find references to me and my work by happenstance, but in a book on competitive eating was the last place that I expected to do so!

Just a reminder that I will be appearing at the Pickelner Arena in Williamsport, PA this Sunday, April 22nd for two free shows courtesy of our sponsors Clear Channel Communications and Immix Wireless.

Tune into KISS 102.7FM, BILL (95.5 and 95.3 FM) or VARIETY 97.7FM for the details. You can also hear me on the morning radio shows found on those stations this Friday, April 20th.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

CONTACT
Roderick Russell
ph: 646-285-5229
fax: 866-705-3503
roderick@roderickrussell.com
www.roderickrussell.com

Roderick Russell Featured in Upcoming Ripley’s Publication

Ripley’s Believe It Or Not and Ripley Entertainment have just announced that they will be featuring world-record holding sword swallower Roderick Russell in it’s upcoming fall of 2007 publication entitled Ripley’s Believe It or Not: The Remarkable…revealed.

Set for inclusion are several photographs, including x-ray images, of Mr. Russell in the act of swallowing swords. One of a mere fifty active sword swallowers remaining in the world, Roderick is the only performing artist presenting this unique and rare art form while dancing a tango.

With a tentative publication date of August 7, 2007, The Remarkable…revealed can be pre-ordered now through Amazon.com.

# Hardcover: 256 pages
# Publisher: Ripley Publishing (August 7, 2007)
# Language: English
# ISBN-10: 1893951227
# ISBN-13: 978-1893951228

Just a quick announcement for everyone in Central Pennsylvania who has been eager to see the show: I will be performing several public shows in April in your area!

On April 22nd I will be at the Pickelner Arena in Williamsport, PA performing two shows. This event is sponsored by Clear Channel Broadcasting and is free and open to the public. Tune into your local Clear Channel stations - KISS 102.7 and BILL 95.5 - for all of the details.

Following that, on April 28th I will be in Canton, PA performing in the space at the Canton High School. This performance space seats 700+ and the show is open to the public. Tickets must be purchased for this show, but I have it on good authority that they will be affordable!

RELATIVELY RECENT NEWS… : Over the past year and a half I’ve been participating in a study run by radiologist Brian Witcombe of the Gloucestershire Royal Hospital in Gloucester, UK, on the physiological effects of sword swallowing, which has been destined for publication in the prestigious British Medical Journal.

The original short article that preceded the full research appeared in the British Medical Journal back in 2005 and received coverage on Boing Boing (coincidentally one of my favorite blogs). The full article, co-authored by Mr. Witcombe and my former business partner with whom I founded the Sword Swallowers’ Association International oh-so-many years ago, was finally released last month. Since then it has received coverage by virtually every media outlet, be it print, television, radio or Internet.

That’s right, I’m offering discounts on tickets to my shows, access to advance ticket sales, VIP seating options and discounts on merchandise to all the folks who want to see the show and who visit me over on Eventful.com and actually DEMAND me to come to their town!

As a touring artist, I need to know where the audience is. This can be a demanding job, and producing a show in an uncertain market can be very risky. Though folks tell me all the time that they want to come to a show, I have no way of seriously assessing how much of a demand there is in a given area - until now!

If you visit Eventful and demand me, you will officially be filing your vote for me to come to your area. Share the link around with all of your friends, relatives, co-workers and anyone else that you think may be interested in seeing the show, and if the demand gets high enough, I will actually book a theater in your town!

It’s approaching the end of the year and I’m clearing out the remaining limited stock of my book Confessions of a Renaissance Faire Sword Swallower.

This pitch book is a 42 page, 8.5″ x 5.5″, saddle stitched document containing a short history of the art of sword swallowing and lengthy interviews with yours truly wherein I discuss my position on this ancient and dying art, my philosophy of performance and other particulars too numerous too name. Also featured are photographs of me performing this feat, along with x-rays and miscellaneous photographs of other acts that I perform such as escapes and fire breathing.

These books are typically only offered in-person at live events, but I need to clear room for more material that is set to arrive, so you folks get to be the lucky recipients of this offer.

Interested in having me come to your town? Want to see the show? Then DEMAND ME in your town!

Yes, you do indeed have control over where and when I bring my show to your area. You can have a measurable impact on whether or not I book a show in your town by going to Eventful.com and DEMANDING me.

Visit this link:
http://eventful.com/performers/P0-001-000000543-9/demand

Click the “DEMAND ME” button and sign in. Yes, you need to log in to do this, but if you do we’ll have it on record that you want me to come to town. If you join forces with others and enough people demand me in an area, then I’ll book a theater and come to town! The power is entirely in your hands!

Back in April I wrote a short article about the many sightings of me and my work that there are on network television - many of which I’m unaware of myself.

Many fans contact me to tell me that they saw me on television - which I love, incidentally, so keep those messages coming - and one of the networks that is often referenced is the Discovery Channel and all of it’s subsidiary networks. This is not surprising, as a lot of footage has been filmed with them.

One program that I seem to be repeatedly sighted on is Medical Incredible, with the latest being spotted just this past week. Unfortunately for me I have not seen this program - though I’m flattered that everyone else has - and I have no idea which episode I am in! Try as I might, I can’t seem to track down any detailed information about the show contents.

In follow-up to the commercial that I filmed for the Magic Hat Brewery (see Television Commercial Filming from July 5th), I will be doing a photo shoot next Tuesday for the purposes of print advertising across the country.

As Magic Hat is hands-down one of the most inventive, hip and decidedly fun companies around, their slogan for the upcoming ad campaign is a “Performance In Every Bottle” - hence my involvement. Towards that end, we are trying to generate some unique uses for their bottles in my act with the intent of photographing it for the ad campaign.

For those of you who have any ideas as to how you’d like to see me use the bottles (hey! keep it clean! ;-) and can imagine great photo ideas with them, please do drop me a line and let me know. Who knows, you may just see your idea in the national media! Time is limited though - we only have five days until the shoot - so get those ideas submitted quickly!