We have a spot in the hallway we use for time-out where it's nice and boring. If DS is misbehaving we tell him he needs to stop or he will be put in time-out. If he continues to misbehave we take him down the hallway and tell him "That's enough, I told you to stop XXX, you're in time-out" and then we go back to whatever we were doing. We only leave him there for 30 seconds or he forgets why he was placed there. Then we go back down the hall and ask him (on his level) why he is in time out. Sometimes he can answer and sometimes he's not too sure to so we tell him "you were put here because I asked you to stop XXX and you did not, we don't XXX, it's not acceptable" then we get him to apologize and give hugs and kisses and let him go back to playing. It works really well for us.

As for getting up out of time-out it is rare because if he moves, we just silently put him back until he stays put, and he knows now it will be over much quicker if he just stays put.