April 27th - Relevant Links
Monday, April 28th, 2008Sharing the links for the day:
100 Things I am thankful for…
Thursday, November 22nd, 2007
So while I had some down time, I thought I would do a post that really only means something to me, but I also thought it would be fun to share. So here are 100 things I am thankful for:
- My family
- The coffee pot being full when I wake up - thank you digital coffee pot
- Rain in Georgia - yes it is RAINING!
- The bar at the W on Times Square - the best place to people watch I think
- Live Music
- Our babysitter, who allows us to see live music
- Not having to drink the last inch of a beer
- Tivo
- The grilled cheese sandwich I had at Kingston Station on Tuesday - Gruyère mmmmm
- A cab driver who doesn’t talk to me
- The fact that I almost know how to get around boston now.
- My new years eve tickets for Widespread Panic for me and my friends
- My children
- Kids with Afros - see above
- Flickr
- My dogs
- Cool maps
- A night at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta
- Sancho’s broken arrow in denver - could be the best bar on the planet.
- Watching kids have fun - see below
- Reading on a plane
- A nice pair of new socks
- Good movies on a rainy day from on demand
- My mentors (Ron, Ken, John and Jim)
- My fraternity brothers - go sigma pi
- Lazy afternoons at Turner Field, few things are more relaxing
- The DVD player in our Van - what did I do without one, the DVD player, not the Van
- A day on the beach
- Looking at the stamp on my passports and thinking about the places I’ve been
- Not having to travel to LA that much, I just don’t like LA
- The fact that I have never made Platinum Medallion on Delta
- The first night on a new pillow
- The comments and track backs my readers provide, I think I’m over 30 regulars now.
- The closeness that social media provides with my extended network of friends
- Looking at my setlists on Everyday Companion
- That logic mostly wins
- When I have more that two beverage choices in my refrigerator
- The Onion
- Amazon Unbox
- Emily’s cooking, specifically her pork paprikash
- When Hadrian smiles
- The day that Jeff said I should shave most days and dress a little better - good advice for everyone I think
- The day I decided to give this whole blog thing another chance and started spatially relevant
- The Chicago Institute of Art
- My crown room membership - TV, free soda and WiFi
- That Jen is a great mother of Kevren and Dijouri
- My college friends I never seem to catch up with Patti, Drake and Michael J.
- My iPod
- Everyday I have the opportunity to learn something new
- Google for creating google reader - what a time saver!
- A nice day on the Bruce Pennisula
- Any day I can find my slippers
- American Express Rewards - I get things I would never spend real money on.
- My Bose headphones
- Jaco Costa Rica
- When I get upgraded to the big seats on a long flight
- When I don’t forget my mom’s birthday (apparently 2007 wasn’t one of those years - sorry mom)
- Not having to travel for Thanksgiving this year
- That I still have my atlas from my 18th birthday
- All the great friends I have in Atlanta
- That I have in-law’s that will come to Georgia anytime to babysit so Em and I can travel
- Waiting at a random train station in a foreign country and trying to figure out where I’m supposed to be and when I’m supposed to get off the train since no one speak English and the signs are in the local language.
- When my kids brush their teeth without me reminding them
- When Emily calls bullshit on me - I guess that’s why I married her
- The AJC sports section and TV game clips so I can have something to talk about to Georgia Bulldog and SEC fans
- Shrek 1, 2 and third - toddler crack let me tell you.
- Watching Dijouri skateboard
- Watching Kevren “aggressive inline” skate
- Watching Prescott drool when watching a movie
- When Burning Down the House comes on my iPod
- That most people are thoughtful and kind
- A $1 grilled cheese sandwich from the heart and made with love in the lot at a show
- having very athletic kids - sometimes NOT being like your dad is a good thing
- teamwork makes the dream work!
- Sometimes a cliché just works - I mean there has to be a reason they exist
- The day I installed firefox, got a flickr account and a twitter account - what a great day!
- The day I realized that art is as meaningful as science.
- Any day I get to golf - the extent of my being athletic
- Quiet time just spent remembering past experiences
- When the batteries died in the toy saxophone Jeff bought for Prescott
- Clearing security at ATL Hartsfield in under 10 mins
- Moments when I have the clarity of thought to acknowledge that I can’t control what happens - only how I react
- That I almost have the right tools for nearly every job
- For the people in Dallas which have let me go through toll road 2 times without paying
- When dinner is actually delivered in the 45-50 mins as predicted by the order taker
- Every time I type a message on my blackberry which has all the words, correct spelling and reasonable grammar
- Big brothers being patient with their little brothers
- When my friends are willing to help me on stuff and are willing to let me help them on stuff
- A short line for check in at the Marriott Marquis when I get to NYC at 11PM and want to sleep
- having nothing left on my itinerary, but having another 4 hours to slack
- Grilling outside in the winter, not a Georgia winter, but a snowy Michigan day
- An unplanned weekend in the mountains - you decide at noon and your in a cabin at 6PM.
- That it all works out in the end
- The burn that happens in your throat when chugging a coke on a hot day
- No traffic on GA 400 when going home from a business trip
- A burger from the Barley House
- A perfect steak with a bottle of Silver Oak
- That a Little Caesar’s just opened by my house
- The Big Chill soundtrack
- Any opportunity to share, listen and be with people I care about
I probably have another 100 things I should be thankful for…. What are you thankful for?
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Technorati Tags: Live Music, Gruyère, boston, Widespread Panic, Flickr, Sancho’s broken arrow, denver, movies, sigma pi, Platinum Medallion, social media, Everyday Companion, Unbox, Chicago Institute of Art, iPod, Google, google reader, Bruce Pennisula, American Express, Jaco, Costa Rica, twitter, Marriott, Silver Oak
Did Morgan Spurlock Damage the McDonald’s brand?
Saturday, October 6th, 2007I remember with great joy and glee when I would request going to McDonald’s during my early childhood and I clearly remember it meant anything - Arby’s, Burger King, KFC or Wendy’s - just fast food please. I also think I remember this word usage in college, but it doesn’t seem to be the case today in casual conversation. This may not even be a reasonable observation by the extremely focused group of folks I interact with, which are effectively 30+ yrs old for the most part.
So the question I have is - Has the McDonald’s brand been permanently damaged for the 30 somethings due to Morgan Spurlock? This question came about due to another post I made on Culinary Gizmodo:
So we all like McDonald’s, most will probably not admit it and seldom not feel guilty after a visit - but we DO like McDonald’s. All of us have new way of referring to a quick stop as Micky D’s. Ever since the movie Super Size Me from Morgan Spurlock we refer to McDonald’s with euphemisms: “grabbing something quick” or “getting a burger”
I’m not saying we never admit we eat at McDonald’s, but if we do the admission somehow includes a salad and Dasani. I think many of use say fast food instead of McDonald’s as well. So my hypothesis is that at some point since Super Size Me in 2004, Morgan’s work could quite possibly have demoted the McDonald’s brand to a less than synonym status of the like of Coke or Kleenex.
The other option is that Spurlock didn’t erode the brand and my cohort group just isn’t a naturally strong demographic. Thoughts?
Technorati Tags: Arby’s, Burger King, KFC, Wendy’s, Morgan Spurlock, Super Size Me
It takes a little fun and a network
Friday, August 31st, 2007So a couple of weeks ago I got the opportunity to catch up with a friend who I hadn’t seen in like 5 years, Chris and meet a voice from the phone, Mark. Both of these guys are currently out in the desert at Burning Man letting off a little steam with 1000’s of other creatives. Chris has been unsuccessfully coaxing me to go since 2001, one of those it just doesn’t work things with my life - so far.
Chris isn’t the only one, so has my friend Rick - these people are polar opposites and both rave about the week every time they get back. So there has to be something to it.
Then I realized is it about letting off steam of getting creative? Burning man is this week long event which is a little hard to explain, in fact even for the organizers:
Trying to explain what Burning Man is to someone who has never been to the event is a bit like trying to explain what a particular color looks like to someone who is blind.
While I’m not sure it’s that difficult to explain - I do think that the dynamics of relationships and people are that hard to discern which is a core component of burning man experience. This event is as much about your current friends as it is about the friends you haven’t met yet and value they can add.
Burning man is effectively a social network for creative expression which leverages an informal barter economy exclusively during the duration. A goal for the event is sustainability through preparation and social interaction in 100+ degree heat in the middle of nowhere with art.
I’m not quite sure the reason for this post, but this observation was conjured up when I spoke to another friend about the weekend, since I completely lost track of the date and was thinking the 2 BBQ options I have aren’t so cool. He and his wife are making it down to Charleston for the weekend. When I asked what he was doing this weekend he only said “Nothing, just catching up with Bolt for the weekend”. He paused and said “take that back, I’m going to relax and catch up on life”
Enjoy the holiday weekend, perhaps a BBQ or two is a good thing.
… continual hard labor deadens the energies of the soul, and benumbs the faculties of the mind; the ideas become confined, the mind barren, and, like the scorching sands of Arabia, produces nothing; or, like the uncultivated soil, brings forth thorns and thistles. - Maria Stewart (1803–1879)
Technorati Tags: Burning man, social network, BBQ
The 5 Step: A presentation framework
Sunday, August 19th, 2007So PowerPoint is the core medium of marketers, we are asked to give presentations all the time. Sometimes it’s a prospect presentation, some times the executive team or to your reports. Did you know that most EVERYTHING can be effectively explained in 5 steps. The 5 Step process has it’s roots in P&G and is a great platform for communication. The five step can be used for memos, collateral or even wedding proposals. So here is the 5 step framework:
1. Background. Why are you here? Only baseline info in the Background - this is the basis for discussion, basically just the facts or mutually agreed to corporate/industry myths. In a prospect presentation it’s the problem/need.
2. The Idea or Recommendation. What are you proposing? This is typically one sentence, but I cheat some times.
3. How it Works. The details. In addition to How, also What, Who, When, Where. Another way to look at this is plan.
4. Key Benefits. Often these tie to the actions in how this works.
5. Next Steps. Who has to do what and by when for this to happen?
Often when giving a 5 step to the uninitiated they often don’t believe you will proceed against the five steps. It’s a little odd, but it happens. It represents a series of talking points and necessary supporting data or metrics to drive the decision process. The 5 Step Presentation can be more than 5 slides, but most things can be done in 5 slides.
Technorati Tags: PowerPoint, 5 Step Presentation
NZ Couple wants a SUPERMAN Baby
Wednesday, August 8th, 2007It takes all kinds in this world and apparently I don’t take the cake for odd naming. I have kids named dijouri (after a didgeridoo) and Kevren, after the village of St. Keverne and Ron Kevern, a mentor of mine. Apparently this couple wanted to keep things real, by originally naming their newborn 4 Real, but it didn’t pass the naming rules of NZ.
Now the original idea is - what if it became a trend to have cool license plate like names - - agrav8 or 78 Stang. Think of the fun we could have Kewl Kid or RZR07, you could brand your kids. Brand as in logo, not scar - there will be enough scarring in life with a name like RZR or Dijouri - errr wait. Ok apparently I didn’t think ahead that there would be a cartoon called Digimon, admittedly I thought Digit might be a cool nick name - go immediately to math geek do not pass go, do not collect 200 dollars. I got the nickname Golum and Sancho later in life - both are somewhat amusing stories, to other people.
In principle this is a growing challenge for individuality is increasingly over populated planet. I’m not sure what is a good name or a bad name, but I think culture and language are changing so quickly that all the old barometers are no longer viable. So our flat world is not only running out of IP addresses - apparently names as well.
All things are relative and typically where you predicts you views - so alas, as I left the greater Ann Arbor area after the birth of my twins to ATL, I felt a little more compelled to get a more mainstream name for my latest child, Prescott. We can’t all be super heroes, but we should all try to be super people and super tolerant. I look forward to the day we look back to superman being just another name….. Alas - what’s in a name?
~! cheers
superman name
