Complete Fulfillment

Las Vegas

2009-12-01T12:24:00.001-08:00

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My blog has moved to www.matthixson.me

2009-11-29T10:03:00.001-08:00

If you were reading my blog here, the blog has now moved. I have relocated the blog to www.matthixson.me. I am working on posting more regularly as there is a lot going on with me and I would like you get your opinions on them. Please join me over there or you can click here to subscribe to the blog. I am still experimenting on using Posterous for posting everyday pictures of things I find interesting, which seems to be what most people are using it for. The content from www.completefulfillment.blogspot.com has been imported to my new blog at www.matthixson.me and will be discontinued. This blog is being moved because I am now using the squarespace platform which is much easier to design and use than blogger.

matt

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I am no longer an Ignite virgin

2009-11-19T23:02:00.001-08:00

I had the chance to attend Ignite Portland tonight. What is that? I really didn’t know walking into the event but a friend of my @geekygirldawn suggested it a good event so I tried it out. Here is the deal. There were 19 speakers on random topics that were chosen by a selection committee. I ran into Dawn on the way in and asked what I was in for. This is the deal - each presenter gets 5 minutes to present 20 slides. The slides automatically advance every 15 seconds. There is no MC. When the speaker is done the next one comes up. That is it. The topics are very diverse and the skill really being demonstrated is storytelling. It was a great event and I'm glad to have discovered it. It was at the Bagdad Theater which was cool by itself. The next one in Portland is on March 3rd. They are held all over the nation so find the one near you and check it out. Sorry for the blurry pics but that is what you get with an iPhone in the dark. They are also posting the video from the event on the Ignite Portland site.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Google Launches Google Chrome OS and Manages Not to Say Cloud

2009-11-19T12:43:00.001-08:00

Today Google launched a preview of the Google Chrome OS. What is that exactly? Watch the video below to get a better understanding. One of the most impressive things was they did not say cloud in the entire 3+ minutes of this video. They drew a cloud but they never said it. I think they did a great job of talking about this in a light an humorous way that can speak to everyone with a base of technical knowledge. It would have been so easy for them to talk overly technical about it – and use the hottest word in IT. Cloud. But they didn’t – nice work Google.

Things are lining up for an even more epic battle between Microsoft and Google. Between MS Windows and Google Chrome OS to MS SharePoint and Google Wave to Office and Google Docs. I love competition – it brings the best products to the surface.

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Kids + Creativity + Technology = Amazing

2009-11-15T13:06:00.001-08:00

I have been doing some work on some side projects lately. One of these has been looking at how my kids schools can take advantage of the best assets they have which are the amazing Christian kids that go to that school. I went over to YouTube for another project but I ran across this video by a 6th Grader for his science class. The world has changed a ton since I was in 6th grade and the people running these schools need to get with it. There are not just new technologies the paths of communication have radically changed. This is a great example of if a teacher was aware of how to do some of these things it would greatly empower more kids to do amazing things. I have found that new technology is scarry for people that don't understand what they are or how to use it properly. I am working to change that in 2 small cases right now but I hope to free more people to do the same.

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A New Approach to Balance

2009-11-09T09:30:00.001-08:00

Balance is a tough thing for me. That is why I started thinking and talking about Complete Fulfillment (part 1 & part 2). As the week gets into full swing I get engaged at work and come home to not enough time to assess what I need to do there. For years I have read and used all sorts of organization and productivity books and tools such as Franklin Covey and GTD. I have settled on GTD for the past 4-5 years and have spent that time trying to implement it – over and over and over. What I am really doing is trying to over compensate for my low prudence.

When I can make myself do it the weekly review is a great level set for me. I spent the 2 hours on Sunday reviewing all of the projects that I have taken on and where they are. As usual, my appetite for things to do and reality are probably not in line but this week I am trying something new. I have taken each section of Complete Fulfillment and tried to pick one achievable item to get done by next Sunday when I do my next weekly review. I have tried to pick most of these outside of work so I will need to go back and make sure that work is actually doable so that I am focused on the right things when I am there but work never seems to be the area lacking attention.

I am taking this approach in an attempt to make sure that there are not parts of my life that are left behind. We will see how the week goes – I am tired of writing posts about how poorly this concept has gone for me. Time for some progress.

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I love social media

2009-11-01T09:22:00.001-08:00

It is interesting watching people talk about social media, the social web or whatever they choose to refer to it as. There seems to be this constant displeasure pop up about people referring to themselves as “experts” by some of the same people that consider themselves experts. I am not claiming to be an expert but I can say that I love this stuff. The social interactions that applications like Facebook and Twitter create are not just neat new technology but game changing platforms.

In the context of Complete Fulfillment I am writing about this because as I have realized that this gets me excited. I don’t know exactly what that means for me going forward but I want to make it part of what I do at work. I am convicted that this changes the way people operate and most people don’t understand it even remotely. This leaves the ability for growth and change wide open for the masses. I will find a way to make this part of what I do every day. To this point it is most days but it can get pushed aside by other duties.

I came across this video this week that I enjoyed and wanted to pass along.

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I need a Manspace

2009-10-10T15:25:00.001-07:00

I was going through my backlog of RSS feeds from the many blogs that I follow and I came across this TED talk about manspaces. I was an only child growing up and moved around quite a bit. As a result I am an introvert. This might surprise some people that I know but I get my energy from spending time by myself. That can be a tough thing to get anymore. Work is just crazy all the time and when I get home we have three kids ages 5,3,<1.

When I saw this talk today I was thinking that this was a great idea. One of the issues we have is that we are not in the house we want to be in 5 years from now so I don’t want to invest in something we would leave. We also don’t have enough space for this but I love the idea and something I will keep thinking about.

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Complete Fulfillment has been a myth for me to this point

2009-09-27T23:17:00.001-07:00

Over my last vacation on the 4^th of July I came to the conclusion that my life was anything but balanced and I needed to fix that. I had this revelation about Complete Fulfillment which I started to write about here. Well that idea quickly got pushed aside by work – again – along with my blogging if you will notice the last date I posted. I just took another vacation and did some reflecting and attempted some stress management and realized that I am no better off than I was 90 days ago and in many ways things are worse. I’m not exactly sure how to get a handle on things but one thing that has worked somewhat in the past is protecting my personal time. This means not multi talking but being present with the things I have decided to do at that time.

I have been working my ass off to get a new business off the ground and it has been a great experience but that great experience has come at a significant price. The price has been eating bad, sleeping little, the most stress I have ever had, short with my kids, not being fully engaged with my kids, no prayer, no personal time and less time with my wife than ever. There are a lot of pieces to life that are more significant than work and none of those are getting a fair shake in my life right now.

This is the second vacation that my work has significantly interrupted my personal life. I am admittedly one of those people that checks the iPhone multiple times and day and responds but these are on the level of someone freaking out to the point that it ruins my time with my kids. And that is not ok with me. I am more than willing to bust my ass for work - I have done that consistently for 10 years now. I am not getting everything right in this current position but I am giving it everything I am equipped to give at this stage in my career. From the ups and the downs I am learning every day and part of that learning is that I have to have the other parts of my life represented. I know there will not always be perfect balance but no balance is not healthy and not acceptable to me. I keep trying to balance my life based on my job being the one thing I can’t change and everything else balancing around it but maybe I have things backwards.

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Get Mozy and forget your worries about losing all your memories

2009-07-23T08:32:00.001-07:00

The last two weeks of my quest have fallen very short of where I wanted to be for a little more balance in life. I realize that I am not going to make wholesale changes and balance everything overnight so I am taking on individual things at a time. One of the items that has long been a nagging pain is backing up all of the data at my house. A friend of my, @ThatDwayne, has long told me I should use Mozy because he loves it. I have tried to use it in the past but on my wife’s old computer we used an external drive for all of her pictures and I could not get it to play nicely with that setup. She now has a new computer with a 500gb hard drive so we keep all of the gazillion pictures and videos of the kids on that computer. This makes things easier but only increases my anxiety about losing the data. At our recent trip to the beach for the fourth of July we took over 500 pictures and with our 3^rd kid I have realized how quickly they change and you can’t go back other than in pictures and video. If that computer blue screened and we lost all of that data it would be crushing.

So given the new setup I went back to check out Mozy. The service is very simple and very cheap, it is $4.95/month for unlimited storage per machine. This is the personal use plan. It took me about 5 minutes to sign up for the service. I downloaded the client onto each machine and the backup process got started. It takes a look at the amount of data you are wanting to sync and then runs in the background to upload the files. On my wife’s machine it estimated that it will 7 days to get it all sent to Mozy. After that it syncs the backup on a regular basis. No more worry. A very easy way to remove a minor irritation that could become major heartbreak for $15/month.

Go check out Mozy – iJustine (check out her blog and videos – she is great) is a spokesperson for them and you can see a video of her on their home page.

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Complete Fulfillment has be a complete disaster this week

2009-07-15T22:51:00.001-07:00

Good thing that I realize complete fulfillment is a work in process because this week has been back to working all the time. I did work out this week and will do it again on Friday. I have been eating better. I need to start breaking out some more techniques to bAlance better. I will be working on one around finances this weekend. I will write more on it later. Night all.

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Health: A better night sleep

2009-07-11T18:32:00.001-07:00

For some time now I have woken up feeling stiff and exhausted. I just assumed that it was the long hours and stress but after a week of vacation I realized that there might be another factor. For a long time I have bitched about our bed and how I thought it was no good. Last week at the beach I slept on a AeroBed for the week. This is basically a glorified air mattress but I felt better every morning than I did at home. I was not sleeping any more but I sure felt a ton better. So this weekend I did something about it. I finally broke down and bought a new bed. Bed shopping is about as bad as car shopping but the good thing is that they will deal with you. I ended up buying a Tempur-pedic Rhapsody. It was great and I know about 4 people at work that have these type of beds and love them – not just like them but love them. This is a little piece of the health category that I am putting rocks in the jar for but probably taking some out around the finance piece. The bed was $3800 – Yikes!! - the only reason I ended up buying it was because they gave me 3 years no interest which makes it about $100/month – which I can handle. They deliver it tomorrow so let the sweet dreams begin.

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Wanting to do too much in each category doesn't work

2009-07-11T09:27:00.001-07:00

This post is in relation to the last post I did about categories. You only have a finite amount of time and you can’t do everything in each category.

Remember – I would love to know your comments.

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Complete Fulfillment Framework - Part 2

2009-07-06T22:17:00.001-07:00

In my last post I talked about the beginnings of Complete Fulfillment. Once I had this concept in my head I was thinking about it all the time. I realize that I had to actually figure out what the categories of my life I wanted to balance. There are all sort of these out there ranging from simple to very complex. I had to come up with something that fit my life. I was discussing my thoughts on this with Karin and I was guessing at the categories just to get the broad point out there. (Karin tends to be my sounding board for my crazy thoughts) During that session she asked if I had looked at the Wheel of Life concept. I had not so I looked it up and here is a version of what I found.

For the most part I like these categories but I added Spirituality or Faith. I'm sure this fits into this model somewhere but it an important piece of my life that needs it's own category. You will notice that there are points associated with each of these categories. These are very judgemental which seems to me a guess at how you are feeling about each category. That does not really work for me. Below are the categories that I came up with and some subcategories. This is important because of how I am choosing to look at the points each week. I will explain that in my next post.

Spirituality

Faith
Service
Goodwill

Family/Friends

Spouse
Kids
Extended Family
Friends

Heath

Diet
Physical Fitness
Mental

Personal Growth

Intellectual/Knowledge
Emotional Intelligence
Self Actualization

Career

Leadership
Management
Self Development

Finances

Debt
Savings
House
Retirement
College

Physical Environment

House
Cars
Yard

Romance

Fun & Recreation

Activities with wife
Activities with Kids
Activities by myself
Activities with friends

Note the lack of subcategories in Romance - if anyone out there has some suggestions about this or anything else I would love to hear. One of the things I came to realize about his framework is that I wanted to make it something that anyone could adjust to fit their needs. You will see this in the point system also. As always please let me know your comments or feedback.

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Complete Fulfillment Framework - Part 1

2009-07-04T17:41:00.001-07:00

There are so many thoughts going through my head this week it is tough to get them all down to get this blog rolling. One of the first things I want to do is to lay out the framework of what Complete Fulfillment means. I work a lot and I take a ton on responsibility for what I do. I am currently running a startup within a larger company which has totally consumed me over the last 9 months. I would like to say that is not normal but taking on a ton has been a constant theme over my career.

As I mentioned in a previous post I had a very eye opening week at a class at Harvard recently. Out of that for me came Complete Fulfillment. I realized that I have long struggled with the balance of all the areas of my life but had never found a good way to really be better about getting them in balance. They always tend to be 90% work and 10% everything else. I have worked with an executive coach (one of the great resources I have at Tripwire). Her name is Karin Kolodziejski - she has probably been the most impactful people on my professional career. Many of the things we have chatted about have directly overlapped with my personal life. As many conversations as we have had over the years I have still never been able to effectively balance things out over any period of time.

The class I took at Harvard was on leadership with some of the top professors on the subject and the most surprising thing about the week for me was that they talked about soft skills most of the time. What I realized was that for me to perform at the highest level at work and enjoy life to the fullest I needed to balance things out better.

One of the concepts that helped my thoughts about this was something my wife and I tried with our kids. I have two great daughters (and now a son) and as for most parents every day is a new challenge. As parents, my wife and I try different techniques to see if they work. A while back we made jars with the girls names on them and we had a bunch of rocks. The idea was when they did good things they would get a rock in the jar. For example - when our 2 year old would go on the potty she would get a rock. If they washed their hands without being told they would get a rock. If they asked nicely and said please they would get a rock and so on. If they did something bad they would get a rock or rocks taken out. If they hit each other, threw a fit, etc. rocks would come out. If they filled the jar to a certain level they would get to go to build a bear and get a new stuffed animal.

What does this have to do with life balance? A lot. I started thinking about life in this same framework. Each week you are given only so much time. That is finite and you can't change it. The objective is to spend the week filling up your jar with as many rocks as you can through positive experiences and minimize the number of rocks you have to take out from negative experiences. If you can maximize this over time you can achieve Complete Fulfillment.

When I applied this to myself I realized that I spend much of the week filling up my jar with rocks from work. The problem is that also beat myself up because I am exhausted each night for my kids. I eat like crap. I don't work out. I don't spend any time reading my bible or praying. All of these other areas of life I neglect and they cause me stress because I feel like I should be doing them. As a result I take rocks out of the jar. Work is also stressful because of the shear mass of the project we are taking on and the amount of responsibility I put on myself about it. Don't get me wrong about work - I like my job and vWire is very exciting but the net impact is that I don't fill up the jar very much.

The next few posts I will lay out some more of the concepts I have been mulling over the past month.

- All rocks are not the same size.

- Rocks change size over time.

- Time is not variable.

- The categories of life.

- This is a game of math not judgement.

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Happy 4th of July

2009-07-04T15:36:00.001-07:00

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Sand Castles

2009-07-04T10:55:00.001-07:00

Spending time at the beach hanging with the girls and having fun playing in the sand. Two parts of Complete Fulfillment.

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Bring yourself back to the present

2009-07-03T13:44:00.001-07:00

One of the great people I met at Harvard had a great technique for reducing stress and bringing yourself back to the present moment. It is very simple. Take a few seconds and recognize each of your senses in the place you are at that moment.

Sight - look around you and notice all the details. Look at the cracks in the wall. Look at the speck of dirt on the floor. Recognize the shadows and so on.

Sound - Focus on the details. A bird chirping, a baby talking and rolling in his bed, etc.

Smell - this one is hard for me as I don't seem to notice different smells. Things like food baking, people walking by, etc.

Taste - This is powerful if you are eating or drinking, otherwise it might be what is still in your mouth from earlier.

Touch - the best example for me on this was if you are standing feel how you feet touch the ground.

Most of the time we are thinking about was has happened or what is going to happen not what is happening. By doing so we rob ourselves of the present moments. This is one way to bring yourself back to the present.

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Notice anything strange about this?

2009-07-02T17:47:00.001-07:00

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Complete Fulfillment

2009-07-01T23:44:00.001-07:00

I recently had the opportunity to spend a week at Harvard in the High Potential Leaders Program – a week long Executive Education program. I have always had high expectations of Harvard but I really had no idea. I was blown away by the level of teaching, the facilities and the logistics of the entire program. The class was made up of 99 executives from around the world (65% non-US). We had about 10 cases to read prior to the program and no idea what to really expect beyond that. The program started on Sunday night and we went through a small case. That evening we meet with our group for the week. We lived in the executive housing with our group. We stayed on the same floor and each group shared a common area that was as good as any conference room we had at work in addition to a kitchen and TV area. You can see my pictures from the trip here.

The next day we went through some more cases and I remember thinking – this lady sure knows a ton about this case. I soon realized that Linda Hill (one of our instructors) wrote the case. While the rest of the country’s MBA programs are teaching the Harvard case study method using Harvard cases, there is no substitute for learning from the best minds in business academics who also wrote the case.

The next day we spent with an acting group. Our living groups worked with one actor all day. It was an amazing experience that was a big hit with everyone. The intent was to make us better presenters and give us some skills that we may not have had. An amazing day.

The next day was spent with John Kotter. He is basically the godfather of leadership. I was not sure what to expect. I thought he might be a little full of himself and stuffy but boy was I wrong. If Linda was a 9-10 as a professor – Kotter was a 12. He was really amazing. His ability to teach through storytelling was something else. He was the most engaging and friendly teacher I have ever been around. After that day everyone walked around by themselves trying to absorb what just happened. It was a very powerful day.

Thursday we went through some more cases and one on Friday morning. It was such an intense week that I did not have time to reflect on it until the 6 hour plane ride home. When I did I had one of those ah-ha moments that happen very few times. I have long struggled with balancing all the priorities of my life and the way I actually live my life. I have a very strong ambition that drives me to work hard and neglect other areas. I came up with this concept that I call Complete Fulfillment. I have decided to use this blog to write about my thoughts on this subject and as a way to detail my journy in balancing my life and honing this principle. More to come on exactly what that means. I am also experimenting on using Posterous - my stream is at matthixson.posterous.com

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Mayberry to Madison Ave and Back – the Emergence of Social Media

2009-02-04T07:00:00.000-08:00

The other day I saw the update Did You Know Video and the main stat that stuck out to me was this.

Years it took to reach a market audience of 50 Million.

This was a pretty amazing stat. I am just truly learning about social media and it’s power over the last few months . I just got my Facebook account set up about 3 months ago. I now am getting addicted to Twitter – once the tools get better I sure it will be hard for me to find anything else to do. The power of social media is apparent to me so the stat does not seem unreal to me but it still made me think – Why?

The interesting thing about this list is that they are all technologies. They are all technologies that enable communication. They are all technologies that enable human behavior they don’t really create it. So I had to ask the question what would be on the list before radio? Before the radio technology gets pretty weak. I am not a marketer by trade but it would seem the most powerful form of marketing is word of mouth and before Radio that was the main form of communication.

Mayberry

Did you ever watch the Andy Griffith show? It was small town USA – made for television of course – but what it showed was how things happened in small communities back in the day. People found out about things from people in their community. People would use something and not matter what the result others heard the review from the people they knew and that was powerful. This could have also been spread by letters via snail mail but the real impact was how things were spread at the barber shop, at the diner or on the street. But over time all that changed.

Madison Ave.

Along came Radio and then Television. They did not come along at the same time but had roughly the same result. People could now broadcast out the message they wanted to spread to anyone with a receiving piece of technology on the other end. This message did not care who you were or your relationship to the person on the other end. It was designed to reach as many eyes and ears as possible. The birth of true mass media. For years we have lived in this space. It has gotten much more complex over the years. Brand experts have made a science and an art out of building brands. For years the public has been told what to think about brands and how that brand should be perceived. But times are changing…

Social Media

In many ways Social media takes us back to the days of Mayberry. We can now hear from the people that we know and trust about things that we care about – or they care about – or no one cares about – ? But the point is that now in an instant on Twitter I can learn about someone's experience with something or something they find of interest – via word of mouth or tweet.

The difference now is that I am not restricted to the people in Mayberry. I can find interesting people all over the globe that have something to say that I want to hear. The tools on how to find these people, how you interact and filter the noise are still maturing but these are rule changing times. I’m sure that brand managers are starting to figure out, if they have not already, that things are moving in a new direction. The powerful thing is that Joe Public has no real idea what is coming. People on Twitter and Friendfeed and all the like may not realize this but the average person has no idea what all this is.

The next few years are going to be very interesting because as the data at the beginning of this post shows things are moving fast. The infrastructure is there – no longer do you have to buy a radio or TV or wait for the infrastructure to be built. It is here – many people have internet access and millions more every year. Developers now just layer the software on what is there already.

So what do you think? Are you ready? Do you realize the power you have?

The Monk Has a Hint to the Riddle of the Red Rubber Ball

2009-02-01T18:32:00.001-08:00

I started this blog on June 22, 2007. Not exactly early to the game of blogging but I was after what many early blogger were after – understanding. I was not early to blogging as a technology but blogging was in its early stages to me. My objective was to learn, as it is today with all of the emerging social tools – this time I am not as behind the curve.

I decided that my blog was to be about finding my passion. I had no idea what it was. At the time I was the Director of Finance at Tripwire in Portland, Oregon. I was bored with my job and was searching for my passion. I had no idea what it was so I decided this blog would be about whatever I felt like at the time. The name was derived from my search of my passion which is explained in my second post. I was not concerned about readers as I figured my only regulars would be my Mom, Dad and a few others. That assumption has turned out to be mostly true which has resulted in sporadic readership which is most likely because of my lack of focus.

Over the past year I have graduated from an MBA program and started working in Business Development. This has been a great switch for me. My job has evolved at breakneck pace over the past 5 months and has lead me to social media. I have always found interest in two main things over the years – people/relationships and technology. I realized over the past few months that this revolution is taking place around technologies like Facebook, Twitter and Friendfeed. The exciting part to me is that these technologies are not even close to fleshed out and are still evolving.

Because of the emergence of all these things in my life I have decided that this blog will be focused around social media and how it is where relationships and technology meet. With this focus and the desire to start developing a regular group of readers on this site I am working through the rest of the site redesign and an abbreviation to the name – so stay tuned. This is a step in the direction of my riddle.

Light & Shadow Photography – My Favorite in PDX

2008-12-31T20:19:00.001-08:00

We recently took our girls Katelyn (4) and Addison(2) to Lisa Cornell over at Light and Shadow Photography. This is the second time that we have taken our girls to Lisa and both times she has done an amazing job. Her studio is at her house and she has an amazing way with our girls.

As you can see in the pictures the girls have a great experience and that comes out in the pictures. In the past we have done pictures at lots of places – the first year of Katelyn’s life she had photos every month. We don’t get around to that as much any more but there is no question that if you want to end up with great pictures that bring your kids to life you should go see Lisa over at Light and Shadow.

I have yet to meet Lisa as my wife has taken them both times but I have always been impressed with the variety of pictures she produces. Many of the poses are what I call real life pictures. The girls are playing and don’t always seemed posed – these end up some of the best picture.

Professional pictures can tend to be expensive but we get a ton of pictures for the price. One of the best things is that she will sell you a CD with all the pictures taken and you have the rights to them. She also has the small things nailed. She gives you a small leather book with all the pictures and the CD is in a beautifully designed box.

The true test of business is would you recommend them to your friends? For our family that is an easy and emphatic YES.

Current - Did You Know Video

2008-12-30T09:49:00.000-08:00

The original video of this was eye opening enough. I don't know that this is the official version of this as many versions have been done. This one is very up to date and is even more amazing. If you have never seen this take 5 minutes to watch - it will be educational. I think all Americans should watch this. The current economy has been fairly eye opening for most Americans but many have never been through true hard times and they are use to America being on top. This video should tell those people to get off your butt and start working for what you want. Although Americans work many don't know there can be anything any different.

Great interview with Tim O'Reilly on ScobleizerTV

2008-12-28T13:40:00.000-08:00

I came across this video interview of Tim O'Reilly by Robert Scoble. I have been watching both of these people on Twitter recently. They both are very connected and are looked at as leaders in social media. Tim O'Reilly is the person that coined the term Web 2.0. This is part one of a two part series. For me this gets interesting about 17 minutes in where they start talking social media. There are many other great interviews on ScobleizerTV.

vlingo for the iphone - great voice app

2008-12-23T21:38:00.001-08:00

I cam across this great new app for the iphone that allows you to voice dial, search (google & yahoo), map and status update for twitter and facebook. One of the best things for viral marketing is that I am writting this blog post in the video player of their demo.

Without the sun we run out of energy

2008-12-21T09:27:00.000-08:00

I read an interesting article in outside magazine that put the nation (and world's) energy needs in perspective. Now I have no idea if these estimates are correct but I trust that this is a very smart guy at MIT that is respected by the energy community. His name is Daniel Nocera and he thinks that he may have found the solution to the nation and world's energy problems.

The article made one main statement that caught my attention. Today Planet Earth uses 15 terrawatts of energy a year. It is estimated that by 2050 the planet will use 30 terrawatts of energy a year. So how do you make up the difference? Nocera says that if you cut down all plants on earth except those needed for food and turn it into biofuel which would produce 7 terrawatts. "We could build a new billion-watt nuclear plant every 1.6 days until 2050 = 8 terrawatts. We could cover every inch of land on earth with wind turbines = 2 terrawatts."

So for those of you counting at home that is 30 needed - 15 today = 15 needed - 7 biofuel - 8 nuclear - 2 wind = +2 terrawatts. The problem is doing all of that is not realistic from an actual construction perspective or a livability perspective. The one thing not mentioned here is the sun which sends 800 terrawatts as much as every hour. The sun sound like the way to go and Nocera thinks he has a way to harness it. Find out more in the current issue of Outside Magazine in the Code Green Column. The article is not available online yet but it is worth picking up the print copy.

Great Advice from Barkley to Greg Oden

2008-12-12T17:35:00.000-08:00

Here is some sound advice and why anyone jumping on Greg Oden's case should take a flying leap.

Don't just give the auto industry money

2008-12-07T19:35:00.001-08:00

I found a great artcile by Jack and Suzy Welch today in Business Week. I like the approach it takes. It may not be the right solution overall but it doesn't involve just giving them money. It requires them to fight through bankruptcy and emerge a better more competitive merged company. As the US moves forward they are going to have to realize that the global landscape is requiring change and competition in new ways. The auto industry is finally having to face this fact. This is a good article and worth the read.

http://smub.it/matt/auto

State of the Blogosphere 2008 Report

2008-12-02T14:47:00.001-08:00

Technorati has published a State of the Blogosphere 2008 Report on their website. It is worth a read. The graphic below is one of the most interesting stats. You always hear about how many blogs are out there which is true but only a fraction are active. Blogs are so easy and free to create it should not be surprising.

The report breaks down into the following sections.

Lesson to us is to keep it active to keep it real - otherwise we are just part of the noise.

Welcome Greg Oden!!!

2008-11-14T21:38:00.001-08:00

Living here in Portland there are a ton of expectations on Greg Oden. People jump on the band wagon really quick and they jump off really quick only to jump on the dog pile. It is really annoying. People just need to give him time to get into the NBA. Tonight was really his second game. He is a number one pick who was the pick of the decade to most people. Then he was hurt for all of last year then in the first 2 minutes of his first game he gets hurt again. He came back to play for the first time in Miami a few days ago and played tonight in New Orleans. He is now coming off the bench which is great in my opinion. In the Miami game he looked OK but still not in sync.

Tonight he looked great. He was a major defensive presence - patrolling the paint. He looked good running the floor - which he had not to this point. He was aggressive on the offensive end even though he did not get his number called much. He had a monster dunk off an inbounds play that was good to see. The main thing in my mind is that he seemed to feel comfortable for the first time ever on the court in the NBA. He was into the game and there was no center on New Orleans that could keep up with him. Here is what we have to look forward to in the future - a sky high block - this was awesome.

Need Something Like Mozy or MyPictureTown?

2008-11-12T08:00:00.000-08:00

I have been looking for some time to find a program that would allow me to store photos online. In today's day and age if you lost a drive of photos it would be the equivalent of a fire in a house. I have a back up external drive of our photos but if the house burned down we would lose them. I have taken a drive out of the house but that is hard to remember. I have tried Mozy but it would not work on an external drive. If they could fix that it would be the way to go. I have started using My Picture Town by Nikon. It seems to be a good resource but it is taking forever to load all of our photos. It does have taking which is cool and it keeps them all online so that I can get to them anywhere. The price is very reasonable. I would expect with all the talk about Cloud Computing there will be a user friendly solution coming. If anyone knows of a tool that will work with a Mac or a PC - work with an external drive and constantly backup in increments for a low price please LET ME KNOW.

LinkedIn Events Is Good Idea - If People Will Use It

2008-11-09T13:04:00.001-08:00

LinkedIn recently launched a new application called LinkedIn Events. It is a cool concept but we will see if people use it. So many people use LinkedIn but most of them - including myself - use it as a rolidex and not much more. It will be interesting to see how they engage thier users to use some of these great applications that they are coming out with.

Razorfish Report on Social Media is a must read - if this is your thing

2008-11-05T19:37:00.000-08:00

As I said in my last post my job at work is heavily involved in social media. I find the subject very fasinating and I am learning as much as I can as fast as I can. I cam across a report early last week - FEED - The Razorfish Consumer Experience Report. It is a very cool report that you should check out even if you never read a page. The graphics and the experience of the report is very cool. Every page is very engaging and has some writing. It is not heavy on the text but very heavy on keeping your attention. It covers all sorts of subjects such as mobile devices, how to design a customer experience - not just a web page, twitter, widgets, games and business, wisdom of the crowd, visualizing data, and more. If these subjects or cool graphics are not your thing you should check out how they present the report online - this is nothing new but it is one of the better applications of it I have seen. Good stuff.

Inc & Kevin Rose of Digg

2008-11-04T19:27:00.000-08:00

I just read an interesting article I have been trying to get to on Digg in Inc. Magazine. It is a great article and gives a good insight to the future of user based interaction. It is amazing to me how many people are deeply involved in some of these sites. I twitter, Facebook, Digg, blog and a bunch of other things. My role at work is focused largely on social media and so I am learning more and more every day - yet it is hard to keep up with everything. This article is a great read for anyone who is interested in this topic because it shows that web start up culture type of company still exists and can be very successful in even hard times.

Sometimes You Have to Take a Time Out and Regroup

2008-10-26T12:27:00.000-07:00

My current role at work could have me working 24/7 for quite some time. I love the work I am doing and it is very engaging but I have to be careful. Yesterday I was just not feeling very engaged with working - which should be OK since it was Saturday. Everyday that goes by I feel like I have missed some time to be productive. Yesterday I just could not get motivated to do much - so I didn't. I rode my bike and did some errands but that was about it. Looking back on it today it was the best thing I could have done because today I am ready to execute on some things. Lesson learned that sometimes you have to take some time off to regroup.

When I started working years ago it was for a Big 4 accounting firm where staff were usually just worked as hard as possible. It was just considered part of the job and on some engagements that meant lots of hours 7 days a week. A partner I was working for once said he would rather staff take 30 minutes to regroup if they needed to rather than working in a partially productive way - this was not the norm at the time. You are much more productive by taking some time off than just pounding through a task. Taking yesterday off has put me in a much better place today - bring on the week.

How my MBA has changed my career.

2008-10-24T21:51:00.000-07:00

I finished up my MBA from the Oregon Executive MBA program (OEMBA) in June of this year and the class still has a mailing list. Lately there has some chatter on the mailing list with the main thing kicking it off is that three of my fellow Class 22 graduates appeared in the Portland Business Journal. The article was featuring some of Portland's recent Executive MBA's. I didn't read the article but most of the conversation within my class was about one person being misrepresented in the article and feeling that he sounded like he was unappreciative of the experience. The reality was that when he started the program he was in the corporate world and it was applicable to where he thought he was going. Not long into the program his path had changed from the corporate world and the value of his time and money changed. It really got me thinking about what I thought the value of my MBA was.

For a long time I have intended to make a review of the OEMBA so that others that are researching the program could get a view of it if they did not know someone. I will get to that at some point but in looking back on the value of my MBA I realize that it means something different for everyone. People who paid for it themselves have a different view than those that were paid for by the company. There were things that I learned in my MBA but I have to admit that I don't feel like I got much out of it until the 2nd year and even then it was hit and miss. The reality for me is that I have a business undergrad and have worked in Finance for years so much of the content was not new.

But my MBA has changed my career path. This is not because I have the degree but because of the opportunity it gave me to build relationships. Do not take this that there was nothing learned but no one has said - You have an MBA. Please take this job. This is only a piece to the puzzle, but during our first strategy class the assignments gave me a chance to work with one of our VP's that is a strong force in our strategy. This interaction gave me a chance to develop stronger relationships with him and let him see that I was capable of more than finance and accounting. This interaction over some of my projects let me expand that relationship beyond business as usual.

In May before graduation he asked me to come work for him in Business Development. I went over and quickly got involved in another project that I am now running. It is the first job that I can actually say that I enjoy in which I am a business owner for a very exciting part of the company with a fantastic team. After two years a lot of money it was the chance to further a relationship over some homework is how my MBA has helped me the most.

Obama and Palin on Dancing with the Stars

2008-10-17T21:47:00.000-07:00

I knew they could play nicely together. They are both so graceful!!

This is a fake by the way for those of you that can't make that conclusion on your own. But it is funny for Democrats and Republicans alike.

I spent the last week at VMWorld

2008-09-18T20:43:00.001-07:00

I just got back from VMWorld. It was quite an experience. This was my first tradeshow and was some great learning for me. There were over 14,000 people there over the last 4 days. It was crazy the amount of infrastructure that was required to manage all of the logistics of this many people. They had this cartoon theme. I took some pictures of these ~30ft tall pictures that lined each of the hallways.

I will post some of the video I took of the lunch room. It was amazing.

The next Microsoft commercial

2008-09-18T20:43:00.000-07:00

This is the long version of the second commercial.

Here is the article that ran in Fast Company a few months ago about the firm that is developing these commercials.

Great New Microsoft Commercial

2008-09-08T22:19:00.000-07:00

This video is great. I don't know what it is with me blogging about videos lately but oh well. This has gotten awful reviews on YouTube but I think it is great. Microsoft recently engaged the same marketing firm that brought you the King - of Burger King. I think this will be the first in a series of strange but attention getting commercials.

Rudy Fernadez shows well in gold medal game.

2008-08-24T19:47:00.000-07:00

I can't wait for this guy to join the Blazers next season. He is going to need some work but he is high energy. In the gold medal game last night he made some threes, some great passes, rebounded and this great dunk. He fouled out and Spain lost but you can tell that this guy will be an exciting add to an already great Blazers squad.

The Russian reaction is the best part.

This is awesome!

2008-08-20T18:00:00.000-07:00

Something's in the water in China.

2008-08-19T20:31:00.000-07:00

Have you noticed that every swimming race in the China Olympics has been a world record? Some people might jump to the idea that all the swimmers are juiced. Given how many times that Michael Phelps was tested for drugs I find this highly unlikely - although it is just a matter of time until a French newspaper makes the claim.

Could there be something in the water? I'm not typically a conspiracy theorist but China is very motivated to show well in these games. Could they do something to the water that would allow the swimmers go faster? Could they reduce the friction or something? Just a random thought.

This commercial is funny but all to real.

2008-08-16T19:19:00.000-07:00

Brandon Roy has knee surgury

2008-08-14T22:19:00.000-07:00

I opened the paper this morning to see that Brandon Roy was to have knee surgery this morning. It was a flash back to Oden last year. The good new is that he is going to be fine. He sure gets beat up but this is good news for the Blazers at this point. Here is some video of Pritchard talking about the procedure.

Kevin Pritchard on Brandon Roy's knee surgery

Why Are the Redeam Team Players Playing?

2008-08-10T19:31:00.000-07:00

After the original Dream Team there the US went through a period of over confidence and eventually was not as dominant as they should have been, failing to win in the Greece Olympics. After the last embarrassment, it was great to see all of the great players who are now on the team. In watching the game today against China it was really amazing to realize the collection of players that was out there.

After the game there was an interview (click above for the video) with Lebron James who has seemed to become the vocal leader of the team. He was asked how this compared to the NBA finals or the NBA All-Star game. He said it was by far the biggest thing he had ever played in. Now it was estimated that 500 million Chinese watched the game and I would assume millions more around the world. It was said to be the most widely watched basketball game in the history of the sport.

It hit me as to the motivation of Lebron and possibly some of the other athletes. Lebron wants to be a global icon. He has made this claim in the past and it can be seen in his actions. Basketball is very much a global game and one of the largest passions of the Chinese people. Lebron would not have missed the chance to increase his global icon status on the largest stage on the planet.

Kobe has been said to be the best basketball player in the game and it shows the way he plays on this stage. Kobe wants to be famous but more than that he want to win and be one of the best players ever. If Lebron could ever get that killer instinct like Kobe or MJ there is no telling what he could do. Lebron becomes a free agent next summer and if he wanted to win he would consider Portland. With the players they have up and coming adding Lebron would be SCARY. But unfortunately Portland is not a big enough stage and the west coast is hard because of TV coverage. He will end up at the NY Knicks or the Brooklyn Nets. My bet is the Nets but we will see.

Evernote - A Daily Tool for Me.

2008-08-10T13:05:00.000-07:00

I have recently been using a tool called Evernote. At first I thought it was just another online tool but the more I use it the more I love it. It has four ways to get to it. I have a client installed on my PC, a client installed on my Mac, there is an iPhone application and a web tool.

It allows you to take notes in various notebooks - similar to OneNote - and it allows you tag those notes. You can also email those notes. Fairly basic features. The cool part to me is the iPhone app. It allows you to record voice memos, take pictures and make notes. All of these can be tagged and put into specific notebooks. All of this information syncs over the web and all of your clients can see the same thing. This gives me a way to compile data all in one place and see it where ever I am.

One of the other cool things is that it will index and search on text that is within pictures. This works fairly well but not perfectly. If it is typed it works pretty well and finds some hand written stuff.

This has become my main note taking tool in meetings and when a whiteboard is used I take a picture and sync it with Evernote. I also make notes to myself using the audio record function while I am in the car.

This is a beta and free right now. There is a premium version if you exceed their data limit each month which seems to be fairly large. I have not reached it. I would pay for the premium service at this point. They could take this to the next level by adding a task list and allowing you to share this with others. I would love to make this more GTD friendly. Still I am a big fan.

Sierra Designs Bedouin Annex 4 + 2 Tent Review

2008-07-27T18:27:00.000-07:00

I recently needed to get a tent that could fit more than me. I have moved from my backpacking tent that fit me and some gear to something that could fit my wife and 2 kids. I wanted something that would fit everyone overly comfortably because we have another kid on the way and if you want to car camp go a size bigger than what you think - it is worth it.

I ended up settling on the Sierra Designs Bedouin Annex 4+2 I got from REI. I have bought Sierra Designs before and have never been disappointed in the quality or design. This tent is about $450 and my wife kept asking why not just by the Coleman at Costco for $120. I buy things with the thought that they are going to be around for a long time to come. Those tents would not hold up in the long run and I would not want to be in much rain in one. If you have ever done any camping in wet weather you know the value of a good rain fly and sealant.As I was looking to buy this there were a lot of pictures on manufactures sites but it was hard to get a true feel for what the tent was like. Because of that I thought I would post some of my pictures here. The tent has two sections. We put a queen blow up bed in each section. The front section was a little harder to do that but we made it work. The back there was plenty of room and a nice walkway. The ceiling was about 6ft which was perfect everyone involved.

It was extremely easy to put up. I have put up some tents where it was hard to know if you were doing it right but this was very straight forward. Lots of pockets on the inside which is great for any sort of extended trip.

Great tent that I would highly recommend to anyone - great job Sierra Designs.

China Invades Africa

2008-07-24T21:34:00.000-07:00

If you say Africa there are many thoughts that come to people: AIDS, abuse, poverty, beauty, history and probably many others. If someone said Africa to me my thoughts would go to what I know – or think I know. My church supports a group in Kenya. We send a group there each year and do work on houses, churches, etc. We see pictures of cute appreciative kids and a lifestyle I can’t truly fathom. My other thoughts of Africa are the stories of massive AIDS on the continent and movies like Blood Diamonds. When I watched that movie I was sure that some of those things happen but there was also a good amount of Hollywood to the drama. I know there is war and abuse. I know that the United States gives a ton of support to the continent and we are pushing human rights issues but I am also not naive enough to think that we are not doing thing under the tables to get what we want.

All that said I recently read a very disturbing article in regards to China’s interactions with many of countries in Africa. This was special report in Fast Company magazine, China in Africa. The article profiles X countries and how China’s involvement in each country pillaging the countries to get the raw materials they need to fuel their economic growth. While the US is trying to improve the social conditions in the country and set a standard that we think should be upheld in Africa, the Chinese are doing just the opposite. They are investing billions of dollars on the continent to secure long term rights to resources. In return they are building soccer stadiums, government buildings, and infrastructure. These things keep the people in power happy and build the things they need to take what they need. The brutal facts are that there are war and extreme poverty conditions that need to change for life to improve for the people in that part of the world. This was a very eye opening article for me and something that all people should read so that they understand the reality Africa is inevitably going to get worse. If the future powers of the world are based on their access to the resources they need the US is going to be in trouble if they expect Africa to be a major source of that.

Mozambique, Zambia, Congo and Equatorial Guinea are the countries that are profiled in the article and only one point on each. The article is amazing and should read in its entirety.

A few of my favorite quotes from the article:

"Let China sleep for when it awakes, she will shake the world." - Napoleon

"The Chinese are building thins in exchange for mining rights, timber rights, fishing rights, and these are absolutely bad deals. We've lost an asset, and in exchange we got a ministry building, which is just an opportunity cost for China."
- Jim LaFleur

"China is like an elephant riding a bicycle. If it slows down, it could fall off, and the earth might quake." - bureaucrats in Beijing

Sunray Premium Playground Review Update

2008-07-16T18:23:00.000-07:00

It is amazing sometimes what will drive traffic on a blog. I originally put my post about this play structure up so that my dad could show pictures of what we did to friends back home. To my surprise this gets about 20 hits a day on the blog. So I thought I would give a few more tips and tricks to the assembly.

Tip #1

If you don’t have an air compressor and a impact wrench get one. If you have to rent one or just break down and buy one it is worth it. There are a lot of bolts that will make your arm fall off if you do it the old fashion way. We bought a small Porter Cable one with the wrench for about $200.

Tip #2

Have two people. This would be tough to get started by yourself. It is not impossible – I put tried putting some of the initial pieces together without my Dad and it sucked. It was very inefficient and hard. Once you get the basic framework up you can do a lot of it alone but two people is way more efficient.

Tip #3

Have 2 electric drills with at least 2 batteries. We used multiple drills. My trustworthy Black and Decker that I have had forever started smoking by the end. It was only 14v and was getting a workout. I used a neighbor’s Dewalt 18v drill and it was a champ. When my Black and Decker finally bites the dust that is what will be replacing it. Make sure you have at least 2 batteries for each drill. Having two drills lets both people be productive. Most of the holes are predrilled which is great. That made assembly easy. There are a zillion screws to this thing - easy but a lot.

Tip #4

Don’t stress out about anchoring it. When you get this whole thing together it is very solid. You should put it on as level of ground as you can but we had it on a slight slope and it was ok. We had to put some cement 1” blocks under the swing set side to level it but it is very steady and has been getting lots of play. When you are done it comes with a bunch of 18” rebarb with some big washers welded on the side. You pound that into the ground and drive some lag bolts into the structure and it really won’t move.

If you have any specific questions please feel free to ask - I will be happy to answer them if I know.

You Need to Get the Blind Pilots Album!

2008-07-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine in Portland has a little record label that just released this album. It got over to the folks at iTunes and now it is the free single of the week. Everyone should check this out it is a great album. You can download the entire album on iTunes now. It is getting great reviews. I purchased a copy today and concur it is some great stuff.

iTunes

My Space

Expunged Records

Catching Up On Some Reading

2008-06-14T22:16:00.000-07:00

For anyone that has followed this blog regularly or by chance will notice that my postings have been sporadic at best. Last Friday was my last deliverable for my MBA program I am completing, which I have been doing along with work and two little kids. So needless to say I have not had much free time. I found a pattern last summer when we had a few months off after the first year. I spent the first month catching up on all the reading I had not done for 9 months - along with other things like family, movies and blogs. I am now going through all of the magazines that I need to catch up on. I am reading about 40 blogs a day, eWeek, Infoweek, CFO, Fast Company and Inc. The biggest backlog is with Fast Company and Inc. As I work through those they usually will drive some interesting thoughts. If you don't read these you should start. They are run by the same company and get joint marketed - so you can usually get a great deal on the subscription for both. Anyways... more thoughts to come on the readings.

Countdown to my MBA graduation!

2008-06-13T11:36:00.001-07:00

View My CountDown Page

Create My Own CountDown Page

The Flip Mino - I Have To Get This.

2008-06-08T20:15:00.000-07:00

One of the blogs that I read is Jason Graham-Nye over at g-Diapers. I met Jason when he came to speak in an MBA class I was in. Jason and I have yet to connect but we have many items in common and one is an affinity for gadgets. Jason has a new Flip video camera he just picked up. This is something I need to have not necessarily for me but my wife will love this and use it to death. She currently takes video of our kids on the old digital camera but it has really poor quality. We have a nice hard drive video camera but she won't use it because it is to hard.(?) The Flip is amazing because it is inexpensive, small, and very easy to use. The video quality seems good - especially considering you will probably watch it on your computer and not a hi def tv. You can see an example on Jason's blog and another over on Gizmodo. The one on Gizmodo is the new Mino which is smaller and has a rechargable battery. I'm not sure what model Jason got but it is probably the Ultra because the Mino just came out last week. The only bad thing it seems about the Mino is that the batter takes forever to charge. This will be a purchase in the near future.

Hi Def is the Best Thing to Happen to the NHL in Years

2008-06-03T18:34:00.000-07:00

Hi Def is an amazing invention for all sports - the grass is greener for football, the players look like you are in the front row for the NBA, and you can actually see the puck for the NHL. Not many people are big fans of the NHL in the US - Canada is another story.

If you have ever been to a NHL game in person there is nothing like sitting on the glass. The action is nonstop and hard hitting. But if you have ever tried to watch it on tv it is awful. The NHL Finals are in progress and if you have HD you can see an amazing difference. You can actually see the puck and all the glory that comes with all other sports in HD. I don't know if HD will give any more fans but it might stop people who are flipping channels for 5 minutes.

Sunray Premium Playground Install Sucess

2008-06-02T21:54:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend my Dad and I installed the Sunray Premium Playground we bought at Costco. In came in six boxes and I thought I was giving up most of my yard. While it did take up some of the yard it seemed to complete it. My wife and grandma did not think we would be done in 3 days but there was more than enough time to do the building and the yard work.

I was impressed with the engineering and ease of construction of the swing set/clubhouse. I really wanted to make this post to show off the pictures and say thank you to Sunray for making such a quality product. It looks great, the instructions were clear, and the quality is fantastic. My girls love it and it is hard to keep them inside. It is a great addition to our backyard. Thanks Grandpa and Grandma for everything on this!

The finished product.

A set of custom stairs on the back. We have a two year old that is too little for the set as designed. We had to find a better way for her to get into the clubhouse. She has a four year old sister that she is going to follow. We wanted to make that possible and safe.

The factory ladder - not two year old friendly.

The steering wheel and scope.

I'm back! Did you miss me?

2008-05-23T20:50:00.000-07:00

I'm back - not that any of you missed me but anyways...

I am in the process in finishing up my MBA and I have switched jobs. I have never been consistent about writing in this because of not enough time to commit. Hopefully I have some time to write and enjoy this and another blog that I write. I was looking back at these posts and it has been a while. I bought an iPhone in December and the new one is slated to come out next month. Needless to say a lot has happened since I last was active on this. More to come soon - Blazers & the NBA draft and the iPhone.

The Beauty of Buying Single Songs

2007-11-21T22:58:00.000-08:00

I have accumulated so much music it won't fit on my 30 gig iPod. So I am going through my music slowly and rating it all on the 5 star system provided by iTunes. There is an upside to the digital way to purchase music. You can buy individual songs which is great because in my review of my old CD's there is a lot of crap stuck around the few good songs. There are exceptions for some great complete CD's but that is not the rule.

Windows Mobile 6 is here for HTC 8525

2007-11-10T13:22:00.000-08:00

I have been looking for this and have missed it for the last week but the Windows Mobile 6 upgrade for my Cingular 8525 is available. You can find it on HTC's support page for the 8525. It took forever to download and I got some huge help from a friend but 4 hours later it is downloaded. My friend went out and got a tool called Fresh Downloads that would get 8 streams of download at one time and keep it in one file. That sped up the download and would let us resume where we left off when the server for HTC crapped out. Finally it is downloaded and it installed successfully in about 15 minutes. This should keep me interested in this phone for another 6 months.

2007-11-02T21:14:00.000-07:00

Maybe everyone already knows this and I am the one who missed it? I came across a article in a magazine that talked about haveing and ICE phone number in your cell phone. ICE stands for In Case of Emergency. This would allow a hospital to search for your emergency contact number in your cell phone vs. digging through your wallet and hoping to find something. For Example - ICE-DAD. That would call your dad in an emergency. As I looked into this Irealized this is an old idea - but I have never heard of it so there you go.

Oden Out - Time to Rethink Things

2007-09-14T09:32:00.000-07:00

So as most anyone who follows the NBA probably know - Greg Oden is out for the season. He got up of the couch a while back and his knee was hurting. Then after about a week he was running at the practice facility it hurt more and he told someone. There was some swelling and an MRI - then they scoped the knee. The papers were talking about this should not be bad and he will probably be out for six weeks. Then microfracture.... What? Microfracture? That is the worst news that could come out of exploratory surgery. The first thought with microfracture is that he might not come back. A friend sent me this page that shows all of the NBA players that have had the procedure and the results. There are some bad results but there are more good results. The key is not to come back to early and put in the work. Zack Randolph had his best year every last year 2 years after his microfracture but his first year back was a struggle.

All these bad thoughts come but then time to get back to reality. The damage was very minimal, it was clean, there was no flaking and the rest of the knee looked great. He is 19 and has loads of talent and work ethic. And by the way the Blazers have a better team than anyone gives them credit for. Sure - Oden was going to help but it was a good 50% of the season that he was in a steep, steep learning curve.

Last season the Blazers were better than anyone ever expected. That was with Roy, the Rookie of the Year and leader, out for over 20 games. Lamarcus Aldridge out at the start of the season. Joel Pryzbilla out for a good chuck then having a rough time getting back. Zack was there but he was Zack. The Blazers proved that they played well without Zack - if not better.

Certain people think the Blazers will still be bad but those are the people that probably didn't watch 5 games last year. John Hollinger over at ESPN has a mathematical formula that he says has the Blazers winning 26 games next year. Are you nuts? That is worse than last year. This team will still be in the running for the 8th spot most of the year. They will win about 35 games. As Prichard said yesterday, this gives the other players a chance to step up. And a report from Blazers practice was about how Roy and the team decided it was time to support Oden and for everyone to step up. The team could decide this because they have all been at the practice facility working out for about a month. They are there because Roy called everyone this summer. No coaches just a team that is hungry. Watch out folks the Blazers are coming. It may be a couple of years to fully get there but if you are counting them out you are a fool.

The first thing that Oden said to GM Prichard was - sorry (about 20 times). He will be back and prove to the world his talent. And he will only be about 21 when he does. The future is still very bright for the Blazers.

1 Three Year Old + 1 Big Black Permanent Marker

2007-09-12T22:21:00.001-07:00

Tonight was an experience. My wife and I were upstairs talking in our office and it had been a while since we had seen our 2 kids (3 & 1.5). It was way to quite so we went out to look for them. We found them in the bonus room working on a little "art project". Our 3 year old had taken a large black Sharpie and decided to leave her mark on about 20 things in the bonus room. The door, the wall, the wall, the treadmill, the 32" television screen, some toys, the work out balls, my leather chair, and a number of other items. Besides being upset how does a permanent marker come off of things? Off to the internet. I found a blog that suggested these 8 things.

Mr. Clean Magic Eraser (also works for crayons),
WD-40,
Anti-bacterial hand gel,
Hairspray,
Cooking spray,
Nail polish remover,
Bleach (depending on the surface),
Goof Off

We only had WD-40 and Nail polish remover. The WD-40 worked best and only took off the smooth surfaces. You have to go at it for a while and some of the marks did not come all the way off. The leather chair still has a faint mark on it and the walls we had to paint over. This was the first real toddler incident that we have had that I'm sure will be remembered for a long time. She knew she did something wrong but I don't think fully understood at first why it was so bad. After most everything came off and a few hours later it was a little funnier. The joy of kids.

Gene Kim - Rock & Roll Kung Fu Low Tech Style

2007-08-14T08:46:00.000-07:00

I have worked with Gene for about 5 years and he never ceases to amaze me. We have had many interesting conversations and Gene's thirst for knowledge is never ending. Gene is a founder of Tripwire and just a really smart and curious person. Gene is well know in our part of the software world and has a great technical knowledge which we refer to as Kung Fu. I was in visiting Gene and Dwayne Melancon the other day and Gene pulls out this ancient looking device. Dwayne and I normally discuss the newest gadget coming out or website we found. So we harassed Gene thoroughly but Gene had a great point. He is easily distracted by email the Internet and every other possibly thing. I realized that I am the same way. So what is this thing? It is the NEC MobilePro 900c and it is actually a new product. It is a device with a full keyboard and some software. It allows Gene to write and not be distracted because he can't go to email or the Internet. Focus is a very difficult thing and going more low tech and slowing down might be the answer to better focus.

A New iMac Released Tomorrow?

2007-08-06T21:40:00.001-07:00

For some time now there has been rumors of a new iMac to hit the streets. It has been rumored to come out later this summer but the summer is disappearing rapidly. I am not a Mac user but I think our next computer purchase will be an iMac. My wife will love the easy interface for pictures and video and I think it will reduce her frustration she has will our slow Dell.

Apple is hosting a Mac-related media event. The rumor is that they will be available directly after the meeting. According to www.appleinsider.com Apple has issued 3 new price points to suppliers. A 24” will look great in our office! Apple sure knows how to get the media worked up over a product release.

Made to Stick - Concrete Ideas

2007-08-02T22:12:00.000-07:00

The current book I am reading is Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath. I am only about half way through the book but I wanted to make a post based on what I have gleamed so far. The book is interesting but the concepts seem simple but not obvious. Most of the concepts to this point are around how stories are constructed that make people remember stories.

The point that I found very interesting and useful for me was the concrete idea. This is one of the most simple and most overlooked concepts I have read about in a long time. I have just completed the first year of an MBA program that ended with a Finance class. You could tell that the teacher was smart but could not get the ideas across in class. I thought that the class was going to revolt after the first couple of weeks. Most people realized it was not going to change and just accepted it. People struggled and I was fairly frustrated myself. Then he instituted a project that the class had to go and figure out the weighted cost of capital for their own company. This was finally something concrete that was close to home for all of us. All the sudden people started learning something! Because of a concrete idea they could latch onto. I learned more from that project than hours of teaching or problems. As I looked back on most of the classes we took the concepts I remember and will take away are concrete examples that I could relate to. I will give another update when I finish the book.

3G iPhone?

2007-07-25T21:48:00.000-07:00

I was surfing www.appleinsider.com for the latest news on the rumored new iMacs and stumbled upon this article. The rumor is that Apple has a 3G version of the iPhone in the works. They basically have to given that it is a sweet phone but has some limitations. This article states that we may see the 3G version this November before the Christmas season. If they could figure out a way to make the business email a reality I would be in with a 3G version! All those poor people who dove in and spent $600 on the first generation. I shouldn't laugh. I did that with the Treo 600 but it was a revolutionary device at the time. Given that I need the email and speed is a must if the functions are going to be worth anything I am waiting for the new and improved version. The article also talks about the affect on RIM. You would think that this is something apple is looking to address.

The 4-Hour Work Week - A Must Read

2007-07-15T00:59:00.000-07:00

I was recently introduced to the book The 4-Hour Work Week. The warning I recieved was you just need to keep reading through the first 20% of the book. I went and downloaded an audiobook of this to listen to on the way to work. My first impression was this guy was out there and this was not something a normal person would do. How could you? This is not how the world works? But I kept with it and the book is really amazing. You can take the concepts as far as you would like or are comfortable with.

The author Timothy Ferris lives a great lifestyle of living life by creating an income flow that can be managed on a minimal basis yet provides enough to do some of the most amazing things in the world. This book fits well with my current delima of what to do in life. His advice is to find a way to live life and not wait until retirement to do the things you want to. He has foreseen all the excuses and eliminates them. He also does a great job at giving a step by step guide to developing all the pieces necessary. This is truely a book written by someone who has done this.

The ideas I have grasped on to are the outsourcing and automating a business. I currently run an eBay business but I know that it could run 100x smoother if I spent some time makeing it that way. I spend bunches of time to get it back in shape. I am going to experiment with outsourcing at work this quarter. He give details on what outsourcers in India and China will do - basically anything they do not need to be physcially present they can do. I am going to see where I can get some leverage out of this for report design, spreadsheet work and research. Based on the sucess I will expand this to further businesses or my personal life.

I think that anyone should read this book. If you go to a job each day and are saving for tomorrow then this is a must read. The only requirement is to have an open mind and explore the possibilities. Timothy might disagree with this but you can take as many of these items to apply as you feel comfortable with. They have created a great website that has lots of additonal resources. Hint - you have to have the book to get the full use out of the site.

The iPhone - Not quite for the business user

2007-07-15T00:25:00.000-07:00

I have played with the iPhone and was very impressed. A friend of mine waited in line to get one the night they came out. I have since bugged him two or three times to play with it. It is the most beautiful device I have ever had my hands on it. It is truely a new device. Most phones will do some music but this is a better music and video device than any previous phone or iPod. I would encourage anyone to get their hands on it to see it.

The picture at the top is a line to the main page for the iPhone. Watch the demo at the top of the page to see all the functions. The resolution is amazing as well as the interface. It does need some improvement before I am willing to make the leap. First it has to have the ability to get my Outlook email in real time. The second is it needs to be faster to truly take advantage of the great features and web it has. The next version needs to be 3G and a company will find out how to get the Outlook to sync. The keyboard could be challenging for someone who used the phone to do email very much but for the other features I think I could get over it.

The improvements over my current phone are the full sized keyboard on the phone. My current phone the Cingular 8525 has a virtual keyboard that is the most difficult frustrating thing in the world. The iPhone keypad is large with a finger easily fitting on each key. It is really thin which is an improvement over the 8525. I would buy this today if I could make the jump to not being connected to my email at all times. Life might get better if I could make that leap.

The Beastie Boys are back....kind of

2007-07-15T00:17:00.000-07:00

The Beastie Boys have come out with a new album. I was excited so I went to iTunes and looked for it in the top 10 albums but it was no where to be found. I searched and found the album. It is called The Mix-Up. For people who claim to be a fan this is a true test. It is in instrumental album. If you really appreciate the beats that the Beastie Boys have produced over the years this is a GREAT album. The Beastie Boys have always been innovative in their music and this time was no different. I did not know what to expect but had no hesitation in the purchase.

The Next PDA

2007-07-06T20:50:00.000-07:00

So one of my favorite topics will be about gadgets - especially phones. I have very picky about my cell phone and I have traditionally had something that I can do email and work on. A bad habit but I tend to be very connected to work. I have had in the past a Treo 600 - it died. Then I went to a Treo 650 - then work decided to to move to Blackberry or Window Mobile. My Treo was a palm device so it was out. I move to the Cingular 8525 which is a HTC device. I like it but the small virtual keypad is proving to be a big drawback. I like the power, the large screen and the touch screen. I have had it since it came out but I am already looking for the next best thing. I am not really happy with this phone. The hype this last week has been the iPhone. It looks cool but has a virtual keyboard and does not support business email. I will wait to see the reviews about it. A great site for looking at all the specs on a new phone is http://www.pdadb.net/. The HTC S730 is the phone I have my eye on. It is slated for later this summer. So probably be at AT&T in the fall. It still has the slider keyboard, is slightly smaller than the 8525 but it lacks a touch screen. The lack of touch screen is a big drawback for me but might not kill the deal. They have the specs on this phone and the little brother the HTC S720. HTC does have an answer to the iPhone but it still has no keypad which does not excite me - the HTC Touch.

You will notice a camera on the front right corner of this phone. There is another camera on the back. The front camera has been a feature on a few rumored HTC phone but has never actually materiallized. This may be the real deal. AT&T announced a video conference feature recently.

VEGAS SUMMER LEAGUE

2007-07-06T20:32:00.001-07:00

The Vegas Summer Leage has started and the Blazers are playing the Boston Celtics. I was excited because the games were suppose to be broadcast on NBA.com. BUT...the Blazers game is blacked out. It will be on NBA TV tomorrow but still a fairly bad move by the NBA. Oden did not get of to a hot start but will be fine in the next game. That guy has so much pressure and attention I can't even imagine. This year will be great. It should be interesting to see the rest of the moves the Blazers make before the season. Darius Miles please retire.

WHAT'S UP WITH THE NAME?

2007-07-06T20:14:00.000-07:00

Ok - so what is up with the name. There are a ton of blogs out there and every simple name was taken. This is a combination of two books I have read in the past year that have had an impact on me. The first book is the Monk and the Riddle - The Education of a Silicon Valley Entrepreneur. This book is fairly simple and straight forward. Do something you like and are passionate about. The story is about a guy starting a funneral company on the internet. He originally had an passion about the idea and wanted to do it for more than money. Over time he could just see $ signs and not the original idea.

The second is a book but I really heard Kevin Carroll speak in Portland about 6 months ago. The book is called The Rules of the Red Rubber Ball. The idea is for you do follow what you love and it will lead you on your path through life. Kevin has an amazing personal story to tell. His journy to get where he is today is encouraging and enlightening. Kevin writes a blog http://www.kevincarrollkatalyst.com/ and runs a consulting practice.

The theme of these books are to do what you love and it will lead you on your journey. I have been working in accounting for 7 years and am at a crossroads in my career. I have much more to offer than working in accounting and I have a strong desire to do more. I love to lead and love the challenge of business. I like creativity and solving problems. That is limited to some degree in accounting. So this blog is for fun and for me to explore many items as I try and find out what I want to do in the next stage of my life.

The beginning...

2007-06-22T20:59:00.001-07:00

So this is my blog. I have put off doing this for many reasons. One is because I have no idea what this is going to be about. There are so many things that I want to talk about from sports to books to gadgets. I thought that I had to have a topic to focus on but I am going to just start writting and see what comes out. Another reason I have not taken this on is because I have been in an Executive MBA program for the last 9 months and have not had any extra time to do anything. Well today was the last day of my first year of the MBA. So here we go....