My Saturday Morning...

Biking out to Auberry this morning.

Business School in a box...

Having never been to business school myself I can only postulate as too what goes on in the hallowed halls of academia. Of course that is not the purpose of my posting here; rather it is my personal findings about conducting business:

1. It is going to cost more than you think it is going to cost

2. It is going to take longer than you think it is going to take

3. You are going to make less than you think you are going to make

At first glance these are pretty fatalistic axioms, however if you can find something that is worth doing while accepting these guidelines you will do pretty good. Anytime I have ever done something purely for the money it has proved to be a pretty horrendous experience. Now that is not to say that these are hard and fast rules without exception. It is simply the fact that you can't bet on stupendous success as an outcome, you can hope, but the better plan is more firmly based in the aforementioned parameters.

PS- Later I will talk about the nasty little word that almost killed any success that I have ever had.

Getting ready for the sale...

Tonight we are cooking up the shells for the breakfast pizzas we are serving tomorrow and Reagan got to make himself a cupcake.

Your chance to say you were there...

I have been experimenting with a new culinary endeavor and will be making it's debut this Saturday morning at the big yard sale that they have every memorial day weekend in the Tower district. It is a breakfast pie that is full of too much awesomeness. My informal taste testing has been terrific so now I am going to see if I can make some profit with it. A slice and a cup of coffee will run you $3.00. My goal is to move 100 pies (lofty I know but it is my goal none the less). The festivities commence at 4:30 am and will continue until 1:00pm. Come by, say hi, buy a ton, and tell everyone how awesome it is. BTW I will be located here.

A great moment pt.2

This is my sons pictoral representation of his Mom singing. What can I say I have got it made!

A great moment...

Though it is nearly indistinguishable that this is photographic evidence of my wife singing on our worship team, that is exactly what it is. She has worked really hard to learn her parts and was very nervous but did a great job and I am very proud of her. Love you Sugar!

Striving to endeavor to provide suckiness, mediocrity, and a forgettable experience...

I don't generally blog during work hours but today proves to be the exception. I am evaluating a number of company's product's for our future development when it hit me; I hate mission statements. Not the concept of mission statement but rather the wording. It just sounds legal and sterile. Everyone's statement is striving or endeavoring to have excellence or efficiency. BORING. We need more action movie mission statements, especially if you are going to post it on your front page.

How about instead of:

Here at Generic Corp. we endeavor to provide the customer with excellence and professionalism while striving for the utmost in quality.

They tried this one:

Generic Corp. is awesome otherwise we wouldn't work here and you wouldn't be reading this. If you are ready for some awesomeness then give us a call and we will rock your world and blow your mind.

Which one would you choose?

PS-After looking at my company's mission statement I am changing it tonight.

A Stimulus Package and the Nanny State Creep...

I received the stimulus check for our family today. It is, initially, a nice feeling to have this unaccounted for lump of money sitting in my checking account. Then as I sat looking at the money a slow hollow feeling emerged. This money was originally mine that went into the government abyss only to return to me after Washington said that we could have it back. It is kind of like when a bully took your baseball mitt as a kid and gave it back only after the teacher made him; it is nice to have it back, but it would have been better had it never been gone.

I have been and most likely will always remain a small government, Uncle Sam don't bug me, kind of guy so it is with slight melancholy that I view this latest stunt. I am glad to have the (my) money back, but it is sad that the government has so much say in our lives that they can play God with my money in the first place.

Statistically and historically speaking there is little chance that we will become a more limited form of government; more concerned with personal liberty and responsibility. Socialism and the Nanny State is the near inevitable creep that happens to every great empire and we seem to be in the carpool lane. It is not my preference and I hope that I am wrong, however I do have an overwhelming bit of history to back me up.

One of my main points of frustration with the Nanny Creep is that a large soulless organization presumes that they know better how to run my life than I. As the always controversial Barry Goldwater once said, "The Government that is big enough to give you everything that you want is big enough to take everything that you have."


PS-Maybe the Government should do with it's left over revenues what I am doing with mine; pay down it's debt.

Sometimes you just have to blog about your Mother-in-Law...

She leads our children's choir and this her walking like an egyptian (love Ya Brenda).

You know you are in Hollywood when...

Worth a thousand words...

Here comes the conference...

Here is a shot of the soundstage where the conference is being held. It is pretty cool we are on stage 15 at CBS studios. There will be more pics to come...

Meeting that I am at right now...

This is a meeting I am attending right now called Church 2.0. It is a bunch of people like myself who are passionate about the bleeding edge of technology and it's usefulness for the church. So what better way to commemorate this techie meeting than to blog from my phone.

PS- The main guy in the photo is Spencer Burke, he is a good guy and has a great site called theooze.com

What it takes to be an expert...

I am sitting on my first panel at a conference we are sponsoring this weekend. It is kinda weird because people will be asking me questions and I will be answering them and there is the distinct possibility that they might listen to the actual answer. I have always enjoyed pontificating about the frivolous and trivial in life but to be a panelist, kinda scary.