Serendipity…in Full Color

Along the road south during our vacation, the NFO and I were teaching the kids new vocabulary words.

I don’t know why, but I some point, I introduced them to the word “serendipity.”

Later on in the trip, we had planned to go to Colonial Williamsburg, but the weather conspired against us.

As much of the activities there are outside, the predicted torrential rains convinced us that we should do something else.

Our kids are big fans of the Presidents, so we went to Ash Lawn-Highland, home of our 5th President, James Monroe. It was a solid tour (though the guide spoke at a pretty high level…didn’t really do a great job of customizing for his audience).

The way back to the Williamsburg area was brutal…you could barely see. So much so, that we just stopped at a mall to wait it out.

As we left the mall, however, we were greeted by a most beautiful site…a GIGANTIC rainbow.

As we drove further, we actually saw the other end of the rainbow and then, the whole thing…in all its glory.

There is a special prayer when you see a natural wonder like that…and we said it.

Then, I said to the kids, “this would be a moment of serendipity.”

iPads on Family Vacations…

Image via CrunchBase

One of the things that I couldn’t reconcile was whether or not it was ultimately a good thing or not to have our iPad playing videos in the back of the car during our family vacation.

On the one hand, it kept fighting and complaining to a minimum. On the other hand, it kept them from absorbing the countryside.

We didn’t go full on videos for the entire time, trying to balance it to involve conversation and quiet time, but I did think about it.

1 Tip on How to Start a Conversation…

One trick I’ve picked up in trying to get people talking is to ask yourself “what kind of extreme situation would this person know about that only they would know?”

So, for example…I always ask taxi drivers

• what’s the furthest anyone has ever asked you to drive?
• what’s the strangest thing that has ever happened in the back of your cab? (not for the faint of heart)

and baristas…

• what is the MOST number of shots of espresso anyone has ever ordered at one time? (so far, 23 is the record)

If you can ask these, you can usually get people talking….

Animals on the bed…

When you share a room with your kids for a few nights on a family vacation, you get to see some little things that you might otherwise miss…like how your 3 year old arranges her dolls and stuffed animals before she goes to bed.

Jamestown Settlement…

Of the 3 days on our winter vacation and the numerous places we visited, the NFO and I thought that the one which gave our kids the best sense of history and stimulated their curiosity the most was the Jamestown Settlement museum.

While the 26 minute introductory movie was a bit over their heads, the outdoor portion (a Native American village, the Jamestown colony fort, and replicas of the ships) was a home run.

The kids LOVED playing on the ship, grinding the corn, removing the fur from the animals and all of the demonstrations.

Thanks to Uncle Walt (Disney, that is), they knew about Pocahontas, of course, so they were primed, but this one was well worth the money and the time.

Definitely recommend it.

No More Cautious Kindle Purchases…

Cover via Amazon

I wrote about how I was afraid of making bad purchases on my Kindle.

No more.

They have a super smart and GREAT return policy. Full refund w/in 7 days.

If you like a book, you annotate it…then you want to keep it for reference.

Sure, it probably opens the door to abuse, but not enough that it’s worth it to irritate the honest customers.

Man, I love Amazon.

Parenting and the Fear of Failure II

You may recall that one of the areas I was trying to work on with Tonka was to help her get over what I considered to be an unacceptably high fear of failure.

I got some good advice from blog readers and developed a hybrid model.

On our winter vacation, I used that approach to convince her to go down the “Tornado” slide (the steepest one) at the Great Wolf Lodge.

She did.

The whole way down, I just watched her face, particularly enjoying how it turned from fear to excitement as she realized it was fun and she was safe.

It felt good to give that to her.

Family Vacation and Bonding Time…Finally

We took the kids to southern Virginia (Williamsburg, Jamestown, and Charlottesville) during the Winter Break and though we had taken them on trips before, this was the first we took where it wasn’t a HUGE ordeal.

Nadia is out of diapers. The kids are old enough to appreciate and interact with things and don’t need CONSTANT attention.

It’s work. A lot of it. Most of it falls on the NFO, but still, a different level.

Our first night took us to the Great Wolf Lodge in Williamsburg. We had heard great things. We were optimistic.

Unfortunately, in the NFO’s mind and mine, it didn’t quite live up to expectations (no need to vent here). Still, the kids had a great time, but what was really special was the unexpected moments of bonding that occurred.

The two older ones could go on almost all the rides (it’s an indoor water park) and I found that while we were waiting in line, we had some nice chats about life, time optimization strategies, whatever was on our minds. We were just TOGETHER and that was great.

I found this to be the case in the morning and the evening as well.

Since we were all staying in the same room, the NFO and I went to bed earlier, but we had a chance to just relax/snuggle with the kids before they went to sleep and when they woke up…reading, watching videos on the iPad, whatever.

My friend, Jeff, says, “it’s not about Quality Time…It’s just about TIME.”

And he’s right.

One of Costco’s Youngest Fans…

Image via Wikipedia

The NFO goes EVERY single week to the Costco in Beltsville, MD. It is located on Maryland Route 1 about 1.5 miles down the road from IKEA.

Over the Winter break, we took the kids to southern Virginia and as we drove down I-95, Nadia (3.5) saw  another IKEA store and you know what she said?

“YEAH! We’re on the Costco street!!”

How I Plan to Never Stop Marketing This Year…A New Job

When I started Never Stop Marketing about 3.5 years ago my intention was to create a beautiful link between the type of marketer I wanted to be and the types of clients who would benefit from how I view the world.

With this blog, the eBooks (CDM, Dandelion Marketing, 10 Ways to Grow Your Fans ), my goal was to provide you, my faithful friends and readers (aka Community of Raving Fans!), with a front row seat as I've pursued this dream with you.

The consulting portion of NSM has been very very good to me. I'm thriving professionally, I'm making many new friends, I'm traveling the world, and I'm even putting plenty of food on my table.

Of the many new friends I've made, one of the more interesting (and persistent) is Ragy Thomas (via Sean O’Rourke).

Ragy is a successful entrepreneur and the second most insightful person I know when it comes to how society is being fundamentally altered as a result of the arrival of all of these social tools .

His newest company, Sprinklr, is focused on helping large enterprises build meaningful, authentic, and REAL relationships with a community of customers and do it in a way that is manageable and scalable.

If this sounds familiar and similar to NSM, that's because it is.

When I talked to Ragy 3 months ago, he came straight out and said:

“I’ve seen your stuff and we need you to join us. We’ve raised some money, we’ve got some Fortune 500 clients and I want you on our team.”

My answer…”what are you talking about? I love what I am doing now. Not interested.”

He persisted…and, over time, I realized that this company represented a chance to take my skills and mission of changing marketing to a new level, so I accepted their offer to become the VP of Marketing, effective January 15th.

Yep, I know. I’m still coming to terms with it myself!

I’m excited. Scared, too. But definitely excited.

Ok, here we go.

Teaching Good Behavior Through Football…

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

One thing we’ve been working on with Paco is how to be a good sport.

He’s VERY competitive (wonder where that comes from!) and when he loses, he doesn’t always respond so well.

Now, he loves football and it so happens that his favorite team is the Green Bay Packers, so I took a clip from one of their games where a defender, Charles Woodson, (who has himself won a Heisman Trophy and a Super Bowl) acknowledges the great play of an opponent who beat him to score a touchdown.

The message was: if you give it your all and you still lose, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. And, if your opponent gives it his all and wins, you can respect that and not resent him or feel anger about it.

Here’s the clip

Remington’s Moral Lapse…

Perhaps I harbor a naïve belief that companies can be a force for good. I hope that you can be socially responsible and profitable and avoid selling your soul.
Obviously, there are PLENTY of examples to the contrary, so that’s not news, but when you see something as egregious as potential compromises of morality when it relates to manufacturing and selling of guns…man, that just puts you to the test.
I watched this CNBC documentary called “Remington Under Fire” which alleges that the rifle manufacturer knew about a defect in its most popular model as early as 1948.
5 million guns sold later and there are numerous claims of accidental firings resulting in injury and death.
Just sad.

Related articles

• Rambo Sues Remington Arms Company Alleging Rifle Fired Without His Father Pulling Trigger (prweb.com)
• Mystery company buying up U.S. gun manufacturers (sfgate.com)
• A CNBC Mention, Positive Or Negative, Causes Stock Prices To Rise (huffingtonpost.com)

Should Kids Skip College?

I’ve long wondered if the idea of “everyone should go to college” is becoming doctrine and no longer based in reality.
Sure, the credential has value, but is that based on a paradigm that is becoming outdated?
Are the “skills” taught in college really the ones that will be most valuable in the next innovation economy?
I have doubts.
Add to that the college marketing problem. Namely, the colleges, because there are too many of them (leftover from the Baby Boomers) have a marketing problem, so they-out of necessity-make us all believe that a college education is the KEY.
Of course, as we all know, there are ample sets of evidence showing that college doesn’t always turn out to job security or wealth.
All of this came to mind, because of these two articles which came across my desk.

• Don’t Send Your Kids to College
• 10 More Reasons to Not Send Your Kids to College

Tech Vocabulary of a 3.5 Year Old

Recent things said by Nadia (3.5)

“Remember when you were in China and we Skyped you on the iPad.”

Upon getting in the car and hearing the radio, “I don’t want this. Please turn on Pandora.”

Upon hearing that I was packing my Kindle for a trip, “Are you taking the Kindle or the Kindle Fire?”

“Hey, I want to see my avatar on the Xbox!”

“Can we play Kinect?”

And when I asked her, ‘do you want to play with the iPad now?” she responded, “no, I want the iPhone.”

Love Letter from my Son…

This one brought me to tears.

I went to NYC…just for one day. Nothing compared to most trips.

But, when I came back, Paco handed me this.

“I miss you a lot Abba (dad). I reely want you to come back. Abba please please please come back.”

Man, this life balancing thing is tough.

Installing Solar Panels…

So, we (well, I ) went ahead with the installation of solar panels on the roof. It took about 3 days when all was said and done.

If you are interested, here's the link to get an estimate.
(full disclosure...if you do sign up via this link, we both get some $).

Some FAQ’s:

1. I went with "lease" instead of "buy" option.
2. Put $1k down and have committed to $68/month. At current electricity consumption rates, this covers about 25% of our monthly usage at a FIXED rate.
3. Payback period…approximately 7 years.
4. Green value is something I am factoring in.
5. Best argument, in my mind, came from Gary of Clean Currents who positioned it as a “hedge against future energy price increases.” (If there’s one thing I have a high degree of confidence in-sure, I could be wrong—it’s that energy prices will go up)
6. It helps to have a new or mostly new roof
7. The company guarantees 95% of their estimates.
8. I’ll be sharing the results of this experiment in the months to come…

To be CLEAR...I'm not advocating just yet since I don't know how it will go, but figured I'd share it for now.

To understand some of the technical components, check out this interview with one of the installers.

How Perspective Shapes Experience…in Freising, Germany

Sometimes adhering to my travel philosophy of “do something unique to that location” can be a challenge.

I arrived in Munich on a Monday morning, having had basically NO sleep on the plane. It was 7 am.

Tuesday was a full work day and the plan was to leave on Wed. AM, so Monday afternoon was the only time.

Thing is…I was exhausted. What’s more, I wasn’t IN Munich, but a suburb called Freising about 50 minutes away from the city by subway.

Originally, I had envisioned a trip to one of the city’s top art museums, the Alte Pinakhotek, but after a 5 hour nap (I was wiped out!), that dissipated. Just not practical.

It was getting late and going to be dark soon, so at 4pm, I went for a walk in Freising and, as I did, I was reminded (yet again) that “anything can be an experience/adventure if you view it that way.”

As luck would have it, I was a 5 minute walk away from the center of Freising and if there’s a stereotypical German winter scene, it’s that each town has a “WinterMarkt” where daily, various vendors come out to sell their stuff for Xmas. There’s all kinds of food and drinks, as well, obviously, but it’s a fun, joyous, festive scene and nothing like an overcrowded target or retail mall.

So, I lucked out and found Freising’s version of this event that happens all over Germany at this time of year.

I had an espresso, bought some socks (why not), and chatted up the vendors, both to practice my German and to get a feel for what is going on in the country at the moment.

On the way to/from, I got to see some of the typical German architecture, street design, and sidewalk patterns.

I thought to myself…”victory declared.”

Just a reminder that so often, it’s a matter of perspective that shapes what you experience.

(Note: those “tools” in the picture are all made out of chocolate.)

Express Trip Down Memory Lane

Before moving to the DC area, I lived in three places: Germany, Japan, and New York City.

Over the course of December, in three successive weeks, I had the chance to visit Japan, New York City, and Germany.

Kind of a mini-summary of my pre-fatherhood life.

Death to Pennies...

Why we should get rid of it.
HT Dan Pink

Cautious Kindle Purchases...

I love my Kindle, but I find that I'm actually MORE cautious about buying books now b/c of it.

In the past, if I bought a book and didn't like it, at least I could give it away to someone who might...now, I'm stuck with it. I read reviews (all stars) with much more skepticism (since I know that authors get their friends to pad their reviews).

This is why "social search" will be important. I think we'll only want to read reviews from people we trust and/or we'll want to see HOW we're connected to them...and how the reviewers are connected to the authors.