home again, home again.. long 6 hour drive back from NY with much on my mind.. I ended up getting lost in eastern NY due to a closed road and a recalcitrant GPS.. Very happy to be off the road and heading to bed.. My head is full of all i learned on my recent trip. A trip to headquarters is like visiting Oz.. everyone there is smarter and better dressed than I am.. but for the most part they are kind and wise.. I want to be like that when I grow up..
nite all, nite sam
-me
Greetings from the Boat in brooklyn. Good day down in Armonk today.. I am down for a set of meetings.. ran into a whole bunch of friends in the building that made me feel very welcome. For as big as this place is, it sometimes feels nice and small..
After my meetings I drove down to Helen Hayes hospital to visit my friend Jim.. He’s been making slow but steady progress since his accident several months ago.. He is awake and talking, but it’s not easy to understand what he’s saying most of the time.. so it goes with traumatic brain injury.. it’s a long path.
I was very happy to see some friends there.. My old friend Lenny ..John who’ve Ive met several times in PK and another friend of Jims, Brian who I’ve never met… We had some good hang out time with Jim .. as we pushed him around in the halls. Jim was able to interact a little. he recognized some song lyrics, answered a question or two about his kids… and get this..
Lenny and I hadn’t seen each other in many years.. I was trying to tell Lenny that Id run into someone he’d known as a kid.. but hadn’t seen in 30 years..For the life of me I couldn’t remember who it was.. Lenny didn’t know eaither.. Then Jim came out of his world for a second, looked straight at me and said “Mark Merrill” then went back to his planet.. and he was right. !. I don’t even know how he would know that, much less how he knew what we were talking about .. There’s a lot going on in that head of his
Right before we left a really nice guy named Dan came in to say hi to Jim Dans wife is a few rooms down.. also in here for a tramatic brain injury.. its a tough place… tragedy and triumph every day..
I’m sitting here typing and two big fat rats keep coming up here a few feet from me to see if I have any food. they are SO brazen that you have to work to scare them off. I swear this palce is like the Colony.. If they only knew that I used to eat rats n the show they might not be so bold.
ok.. It’s late and I have an early day/ more tomorrow.
nite all, nite sam
-me
Busy day.. And complicated one . it began with a really bad talk i gave for a bunch of students from a local college..it totally bombed . Im not sure what went wrong.. Maybe it was too early, or my message was off.. But i really did not connect. This was my 14th University talk this year (believe it or not) ..and the first one thats gone badly.. I guess you need to suck sometimes if you are going to stay sharp.
No scratch that.. It sucks to suck..but it happens sometime, i quess.
The rest of the day was busy and productive work stuff… I did have a cool lunch meeting with some maker colleagues in sweden.were planning a joint event between ibm, malmo university in sweden and the. Vermont makers. We had a short coordination call today using google hangout.. http://www.google.com/+/learnmore/hangouts/
Its a really great tool for small meetings like this,,l so far its the best/easiest multi person video conference sw I’ve used. Ive never been a big fan of video conferencing because it never really works..but miraculously..this seems to actually work reliably. Check it out
Nite all, nite
-me
Location:Duxbury Rd,Richmond,United States
It has started.. today I walked in the grocery store and heard my first strains of christmas music.. I know by the calendar that it must have been going for the past week.. but then, I don’t get out much.. .. I noted more chritmas lights up on my drive home from work.. and even spied a christmas tree in one house.. The signs are up for ‘cut your own’ trees.. and the mail box is full of catalogs…
This year, like all of the past 6, brings a mix of emotions… that’s natural. I guess
all in all, I like the season.. i lie the weather.. I like shopping.. I like the decorations. but most of all , I love the distraction.. everyone is running around sort of out of their minds… whether its end of year work deadlines or shopping.. or just love of christmas, everyone’s minds are on a thousand different things.. that they should/could be doing.. Maybe I like it because the worlds distraction level catches up with my own ? Maybe I just love the chaos.. Now if i can just find that Alvin and the Chipmunks song.. the mood will be complete
nite all, nite sam..
-me