Cookenstein

Time to smell the roses. A comment that has been used so many times, and yet I never really gave it much thought. This past year I logged well over 40 thousand road miles. While this does not even come close to the airline travel I was logging in past years, it certainly is as much time spent.

In these drives I get alot of audiobook reading in, as well as podcasts. mainly technology based. I am learning all the time. Currently I am reading/listening to "Super Freakonomics"  a book I had downloaded from Audible.com I am a gold member with them and it has been a lifesaver. I find I consume more books now than at any time in my life thanks to this excellent service.  I do more frequently take time to stop and take picture now. I was recently in Halifax VA. I was actually off the beaten path back to a work location and got a neat picture that seemed to take me back to my childhood for a moment.

 

It was next to some railroad tracks and it was just an image that for a moment reminded me of Appalachia VA when I was a little kid. The building just looked like something out of the very early 1900's, and the area surrounding it did too. I'm seeing alot of this these days and frankly I like it. I just need to take more time to capture it, and think about it.  We all have very little time on this place. And much of what I do involves driving and downtime. I am making much better use of that time these days.

     I don't think it's possible for me. I will be vacationing in Florida this coming week starting this evening. I plan to not check email, nor any of my social media sites thorugh this time. Although I will likely fail, this raises a good question about discipline and needs in life. I am attached at the hip to the internet for so many things now, that it is a little scary. In fact we are a bit forced down in Florida because we have no broadband connection, only dial up (put a gun to my head now!) connection, and this type of web browsing makes for nothing but aggravation and lots of time wasted just wating for sites to load.

So there's a little incentive to stay away from the internet. I am sure I will find a cafe with a wirless connection and succomb at some point, but until then, I hope to make great use of my Nikon D80 and lenses to get some good photography of landscapes, ocean, and wildlife where possible. Florida is a place that once I am there and settled in, I undertand why people come there to retire.  

 

As the internet and connectivity continue to grow and develop, it is becoming increasingly easier to say connected with everyone. This is both good and bad. I have little excuse not to be connected, however I do drive and work in several areas where they have no or very limited connectivity. Moments of rest.

I think the overload of connectivity is what has taken me away from Cookenstein for awhile. You just get info/internet overload sometimes, and I am way guilty of this.  I belong to too many networks, and keep up with them average to poorly. In fact I just joined Vimeo and am following conversations and watching the incredible growth of Kevin Rose with Digg.

Taking your Site from One to One Million Users by Kevin Rose from Carsonified on Vimeo.

I have followed Kevin Rose's rise from the Screensavers on tech TV in 2001-04, I believe till now. His growth online has been impressive to say the least.  This conference he is speaking at, has some simple yet excellent tips about taking yourself from potentially 1 to 1 million viewers/followers. This is the thing that everyone that puts time into their online presence eventually runs into. Will anyone care? And why?  Someday I will figure out how to incoporate some of my silly moments into decent onling reading.

 

In a few days, I am going to be taking a long overdue vacation, and while it is not the time of year I normally do so, it is certainly needed. I am going out to Colorado to spend some time with a friend that I worked with for a couple of years and certainly miss the time we had worked together as well explored and ate at some fine little food establishments in the areas outside of Boulder. 

A little more than a year ago, we went to the top of Pikes peake, it was an experience, I'll never forget. Life oftentimes changes quickly, in work and in our personal lives. There are many people I have seen and not seen in the past several years because of work and personal reasons, and this is an opportunity to have some fun and see someone important to me as well. I will be posting from Longmont colorado next week, and look to have a few food videos from this location soon.. Overlooking the surrounding states from 14k+ feet!

This week saw me doing more public speaking even if only for a few moments, it showcased me behind a live action station speaking on the subject as well as one of our foundational programs, to a group of students and faculty. It also showed me how easy it was to convince a client whom was completely happy with their provider to consider us. It will be real interesting to see how it plays out. I also got a new piece of business down in southern VA. A military school, which kind of takes me full circle back to my days in Fishburne Military school back in the late 70's early 80's. To sum up my public speaking moment, it started weak but ended strong. Bonus!