I fell off the blogging wagon…big time. No excuses here…I just did.
I’m going to get serious about it again. I’m going to help a new friend, Marty Crowe, get into it. Ms. Jill & I are going to a blogging conference this weekend. I fell off - time to climb back on and make you guys think and, once in a while, smile.
I’ll be back…before the end of the week. Time for a new start in the blogesphere.
I have to tell you today, I’m REALLY excited. For almost a year my friend Amber Ludwig and I have been working on a home remodelling video directory site named www.RemodelVideos.com. In September I met a very nice guy named Bruce Lamb - who owns tons of video content about various remodelling skills.
Amber and I did a deal with Bruce. On Saturday, www.RemodelVideos.com went live. Have a problem with a tiling project? How about faux painting? Flooring a challenge for you?
Check out www.RemodelVideos.com! There are around 600 videos on the site. If you need to work on your home - this is the high quality site to visit to learn what to do (next)!
This is a totally new business for this old dog. That’s exciting!
Wish us luck.
Jill and I had a wonderful weekend in Steamboat Springs for Thanksgiving…except getting home!
The usual 2 1/2 hour drive was over 6 hours of white knuckle time! It took about 2 hours to get from entering I-70 through the Eisenhower Tunnel (normally about 10 minutes).
We were lucky though. We’d bought gas in Steamboat. We had food. We had a new BMW X5 that really didn’t care about a little (OK, a lot) snow and ice.
‘Tis back to work - and normal - today.
Now the REAL procrastination begins…how many times will YOU hear ‘we’ll make a decision after the Holidays’ this year?
;-(
I spent the weekend in Atlanta, attending Armand Morin’s Big Seminar 12. As with all Big Seminar’s (this was my 8th), Armand goes out of his way more than anyone else I know to try to make his students happy - and well fed!
The speakers were mostly terrific.
I’d missed the Big Seminar last April, so hadn’t seen some of my internet friends in a year. It was great to catch up with them. I came away energized about a new product I’ll be announcing in the next month. I now think, even more than I did before, this product (which is really a service) will be a big hit in the internet marketer market.
And, I can grow it past that!
I finally got home today from San Jose. Between Canada week before last and California last week it seems like I’ve been gone forever! I wonder why? I used to travel for weeks at a time and never cared much. Maybe because life at home with Ms. Jill is so good? Don’t know.
But I do know I’ll be home for a couple weeks. That’s a good thing.
We had a funny thing happen in San Jose. On Friday, after Simon Leung’s event, I went to dinner with a group to this Vietnamese place. The food was great.
A mostly different group decided to go back there on Saturday. The food was still great - but the service was among the worst I’ve ever had at a restaurant. I think I literally asked for one dish 9 times! The staff took our place settings away, an owner told us the dish in question wasn’t possible that night, that she would create a ’special’ veggie dish for us…then the staff came back with new place settings and the snow pea leaves with garlic we’d ordered a couple hours ago! It got to the point where it was very funny - but probably only if you were there…
I know more about Google AdWords tonight than I did Thursday night before the weekend event. Thanks for that, Si.
Now…home to get some real work done and seriously get back onto my raw food diet. The diet isn’t hard at home - especially with Jill’s support. It sure is hard on the road, though. I’ll be feeling better again in less than a week.
Take notice, folks. That is better in less than a week. Yes, we are what we eat.
I’m in San Jose, CA this weekend - hanging out at Simon Leung’s AdWords bootcamp. It is a small event - lots of hands on TLC from Si and his team. There is no reason why anyone here should leave without knowing at least most of what they need to know about driving internet traffic with AdWords.
A bonus…I got to have dinner last night with Carolyn McCormick (coach extraordinaire), my friend Ruby Yeh (who drove down to San Jose from her home in Marin County), Simon and his fiance, Karen. The Vietnamese food was terrific - the company was even better. To hell with my raw food diet for one meal - this was too good!
There are a number of attendees here from The Capital Factor, too. It is good to see them learning more and taking advantage of the opportunities we created there. That makes me feel good.
Can’t you just hear Willie Nelson singing it??
I’m in San Diego again doing a little consulting. I totally forgot it is US Open week here. I’m staying just a couple miles from the venue. There are lots of Tiger, Phil and other golf fans at my hotel. It’s fun to watch them…AND expensive.
When I got here yesterday I couldn’t even get a rental car. I finally did - but it took way too long. Ah…the joys of the road.
I met with two people last night that I’m forming a mastermind group with: David Hlavak and Jill Secard. I’m excited about it. They are both operations people. I think we will learn a lot from and teach a lot to each other. I’d like to see the group grow. We’ll see if we can make that happen. I haven’t had a virtual mastermind group before. Just in-person ones. This will be a new challenge.
I’m off to San Jose after work tomorrow for Simon Leung’s bootcamp in San Jose. By the end of the weekend I expect to be an AdWords wizard! Well, maybe not - but I am expecting both the information and the networking to be outstanding at Simon’s event.
Next week I get to stay home! That’s a good thing. I feel like I never get caught up when I’m on the road. Plus - I’ve barely seen Jill in a couple weeks. That isn’t a good thing, either.
I can’t remember….did I tell you Jill’s 20 year-old niece Anna has arrived for the summer at our house? She’s going to work every day, running, playing water polo, going to movies and out to dinner with friends from Grinnell. She’s a delight. I hope she’s having as good a time as we are having her around.
Ms. Jill and I spent all day Friday and Saturday at Brendon Burchard’s Nonprofit & Corporate Sponsorhip Bootcamp. There will be more starting in a few minutes…I can’t wait.
The hours pass like minutes. This guy is magical in his presentation. Plus…there is serious meat inside.
If you get a chance to attend one of his events…do it!
It is interesting to me that the demographics of the crowd are significantly older than ‘normal’ marketing seminars. I asked Brendon if he knows why at the VIP dinner last night. He doesn’t!
All I can say…old folks, keep coming. This guy can teach a lot of us new ways to do our business….while adding value to a society that needs it.
Thanks, Brendon. I’ll be back.
Wow! It is late Saturday night and I just realized I haven’t posted to this blog all week. Blame it on a senior mind?
NOT!!
I just got busy and, frankly, oldmansrevenge.com wasn’t at the forefront of what was going on.
I missed my first Big Seminar in years last weekend. Armand Morin puts on a world-class event. I love the learning and networking at BIG. But, I’d been traveling the week before and had considerable problems with my bad eye during flights. I just couldn’t face another plane trip a few days after. So…I missed out.
Friends who were there report it was, as always, a super event. I’ll be at the next one in October (assuming it isn’t the same weekend as Jill’s Celebration Ride - I haven’t checked the dates).
I also probably buried a business last week. It is a long story - but one of my partners went off on another and his family. I see no way to recover from that. My guess is all of us will walk away. Too bad. The company hadn’t done as well as it should - but things were looking up for it.
Love of my life Ms. Jill had a tough week. Those of you who know us know she recently survived breast cancer. Last Sunday she started complaining - a lot - about a headache and pain in her eye. Believe me, eye pain is something I can relate to. She got in to see her oncologist Monday. It seems she has shingles - in her eye! She feels awful. She looks awful. My heart goes out to her - but all I can do is support whatever she asks for. There is no way I can think of to do anything else.
I’ve never had shingles. It is supposed to be very painful. Ms. Jill is going through that. Kind thoughts toward her will be appreciated!
Something fun did happen. Lynn Pierce asked me to speak this August in Scottsdale at her Woman’s Business Empowerment Summit. I hear Lynn puts on a terrific event. A few friends will also be speaking. I’m looking forward to it.
I spent today trying to learn a few things about the real estate market at a bootcamp sponsored by the Real Talk Network. I’m the first to say I know less about real estate than anyone else I know. That said - it was an interesting day and I learned a lot.
I did get three fixed gear bike rides in this week. Not riding enough yet - but three rides is better than none!
There was a bad downside to the week, too. I was out of line and went off on the best employee I’ve had in years. She wasn’t performing well - but there are reasons for that and I knew them. She deserved support - not stress.
Do you think I have a chance of growing up soon? Maybe by the time I’m 90?? DAMN - I know better.
What a weekend! I spent it with 500 others at Frank Kern’s Mass Control seminar at the Hard Rock Hotel in San Diego.
As always - I had a great time hanging out with other like-minded entrepreneurs. People focusing on the internet space are especially an interesting bunch. They are generally a bunch of social misfits trying to figure out how to make a living from home by just being smart. Some of them are REALLY smart - and do well. Some others don’t do so well. They are pretty much universally nice people. I always enjoy internet based events.
I may or may have not been the oldest guy in the room - but I at least competed for the honor. I think that is fun, too. Conversations - and maybe even a cold one or two - with twenty-five year olds from very different places than my space (both culturally and economically) makes for fast learning.
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02 25th, 2009| 