Meatloaf

Righteous … though it looks more like Hal Linden to me …

"Was it twenty years ago or yesterday?  What happens to time in our minds?"  - Richard Bach

How  you been these past five weeks?

I’ve seen an icky computer crash, a dear family member lose a friend, a dear friend lose a family member, another dear friend get all gooped up over a chick, some more friends write a best-seller, yet another friend help erase time and distance with one long email each, and many, many long days.

At the end of each, my wife and my how-in-Heaven’s-name-is-he-almost-eight-months-old child were waiting.

I’ve watched several new clients come and one go.

I’ve read several surprising emails asking me to start writing.

I fell in love with Burlington, Vermont, in 22 hours.

And at the end of each day, my wife and beautiful boy were waiting.

I’ve spent the weekends working with my hands instead of my mind.

I’m moving to a new home with both an American flag and hammock in the yard.

I bought The Once and Future King by T.H. White.

And, still, patiently waiting at the end of each day, were Deidre and Big Willie.

There’ve been exciting plans for new books and clients and projects outside comfort zones.

I’ve taken counsel from a 23-year-old prodigy who’s evolved at lightning speed from assistant to Partner.

And there’s been talk … oooooh, a lot of talk.

I’m certain it was either John Lennon or Grover Cleveland Alexander who wrote that "life is what happens while you’re busy making other plans."

Hope life’s happened decently for you these past five weeks.

It’s nice to be with you again - if only for a few moments today.

What are we looking for in new clients?  Several things, but as we listen to you talk about your business, your hopes, your dreams, one common denominator among new clients is most certainly passion.

How do you measure passion?  How do you quantify it?  Is there some sort of Mendoza line that makes us say ‘yes’ or ‘no?’

Well, it requires a subjective judgment.  As Justice Potter Stewart said in 1964, "I know it when I see it."

I saw it Saturday night:

I saw it after wending through unknown country, home … to the Gifford, Illinois, farm that raised me behind-the-barn practicing those same shots they made in the waning moments Saturday night.  Back in my imagination-day, I hit those shots to beat always-hated Indiana, though.

Even before, I saw it in our preparations for the trip - as we chose mulitple orange and blue outfits for the boy.

I heard it in a conversation between an older and baby brother:  an older brother who hadn’t seen his nephew since Christmas sheepishly asking if it would be alright to risk not seeing the kid since a miracle ticket just became available for the game.

The baby brother took deep offense … at the notion that his big brother would even consider not going.

And it will be replayed and retold for the next hundred years - handed down through the generations until it becomes the stuff of legend.

With all due respect to Robert Earl Keen, Jr., this third act goes on forever, and the party never ends …

So, anyway.  Passion’s something like that.  Wish you could have been there with us, too, cause my mom’s such a good cook.  Any questions? 

There’s an evolution taking place … did you read about it?  Where did you read about it?  Our world slowly turns upside down every forty years, and that turn is most certainly always led by the youth.

Do you understand their motivations?  Their values?  How they get their information?

Do you understand interconnectivity?  Will it affect how your business communicates with the public in the years to come?  Oh, yes.  Though, you may read this and think you may pretend the changes taking place are too small to notice, and that you’ll just continue doing things the way you always have. 

Let me know how that works out for you.  From the Center for Media Research:

Age Gap in Blog Reading Changes News Consumption Pattern

According to a new CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, relatively few Americans are
familiar with the phenomenon of blogging, in which individuals post running
narratives of their thoughts and observations on whatever interests them. 

Although 75% of the U.S. public uses the Internet, only one in four Americans
are either very familiar or somewhat familiar with blogs (the shortened form of
the original "Web logs"). More than half, 56%, have no knowledge of them.

While blogging is wielding some influence in media and political circles,
traditional news outlets are still the dominant sources of information for the
American public

According to a December 2004 Gallup Poll, the percentage of Americans getting
their news on a daily basis from the mainstream media is 51% for local
television news, 44% for local newspapers, 39% for cable news networks, 36% for
the nightly broadcast network news, and 21% for radio talk shows. By contrast,
only 3% of Americans say they read Internet blogs every day, and just 2% read
politics-focused blogs daily.

Blog readers are younger than the population at large. Although 17% of the
public is aged 18 to 29, a quarter of all blog readers (those who read even
occasionally) are in this age bracket. At the older extreme, 17% of Americans
are 65 and older, but only 6% of blog readers are this old.

*Blog readership is defined as reading blogs every day, a few times a week, a
few times a month, or less often than that.

This age skew reflects both the younger demographic of the Internet-connected
universe as well as a greater likelihood of young people on the Internet,
compared with older Internet users, to gravitate toward blogs.

The age gap in blog reading is particularly noteworthy because it is a
complete reversal of the typical age pattern gap for news consumption. Gallup
finds Americans’ use of all traditional news media to be positively correlated
with age. (For instance, only 32% of 18- to 29-year-olds read a local paper
every day, versus 61% of those 65 and older.)

Gallup finds no gender differences in blog readership, or according to party
affiliation. There are slight differences by political outlook, as about a
quarter of liberals (24%) say they read blogs at least monthly, compared with
15% of conservatives and 12% of moderates.

You can find out more here.