Fairtastic Fun

Many of you might wonder, why do I go to the Fair so much? Do I really like crowds that much?

Well, honestly? YES! But that’s not all.

I mean, sure it’s convenient. It’s close enough to run there, so I don’t have to deal with drama of parking. But convenience isn’t everything. Not enough to bring someone there three times each year (I only eat a lot one time… give or take….).

But I love the Fair because it lets be myself. Normally to run as much as I do, people would freak out. But at the Fair, it’s big enough (or crazy enough) that they don’t even care. Anything goes at the Fair. Heck, I’m surprised I wear regular pants when I go.

Or it’s big enough that I can get enough distance from them before they can realize that they’re freaking out. It’s kind of the same from my perception. If you want to change anything on the world, communicate. I’ll resist a tirade.

But it lets me do whatever I want. Even in groups, people can do whatever they want. For instance, during my first jaunt this year, I was on a Meetup group that wanted to sit and talk. The whole time. So I just took off with someone who came from NYC just to check out the Fair. He’s MN friends weren’t around, so he joined the Meetup group.

Today was with my group. My group is awesome a prefect! Everyone goes off on side adventures, and while it might take 10 minutes here or there, everyone regroups and continued the journey together – I couldn’t’ve asked for a better group!

But getting back to how the Fair is awesome:

The Fair has live music everywhere, and always a dance floor…. well, at least a little area between the front seat and the stage….

During the day, sure, I “got the dance out of my system,” something I have to do when there’s a great atmosphere, live music, and time. I was at Dino’s work my group and danced a couple of quick dances, but they barely counted. It was install asks because the band just started again (crowd wasn’t warm yet), and I just wanted to impress my group.

But as I was leaving, there was a band playing Duran Duran. So naturally, I entered. I danced my way in, everyone smiling at my ridiculous dance-walk, as I surveyed the room. And then I saw her – the woman I HAD to dance with, and three woman I knew would say yes.

She was obviously a bride to be, celebrating with her sister at the Fair. Now if anyone sees me out and about at random dance floors, which none of you do because you don’t go out, you would know I always dance with the bride to be. While this prenuptial princess liked the idea of dancing, usually if they don’t, there’s helpful peer pressure from the wedding party to dance, plus I always quietly tell them I’m good at leading, and that she’ll impress her friends…. at least I will. Instead of stick around to talk to the lovely ladies, I just exit as quick as I enter. It’s a girl’s night out. I’m not going to mess.

But what I do, in theory, is I create stories. I create memories. Not for me, but for the bride to be. A lady’s bachelorette party may not be as crazy as some guys’, but I think everyone should have stories to tell, so if there was nothing besides that nice day, and provably that cake or champagne at a restaurant, they’ll be able to recall that time when she was dancing at her bachelorette party.

Small? Yes. Unlikely? Maybe. But it’s the details that make life fun.

Why a Nonprofit?

The reason I started a nonprofit was the combination of two ideas.

1) Was Equity Crowdfunding was the topic of the entrepreneurial elite. I’m not an elitist. I wanted to bring Equity Crowdfunding to the crowd.

2) Minnesota is in dire need of glamour.

By making Minnesota a hotspot for entrepreneurship AND a little more glamorous, we could attract and retain a whole bunch of talent and capital. Silicon Valley was for the 90’s. It’s still the center for IoT.

But right now, things that are very Minnesotan, such as MedTech, Food Tech, and others, are being lost, as innovators move West, where the money is and where the action is.

Now is the time to change that. Hence the name, MinnesotaNow.

MinnesotaNow has published several articles, but not everyone bothered to read them.

Complaining that MinnesotaNow was charging $15 for a chance for people to meet Venture Capitalists, which it was not doing, is just as well justified as the guy who complained because it wasn’t a singles event.

Seriously people….. Stop being sad.

MinnesotaNow is about raising the bar so Minnesota is a more suitable environment for small business investors. We’re trying to get away from”Venture Capitalists” because the phrase is too marketingesque.

But MinnesotaNow is also another reading the bar for events. Every event is the same. That’s why it’s gala was different.

MinnesotaNow is also about the long-term. Capitalism seems to be short-sighted. MinnesotaNow is going to make more money for everyone. It’s just not doing to happen in this fiscal year! Be patient. MinnesotaNow is about culture. It’s about helping this be such a great small business environment, that the guidance, knowledge, assistance, and capital is available, so all people need to succeed is a great idea and hard work/discipline.

That’s what MinnesotaNow is about. It’s a nonprofit because the kind of return it’ll give I’d I’ve The course of years and years, and that’s not a good investment, and it’s a return for everyone.

Oh, and awesome events. Duh. But that’s because I’m in charge.

 

MinnesotaNow should write a formal now similar to this, but I feel like they’re not going to have time until at least their Community day is passed.

The Honest Truth About Why I’m Single

So I’ve finally figured out why I’m often single, and I’ll share it because it’s interesting.

Most of you know me as the spitfire professional with seemingly endless energy. Okay, with actually endless energy.

It’s true, that’s me in my true form. And that’s too much for anyone to join, for the most part.

But you’d think I could find someone. I’m out and around often enough. For instance, tonight I was at a meeting, and there were ladies-a-plenty.

But people want to chill. Do you know why? Because that’s how people build connection. By chilling.

I know this, but that’s not how I do it. I’ll have fun with people, and once I know they can keep up, and once we have enough shared experience, then I’ll open up.

This is a learned behavior. Moreover, opening up too early is generally not accepted. Instead of talking and asking the cliche bullshit questions that minnesotans do, I’d prefer to have shared expeience. I’ll find out all that stuff later, but really, I don’t need to know everything all at once. I’m patient. Try it sometime. …

So why don’t I chill when I’m with a group a ladies? The truth is, I just don’t want to date or know them on a deeper level. They all come across as low-energy or lame, so I’m just not attracted to them.

State Fair 2017: Day 1

Tonight I went to my first day at the Fair in 2017. For many of you who don’t know, I usually go to the Fair three times each year.

I went there with an event hosted by Tam in the Fun In Or Around Uptown group. From all angles, they did the Fair very different that I do. Many of you know that I’m a doer, and I experience as much as I can in whatever time I have.

But in the group, I met lots of people. They were all content to be pretty relaxed. One person I met, Joey, was from New York City. He and I spent most of our time chatting. Believe it or not, being a New Yorker, or a traveler (whichever it is), he didn’t want to sit, chill, and relax, so he and I went on our own quest to find different foods.

Leading up to the event, even though it wasn’t my event, I posted the MSP Magazine list of new foods. It was an awesome article that had concise reviews of the new foods. So we hunted for a few of them while the group “hung out.”

It was interesting to hear some of his stories. For instance, when he was in high school, he made a program that made a mouse click at a random algorithm.

Now, in NYC, the stage is really competitive, so the only ways you can get on stage is by either selling 20 tickets, paying money, our filing a room. He said to impress a girl, his brother started doing standup.

His algorithm eventually made thousands of Myspace friends. By sending then all a similar message, he said he as able to fill three rooms of people with Myspace people just to watch his brother.

The story continued. He told me about how they started traveling to do shows on the East coast and just staying for free with different fans.

He told me that one house in Connecticut was a “vampire family,” where the members slept in coffins. He, his brother, and his brother’s girlfriend took turns being in guard  at night because they were so creeped out.

He said eventually, Myspace changed to disallow many accounts like his account, and that he “took down Myspace (meaning made them close, obviously a fun extrapolation).”

We had conversations about NYC and life, and it was generally a fun time.

Joey is in town for just the weekend because he wanted to go to the Fair. He said his Minnesota friends he was planning to visit had to change last minute, so he came here for the Fair solo, found an event in Meetup, the standard “meet people while traveling” app, I guess.

It was a fun night, and hopefully we’ll go out in Uptown tomorrow.

Joey said he just got his passport, so who knows where adventures will lead?

We took this in front of New York New York…. You know, because he was from New York….

Going for a walk – Me Style

After a hard day working, I got home, changed into shorts and a tee shirt, and decided to go for a walk. I’m writing this how it happened:

I started raining to the A Line, an efficient bus/rail hybrid that rocks Saint Paul. Walking was too slow, and I had no interest to just stay in my neighborhood, so I ran to the A Line station.

Well, the sign said there was 4 minutes until the bus, so I thought, “I can easily jog to the next station.”

And that’s what I did.

I guess the bus had some bikers or something, because when I got to the Minnehaha Station, the sign said 7 minutes.

“7 minutes before the bus?! I could run to University sooner than that.”

And that’s what I did.

The problem with doing things too spontaneously is that I still had no idea where I was going or why I was going there. I don’t need to buy anything, and I don’t need to eat because I packed food in my day bag (little backpack).

So I started going to the rail station. But it was 7 minutes until the next train, so I decided I’d jog to Target.

Halfway there, I realized that I didn’t need anything, plus I forgot my Red card.

“Turn back!”

So I ran back to Snelling.

“Seven minutes until the next bus? I can run to Dayton faster,” thought I.

And that’s what I did.

At Dayton, I hopped on the bus until Grand. Then I walked around and ended up setting up my tablet and writing.

It’s getting dark, so I should head home to work.

So this is what happens when I have time to go for a walk.

Thanks for reading!

I’m Back (Again)

Taken away by first tax season, then nonprofit founding, I was struggling.

After the gala, I had to catch-up.

I was busy, and there’s still a ton to do.
My firm decided to hire a colleague to help. Not another contractor, but a full-time employee. It’s great!She’s to the point where she can get things done.

*Whew*

Lots of work, work, work. Naturally, I needed to travel.

After long weekends in Amsterdam and NYC, then catching up from those, I can say “I’m back.”

Kickin’ ass and taking names. Kicking ass, because I can’t help it. I’m just me, and people say that’s what I do.

I’m taking names, usually for two reasons: either they’re a potential client or a potential friend, or both. Usually I just want to learn more about them.

So of what does ‘being back’ consist? This weekend is a good example:
Last night, I hosted a drive-in movie event.
Today, I went to a French conversation coffee event, now I’m at home working real quick. Then, I’m going to host an event at an awesome distillery. Before then, I’m working and maybe owing the lawn.

I will also likely go to the Uptown Swingout tonight, too.

Then tomorrow will be doing everything at home I didn’t do yet, plus getting everything ready for my gal to kick ass this week.

I was going to put the “I’m back” song by Aerosmith, but this video let me know it’s kind of inappropriate, so don’t watch this video. It’s not approriate:

Technology Allows Flexibility

I’ve been enjoying my summer, even though I’ve been predominately hanging out with myself.

That’s kind of my own doing, since my typical evening consists of going to the lake, usually Lake Calhoun, and working. Most nights, working consists of no client work, but the work I do extra, and it’s at a highly relaxed pace, because it’s summer, Yo.

I’m saturated with technology. For instance, right now, I’m at the beach, lying down, typing on my bluetooth keyboard, that’s connected to my tablet (obvs), that is tethered to my phone’s internet, that is charging on one of my mobile chargers…..

I have a similar setup with my laptop, including a mobile AC battery charger bought 100% for business purposes (because I needed to work on the cruise ship deck).

Next Steps

Since I’ve proven that my system works, and since I have military-grade encryption on my VPN, I can actually work remotely from anywhere in the world, and have no client files on my computer. If a computer gets lost or stolen, I can easy ‘cut the cord’ (make the connection to my server inoperatble), disabling any access until it is found or permanently.

This is a pretty cool. In the near future, I’m going to begin traveling more. I just hired a full-time employee, and she needs to work with me, so for a while, I’m just going to be taking Friday’s off and having long weekends. It’s unlikely I’ll work during these. But perhaps after the fall tax season, I’ll be able to take some prolonged trips where I’ll work *gasp* in the mornings and explore the rest of the day.

I think I’ll post on my travel blog now.

Happy Fourth!

Rare Post from Summer 2017

It has been incredibly busy lately, but since I decided to not work tonight or not zone out in front of the TV, I thought I’d tell you all about what’s up.

First of all, to my neighbors, I’m sorry. I am going to cut my grass for the second time this weekend. I will cut it every weekend. Previously I cut it every 8 days, figuring I would have to mow the lawn 14% less each summer. It’s a theory that works when you are able to get home before 9:30 most nights.

For my clients, I am working my tail off. For those who I haven’t finished, I will get everything to a point of “near finished” with just a couple questions. This will be a weekend of work. As in, not even outside or at a lake. That’s for half of y clients. The other half, I’ll email you and remind you of what you need to send me (in most cases, it is “everything”).

As the last paragraph may indicate, my tale has not been worked off from tax returns. While I did things here and there, the month of May was consumed mostly by MinnesotaNow. MinnesotaNow is a new nonprofit that was formed somewhere during tax season.

It’s an awesome thing Minnesota needed, and greatness needs to start somewhere, so why not?

 

Healthy, Cheap, & Quick Lunches

One thing I start doing more this tax season was bringing my lunch.

Now, anyone who knows about staying healthy knows that you don’t want to bring junk food lunches like TV dinners, and you certainly shouldn’t eat out everyday. Most people know that when I do eat out, it’s more often then not, Leann Chin. Notably, I figured out that at Leann Chin, you can order a half portion of meat for about $3.50.

Let me translate: you don’t have the empty carbs of rice, and you get two meals worth of chicken, already cooked and ready to be reheated, for $3.50!

That’s $1.75 for a meal–it’s like school lunch prices! Except it’s not crappy school lunches; it’s natural chicken!

Throughout the week, you just reheat it, preferably in another container, and you have a lovely lunch, a delicious dinner, or dad I say, part of a complete breakfast!

Admittedly, I’ve never had a chicken breakfast, but I wouldn’t put midnight snack or of the choices….

Why Routines Are Often Unproductive

Routines are important in a lot of areas of life. For instance, you don’t need a checklist of things to do in the morning because you brush your teeth as part of a standard routine.

I do not live a routine-filled life. In some ways, I wish I had certain routines, like waking up and running, but that just doesn’t fit with my energy cycle (i.e. I hate mornings). I will add, though, that I did dance a couple Cha Chas this morning to wake up after a night of lesser sleep, and it did a decent job. Maybe that’ll be part of my morning routine.

Routines can also kill productivity. I’ll give you an example:

My friend Michelle came over to help domesticate my house a little bit–you know, make it seem less like Austin Power’s Pad.

Part of the deal was that in order to organize and rearrange things, I had to clean, with chemicals, my tax season “state of working.”

Understandable, but she came over earlier a day earlier than anticipated, plus the free time I was originally going to spend cleaning was consumed by starting my nonprofit and prepping for a great interview with the MSP Biz Journal reporter.

So I didn’t have time to clean everything. I mean, it was pretty darn spotless, but not perfect.

Well, she was going to put dishes in my sink, so I quickly disclaimed the imperfection of the left sink. The enamel of the left sink is thin, do it becomes discolored quickly, and I didn’t prioritize scrubbing it.

So I told her one of my life theories, one involving housekeeping:

There are jobs one does often. They’re done quickly and have a high impact. They are routine jobs. Scrubbing the sink is one of these.

But if one wants to make actual progress, he or she has to do nonroutine cleaning, which is what I did.

Notably, the routine cleaning will get done regardless of effort. Need silverware? BAM–dishes get done.

But if I want to make any progress at all, I start by doing nonroutine jobs. These are jobs I generally try to permanently defer, or they’re jobs for which I never find time. They are often the above and beyond difference no one will notice. Or they’re jobs I don’t particularly enjoy. These are tasks like organizing papers​ into where they actually go instead of placing them in a “file later” pile or dusting the shelves no one will see.

These are tasks like replacing your food into single serve containers.

These are tasks like making the bathroom mirror sparking clean instead of just wiped down (okay, that’s an often noticed plus).

By breaking routine, sometimes you can actually get things done. Now, a life of a million pieces seems completely random, but my routine is to point them all towards a  single, unified purpose.

That is how I handle routines, or don’t handle them, or why I choose to keep a nonroutine life.