Remodel At D+42, Painting Blitzkrieg

As promised, the painters arrived first thing Monday morning. Despite the situation with the Master bedroom and bath, most of the house is in pretty good order for painting. There are some rooms where some furniture needs to be moved. This painting company owner insists his people not move things (evidently issues with customers in the past). But the actual guy running the painting crew (there are three all together) seems to be taking a more lenient approach. 

Nonetheless they have dived into the work and even in a single day have made great progress. They said they wanted to start at 7:30am this morning and we'll see how much more they can get done. Were it not for the moving and the Master Suite issues, I am sure they could have knocked this out by the end of the week.

Remodel at D+40, On The Other Side Of The Hump - The Black Diamond Trail Descent Of Chaos!!!!!

We are definitely on the way toward completion...just not in any nice smooth, well-planned manner. I don't ski but my friends who do note that the Black Diamond Trails are the steepest, fastest, most difficult. It feels like that's what happened in our project. 

Just this weekend all this took place.

• We are pressing our various contractors to get things done because we will have granddaughter 2.2 staying with us in two weeks.
• This means everyone is working all weekend to get the hardwood floor and carpeting done. 
• Wife is going nuts trying to pick out the paint colors because painting is supposed to start on Monday (today).
• It is critical that the bathrooms be painted first so they can be finished with the final plumbing and electrical installation. 
• On Sunday they are installing the last of the carpeting in the bedrooms. But they don't ask us where we want the furniture. They put it against the walls as it was but not the way it needs to be for the painters.
• And they announce there is not enough carpet ordered to do the master bedroom. They depart.
• We inspect. All the furniture from the bedroom as been stuffed into the master bathroom meaning that there is no way to paint there. Painting on hold.
  
• 2.2 contacts us. She's not coming. She's going to stay in Spain. 
• Our contractor comes today and tells us the painters are starting Tuesday (tomorrow) as we are on the schedule and if we don't start, the delay will be too long. 
• We're not sure when the final bedroom will finally get its carpet and they still need to do the stairs.

Stress, yes. Am I living in a poverty in an undeveloped country with no way out? No. And it is all looking pretty awesome I have to say. 

Hats off to Wife, design mastermind!

Remodel At D-37, Over The Hump!

After 5 days in exile in an Airbnb, the crews doing the flooring succeeded in getting the hardwood hallway to the upstairs done as well as ALL the upstairs carpeting. Marcos, the hardwood guy (who I like a lot) is doing the living room and the library in stages so we will have access to the kitchen and garage. 

 The bedrooms downstairs are the last major parts to be redone with new carpet. We are discussing punting on doing most of the painting because Wife cannot get her head around the color selection with all the chaos and not seeing the finished flooring product. We most likely will only paint the bathrooms downstairs so they can finish the electrical and plumbing there and the library because we have to put the bookshelves back together to reclaim the kitchen and New Mexico room.

There is an end in sight.

 

Remodel at D+34, Gulp!

We have been through quite a few remodels and the current one in many ways is no where near as big a job as others we've done (adding the second story, adding on to and redesigning our kitchen. However, in those cases we were able to stay in our house during the work. The second story was built on top of the first and they only broke through and connected them at the very end. When we added on to the kitchen, we were disrupted in terms of eating but could continue living in the rest of the house. But with this job, taking up 70% of all the flooring at once! Well, I will show you these videos and you can have your own opinion.

 

On a more uplifting note, the bathroom vanity tops and sinks are in

Remodel at D+32 - Let The Craziness Begin

Now starts the time of complete chaos. The vast majority of the flooring of the house will be replaced this week. Then the entire house will be repainted. During this the bathrooms will be completed somehow with all the fixtures, plumbing and electric done.

For the floor to be done, everything must be moved out in a way to allow them to move furniture quickly. For the painting, everything must come off the walls. We've moved to another Airbnb for five days this week. We had movers in on Sunday to box up everything and get it out of the way.

 

  

Remodel at D+30 Plus Special #2 Update

Things are picking up pace. The bathroom tile person finished days earlier than expected. This allowed our GC to get the vanity cabinets installed and the vanity countertops measured. We're hoping to get them installed next week. He also had a carpenter do work on closet shelves Wife had designed. The flooring people will be starting on Monday. They expect to take the whole week. 

Wife and I have rented a place since there seems no way we can be in the house given the need for the hardwood part to set before one walks on it. Given the way our house is laid out, there is no way we can get from the upstairs where we currently reside to our kitchen or our garage without going over the new surface. We talked about bringing dried rations to last us for three days and just staying upstairs but ultimately decided that cheap though we may be, that was a bit too much.

 

 Talk About Gifts That Stand The Test Of Time

 

Made a soup for lunch using the Somen Noodles gifted to us when the #2 clan camped out in ABQ during an early Covid evacuation from (Ukraine?). As Wife is not an Asian food fan (she tolerates my making it - I love it), and I don't think somen is my favorite noodle, it takes a while to get through 3 pounds. But I think we are about 75% of the way done. Maybe I can make some for 2.2 when she visits us to check out NM schools in a couple of weeks?

A Minor Victory Over The Forces Of Medical Cost Exploitation!

I suspect I am part of a rather large group that believes the United States medical system is completely screwed up and works primarily to enrich a small number of corporations that control the vast majority of medical care delivery (Hypocrisy check - I bet I have quite a few of these 'evil' companies in my investment portfolios 😬). As an advanced aged person in our country, you are required to be part of the system called Medicare. And as part of that system, the drug coverage providers seem to be the most insidious. Maybe that is mostly perception because you have to deal with it on a regular basis.

You see if you are getting older, you are HIGHLY LIKELY to be having more and more medications. Managing the cost of these is important. Each year, you can change your provider. You have a 90 day window to shop the plans and decide which one you want for that year. Each year the providers change what they are willing to cover and at what cost. You plug in the drugs you need and you get quotes. Except that sometimes the quotes don't always represent the reality of what you are going to get. 

I have some very pricey medications. I've shopped all over to see if I can get them for less but it is difficult. However, I have one, Synthroid, which has never been that expensive. I plugged that in when I got my estimates in the fall. However, there must have been some fine print somewhere that said they were quoting on the drug or its generic equivalent. I'm all for generic equivalents. Except in this case, I have a small problem. I am allergic to the generic. Don't know why. I just am. So for decades I've been taking the name brand.

However with my new provider, they are refusing to cover the name brand, They will only cover the generic. And the uncovered price of the name brand is substantial at the normal pharmacy chain I do business with. I did call the provider to explain the allergy issue. (It could be another post on my experience with the automated assistant nonsense) but finally the authorize an exception which is somewhat better but not really. I check some of the better known discount pharmacies online but they are only selling the generic as well.

I'm pretty much resigned to paying through the nose for this drug when I decide to trot out my AI tool, Perplexity. I ask it where can I purchase name brand Synthroid. Guess what I find? The manufacturer of the name brand has cut a deal with an online pharmacy to sell its product. AND THE PRICE IS 2/3RDS LESS THAN WHAT I CAN GET FROM ANY OTHER PHARMACY!

So I've enrolled and am hoping to get my first shipment in a couple of weeks.

Remodel at D+24

The tile work is moving along at its own pace. We've been told by our GC and the Flooring people that the specific installer assigned to us is a real quality guy. He goes slow but he does things right. We met with both the GC and the Flooring people and finally got our battle plan in order. While we had quite a bit of time to begin with, we now have 2.2 visiting us to look at schools here (an longer story I will write about later). So having a house where we can actually put her up would be desirable. 

Next week they will finish the bathroom tiling. Then on April 7 doing all the floors will start. We decided the only way we could expedite the floor work was for us to move out of the house again. So we'll be gone for 5 days. Then on the 14th they will start the painting, which hopefully can get done in a week. Now sometime in all this, the new bathroom vanity, toilets, shower fixtures, mirrors, & lighting all have to be installed. It's going to be interesting to see if this can get done in time for 2.2's arrival on April 22.

And here is the week of work in pictures

Remodel At D+19

Progress has not been as fast as we would like and it looks like thinks will be slipping quite a bit beyond our hoped for completion dates. We've been doing and will have to continue doing quite a bit of juggling of when certain things get done. The biggest complication is when we have movers come in to prep the house for the flooring and painting. We've already delayed them a week and it looks like we will have to delay them again. There are also all kinds of logistical issues with us wanting to stay in the house when they start the flooring as we may have to take food up to the upper story so we can last for a few days and not go downstairs (I am slightly exaggerating...slightly).

Working on the Bathroom Tiling

The prep work getting the surfaces level and prepared takes more time the putting down the tile

 

 That all took place last week. Today tiling actually began.

On Being AI And Being Last

The wheel of karma goes round and round. You make a start, go to the middle, come to the end, only to begin all over. 

When I was in the fullness of my late career, I was part of a group that built and organization dedicated to teaching professionals the art and science of building a person a network. It was called Trusted Advisor Network. For a short period, it was a dynamic organization. It offered a different, a more fundamentally value laden way of interacting. At the core of all of it was the training program I'd developed called the TAN System. It was the heart and soul of the organization. A great many people benefited from it feeling that it provided themselves a sense of deeper purpose. 

Sadly, its ongoing development was not to be. It was torn apart by selfish forces that often occur in these situations. I was at that point where I was doing my great transition in 2014. I did help a part of the organization to restructure, but mostly I just moved on with my life. From time-to-time, I would hear this comment or that on how it was working or not working. Mostly it seemed that it was gradually coming to an end.

But I still had contact with many people who had been a part of it. Many who rued it having fallen down. Others who were committed to reviving it. So it was in January, as I was yet again looking to revive my own personal network to gain more business, that I was talking to two of these old TAN comrades that were part of this revival team. There message was simple. 

"de-I, we need your AI."

"What? I have nothing to do with artificial intelligence. And how is that going to help with your revival of TAN."

"No de-I, we need your ANCIENT INTELLIGENCE!"

"We need the founder of our system teaching us. Our people have forgotten all about the system that made us special. Will you come and and teach us anew?"

As I thought about this, I realized I had a lot to gain. I needed to rejuvenate my network. And this would be an ideal way to meet some younger professionals. So this last Thursday I found myself flying to Phoenix, Arizona to give a presentation on the TAN System. 

How long had it been since I'd done a 'business' trip? Over a decade for sure. As the vast majority of my travel over this period has been long-distance, long duration, I wasn't quite sure even how to arrange things for a same-day go and return flight. But I figured it out. And I had an interesting realization.

Virtually all of my travel for the longest time (including business travel) involved my having a carry-on bag. This led to a pattern of me wanting to get on the plane first to ensure I had overhead space for said bag. On this trip, I realized that was not the case. There was no need for me to get on the plane any earlier than absolutely necessary. So on both the outbound and return flights, I made sure I was THE LAST person to board. What a delicious and interesting feeling of nonchalance and freedom. 

Oh and by the way, my presentation was very well received and I met a number new, younger people to add to my network.

Getting Serious

Now we start the real work...the building out. The workers for installing the new tiling in the bathrooms started today. Things will get progressively more busy and intrusive. But the reality of the build will be actualized.

 

Return Of The Creativity Tsunami

In my last post on seizing each day, I made mention of getting fully back into the writing mode of my books. I think I may have understated just how much the creativity is flowing. 

There are so many story lines and I find my mind just flowing each time I sit down to write. In fact, it is somewhat like those heady days in 2014-15 when I could barely jot down the ideas fast enough. In just three-weeks, I've already written down 13 pages of general outline. In the past for example, 45 pages of outline led to 425 pages of writing, so just a bit short of 10 pages of writing for each page of detailed outline. The current outline is still general. So I can assume we have at least 130 pages of material...and I'm just getting started. 

Stay tuned. Details at Seven.

 

Savoring Each Day

The days are full. 

The remodel is constantly requiring adjusting one's daily schedule to deal with workers coming and going, discussion with the two key contractors, and various follow-up activities. 

As we need to replenish funds from the remodel project and fund on-going travel, I've been in a more active business mode than I've been for quite some time. So there are meetings as I work the network to drum up new clients. 

Theodora and Rotary continue progress at a steady pace. Both need on-going attention to get them to a next level, but neither are requiring huge amounts of time and effort either. 

I have doing various interesting cooking things (like my recent poached eggs) that pique my creative curiosity. I find myself in a mode of continuous improvement attitude, trying to refine and improve things I've been cooking for a long time. 

The Book (or I should say Books), my fantasy writing, has undergone a complete 180. After the six year ordeal, book #6 in the series completed and I have suddenly reentered a period of intense creativity. I am furiously (well as furious as and hour and a half of work a night can be!) outlining all the aspects of book #7. In fact, I am thinking there is so much material that I may need to structure it into two books.

And I am in HAPPY TRAVEL PLANNING mode. We threw together a minimalist little trip in May to Sweden once we knew Wife was healthy. (It's going to be three weeks. I've told a lot of people that for those who know Wife and I well, this is like a weekend trip LOL!)  I really didn't have time to do much planning and because of the lead short time, we got hammered on the airfare. But, then I shifted my focus to our big Fall Spain trip. You may remember that we've already booked the same apartment in El Campello for the same month as we had last year. Here I have done the kind of travel planning job I expect of myself.

• First, we scored a really good airfare to Europe.
• Second, based on how I've scheduled our arrival departure, I think we are going to get an equally killer deal on a rental car for the whole time.
• I've found a really good Airbnb for a short stay in Bilbao.

So, yes, I'm pleased and excited about all this.

Last night as I was contemplating all this, I remembered where my head was in December in the full throes of Wife's blood clot incident. All the thoughts that maybe our life would be permanently altered as happens as one ages. So to be back in this space as before is not something I take for granted. It is something I am determined to enjoy and savor each and every day.

Remodel Update

This week's work.

 

The demo is done. Plumbing and electric installed. Drywall put on. Next week, they begin tiling the bathrooms.

Early Adopter

 

Poached Eggs Perfected

 This dear followers is PERFECTION

Wife and I normally do our own thing for breakfast...except on Sunday. Then we eat together a breakfast I cook. We've been doing this for so long, we can't remember when it started. We have a three meal rotation of which poached eggs are one. Wife likes hers plain on a toasted English Muffin. I like mine with some kind of additional flavor element. For all the times I've done this (hundreds I would say), there has always been some flaw - the bread is too toasted, not toasted enough, the egg is too cooked or not cooked enough, the cheese is too melted or not melted enough, flavor elements get lost or are out of balance.

Somehow, this last Sunday, with a combination of rye bread, ham, asparagus, American cheese and the eggs, I FINALLY got it right. It tasted as good as it looked

I probably should stop eating poached eggs now because I only can go down from here.

Remodel Project 2025 @ D-1 and D+1

D-1 

Before it starts. The two major bathrooms in the Tower.

The Master Bedroom Bath

Second Bathroom

 D+1

After the first day of demolition

The Master Bath

 The Second Bath

Remodel Project at D-2!

Wednesday morning is D-Day for the remodel to begin with the demolition of our current two primary bathrooms. Wife and I have been busy emptying everything out of the bathrooms and the master bedroom. It has been lugging a lot of stuff around which has been tiring and tough on our aching backs.

Figuring where to store everything so it is covered in dust that is inevitable from any kind of remodel project (this being our third!) has been a challenge. I will be taking a huge load of stuff to Goodwill today. We have junk removal people getting rid of our antique, barely working exercise equipment tomorrow. 

Based on advice from #3, we have decided to NOT include the full house painting as part of this project. Wife was going nuts trying to figure out the colors with only a few small samples of the new flooring. #3 advised we live in the house for a while to get an idea of the best colors. So there will be another project that will essentially be an interior design project with painting, throw rugs for the hardwood floors, revamping of furniture and rooms that will come after this. 

Wife, who has been our purchasing agent and has saved us big bucks in the process, still has some last minute plumbing things to buy. We are going to a rental for two days during the demolition process.  

Finally happening. 

de-I - IT Tech Support Professional

Yesterday we had an internet meltdown. 

First the ISP was down for about 3 hours. Of course I was in the middle of a call with #3. And then missed a scheduled meeting (and couldn't even tell the person why because I didn't have their phone number and my phone email connection wasn't working either). I managed to salvage a third meeting by doing it on WhatsApp using cellular data. Wife was unable to do any of her construction purchasing work.

Went it came back up, our modem crashed.This I discovered by working for over an hour with Xfinity 's (our ISP) automated customer service system where no matter the interface, calling, texting, using the internet, you will not get a real person. All you do is get shunted down the same menus again and again telling you to do the same things that have failed again and again. I finally ended up with a message that said, "Looks like you need a technician. We can get you scheduled for an appointment in 4 days. 

At this point I was ready to get another ISP.

But I remembered that Xfinity has a store in Albuquerque. It was 5pm by this time but it was open until 7pm. I ran out with the modem. There, I found real humans (if rather blah attitude humans) who swapped out the modem right away.

Then had to get it set up using their app which took a while. Right after I finally got it set up and working, THE ISP WENT DOWN AGAIN. Finally about 7 hours later everything was working.

And to end up a totally frustrating afternoon, I asked Wife if she would fill out a brief  survey giving me a high rating for my tech support services. 

She said, "I don't do customer service surveys."

And The Return Of Travel

Not only is our latest (and hopefully LAST) remodel project less than a week from start-up. We are back in the traveling business again! 

Until we got Wife's clean bill of health, we were not willing to commit to anything. Our scheduled March trip to Malaysia we canceled. But the moment we got the green light, we booked a short (for us) three-week trip to Gothenburg Sweden. It is the second largest city in Sweden and is only a couple of hours away from #3 and family.

We are both in need of the R&R that we only seem to get from travel. 

D-Day Announced! Purchasing Mama Already Deployed!

Received in an email today...

"We will start on Wednesday 3/5"

  ...from our contractor

In follow-up emails, he detailed an estimated schedule that will take us through the first week of April. If all goes well, we would expect the job to be finished by around April 7-9. We will be able to stay in the house through March 24 when the painting and flooring will be done. So we will only need to be out of the house for about 2-weeks.

And while this planning going on, our resident super heroine, Purchasing Mama (aka Wife) has been working to save us big time bucks by researching and purchasing the massive amount of plumbing hardware needed for the bathroom remodel.

After the years of studying options, starting and stopping, hitting walls, going down blind alleys, the remodel we've envisioned to allow us to stay in the house long-term is taking place. 

Breakthroughs! Progress On Many Fronts!

Suddenly A LOT is happening.

THE REMODEL

Money has been exchanging hands. Product is ordered. Dates for the construction commencement have been floated. Plans for how we are to are to live in the house during the construction have been finalized. We are hoping work will start in about three weeks. Keeping my fingers crossed.

 WIFE HEALTH

Wife went for her ultra-sound to see if the blood thinning medication was helping reduce her blood clot. Not only was it reduced. It was gone! In fact the vascular surgery people recommended she stop taking the blood thinner. Having watched Wife's energy and behavior over the last few weeks return to what it was before the blood clot incident, I can't say I was totally surprised. No, that's not honest. I saw the improvement and hoped it was a sign that the clot was diminishing. I can't say I expected her to get a 100% clean bill of health! We actually looked at the pictures of the current veins working versus what they were in November. It was dramatic.

TRAVEL

And the health news means travel is back on the table! We have put in motion a short (well short for us) three week trip to Sweden in May!

Woo Hoo!

BOOK SIX FINISHED!

OMG! After five years of on and off writing, it's done!

I did my first re-read over the last couple of weeks and I was amazed (pleasantly) that despite the herky-jerky process of writing it, all the stopping and starting, all the painful blocks in determining what the story line would actually be, it turned out pretty darn good. And as I commented in my last post related to it, there are a number of ideas and themes that can be used to create the next book or maybe even books. 

My next task will be to re-read and capture all those ideas in written form so I can begin designing Book Seven.

BiL And SiL

That would be Brother-in-Law and Sister-in-Law, Wife's Brother and his Wife. 

Of all our family, I would say, over the decades, we have been closer with them than any others. Yet it had been a long time since we'd actually been together. They had taken the initiative and asked if they could come visit. We were truly happy they did. 

So what does one do for three days with your close relative that you've not seen for years?

TALK

It is hard maybe for some to understand that we spent an immense amount of time talking. Talking about all kinds of things. It was truly impressive. However, there is a sub-plot in this...the talking relationship between Wife and her Brother. Each evening they would start talking. Often it was about aspects of their life growing up on the farm in Windom, MN with their somewhat dysfunctional parents. After a couple of hours both SiL and I would bail, go to my Library and sit quiet reading while the two siblings went on and on. Honestly, I haven't seen Wife this animated, engaged, and energetic since the November blood clot issue.

COOK AND EAT

Seriously? You think de-I is going to have guests and not pull out the stops cooking and eating?

Our first day, Wife and I had our contractor in and out a couple of times as we have been trying to get the last parts of our remodel finalized. I opted for a simpler meal. I took out a number of last summer's smoked meats (ribs, pulled pork, brisket) from the freezer. I made my crispy not quite mashed potatoes, and slow roasted (a la #1) a butternut squash to crispy outside/soft inside perfection.

Day two was pasta making. I had the lust to make pasta from scratch. My BiL, the curious learner and engineer he is, wanted to watch and participate in the whole process. I had him rolling and cutting the pasta. I made a very meat centric sauce using some goulash I had in the freezer, pressure cooked with pork rib meat. The pasta turned out top notch!

Day three was Cambodian Fish/Shrimp Amok. I showed SiL how to make curry paste from scratch. Another top notch winner.

de-I DIY APPRENTICE

My BiL is an amazing engineer and notorious fix it person. SiL bemoans the fact that if they visit family in their homes, it always turns into a home improvement project. We had small need. Our on furnace humidifier needed its internal canister replaced. BiL was confident we could do this ourselves. I volunteered to be his student not realizing that BiL, being a great teacher, would have me do everything!

Yours truly throwing himself into the task

 Let me tell you how much FUN I'm having

 After we'd replaced the canister, BiL insisted that we open up. It was amazing the amount of mineral deposits on in and on it!

 

 

 Evidently there are a lot of minerals in our water. I am not sure if we should be concerned about the amount of minerals we are consuming in our water, OR if we should be bottling our local water as natural mineral spring water!

Humidifier Canister Replacement Success

Theodora/Ghana Trip Round-Up

I'm back in Albuquerque, back in the day-to-day saddle, and reflecting on the trip just completed to Ghana. A LOT was accomplished. 

• We kicked off open book management and got great involvement from the team as I related in my earlier post.
• We met with our Ghana board and advisors and believe we have renewed engagement from them.
• Met with two potential joint venture partners and have agreed to put together a test (more on this below).
• Purchased four badly needed new computers for the team.
• Put 'teeth' into the idea of 'participant management' with a set of definitive projects the team is to work on (more on this below).

JOINT VENTURES

During the last half of 2024, I met and had ongoing conversations with two other social impact organizations in Ghana dealing with the same problems related to disadvantaged & trafficked women. One, Muslim Family Counseling Services (MFCS), has an excellent track record meeting people 'where they are', and gaining trust. The other, Breaking The Chain Through Education (BTCTE), specializes in getting trafficking survivors and giving them education and skills training so they can build a better life. Both these organizations face the same challenge...they've been unable to come up with the means to provide solid employment for those they serve. Thus, when they learned about Theodora, they were both very intrigued.

This led to the local heads of both organizations coming to our office in Accra to see for themselves what has been accomplished. They met with our team, learned about their backgrounds, the challenges of transforming into those that could do our work, details of the actual work being done, and their feelings about their own future and the future of Theodora. Both commented on the magnitude that had been accomplished. And both have indicated they would like to see what we might do collaboratively. 

If we were to develop a collaborative effort, these organizations would fill two big gaps in Theodora's potential growth plan...the recruitment of new candidates (MFCS), and providing the basic training fir new participants (BTCTE). We've agreed that an initial concept test would be the next step. We are hoping to have the design of this test for our respective Boards by this summer.

OWNERSHIP ATTITUDE CHALLENGE

There is a saying, be careful of what you ask for, you might get it. In the case of my Theodora participants, I would rephrase that to, be careful of what you question your CEO's decisions, you might get the task to resolve it. Thus on my last day in Ghana, I handed out the following to the team.

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT PLAN (Mary F) – This has been mostly built out. Mary needs to move it into implementation and provide a results tracking system.

 

FUNDRAISING (Ann & Mary M.) – You have your system built. I need you to BLAST OUT the new content and talking points I’ve given you.

 

AI STRATEGY & TACTICS (Miriam w/Mary M & Benedicta) – We want something we can be implementing by the second half of the year.

 

OPEN BOOK MANAGEMENT (All) – Start ‘really’ studying the financial information. Ask questions!

 

TIME WORKING IN VS. OUT OF OFFICE POLICY (Open) – I’d like to see something by the end of February.

 

CLIENT’S PAYING VA BONUS POLICY (Open) – We should have something approved and out to our clients by the end of February.

 

PAYROLL, COMPANYWIDE SYSTEM  (Open) – This will be a hard one. I’d like to see some preliminary ideas no later than the end of April.

 

ROTARY FOLLOW-UP (Benedicta) – We need to be going to at least one meeting per month & make sure all are comfortable with and can use the talking points. We need to start collecting names of contacts we make at these meetings.

 

PUBLIC RELATIONS CAMPAIGN (Miriam) – Establish list of PR contacts by the end of February. Begin sending press releases by March.

This should keep everyone engaged for a while!

Jet Lag Management - The Bear Hibernation Technique

There are two primary options for flying between the United States and Ghana - through Washington Dulles on United or NYC JFK on Delta. I have no particular favorite. There are pluses and minuses to both routes. I usually make my decision based on price. 

However, recently, within the last year, Delta made a major time schedule change which makes it much more difficult for people west of the Central time zone to connect without a very long layover somewhere along the way. So my last two trips prior to this were on United. But when I made my reservation for the trip I just concluded, the price differential was so great (Delta being much lower) that even with a couple of hotels for those long layovers, I was saving big bucks. 

One side effect, of the new Delta schedule is it now leaves Ghana in the morning local time and arrives in NYC mid-afternoon local time. This is just like most of the return flights from Europe to the U.S. If you are stopping in NYC that's fine. However, if you are going on, it is on it creates a jet lag management challenge.

When flying these long routes (8 hours and longer), the ideal time as a business class flier is to have them go overnight so you can sleep. That's the way it has been in the past. But if you have an 11 hour flight going through daylight hour, what do you do? Your body won't be ready for sleep. 

I use what I call the 'modified hibernation technique'. I don't want to have my body stimulated and feeling it is awake because then my body clock will be screaming at me to sleep when I arrive in the U.S. with many hours of daylight ahead. So I basically just lie down with eye shades on, listen to music and do nothing. I try to make my brain and body functions as slow as I can. If I was staying on the East Coast, I would only do this for half the flight to get on the local time. In this case, I still had 9 more hours of travel after my arrival until I got to Atlanta, my overnight location. I pushed the hibernation then for as long as I could on Ghana to U.S. flight. 

I was feeling really tired during my layover in NYC but was able to grab a shower which made a world of difference in terms of keeping me awake. I was able to get a pretty good night's sleep in Atlanta as I did not have to get up early for my last flight to Albuquerque. 

I'm feeling reasonable this morning. I did wake up a little earlier than I would have liked but that is normal for this kind of time zone change. 

Laksa Like Food Product - A Breakfast Dish In Two Acts

A story of cooking improvisation.

ACT ONE - MUSHROOM CURRY

I had made some SE Asian inspired noodles earlier in the trip. I had some coconut milk leftover and wanted to make use of it. I also didn't want to go to the work of pounding various roots and bulbs to make a curry paste since my kitchen in Accra lacks those tools. So I did something, I've done in the past, I used my SE Asian flavors but used a Ghana cooking technique. 

Assembled were:

• Onion
• Garlic
• Ginger
• Tumeric
  
• Tomato
• Chile
• Cumin
• Black Pepper
• Fish Sauce
• Coconut Milk

 This all went into a blender and were processed until smooth. Next I took some Thai Shrimp Paste and Cambodian Style Onion Paste (Yes! I carry these things to Ghana and leave them there. They keep forever.) and quickly sauteed them in oil. I added the curry mixture, let it cook for a bit, added the mushrooms. This became a side dish for my dinner. 

However, looking at the leftovers, I was inspired to use this as a base for some curry noodles for breakfast the following morning. 

ACT TWO - LAKSA LIKE FOOD PRODUCT

(If you've ever read the label of things like American Cheese or Velveeta they will say "cheese like food product" as they don't meet the strict requirements set by law to be called "Cheese". With all my international inspired cooking, it is exceedingly rare that I EVER produce something that is 'authentic' to the original way it is made.)

The next morning, I took noodles and boiled them. I added a Maggi Fish/Shrimp cube. In went the leftover Mushroom Curry and the rest of my Coconut Milk. I took two eggs, beat them, and whisked them into the soup. This thickened the entire dish.

!"

I took one taste and said, "Damn this tastes just like Laksa (a Malay curry noodle soup). Hence, Laksa Like Food Product. 

I ate every bit of it!

Putting On The Ownership Attitude Jacket

Here in Ghana, we are continuing the process started last summer of building Theodora Ghana Virtual Assistants' ability to be an independent business...which primarily means focusing on the ability of the women in the program to manage their business. Viewed objectively, this is a massive undertaking. Viewed in context of what we've already overcome, it is no more massive than the entire project as a whole.

One of our promises to the people in the team was that Theodora would become an employee owned company. We are hoping to have our Employee Ownership Trust in place by the end of February. With that in mind, going back to the summer, I have been talking to the women about what an owner does. We've talked about the tradeoffs an owner is constantly making particularly when it comes to money. One of our people, Ann, back then coined a phrase as she was discussing why she'd made a client decision.

"I put on my Ownership Attitude Jacket!"

I warned the team prior to this visit that we were going to take 'Wearing the Ownership Attitude Jacket" to another level because I was going to institute 'open book management'

Open Book Management is a philosophy that encourages ownership and leadership to share financial information with those being managed. It goes counter to common practice in business where most owner/managers feel they don't want their employees to see what is going on in the business, in particular, how much they make. 

I'd given them the information before I arrived. And we went over it when I got here. Of course, it is not that easy to dig into numbers when you're totally unfamiliar with financial reporting. Nonetheless, the women did pick out a couple meaningful things that led to substantive discussion. Compensation was one which led to me giving them the task of developing a compensation program for the company going forward. (Good luck with that team. LOL. For as long as I've been in business, I've never met a business that was happy with their compensation system!)

Another very interesting example had to do with our hours at work. We struggle because of the need to be responsive to clients in time zones far different, offset by the advantages of having our people in an office to stimulate collaboration, work ethic, and culture. My two managers felt we'd gone too far in the direction of being a 9 to 5 culture which didn't work with the level of service we need to give to our clients. Discussing this as a team, they came to the conclusion that we needed to establish a set of rules that balanced the two requirements.

This led to a last conversation. One of my managers and I knew we had a very long day running around getting new computers and looking at potential new offices. My manager wanted to leave early, there not being anything going on at the office requiring our interaction. I was concerned about the image this presents. In the spirit of our collaborative management approach, I told the manager that we'd bring it up to the team. (This is an easy thing to do since we are small and they all sit in the same room).

I brought up my concern about how a leader should set the tone by example. And if I was leaving the office early, what message did that send to them. One of my people, Mary M, said the following.

"Michael, if I have work I need to get done, I stay late. If I have an early client meeting, I come in early. If I'm done with my work and it is early, I go home. I trust all my teammates. I know they are doing the same. It makes no difference to me if manager M goes home early or comes in late because I know she is doing tons necessary for us to succeed. I know you are committed to us. I don't need to see you in the office to know that."

I didn't breakdown and cry though I felt like it because hearing something like that you KNOW they are owning the Ownership Attitude Jacket.

Musings On Social Impact Start-Ups In Cultures Very Different Than Your Own

Two Posts ago, I went on a tangent and began musing on perceived prospects of the Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking, Economic Development Initiative versus the Theodora Project. I made the statement.

"This isn't because I think the concept is bad, unworkable, or have the potential to make it. The problem is I don't have the time and the energy to make the start-up work."

Daughter #3, who has spent much of her recent career in the business start-up space, commented on her observations related to the massive amounts of time and energy that start-ups take, She further related that in the past she never questioned the costs that extracts on other parts of your life, but now she does. And she asked me to go into more depth with my related to my statement related to EDI. So here goes.

I would start by observing that not all start-ups are equal. For example, the start-ups that #3 has mostly been involved with - technology based, aggressively funded, with massive expectations for success are a special kind of artificial pressure cooker that can totally consume and grind down people. On the other hand, the kinds of small business start-ups that I have dealt with over my career, that often relate to the livelihood of those involved, have a different kind of pressure. Most that pressure is self-generated and relates to the need for the business to succeed in order for the founders to avoid financial disaster!

All start-ups take a lot of time and energy. I have always equated it to the laws of physics. If we think of Newton's First Law of Motion (special shout for extra credit from R in Madrid for using a physics reference), an object at rest will stay at rest unless acted on by an external force. Think of the start-up business as an object at rest. It has no customers. It is not producing a product or service. There is no cash flow. The external forces that start to change this are the time and energy of the entrepreneur / founder (or plural as the case may be) and capital. In the tech rapid growth world, much more capital is used to hire lots of bodies to do things. In the small business, it is the entrepreneur / founder who applies energy and time in lieu of capital to do things. 

In both cases, there will be a steep learning curve. No matter what one has thought the model will be or the prior experience one has, there will be lots of changes and adjustments along the way until a dependable model is moving along and the amount of energy, time and money can be backed off. In the small business start-up that almost always takes about 5 years.

Now look at the kind of social impact models with which I've been working. These have all the characteristics of the small business start-up but with the added complexity of simultaneously requiring complete culture attitude change. This takes the challenge to a substantially higher level. 

As I have slogged through all the learning necessary to get Theodora to a level of sustainability, I have begun to realize why most attempts to build new sustainable business models in less developed worlds fail...people simply are not willing to put in the massive amounts of time that are necessary to change the inertia of the existing cultural models. In my personal case if I had not been so 

a) determined, 

b) obsessed, 

c) crazy, 

d) stubborn, 

e) a & c, 

f) b & d, 

g) all of the above, 

I certainly would not have gotten us to where we are today.

Hence my comments related to EDI. It is a different model. The nature of the cultural challenges and change that must be overcome are different. I can see the energy and time that will be required. And I don't have it. And even if I did, I doubt I'd be willing to make that kind of commitment again. I will try to do somethings that involve more people to see if I can get at least a prototype started. But I would have to say overall, I'm not optimistic this one is going to happen.

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Rotary Event

A week before I was to head out to Ghana, one of my fellow Board Members of the Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking, E, sent an email out to me and the ladies of Theodora who are in our club. E's brother, Mark, a prior President of Rotary International, and now a Trustee of the Rotary Foundation was doing a tour of Africa. He was stopping in Ghana. They would be giving him a gala dinner just two days after I arrived. Our club President asked if any of our people would be willing to go as it would be great if our little Ghana contingent could be seen at such an event.

Much to my surprise, virtually our entire team with the exception of the one who is a recent mother decided to go. 

I had my own thoughts as to what would happen and I tried hard to tamp down expectations. There would over a hundred people. All would be clamoring for attention from such an important personage. Since 'E' was speaking to her Brother and Sister-in-law, I was sure we'd get a small shout out. Mainly, I wanted to show the women how one works a room such as this as none has had any kind of experience such as this.

Despite all my years coming to Ghana and experiencing "Ghana-Mahn-Time" which is like "Manana" on steroids, I cannot shake my American punctuality upbringing. So we arrived when the event was supposed to start. First thing we encountered was a classic case of Ghanaian petty power. In a very hierarchical society where those with more lord over you, many with any authority have a tendency to lord it over those they can.

At the reception desk, they didn't have a name for our reservation. We had a copy of our payment receipt but no, the person in charge said if there was no name on the list we couldn't get in. We had to go over to the side and wait until we could contact the person who'd purchased the tickets for us. I was close to pulling an 'African World Airways Meltdown' but I kept it under control and we in due course were allowed in with apologies from one of the staff leaders and glares from the petty tyrant.

Of course no one was there. The room wouldn't fill up until almost 45 minutes after the official start time. We were by ourselves.

 My team cooling our heels waiting for things to happen

I decided some alcohol lubricant would lighten the mood which it did.

 

As more Rotarians arrived, some of the people I know got me into conversations. Then as we got close to the time the unexpected happened. The District Governor, a woman who had met one of woman when she went to a club meeting with my main Ghana partner and benefactor Jonas, came to our table. Past Rotary President and Trustee Mark wanted us...All Of Us...to come to their table. 

So off we went through the room go meet PRP (Past Rotary President) Mark and his Wife Gaye. And they greet us so warmly. And Gaye insists on taking multiple pictures...all while the MC is trying to get the meeting started. 

 

 

 Me hobnobbing with the PRP

 

As we returned to our seats, I saw a couple of our women make eye contact with the lady who'd given us such a hard time and grace her with a some malicious smiles. Our women have spent a lifetime being disrespected so I can't blame them.

Then Mark was called up to do his presentation.He starts talking about how important it is for Rotary to be innovative to get new members. He talks about the move during his term to creating different kinds of clubs. He talks about his Sister's journey, she who had no interest in Rotary at all until the unique Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking came to her attention. Then Mark said,

"And we have members right here in Ghana who are members of that club."

 

And he had us stand up for recognition, the only club so recognized.

 

We were all blown away!

 

Our Rotary event experience.

Headed To Ghana - Some First World Travel Problems

I am back in Accra, Ghana for (what is now) my semi-annual trip working on Theodora Project and Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking Economic Development Initiative (EDI for short). The two projects are at very different points of their development. 

Theodora has gone beyond the stark, 'new concept, can it even work?' phase to the 'we've proven the concept, we have a working business, can we create meaningful succession and scaling.' That's pretty cool for sure as I've detailed in December. 

EDI on the other hand is absolutely in the 'can it even work?' phase. And if I am to be blunt and truthful, I'm not sure it is. This isn't because I think the concept is bad, unworkable, or have the potential to make it. The problem is I don't have the time and the energy to make the start-up work. 

I was fortunate that the fate that put me into the Theodora situation, coincided with me still having enough time and energy to do the intense work necessary to get it over the challenges to success. Now, six years later being in my late 70's rather than my early 70's, I don't have that energy and my time is running . 

Anyway, I'm not sure why I started writing on this. I will come back to it in a subsequent post. What I wanted to write about was my actual flight experience to Ghana which brought up to me just how we lose perspective in the world. 

I was able to get a really good fare on this flight but it meant having overnight layovers in each direction. That makes for a long travel time. Plus, leaving the airport to get a hotel (I still saved well over $1k doing things this way) and having to go through whole airport security thing over again.  

So this particular set of flights had a whole litany of annoying/irritating things. To note:

• Delta Airlines not seeming to be able to get its computer system to remember when your documents have been checked leading to you have to recheck them numerous times.
• Delta's app completely freezing when you go to a place requiring a special visa, meaning it is not available to track your flight details or other information.
• Running into one of the most anal TSA agents I've experienced in ages in Atlanta that made me (and others) do things in the TSA Pre-Check line require me (and others) to go back and forth between the screening gate and the line you put your belongings on multiple times, screwing up the process for everyone as a result.
• Getting Business Class seat that was incredibly hard causing all kinds of problems with my arthritic shoulders and hips.

The first three of these were all before I got on the long-haul business class flight and I was in a pretty crappy state-of-mind when I boarded my flight from Atlanta to NYC. The flight attendants on boarding asked how I was doing, and I kind of vented. And at that very moment, images of Los Angeles, Gaza, Syria, Sudan jumped into my head. And I immediately made note of that observation to the same crew members I had just bitched to. 

I won't say I immediately moved into a state of bliss. I was still annoyed. But I took my whole attitude with a distinct grain of salt.