Ok - so looking more like the pumpkin, but as long as we call it the pumpkin, there is some hope that it will turn out ok. Actually, just a few random thoughts this week.

First - why is it that hammering out a coherent power point presentation as a group is such an unbelievably hard task? It's as if when one says "I think we need to rework slide 16", the person who slapped the presentation together in the first place hears "I can't say you have any worth as an individual, and this slide is just another example of a general lack of intelligence" (I've been on both sides of this before). In such happy meetings, there are many roles to play:

Hyper-defensive author - must begin each response to a suggestion with "the reason that I put that in is that..."

Time nazi - persistently insists that there is no way that a person can cram 45 slides into 60 minutes (incidentally, this person is usually right)

Pithy nazi - has a pre-determined limit for bullet points or words, and exceeding these values will cause irreparable harm to innocent audience members. Ideal slide has heading like "Competitors" with 3 nondescript bullet points like "Distribution, Value Chain, Cannibalization"

Chart guru - Pushes group members to use more charts than Ross Perot. Everything has to be shown in chats with upward trending lines.

Audience advocate - Usually begins sentences with: "sure know what you're saying, because we're here, but put yourself in the shoes of the audience". Very similar to the Executive Advocate, who insists that all executives have the attention span of 3 year olds, and must be spoon-fed data in 10-second sound bytes, with the entire meeting lasting no longer than 5 minutes. Incidentally, these people are frequently right, too.

Techno-wizards - are aware of obscure and puzzling powerpoint functions, frequently relating to multimedia applications. This person would know, for example, how to patch 1/4 page-size video conference session into slide 33 ("Live Goals") so Anthony Robbins can conduct a live Q&A.

The Realist - points out after a grueling 2-hour smackdown, after which most group members feel insulted, that the power point is just a small part of a great presentation, and that Microsoft has tricked us into thinking we don't need a good story if we've got slides with cool features like "wipe" animated bullet points.

Enough on that. Random thought 2: while handwriting a really long word, like "differentiation" it is frustrating to realize that the first few letters are too ambiguous to support an abbreviation, and that I will just have to write the whole thing.

Random thought 3: the best thing we've bought at Costco in the last 2 months is le petit francais. WOW - this is really good bread, and now they don't sell it anymore. As you can see from the web site, you can get it shipped to you, but it costs roughly 200% more than it would at Costco.

That's all for now.