Slow start to the day....worse finish.

This morning came early as I had to get up at 6:00 a.m. to drive out to the burbs for a day long seminar. Woody Allen said, "half of life is just showing up" and that's what I was doing today. And guess what? He was right.

I arrived at the breakfast before the conference, sat down at a table with a few guys at it and struck up conversation. Turns out one of the guys is a speaker later in the day and the other guy is from Detroit (my hometown if you didn't know). Shortly thereafter two other guys sat down; another speaker who was from Michigan and a guy who has recently done a large amount of business with Morningstar. Too ironic.

A year ago last summer, I had the great fortune of having dinner with Ernie Harwell, the long-time Detroit Tiger's announcer. To people who are baseball fans or who lived in Michigan, this is a pretty huge deal. The breakfast table was enthralled with the story, which led to more questions about what I do ("other than dine with famous baseball figures"). Suddenly I was networking. Half of life is just showing up.

After a long day of seminars, I stopped by the house before heading over to a client's open house for more networking, or more appropriately client contact. As you know, I'm replacing the baseboards and doors throughout the house. Upon entering my humble abode, I was welcomed to this site:





It used to be neatly painted and NOT have holes in the wall. Ugh. Turns out the job of removing the trim was much more complicated than it first appeared as the remodelers from twenty years ago decided to nail the hell out of the baseboard to the point where the wall was actually moving while Manual Labor Mike was removing the baseboard. Plus it took much longer than he expected, so the other stuff he was supposed to have done was delayed.







Fine, on to the client's open house, where both clients and their employees were having cocktails and hors d'oeuvres. A bunch of the client's employees were in from out of town and I was able to meet the new COO. And then, as if the day wasn't long enough, I was off to meet a date.

Well, I should have quit while I was ahead (or possibly I was already behind). While this young lady showed promise (we've had several very positive dates), surprisingly tonight was the last. Back to the drawing board!