Chocolate

There's a lot going on with this dessert, but the basic idea is
chocolate. The other flourishes like the caramel and chocolate
drizzled across the plate and the sugar design are because this was a
fancy restaurant.

My love for chocolate comes from all three sides of my family, so the
decision of what to order for dessert generally isn't a mystery. It's
actially quite unfair to the other desserts.

The Big Ticket Weekend

Three big events this past weekend, led by a Sigur Ros concert Friday
night. Check out the confetti during a particularly happy song.

The other two events were fun but less happy: tickets to watch the
Pats get pounded by the Dolphins on Sunday (38-13) and tickets to
watch the Sox lose to the Indians Monday (4-3) and NOT clinch a
playoff spot.

Present

I recently checked out a little happening downtown called Pecha Kucha. The event, held at a small club, invites people to present 20 PowerPoint slides of something. This included an architecture student showing sketches of buildings, a photographer displaying a study he did, and even an entrepreneur talking about his startup. The catch was that each was allowed just 20 seconds per slide. Twenty slides, 20 seconds each.

The format really made me think hard about presenting, as the skill is one that's very necessary in my field. How is information displayed, what does the audience need to see (in 20 seconds), how simple/complex is the layout or idea that's being shown, does the slide tell the story or does the narration, etc. I also thought about some of the presentations I've seen from various leaders at my agency. I'm impressed each time I see them. And I wonder whether being an amazing presenter gets you to the top, or if this is a skill that's learned along the way. Or maybe I'm unnecessarily I'm awe of the people at the top who make these presentations and they're really not that amazing...

The OTHER Bathroom

Here's the setup for the upstairs bathroom. That's a mini-fridge for a
cold glass of water in the middle of the night and a futon for the
heck of it. Weird to have all this? Not when there's space for it.

Unpacking

The empty boxes go in the extra bathroom. Not exactly sure when that
gets addressed...