Continuing my investigation of the NSA Vendor fair I talked with Tracy Penwell who sells handbags under the name Dressed Up Cat.

Her one-of-a-kind bags are created from “found” bags & objects. The bags are all made from recycled components, Penwell says, and in 2008, she was a finalist for “Best Green Handbag” in the Independent Handbag Designers Awards. She was also a 2008 nominee for the People’s Choice Design Award from the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum.

To hear what she had to tell me about her bags, and why professional speakers are a good market for her, click on the podcast icon below.

 

 Interview: Dressed Up Cat Bags [2:12m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

NSA Exhibit Area

As with many large conventions, the National Speakers Association gathering has an exhibit area where vendors sell everything from self-publishing solutions to, well, handbags and jewelry.

Speakers have to look good on stage and off.

I took the opportunity to ask a couple of the vendors about the goods they sell and why they come to exhibit at NSA.

Illusion Jewlry

Patricia Carbeery has been working with glass for over 25 years.

She finds working with hot glass is very direct and immediate—the ever changing rainbow of color and light while working with dichroic, metals, powders, as well as the glass, continues to fascinate.

She creates her own beads using the ancient technique of lampworking. To make each bead, she melts glass in an oxygen propane flame at temperatures in exces of 2000° F. She then anneal the beads in a kiln for five hours or more. All her designs are unique—incorporting her handmade lampworked beads, Swarovski crystals, silver from Bali, and freshwater pearls.

Her work can be found at The Phoenix Art Museum and The Bead Museum in Glendale, as well as several fine stores.

To hear what Patricia told me about her jewelry, click on the podcast icon below.

 

 Interview: Illusion Jewelry [1:54m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

End of Year Party

The NSA/NC year ended on May 2nd with a final day-long meeting at the Sheraton Burlingame.

I handed over the gavel to our new president Karen Walker-Tunoa who had arranged with singer/comedian Lauren Mayer to toast me in song with a tribute to everything from my knowledge of social media to my love of Marmite, Science Fiction novels and Bob Dylan songs.

They also expressed their appreciation for the theme Telling It Like It Is and the new theme Shake it Up.

Take a look.

Continuing the tradition began three years ago and the year after, I can reveal that in the past 365 days I have, surprise, become another year older.

I fully embrace the transparency senior executives and politicians tolerate in regard to their age and biographical details. These days it’s only the plebs who have no online identity where anyone who is interested can find out your age, marital status and similar ‘private’ data points. As Sun Chairman Scott McNealy once remarked “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.”

I’ve now reached the age where 57 years of variety is the spice of life. It’s not only policemen who look younger, suddenly President’s do. As my Irish father-in-law once remarked, you’re not really old until the Pope is younger than you are.

Buried in Lewis Jones’ wonderful review of books about Samuel Johnson in the Weekend Financial Times is clear evidence that the 18th-century man of letters, author of the Dictionary of the English Language and subject of Boswell’s Biography, would, were he alive today, never blog:

“No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money.”

Johnson - flatulent; scrofulous; half-blind; half-deaf; overwhelmed with dejection and gloom; yearning for the “Fetters and Padlocks” which his mistress deployed - wrote to avoid the debtors prison. Solid advice for all writers in today’s economy. Blogging is, perhaps, for blockheads.

Flying back from an exhausting few days at the National Speakers Convention in New York on Tuesday I was looking forward to catching up on my sleep with a few hours rest in the window seat of JetBlue Flight 95 from JFK to Oakland.

Imagine my surprise when I opened the New York Times that morning to read that the “Happy Jetting” airline had decided to charge customers $7 for pillows and blankets.

Exhausted and intrigued, I decided to hand over my credit card (no cash accepted by the cabin crew) and see what money can buy at 36,000′ these days.

A lot less than I expected.

The pillow and blanket came in a sealed plastic sack which also contained a $5 voucher for Bed, Bath & Beyond. So the net cost is $2 if you remember to cash in the coupon.

The package was branded as a CleanRest by MicronOne and promised “The World’s Cleanest Pillow”. Gary Goldberg the founder of CleanRest tells us on the insert provided with the pillow that “my wife’s vigilance in building the healthiest possible environment for our kids led me to take action … to create a clean, safe, sleep environment for our kids.” Hopefully the Goldberg’s keep their kids off airplanes where recycled air carries far more germs than are ever found in a pillow.

Anyway, the pillow was not worth the money. It’s tiny (10×12) - and does not bridge the gap between the seat-back and the wall which is the main way someone sitting in a window seat can make themselves comfortable.

Obviously, airlines are suffering from high fuel prices. They don’t seem able to raise fares to cover the added cost of flying, so they are reverting to charges for items which they used to provide gratis. One wonders where it will all end. How about a nickel a sheet for loo paper?

I’ve always been amused by the language of wine. Many reviewers pile adjectives on top of one another with repetitive monotony. This might be due to the professional necessity of writing while tipsy (despite claims to spit and not swallow.)

Jon Bonné and Lynne Char Bennett’s list of 100 Best Wines in the Sunday San Francisco Chronicle, modifies ‘cherry’ in no less than 17 different ways when describing red wine:

…red cherry, crushed raspberry and spice…
…vibrant cherry, plum and berry fruit that’s laced with subtle sweet oak shadings…
…toasted cherry and a leafy hint…
…musky red fruit - strawberry, dusty cherry…
…baked cherry and raspberry…
…radiant red cherry, highlighted with cranberry, candied orange rind, oregano and fir cone…
…bright with thick cherry and citrus zest…
…ripe black cherry and subtle plum, with a mineral overlay and a juicy, salty profile…
…cherry, blackberry and cedar…
…rich pile of black cherry, nuanced raspberry and blackberry, coffee, toast and a full box of exotic spices…
…dried cherry and oolong…
…dried cherry, pebbles and black tea aromas…
…coffee, vanilla, mint and plush back [sic] cherry…
…rubyish cherry and cranberry fruit…
…roasted red cherry, warm oak to round the edges…
…tree bark and cherry lozenge…
…raspberry and cherry scents, with slight mushroom and mineral…

Ray Davies was right on the money back in 1970:

I met her in a club down in old Soho
Where you drink champagne and it tastes just like cherry-cola
Cee-oh-el-aye cola
She walked up to me and she asked me to dance
I asked her her name and in a dark brown voice she said Lola
El-oh-el-aye Lola la-la-la-la Lola

Lola - The Kinks

Thanks to freelance communications specialist and technology maven Davis Fields, I have a picture of my blog on an iPhone:

How cool is that!

Enough has been written about the changing fortunes of the major computer manufacturers to fill my hard disk many times over. Analysts have reviewed product mix, features and benefits, distribution models, P/E ratios and more, However, this chart comparing the page views for dell.com, hp.com, ibm.com and sun.com over the past 3 years says it all:

Remember, unlike HP, Dell is a company known for doing most of its business online.

Ever noticed there’s a slew of consultants out there who will offer advice on what the well-groomed public speaker should be wearing?

It all began with Dress for Success.

Now, for the executive on the fast-track, there’s outfits like Global Image Group who offer to

Perfect your understanding of industry appropriate business attire using The Style Scale System and define your own personal style.

Why sweat the details of speech structure, message and authenticity in communications when it can all be reduced to implementing the guidelines of confident dressing and dress for the position you want, not the one you have. Look for help from Michelle, a Certified Image Master.

If people are wow’d by the clothes you wear they’ll not even notice the sweat on your brow and upper lip; detect the fear in your eyes or even take much notice of your face at all.