Ride of my Life

Compression-only CPR works.

You can skip the mouth-to-mouth breathing and just press on the chest to save a life.

In a major change, the American Heart Association said Monday that hands-only CPR — rapid, deep presses on the victim’s chest until help arrives — works just as well as standard CPR for sudden cardiac arrest in adults.

Hopefully more bystanders will be more willing to help in a crisis situation.

No Comments | Leave a Comment!

I was introduced to Rachel (my now wife) a couple weeks after I returned home from my mission in Brazil. Supposedly I still had my hair parted, a cheesy smile, nerdy glasses, a white collared shirt, some over-ironed khakis, and weird sandals. Rachel and I didn’t actually start hanging out for another year or so….but whenever we reminisce on that original encounter a few weeks after my mission….she says she thought I was the biggest uber-nerd she’d ever met. My “adjustment” back to civilization was evidently a little slow.

Anyway, no matter how nerdy Rachel thinks I may have been….there is absolutely no way I ever held Rachel like this dude is holding that chick. THAT I know for sure. My mother taught me better. What a nerd.

1 Comment | Leave a Comment!

Startin’ to see a hockey stick here….

No Comments | Leave a Comment!

Saw this commercial as I was working/watching all the conference tourney b-ball games today. I love the App. St. shot in the hallway with the weight room sign. Gives me chills every time I see it.

There are no cinderellas. I love this time of year.

No Comments | Leave a Comment!

I was watching tv in the background as I was doing some work on my computer….and I thought this commercial was pretty funny. So I went and found it on youtube and I thought i’d share it here. It made me laugh…..cuz from the little start-up perspective, I feel like we are moving a gazillion miles per hour. The big companies in the education space trying to do what we are doing….well…..quite honestly they take fooorrrrreeeeeeeeevvvvvveeeerrr toooooo mooooovve.

The big companies plan plan plan….do case studies and focus groups and 3-year research papers on if the market wants this, that, the other, blah blah blah blah blah. The market will have changed anyway by the time they’ve made their “conclusion” on what they should build. Bahhumbug! One of the many reasons I never wanna work at some cubicle in some big corporation. Forget you fools. You ideate all you want while I go do.

For better or for worse, we just go. Go go go. We often times take the ’shoot then aim’ approach as opposed to the ‘aim then shoot’ approach. Sometimes it works…sometimes it doesn’t. But either way, I love the ability we have to be nimble…being able to turn on the dime if we need to. No committees. No big fat board of director junk. No paper pushing and signature hopping. It can be a huge advantage of being the little guy in any market. The big guys can ideate all they freakin’ want. We will own you. Yes, I said we will own you.

Here’s the commercial.

No Comments | Leave a Comment!

Last week, a well known silicon valley entrepreneur, Jason Calacanis, wrote a blog post about a few tips for start up companies on how to save money. There were some good things in there. There was one thing in particular however that set the whole blogosphere on fire.

Below is what he said on one particular issue (he later went back and struck out a few things to re-word the point he was trying to make):

“Fire people who are not workaholics. don’t love their work… come on folks, this is startup life, it’s not a game. don’t work at a startup if you’re not into it–go work at the post office or stabucks if you’re not into it or if you want balance in your life. For realz.“

It triggered responses all over the blogosphere like here, here, here and here. These responses have a lot of good points (about how to treat employees, etc) that I agree with. There’s other stuff, however, that I totally disagree with (mainly the “workaholic” concept).

Most people think Calacanis is an idiot for saying what said, believing in what he believes, and doing what he does. However, to his credit, I think he comes out with a very good follow up post about working hard and still being able to “have a life.”

Anyway….this whole storm of controversy got me thinking about how hard i’m working….why i’m doing it…..what it all means….

These last couple months (especially in recent weeks) have been more intense than ever. Intense in the sense that we have A LOT going on with the company. March Madness has kept us super busy (and will continue to keep us super busy during the next month or so). Investors and potential investors always have new questions to ask, conference calls to schedule, travel plans to arrange, and checks they’re begging to give us. Biz dev & partnership opportunities never go away and always seem to be knocking on our door (thank goodness). But above all right now for me….our product development is going 100mph. We have a bunch of big features we are releasing these next couple weeks….and it’s certainly been a lot of work to put it together in the time given. Hopefully it’ll all pay off. A lot of hours and sweat have been shed to make it happen….

I’ve found myself putting in 14 hour work-days during these last couple weeks. I see no sign of that slowing down anytime soon. I’ll usually be at the offices till around 6-7pm. When I get home, II try to exercise, spend some time with my wife, watch a few of my tivo’d shows every once in a while, and do a few personal things….but other than that it’s work for the rest of the night until 1 to 2 in the morning (all this with the only exception being Sunday). Yes, I work most of Saturday…

Yup, i’m exhausted. Doesn’t seem like a super balanced life does it?

Usually all this would imply that i’m not enjoying myself. The reality is that it’s quite the contrary. Would I like to get a few more hours of sleep each day? Certainly. Would I like to spend a few more hours chillin’ with my wife. Yup. Would i like to have a bit more “balance.” Probably.

So why am I doing what i’m doing then, putting in crazy hours? Two reasons.
1) Because I love it. I’m passionate about what we’re doing and i’m enjoying every second of it.
2) I’m perfectly willing to sacrifice (or in better terms: invest) most of my time, most of my resources and most of my brain power TODAY……so that TOMORROW I can have 10x as much of it (referring to time, resources, etc). It’s called an investment.

It’s so that I can sleep a few more hours each day (on a nicer mattress or on a nicer bed or in a nicer home) some day. It’s so that I can spend a few more hours(or a lot more hours) with my wife (perhaps backpacking through Europe or simply just playing board games at home WHENEVER we wanted). It’s so that I can spend more time doing the things I love with the people I love (golfing at Riverside with my family, playing crossfire whenever I wanted with JP, or watching cheesy movies like Enchanted with my wife). It’s so that I can be in a better position to give of myself (talents, time and resources) to those in need; to serve more and not be so stressed about paying next month’s bills. It’s so that me and my wife can get off to a sound financial start early on in our marriage, and invest invest invest….be it in our future kids’ education, future business ventures, or through “teaching men to fish” & philanthropic work.

I’ll probably be doing this (sacrificing a lot and putting in insane hours to start/grow a company) maybe 10 more times in my life. Hopefully with each go at it, i’ll be accumulating more experience, knowledge and more digits in the bank account.

Yup, i’m exhausted. No question about that. It’s fine though…cuz I see the bigger picture. Hopefully there’s a pot of you know what at the end of this rainbow. But more importantly, I love doing what i’m doing!

In my opinion, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with Calacanis’ point of view on working hard and the essential component of enjoying what you do. Nothing wrong at all. I wrote about something similar a while back about Passion.

No Comments | Leave a Comment!

I’m not sure how many of you already know….but we’re doing something pretty awesome this month at Zinch. More than a 100,000 students applied to win our big $20k Sweet Diggity Dawg Scholarship. We’ve brought it down to just over 200 semifinalists. They are incredibly talented and deserving of the scholarship. At this point they are all qualified to win the scholarship.

Anyway….we are doing it March Madness, bracket style. First there are Regional Tournaments to decide who gets into the final brackets of 64. From there…it’ll be pure bracketology. A student will go up against another student….winner moves on to the next round….all the way till there is a champion.

Regionals just started this week and so far the traffic/voting is going crazy. It’s a lot of fun. Kids are going to great lengths to get their friends and other high school students to vote for them. It’s been fun to see.

We also have a cool thing called the Cinderella 3. Basically any high school kid in the world can still make it into the final 64 (even if you weren’t chosen as a semifinalist). It goes to the 3 students who can get the most friends registered on Zinch. These three lucky students will jump right into the final brackets.

Anyway….it’s kept us busy….but it’s been a lot of fun.

No Comments | Leave a Comment!