Lapse in Concentration

Performance Gap..
Now two weeks into a good winter cold an excuse could be made for a failure to post, but it's not a good excuse.  I've been reading a lot about blogging and blog branding in the pursuit of blog monetization.  Previous posts have mentioned that really successful bloggers are women between 25 & 40 who write about food, children, marriage, love and probably home decorating.  Who exactly cares about geezers and their pursuit of income?

The smart people, those of 'thought leadership' designation in the blogging world stress that 75% of all leads on pretty much anything come from Facebook posts, sponsored or not.  Blogs are a bit passe.  Readers want the short sound bite (word bite?  thought bite?) and have little interest in having to read a number of posts to understand your current post.  Certainly the food bloggers have individual posts stand on their own.  You don't need to refer back to previous posts to understand the food project of the day.  If you've seen one Rachael Ray cooking episode, you've seen them all...open a can.

Social Media and the Pursuit of Work...
The outplacement firm stresses the importance of face-to-face networking and contacts, get in front of people.  I've sat through a number of seminars there and even the staff themselves seem not totally caught up in the social media world.  That's interesting because everyone checks out your social media presence before interviewing and that's how most of us find out about new position openings and it's how we keep in touch with key placeholders in our networks.  Just today I reached out to a Senior VP of Marketing who might not have taken or responded to a call but responded to a forwarded link on marketing/branding/innovation within two hours.

As I grind through the wrap up of business and personal taxes I'm focused on a second quarter income pursuit.  This includes putting a wrap on the outplacement resource.

Global Warming...
Conventional wisdom, actually contemporary wisdom on blogging would indicate that these should be single thought posts, but I'm not ready for that.  Historically JAN & FEB in MN have been tests of one's ability to deal with cold and snow.  This year I've rarely put on a hat and routinely don't wear gloves.  Now it's more or less 20 degrees F and some might find that nippy but the warmer weather makes it feel like March and certainly that is the time of the year to start shedding.

Agriculture & Bees...
After 50 years I'm about ready to wrap up the beekeeping.  My 75 year old beekeeper friend listened to me make that announcement, later commenting that I should have at least a couple of colonies.  Of course he milked 150 cows until he was 70.

There is the opportunity to bring back some of our ignored and abused cropland which my renter plants in corn despite my annual indication to do otherwise.  It's time for me to seriously attend the following and buddy up w/ the agricultural extension office:

Art & Culture...
The small business backs up to a railroad track which carries at least fifteen trains per day, most of them eastbound from the North Dakota Bakken oil field.  Boxcars, almost without exception carry graffiti from...well, I guess a lot of rail yards across the country.  This particular car was remarkably well done.  We it not for the brambles and the the fact the train was moving about 20 MPH a closer shot would be had.  Growing up next to the tracks which was a much a playground as the street in front of the house I have a sense of caution and preservation on getting too close and I'm always looking for my exit route as they rumble by and consideration is given to ignored maintenance and impending derailment.

The left end of the car has a nice image.  A final image was on the trailing end of the car.

What did catch my attention, too was the message "who's next?"  I'm quite certain I'm next in one way or another.