BlogSat

Of course things got nuts and I'm slow on blogging again. I'm resolving to change that ..yet again. Hey, public resolutions are the best motivations there are! :) We've spent the last couple of weekends trying to use the spare time we have to set up the place we just rented. Its meant a lot of shopping (argh!), cleaning (double argh!), unpacking (triple argh!) and some screw-it-its-taking-too-long-lets-take-a-break (yay! :)) Its been a while since we were both in home where we knew we were going to be for a while, which has meant we've been able to put our nomadic but-we'll-move-soon-and-we're-in-two-cities-now-anyway existence away. Its meant we've finally bought furniture we like and can think about decorating our place, because we'll be there to enjoy it without ridiculous amounts of travel and some possibility of permanence. I've been shocked that despite our efforts to minimize the "stuff" in our lives, just how much stuff we m

[Updated (a teeny bit): Oct 2012] [Updated again (a super-teeny bit): Oct 2014] Q: Why this post? For the last few years, every Fall as students head back to campus to start recruiting season, I get a similar set of emails from students at my MBA alma mater. Either students look me up in the Chicago MBA Alumni directory, or through friends of friends ask me for 15-20 mins of my time to discuss my job, Google or product management in general. I've done at least about 7-10 calls like these around Sep-Oct every year for the last four years. Last year, I tried to get a little efficient by asking folks to schedule a conference call with 4-5 students at once, and still ended up talking about 20-25 second-year students or recent grads on the phone. I really like doing these calls, even though I think I'm only slightly helpful to most people. I  know what it feels like when you're in school and trying to figure out what to do next and the future seems like a bit of a mes

I just realized that the last time I'd blogged was just over 4 months ago; I've had blogging hiatuses before, but this one was different. The news that Blogger had a new interface , was sufficient motivation for me get over my procrastination from earlier in the week and revive the blog. BTW - Really like the new interface so far! :-) This blog has been important to me not just to express myself, but I've really liked it was a way to clarify my own thinking on things that have been on my mind, in a public forum. Generally, when I've stopped blogging its been because: I got lazy I got busy I got lazy and busy at the same time - yes, this is possible. This time however, while being busy was part of it , for the last few months I really didn't feel like saying or thinking much publicly. Professionally, the last few months have been a blast . Personally, they've been the most difficult for me ever. The fact that the two have overlapped in ti