Endless Knots

Champions of Freedom (House) 2008

Freedom House, which will be sixty next year, names "Champions of Freedom" each Spring. We celebrated last Thursday night here in Boston.

Pam Cross served as Mistress of Ceremonies,
here with her hubby, Ron Ancrum

THE ENVELOPE PLEASE

David Goodman (middle) received  a special award in honor of his mother, Dr. Carolyn Goodman, who, in 2002 was the first recipient of the Freedom House History Maker Award. Cynthia Bell (left) and Sarah Cleto Rial (right) accepted the History Maker Award on behalf of My Sister's Keeper. 

Paul Grogan accepted the History Maker Award on behalf of The Boston Foundation, where he serves as Pres and CEO

Dr. J. Keith Motley, Chancellor, UMass Boston, received the Ellen S. Jackson Award for Excellence in Education, as did the Boston School Reform Initiative.

And Richard Mintz, who worked with Freedom House founders Otto and Murial Snowden, accepted the Adrienne Williams Spellman Diversity Award on behalf of Mintz Levin.

And here are Freedom House Chair Emeritus, Gail Snowden, whose parents founded Freedom House, with her daughter, Lee Snowden Trimmier

 

A matter of good Taste

Remember my rave about Taste? I had to find out more.

It won't be long until there's a major feature in The Times or Gourmet about these two. Or it may be in JAMA. Too good to be true but let's start with their ages - 23 - until the end of the month when first Nik Krankl turns 24 on the 24th and a week later Julia Tatum does. They're engaged.

Last week, Julia began her residency in psychiatry at Brigham & Women's Hospital here in Boston (third year of Harvard Medical School).

Two months ago, Nik bought Taste, the former Caffe Appassionatto, far and away the most beautiful coffee house in my hometown.

So how does someone (Nik) this young (when she's not at the hospital, Julia's writing the board, washing dishes, chatting up the customers) manage such a thing - and radically improve it in a few short weeks? Study journalism, manage six JP LIcks stores for a year and a half, write for a poker magazine, and come from a food family. "I'm no stranger," Nik says, as in his mother, Gail Silverton, owns Gelato Bar in LA, his aunt is the Nancy Silverton, pastry chef, restauranteur, and cookbook author, and his father, Manfred Krankl, owns Sine Qua Non Winery in Ventura, CA.

And Nik lurvvves coffee so much he "wants to roast," wants to "provide the service of roasting and how to prepare" the global bean "that wants to taste bad." Espresso is "the fragile one," he says, because it "takes coffee and puts it under a microscope."

Yesterday was a tasting day at Taste and when we arrived after 5, the place was still packed as a violinist (who was blocking "our" table, ahem) played.  Ah, the good old days at this location, when Sunday's meant coffee house concerts by jazz trios and guitarists. Only better.  Nik's pedigree shows - I celebrated with a double decaf espresso, served with a chocolate kiss and we shared a piece of coffee cake, my indulgence. Jeff had his regular cappuccino, which he reports as "excellent."

Look for us there. We're already regulars. Again.

Taste Coffee House, 311 Walnut St. Newtonville, MA 02460 (617) 332-6886

Powerless Point

Last week, I was cleaning up a presentation ("Virtual Teams in the Age of the Network") that I gave last Fall at the Brookings Executive Education program for a new one I'm giving there next Tuesday. It was, let me see, a frustrating (no), aggravating (closer),  *!#$%^***!! (getting there) experience.

For reasons known only to some programmer (not even a developer) who's probably cashed out by now for life on a private Caribbean island, I could not change the footer. Page numbers would not appear. Bullet symbols would not convert from vertical lines to small dots. Line spacing would not reduce.  Please don't send me suggestions as I didn't just fall off the PPT turnip truck. I tried saving with a new file name, copying content of troublesome slides to new slides, changing slide master, etc. We all know the tricks. A colleague with a PC (yes, I'm Mac, he's PC) - after struggling as well - was finally able to make most of the changes.

So when I was asked to speak at the Boston KM Forum, I decided to go slideless. Just stand up and speak. True, the topic lent itself to addressing the audience directly: "Moving Beyond Web 2.0 Resistance." Which ultimately is not about technology but about people, ye ole' "90% people, 10% technology" rule.

When Larry Chait introduced me, he said I would not be using slides. A hearty round of applause followed. And as I spoke, I sensed that people were actually listening, as in making eye contact, nodding their heads, responding when I asked questions. Note to other speakers out there: IT FELT GREAT!

Doug Cornelius live-blogged my talk which Paul Levy has responded to with "Throw off the crutches of ppt!" - where he gives a really good list of reasons why Powerpoint may not be exactly the most powerful way to engage an audience. Read them both. And thanks, guys. Maybe we can teach a class about how to give a presentation without slides.

One last thought: Edward Tufte gives a very good seminar (and has written an essay called "The Cognitive Style of Powerpoint," in which he gives some excellent suggestions for how to use PPT if you must). I attended it a few years ago and, humbly, feel that when I do use slides, they're the better for it.

How big is Boston?

Geraldine Brooks's People of the Book is hardly about Boston except insofar as the main character visits on her odyssey to understand the ancient "Sarajevo hagaddah's" history yet she makes an observation on p. 134 about our beloved city that can only make us smile:

Sometimes, I think if you took all the universities and all the hospitals out of greater Boston, you'd be able to fit what's left into about six city blocks.