Each evening as the pets wax needy, the caffeine wears off, and the house creaks as it cools, I think: I should blog. A pin-snip tightening in the solar plexus; I clamp down and I panic lightly and I know, for one, that I don’t have the margins of energy to tell the whole story of what January is or has been. For two, guilt. The longer I go blogless, the heavier the onus. Even this paragraph has made me lose a kilogram or two of psychic weight.

So, in compromise, let’s slide narrower the window of recap to encompass only one subject: two presentations I gave this month. That’s safe enough. Dull as Tuesdays, but allows me to put a checkmark next to blog, for chrissake on my tattered to-do list.

It’s slightly insipid, but I have an aim to perform more public speaking this year. This is a goal that likely shows up on the uninspired New Year’s Resolution worksheets of MBAs and delusional self-starters. But it is something that has its uses. My uses? Objective one: Even one percent less self-deprecation, as allowed for by requisite increase in self-confidence. Objective two: World, meet me—I’m not totaled out by my anachronistic and wordy self over here on my slightly la-di-da Web site, I also do this one thing all day, every day. I helped co-found a company that has been around, not without some marked success, for the past three-and-more years. So, yay. Let’s share some of this stuff we’ve learned at work with others, shall we?

Presentation the First: Totally Technical

I gave a talk last month at the Portland Drupal Users’ Group (PDXDUG) and sort of sheepishly posted this slide deck, expecting it to go darkly into the Internet night. Oddly enough, it seems to have made the rounds, ending up places I would not expect, cheering me. It’s probably really boring to you unless you’re one of the four hundred people or so in the world who spend night and day making Web sites for mobile devices. Using the Drupal Content Management system. Yeah, I didn’t think so.

Presentation the Second: Totally Megalomaniacal*

I also got invited to Research Club, to give a talk on, yeah, whatever seemed interesting to me. I plumbed the depths of my weird hobbies to see if I could come up with a thread or a metaphor or a theme. To see if I could make my life imitate art. Here’s what I came up with. It was better without the text—that is, it’s a slide deck that needs presenting—but ah, well, caution, to the wind, has been thrown. See what you think and be gentle about it; I’m fiercely self-conscious of how many photos of me are in this damned thing.**

* But that is okay…at times? Right?
** I just finished reading Henry V. It was difficult not to type that as damnéd.