WeWorked By now, most people in the literate world have heard of WeWork. It is the shared workspace company that caters to and further encourages the entrepreneurial culture that is blossoming across the globe. WeWork has become globally ubiquitous in the less than ten years of its existence. What Uber/Lyft are to car culture and what Airbnb is to hospitality, WeWork is to Dilbert and office cubicle culture. Adam Neumann, the Israeli kibbutz-raised kid and…
Summer Haircuts Our dog, Cecil, is pure Bichon Frise, so like the dandelion pappus that adorn the late-summer lawns of the U.S., he becomes a fuzzball as the summer rolls on. When he gets his summer haircut he is as happy as a dog can be. It could be my imagination, but he seems to hop around with his high and tight white clip. Kim thinks he struts like a little tough. He looks cooler…
Beyond Meat I am intrigued. Beyond Meat, the California start-up that launched its highly successful IPO a few months ago, now trades at over 100X sales. What’s especially interesting is that the concept of an alternative protein that provides a substitute for meat products (beef, pork and chicken) is hardly new. Where is tofu with its patent infringement claims? How upset must the ubiquitous veggie burger be at this turn of events? Even Bacos…
Grindr Goes Global Admit it, you’ve heard of Grindr, the world’s largest social networking app for gay, bi, trans, and queer people. My wife Kim and I have many gay, one trans and probably a lot of queer friends (even though I do not think I could adequately define that term with any precision). You notice I do not suggest we have bi friends, though we may, because how would we know unless we…
Life on the Bubble What is a bubble? On the one hand a bubble is a globe-shaped amorphous item with a gas inside of a liquid formation. If you had to live on a bubble, it would be a very tenuous existence for sure. A bubble can also be a situation where market prices are unsustainable and artificially high. That’s an economic term usually applied to situations that cause many people to make a…
The Week of Living Dangerously In 1965 he was your foreign correspondent in Jakarta covering the political machinations of a desperate dictatorship in decline. He looked a lot like Mad Max back then and his squeeze, Sigourney, was his reminder of the power and yet fleeting nature of empire as she tried to use the British Embassy as her base station. Those were the days when you had a whole year to play out…
Triangulating Friendships Last night Kim and I had drinks and dinner with an unusual kluge of friends. They themselves are not unusual, but the connections are a bit complicated. Tricia worked for me in 1981 in the early days of Bankers Trust. She was fresh out of school and both impressionable and eager to learn about the world. Her husband Sam, who came along years after Tricia and I had parted ways, came to…
Suffering Succotash My first recollection when I thought of this title was Snagglepuss, the pink, high-falutin, well-dressed cat who thinks of himself as a great thespian (Thay that with a listhp). But Snagglepuss was the cartoon character who most often said, “Heavens to Murgatroyd!”, with a slight Bronx accent. And who can forget his stage-craft with the phrase I find I use all the time, “Exit, stage left!” But Snagglepuss had no appetite for lima…
Hiding in the Dark This morning I did my usual few hours of work on my computer in our study, which is an interior room without windows. I work in the bowels of the building where little can disturb my concentration and I stare at the screen or the wall (albeit I am listening to MSNC on the TV in the corner, but that is hardly a distraction any more, more like an oxygen hose…
Getting Smaller I was watching an obscure little film from 1993 called Indian Summer. It had a great cast with Alan Arkin, Diane Lane, Matt Craven, Bill Paxton (RIP) and Kevin Pollak. It is another Big Chill movie with a summer camp twist. I am sure many can relate to the ensemble of characters and roles, not to mention the reminiscences of summer camp summers past. At one point in the story, there is a…