The Little Words Mean the Most

new title for new book?

 

 

"I dunno. What do you think?"

 

40 World-Sourced Answers Every Nonprofit Boss, Board, Fundraiser and Marcomms Pro Should Know

 

An essential reality check

 

 

A Snail's Progress: Where I've spoken on 1 side of the planet

 

1 big problem with an older brand is staying relevant

 

Everybody knows you.

But nobody cares all that much.

Ask your parents if this is true.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

sometimes inhibited by programs that work and so attract gov't money

but does anyone really believe in gov't money anymore?

 

 

Chalked on the streets of Oslo

 

The Norwegian Air personality quiz

 

 

New opera: "Beate's bracelet," co-starring Peter...

 

 ... Muffett & (s)Elect Women

...for Ice Cream!

 

What to do in Oslo

Beate Sørum and Mark Phillips wax figures

 

attend my "show" in Oslo

Echo M. asked about where to stick the dean's letter in a case

 

Ummmmmmm.... Good question, Echo. (Oh, and superb analysis of the Case Writers portfolio, by the way.) ¶ In our little world, where we pretty much get to write and design whatever we think is best, working with a group of clients who want exactly that, every "normal" element is questionable. In fact, you start each day with this question, "What if everything I think I know is wrong?" ¶ In other words, if something normally goes first (like a CEO's letter), you ask WHY? How did it earn that pride of place? Is it maybe just a convention that no one's ever questioned? ¶ "Everybody else does it. We should, too!" That's how a lot of nonprofit communications have ended up in the sad, non-lucrative, donor-ignoring, under-performing state they're in. ¶ Is it [one asks] these days maybe even a REALLY BAD IDEA to put that letter first? ¶ See, now we have a lot more neuroscience handy than we had back in 1950, when this convention might have been hatched. "Anchoring," for instance, was discovered in the 1970s by two Israeli psychologists (one became a Nobel Prize winner). ¶ "Anchoring," in reductive lay terms, discovered that whatever comes first sets the framework. So let's assume the president's letter comes first. IF that letter is a cumulus cloud of BS crossed with PR crossed with jargon crossed with smiley faces, then basically the framework the anchoring just set up is this: "Here we go again. The usual crap." On the other hand, IF that president's letter is like the one that opens the billion-dollar-plus "Yale Tomorrow" case (2008), it will talk about the university being in its sunset years ... unless there's a HUGE infusion of donations as fast as possible. Yale went over-goal.

 

 

asyou suspected

 

 

he thought, If

more things could be safely done while drunk

I'd get more things done.

definitely though the chain saw on a pole

a tool I own

like a head on a pole

scares me all the way to doubt

 

see

I once in my life (add it to our archives, mumsly)

chain-sawed trees in our this? backyard

to carve out a better? view

while at the time same time

standing firmly

 

on murderous, cruel, unforgiven

MMM-NO-UNH-UNH-NO anthropomorphic ice

thick as clear body armor spread

across our backyard every

acorn dead bug root pine back view

needle mat and the down slope

 

An angel goes into a bar.

"Who's the clumsy, drunk one?"

I slipped footloose freeforall

 

my chain saw still running

toward the sunset

curving toward the old drystone

walls of this defunct glacial volcanic New England dairy farm