Yup, I have an Audible membership. Love it! Each month I know I have a new credit available, and each month I grab another book from Harrison. Just finished “Dead Witch Walking” and about to start on her New York Times bestseller “Black Magic Sanction.”

For more on Harrison, here’s her site: http://www.kimharrison.net.

I chuckled and added it’s a true statement! I went into the Apple store expecting to pay about $1000 after adding in a few extras.

I think the presentation went well. I say this because, well, no one walked out…ha! And because during the 2nd part it seemed that creative juices were flowing by way of comments and analytical questions. By the 3rd part there was collaboration in defining what they needed and wanted to know, in order to take that next step in developing their digital product offerings budget in 2011.

I split it up into 3 parts — initial high level followed by a deep dive into analytics (for their flagship site) and closed with a quick “What the Web Thinks About Your Site” overview.

I’ve recently found that this book “Slide:ology” by Nancy Duarte is helpful in polishing a presentation. I particularly like the part about “Ingredients of a Great Slide.” Worth picking up if you want to add polish to a presentation.

Here’s the result!

An enticingly tall garden of flowers and 4 leaf clovers made of geometric shapes. There’s a pot of gold coins at the end of the pipe-cleaner rainbow. And peanut butter lined inside the pot so the Leprechaun will be stuck inside the pot!

It was a great evening with my little niece!

The entire book is hand stitched and the monsters are phenomenally illustrated and stitched, as well. I’m obsessed. It’s been exactly 5 days since discovery!

Here’s a little background… I was trying on clothes in Anthropology at the Grove. My guy was permitted into the dressing room lounge to wait for me. I came out to show him the first outfit choice and found him mesmerized by the book. There he sat on an over-sized leather sofa with this enormous book of stitched monsters. This book is so clever! I’m torn between my favorite monster being the “Hot Water Running Cold Dragon” or the “Garden Poo Monster.”

Here’s the stumbling block… it’s $1200. Check-out Anthropology’s page for the “Monster’s of the Household Variety.”

Note to Ruth: If you need a web developer or help with online marketing, viral campaigns, or anything along these lines, please get in touch! I emailed you already off of your personal site but haven’t received a response. I’m hoping you use Google Alerts and that this gets picked up and sent to your in-box. I’m a HUGE fan of your creation!

As you can see in the picture Social Media 101 (Amazon affiliate link) has become a very well used reference book, for me. Only it’s plastered with sticky notes (by color to show my O.C.D. side) as reminders to show my brother Will and sister MJ the section pertaining to real estate as they are both reactors. There’s a part that I want my uncle to read as he just started blogging. And my youngest sister Katie should read the bit about branding yourself, as I keep chatting with her about “building the Katie brand.”

My point is, I don’t want these helpful hints to get buried under my desk. I wish I could copy and paste — though not sure how ethical this is — parts of this book and shoot them to the above family members so that they would buy the book. And yes, I could just buy them all books, but this would add up as I am one of 7 kids in my family.

Hmmm, I’m leaning towards buying myself the iPad for my birthday. Looks like I should make a list of needs that this new purchase must fulfill!

Just launched a small one-off site for my client of 6 years, Custom Building Products, www.CustomTVIS.com.

Here is a drafted version of the scope docs: CBP_TVIS_SitemapWireframes_Draftv2.2 And yes, the site is a bit different from my last version of this doc but I will refer to the lesson learned while selling shoes at Nordstrom, (yes, I was a shoe dog back in the day) the customer is always right!

The CustomTVIS site is my design. I developed it in PHP, MySQL and Flash.

On to the next project of redesign and redevelopment of their Jamo brand site, www.JamoInc.com. Plus a push of new products to their flagship site which I have maintained for 6 years, CustomBuildingProducts.com.

Thank you Custom for the work! I am proud of the years I’ve spent collaborating with your marketing team!

My dad wanted to build a website that would “give a home” for community members with the same gripe(s) about Jerry Brown that he has. I have to say, I love my dad for going at his content in a way that is factual. Hmmmm… clearly I get my analytical approach to business from him.

Well, the site is up and he’s posting content on his own — I’m so proud! Check out JerryBrownFactCheck.com.

Now onto what I learned this past Saturday…

I always learn something from every web project, big or small. This time I learned… don’t walk away to perk coffee while your “client” is typing into his/her registration page, because a misspelled email will delay confirmation and progress for 42 painful minutes on the phone with customer service. And, if you need to call customer service for this reason, call from the registered PHONE number to avoid having to start all over again on that registered/authorized number!

Ps. Love you dad!

Pss. For those who dislike calling customer service departments as much as I do, check out TheOatmeal.com’s post “Why I’d Rather Be Punched In the Testicles than Call Customer Service.”

If you are interested, check-out the book club on Meetup at http://www.meetup.com/GuiltyPleasuresBookClub/.

Usually I run a book on audio while I’m working from home alone — keeps me company, sort-of. While running this book in the background I tuned in when I heard the reader say, “Reward narrows our focus.” I stopped working and sat at the kitchen bar to drink some coffee and listen closer to what came next.

I ended up listening through the next few chapters before I realized I had walked away from my computer for nearly an hour.

It’s been a few days now and I’m still contemplating the statement “If-Then rewards squash creative thinking… shift to “Now-Then” rewards” and consider non-tangible rewards like verbal praise which can have an enormous effect.

I’ve been trying this in various areas of my life and looking for how others motivate… verbal praise is so under-rated these days.