Well, the hotels are filling up, the restaurateurs are looking a bit frazzled, and the traffic is getting a bit worse so it must be that time of year - the Kentucky Derby. While I realize Derby Parties will be happening all over the world, I thought I’d provide a little bit of help to make those parties a bit more successful and authentic. Thanks to Jason for this link, and be sure to check out his Eastern Kentucky Mint Julep video.

I post this today because Julep Bourbon takes 2-3 days to marinade in the freezer. So do this TODAY!!!

Here’s the Maker’s Mark Mint Julep. After having some pretty badly made Juleps, this may just be the one to take home the roses this year. We have been going to derby parties as long as I can remember and hopefully some of you will check this out. And good luck on your horse.

Here are some others posting about this famous cocktail.

Mint Julep Roundup: Kentucky Derby Edition from Jeffrey Morgenthaler
Looking for a Mint Julep in Orange County?
The Perfect Mint Julep on Drink of the Week uses Maker’s Mark recipe too.
Got money to burn?  Check out the world’s most expensive Mint Julep Cup

I had the pleasure of attending the dinner for Dr. Abdul Kalam, 11th President of India last night, organized by the Bluegrass Indo-American Civic Society. It was a night filled with messages for the leaders of the world, and for the hearts of individuals. The room was filled with Kentucky’s most influential people, mixed with some of the region’s diverse Indian community with their families…a spectral array of native dress and beaming smiles. Standing in the Marriott vestibule, it was easy to imagine I was at a celebration in Hyderabad or Jaipur, and it was intoxicating.

Kalam, who served India as president from 2002-2007, moved India forward and set up an ambitious plan to create a fully developed nation by 2020 (see Technology Vision 2020 plan.)

Dr. Lee Todd of UK did a nice job of talking about diversity on campus and in Lexington, which I think is critical to the future of our community. During the presentation, a gift of $1M was given to the Gatton School of Business by Melappalayam S. and Sowmya Vijayaraghavan of Lexington to support professorships and research in India business studies. There was a commitment made to increase the ties between UK and universities within India. (more…)

I hope you’ll indulge me a little local Lexington Kentucky bragging… Our city was ranked top 5 in Forbes’ “Best Places for Business and Careers” for 2008. This doesn’t really surprise me. It’s also cool to revisit the heatmap generated by the Creative Class Group where the Cinci/Lou/Lex triangle glowed brightly (see below). The graphic shows how areas are feeding off of neighbors with creative class attributes (which explains Seattle’s lack of a glow.)

The top 5 on the Forbes list were

• Raleigh, N.C.
• Boise, ID
• Fort Collins, CO
• Des Moins, IA
• Lexington, KY

(more…)

I’ll be hopping on I64 and heading to the Social Media Louisville meeting at Ramsi’s Cafe tomorrow night. Hope to see you there!

WHO: Social Media Club Louisville

WHAT: February Gathering

WHEN: 7 p.m. until 9 p.m., Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2008

WHERE: Ramsi’s Cafe on the World, 1293 Bardstown Road, Louisville

WHY: To share, learn and grow as social media experts both individually and together

About the meet-up:

Three members of the group have graciously volunteered to lead our discussion, which will focus on selling social media to clients, bosses and CEOs and the public, media and more. Brian Wallace of NowSourcing.com, a full-service social media and reputation management consulting firm, will share his thoughts and expertise on pitching social media to clients. Clay Marshall, a social media specialist with Digital Business Solutions (DBS), will tackle the topic of convincing bosses and CEOs to buy in and Rick Redding of The Ville Voice (and LEO columnist) will offer his insights on selling social media through to the media, advertisers, media buyers, friends, co-workers and more.

PS: It looks like the SMG was covered in Louisville Business First - on the front page. Nice Job Guys.

Webpronews did a good Interview 

I live two blocks from the Henry Clay estate and walk there when I take breaks. On the path, there is a plaque which indicates that Henry Clay loved the house and paths because they allowed “considered contemplation” of heavy issues facing him. Henry Clay would return to Lexington to think, and then travel back to Washington to serve as Speaker of the House and a wide spectrum of other roles. It’s cool to walk the same paths he did.

Working in a city like New York or San Francisco (yes, I have) imposes restrictions, but opens many opportunities. The creative class (yes, Henry Clay fits the bill) often look to find the best of both worlds by living “near” the city and telecommuting part-time. This is the ideal arrangement if you ask me. But it appears that, despite legislation introductions to prevent it, New York continues to this through a nasty double-taxing system through its state tax code and it has people up-in-arms.

From the New York Times article:

“New York’s “convenience of the employer” rule taxes nonresidents as if they came to the office every day, even if they worked at home part of the week, unless they can prove their employer required them to telecommute. Yet they must also pay income tax in their home states for work they did there.

New York is the only state that aggressively enforces its tax code this way; most states use a “physical presence” test that lets workers pay taxes in proportion to the amount of time spent working in each state.”

Senators Christopher J. Dodd and Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut were sponsors of the Telecommuter Tax Fairness Act, which would ban any state from double-taxing nonresident telecommuters. Now, apparently, the bill is stuck in committee and a vote does not appear to be forthcoming.

Cali Williams Yost recently posted on FastCompany’s expert blogs area “Work/Life: NYC Versus Kentucky—One Resists Flexibility, the Other Embraces It. Who Wins?” which compared the approaches between New York and Kentucky - places most would find more different than night and day. It would seem that New York would use telework as an opportunity to reduce congestion and boost their economy. According to the Partnership for New York City, excess congestion shaves up to $4 billion a year off the region’s economy, preventing 52,000 jobs from being created. But with office real estate sitting empty, there is significant pressure to bring people to the city and fill those leases.

Contrast New York’s active resistance with that of the State of Kentucky. Not only is Kentucky embracing flexibility and innovation but sees it as a key lever for future growth and development. Business and community leaders from across the state, and within cities such as Lexington, are working with the Institute for Workplace Innovation at the University of Kentucky and its director, Dr. Jennifer Swanberg, as well as the University’s President, Lee T. Todd, Jr. to achieve their collective vision.

According to President Todd, “I envision Kentucky as a state of choice, a place where employers want to locate and employees want to work…Becoming a leader in workplace innovation is imperative for the growth and development of our economy.” (To read more about Kentucky’s initiative and what Kentucky employers are already doing download the Institute for Workplace Innovation’s “Making Workplaces Work—Employer Best Practices in Kentucky, 2007” publication.)

I am not a scholar of Henry Clay or his work, but I have a strong feeling he’d have a word or two to say about double taxing those wanting to work in quiet places. It’s silly to fight the changes that are happening in the workplace, or to discourage work/life balance among top talent. I hope that Senator Dodd and Lieberman’s bill makes progress. And I hope that more people spend time looking at Kentucky’s environment for clear thinking and good work.

NYC photo by Jorge Gobbi

Some Lexington news here, Exstream Software is being acquired by Hewlett-Packard for an undisclosed amount.

PALO ALTO, Calif. (AP) - Hewlett-Packard Co. said Tuesday it has agreed to buy American Capital Strategies Ltd.’s Exstream Software LLC for an undisclosed amount.

Based in Lexington, Ky., Exstream Software makes software that allows businesses to personalize documents aimed at their customers. Founded by Davis Marksbury and Dan Kloiber, the company’s brands include Dialogue and AFP Studio.

Upon completion of the acquisition, Exstream Software will be integrated into the Web Services and Software business unit within the Imaging and Printing Group (IPG) of HP. “Businesses – whether a bank, healthcare provider or utility company – need to communicate relevant, personalized information to their customers through a broad range of channels,” said David Murphy, senior vice president, Web Services and Software Business, IPG, HP. “We expect that the acquisition of Exstream will allow HP to address a broader set of customers and be a strong leader in the fast-growing document automation market.”

We are very happy to join with HP to accelerate our ability to help businesses around the world to efficiently develop and deploy personalized communications,” said Richard Troksa, chief executive officer and president, Exstream Software. “The combination of Exstream’s solutions and HP’s print software expertise will provide customers with a more comprehensive approach to delivering reliable and targeted business communications.”

The company’s programs help banks print account statements, government agencies print applications and utilities print bills.

Hewlett-Packard expects the deal to close in the second quarter of its fiscal year.

The company plans to integrate Exstream into HP’s (NYSE:HPQ) Web services and software business unit, which is part of the imaging and printing group.

Exstream has more than 300 employees, and its customers include banks, insurers, government departments, retailers, telecommunications companies and utilities.

Jason has good coverage over at WebProWorld as well.

Mark Nickolas, Kentucky political blogger and founder of award-winning blog bluegrassreport.org is joining former CNET founder and CEO Shelby Bonnie in the formation of politicalbase.com. The site, which is open to all political affiliations, looks to have a lot of very Web 2.0 features.

The site is focusing on the presidential races and has tools such as campaign finance and polling databases. Web 2.0 features include traditional blog comments and Wikipedia-style content about candidates, players and issues.

Kentucky Politics gets interesting, as usual.

Bluegrassreport.org made lots of waves, including big news in Kentucky when Gov. Ernie Fletcher of Kentucky blocked the site from State employees’ computers, later claiming the ban was strictly to keep them productive. But subsequent information provided by Michael Inman, the former technology commissioner of KY stated that Mark’s site was singled out.
Good luck Mark.

Up from 30th, nice to see.

An interesting study comes from CCSU

Drawing from a variety of available data resources, the America’s Most Literate Cities study ranks the 69 largest cities (population 250,000 and above) in the United States. This study focuses on six key indicators of literacy: newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment, and Internet resources.

Here are the first 30…

City	Overall Rank 2007	06 Rank	05 Rank
Minneapolis, MN	1	2	2
Seattle, WA	2	1	1
St. Paul, MN	3	5	9.5
Denver, CO	4	8	6
Washington, DC	5	3.5	3
St. Louis, MO	6	12	15
San Francisco, CA	7	9	5
Atlanta, GA	8	3.5	4
Pittsburgh, PA	9	6	8
Boston, MA	10	11	7
Cincinnati, OH	11	7	9.5
Portland, OR	12	10	11
Cleveland, OH	13	14	18
Raleigh, NC	14	13	13
Kansas City, MO	15	17	14
Tulsa, OK	16	19.5	24.5
Lexington-Fayette, KY	17	30	27.5
Honolulu CDP, HI	18	22	35
Nashville-Davidson, TN	19	18	17
Tampa, FL	20	21	24.5
Columbus, OH	21	15	12
Miami, FL	22	23	27.5
Austin, TX	23	16	16
Virginia Beach, VA	24	27	41
Sacramento, CA	25	28	22
Charlotte, NC	26	19.5	20
Baltimore, MD	27	24	21
New York City, NY	28	42	32.5
Indianapolis, IN	29	29	23
Colorado Springs, CO	30	33.5	19

100%. That’s how many of my comments have been censored by local Lexington TV Stations, dropping any credibility for a real attempt to build a community online.

I wonder….If you have something “thoughtful” to say, perhaps not jibing with the bible-beltish, hyper-conservative viewpoints, would it ever be published? From what I can tell, the only thing that makes it in are “God bless our troops” or short, brain-dead “hollerin’”

All of my comments were SFW. I’m not a trouble maker, well, not really, nor am I a minion ready to “cute” my way on the screen.

“We have to keep our comments family-friendly” — oh really?

So that is why you post Santa with a M-16. Yee haa.

Holiday stress, money problems, and more causes child abuse to rise during this time of year. During this time it’s more important than ever to keep a watchful eye on the kids who are part of these situations.

This list, from a release posted at St. Louis University should be read by every parent.

1. Use common sense to determine how many “extras” really need to be done during the holidays. Don’t attend every holiday party, do lots of extra cooking, baking and decorating, mail cards and spend days shopping for perfect presents if the demands of caring for a child already are leaving you feeling stressed.
2. Stick within a budget and spend what you can afford on gifts. Pass on buying your child the extra-expensive gift he is requesting in favor of something else he wants that is within your means.
3. Try to get out, even if the weather is cold and gloomy. A change of scenery can prevent you from feeling so boxed in.
4. Know your personal limitations. Some people can’t handle the incessant crying of a colicky newborn but are fine dealing with a pre-schooler’s non-stop questions.
5. Talk to your spouse about the potential for child abuse. Make the topic a legitimate part of your communications. Don’t be afraid to ask for a break from caring for the children, and conversely, be willing to take over childcare responsibilities if your partner needs some time away.
6. Recognize when you’re about to lose your cool and do something about it. Make sure your child is in a safe place and leave the room. Counting to 10 is another way to cool off.

USA National Child Abuse Hotline
1-800-4-A-CHILD
(1-800-422-4453)
TDD: 1-800-2-A-CHILD

National Numbers and Weblinks by State is here

To report suspected child abuse or neglect in Kentucky call 800-752-6200.