So this post is more about food than anything else, but let me highlight the beautiful little dumpling morsels seen above, caught through a window of a joint in Koreatown. As far as work goes, I spent most of last week at meetings in the city, punctuated by a couple of fun dinners with coworkers and friends. First up on Tuesday and Wednesday were a couple of Internet Advertising Bureau events. I spoke on a panel discussing ‘New Mediums, New Challenges – How Ad Operations is Being Redefined.’ Former coworker Mike Stoeckel (now of Fox Interactive) was the moderator, and Tim Messier from Weather.com, Jared Iwata from Microsoft and I had an energetic discussion on podcasting, vodcasting, mobile, video syndication, AJAX and the general implications of Web 2.0 technologies on existing counting, ops and reporting methodologies. Wednesday featured more IAB meetings, including a joint publisher-agency ad ops summit at the NYC ‘Googleplex’ which only opened recently – with quite the cafeteria, let me tell you! Thursday and Friday was a return to all things Turner as we kicked off several major ad technology projects that will keep my team busy through January. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the awesome dinners I had while in NY. First at a great Argentinian steakhouse on 9th Ave with my fellow AdOps council members, then a great selection of gourmet pizzas featuring lobster and bacon on one and a white clam topping on another delivered to my old coworker and friend Hart’s place in Chelsea. And finally, a fun outing with coworkers Lauren Gardner and Beth Kuenzi to Koreatown for some hardwood charcoal goodness. That evening was topped off by cheescake (multiples for some of us) at a 100+ year-old bakery in the East Village. Yummy. Photos are here for your salivating enjoyment.
I was in New York last week for a long series of meetings over three days, and I’m back for a quick set of meetings today. First for the IAB’s Ad Operations committee, then for the MRC Internet Council (pictures from IAB dinner are here). That was followed by vendor meetings for the next two days. And boy was I tired by the time I got home. I did manage to hang with some old friends from SI.com and have a nice dinner one evening. I’m back again this week for a quick trip – spending some more quality time with CNN Digital ad sales. I can’t wait to get home and forget about travel for a few weeks – I hope work allows me to stay put for a while. Photo above taken while I was waiting to meet folks at the Time-Life Building.
Quick trip to NYC for one night this week – stayed close to Columbus Circle at Dream NYC – where the rooms have a lovely glow about them. It took me at least 10 minutes to figure out which switch turned off the ‘soothing’ lights. Felt like I was back in the 70s, less the shag carpet. Nice room nonetheless.
On Saturday, we explored Manhattan briefly and then headed out to Brooklyn to meet Siena Camille. What a cutie! We had great fun riding the subway out (less so on the local returning), and Baila and Arthur hosted a fabulous spread – and we won’t hold Arthur responsible for showing Sam how to use his beloved Dustbuster ;-). More photos of the afternoon in Brooklyn are here. That evening, we had a sitter for Sam and had a fab dinner at Abboccato – a very lovely meal. Amy and I split the Spaghettini – with razor clams sliced like garlic, toasted bread crumbs for a lovely toothy effect, and pressed mullet roe for a wonderfully briny flavor. I’d never had this experience, but every sip of the Montefalco Rosso Tiburzi that Marty had selected (on the basis of being lost in Montefalco on a trip to Italy once) really opend up the flavor of the sea. Yummy! On Sunday, we checked out of the hotel and headed to Blooomingdales for some good shopping opps for the ladies – and had a chance to walk amidst the annual Pride parade in NYC. Photos of all that fun are here. It was a great weekend spent with Sam’s grandparents, Amy’s niece Kailey, and the extended Golus-Celedonia-Sparacin clan. Hope to do it again sometime soon!
