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Last year CiscoLive overlapped with Ramadan which was not a lot of fun for the Muslim attendees. This year it conflicts with Shavuot, requiring observant Jews who planned to attend to arrive a week in advance. Add those challenges to the normal stress an IT person with a strong religious, moral, or ethical POV has: finding a place to pray, navigating how "outwardly" they want to present as a religious person (and if that's even a choice), managing work-mandated venue choices for food and "entertainment" that push personal boundaries, etc, and it's a wonder we're able to make convention attendance work at all. In this episode, I speak with Mike Wise, Al Rasheed, and Keith Townsend about how they make conventions not only possible, but a positive experience religiously as well as professionally. Listen or read the transcript below. Dez: 00:00 Welcome to our podcast where we talk about the interesting, frustrating and inspiring experiences we have as people with strongly held religious views working in corporate IT. We're not here to preach or teach you our religion. We're here to explore ways we make our career as it professionals mesh - or at least not conflict - with our religious life. This is Technically Religious. Leon: 00:24 Last year, Cisco live fell squarely in the middle of Ramadan, which created a challenge for followers of Islam. Here in 2019 it coincided with the Jewish holiday of Shavuot, meaning that many observant Jews had to skip or cut short their attendance. Between these special situations and the more common stresses of finding a place to pray - sometimes multiple times a day; navigating dozens of interactions where we find ourselves explaining our religious limitations regarding food, venues, and even personal contact; and asserting boundaries between the requirements of our work and the tenants of our faith. Between all those challenges, it's a wonder we choose to attend conferences and conventions at all. In this episode, we're going to hear from a few folks about how we survive and even thrive in this environment. While holding strong to our religious values or moral or ethical points of view. I'm Leon Adato and the other voices you're going to hear on this episode are: Al Rasheed, who's a sysadmin for a federal contractor. Al: 01:16 Hello! Leon: 01:17 Welcome to the podcast. Al: 01:19 Thank you. Leon: 01:20 Mike Wise, a freelance consultant in insurance technology and specializing in blockchain. Mike: 01:26 Hello. Leon: 01:27 And finally a returning guest, Keith Townsend from CTO Advisor. Keith: 01:31 Well evidently the unedited version of the podcast hasn't gotten me kicked off . Halooo New Speaker: 01:36 Right. I'm not going to give the number, but there is one where I forgot to post the edited version. So before we dive into this topic, I want to give everyone a chance for some shameless self promotion. Al why don't we start with you. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Al: 01:51 So I'm a SysAdmin here in the northern Virginia area for a federal contractor. I am a Palestinian American, born in Jerusalem and a, I am Muslim as well. You can find me on Twitter @Al_Rasheed. And my blog post is also listed on my Twitter profile. It's http://AlaRasheedBlog.wordpress.com. Leon: 02:15 Perfect. Mike, how about you next? Mike: 02:18 Yeah, so thanks a lot for having me on the show. I'm, you can find me at "MikeY07" on pretty much every social channel including Twitter. I'm doing a lot of tweeting. I'm also sharing a lot on Linkedin and my website is http://blockchainwisedom.com It's a play on my name. Leon: 02:40 Nice. Keith, for those people who might've missed the other episodes you're in, where can we find you? Keith: 02:45 @CTOAdvisor on the Twitters, which my daughter hates to say And you can find the blog, http://theCTOadvisor.com. New Speaker: 02:54 Great. And just around things out. I'm Leon Adato. You can find me on Twitter, on "the twitters", I'll say that just to make a Keith's daughter's skin crawl. You can find me there @LeonAdato. And my blog is https://www.adatosystems.com. And as a reminder, all of the links in all the things that we're talking about today are going to be in the show notes. So if you're scribbling madly, don't worry about it. There is a place where this is all written down. So where I want to start with this just for a little bit is to talk about how conventions are challenging in general. A lot of folks who listen to this podcast may not be lucky enough, have the privilege to go to conventions, and maybe you're thinking "It sounds like a vacation man! You go to Vegas or Orlando, it's nothing but fun. You get to go to..." You know. So why are conventions challenging, just generally speaking? And I'm going to start this one off and say that you have to deal with time zones, sometimes two or three. I actually have one of my coworkers, Sascha Giese is from Germany, so he'll travel four or five times zones, not to mention 12 hours at a shot to get to some of these places. So you're just generally exhausted and generally sort of strung out. And then you have to hit the ground running, attending classes and you know, your brain has to be at it's peak performance. So that's one of the first things that people don't expect. What else is there? Keith: 04:14 Well, I hate people. Everyone: 04:15 (laughter). Mike: 04:15 People suck. Keith: 04:20 You know what? For someone with 7,000 plus whatever Twitter followers and as much social media that I do, crowds are just too much for me. VM world is going to be 20-something thousand. AWS Reinvent it's 47,000 and I go and I just get exhausted. Keith: 04:35 Right. So yeah, if you're, if you're not an extrovert, if you're an introvert, then that by itself can be draining. Absolutely. What else? Al, you had something we talked about before we started. Al: 04:46 Staying in touch with your spouse and or your kids. I'm fortunate where my wife has tagged along on some recent conferences with me. Also we're, we're blessed because both of our kids are old enough to mind for themselves, care for themselves. But you always have to remain in contact, keep tabs on them and just make sure they're safe. Leon: 05:02 Yeah. No matter how old they are, that never ends. Mike: 05:06 It's a juggling act between personal and professional. Leon: 05:09 Yeah. You definitely have to juggle. So, not only the wife and kids, the spouse and kids, but also Mike, to your point, you have to juggle other aspects of your life too, right? Mike: 05:19 Yeah, that's right. We've got, you know, we all live in the blur, right? And so we've got personal stuff going on. We've got professional stuff going on, we've got community things that we're involved in. Board, you know, everything's constantly happening at the same time and it's all going right through our mobile device. So it's really challenging. Leon: 05:39 Yeah. There are times when you're walking through a convention and you don't even know you're there because the screen in front of you is taking precedence over it. All right. So for those people who haven't been to conventions, that's just a taste of why they're not a vacation. There can be, there can be aspects of it that are vacation-like, and I think that it's important for those of us who attend conventions often to find those moments. Al, to your point, seeing if a spouse or even kids can tag along. I know that recently Phoummala Schmidt, brought her daughter along to a whole series of Microsoft events. And it was a real eye opener for both of them. Her daughter got to see what Mom does and the kind of people that she interacts with; and Mom got to show this whole other like, "No, I'm not just going out for drinks or whatever. Like there's real work happening." So those are the ways in which conventions are challenging... Mike: 06:36 Yeah. Yeah. So, so the other, one of the other ways that the conventions are challenging, and they're definitely not like some sort of vacation... You know, unless, and I've started to do this more and more often, is I schedule a day ahead or a day on the back end, to make them into some quiet time somewhere, you know, if I'm going to some place that's awesome, and I know the convention is just going to be nonstop one after another, three days of hard running the whole time. I'll schedule my return flight for 24 or 48 hours later so that I can go and go to some sort of temple or some landmark or something like that and debrief and decompress after that. Keith, I would think that, for an introvert that would be super helpful just to check out for 24 hours, you know? Keith: 07:39 I don't do many of the parties at any of the conventions though. I'll meet the rare exception, like run DMC was at VMWorld last night, you know, it's run DMC, so you're going to do that. Uh, but you know, about one o'clock in the morning and I'm pretty, you know, tired of people. So for the most part at night, I don't normally do the big events just because, you know, I spend so much of the day, I'm visible in the, in, in most of these conferences and I get to kind of the tough part, like where I'm not known at conferences are actually even worse than conferences that I'm known at. Al: 08:20 And if I could go back to Mike's Point, I guess it does depend on where you're going, if it's a unique location. So for example, for me, I'm Cisco and Tech Field Day were kind enough to allow me to join them for Cisco Live Europe in Barcelona and I hadn't flown overseas in over 25 years, so I took full advantage of that opportunity. I arrived two days early, did some sightseeing and I was able to kind of just chill, relax, take in the sights and sounds and the rest of the week was relatively straightforward, very easy going, not very stressful at all, but there was a lot involved. Don't get me wrong, but it definitely helped the cause. Mike: 08:58 That's a really good thing to do, to go early and get acclimated. You know, the other thing too is when something happens, when you're at an event that is a significant event. You know I'll never forget the time I was at a conference and Columbine happened. Right. There. So that was a major event and brings up all kinds of interesting dynamics associated with that particular event - whatever it is. You know, I know people that you know, were at an event when 9/11 happened. I know people that were an event when that Las Vegas shooting happened a couple of years ago. So how do you deal with that? Especially if you're known to be religious? Leon: 10:03 So we're going to to dovetail into that in a minute, but I think, to both of your points, that I was just saying - for people who don't get to go to conventions, why are connection challenging? But I think just as meaningfully for folks who DO go to conventions and may feel like they're heading toward that burnout phase, that's really good advice is to schedule some extra time so that A) you feel like you're getting some personal time. Some "me time" as you might call it, associated with the event if you can. And then Mike, to your point, when, when something big happens in the world that does change the entire nature of it - of the, of the event - all of a sudden it becomes about something much larger than just, you know, Keith, you said 40,000 people at reinvent, it's not just 40,000 people reading it. It's 40,000 people who are all having a shared national or international experience away from home, away from kids, away from their support network. And so everyone sort of becomes the support network for each other. And that can be somewhat transformative. And I think Mike, where we are going with that is, is the next part of this topic, which is: not just the ways conventions are challenging or, or different for everybody, but as people with a very particular religious or moral or ethical point of view, what do conventions represent? You were all talking about taking extra days before and after. So, as an Orthodox Jew, the trick for me is that for the Sabbath, for Shabbat, I'm completely offline. Anything with an on off switch can't be touched. So I can't fly, I can't travel. And even where I stay, hotel rooms become interesting if they have electric doors or you know, entrances that are only... You know, like it becomes this, this piece of calculus that is tricky. So I was at Cisco Live Barcelona last year and my wife and I went out, my wife happens to have been born in Spain, but we came out several days ahead of time so that we could be there in time for the Sabbath. And we stayed several days after. But it creates this even larger buffer, which I'm sorry to say, you know our, I'm happy to say if it's Barcelona, if you're in Spain, not such a problem, like who's going to complain about some more extra days in Spain? Keith: 12:28 Oh, I'll throw you a in Chicago in February, you will see. Leon: 12:33 Right. Okay. Right, exactly. So this past Cisco live with it being Shavuot, I had to come out on Thursday. And Friday night I just sort of hunkered down and I was in the city, in my hotel room, but those next three days, offline - from Friday night through Saturday night, which was Shabbat, and then Sunday and Monday, which was the holiday of Shavuot, were all offline. And it became very complicated. And being away from family was tricky. So scheduling can be an interesting thing. Al: 13:04 That's a lot of discipline. I'll give you a lot of credit. Mike: 13:06 Yeah, really Leon: 13:07 You know what, we knew what we were getting into, me and the family and, uh, I will tell you lessons were learned, and we will probably just opt to skip a convention if it happens like that again because it was not the experience I wanted. But I appreciate the support. Okay, so scheduling, like I said, scheduling can be tricky for us with religious points of view. Not just scheduling getting there, getting home. But also daily scheduling, finding time and a place to pray. So I'm curious if you've had any sort of experiences about that? Al: 13:44 Not necessarily. I mean, you can always find a location to pray if one is not provided. But for example, Cisco live in Europe (and I'm sure the same here in the US) they provided a prayer room for all religions to use, which I found very convenient, very kind to them. It actually caught me off, I guess caught me by surprise. Maybe I'd never seen it or stumbled across such a thing. So I thought it was a nice gesture on their behalf. Leon: 14:08 So I saw the same thing. I was ecstatic. I actually took a selfie in the room. I was, you know, had my tallit and tefillin on. I'm like, "THIS IS AWESOME!!" So, uh, it was really wonderful. Not only was it a room to pray, but they had removed all iconography. There was no, like, sometimes you'll find a place and they'll be crosses up or something like that. And it can be very challenging for some folks. Where like, "well, wait, but that's not my space." They just made it a very generic space. Cisco live us does not do that, just FYI. But it was deeply appreciated, especially because, you know, you've got to duck away for three times a day or five times a day. And it's like, "No, I got a place, like there's a room." I find a corner. I literally just like walk off the floor and find a corner to stare at a wall. Like, "What's he doing?" Like, "Don't worry about it. It's okay." Mike: 14:55 So you're in the middle of your prayer. You know, you're doing this heavy duty, some heavy lifting on prayer time with God and all of a sudden some guy comes in and starts taking selfies cause he's so excited that there's a prayer room. Al: 15:10 That's a good point. Leon: 15:13 Okay, so the room was empty. I was not, I was not going to take my enthusiasm. I was going to curb my enthusiasm if anybody else was in the room. But in fact it was, the room was, was all, it was all clear. Mike: 15:27 I'm so glad you were sensitive about that. Keith: 15:28 Al you missed the chance to say "a Jew and a Muslim walking into a prayer room." Leon: 15:33 I... Al: 15:34 I wanted to but I didn't know how that would come across. Leon: 15:36 No, no, no, no. I I keep on waiting. I keep on waiting for that opportunity for like, you know, for, for the, the folks who follow Islam and, and you know, the Jews are like, "Yeah, we got to do that. Okay, this is our room? All right, cool. Great!" Mike: 15:50 So Jew and a Muslim and a Christian go into the prayer room at Cisco Live... Al: 15:57 I like that Mike. That's, that's a good one. Keith: 16:00 That's literally the joke. Leon: 16:03 That's the tagline for the entire podcast. Okay. Okay. So finding a time and a place to pray. So with the prayer room, that was wonderful. But have found that breaking away, you know, if I'm in the middle of a session, a class or I'm in the middle of a conversation, realizing that... So for Orthodox Judaism, there are specific times that you pray - windows in which you can pray. And the windows are hours long. But sometimes you realize, "oh my gosh, the day is getting away from me." So finding both the time and the ability to break away is a challenge. I don't know if it's a challenge for any you folks. Al: 16:42 It could be. I mean, you can always make it up as long as, at least the way I feel, you have the intent, uh, you're doing it for the right reasons. You're not doing it to show off or gather attention. You know, it's, it's, there's a purpose behind it and in its most times in that it's respected. It's not a big deal. Leon: 16:59 So another challenge that I think folks with religious points of view have a with conventions is just eating, just finding food. Now a lot of conventions will have options. In fact, I remember laughing because of the two dozen different dietary options. One was "gluten free, low sodium halal." Like that was incredibly specific. Al: 17:21 It's pretty detailed Leon: 17:22 But not always. Um, so I dunno what's, what kind of food challenges have you run into being a conventions? Keith: 17:32 So every now and again I'll do a "Daniel fast" where, you know, I'm not eating any meat or choice foods. You find that it's hard to find non-choice foods during a convention. And the other thing is that you know, you, and this is a, a challenge that you know, vegans and vegetarians have. And then when you go for meals at night, like the convention will at least have Vegan options. When you go to dinner with your friends at night? You know, my Tech Field Day brethren love their steak. And it can be really difficult to find some place. So, you know, that's happened to me more times than I would like where I, where I had bad timing, where I did this fast, that didn't allow me to eat choice foods. Great thing about it is that it, you know, the purpose of it is for me to pray and, and be reminded of my sacrifice, the bad part about it. There's a lot of times for it to feel like it's a sacrifice. Al: 18:40 I think for me the biggest challenge, if any, the food options are most times are readily available and most conferences do accommodate, you know, the needs of the specific religion. You know, my case hello, but sometimes it's a, it's disappointing to put it nicely when food is not labeled properly. That's probably the easiest thing to accommodate. Mike: 19:05 What's an example of that, Al? Al: 19:07 If there's a tray of food, like for example, I don't want to, I don't want to call it a specific company or conference, but let's just say it's a buffet style set up and they have trays of food, one behind the other, and there's no label, it'll just tell you, let's say for example, "chicken", but there are other ingredients that you can see for yourself, but you're not necessarily sure what they are. KeithSpeaker 6: 19:31 Yeah. So I'm Al's food taster. So I go in and Al is like "Is there any pork in here?" You know what, Al, I will let you know if there's pork in this chicken dish. Al: 19:42 Right. But I appreciate you, Keith. But also for, uh, for allergy related reasons as well. Keith: 19:49 Yeah. Right. Like I'm allergic to peanuts and there's not always obvious that peanuts are in, in, in a dish. Leon: 19:56 So one of my coworkers, Destiny Bertucci, who's another voice you'll hear on, Technically Religious has a gluten free diet, and finding things that are really gluten free... And I think we've also also run into the well-intentioned, clueless staffer, you know, who's like, "Is any of this, is any of this kosher?" "Oh yeah. I'm pretty sure that over there is kosher." It's like "that's bacon." Yeah. Keith: 20:32 That reminds me that during the superbowl my vegetarian option for chili is a chicken chili. For vegetarians. I have the chicken chili. Mike: 20:43 Oh, okay. Yes, of course. Leon: 20:45 Yeah. You know, so there's no like, you know, gluten free. It's like, "I see there are croutons on that salad." What are you, what are you doing? So you have to be sort of vigilant. And I like, I like the idea of having a taster, having like a designated person to help out with that. And you know, Al to your point about like, well, what was the, you know, was it, um, sauteed in a wine sauce? Al: 21:09 That could be the case as well. Leon: 21:11 Yeah. Yeah. So for a lot of us, especially those of us who have much more strict dietary needs, the conventions become a big building full of, "nope." Like, "can you have this?" "Nope." Al: 21:23 You end up eating like a rabbit. Mike: 21:25 Which is, which isn't bad by the way. Right? It's a good opportunity to, uh, like, uh, Keith was saying before, you know, sort of sacrifice, right? Uh, what do they call it? A asceticis, right? Yeah. Leon: 21:37 Right. Well, you become very sensitized both to the, the, the choices that you've made. And also you become very sensitized to the blessing of having food available. So, you know, in one respect, when, when you do, you know, when I do go to a convention and there was one point, I remember it was Cisco Live Europe in Berlin and they put out a, and normally those buffets that you were talking about or just again, "nope". Like, I don't even look, I'm not like, "nope. Nope. It's not, it's not, it's not, it's not". Um, and, and my coworker is like, "we'll just go look." You might have something like, "no, huh-uh, ain't going to do it." There was an entire set of coolers full of Ben and Jerry's ice cream pints, which is kosher, and I just like, I'll be having seven of these. Al: 22:28 Can I have it delivered to my room? Leon: 22:29 Yeah, it was great. Like, but the point wasn't like I gorge myself. The point was I was so grateful. I felt such a, an a huge moment of, "wow, what a blessing this is." That it was wonderful and I was giddy from it. So that's, that's sort of the, the other side of it. When it happens, Leon: 22:47 We know you can't listen to our podcast all day. So out of respect for your time, we've broken this particular conversation up. Come back next week and we'll continue our conversation. Doug: 22:57 Thanks for making time for us this week. To hear more of Technically Religious, visit our website, https://technicallyreligious.com where you can find our other episodes, leave us ideas for future discussions and connect to us on social media. Leon: 23:10 Hey, there's this great convention happening next week in Cleveland who's in? Everyone: 23:14 (grumbling, excutes, nope)  

Top story line: The most recent difficulty adjustment, a major vulnerability handled extremely well by Core devs, a decision on the VanEck-SolidX ETF pushed back, Bitcoin privacy creeps forward.Show notes and transcripts for this episode available: https://bitcoinandmarkets.com/e132SUBSCRIBEiTunes | Stitcher | Google Play | RSSGET OUR FREE FUNDAMENTALS REPORTA weekly report with all the fundamentals you hear about on the show. Stay informed, and it's free.SUPPORT THE SHOW!No Ads + Member Content on PATREONBTC or PayPal DONATEGet 2 free audio books when you sign up on AudibleOur Big Page of Educational LinksPRICESPrice: $67031 finney: $0.67 $1: 1.4929 finneys | 14929 satsDaily 200 SMA: $7466Mayer Multiple: 0.898FUTURESOkex Futures: (Dec) $6605 | spread -$100 CME Futures: Sep $6690 | Oct $6695 | open interest 2,706 / 13,530 btcBitmex Futures: Sep $6668 | Dec $6610 SENTIMENT Longs / Shorts: 27,700 / 36,400 (0.76)CommentaryATH shorts, 40k was hit. If I were short, my stops would be in profit from $7200, and in the high 6000s. Maybe I'd start closing them now. MINING Difficulty: 1.9% below my sweet spot. See reportMining profitability: $0.22 THash/s/day Mempool: 7d High: 16MB | Time: 2h45m to clearMedian on chain fee: $0.09/txHalvening: 87,629 blocks | 569 days | Apr.12.2020DEVELOPMENTUpgrade your nodes! Vulnerability patch in 16.3Current release: 0.16.3 / 0.17 RC4Next major release est: 0.17.0 - Oct, 2018New Optech NewsletterTRENDS Interest according to Google Trends is declining. This is the first time in a few months where the short term interest has put in a new low. General disinterest. Explore search interest for bitcoin, Ethereum, Blockchain, Cryptocurrency by time, location and popularity on Google Trends - https://g.co/trends/QxskMNewsVanEck-SolidX ETF deadline pushed back.Samourai Stowaway Blog HereFOLLOW @AnselLindner | @btcmrkts | Instagram | Facebook THANK YOU LISTENERS!Huge list of episode sources Music by Tonezpro **DISCLAIMER: This is not investment advice, do your own research.**

Podcast Summary: In January of this year, Amazon shook up the retail space by introducing their own brick-and-mortar retail space, but they added a twist. The entire store is checkout-free. Customers walk in, grab their products, and go. With the use of an app, a combination of sensors and cameras, the store tracks a consumer’s purchases and charges their Amazon card when they walk out. It’s the epitome of quick and convenient, and it’s got a lot of traditional retailers on edge. But with every new innovation, there are other companies who are quick to redesign the reinvented wheel. Now, Microsoft is designing a rebuttal to Amazon Go. While Microsoft has no interest in creating its own ecommerce platform or running a retail store, the tech giant is investing in creating cashier-less shopping technology and expanding its commercial cloud services to more retailers and businesses. Microsoft isn’t the only company that’s hopping on the Amazon bandwagon. Retailers across the globe are trying to implement Amazon-like qualities into their digital and physical marketplaces. But should they? In today’s episode, I’ll once again be joined by Dave Kuchenski and we’ll discuss how the Amazon Effect has feverishly gripped retailers, and whether or not that’s a good thing. Resources: Blog: https://blog.dieboldnixdorf.com/personalization-store-one-future-retail/#.W1s8WtJKiUk https://blog.dieboldnixdorf.com/e-commerce-represents-major-gap-for-u-s-grocers/#.W1s8etJKiUk DN website: www.dieboldnixdorf.com COMMERCE NOW website: www.commercenow.libsyn.com Transcription: Amy Lombardo:                00:01                     In January of this year, Amazon shook up the retail space by introducing their own brick and mortar retail space, but did you know they added a twist? The entire store is check-out free. Consumers walk in, grab their products and go.                                                                                 With the use of an app, a combination of sensors and cameras, the store tracks the consumer's purchasers and charges their Amazon card when they walk out. It's the epitome of quick-and-convenient, and it's got a lot of retailers on edge.                                                                                 But, with every new innovation, there are other companies who are quick to reinvent the wheel. Now, Microsoft is designing a rebuttal to Amazon Go. While Microsoft has no interest in creating its own eCommerce platform or running a retail store, the tech giant is investing in creating cashier-less shopping technology and expanding its commercial cloud services to more retailers and businesses.                                                                                 Microsoft isn't the only company that's hopping on the Amazon bandwagon. Retailers across the globe are trying to implement Amazon-like qualities into their digital and physical marketplaces, but should they?                                                                                 In today's episode, I'll once again be joined by Dave Kuchenski, Diebold Nixdorf's Director of Retail Strategy and we'll discuss how the Amazon effect has feverishly gripped retailers and whether or not that's a good thing. I'm Amy Lombardo and this is COMMERCE NOW. Amy Lombardo:                01:54                     So, hello to our listeners. I am joined once again by Dave Kuchenski, the Director of Retail Strategy here at Diebold Nixdorf. He has also shared with me that he is a self-proclaimed Sonic the Hedgehog video game expert. Hi, Dave. Welcome back. Dave Kuchenski:               01:53                     Hi Amy. I'm glad to be back. I don't know if I'd call myself a video expert. My four-year-old kind of beats me every single time we play, but thanks for sharing that with everybody. Amy Lombardo:                02:04                     Yeah, no problem. That's what you can depend on me for. All right. In our last conversation, we talked a lot about the in-store shopping experience and the idea of having this connected consumer. I want to follow up with that discussion today and give some more specific examples, but to refresh the listeners' memory, we left off talking about this idea of the blind spot.                                                                                 I think of the blind spot as that spot you can't see in your rear view mirror or even a movie that was popular a couple of years ago, but when it comes to the retail world, can you talk to me about what the blind spot is? Dave Kuchenski:               02:47                     Yeah. There's this blind spot that physical retailers have that online retailers do not. If you think about online retailers and how they market to their consumers, they have visibility to me, as a consumer, a lot of times, we have profiles that are set up. They know how many times I've come back to a site looking at a specific item.                                                                                 There's personalized ads offers loyalty and they know who I am basically while I'm shopping on their site. They know my shopping history, what I've bought before, things that I like. There's this advantage that online shoppers have that physical retailers don't.                                                                                 When I step into a physical retail store, the customer's activity is unknown. The shopping history is not visible until after I check out. I've bought some item and I'm out the door. There's a little bit of an opportunity there to capture me by the mobile app, based on the purchased history at point-of-sale, but it's a vast difference between what online shoppers are actually able to do.                                                                                 The idea is what if we could change that blind spot and help recognize customers when they're coming into the store, help provide a more immersive experience that's personalized and make that interaction inside the physical store more valuable to the consumer. Amy Lombardo:                04:07                     Yeah, that's a good point, Dave, because think about your weekly grocery store ad that you get or like your home repair store. The same things are on sale to every single consumer, no matter age, demographics, whatever that might be, and that's a good point, if there could be a little more personalized.                                                                                 On that thought, talk to me a little bit more about how the physical retail world itself is changing and how retailers can look at ways to overcome this idea of the blind spot. Dave Kuchenski:               04:38                     We see retailers innovating in several different ways around their customer's journeys. We've kind of outlined this framework of five areas that our customers, retailers are innovating. The first being, experiential. Improved in-store experiences. They generate more satisfaction in the shopping journey. It's purely about customer enjoying their time in the store. Expertise, customer store alliance, subject matter experts to provide guidance on products. We see some innovation there happening with retailers enabling their in-store associates with technology. Showrooming. We see different store formats happening.                                                                                 Groceries are a great example. If they're not just necessarily doing these giant grocery stores anymore with thousands of products in them. They're doing these smaller format-type showrooms with more frequently purchased items, so that's one example. Then, we have store intelligence. Consumers generate data within the store, things that they look at, things that they buy. Retailers are constantly trying to find ways to collect different data points, become more intelligent about the activity that's happening in their store, and then utilize that to create better experiences, offer better products for the consumers.                                                                                 Then, the last one is supply chain and fulfillment. We see all these new fulfillment models. It started with Amazon and Amazon created all these warehouses. They were able to create two-day delivery. Now, we're starting to see these physical retailers come up with creative fulfillment models to be able to deliver more products, more efficiently to customers. Amy Lombardo:                06:15                     Dave, that last example about supply chain and fulfillment, are you saying that some retailers, if they can't meet that shipping quota, they're using some of their hub-to-warehouses to actually ship product out of versus standard warehouses? Dave Kuchenski:               06:29                     Yeah, they're actually viewing their physical stores as this network of warehouses, mini-warehouses. Things like ship-from-store. They'll get drivers to come pick up items that have been bought online, in the store, and then deliver them to locations.                                                                                 They're also thinking of things like buy online and pick up in store. Buy in store and ship to home. There's a lot of different ways that they can think about how products actually get delivered to-and-from the different retail locations. Amy Lombardo:                06:59                     Well, I guess that could be a good example, if you're buying something that's very heavy or very large and it wouldn't make sense to maybe put it on a truck or what that may be. Talk to me about some of the advantages of having ship to a store or pick up in a store, because to me, it almost would seem that it would be less convenient then. Like, what's the advantage to the consumer? Dave Kuchenski:               07:24                     Yeah, there are various reasons why consumers may want to pick something up at the store. Maybe I'd buy something online and indicate that I'm going to pay with cash in the store, so consumers come in and pay with cash, so that's kind of like the last mild problem that Amazon deals with. Amazon today, if I want to buy something with cash, I have to go purchase an Amazon gift card or fund it at different locations with the cash.                                                                                 Retailers have that ability. They have the cash ecosystem already in place, so that's kind of one advantage they have there, but there's various reasons why customers may want to come into the store. Maybe I need something that day, so I buy it online and I need to pick it up immediately. There's a lot of reasons why, I think consumers may want to utilize different fulfillment models. Amy Lombardo:                08:10                     But Dave, you had talked about the Amazon model and you're not able to pay with cash. Does that speak to the whole unbanked and underbanked story line? Is there research that shows that Amazon is losing out and needs to figure out something else different for their delivery model? Dave Kuchenski:               08:29                     Well, I don't know that it's Amazon losing out. I think Amazon is trying to capture those customers, that's maybe it's had difficulties in the past with. For instance, Latin America. Latin America's a very cash-based society. Amazon has traditionally had difficulty capturing those customers in that market.                                                                                 Utilizing different fulfillment models, collect on delivery. I have, say a UPS guy show up at a house and that UPS guy is then collecting the cash for the retailer. Amy Lombardo:                09:06                     Oh, okay. That's a good example. Yeah. That makes sense. Dave Kuchenski:               09:11                     Yeah, it's well-documented that Amazon has had difficulty capturing those unbanked consumers. I really think that's one area that physical retailers kind of have an advantage, especially ones with large footprints for consumers that are cash-based to come in and pay for their goods, using cash. Amy Lombardo:                09:30                     Right, right. Let's talk a little bit about loyalty. With nowadays, just all the options available on how you want to shop and when and where, is loyalty increasing for a retailer or could it possibly be decreasing based on that experience? Dave Kuchenski:               09:48                     Yeah. Loyalty's a difficult thing for retailers to achieve today. Many times, we see consumers being more loyal to brands than to the retailers themselves. Probably has a lot to do with Amazon offering such a massive breadth of product offerings.                                                                                 If I find a brand I like and their shirts fit me well, I'm going to continue to buy that brand for simplicity's sake, because I know it's going to fit and I know I'm probably going to get a great price from Amazon. Additionally, Amazon's able to offer me a significant selection of a given item and potentially brands that I've never heard of before.                                                                                 But, they're well-rated by other buyers, so I know they're going to be quality items. The curation of products is something that is changing and retailers are going to have to excel at and find the best products at the best prices to keep up with the Amazons of the world.                                                                                 So, we've all had that experience where trying to find some off-the-wall item that I have nowhere to buy that's around me, so I go on Amazon and you find 20 different types of that given item. That's a difficult thing for physical retailers to keep up with.                                                                                 I think providing product data to consumers, it's unbiased is a great place to start. If you think about the ways that retailers have approached their eCommerce in the past, a lot of time you get these review ecosystems and you kind of question whether or not they're completely unbiased and whether they're providing me data that is actually relevant.                                                                                 You kind of get that sense with Amazon. That the reviews are pretty much unbiased. You'll get occasions where the retailer, whoever's selling on Amazon may try to skew those reviews, but Amazon sorts through those pretty quickly. As a consumer, you kind of feel like the data that you get off Amazon, the product reviews, are pretty unbiased and reliable. Amy Lombardo:                11:37                     Okay. If I'm reading between the lines, I'm thinking you're going on Amazon and trying to find your son that cool Sonic the Hedgehog action figure because he wants to play the game with you. Dave Kuchenski:               11:50                     You're right, and they do. For whatever reason, they've kind of restarted the whole Sonic the Hedgehog TV series. But, they haven't put out the toys, so the only toys left for me to buy him are the $40 pack of collectible of Sonic the Hedgehogs that are extremely fragile and he just breaks on a monthly basis and I'm left with buying another $40 pack. Amy Lombardo:                12:16                     Find a game that is a little more like the characters a little more universally known. Dave Kuchenski:               12:22                     That's right. Amy Lombardo:                12:24                     All right. In your role, you spend time looking to leaders in the retail space and what they're doing and how they're innovating and how these answers can lead us to our own business model, here at Diebold Nixdorf. Let's talk about some examples of these companies that are doing it right. Dave Kuchenski:               12:43                     The first example's I'll give is Kroger. They're really do a lot of innovative things. They're the largest, I believe the largest grocer, if not one of the top three in the United States.                                                                                 They've done a couple of things. We talked about store formats and showrooms. They've created their Fresh Eats market. It's small, convenience store. Smaller than their normal format. They offer a wide assortment of goods. Made-to-order food.                                                                                 They have comprehensive produce area, bakery in bulk section. These smaller formats. They offer a wider assortment of traditional, convenient store goods. That's one thing they've done.                                                                                 The other thing that Kroger's doing is we talked about product fulfillment. They've partnered with a company called ... I believe I have the name right. Ocado. Ocado's a fulfillment technology. They utilize technology to basically provide better store inventories to be able to enable Kroger to do their order online, deliver to my house, type of fulfillment models.                                                                                 Kroger's moving towards a model where you can order your stuff online and get it delivered to your house the same day. I think Kroger's doing an excellent job of innovating for traditional grocer. Amy Lombardo:                14:02                     Those smaller convenience stores that you were talking about, are those in lieu of or is it closing down the larger locations or are these new locations that are popping up to help with drive time or just traffic patterns? Dave Kuchenski:               14:18                     Yeah, it's a trend we've seen where supermarkets are downsizing their fleet of larger stores for these smaller footprints that are potentially a little bit easier to manage, more popular, and create that competitive advantage to be able to deliver the most common goods the same day, so doing same day delivery.                                                                                 I think it's something that is definitely going to be a trend with other grocers to help keep up. McDonald's is an interesting one. They've rolled out some new food kiosks. It's a really interesting change to a quick service restaurant model that has been around forever. It hasn't changed in my lifetime.                                                                                 You walk up to the countertop. You order your food. You stand there and wait until they bring it out and you go sit down at your table or you take it home, but they've adopted these kiosks.                                                                                 Now, you can walk in and order your food by that kiosk. You don't necessarily have to feel like your lack of decision-making is causing frustration on the person behind you because they have four to six kiosks in every location, so you don't feel rushed as a consumer.                                                                                 Chances are, you may end up buying more because you don't feel rushed and you can kind of browse the menu at your own pace. Once you make your payment at the kiosk, you pick up a table card and then go sit down and then, somebody brings you your food. There's Bluetooth built into those table cards so they know where you're saying.                                                                                 It's just a really interesting take on the traditional quick service model. I think it's something that really enhances that consumer journey for McDonald's customers. Amy Lombardo:                15:56                     Yeah, like upselling. The other day when I was using the kiosk and my daughter saw the slushy instead of the healthy juice box, I ended up having to get a slushy because it wasn't worth the complaining. Dave Kuchenski:               16:09                     Yeah, that's right. There's probably reasons that those kind of products are down at the bottom of the kiosk where kids can see. Amy Lombardo:                16:17                     I know, I know. That's smart marketing, smart marketing. How about an example about expertise? Is there one that lies in that portion? Dave Kuchenski:               16:25                     Yes. Several of the beauty retailers are doing an excellent job with this. Companies like Ulta, Sephora. They have these beauty technicians. They're enabling them with technology about me as a consumer, what I like, what I need. They're enabling their associates with things to be able to allow the consumer to virtually try on different products and see how it looks.                                                                                 I think Sephora and Ulta are great examples of enabling those subject matter experts in the stores to be able to better help serve their consumers. Amy Lombardo:                17:01                     Okay. Dave Kuchenski:               17:03                     I think Domino's is an interesting one. Domino's came out with great market earnings. Business models don't always have to be difficult. Things can be simple to make money. I don't know if you guys have ordered with Domino's lately, but they're basically an eCommerce company that delivers pizza or makes pizza.                                                                                 They know ... They capture me on my mobile device. They capture me online. The ordering process is really simple. When I place an order, you, as a consumer, get a time that your order goes in. You get a time that your order is finished cooking. You can see when your driver has left the store, when they're on route to your house, when exactly they're going to be there.                                                                                 I think that Domino's is an excellent example of a pretty simple business model. They make pizzas and they deliver them to their consumers, but they really transform themselves into an eCommerce company that utilizes things like data analytics and mobile to really drive a better experience for their consumer. Amy Lombardo:                18:06                     That seems interesting to go through all of that for a pizza, or salad, whatever it might be, for something that's a low dollar amount type item, but if earnings are well, then obviously, it's working, right? Dave Kuchenski:               18:22                     Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. I think they've done an excellent job of surpassing their competitors. Little pizza shops, they have difficulty keeping up with that because they can't invest in that technology to kind of really, I'll call it Uberize the pizza business. Amy Lombardo:                18:40                     Right. I want to keep going on this for a minute because you brought up something interesting, these mom-and-pop pizza shops. Within the small-to-medium business size market, are there maybe less costly or less time invasive-type things that those SMB market can look at reinvent themselves, based on what we've talked about here today? Dave Kuchenski:               19:06                     Well, I think what the small-to-medium businesses can do is, they can identify their pain points, because there's nothing that gets a consumer to stop interacting with your business like some significant pain point. Maybe it's a payment, maybe it's your menu and how you interact with your consumer by that menu. Are products difficult to find on your menu? Is your ordering difficult?                                                                                 I think that focusing on those little pain points and identifying them first off and then coming up with some creative way to solve that pain point is something that the small-to-medium businesses can do to really just create a positive interaction because that's going to keep customers coming back. That's going to create this word-of-mouth that is going to help your customer base grow.                                                                                 I think that the biggest piece of advice is just focus on those pain points and get rid of them. Utilize the things that are available to you. Your past customer shopping history is a good one that every retailer has small or large. I think that's good advice for SMBs. Amy Lombardo:                20:13                     Okay. That makes sense. How about store intelligence? Is there an example of store intelligence being used? Dave Kuchenski:               20:19                     Coop Italia is a great example. They created the store of the future. I think they launched it several years back. You can go actually and use it and people use it every single day. It's blending the digital and physical into one experience in stores. The products that are on their shelves, they use this technology to see what consumers are reaching for.                                                                                 Say, I pick up an apple or I pick up a banana. The digital signage within the store is changing based on what I touch and what I put in my cart. I may pick up a banana. I look at the digital signage. It tells me where that banana is from. It tells me the price, the nutritional information. They're really trying to blend the digital and physical space into one experience that is creating this more immersive-type of grocery experience. They can potentially utilize that data of what I've touched and felt. We talked about that blind spot and not being able to recognize consumers and what they're looking at, or what they're touching and feeling in stores.                                                                                 Coop Italia's doing a great example of collecting all those data points that consumers are generating and then utilizing that data to then potentially upsell or just create a better experience in general. Amy Lombardo:                21:36                     How else is store intelligence used? Is there other examples of that or is it just the idea of you're picking up a product? Like, are cameras being used to see what the consumer shopping or maybe the pattern of which they walk throughout the store? Dave Kuchenski:               21:53                     Yeah, there's several ways. Consumer tracking via cameras is one way to see where there's hot spots throughout the store. Consumers stand in this area more often than over here in this area. There could be various reasons why. It could be which signage is up, which products. It could be that people don't linger very long in the frozen section.                                                                                 There's various ways to capture that. There's actually some technology out there too that's utilizing lighting to be able to interact with the cameras on our phones. If I've got my phone out, they can actually track where consumers are moving to.                                                                                 It's evolving technology, but again, I think it all comes down to identifying a consumer, anonymously or not, watching them walk through the store, seeing what they're collecting, seeing what they're picking up, utilizing the different data points that are available to the retailer, and then that enables you to help remove that blind spot and potentially increase your conversion rate in store, raise your basket size, and then just increase your revenue in general. Amy Lombardo:                23:02                     Let's close out the conversation with just some best practices. Is there a sweet spot? Is there a secret sauce here that retailers need to be taking away from this conversation? Dave Kuchenski:               23:15                     I think the first thing is, retailers have an imperative to adopt to changing consumer expectations. Don't sit back and hope your loyal customers are going to continue to visit your stores. Delight them with new experiences and information they don't expect.                                                                                 You may wake up tomorrow and find that some other retailer has provided a unique enough experience to lure them away. It's really competitive out there. Physical retailers need to take a design thinking approach to solve consumers' needs.                                                                                 Consider your customer journeys. Evaluate their pain points they experience every day. What are the best products available to me? Am I getting the best price? Where do I find these items in store? How can we get customers in-and-out as quickly as possible? How can I utilize data about my customers to curate products and provide a better experience?                                                                                 I think there's a lot of different ways if you just think about the consumer and their needs, you can achieve a lot. Repurposing the physical space to kind of create a greater value to the consumer is just good business. Times are changing. Consumers' expectations are getting bigger, so it's important to evaluate what is valuable to your consumer and deliver on those expectations.                                                                                 It's going to be different for each retail vertical and each retailer in those spaces. So, begin with your customers' journeys and I think that's going to get you started down the right path. Amy Lombardo:                24:29                     Okay. Thanks, Dave, for being with me here today and to our listeners for tuning into this episode of COMMERCE NOW. To find out more on this topic, go to dieboldnixdorf.com and click on the link in the podcast show notes. Until next time, keep checking back on iTunes or however you listen to your podcasts for new topics from COMMERCE NOW.

Mary Bruno is the owner of Bruno Press, a printer, artist, and advocate for her local creative community. She grew up in a small town in central Minnesota and learned the love of printing from her father Don Bruno.  Mary has an irreverent line of greeting cards that is sold nationwide and she teaches the old school art of letterpress printing the way her father taught her. Mary loves to collaborate with other printers, poets, musicians, kids, designers, you name it. And, we’ll talk about some of those collaborations today.   On today’s episode Mary tells it like it is, shares her story and how she organically grew her business through hard work and learning as she went. We also talked about her personal growth—why she no longer let’s the criticism of one person overpower the praise of hundreds. She also shares about why she’s her ideal customer. ON TODAY’S EPISODE: The oldest piece of machinery that she has in her print shop Where she learned her love of printing Her background prior to starting Bruno Press and how losing her dad lead her to taking over his print shop How she decided on the product line she wanted to create The backstory behind her logo How she essentially fell into wholesale & working with sales reps Her personal journey to not letting the criticism of one person overpower the praise of hundreds Her first experience at the National Stationery Show What the design process looks like for Mary Mary’s work as an advocate for her local creative community How Kid Collab got started Mary’s advice for anyone just starting out in a product-based business KEY TAKE-AWAYS: “ I inherited my love of big iron machines from my dad. I dig how machines like this were built to last.” - Mary Bruno “This ain’t Hallmark. I want to print the cards that nobody else is printing.” - Mary Bruno “Sometimes I feel like if I don't offend someone my shit ain’t doing its job.” - Mary Bruno “I didn't know there was other people making cards like me so I felt super alone in that for a long time. I just kept my head down and kept printing and people kept buying.” - Mary Bruno “If I'm not goo goo staring at this card for the next three days then I shouldn't even bother printing it.” - Mary Bruno “A lot of the success that I've had with my business has been because of the support of my community and I don't want to take that for granted and I want to give back and I want to make this community better.” - Mary Bruno “The working with kids thing has been awesome. That's something that fills my cup.” - Mary Bruno “It’s interesting when you get into because it’s what was presented to you rather than something you sought out because you were so into it. The fact of the matter is that if my dad was a shoe cobbler or like a freaking offset printer my life would be a lot different. Maybe I'd be cobbling some shoes right now. I can't say for sure that I wouldn't.” - Mary Bruno “I say my target audience is me. It has been from day one and it is still. I think that is sort of what defines my work.” - Mary Bruno “I print what I think is cool or funny or needed or lacking in stores or whatever the case may be.” - Mary Bruno “A lot of people helped me along the way and I want to be like that as well for people coming up because hopefully people will continue this forever and snail mail won't ever go away and tangible cards will be a forever thing.” - Mary Bruno   CONNECT WITH MARY: Website: http://www.mcbrunopress.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BrunoPress/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brunopress/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/Bruno_Press?lang=en LINKS:   Kid Collab BOOTH BLUEPRINT: If you’re gearing up for trade show season and need help creating a beautiful booth that doesn’t break the bank, I want to invite you to my free masterclass.   I’m sharing my three secrets to maximize your trade show investment and keep wholesale orders coming in long after you trade show end.  To join me for this FREE workshop, head to www.theboothblueprint.com to register! SUBSCRIBE To subscribe on iOS, go to the iTunes page and subscribe to Proof to Product. On Android, you can listen using your favorite podcast app. WRITE A REVIEW Writing a review on iTunes will help other product based business owners find Proof to Product as they are working to up level, scale, and build profitable and sustainable companies. FOLLOW PROOF TO PRODUCT Follow Proof to Product on Instagram for the latest updates. JOIN OUR EMAIL LIST If you'd like to receive more information about our upcoming episodes of Proof to Product including show notes and information about our guests, head over to www.prooftoproduct.com and sign up for our email list.   SHARE Be sure to share Proof to Product with all of the product based business owners that you know! ABOUT PROOF TO PRODUCT: Proof to Product is brought to you by Tradeshow Bootcamp and hosted by Katie Hunt. Since 2011, TSBC has worked with hundreds of product based businesses to help them up level, scale, and build profitable sustainable companies. You can find our show notes and additional resources at ProofToProduct.com. If you like what you heard today, please head over to Apple Podcast to leave a five star review and subscribe. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back next week with a new episode!

Sugarby Cat RamboThey line up before Laurana, forty baked-clay heads atop forty bodies built of metal cylinders.  Every year she casts and fires new heads to replace those lost to weather, the wild, or simple erosion.  She rarely replaces the metal bodies.  They are scuffed and battered, over a century old.Every morning, the island sun beating down on her pale scalp, she stands on the maison's porch with the golems before her.  Motionless.  Expressionless.She chants.  The music and the words fly into the clay heads and keep them thinking.  The golems are faster just after they have been charged.  They move more lightly, with more precision.  With more joy.  Without the daily chant they could go perhaps three days at most, depending on the heaviness of their labors.Full transcript appears under the cut.----more----[Intro music plays]Hello! Welcome to GlitterShip episode 13 for September 1st, 2015. This is your host Keffy, and I'm super excited to be sharing this story with you.We're back from our unfortunate hiatus, which was caused because it turns out that moving more than 3,000 miles away across the entire continent is a bit of an upheaval. But, I'm settling in over here in New York, now, and I'm a little more than a week into the first year of my five-in-theory-year program.Our story today is "Sugar" by Cat Rambo. Cat Rambo lives, writes, and teaches by the shores of an eagle-haunted lake in the Pacific Northwest. A prolific storywriter and Nebula and World Fantasy Award nominee, her publications include stories in Asimov's, Clarkesworld Magazine, and Tor.com. Her most recent book is Beasts of Tabat, Book 1 of the Tabat Quartet. She is the current President of SFWA (the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America). For more about her, as well as links to her fiction, see http://www.kittywumpus.netSugarby Cat RamboThey line up before Laurana, forty baked-clay heads atop forty bodies built of metal cylinders.  Every year she casts and fires new heads to replace those lost to weather, the wild, or simple erosion.  She rarely replaces the metal bodies.  They are scuffed and battered, over a century old.Every morning, the island sun beating down on her pale scalp, she stands on the maison's porch with the golems before her.  Motionless.  Expressionless.She chants.  The music and the words fly into the clay heads and keep them thinking.  The golems are faster just after they have been charged.  They move more lightly, with more precision.  With more joy.  Without the daily chant they could go perhaps three days at most, depending on the heaviness of their labors.This month is cane-planting season.  She delegates the squads of laborers and sets some to carrying buckets from the spring to water the new cane shoots while others dig furrows.  The roof needs reshingling, but it can wait until planting season is past.  As the golems shuffle off, she pauses to water the flowering bushes along the front of the house.  Placing her fingertips together, she conjures a tiny rain cloud, wringing moisture from the air.  Warm drops collect on the leaves, rolling down to darken pink and gray bark to red and black.Inside the house is quiet.  The three servants are in the kitchen, cooking breakfast and gossiping.  She comes up to the doorway like a ghost, half fearing what she will hear.  Nothing but small, inconsequential things.  Jeanette says when she takes her freedom payment, she will ask for a barrel of rum, and go sell it in the street, three silver pieces a cup, over at Sant Tigres, the pirate city.  She has a year to go in the sorceress' service. Daniel has been here a year and has four more to go.  He is still getting used to the golems, still eyes them warily when he thinks no one can see him.  He is thin and wiry, and his face is pockmarked and scarred by the Flame Plague.  He was lucky to escape the Old Continent with his life.  Lucky to live here now, and he knows it.Tante Isabelle has been with her since the woman was thirteen.  Now she's eighty-five, frail as one of the butterflies that move through the bougainvillea.  A black beak's snap, and the butterfly will be gone.  She sits peeling cubes of ginger, which she will boil with sugar and lime juice to make sweet syrup that can flavor tea or conjured ice."If you sell rum, everyone will think you are selling what lies between your thighs as well!" she says, eying Jeanette.Jeanette shrugs and tosses her head. "Maybe I'd make even more that way!" she says, ignoring Daniel's blush.Tante Isabelle looks up to see Laurana standing there.  The old woman's smile is sweet as sunshine, sweet as sugar.  The sorceress stands in the doorway, and the three servants smile at her, as they always do, at their beautiful mistress.  No thought ever crosses their minds of betraying or displeasing her.  It never occurs to them to wonder why.Christina is a pirate.  She wears bright calicos stolen from Indian traders and works on a ship that travels in lazy shark-like loops around the Lesser and Greater Southern Isles, looking for strays from the treasure fleet and Duchy merchants.  The merchants, based in the southernmost New Continent port of Tabat, prey on the more impoverished colonies, taking their entire crops in return for food and tools.  The treasure fleet is part of a vast corrupt network, fed by springs of gold.  This is what Christina tells Laurana, how she justifies her profession of blood and watery death.When Christina comes to Sant Tigres, she goes to the inn and sends one of the pigeons the innkeeper keeps on the roof.  It flies to Laurana's window.  She leaves her maison and sails to the port in a small skiff, standing all the way from one island to the other, sea winds whipping around her.  She focuses her will and asks the air sylphs, who she normally does not converse with, to bear her to her lover's scarlet and orange clad arms.Tiny golden hoops, each set with a charm created by Laurana, are set in Christina's right ear.  One is a tiny glass fish, protection against drowning, and the other is a silver lightning bolt to ward off storms. Christina likes to order large meals when she comes ashore.  Her crew hunts the unsettled islands and catches the wild cattle and hogs so abundant there to eke out their income.  They sell the excess fat and hides to the smugglers that fill these islands.  So she is not meat-starved now, but wants sugary treats, confections of butter and sweet, washed down with raw swallows of rum, here in harbor, where she can be safely drunk."Pretty farmer," she says now.  She touches the sorceress's hair, which was black as Christina's once, but which has gone silver with age, despite her unlined skin and her clear, brilliant blue eyes."Pretty pirate," Laurana replies.  She spends the evening buying drinks for Christina and her crew.  The pirates count on her deep pockets, rich with gold from selling sugar.  Sometimes they try to sell her things plundered on their travels, ritual components, scrolls or trinkets laden with spells.  The only present Christina ever brought her was a waxed and knotted cord strung with knobby, pearly shells.  It hangs on her bedchamber wall where the full moon's light can polish it each month.Laurana brings Christina presents: fresh strawberries and fuzzy nectarines from her greenhouse.  In Sant Tigres, she trades sugar for bushels of chocolate beans and packets of spices.  Someday, when circumstances have changed, she would like Christina to spend a day or two at the plantation.  Jeannette would outdo herself with the meals, flakey pastries and flowers of spun sugar. It is time to send for a new cook, she thinks.  It will take a few months to post the message and then for the new arrival to appear, and even more time for Jeannette to train her in the ways of the kitchen and how to tell the golems to fetch and carry.Someone leans forward to ask her a question.  It is a new member of Christina's crew, curious about the rumors of her plantation."Human slaves are doomed to failure," she says. "Look what happened on Banbur – discontented servants burned the fields and overtook the town there, turning their masters and mistresses out into the underbrush or setting them to labor."And," she added. "Whites do badly in this climate.  I can take care of myself and my household, but it is easier to not worry about my automatons growing ill or dying."Although they did die, after a fashion.  They wore away, their features blurred with erosion.  They cracked and crumbled – first the noses, then the lips and brows, their eyes becoming pitted shadows, their molded hair a mottling of cracks.Time to redecorate soon, she thought.  She did it every few decades.  She would send a letter and eventually a company representative would show up, consult with her, and then vanish back to Tabat, soon replaced by rolls of new wallpaper and carpets, crates of china and porcelain wash basins.  She looks at Christina and pictures her against blue silk sheets, olive skin gleaming in candle glow.Later they fall into bed together and she stays there for two hours before she rises, despite her lover's muffled, sleepy protests, and takes her skiff back to her own island.  Overhead the sky is a black bowl set with glittering layers of stars, grainy as sandstone and striated with light.  Moonlight dapples the waves, so dark and impenetrable that they look like polished jet.At home, she goes upstairs.  A passage cuts across the house, running north to south to take advantage of the trade wind, and open squares at the top of each room partition let the wind through.  Britomart's is the northernmost room.The air smells of dawn and sugar.   Sugar, sweet and translucent as Britomart's skin, the color of snow drifts, laid on cool white linen.  The other woman's ivory hair, which matches Laurana's, is spread out across the pillow.Tonight her face is unmasked.  Laurana does not flinch away from the pitted eyes, the face more eroded than any golem's.  Outside in the courtyard, the black and white deathbirds hop up and down in the branches, making the crimson flowers shake in the early morning light."Pleasant trip?" Britomart says.Laurana's answer is noncommittal.  Sometimes her old lover is kind, but she is prone to lashing out in sudden anger.  Laurana does not blame her for that.  Her death is proving neither painless nor particularly short, but it is coming, nonetheless.  A month?  A year?  Longer?  Laurana isn't sure.  How long have they been locked in this conversation?  It has been less than six months so far, she knows, but it seems like forever.She goes to her room.  The bed is turned down and a hot brick has been slipped between the sheets to warm them.  A bouquet of ginger sits on the table near the lamp, sending out its bold perfume.She lies in bed and fails to sleep.  Britomart's face floats before her in the darkness.  She is unsure if she is dreaming or really seeing it.  She wonders if she remembers it as worse than it really is.  But she doesn't.Two weeks later, the pigeon at her window.Christina has a bandage around her upper arm, nothing much, she says, carelessness in a battle.  She pushes Laurana away, though apologetically.  Rather than sleep together, they stay awake and talk.  It is their first conversation of any length.  Two hours after their first meeting, in the Sant Tigres market, they had fallen into bed together, four months ago."So she's sick, your friend?" Christina says."You were raised here in the islands," Laurana answers.  "You don't know what it was like in the Old Country.  In the space of three years, sorcerers destroyed two continents.  Everyone decided to make their power play at once.  They called dragons up out of the earth and set them killing.  The Flame Plague moved from town to town.  Entire villages went up like candles.  Millions died, and the earth itself was charred and burned, magic stripped from it.  Some fought with elementals, and others with summoned winds and fogs, but others with poisoned magic."She pours herself more wine.  Christina's skin is paler than usual, but the lantern light in the room gleams on it as though it were flower petals."And you were here…" Christina prompts."I was here in the islands, preparing to go.  I heard that Britomart had blundered into someone else's trap and was dying of it.  I brought her down.  The magic is clean here, and there are serendipities and artifacts.  I hoped to heal her.""But that hasn't happened."The wine is mulled with cinnamon and clove and sugar that has not completely dissolved, a gritty sweet residue at the cup's bottom."No," she says. "That hasn't happened."Christina smuggles Laurana onto her ship while it's at harbor.  She and three other sailors are supposed to be watching it.  Laurana sits with them drinking shots of rum until the yellow moon swings itself up over the prow, its face broad and grinning as a baby's.  It reminds her of Britomart and her tears well up.  She savors the moment, for magic removes almost all capacity to weep.She nudges Christina and points to the distant reef.  Out on the rocks, mermaids cluster, fishy eyes shining in the moonlight, fleshy gills pulsing like tidepool creatures shuttered close by the light.  She kisses Christina as they watch.Eventually, the two climb into Christina's bunk for frantic, slippery, drunken lovemaking, careful of the still healing arm.She leaves in the small hours, past the stares of the mermaids.  It is still planting season and the golems work and night.When she first came to the island she tried yellow-flowered sea-island cotton.  Then indigo and ginger.  With the arrival from the Wizard's College of Tabat of schematics for three-roller mills and copper furnace pots, sugar cane has become the crop of choice.  Her workers perform the labor that must be undertaken day and night when the cane is ready to harvested and transmuted into sugar and molasses.  She makes rum too, and ships barrels of it along with the molasses casks and thick cones of molded muscovado sugar to Sant Tigres, which consumes or trades all she can supply.Most sorcerers are not strong enough to animate so many golems.  She has the largest plantation in this area.  Others, though, have followed her lead, although on a smaller scale.  It took decades for them to realize how steadily she was making money, despite the depredations of the Dutch merchants or the pirates they paid to disrupt the Aztec shipping trade.She had been to the Old Continent before all the trouble, two years learning science at a school, where she had met Britomart, who was an actual princess as well as a sorceress.  She had been centuries old when she met Britomart but she had dared to hope that here was her soul mate, the person who would stay by her side over all the centuries to come. But in the end, she wanted to return to her island, full of new techniques and machineries that she thought would improve the yield.  Rotating fields and planting those lying fallow with clover, to be plowed into the soil to enrich it for planting.  Plans for a windmill to be built to the southeast, facing into the wind channeled through the mountains, with sails made of wooden frames tied with canvas.  Lenses placed together that allowed one to observe the phases of heaven and the moons that surrounded other planets, and the accompanying elegant Copernican theories to explain their movements. She swore to Britomart that she would return by the next rainy season and she kept her promise.But by then, the trap had been sprung and Britomart had begun to rot away, victim of a magic left by a man who had died two weeks previously."You're ready to be rid of me," Britomart says."Of course not.""It's true, you are!"She goes about the room, conjuring breezes and positioning them to blow across the bed's expanse."You are," Britomart whispers. "I would be."Two breezes collide at the center of the bed.  Britomart wants it cold, ever colder.  It slows the decay, perhaps.  Laurana isn't sure of that either.Outside she sees that the golems are nearly done with the south-east field.  One more to go after that.  She glances over the building, tallying up the things to be done.  Roof.  Trimming back the bushes.  Exercising the horse she had thought Britomart would ride.Half a mile away is the beach shore.  Her skiff is pulled up there, tied to a rock.  Standing beside it, she can see the smudge of Sant Tigres on the horizon.She is so tired that she aches to her bones.  Somewhere deep inside her, she is aware, there is an endless well of sorrow, but she is simply too weary to pay it any mind.  It is one of the peculiarities of mages that they can compartmentalize themselves, and put away emotions to never be touched again.She does this now, rousing herself, and prepares to go on.  She has a pact with the universe, which told her long ago when she became a sorceress: nothing will be asked that cannot be endured.  So she soldiers on like her workers, marching through the days.She is still tired a week later."Go to her," Britomart says.  "I don't care.  You don't have much time with her.""I have even less with you," Laurana says, but Britomart still turns away.It is harvesting season’s end.  Outside in the evening, some of the golems are in the boiling house, where three boilers sit over the furnace, cooking the sugar cane sap.  The syrup passes from boiler to boiler until in the last it begins to crystallize into muscovado.  Two golems pack it into clay sugar molds and set the molds in the distillery so the molasses will drain away.In the distillery, more golems walk across the mortar and cobble floor in which copper cauldrons are set for molasses collection, undulating channels feeding them the liquid. They mix cane juice into the brew before casking it.  In a few months, it will be distilled into fiery, raw rum and sold to the taverns in the pirate city.She goes and fetches her notebook and sits in the room with Britomart, her pen scratching away to record the day's labors, the number of rows harvested, and making out a list of necessities for her next trip to Sant Tigres.  She estimates two thousand pounds of sugar this year, three hundred casks of molasses, and another two hundred of rum.  Recently she received word that the sorcerer Carnuba, whose plantation is three days south, renovated his sugar mill to process lime juice.  Lime juice is an excellent scurvy preventative, and much in demand – she wonders how long it would take a newly planted grove to fruit.  Her pen dances across the page, calculating raw material costs and the best forms of transportation."Is she pretty?" Britomart asks.  Her face is still turned away.Laurana considers. "Yes," she says."As pretty as I was?" The anguish in the whisper forces Laurana put down her pen.  She takes Britomart's hands in hers.  They are untouched by the disease, the nails sleek and shiny and well-groomed.  Hands like the necks of swans, or white doves arcing over the gleam of water."Never that pretty," she says.The next morning Laurana goes through the room, touching each charm to stillness until the lace curtains no longer flutter.  Until there is no sound in the room except her own breathing and the warbling calls of the deathbirds clustering among the blossoms of the bougainvillea tree outside.She hears a fluttering from her room, a pigeon that has joined the dozen others on the windowsill, but she ignores it, as she ignored the earlier arrivals.  She sits beside the bed, listening, listening.  But the figure on the bed does not take another breath, no matter how long she listens.All through that day, the golems labor boiling sugar.  Jeanette brings her lemonade and the new girl, Madeleine, has made biscuits.  She drinks the sweet liquid and looks at the dusty wallpaper.  The thought of changing it stuns her with the energy it would require.  She will sit here, she thinks, until she dies, and dust will collect on her and the wallpaper alike.Still, when dinner-time comes she goes downstairs and under Tante Isabelle's watchful eye, she pushes some food around on her plate.Daniel cannot help but be a little thankful that Britomart is dead, she thinks.  He was the one who emptied her chamber pot and endured her abuse when she set him to fetching and carrying.  The thought makes her speak sharply to him as he serves the chowder the new girl has made.  He looks bewildered by her tone and slinks away.  She regrets the moment as soon as it is passed but has no reason for calling him back.Upstairs the ranks of the pigeons have swollen by two or three more.  She lies on her bed, fully clothed, and stares at the ceiling.The next morning she takes two golems from their labors to carry Britomart's body for her.  They dig the grave on a high slope of the mountain, overlooking the bay.  It is a fine view, she thinks.  One Britomart would have liked. When they have finished, she stands with her palms turned upwards to the sky, calling clouds to come seething on the wind.  They collect, darkening like burning sugar.  When they are at the perfect, furious boil, she brings lightning down from them to smash the stone that stands over the grave.  She does it over and over again, carving Britomart's name in deep and angry, blackened letters.At home she goes to lie in bed again.One by one, the golems grind to a stop at their labors, and the sap boils over in thick black smoke.  They stand wherever their energy gave out, but all manage in their last moments to bring their limbs in towards their torsos, standing like stalks of stillness.It may be the smoke that draws Christina.  She arrives, knocks on the door, and comes inside, brushing past the servants.  Without knowing the house, she manages to come upstairs and to Laurana's bedroom.Laurana does not move, does not look over at the door.Christina comes to the bed and lies down beside the sorceress.  She looks around at the bedroom, at the string of shells hanging on the wall, but says nothing.  She strokes Laurana's ivory hair with a soft hand until the tears begin.Outside the golems grind to life again as the rain starts.  They collect the burned vats and trundle them away.  They cask the most recent rum and set the casks on wooden racks to ferment.  They put the plantation into order, and finish the last of their labors.  Then as the light of day fades, muffled by the steady rain, they arrange themselves again, closing themselves away, readying for tomorrow.END"Sugar" was originally published in Fantasy Magazine in 2007.This recording is a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license which means you can share it with anyone you’d like, but please don’t change or sell it. Our theme is “Aurora Borealis” by Bird Creek, available through the Google Audio Library.Thanks for listening, and I'll have another story for you on September 8th.[Music plays out]

Brain Burps About Books Podcast #213 A Pinterest Rockstar Shares Her Secrets Announcements Just a quick note to let you know that I’m starting a new podcast soon if I haven’t already started by the time you hear this. Want to know more? It’s going to be pretty awesome and very different from this show. Go to writeakidsbook.com/podcast to learn more.   There's still time to join Crank It Up with Katie! It's a great opportunity to get coaching for your writer business in a small group format. Join HERE. I’m inviting you to a party! Join the KidLit.TV Pinterest Party on January 29th at 9pm EST. Be sure to follow for the latest resources on KidLit and a chance to WIN! Comment, Like, Repin... it's like a visual Twitter Chat on Pinterest! Have you ever been to a Pinterest party? One for writers? One that will grow your followers? RSVP HERE. Sign up for a FREE 15 minute Pinterest Session HERE! Plus, receive $20 Off a Pinterest Consulting Session by click HERE. This Week's Guest is Kim Vij! Kim Vij is a Pinterest Consultant, Educator, Blogger, Freelance Writer and Speaker. Using The Educators' Spin On It, she has created award winning boards on Pinterest with over 1.6 Million followers by focusing pins on Education and Parenting. She’s successfully partnered with leading children’s educational bloggers and brands to create powerful Pinterest boards for early childhood education. In the past three years she has discovered how to reach out to parents to encourage them to become their child’s first teacher by blogging and pinning resources and tips onto her Pinterest Boards. As a mom of 3, Kim enjoys sharing simple ways to make every day moments into learning opportunities. Kim and I talk about • What to name your author board. (Hint: Use Pinterest Name-author) • How to pick a niche topic. • How create a character building board. • Naming your boards. • What to use for board descriptions and how tabs connect. • The educational aspects of Pinterest. • How often should you change your board covers? • Promoted pins – paying for pins to be promoted. • Picmonkey.com and Canva.com • What is the maximum size image you can use? • How to pin to secret boards and release later. • Should you use Tailwind or Viraltag or Ahalogy? • Can you change the name of your board? • How to embed your boards on your site. • The steps to a perfect pin. • What should be in your pin description? Answer: Title for the blog post, plus one more sentence, about 100 characters total. • What are the Pinterest don’ts? Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper! http://katiedavis.com/donate  

 Go HERE to get my Market and Promote Your Book Checklist & Worksheet PLUS 21 Ways to Promote Your Book on Amazon!! http://katiedavis.com/21waystomarket   Brain Burps About Books Podcast #210 My #1 Marketing Tool That's Helped Me Sell More Books Announcements I’ve got something FREE to help you bump it up to the next level in the coming year! It’s a simple little planner. Click here: www.katiedavis.com/2015 The Early Bird price for Crank It Up with Katie expires January 7th. For only $97, you'll get four weeks of group coaching with me. We'll go over Social Media, Email Lists, Marketing Your Book and Yourself and Video & Tech. Only a few spots left. Start the new year off right by investing in yourself: www.coursesforwriters.com/crankitup Contributors A grateful segment from Julie Hedlund This Week's Guest is YOU! I recently did a survey asking you what questions you have about marketing your books. There were over 500 responses and today I will answer one question I think is most representative of what you want to know: What is the #1 tool that helped your sell more books?   Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper! http://katiedavis.com/donate  

Brain Burps About Books Podcast #209 Holiday Replay: How Do You Win an Award, Find a Literary Agent, and Get a Book Published? Get Rejected First! Announcements It's coming! I'm working on my New Year's Gift for you! (Hint: I'm planning on helping you have a productive year.) Sign up here so you'll get it as soon as it's available: www.katiedavis.com/2015 Have I helped you this year? Did I say something on the podcast, or in a course, or in an email that you've been able to use? I would love to hear about it! Send me an email at support@katiedavis.com and let me know. This Week's Guest is Illustrator Debbie Ridpath Ohi Debbie and I talk about the process for a first time illustrator. us looking at stuff on the video (she made the image below while we watched!). the word my mom considered a curse word when I was little. art notes Debbie received. how she did wordless spreads. Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper! http://katiedavis.com/donate Sometimes I'll tell you about something that has impressed the heck out of me. If you decide to purchase what I've recommended, you don not pay any more but I'll get a referral fee. But I will only use a referral (or affiliate) link if it has earned my trust.

Brain Burps About Books Podcast #207 Our 101 Favorite Children's Books of the Year Part 2 Announcements Would you answer this one question survey? I want to hear from how I can help YOU: http://www.katiedavis.com/onequestion Getting excited and prepped for the next session of Business for Writers 101: Crank It Up with Katie. Get it now for the early bird price of $97. Support Pencils of Promise! See the free replay of How to Explode Your Career with Video to find out how you can help HERE. Get Video Idiot Boot Camp for $25 off, too and learn how to create videos to help your career as a writer and help a kid get a good education. Between now and December 31, half of every tuition for Video Idiot Boot Camp will be donated to Pencil of Promise, an organization that ensures quality education for children in Ghana, Guatemala, Laos, and Nicaragua. Use code pencils25 when you check out to get your discount. So far, we've donated over $800! This Week's Guests are Matthew Winner of The Busy Librarian and the Let's Get Busy Podcast with Cynthia Alaniz of Librarian in Cute Shoes & Contributor at the Nerdy Book Club. Matthew, Cynthia, and I talk about Their favorite books of 2014. the next 51 books on the list including our number 1 picks! All books are in alphabetical order so we can spread the book love. Getting a downloadable PDF of the books HERE for you to take to your local independent bookseller and get your favorites! Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper!

Our 101 Favorite Children's Books of the Year Part 1 Click to tweet about this week's episode Announcements Would you answer this one question survey? I want to hear from how I can help YOU: http://www.katiedavis.com/onequestion Getting excited and prepped for the next session of Business for Writers 101: Crank It Up with Katie. Get it now for the early bird price of $97. Now through Dec 6, get Video Idiot Boot Camp for $25 off and I'll donate half of every tuition that comes in to Pencils of Promise. Not only that, but the value of your contribution will be doubled because Pat Flynn will match everything up to $25,000! Use code pencils25 when you check out to get your discount! FREE webinar where I'll teach you how you can use video to explode your writing career, on Dec 6th at noon. Sign up here. http://www.katiedavis.com/pencils This Week's Guests are Matthew Winner of The Busy Librarian and the Let's Get Busy Podcast with Cynthia Alaniz of Librarian in Cute Shoes & Contributor at the Nerdy Book Club. Matthew, Cynthia, and I talk about Our favorite books of 2014. 50 books this week and 51 books (including our #1 picks!) next week. All books are in alphabetical order so we can spread the book love. Getting a downloadable PDF of the books HERE for you to take to your local independent bookseller and get your favorites! Go to coursesforwriters.com/video and sign up Use the code pencils25 when you check out to get your discount!     Download a PDF list of all these books here: Top 101 Children Books 2014 - The First 50 Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper!

Announcements Thanksgiving next week! I'm grateful for those of you who have donated to the podcast. Getting excited and prepped for the next session of Crank It Up with Katie. There will be an early bird price of $97 but don't join yet. Wait for Cyber Monday when it will be even less. The lowest it will ever be. If you're not on my mailing list go to KatieDavis.com/news and get on it so you can be notified of the Cyber Monday sale – and if you miss it, you can be notified when the early bird price ends so you don’t miss THAT. This Week's Guest is...  ... author- illustrator James Burks. After spending fifteen years working as artist in animation working on such movies as Emperor's New Groove, Atlantis, Treasure Planet, Home on the Range, Space Jam, the Iron Giant and the television shows, Wow Wow Wubbzy, Ni-hao Kai-lan, the Dinosaur Train and most recently on Fan Boy and Chum Chum, James is now writing and illustrating his own children's books including Gabby & Gator, Bird & Squirrel on Ice, and Bird & Squirrel on the Run.    James and I talk about   Tacos! His Bird and Squirrel song. Art of visual storytelling. How James got in the biz. His preferred medium. Tips for illustrators. 3 things James would recommend. The worst thing you could do as a storyteller or an illustrator. Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper!  

Click to tweet about this week's episode Announcements Thanks to Carrie Charley Brown for the lovely interview she did with me. You can find it at CarrieCharleyBrown.com Since it's NaNoWriMo, PiBoIdMo and PictureBookMonth, I talk a little about the Learn Scrivener Fast course I’ve been going through. This Week's Review This week’s contributor is Emily Wylie with a review of Barry Jonsberg’s The Categorical Universe of Candice Phee This Week's Guest Chris Barton is the author of the picture books Shark vs Train (a New York Times and Publishers Weekly bestseller) and The Day-Glo Brothers (winner, American Library Association Sibert Honor), as well as the young adult nonfiction thriller Can I See Your I.D.? True Stories of False Identities. Chris and I talk about   Austin! Secrets from the 200th episode. Jennifer Zeigler's How Not to Be Popular. Two best pieces of advice for writers. How he came up with Shark Vs. Train. The Great Brain. Note to my podcast listeners When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper!

Announcements Free 4 Quick & Easy Video Marketing Lessons for Writers You’re not making book trailers yet? Really? Seriously? You know I'm an insane, video-crazed freak, right? But do you know why? Book trailers have literally changed my career as a writer. They’ve made me successful, gotten me attention for my books, earned me income, and I absolutely can’t stand it that you might not be doing them. I’m going to make this ridiculously easy for you. Unless you’re cray cray crazy, you’re going to sign up for this free mini-course and learn how you can create and use video to help you sell books and build your platform. Click here to get on the dedicated list of people who will get the info when it starts. You’ll receive an emailed mini-lesson for four consecutive days. But because I don’t want to bug people who don’t want to know how to get more books into more hands, you do need to sign up for it, even if you’re already on my mailing list. This Week's Review This week’s contributor is Heather Preusser, with a review of a debut middle grade novel from Esther Ehrlich and a tip from Chris Crutcher. This week’s guest is Robin Preiss Glasser, illustrator of Fancy Nancy written by Jane O'Connor. Robin has also worked as an illustrator for Judith Viorst, Garrison Keillor, Lynne Cheney and Sarah Ferguson.   Robin and I talk about Who was the inspiration for Fancy Nancy. Her number video rule. How she transforms author art notes in to finish illustrations. Note to my podcast listeners: When I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR I thought, "Hey! I could do that, but with children's publishing as my focus!" That's how Brain Burps About Books got started. Writing is so solitary. I thought it would be a great way to get to talk to my friends and make new ones, plus I could help others learn. Maybe I'd learn some stuff myself, too. I've had the privilege of talking to the first three National Ambassadors for Young People's Literature, to librarians and New York Time's bestselling authors. I've interviewed to booksellers and publishers, writers, illustrators, app creators, and app distributors, and more! There is always something new on the horizon to learn and to share. So many listeners have asked how to support the show, and actually, now you can. I've installed a donate button to help defray the costs of producing the show. What do you learn or get out of Brain Burps every week? If it's worth donating a dollar, two dollars, five, or whatever you think the show is worth to you, it would help enormously. The show costs $20 a month to keep on the server, and that's only if there are four shorter episodes in a month. That number doesn't include other costs like my time to research and record, post, edit the intros and outros, web hosting, and equipment and software to do all this. I ended up loving podcasting. I love my listeners. My "Burpers!" This is my gig, I know. and like I said, it's an incredible experience for me. But if you've you've been helped, or just love it too, and you're able, here's your opportunity to help defray the costs. No matter what, thank you for being a Burper!  

Accepting credit cards through your smart phone, What to do when one of your regulars starts to get on everyone's nerves? Making a negative EV play on purpose, Maybe I'd better get some food now. 

Do I have an original thought in my head? My bald head. Maybe I'd be happier if I were listening to a podcast. This week we see double when we review Spike Jonze's cliche masterpiece Adaptation. Along with that we continue our David Cronenberg festival with another duo from 1988's Dead Ringers. To finish out the show we give you our Top 5 Multiple Role Movies and the long forgotten and much promised feedback section. Send us more! Music by Shark Speed and Blue Sunshine Soul.