GovZine

For the past couple of years Gabriele and I have rented a cabin in the Shenandoah for a quick, relaxing getaway from DC. It’s located about 14 miles outside Front Royal, VA. We’ve always had a nice time, but last weekend was especially fun due to some new food and wine discoveries.

The first find was Vino e Formaggio, in downtown Front Royal. It’s run by Christian Failmezger, a former lawyer and sommelier originally from Austria. He had an impish charm and a lot of enthusiasm, and welcomed us warmly into his shop. He set us up with a gratis tasting, and talked about his philosophy of selling wine in what in his words is still “bourbon and budweiser” country.

He sells almost nothing over $25, and understands he may be introducing his customers to wine for the first time. So he offers a lot of whites and semi-dry wines, and expects a new customer to take a year or more before being interested in reds. He poured us a white wine from Steineger that was predominately the Gruner Veltiner grape, a new one for me. It smelled like a Sauvignon Blanc, but tasted more subdued, not as grassy and with a pear fruit taste dominating.

We had three reds, a forgettable Californian Merlot and French Bordeaux, and then the winner in our opinion. It was a Ruvei Barbera d’ Alba 2007, an expensive wine for the shop at $17. We both like Barberas, and this one was nice, light bodied, very dry but with nice fruit, high acidity and easy tannins. We bought a bottle, and a dessert wine as well. We had a blast, and returned the next day to stock up on a picnic lunch. The serrano ham was fantastic.

Prior to leaving for the weekend, I had used Twitter to ask folks about the best place for dinner in the area. I got back a lot of good suggestions, and some good buzz about a place called Element. It’s one of two restaurants located in a small former apartment building run by David and Stacy Gedney, who met while working at the Inn at Little Washington. Aparment 2g upstairs was booked for the night, so we went to Element.

The vibe is casual and a little funky, without trying too hard to convey it. It’s a small place with only about a dozen tables, and the bartender also waits on the tables. The menu was very small — four apps, four entrees to choose from — but everything was really good.

We started with mussels, and seared tuna. The mussels were large, but perfectly tender and delicious. The tuna was fantastic, perfectly done and served over a salad with a mild Asian sauce that accentuated rather than masked the freshness of the fish. When we go back, I’ll seriously consider asking them to double the portion and have it as my entree. This night I had chicken breast, a different choice for me and done well, very simply. Gabriele had very tasty Mahi Mahi coated with pecan panko, with a delicious Indian couscous side.

As readers of this blog know, we’re big GSM fans. So when I saw two on the wine list, I asked our server for his recommendation. He steered us to the Qupe “Los Olivos Cuvee” 2007. It’s from the Santa Ynez valley in central California, 58% Syrah, 26% Mourdevre and 16% Grenache, a lot more “M” than usual. The wine was excellent, starting with a fresh, subtle bouquet and tasting of restrained fruit through to a smooth finish with a hint of vanilla. I tasted currant fruit, and the wine was a little elusive, hard to describe. It went very well with the meal, and it was very fun to have this kind of meal in downtown Front Royal. We’ll be back, either to Element or to check out Apartment 2g.

We also hit a couple of wineries over the weekend while enjoying some beautiful weather. Narmada winery was pretty and very accommodating. We only liked one of the wines we tasted, their 2008 Melange. It’s their Bordeaux style wine, 60% Cabernet and 40% Merlot. It was nice, very smooth and without the creamy Merlot finish I don’t care for, picked up a bottle for $21.

On the other side of Rt. 211 from Narmada is Gray Ghost winery. Our pourer was very friendly and knowledgeable, and the winner here was a bit of a surprise, their Victorian Red. It’s basically a blush wine, though they don’t describe it that way. 65% Cabernet Franc, and 35% Chardonnay. It’s very flavorful, with a lot of cherry and cranberry fruit that will be enjoyable on a summer day. (OK, Gabriele picked this one but its not bad, and it was only $15.)

So fine food and wine is alive and expanding in the Shenandoah. But make sure you bring you bottle home and leave plenty of time to enjoy the views.

Where the Blue Ridge meets the Shenandoah River

I’m SO excited to share details about NASA’s newest, coolest, never-been-done-before sustainability initiative, LAUNCH:Water.

Accelerating Innovation for a Sustainable Future.

We’ve been working on this project for some time — an innovative collaborative process to “launch” ideas, or disruptive green technologies, that address some of this planet’s growing pains.

All props to NASA’s Robbie Schingler, who envisioned a barcamp-type atmosphere to discuss sustainability challenges. We’d been looking for ways to tell our Space Station green story, and this concept fit the bill. We pulled together a team of creative folks, all bringing together different strengths, to birth theLAUNCH:Water incubator we’ll debut next week.

We wanted a TED-style event but with teeth, where we can chomp into issues and mash-up new approaches and solutions.

We created LAUNCH as a global initiative to identify and support the innovative work that is poised to contribute to a sustainable future. We want this process to accelerate solutions to meet urgent challenges facing our society. That’s the goal: to make a difference, leave this world better tomorrow than it is today.

We chose water as a logical starting point because it’s an issue we deal with on Space Station every day in orbit. Not only is water a critical commodity for our orbiting pioneers, but for so many living on our home planet.

Scarcity within a hostile environment is something we Earthlings and space travelers share.

So what is LAUNCH:Water? We are working with our founding partners, USAID,State Department, and NIKE, to allow 10 water-related emerging technologyinnovators the opportunity to present their ideas to a small group of thought-leadersfrom varied disciplines for a two and a half day conversation about possibilities. We break into small impact rotations to discuss content-focused issues/opportunities that affect each innovator individually. We have a team working with the innovators to develop how we shape these impact sessions for maximum benefit. Our hope is to use these structured conversations to leap-frog these ten innovators further down the path toward success in solving water issues facing our planet.

Why NASA? Because we’re problem-solvers — against all odds.

We solve problems. That’s what we do. I like to call it our brand reduction sauce– after all the ingredients are thrown into the pot and cooked and the essence is left behind. So why not convene a group of expert problem-solvers in various disciplines to address issues we face both on Earth and in the heavens above? LAUNCH is a gathering of problem-solvers to solve one MAJOR problem:

how to sustain life ON and OFF Earth.

We’ll live-stream the innovators’ presentations on Tuesday March 16th and Wednesday March 17th, so you can be part of this glorious experiment with us. We have a LAUNCHorg twitter account that we’ll keep updated, as well.

I’m looking forward to meeting all the innovators in person next week. I’m particularly excited about one of the innovations that bubbled up in the process: Manna Energy, run in his spare time by astronaut Ron Garan or @astro_ron on Twitter. You can go to their website or @MannaEnergy twitter feed to learn how they’re deploying water filtration devices in more than 400 schools in Rwanda, along with biogas generators and high efficiency cookstoves at 300 locations. Gives me goosebumps.

We’ll have so much to share as we move toward our inaugural event next week. We plan to serve “recycled water” just like our astronauts drink on Station, BTW. I guess we can’t serve it in paper cups or plastic bottles — neither are friends of the environment. Yet, if we serve in glass cups, we’ll have to wash them with water and detergent — not nice to the our planet either. Our most sustainable option will be to squirt “reformed urine” directly into the mouths of our guests. Now that will be a sight to see, won’t it? Good thing we’re live-streaming the event.

Stay tuned for frequent updates from the field.

Crosspost on BethBeck’s Blog and GovLoop.

Greetings. My name is Stephen Steiner. I am new to Open NASA.

I am interested in what we as a society could create by open sourcing all technologies–not just computer code, but chemistry, materials, energy, automation, and more.

As an experiment in this spirit, my colleague (and artist-by-training) Will Walker and I co-founded Aerogel.org, an open-source resource about aerogels (the “original nanotechnology”). The mission of the project is

“…to empower, inspire, and motivate people to pursue nanotechnology using open source methodology and to catalyze the discovery of new technological possibilities for aerogel materials in the process.”

To do this, we had to develop an approach to try to make what is easily an impenetrable subject to a newcomer into something digestible by anyone with the interest to learn. As part of this approach, we felt that making straightforward information about exciting science available to everyone is the best way to do so and simultaneously stimulates people to pursue science, engineering, and other creative endeavors.

So I’d like to start some “open technology” on Open NASA to transition some of the knowledge we in technological pursuit have learned to those who want to get involved. Some ideas I have:

• Open carbon nanotubes–how to grow, growth models, unsolved problems
• Open biotech–how to take what we know affordably to the third world
• (Somewhat ironically) open closed loop tech–how to close-loop manufacturing, consumption, and energy production (great for a spaceship, or a planet)
• Open energy–yes, garage innovations are left to be had, even in the 21st Century!
• and of course, open aerogel

What if we could even get NASA to open-source some of its technology development?

What do you think?

I read a good post the other day from Caroline McCarthy of CNET. The post was about market consolidation in the social aggregator space:

Social-network feed aggregators–FriendFeed, Socialthing, Plaxo’s Pulse–have been part of the dizzying array of Web apps ever since it became evident that the average Internet user was using more than one of these nifty social-media services and just might want to have them all in one place. But they’ve been on the way out for some time: FriendFeed sold to Facebook, and Socialthing to AOL, both brands buried within their sprawling new owners. And earlier this week, another small start-up in the space, the well-regarded Streamy, announced that it had closed its doors; one co-founder departed for Facebook, the second for social-gaming powerhouse Zynga.

As I was reading, it struck me that this kind of application consolidation was happening beyond just the aggregator niche. And, that’s how Caroline closed her piece:

If anything, the overzealous explosion of social aggregation start-ups a few years ago is a sign that even in the urgent, someone-else-will-beat-you-to-it climate of the Web, sometimes things will just shake out over time.

So what does this have to do with b2b/b2g PR and online marketing? I believe this is a positive development because it establishes the playing field. When online consumers establish “winners” in specific online niches, it allows for more focus on strategy and business objectives rather than a focus on tools and tactics. Or at least it should, I should say.

Last year, I spent a lot of time counseling clients on where their audiences congregate online and on a long list of emerging tools to reach them. Now, as Caroline described in the aggregator space, the leaders have emerged decisively. Facebook is THE social network, LinkedIn the king for business and Twitter exploded onto the scene and continues to expand its uses and analytic tools. Every client obviously will have more specialized communities of interest — the Ning community Software Testing Club for one of our clients, for example. But increasingly, the online terrain is being established.

And that means we can spend more time talking about WHY the client is doing social media. Many of our clients want to produce qualified leads and/or use social media to support large deal capture. OK, we’ve built a methodology for that now with recognized brands. Some want to use for customer service, some to support internal comms and some to demonstrate thought leadership. All are good reasons, and they often reinforce each other.

But many companies are still confusing the tools for the strategy. Check out this excellent post from Shannon Paul, and the 50+ comments it generated — my comment is somewhere amongst that long list.

Of course, the role of the communications professional will always include informing the client of new applications that could support their PR program. But those are and always will be just tools. Never use them until you can articulate how they support the goals of the organization.

DOL announces $2.5 million grant to continue to aid Maine workers impacted by Base Realignment and Closure actions [03/01/2010]

Y’all are incredible!!

I just got off an emotional call with David Broadwell, who we are featuring as a special Member of the Week.

Steve posted a blog and sent an email around 1pm yesterday, asking the community to raise $2,500 that would help David build a home in Slovakia, where his wife who has a high grade cancer would like to spend her remaining time raising their 17-month old triplets near family in her native country.

Well, we are amazed and humbled to announce: Within 24 hours, YOU have given exactly $2,500. Adding the GovLoop match at $.50 per $1 from community members, our current, total contribution is $3,750!

I called David to tell him this news and before we got off the call, he got a bit choked up and said, “You guys don’t know how amazing this is. You are really helping someone. I just can’t wait to have a brick in my hand, building this house with her dad and brothers and the kids running around. You guys are helping me to fulfill Antonia’s dream…I can’t believe it’s really going to happen.”

On behalf of David, Antonia and their family…and on behalf of Steve, Megan and the GovLoop team, we are humbled and grateful for your generosity.

Below is a special message from Steve regarding next steps.

Wow!! I’m stunned! Totally blown away.

In less than 24 hours, you crushed our goal of raising $2,500 to help David Broadwell and his wife battle cancer and build a home in Slovakia where their triplets can grow up near family!

I always say that you are awesome and that you are rockstars. But this kind of giving is extraordinary proof! I feel so incredibly humbled and blessed to be part of this community.

In fact, we hit the goal so fast, I was left wondering what to do next! So here’s what I was thinking made sense at this point:

1 - Keep giving, if you’d like. The Broadwell family has a much larger goal ($50K), so you can keep giving if the story moves you to make a donation. We’ll be accepting donations until March 15 as we originally stated. Please use sressler@gmail.com as the email address for your PayPal donation.

2 - Let’s give them a card with your words of encouragement. In addition to presenting the family with a check in a couple weeks, I’d love to give them a virtual card that has your kind thoughts, inspirational quotes or stories of how you’ve battled cancer. You can share your thoughts on the original blog post:

http://www.govloop.com/profiles/blogs/govgives-help-a-govlooper

We can pull all of our encouraging words together in a little ebook (anybody up for helping to create it?) that we can present to the family along with our collective donations.

Ultimately, all I can really say is “Thank You!” You guys are truly awesome!

Humbled and grateful,

Steve (aka Mr. GovLoop)

My interview with Gov101Radio this afternoon:

Last week, I had the chance to appear on a Live Video Chat hosted by Penelope Trunk  and Ryan Paugh, co-founders of Gen Y networking site Brazen Careerist.  The overall topic was “Career Management 101,” but my segment specifically covered “Advancing Your Government Career.”  I shared a bunch of resources that are available on GovLoop and beyond.  I’m sure this list isn’t comprehensive and you know of other resources.  Feel free to add more via the comments.

On GovLoop

Job Listings

• Find all listings here.

Forums

• All Forums Related to Job Seekers and Career Advice
• Job Interview Tips: How Not to Act Old
• What Are Your Top Tips for Advancing a Government Career?

Topics Page

• New Hire Handbook

Groups

• Human Resources
• Federal Recruiters
• Discovering Mentors
• GovLeaders
• Young Government Leaders
• Young Acquisition Professionals

Beyond GovLoop

Websites

• BestPlacestoWork.org

• MakingtheDifference.org

• PublicServiceCareers.org

• Students.gov

• USAJobs.gov

Books

• How to Land a Top-Paying Federal Job – Lily Whiteman

• Ten Steps to a Federal Job by Kathryn Troutman

Professional Development

• Graduate School

• Management Concepts

Just when you thought you were safely nestled in a nice plateau of learning something like this has to come along and bump you off…

Actually it’s more of a welcome interruption, I could tell the engines weren’t running as smoothly as they could be. Lots of power interruptions, wasted cycles, and general confusion. But the brain is good at making anything seem normal after a while, so wasn’t everything just normal?

Well maybe not.

Today I was exploring why I didn’t get along with a colleague of mine and why it was I just didn’t have any patience for him. Was it that I was just feeling tired and low on creative energy and so was just being protective of it because I didn’t want interacting with him to use it all up?

Maybe.

But why was I afraid to use it all up? Why did I think, I of ultimate power in the universe was so power limited? Maybe to have a good excuse for why I wasn’t out changing the world more and faster and better! (‘I’m tired’ and ‘I don’t feel good’ are great get-out-of-jail free cards). So then I started to look at that. Why do I think I *have* to change the world? Why do I always feel so guilty that I haven’t done more?

Well, I guess it is an underlying world view that I have had for a long time (read a very OLD habit). It is as dear to me and as comfortable and as close as anything could be in my identity/ego. But as I looked at it, I could see, it was true it was suffocating me.

I could see that most of my life was spent trying to fix myself (gotta be perfect, gotta be perfect), trying to fix others (what is wrong with that guy anyway? how long till he gets removed from the team so I don’t have to deal with him?) and trying to fix society (I even gave an exceptional speech at TEDxNASA about how we could start too).

I instantly started to laugh. I spend so much of my day dealing with my own failings, dealing with other people’s failings and trying desperately to keep humanity’s failings from either derailing the space program or heaven forbid- following us out into space! It seemed to be all I ever did! Fight against the failings of myself, fight against the failings of others, and fight against the failings of humanity. No wonder I was so tired!

Luckily, I remembered a lesson from one of my favorite teachers, Gene Roddenberry. An episode of Star Trek where Kirk is divided in two – the good Kirk and the bad Kirk- and you think the whole time “hey, that wouldn’t be so bad, split myself in two and then jettison the bad and keep only the good!” but as the episode unwinds it becomes obvious that the good Kirk alone is missing something, he can’t make decisions or give orders and is feeling weak. Finally the crew realizes that both Kirks are dying— that they need each other to live. They miraculously fix the transporter room just in time and ‘beam’ the two Kirks back into one. The old commanding, decisive Kirk is back and when Spock asks him how to explain where the bad Kirk went to the crew, he says, “tell them that the intruder is back where he belongs and to leave it at that.”

I realized that what if I stopped fighting all the ‘bad’ inside me, and stopped worrying so much about all the ‘bad’ in others (even the guy on my team) and even stopped worrying about the ‘bad’ in humanity escaping out to the stars, or worse yet not letting us get there. It seemed strange to stop. What would I do all day? What would become of us???

I realized that in the past I had encouraged people not to fight each other but to fight entropy, after all entropy is the REAL enemy of us all right? Suddenly even that was called into question. Death is entropy and death is critical to a biosphere’s function. It is part of the design. Without it the system would not work, just like without the bad Kirk, Kirk did not work. Maybe I don’t even need to fight entropy. I started to wonder if maybe it was time to have my life be about something other than fighting.

I pondered that one as I watched strange enormous snow flakes begin to fall out my window. What would I do all day? What does the Dalai Lama do all day? I guess just be with everything as it was happening. Be compassionate, be accepting, be peaceful. It seemed a strange concept. What would I judge my self-worth on? What if people thought I was lazy? But I realized those where just thoughts of someone who was always fighting.

I began to realize that I had no idea what that life would look like and even more strangely that it was ok not to know. I am an explorer right? What better place for me then somewhere off the map… Somewhere new to explore.

What could I create or have my life be about if I wasn’t fighting? What inspires me?

What I do know is I love the beauty of snow falling, I love the sublime feeling of being connected with another person, I love the joy of exploring the unknown, and I have a lot of respect for the Dalai Lama.