Last week we were in Finland, and this week has been a good one…getting back into the groove, keeping up with responsibilities, doing what needs to be done. Last night I had to fire someone. It was surreal, because it was done over Skype. If a person you hire just […]

Many of us have experienced that moment, that terrible moment, when we get the worst news in our lives.  We have an illlness, and it may well be incurable, or terminal.  What’s it like to be a oncology doctor and have to fill in your patients and their families about […]

We had lunch with Antti Tuomola on an island in the Baltic sea, in a yacht club restaurant called Paven.  In 2011, Antti got together with his friends and they formed a Facebook group to create Restaurant Day, when anyone in the country could open their own pop-up restaurant, without […]

After just an hour of visiting with the dynamic people at the Innovation Alley and the Startup Sauna in the city of Espoo, Finland, we were both exhilarated and slightly overwhelmed. There are so many impressive young entrepreneurs and agile thinkers packed into these Aalto university buildings, it felt like […]

There is one word in the Finnish language that’s known throughout the world–sauna. It’s the word that’s associated the closest with this northern nation, and an experience that is shared by all Finnish people. No apartment is complete without a common sauna, nor is any house complete without the built […]

Tonight I joined a local couple, Deepa Panchamia and Ivan Kulvik, for a beer at their local pub in Fiskar Finland. Over dinner we had discussed many of the topics that always interest me when I travel. I love the contrasts between people’s lives around the world, as well as […]

Today we met a host of very interesting local people in Turku who are pursuing great ideas and blazing new trails.  First we visited Logomo, which is a large event arena and workplace just outside the city center. Janne Auvinen, the events director, took us on a tour of this […]

We flew into Turku to face what we left behind in Mass–the chilly breezes and cold temps of early spring.  Turku is Finland’s oldest city with about 189,000 inhabitants on the Baltic sea. Here, the biggest industry is a German-owned shipyard  builds the largest cruises ships in the world. Carnival […]

I told a  friend who I play music with that I was going to Helsinki over the weekend. “Oh the music club in Hudson, NY?” he asked. “No, actually, Helsinki, Finland,” I replied.  It’s a new city and a new country for me, and Paul Shoul and I can’t wait […]

Pink Talking Fish blew me away last night at the wonderful 2-story Hinge, with me looking up at the band as they torched the place with 1980s hits from Talking Heads and famous jams from Phish like Bathtub Gin, Possum,  and Down with Disease. They segued seamlessly to through their […]

The title of this movie starring Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts is a riddle. When We’re Young, as in, they still are young. But the whole point of this funny and poignant movie is that nobody stays young, and no amount of young hip friends will ever make you young […]