"It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer." -- Albert Einstein

The office is slowly coming together. My desk and big bookcase will be delivered Friday; and my friend Susan is lending us a nine foot folding table this evening, to use as a conference table until my table comes off backorder. Window blinds this weekend. No voice or internet connection until next Tuesday. But the jerry-rigging works! My landlord is a peach. It is most definitely possible to work here, especially with the Tivoli Audio One unit that James & Lauren got me for my birthday. My netbook is propped upon a slick little slider table by the window, and I have a fresh cup of tea in my hand.

We are roaring toward a Friday deadline for the architecture of the new website, which means a lot of writing and thinking. The smoke is coming out of my ears, but I'm smiling all the way. Jesse Brown is all over the logo and iterations of it for the website, for signage, and for printed materials like business cards. Then too it is great that Lauren is used to writing under deadlines from her time as a reporter, because there is a lot to write. I think we make a great team.

The trick will be to get the site done before I accept my first piece of work for ASA -- there are other deliverables besides the website that I'd like to do well, like a press kit, and emails to announce the company to colleagues around the world. I said jokingly that it was unfortunate that the World Health Organization could not wait another month for the formal declaration of Phase VI pandemic. But a colleague reminded me that it will take at least that month for the implications to sink in with the business community, and for action to be taken, so the timing of July 20th may work after all.

I was asked by the web team for "endorsements" of my work. Some of you who read this know that I don't write them on principle, and that I suppress such items on my LinkedIn page. But here's one I had not expected. Each of my staff was given an award in January of 2009, while we were all still together. At the end, my managers called me up to present an award that says:

"Enterprise Risk Services 2009 award presented to Annie "The Princess of Darkness" Searle, For her ability to build and lead quality teams and to always shine the light on risk issues, regardless of how dark the message."

I ended up framing the award, and it will hang near my Institute of American Entrepreneurs certificate in the new office.

I like the Einstein quote a lot.