Travel is exhilarating.

Though it took a full day to get to Providence, I'm thrilled that I made the trip. The Shared Assessments Summit, sponsored by BITS/The Financial Services Roundtable, was a 1.5 day content rich networking experience. The financial firms that usually attend were joined this time by healthcare risk managers, so that truly enhanced the dialogue. The panel that Dave Cullinane from eBay and Niall Browne from Live Ops and myself did on cloud computing provoked many questions and lively debate.

I am sitting now in the Providence airport, on my way to Baltimore and Annapolis, then will fly back to Seattle late tomorrow. Getting out of the office for four days has reconfirmed the rightness of the work I do, and provided some additional clarity on how to explain it.

There are overlaps between what the shared assessments program and ASA do, at least in the areas of vendor assurance and around infosec, business continuity and privacy controls. It's given me some ideas about how to push the envelope a bit further.

Now it's on to Annapolis meetings tomorrow morning.

Mother's Day.

My husband feels that both Mother's Day and Father's Day are commercial ventures, so it was no surprise that he forgot to get me a present. My son, on the other hand, sent me an anthology of contemporary Irish verse. He's been good at presents from the time he was young. Once, he got me a t-shirt that read "Girls Kick Ass" when he was about ten. Often he gave me the newest Rolling Stones CD. I repaid him when he was eleven or so by taking him to the very last Stones concert in the Kingdome for his birthday. Over the years and on his travels, he finds unique l presents to fit my interests as well as his own, often books or music. This book reminds me of how much he remembers, including a trip back to Ireland the two of us took when he graduated from high school. I am still his biggest fan.

Phoenix visit, Seattle gardens.

We had a great time last weekend in Phoenix. In addition to spending time with family and hearing Cassandra's Phoenix Chorale concert, I was able to have lunch with two of my high school chums, Nancy (left) and Beverly (right). We've done this often enough now that we are plotting perhaps to set up an annual weekend at a spa if we could locate the three other members of our girls sextet.


Here's our grandson, Alex Porter, on the way to pick up his girlfriend for their high school prom. He's bound for Columbia this fall, and she'll be right across the way at Barnard College.

I have no good photos of the concert itself, only this one taken from holding my iPhone high. The concert was sold out and full of encores.

The weather was remarkably at around 80 degrees with sun. Though my allergies kicked up, we did sit outside for a tasty Sunday brunch at Sabrina's. She and her family live around an regulation-sized water ski lake, which you may see in the background of some of these next photos. That's the boathouse over Leroy's shoulder.

Here's Reed, William and Sabrina around one table. In the background is their swimming pool, though, not the lake.

Alex and Reed Porter.
Sabrina, Cassandra and her daughter, Rachel Ewer, looking at the new yearbook.

And here is Richard Ewer added into that picture. That is the lake behind him.

Another version of the three ladies. After brunch, and on the way to the airport, we were able to attend a recital where Alex played one of his own compositions and sang a classical piece.

I could not resist taking a few photos of changes to my garden when I got back from working out this morning. Here's the last of the purple azaleas...

And the beginning of a host of day lilies, in another part of the garden.

Can't see it so well here but here comes the lavender!

Tomorrow is a 5k/10k walk/run to support the Kindred Spirits fund raising efforts, called "Inspiring Hope." It will be great to see most of the 100+ person team, and another 160 or so additional folks who, like me, are able still to walk or run this distance. I'll post some photos from the walk over the weekend. My firm, ASA, is one of the sponsors of the walk!