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I’ve had a busy July – lots activity in my portfolio, travel, and interesting stuff to deal with. Most of the companies in my portfolio had solid Q2’s (recession? what recession?), I’ve watched the TechStars teams in both Boulder and Boston grow up quickly, and the tech M&A market has woken up nicely. At the same time, I watch the mainstream press report on the same old nonsense, our government struggle with “big issues” that seem to polarize everyone, and I listen to chatter in trains, planes, and automobiles about all the problems that exist. ...

I’m in LA today taking a break between a board meeting and a dinner meeting. I’ve got a few calls and am then going running somewhere, although I haven’t yet figured out where that’s going to be since I’m deep in downtown LA. While I was stalling before putting my running shoes on, I stumbled onto a video on ReadWriteWeb today that made me homesick. Never Mind the Valley, Here’s Boulder from ReadWriteWeb on Vimeo . ...

I suck at naming things. I named my first company “Feld Technologies” (yeah, that was super creative, but I bet it made my dad proud.) I learned an important lesson from that one – when things go wrong people call for Mr. Feld and yell at him. Better to name your company Costolo Technologies if your last name is Feld. I then went on to name another company I co-founded – this one that was one of the first email service providers (in the mid-1990’s we referred to this as “publishing email”). Guess what we named it? If you guessed “Email Publishing” you are now demonstrating your strong deductive reasoning skills as they pertain to my completely lame naming skills. ...

My friends at Rocky Radar have launched a Colorado Company Index. It’s a free resource designed to catalog the technology companies working within the state, from IT to Life Science to Clean Tech. Thanks also to the guys at SurveyGizmo for helping out here. They are currently bootstrapping the index – submit your company info here.

I’m a big believer in super powers. Each human has at least one super power even if they haven’t discovered it yet. I fly on planes a lot. While I’m looking forward to my own personal teleportation machine and that damn jetpack that I was promised in my childhood, I survive all the travel I do because of my airplane super power. I can go to sleep immediately upon sitting down in my seat and sleep until the plane begins its final descent, regardless of the length of the flight. ...

After Bill Ritter was elected governor of Colorado in 2006, I was asked to be a member of the IT transition team. We had about a month to review the current state of affairs with regard to broadband, the Colorado IT structure and strategy, and to recommend a CIO candidate. I’d never been on a transition team before so I found it to be an interesting experience. I don’t remember the number of transition teams (I have the number 16 in my head) – they were all busy trying to collect, assimilate, and understand what existed, put together clear recommendations that the new Governor and his staff could build on, while trying to separate a bunch of signal from noise of the outgoing administration. ...

Next week is the first annual entrepreneurship week at CU Boulder. There is a full schedule of great events for anyone interested in entrepreneurship. Monday 4/13: 11:30am – 2:00pm: Starting Companies at CU: Technology Entrepreneurship Luncheon @ University Memorial Center Tuesday 4/14: 10:00am – 11:30am: Panel Discussion on Social Entrepreneurship @ University Memorial Center Room 247 Tuesday 4/14: 5:30pm – 8:30pm: Silicon Flatirons Center’s Entrepreneurial Mash-Up @ Dairy Center for the Arts ...

Anyone who has driven to DIA has seen the mysterious big blue horse. Yes – it has special powers. It has killed before (its creator – Luis Jimenez) and may kill again. I’ve just joined the I am afraid of the big blue horse at DIA Facebook group. Here’s one of the best quotes from the wall. Approaching DIA, my heart began to thump. Summoning all my resolution, I gave my Suby half a score of kicks to the gas pedal in an attempt to hasten my journey. At just that moment a splash of blue caught my eye. In the dark shadow of the field, on the margin of the airport, I beheld something blue, so blue, and towering, a gigantic monster ready to pounce upon this weary traveler. “What are you” I whispered, and received no reply. Agitated, I repeated my question. Pushing the gas pedal, I closed my eyes and uttered an involuntary psalm. I opened my eyes. The shadow took shape, a huge horse with powerful frame, whose eyes burned red and followed me, keeping pace. I rounded the curve, bringing the relief of the giant against the sky and I was horror-struck on perceiving it was…art? ~ Jenn Bma (Boulder) ...

I love living in Boulder. But, I travel a lot. And I like that also, especially when Amy comes with me. I’m in Boston today for TechStars for a Day and then doing a bunch of stuff at MIT tomorrow. Amy came with me and is doing her own thing at Wellesley. I often get asked how much time I spend on the road versus at home. I decided to track it – along with several other things (miles run, books read, and airplane flights) for 2009. Following is where I have slept so far this year as of 3/10/09. ...

Congrats to all my friends at Kerpoof – it was announced a few weeks ago that Kerpoof was acquired by Disney . Krista Marks – the CEO and co-founder – emailed me the Kerpoof mouse ears photo which inspired me to blog about them. It’s another great example of a local Boulder software / Internet company that had a passion, made something happen, and had a great exit. I met Krista and her co-founders at a CSIA event and then again while they were gearing up for the 2007 TechCrunch 40 . I gave them feedback on their presentation, started playing around with Kerpoof, and decided that Krista was a star. They weren’t raising money at the time (they were self funded through consulting work they were doing while building out their service) so I gave them feedback whenever they asked and stayed close to them. I encouraged Krista to have Kerpoof join the Entrepreneurs Foundation of Colorado – which they did. ...