On Wednesday I did my final One-on-One with Phil Weiser on the topic of Work-Life Balance. Rocky Radar did a great job of summarizing it in the post Feld on Life Balance: “Accomplish What You Want, Not What You Think You Have to”**. w3w3.com recorded it – you can listen to it here. Since it was at 5:30 and on a beautiful evening, I figured there would probably only be 10 people in the audience. The room was packed and the questions were really fun. Hopefully everyone got something out of it.

Last year we got connected to some guys from Hollywood who talked to us (I can’t decide if we pitched them or they pitched us) on doing a “TechStars Reality Show.” The whole thing seemed seriously sketchy to me, but I knew it was a no-op when they made us a proposal for us to do all the work, come up with all the money, and they would get all the revenue. Clearly I don’t understand how things work in Hollywood. So we punted.

I have a new Windows 7 computer at my loft in Boulder that I’ve been working on for the past 24 hours. It’s the same exact configuration as my desktop (except for Windows 7 instead of Vista) and “my IT guy Ross” images all the machines the same so I get the same base config. The amount of configuration in the image is substantial – it probably cuts out a full day of install, wait, download, configure, reboot shit.

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.

We are super psyched about our investment in Pogoplug. Generally, I hate self-referential tech analogies as a way of describing a product, but in Pogoplug’s case it’s easy: “Pogoplug is a Slingbox for your hard drive.” Our big insight about Sling as an investment was that it was “a bunch of magic software packaged in a cool plastic box that just works.” Similarly, Pogoplug is “a bunch of magic software packaged in a cool plastic box that just works.”

Wow – that was a great and much needed week off the grid. Both Amy and I were exhausted. But, we are back (although she is about to decamp to Keystone for the summer to work on her book.) Before I checked out I spent 36 hours in Idaho with my friends at Highway 12 Ventures at the Idavation Conference. My keynote speech is up on their website along with me hosting the Idaho’s Top Geeks panel. Mark and Pam Solon were incredible hosts – I had a great first trip to Boise along with a superb run with Ryan Woodings of Metageek (really cool wi-spy product). This was my second trip to Idaho – Amy just tossed up pictures from last years Ashton Idaho Marathon with the Blumbergs.

I’m always happy to be “content.” Following are a few interviews I’ve shown up in lately. Q&A with Brad Feld of TechStars: This is a nice short interview in Mass High Tech that happened at the Nantucket Conference a few weeks ago. It talks about TechStars, Boulder, and some of the magic required to build a sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystem. All About Venture Capital: This was a long one – 55 minutes of me riffing on how entrepreneurs should think about venture capital. Exit Outcomes: ACA’s John Huston**: This is an interview with John Huston, the chairman of the Angel Capital Association. Apparently I’m mentioned somewhere along the way (I have no idea if they say good or bad things about me – listen and comment!) The topic is “Ever wanted to hear how angels think of the terms they offer and the returns they expect? And what will happen if the outcome is less than a complete success?” I spent a day in Boise, ID last week at their annual Idavation Conference and had a great time – I’ve got a more thorough post coming on that (which is more than just a handful of links – but c’mon – the links are fun, aren’t they!)

On Wednesday, June 10th, 6:00-7:00pm in the Wittemyer Courtroom, Wolf Law Building at CU Boulder I’m doing an interview with Phil Weiser titled Feld on Work-Life Balance*.* I’ve written extensively about Work-Life Balance on this blog and have a wide range of opinions and perspectives on it. Phil’s intro the event sets it up nicely. For entrepreneurs, lawyers, and other professionals, work-life balance is often a topic that individuals plan on thinking about when they have time. For Brad Feld, this topic “took me 15 years, a failed first marriage, and my current wife (Amy Batchelor, Wellesley Graduate) almost calling it quits for me to realize that I had to figure out what ‘work life balance’ meant to me.” This recognition led to Brad’s commitment to a series of rules, which evolved into a set of habits that include: Spend Time Away Life Dinner Segment Space Be Present Meditate Notably, Brad’s view on life-work balance is not that working hard is not important; rather, it’s that “balance improves the quality/quantity of work that you can get done and he has become more effective at accomplishing stuff.” In this session, we will discuss the challenges about finding life-work balance, developing strategies to both work hard and work effectively as well as how to define success not just in work, but in life.

I heard the line “it’s all about the faces” from someone in the past few weeks. The line stuck with me and I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. Last night I tried an experiment and changed my twitter avatar to a graphic done by Anthony Dimitre, a really talented local designer. While there was plenty of positive feedback, there was also a lot of “I don’t like it” feedback, including the tweet “i think the avatar makes you seem less accessible than a normal pic” from @joshpayne.