Defrag and Blur are only two weeks away, and if you’re not yet registered to come, you should find a way. Why?

1. Makerbot will be there with the Replicator 2 in hand. And is there anything cooler than 3D printing right now?

2. The agenda is absolutely incredible — Kevin Kelly, Jeff Ma, Rachel Happe, Paul Kedrosky, Bre Pettis, Andrew Tschesnok.

3. The networking will be intimate and awesome, as usual.

You’ll see and interact with everything from social business software to big data stuff to robots to 3D printers to augmented reality.

If you’re a student, use the Defrag Student Scholarship and special Blur student tickets to get into both events.

If you’re not a student, use “ejnvip” to take 25% off of your Defrag registration , and if you’d like to come to Blur — use the super secret handshake code of “bifr12” to take 60% off of your blur registration (shhhh)….

Don’t miss it!

Congrats and good karma to my friend Bre Pettis on being able to take his new child – Nika – home from the NICU.

Over the last few months as we were working together to close the MakerBot financing, Bre and his partner Kio Stark had Nika prematurely, which resulted in a bonus six week stay in the NICU. I talked to Bre a number of times during this period, often when he was camped out at the NICU, and he was remarkably calm and engaged during this period.

He’s written a very detailed, thoughtful, and intense post about how to survive the NICU. While I don’t have any kids, nor do Amy and I plan to, I expect all of my obsessive behavior would come out with a vengeance if I ever ended up in a similar situation to Bre’s. My guess is that his rules apply to the hospital stay of any loved one and are well worth reading.

Bre – thanks for taking the time to write up your survival guide. I’m glad everyone is home, safe, and healthy.