You'd figure that living in NY would bring out the mean streak in people, but actually that's not true.  I think the only aspect of me that can be categorized as being "New York mean", is having little patience and tolerance for people walking slowing on the sidewalks, especially when they're big enough to prevent others from passing, and they meander like grazing cows.  Hey, this is New York, time is money!

But I digress, this is about LA.  The last two days, reunited with my rocket Prelude, I've been utterly tearing up the road.  Driving in mild LA traffic, meaning being able to cruise around 70 mph but still be surrounded by cars on all sides, I've rediscovered the aggressive driver within.  Knowing all the sweet spots and abilities of my metal steed, yet not being able to unleash it in this urban jungle, simply makes a man go mad.  Trapped among the countless vehicles, I can sense the growl of the engine resonate with the intensifying beat of the blaring music.  The ennui accumulates as my muscles tense.  When can I just get away, out of this patch of road Lemmings?  Then the moment of rapture strikes; a few cars part for a brief opening, just a few seconds for escape.  Hit the clutch, down shift, grenade the pedal, throttle to 6000 rpm, and vroooommm.  I slingshot away from the herd as my music hits its crescendo, adrenaline peaking as ice cold confidence and boiling exhilaration erupt through my veins.

Then I reach the next bunch of mindless drivers...  Import the autobahn already!

Happy holidays from sunny southern California!  As warm of a winter's it's been so far on the East Coast and in Europe, I'm looking at 70/21 degrees weather here.

I know I've been light on the content lately, but have been occupied with lots of things.  One of the things I struggle with is how to write about my work without making potentially career limiting statements about my colleagues or clients.  If you have some good ideas, please put them in my sock instead of the obligatory lump of coal.

On another tangent, in the spirit of the holidays, I would encourage my high falutin' investment bankers, hedge fund friends to find your inner Ebenezer Scrouge, open up the gold vault (yes, we all know you had a great year), and share with much less fortunate, be it your charity of choice or your favorite school.  Trust me, you'll feel better about yourselves when you look at your situation in the perspective of normal folks, not the guy down the hall who got a fatter bonus check than yours.  ;)

To my dear December promotion friends: Congratulations on completing a fantastic year at INSEAD.  While it was probably one of your best years to date, don't stop there.  Keep adventuring and growing.  Let INSEAD be one of countless highlights of your storied lives.  I promised not to get sentimental, so to keep it short and sweet: continue to work smart, play hard, love life, and most of all, stay in touch.  :)

Day 3 in Atlanta and so far I like it!  True that when the basis of comparison is Orlando, almost anything seems great.  But at the gut level I simply feel happy surrounded by a critical mass of people, not tourists.  Sure, driving on the congested freeways here reminds me a little bit of California.  One interesting side note - the first connotation of Georgia firing among my neural synapses is some obscure historical reference, the Trail of Tears.  Guess I was an impressionable history student back in high school.  What iI wasn't so good at was Geography.  So allow me to share another factoid about this Southern (pronounced 'suh-then') state - it's just north of Florida, not too far from my last project site. 

Speaking of driving, due to some inexplicable pre-holiday hotel congestion, we're staying about 10 miles away from the office.  Everyday we commute from north of Atlanta to the city which hosts the client office.  The first day, my Russian colleague spooks me with his erratic, nonchalant driving style.  Throw in a couple of horrible parking incidents, where the car is parked more or less diagonal and crossing at least one line, I had to intervene and take away the keys.  And he had the gall to question my parking skills this morning, only to discover, upon stepping out, how perfectly I maneuvered in one smooth swoop the American beast of a car into spot-on center alignment.  Getting off my high horse and back to the point I originally wanted to make, I've noticed that people here drive in a mellow fashion, unhurried compared to Californians, and infinitely more forgiving compared to the strict German autobahn rules of conduct.  This is noticeable in the people I've interacted with outside of their metal horses; they seem more friendly and relaxed.  I even experienced one very outgoing and motherly (but young) waitress who made it her mission to keep us all comfortable and attended to.  This style I can get used to, yup.

Not forgetting that we're consultants, so outside of the office and restaurants, the last unmentioned part of our world is the hotel.  Because everything in the area is booked up, I had no choice (really, I swear) but to stay at the W.  A chain within my favorite chain of hotels, the W targets the young chic crowd.  Their bars and lounges in NYC and SF are known to be pickup joints for trendy fashionistas.  Walking into the hotel lobby, you find yourself in a huge lounge with tons of comfortable sofas and a bar filled with more clubbing folk than business travelers.  Loungy chill-out music flows throughout all the public areas.  I even walked out of the elevator wondering where I could the catchy mix that was playing.  As for the rooms, the interior decor remains congruent with the sleek hipster appeal, right down to the facial washes and body butter.  My suite has a proper living room and two LCD TV's.  (Don't worry, we get really good corporate rates)  Even though I haven't had the energy (or proper attire) to hang out by the bar and mingle, just being in such a different atmosphere from the usual business hotels puts me in a super decent mood, certainly one to completely forget about business.  The only squeal you'll hear from me is having to pay $10 for a bottle of uber-pretentious artesian water from Norway.  Naturally, it goes with the territory.

Still battling jet lag and needing a break.  Going to blog a bit about my current assignment.  My firm defines projects as 1+X's, meaning 1 project leader plus X consultants, X usually ranging from 1 to whatever.  In the case of the US office, it's usually 1 or 2.  And of course there is the partner in charge who occasionally parachutes in to schmooze with the higher ups and to crack the whip.  This is normally the partner who sold the project to the client in the first place.

This is my second 1 + 2.  The organization of work looks like a two-level pyramid, with the PL at the apex and the consultants forming the base.  Each individual at the bottom rung takes charge of a module and runs with it.  It's the PL's responsibility to interact with the client, behave as the buffer between consultants and partner, and ensure that work gets finished.  Pretty straight forward stuff.

As for my current module, I work on something very closely related to my last project, except with much wider scope.  It encompasses all of what three of us did on the last project.  Obviously that's not feasible for one person, even if I don't sleep.  Fortunately the client organization has previous exposure to this methodology, and existing tools in place for executing it.  Nonetheless, it is definitely more challenging than my previous engagement from a workload perspective.  While I am really not that thrilled about working on something so similar, this will ensure that I learn this for good.  The question is how valuable I find this methodology.  I definitely refuse to get pigeon-holed as a resident expert in this area for future assignment considerations.

The other annoying aspect of the project: it's an extension of a benchmarking project, meaning what needs to be accomplished in the second phase has already been defined and mapped out.  It's a consultancy trick.  Sell a project, show some promise, and then entice the client to re-up for the implementation project.  Sure it's great for the firm, but for me, it limits the creative boundaries of my problem solving.  We always say that consultants are paid to think.  Yes I still have to use my brain 75% of the time, but I find myself exercising that muscle much closer on the ground level than at the 10,000 miles above I'd like to be.  So, less critical, strategic thinking, and more client team interaction, them being the folks doing the implementation and not C-level execs.

More on Atlanta and Georgia later.

Got back from Germany on Sunday and immediately kicked off a brand new project here in Atlanta.  Since I'm swarmed at the moment, updates will have to come later.  Will have to share about our week-long training session and what's going on here in Georgia.

Some habits never die, including coming home after a late night's worth of partying to pollo con arroz with Gino.  Just a typical Montmelian kitchen gathering - music, chicken, Johnnie Walker, drunken dialing, and four different languages spoken (sorta).

Super busy day today, but wanted to leave you all with a little something before taking off to Europe.  In celebration of Cal demolishing Stanfurd at the Big Game this weekend, I present a little something all Cal freshmen get introduced to in our Chem 1A class back in 1 Pimentel.  Check out this video.