Painting blunders

In my haste to complete the house painting before my friends arrived for the weekend I did not notice the fine folks from Home Depot screwed up my paint order. I actually painted different parts of the wall with two different paint colors. The lids match but the paint does not. Arggg!

Bachelor Party Festivities

Wow. That's just about all I can say about this past weekend. 7 of my best friends, including my little brother, flew in to Chicago from all over the country; North Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and one from the UK. These fine gentlemen treated me to the best damn bachelor party any groom-to-be would die for.

It started on Wednesday evening last week when I picked up my little brother from the airport. First thing on Thursday morning we packed up the dirtbikes and cruised out to Ottawa to Buffalo Range Riding Park; 2 dirtbike tracks and 400+ acres of trails. We got the weekend started with some adrenaline pumping riding and we didn't even crash!

Thursday afternoon and most of the evening was spent at the Hilton Chicago right at the O'hare airport while everyone arrived from their flights. It was amazing to watch each person find their way down to the bar and meet us. It was a cavalcade of best friends from college and my childhood. I was thrilled.

Friday, my best man, Charlie, rented out an entire paintball park for ourselves. No, not just a little private group, but the entire park! I rented a minivan from Enterprise to get us all there and spend some time together catching up on old stories. 8000 rounds of paintball later, a dozen bleeding welts, paint covered pants and thoroughly exhausted, we began the trek back home.

We stopped on the way home to get some things to grill out. "Some things" turned into $329 worth of groceries! We had a massive and killer grill out at the townhouse and a few of my local friends joined in the festivities. After scarfing down hand-made burgers, sausages, potato salad, kabobs, chips, salsa, melon, cookies and having some drinks we rolled out to a local bar for some added fun.

Saturday brought some much needed rest in the morning because Saturday night was fit to be a long one. Just before 6pm a 24-passenger stretch hummer with 3 axles (6 tires) from Exotic Coach rolled into my neighborhood!! I knew Charlie likes to go over the top, but holy crap...this was over the top!


We started at the original Morton's Steak House and had the most amazing time. This was probably my favorite part of the weekend. We were all sober, enjoying a fantastic meal and great drinks, great conversation and a great staff. Our waitress was a sweetheart, my 4 pound lobster was to die for and we drank Cristal and Veuve! I even got to keep the bottle stopper for memorabilia. Oh, and Charlie ate a fistful of wasabi for $80! haha!!

Then, off to Coyote Ugly, Buzz night club, a few random stops, a short stint at the gentleman's club and back to the hotel for a night cap. Most everyone rolled out throughout the day on Sunday and I took Charlie to the airport today.

Wow. What a great weekend! I can't wait to see them all again at the wedding! Only 13 more days!

Stressed Out? Or Burned out?

My brother sent me an interesting article about the different types of stress associated with cycles of success. The article uses CEO's as examples but that be easily substituted for any worker bee out there busting his butt. The short and skinny of the article is to continually challenge yourself; refuse to sit on your laurels and bore yourself. The five ways the author suggests for challenging yourself include diversifying your skills, teaching, planning your succession, networking and renewing your passion.

It also discusses the most common ailments of those facing burnout and how to spot the trend of negative burn out. The author cites the "Four A's" as a result of denying the severity of burnout and the self-destructive patterns that emerge: aloneness, arrogance, adventure seeking, and adultery.

http://www.inc.com/magazine/19960301/1586.html

I can relate in some ways to those cycles. I can see the "eustress" of the building phase and I hope I never see the complacent stage of success that bores me to death!

Last minute dash to ORD

Friday was a nightmare. Waking at 6am to travel halfway to the city for a job interview, rushing back, packing, eating and finishing errands before bolting to pick up Adri from work and get to the airport on time. Luckily, we didn't have any mishaps at the airport and we arrived on time in Charlotte about 6:45pm.

So, by now, the day is starting to look up. We catch a cab to meet our friends at the local Hooters and of course, the cabbie gets lost and takes us to the wrong place. My patience for non-english speaking cab drivers is very low. After explaining to the gentleman that we are from Chicago and have NO idea where the bar is and that's why we hired him...we were able to reach our friends on the phone and have them guide us in. What's the point of driving a cab if you don't know your way around the city? Arg!

Then, as I was saying, things started looking up. We met our friends that we haven't seen in months and all is grand. We slam a few wings and commence drinking. Lucky for me, my friends are so understanding of my newly developed low tolerance, they resort to force-feeding me shots. Between the exhaustion and the drinks I was completely wiped out. Sometime just after midnight at the second bar, I could no longer function. I promptly took a seat in the corner, rested my head against the wall and pouted until we left.

Adrienne Desmedt - The Future Mrs. Rocci!

Adrienne's maid of Honor, Tricia, has made our prenuptial madness quite a bit of fun. She sends little notes and gifts that have been really uplifting. Ash and Charlie sent us an early wedding gift, too. We are blessed to have such great friends. Eww, I just said blessed.

Anyway, here is the latest of maid of honor brilliance:

For more fun details about the upcoming rocci wedding you should surf on over to our blog @ http://rocciwedding.com.

Does your mechanic actually do the work?

Maybe I'm jaded by the dateline investigation series or the many other undercover operations but I never feel confident my mechanic is doing what he's supposed to be doing. If you believe the hype, these reports usually underscore isolated incidents...or does it shed light on a much larger problem? How do you know which mechanic to trust? At Jiffy Lube they change the oil in front of you. You can watch through the window in the lobby as the oil spits out.

But what about the horror stories you hear time and again. How does a regular Joe know if he is getting what he paid for? My suspicion is even higher when I use a coupon. You can always tell when the person taking your order is disappointed you bargain shopped for a deal or downloaded coupons from their websites. How many of these places work on commission?

As a seasoned salesperson myself, I can appreciate the guy trying to upsell a service but there is a distinct line when it comes to doing it with integrity or tricking your customers. Even at NTB, the guy presented 3 oil change options that were "add-ons" to the basic oil change - it was presented in a fashion that most people would not understand they didn't have to buy it at all.

I wish I could say that I blindly trust the services provided by chain-store mechanics. How do you guarantee you are getting what you pay for without doing it yourself?

Just Strap it to the Roof!

The post about our Hooky Day reminded me about the funny trip to pickup the storm door. It was Sunday evening and we had just left our friends house after grilling out some steaks and visiting. So out of the clear blue sky I remember the sale on storm doors ended on Sunday. We rush down to the Menards where they have already taken down the "sale" signs... but, they are still honoring the sale. Phew!

We get through the checkout line and out to the car and realize what a moron I am. We are in our little acura and not the truck. Now how the heck am I going to get a 75 pound door that is 36 inches wide by seven or eight feet tall into this car. The back seats don't fold down, the truck is out of the question and even if I left both rear doors open I still could not stuff the door into that car!

It was getting dark so we had to move. Adri ran to get some twine from inside the store and we tried strapping it to the roof. We got it fairly secured and then it started to rain. Jeez oh Pete, what else could go wrong?

So here we are, driving down the road with one arm hanging out of my window to ensure the front of the door doesn't get caught in a draft, rip the twine and end up in the street. It's raining and gusting wind, the inside of the car is getting soaked and people are honking all around me for going 30mph! I pulled one of the ropes into the window and Adri was hanging on to it for dear life.

All in all, we got the door home and it did not blow off the roof. Although, hindsight being 20/20, after all the crap of putting it up, I kinda wish the dang thing had blown off and broke into a zillion pieces!

Hooky Day

Today began with the potential to be a fantastically wonderful day (mid 70's, bright sun shining, crisp breeze...you get the picture!). I started by trying to convince my fiance that she should call in sick so we could lounge around in the sun, read books, go for a bike ride and maybe start to tackle some of our spring projects since the next five weekends will be out of town or preoccupied. She was unmoved by my earlier persuasions but something struck a cord; half-way to work my fiance called her boss to let her know that she "had too much going on" and needed a personal day.

Why on earth she couldn't simply call in sick when we started this charade is beyond me. We spent 30 minutes cultivating an approach and/or an excuse to taking a hooky day and finally decides to play along after the day is already half over. Not to mention she has already showered, done her hair and makeup, changed twice and driven half-way to work!

Anyway, we got the oil changed on both of our vehicles, had a decent lunch and then split up. She went shopping (like, no duh!) and I went to the office to take care of some outstanding issues (real surprise there). I took off to get a jump start installing our new storm door from Menards.

This, my friends, turned out to be the hardest simple project I've ever tried to do. Nothing seemed to fit where it was supposed to, the door was freaking heavy and awkward and the directions seemed written for a different door. Nothing made any sense! Arrg!

What is your go-to excuse for taking a personal day?

Illinois Real Estate Salesperson License Renewal

Apparently, I am just one of a thousand other real estate professionals that have procrastinated the renewal of their professional license with the state until the absolute last minute. In fact, we have all collectively come together so much, the State of Illinois' webserver is barely functioning and constantly kicks out errors: HTTP 500 Internal Server.

Although on any typical day you could not motivate the independent realtor to do much of anything for his brethren, this day comes as a shock to most in the field. Even the state of Illinois has chimed in on the hammering of their website by reassuring us that even if we cannot complete the renewal online, we will still be assessed a $50 late fee if the renewal is not completed today.

In addition, the telephone renewal hotline is busy and their offices are closed. Awesome.

One Minute Inside a Man's Head

A local radio station, I think it's Kiss 103.5, often runs a skit of "One Minute inside a Woman's Head" which are often quite comical. It plays to the often distracted and completely disjointed thought process of many women; one of whom is my fiance. We have a great laugh about these skits when we hear them. So, I decided I would do "One Minute inside a Man's Head":

Man, I'm hungry. I wonder what's for breakfast. Damn, I know if I want something I'll have to cook it because I know the wife won't do it. So much for eggs and bacon...that reduces the choice to anything that will fit in the microwave. I wonder if we have leftovers. What did we have for dinner last night? Damn, I'm hungry. I don't want to go that meeting at 9am. That old bastard is always busting my balls. I'm kinda horny. No way the wife will go for that this early. Woah! Aim for the toilet bucko...that's gonna suck to clean up. Maybe I should turn the light on when I pee in the middle of the night?

Google Rankings

Well, one point of this blog was to test if blogging would help increase google ranking when searching for key words. This site shot up quickly in the Google Pageranks but just as quickly dropped off the main page and is no where to be found.

Is it because blogspot has no authority? Is it because the site is too new? Does the content fail to stay consistent? Why would the site shoot up so fast and then fall so quickly?

My experiment is not going so well...

Not to mention the lackluster performance of this blog, my LinkedIn profile is also not being indexed by Google. I've followed all the suggestions and parameters from Guy Kawasaki's blog as well as numerous other resources and they have all failed to bump my LinkedIn profile into the search results of Google.

Getting indexed and ranked is tough to do!

David Rocci on LinkedIn

There are many social networking sites out there nowadays; MySpace, Facebook, Zoodango and not to mention the zillions of dating services that tout networking abilities. The problem is many fall short of providing beneficial relationship building for professionals. Many sites lack the professionalism required by today's next generation leaders. LinkedIn fills that gap.

My LinkedIn profile has enabled my connections to network with each other and many have already reaped benefits from the exchange. I intend to grow the network and see where it takes me. I leave my connections open for others to contact and that selflessness is what makes it a better place for everyone to grow.

Guy Kawasaki is a columnist from Forbes that has compiled a list of the top ten ways to improve your listing and get noticed. From his website:

Most people use LinkedIn to “get to someone” in order to make a sale, form a partnership, or get a job. It works well for this because it is an online network of more than 8.5 million experienced professionals from around the world representing 130 industries. However, it is a tool that is under-utilized...

Get the full story on his blog.

Fun times at Chez Rocci

Saturday night was an unexpectedly fun evening in Greywall Club. Around 4-4:30p Adri and I decided to invite over some friends to grill some burgers and dogs and have some beers. Adam, Nicole, Ryan, Paula and their daughter came over for a really fun evening. The first round of frozen Sam's Club burgers went on the charcoal grill when it was a little bit too hot so they were a little burned....luckily no one noticed because they had been drinking. ;)

Then we converted the charcoal grill into a fire pit. We collected some scrap wood from neighboring construction sites and then woke our neighbors while running a circular saw to cut up the wood to fit into the grill. The fire added the perfect flare of ambience to a great night of fun and laughs with some good friends.

All in all, it was a terrific weekend; productive, fun and WARM!

What more can schools do?

In an earlier post I mentioned the difficult boundary of balancing student intervention, covering the liability aspects of the university and refraining from turning our university campuses into locked down prisons with metal detectors and body searches before class.

It seems that Time shares the same sentiment in asking, What More Can Schools Do? While none of us would like to see an event like this happen again we have to be conscious to prevent the sacrifice of our freedoms and privacy.

However much time colleges put into their efforts, there's no surefire way to predict violent behavior, and jumping to conclusions can have dire consequences for troubled students.

What can be done to find middle ground?

Liberty Tax season is over!

The first season of Liberty Tax Service in Shorewood is in the books. After a few grueling months of hectic 15 hour days, I thought I would be relieved that it is all over...but I only feel a bit lost. I've lost my purpose. Interviewing for a job sucks when you know your passion is for business ownership. I'm not looking forward to slaving for someone else...but you gotta do what ya gotta do!

I'm planning an employee party for April 28th. It should be a fun hooray to end the season and thank my staff for their terrific work this year. We are leaning towards an afternoon of bowling and some cocktails.

Chicago Web Design

I've searched high and low throughout Chicago to find a web design company that is responsive, hands-on and current with ever-changing technology. Most of us in need of good web design help are inundated with search results for web design and hosting these days but most companies offer boring templates or do-it-yourself configuration. If you need an expert that is willing to go the extra mile, you need the Usman Group - they are the premier chicago web design company.

Naveed Usman, the head honcho over there has been mentoring me with his SEO (search engine optimization) skill and it is already paying big dividends...stay tuned for the newest Rocci projects! The Usman Group offers programming, design, integration, optimization and expert consulting. You can read a little more about Naveed through his blog or his professional profile on LinkedIn.

Stop your search for quality web design in chicago and start looking at The Usman Group!

Liberty Tax countdown to filing deadline

T minus 51 minutes until my first season as a Liberty Tax Service franchise owner comes to a close. It has been a challenging and tiresome journey with many unexpected hurdles but overall I have learned sooo much from this experience. In the last 7 days I have been at this office for 113 hours! My respect for the income tax preparation business has been magnified by this experience. I can honestly say I've done more work in the last 14 weeks that many people do in twice the time.


Hats off to my phenomenal staff that made this year as fun and rewarding as it has been. These people fought through gruesome nights of training, passionate dissertations from yours truly and many late nights; special thanks to my new close friend, Red Bull. I simple could not have done it without them. I sincerely thank each of these wonderful people for their dedication and perseverance as we learned together.

VT follow-up

I feel compelled to add that I attended Virginia Tech for many years. This tragedy twists a pang of emotions in my belly that is impossible to describe. Two of the guys in my upcoming wedding party have little brothers that still attend the school. As the stories developed we frantically emailed each other with concern. Luckily, the people we know are safe. Unfortunately, the impact of the events will play out for many months to come.

The emotional attachment I have to this situation should embolden my previous post about exonerating Virginia Tech of culpability in this situation. I stand by my previous post that the responsibility for this event lies squarely on the shoulders of the GUNMAN and no one else.

The gunman who killed 30 people at Virginia Tech's Norris Hall before turning the gun on himself was student Cho Seung-hui, university police Chief Wendell Flinchum said Tuesday.

We cannot react to this event by locking down our universities. We cannot respond by creating an environment likened to a prison just for the sake of preventing a once in a zillion chance some wacko is going to kill everyone. These are issues that need to addressed proactively and I don't know what the steps are to do that but I do know we cannot sacrifice our liberties and the characters of our university system because of a single crazed lunatic.

Virginia Tech Massacre

Today brings emptiness after a day of frantic emailing and phone calling to confirm the safety and medical conditions of loved ones at Virginia Tech. As everyone in the country now knows, a lone gunman killed 32 students and professors, including himself, in a historic day of monumental violence.

According to Virginia Tech police chief Wendell Flinchum, it's reported the sick bastard even chained the doors to the building before beginning his systematic murder spree. I struggle to face the mix of emotions I feel about this situation. Anger, frustration and sadness come to mind but still miss the mark.

I've listened to and read many reports that are pointing the finger at VT administration for failing to lock down the campus quick enough. I know we are all looking for someone to blame in this incident so we must NOT take our focus off the killer that orchestrated this heinous act. It's more difficult to focus on him because he is dead and will never face a trial for his actions but we cannot shift our blame to anyone else. The school acted as quickly as they could with the information they had at the time.

No one else is to blame for this besides the gunman. Let's not forget it! It's a shame that he got off so easy but we must not divert our anger and blame for this incident to anyone other than this man.

wedding announcement

While I'm at it, I thought I also should mention that I'm getting married on May 27th, 2007 to a my beautiful counterpart, Adrienne Desmedt. We make a dynamic team and work through challenges with flying colors. She is my rock and helps steer me through all the tough times and she is the MOST fun to celebrate with during the good times.

You can browse the wedding website of David Rocci and Adrienne Desmedt and read our pseudo-blog at http://www.rocciwedding.com. We also elected to have 100% online RSVP'ing for our guests. We streamlined many aspects of our planning to remain on a tight budget. I recommend the budgeting tools on The Knot for anyone serious about keeping budgets and timelines when planning a wedding.

Who: David Rocci & Adrienne Desmedt
When: May 27, 2007
Where: Oak Crest Cove, Sandwich, Massachusetts

David Rocci Introduction

My name is David Rocci. I'm exploring the opportunities of online blogging to expand a SEO campaign of professional networking. This is my first stint into blogging and I only picked this one because it was free. I looked into typepad but they were too expensive. Is there really a difference between where you blog and the quality of search results you obtain?

Everyone said that social networking sites like MySpace and LinkedIn were the key to building sustainable contacts for both professional and personal relationship building but I've found them seriously lacking on Google rankings. Am I doing these social networking sites incorrectly? Am I missing the proper indexing parameters? Or are they mostly overlooked as overpopulated compilations of abbreviated text and absurd two-sentence bulletin posts?

In either case, social networking did not work for me so far. I've now embarked on a campaign to increase visibility by making quality posts to many community forums such as Real Estate Webmasters and YoungEntrepreneur; you can view my respective profiles for David Rocci the Real Estate Guru and David Rocci the Entrepreneur. I've also decided to indulge in some forums for some of my favorite activities as well; motocross and skydiving.