Jay Sachetti joined Jeff O’Brien, partner at Husch Blackwell and Dyanne Ross-Hanson, president of Exit Planning Strategies talked about the market for mergers and acquisitions, exit planning opportunities for companies that don’t end up for sale and how companies can maximize their eventual sale price during an early October panel at the first Upsize on Tap event at Summit Brewing Co. in St. Paul.
When the state Legislature passed a law requiring employers to provide paid leave and safe time for employees, Justin Bieganek started hearing differing details from friends, colleagues and peers.
I got a smart speaker for Christmas and soon learned about all the amazing things it can do, like sync all my light fixtures, turn up the thermostat, mix a cocktail and shovel snow — I think, although I lost interest quickly when it turned out a few of those items were off the table.
I didn’t use it for any of those things, though, because I don’t care about them.
Instead, day after day I would say: “Hey Google, play Adele,” and it would do so, or actually it would sometimes play Pink instead but I don’t know why.
After about the fifth day of this, when I was dancing around the kitchen to Adele (or Pink) my son Clark, who was home from college for break, came up from the basement.
He looked at me with such scorn that, for a moment, I knew exactly how the ancient Eskimo elders felt just before their children put them on an ice floe and shoved them out to sea.
But he was helpful, too. I kept shouting things at the speaker, like, “Hey Google, could you please go ahead and turn down the music now because it’s a little too loud?”
After a few tries and no results, Clark looked at the speaker and said in a regular voice: “Hey Google, stop.” And it did. Then he gave the ice floe a big push.
It’s not that I don’t appreciate technological advancement. I do, just not necessarily things that seemingly many other people find groovy. I don’t care when I was in light sleep or deep because it’s apparent when I wake up haggard or fresh.
I don’t care if there’s an LED sensor on the milk cooler by the espresso machine that shows when it’s empty, because if you lift it up that’s obvious, and it doesn’t cost $400 extra.
Things I care deeply about, meanwhile, like vibrant bricks-and-mortar retail, seem to be stuck tragically in the past. At Target I wait for the cashier to Pick. Up. Each. Green. Pepper. To. Check. The. Price.
At J.C.Penney (don’t ask why) I wait in what appears to be the shortest of four lines, only to be yelled at when I’m almost at the front that the line is actually on the other side, 20 people back. Amazon Prime, I wish I knew how to quit you.
My favorite technological advancement right now is a throwback.
It’s my smart TV with a single remote that has only four buttons: Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and something else. (Is there anything else?) It’s in my she shed, which is what my millennial staff members tell me is the current term for a cougar cave.
I don’t tell them I need to use a dumb remote because I have to keep up my reputation as their sharp and scintillating editor, which I actually can do with some old-fashioned analog skills that I developed the hard way. I can work a source to get the perfect quote or write a story that will blow readers’ minds. What I can’t do is figure out which of three remotes turns on my husband’s TV. Which plays Showtime, which rents a movie, which turns up the sound bar …
What to do? I’ll just go in the kitchen to listen to my favorite songs by Adele. “Hey Google,” I’ll say. “Play Pink.”
