If there's one thing I've learned as an exhibit manager, it's to never believe for a minute that I've seen it all when it comes to trade show snafus. The reality is that there are so many moving parts in this industry that the human mind cannot even begin to calculate the number of ways in which things can go outlandishly, horribly wrong. This kernel of wisdom was thrust upon me recently when I was preparing to exhibit at a show in Las Vegas. My company, located in Tampa, FL

I woke up this morning on a concrete landing outside of the door of my guesthouse in Venice.  It was my first night there, and if I thought my neck was stiff after a transatlantic flight, I had no idea the misery concrete steps could cause me. This was not exactly how I thought my first night in Venice would go. Actually, if I prepared 100 possible scenarios, this wasn’t one of them. But there I was – cold, exhausted, cried out and bedraggled to the point that I definitely lo

Let’s face it, Winona is kind of the epicenter of everything that’s good about the Midwest. Sound like puffery? Not a bit. And let me tell you why… I had this epiphany during a conversation with a smart guy I know named Andy, who also happens to be the former executive director at the  Minnesota Marine Art Museum . We were talking about how Winona is close enough to Rochester and La Crosse to be considered sort of an added attraction for those places – how all our arts and sc

When Matt Mohlke was 24, he wrote ten things on a bar napkin that he wanted to do during his life. Partying with comedian Chris Rock at the Sundance Film Festival was not on the list, but then again neither was the 3,274-mile journey down the Amazon that routed him there. Mohlke was at the Sundance Film Festival to introduce Big River Man, an award-winning feature film in which Mohlke, who lives in Fountain City, Wisc., plays a cornerstone role. But Mohlke isn’t an actor. He

Zombies. The dull-eyed, people-gobbling monsters have become the darlings of American pop culture, though certainly not for their charisma. Their flesh hangs, they'll eat their own families, and they never say anything interesting, yet our love affair with them has only intensified since they first lurched across the silver screen 80 years ago. Today, straight-faced debates rage, to the tune of some 316 million Google hits, about where exactly a zombie has to be shot in the b

I admit it: I was feeling pretty grumpy this holiday season. Downright Scroogish, even. Christmas has always been my favorite time of year; I love the parties and laboring for hours to choose gifts for people I care about, and I love the cheer of my parents’ home where my big family gathers. But this year between Thanksgiving and Christmas my car broke and my camera lens broke and my couch broke and my furnace broke and my dog got sick and my daughter made me really mad...an

A tattered scrapbook and a handful of 8mm movies are like gold to John Schneider’s family. The grainy images of a smiling Schneider are all they have left to remind them of the happy days when he was alive, days that were forever taken from this family by one man’s murderous act. Schneider, a Winona County Sheriff’s Office investigator of 22 years, died from a rifle blast to his chest September 7, 1980 after he responded to a domestic disturbance at a mobile home in Goodview.

As a mother I believe it is my sworn duty to expand the horizons of my children, so on a recent trip to Mexico I was determined that we would not have one of those “resort vacations” where the extent of the culture is contained in the fact that the staff is Mexican. Besides, I’d been to Mexico lots of times, so it was with no small amount of swagger that I announced to my daughters, 12 and 16, that we were going to ride the city bus to the market one day for lunch. They w

I’d like to throttle whoever invented the Tooth Fairy. I hate that nocturnal bicuspid-thieving creature more than any other mythical being I pretend to be for my children, mostly because I’m really bad at it. Being Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny are easy. Holiday shrapnel is all over my house to remind me about the job I have to do. But a tooth is tiny. A tooth is random. A tooth gets buried under a pillow hours before I ever think about calling it a day, and most days I

It’s surprising how much time you have to think about things when you’re accidentally flying through the air on a 500-pound machine. You ponder things like, “I have the handlebars, but where is the snowmobile?” And stuff dawns on you like, “I think I’m about to wreck an $8,000 machine that doesn’t belong to me.” And you mull questions like, “I wonder how many bones I’m going to break when I hit the ground.” And I wondered what exactly possessed me to get on a machine like