Sam the Eagle and my Dad:

My dad's favorite kind of humor is when an uptight snob gets his/her just desserts. So I've been sending him and we've been bonding over Sam The Eagle clips. The one above has been his favorite thus far.

And today is his 65th birthday. Happy Birthday Dad!

Thought of the Day: For my girl...

"These are the dreams that we dream. These are big and special things.
These are days, of rain and shine. You and me. And I feel fine."

--The Bodeans

Just one more day please...

Still catching up. Need one more day please.

From the 'Vantage Point" of Friendship:

So I'm taking myself this afternoon to see Vantage Point (trailer) Why? Because it is the debut screenplay of one Barry L. Levy, a close friend of mine from high school. Barry and I have known each other since 1990 and actually wrote a screenplay together all those years ago called "Parental Consent" about a high school boy whose mother keeps murdering his prom dates.

He obviously made much more of our early partnership than I did.

Seeing it this weekend is my little contribution to its opening weekend, the crucial statistic in measuring movie success. I'm busier than sin this weekend and its raining but one of my promises to myself and the people in my life this year is that I support their endeavors, just as I'd want them to support mine.

So congratulations Barry. Your old friend Kevin is hella proud of you.

Word of the Day: "Fantasia"

Fantasia (noun): "A medley of familiar themes."

Seen: In Maya Angelou's Singin', Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas which I'm reading at the moment.

Golf is in the Ruff:

Maybe you heard but the popularity of golf has flattened out. Reasons are numerous:

“The answer is usually economic,” Mr. Kass said. “No time. Two jobs. Real wages not going up. Pensions going away. Corporate cutbacks in country club memberships — all that doom and gloom stuff.”

In many parts of the country, high expectations for a golf bonanza paralleling baby boomer retirements led to what is now considered a vast overbuilding of golf courses.

Between 1990 and 2003, developers built more than 3,000 new golf courses in the United States, bringing the total to about 16,000. Several hundred have closed in the last few years, most of them in Arizona, Florida, Michigan and South Carolina, according to the foundation.

At the meeting here, there was a consensus that changing family dynamics have had a profound effect on the sport.

“Years ago, men thought nothing of spending the whole day playing golf — maybe Saturday and Sunday both,” said Mr. Rocchio, the public relations consultant, who is also the New York regional director of the National Golf Course Owners Association. “Today, he is driving his kids to their soccer games. Maybe he’s playing a round early in the morning. But he has to get back home in time for lunch.”

Being a dedicated mini-golf player myself, I can't say I'm shedding a lot of tears over this. I'd be interested to hear how the people's game of moats and outsized animals is doing.

Literary Titans and their Birthday Cakes:

Today, February 21st, is the the birthday of W.H. Auden, David Foster Wallace, Anais Nin and Ha Jin.

Crazy! (via The Writer's Almanac)

Continued Silence:

Working on a book review. Must finish by tomorrow night. More upon completion.

San Francisco Writer's Conference:

I will speaking all weekend (starting today) at the San Francisco Writer's Conference. Posting may be light and I will undoubtedly be hoarse.

Museums After Dark:

My awesome girlfriend pointed this piece in the NY Times out to me. Apparently, it's now standard for museums to be open at night and throwing after hours events.

Over the last decade, just about all of New York’s major museums — and a few of its minor ones — have jumped on the nocturnal bandwagon, hoping to hook a younger generation on museumgoing. But they’ve hooked the older crowd as well, with some offering live music or D.J.’s, performances and lectures, discount prices and, not surprisingly, booze.

A majority of these evening activities are on Friday nights, seemingly perfect for just-arrived out-of-town weekenders. The crowds they attract appear much more New Yorker than tourist. The average attendee comes with high heels and a hip handbag, not sensible shoes and a Lonely Planet guide.

Here in San Francisco, both the De Young Museum and Yerba Buena Art Center do this too.

Which actually raises an interesting question my dad and I were discussing this weekend. What is the obligation of a non-profit organziation to cultivate a new generation of supporters?

The brat in me yells "A Huge One!" I'm just as tired as you are of staid, lifeless organizations assuming that, because my grandparents gave to them out of social obligation, that I will simply roll over an do the same. Welcome to the age of limitless choice, where the law is "If you don't speak in my language, I don't have to listen."

However, as Pa Smokler points out "What if another organization in the same community is already doing that? Does every single organization everywhere have to have a young person's initiative?"

Well no. That seems positively wasteful.

Efforts to attract new generations are time consuming, expensive and must be deployed with great care. Some non-profits simply don't have the resources to do that radical paradigm shift, even some of the time, with no certain payoff. And I sympathize with that reality.

However, I also believe there is no greater recipe for failure than ignoring the inevitable future. And the future says that most organizations a few decades from now will have to depend on a more hybridized mix of small and large donors, and non-monetary opportunities for involvement. Big donors are few and far between and are spreading their resources out more than ever. Little donors can become big donors, particularly if you involve them early on. And every organization has costs that can be outsourced to volunteers if done skillfully.

The future belongs to those who prepare for it today. How ready are we?