My Brazilian friend, Valquiria, was going to speak at a conference in Austin, Texas in early November and it would be her first time in the United States so I wanted to be there to welcome her as an ambassador to the USA like she has been an ambassador to me for Brazil. I have never been to Austin before but living in Denver as an adult I met a lot of people who either love Austin, previously lived there or were hoping to return again. The city gets a huge amount of hype within the USA owing to a vibrant music, party and food scene. What once was kind of an edgy, unique and cool alternative city has blown up in the past twenty years to become a mainstream tech hub. During the pandemic people from both coasts moved to Texas to work remotely and save on paying federal income taxes and in the process engineered a sort of cultural revitalization or at least transitioning, at least from my perspective as an outsider who just heard lots of people telling me their opinions about Austin. My post-college roommate Nick back in Allston, Massachusetts and his girlfriend both went to […]
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I stopped in Denver for the first time in a long time — sometime in 2022 I think? Anyway it was time to repack my bag again after so long on the road and I wanted to visit my friends and family. I crashed in the basement of my friend Eric’s house for a few nights and then I headed north to southern Wyoming to visit my dad and his wife on our family’s property in Carbon County. Since my days in the USA are limited for tax purposes (< 35 a year) I always jam pack a lot of obligatory ToDos into a short period of time (re-registering the license plate of my car, Amazon.com orders, catching up with friends etc). This time in Denver I was really fun. I celebrated the University of Colorado’s big first-week win at a watch party in downtown Denver with a big group of alumni, and met up with four different former coworkers. By the time I arrived in Wyoming I was ready to spend time with my dad and go to sleep early. I worked from the kitchen table and had coffee with him and then we rode ATVs around the property […]
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When I was in the Maldives in 2021, I began a year-long program through the University of California Berkeley’s Haas School of Business for Chief Executive Officers (CTOs). As previously related in a previous blog post, I had dedicated the year to upskilling and learning — the CTO program was a part of that initiative. Initially, the program had been designed for extensive in-person learning; however, Covid necessitated a pivot to an online format which was lucky for me — I would not have been able to attend classes from my over-water bungalow on the other side of the world otherwise. As I am increasingly aware — Covid enacted needed changes for remote productivity. Organizations implemented creative, remote-first solutions and opened the door for more ubiquitous location independence I have been living by example since 2015. So I suppose I should say that while Covid initiated negative changes in my life, it also gifted me some blessings as well — attending my CTO program from an island resort in the Maldives was one of them. The eleven-month program was completed with a week of in-person, on-campus lectures, activities, and commencement during the first week of April 2022 in Berkeley, California. […]
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After spending 5 months in Denver, Colorado I needed a change of pace so I heeded the invitations of my international friends who now call Venice Beach home and spent three nights steps from the ocean, channeling some raw creative humanity to break me out of my routine. Boy did it work. Something I have had to rediscover and reminded myself of the past few months is just how much I require transition to be the best version of myself. I thrive with the discomforts of the non-routine and find myself more myself when I seek it out. My short trip to LA could never be described as uncomfortable — everything was easily facilitated with the help of my local friends Arestia, Johnson, Derryl, Chris and Brittany. Between In-and-Out burgers, a Saturday bar crawl on electric scooters and a hip, industrial art show in downtown LA — I had so much fun mixing things up. A total jolt to my system and a needed reminder of just how important environment and wonderful people are to maintaining a healthy, happy Reid.
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Back in December my sister forwarded an airline promotion email between Denver and San Francisco so I bought a flight to visit her and her family for a week in February. The intent was to inject some state-side adventure and family time as a way of self-training appreciation for what America has to offer me. It worked well in Kansas City for Christmas, Breckenridge in January; could such an ongoing strategy of regular, domestic adventures be the key to avoiding American stagnation? Is this the mode that can allow for me to live a conventional life somewhere in the USA without getting stuck in the sort of time hole that makes five or ten years of my life disappear in the blink of an eye? It’s a coping mechanism I’ve been aggressively testing in 2018. So I flew out for a week in early February to live the life my San Fran Fam lives — and it was great. My nieces and nephews are rockstars and being able to hang out with them was the highlight of my week. My sister’s family lives on the West Side of the San Francisco bay in Marin County which is really posh and […]
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This past autumn I knew that I would be living in Colorado for a few months while I recalibrated my direction for 2018. In order to reduce the risk of state-side suicide I plotted with my friend Sam to spend three weeks skiing and working from the small ski town of Breckenridge, Colorado. We really lucked out because Sam’s friend happened to be renting out her very comfortable Breckenridge condo, 4 blocks from Main street. We booked it and Sam flew out from New York at the beginning of January for the month. The condo we lived in is located two blocks from the free Breckenridge shuttle bus that drives to the lifts. We would ski either in the morning or afternoon and in the evenings we worked, slow-cooked pot roast, watched ski movies, watched the NFL playoffs and enjoyed the Summit county, Colorado lifestyle: the USA equivalent to last year’s Swiss Lifestyle. A friend asked how the two compare — I told him that the people are more friendly in Colorado but the lift tickets more expensive. The second weekend I drove north two hours to Steamboat Springs, Colorado (two hours north from Breckenridge) to stay and ski with […]
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I have been anticipating spending Thanksgiving with my relatives in Georgia for years and was finally able make it happen en route back to Denver, Colorado. Special thanks to April and her boyfriend Vince for hosting me for a weekend of sight-seeing and barbeque eating in Kirkwood — a neighborhood of Atlanta very reminiscent of my home back on the outskirts of Denver. Both are industrial, warehouse districts with train tracks crossing them that have undergone gentrification over the past several years as new cool cafes and restaurants spring up. A personal highlight of the weekend was eating pecans fallen from the backyard tree. I created a monstrosity of a coffee by creating a grinded coconut milk infusion for my morning coffee. After that I headed about an hour south of the city to Brooks, Georgia, a very small town where my father’s first cousin lives with his wife. I spent twelve days here working from my computer on their kitchen table, eating a lot of Andy and Susan’s food and disrupting the organization and serving of breakfast, lunch and dinner. In addition to helping with that, I was perhaps the most dull houseguest they have ever had the pleasure […]
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My tenant is moving out of my furnished industrial loft in Denver, Colorado May 13th, 2017. Subsequently I am offering it to friends who want to visit/stay in Denver prior to arranging for a long term tenant. If you are interested please let me know. Location: on the edge of Cole and RiNo I.5 miles to downtown Denver 3 minutes to 1-25 and I-70 Boulder is 40 minutes away, DTC is the same 1 bedroom, 923 sq ft 14ft ceilings concrete floors private roof deck accessible via bay windows Not pictured in the photos below is a fancy new oven and refinished bathroom and shower. Secured parking lot with one parking space. Walk-in closet and laundry & dishwasher. Surrounding area very bicycle friendly. Convenient walking to a Crossfit gym, microbrewery and sports bar. Photos by Tim Bungum
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I met my brother and dad in Cody, Wyoming for a three day road trip, fishing three rivers through central Wyoming. We fished the Shoshone, Yellowstone and Greybull – with the intent of catching Yellowstone Cutthroat – one of the four native species of Cutthroat trout native to Wyoming. My father was in the midst of completing the CuttSlam and needed a Yellowstone Cutthroat to complete the #cuttslam challenge. It was easier than we anticipated and I had a lot of fun practicing my low light picture taking at dusk. We continued on to our family ranch in Carbon County, in the family for 150 years, where I remained and spent some time working and enjoying my favorite place in the world. Though my official mailing address, apartment and cars reside in Denver, this part of Wyoming has always been my home. Though no family permanently resides here (we use it as a vacation residence in the summer) through my young years within a divorced family split across cities and states, two high schools, and college back east, for me it has always invoked that emotion that people ascribe to home. Re-entry to the comfortable can be dangerous when you are in the midst of exploring the world. Why re-introduce discomforts […]
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I lived in Kansas City for twelve formative years of young adult life. In retrospect I can attribute base attributes of my personality to that Midwestern culture within which I was raised: kindness, consideration for others, love of barbeque beef along with the desire to eat more food than is prudent. My mother and stepfather still live in Kansas City and my brother and his family do as well. I made a quick three day trip to visit, eat and see some of my old grade school friends after living internationally for 15 months. I’ve been dreading experiences the comforts and accordance of state-sidelife back in the states. How can I return to 2nd and 3rd world adventures after driving to Whole Foods, eating home style comfort food and speaking English? Some initial reactions upon USA re-entry: air conditioning is uncomfortable. Kansas City is charming and completely underrated (especially by me). Americans aren’t so bad out here. I think I should look at the real estate market downtown these lofts look really cool. If I lived here I would be obese. I remember the sounds of the cicadas from when I was a kid. I visited the Central Library, Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, The Blue […]
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