Tuesday was all meetings in the city, all a couple of miles apart, the perfect day to take the bike. I can’t believe people think it is easier to drive those short trips rather than bike. Lucky me, I have a bike, so I hopped on it first thing and pedaled through the changing leaves over to Waverly for a most excellent meeting with R. and O., two of my favorite co-conspirators. Then it was time for a ride down to Mount Vernon to meet B. and N. for a meeting about redesigning the website and using social media strategically–they pay people for that, but I think we can manage the twitter account without too much trouble. The last stop was at Centerstage for a many-hour symposium, brought to us by the Open Society Institute–Baltimore. It was an odd mix of life coaching, advertising, and interesting reframings of problems, and at the end we got decent wine and really good snacks. I snapped this picture as Pedro Noguera asked us if Baltimore cares more about kids than the Ravens. Giggles ran through the crowd of 500, each of whom paid $100-$125 a seat or knew someone who could pay their way (work paid mine). Of course we care more about kids than a football team. And the the President of the Ravens came out to talk about winning, and how winning in sports can translate to winning in the city, and how seeing winners makes it easier to be winners, and the questions were all softballs and the moderator made a crack about his nagging wife and then I just wanted it all to be over, it was just too grotesque. I took a bathroom break, ate a couple of cookies, and was back in my seat for more. And then N. sauntered down, we went out for a most delicious dinner, and I beat her home by 40 minutes. Bike beats bus, every time.