Although I never knew Mr. Jobs personally, the works of Apple had a profound impact on my life and is indirectly responsible for where I am today. From my first Mac LC, to the amazing Quad-Core MacBook Pro with Dual Thunderbolt Displays, I’ve been an Apple fan-boy through and through.

My closest encounter with Steve Jobs was when he showed my wedding video during his 2005 keynote at Macworld. We had just gotten married a few weeks before in Hawaii and Apple had sent a crew out to film our happy day, although we didn’t know at the time how it was going to be used. To seem him on stage showing a 30 second clip of my wedding promoting Final Cut Express HD was one of the crowning moments of my tech life. Here is a picture from the keynote.

So with that, I would like to bid a fond farewell to a true American icon and business legend. May you ride off into that digital sunset with endless playlists and free wifi. You have changed the world for the better.

I am very humbled by this award and it also serves as a reminder of why I love what I do and can’t imagine doing anything else.

As a reward, I will be heading down to our Australia next month to visit our Sydney office. I’m looking forward to seeing how they do things down under.

We not only launched a refresh of Joost.com, but also launched our corporate site joostmedia.com. There were the usual branding elements such as logos, business cards, color palate, and general style guides, but there was also the presentation decks to help market the company.

At the same time, we were also charged with launching one of our new business units, Adconion Direct. I personally helped guide them with their overall messaging, this included the concept of “Be Direct”. Take a look at the site adconiondirect.com.

It seems to be months in between blogs, but I have been so busy, it’s just silly. I’m putting together a couple of case studies and should have that and examples up soon.

The site is built on the WordPress framework and it does a fantastic job showcasing what RedLever is all about.

As of the beginning of January, my Creative Services group has been living under the Joost umbrella. While the official move will happen next week with the brand re-launch, we have been operating in that fashion for some time.

While there is a certain nostalgia factor in being associated with RedLever, especially considering the growth we have seen internationally, there is something really sexy about Joost. To me, getting to say that I am the Creative Director at Joost is really cool. I just love saying it.

We launch the new brand on March 1st and I currently have 15 things on my to-do list before launch and the list seems to get longer by-the-day. The good news: I have a fantastic and incredibly talented team that is going to “crush it”.

Stay tuned for some cool snippets from the upcoming brand launch…

I pay over $600 a month for insurance that covers myself and the other four members of my family

Over 70% of all the requests and claims we make for Makoa are denied by our insurance

The real icing on the cake was this past week when we were denied a RSV vaccine that would help strengthen Makoa’s immune system, which is the exact reason we were in the hospital in May. Our case worker told us that if we made less money or didn’t have insurance he would be able to receive the vaccine.

Hold on a minute, you are telling me that if I didn’t have a job or didn’t have insurance I could get the vaccine? Does anyone else see the fatal flaw in this? I pay for insurance every month and I’m paying taxes for the people that don’t have insurance, yet they get better coverage and healthcare than I do? Does anyone realize that I am being encouraged to mooch off the government?

I’m all for everyone having health care. I’m thankful that Makoa will always have coverage because of his pre-existing condition. I think it’s absolutely crazy to provide health care coverage to those who don’t have it when the people that pay for it can’t even get the health benefits they need. Fix what’s broken first. Go after the insurance companies that we pay each month that refuse every claim and every referral we put in.

While all the unemployed people and folks who don’t have insurance are getting the best care, I’m forking out over 15k to get the coverage my son needs, hoping to recoup some of that from Anthem. We all know that isn’t going to happen.

I say repeal Obamacare and fix the current system or put a system in place to cover those who pay for insurance and pay taxes. I’d love to have someone debate me on this because if you’re not living this nightmare, you don’t even deserve to be at the podium.