EMP-60

Greetings EMP-60ers! I was so happy to hear from more of you when I put the plea out for updates, and I am not above using Facebook to spy on all of you and create updates of my own for you, so heed my warning.

PA Wendin checks in via email at pwendin@innlink.com to let us know that he is doing well and has moved back to Sweden after 15 good years in the U.S. He is happy to be closer to family and is working as a consultant at Accenture again. He has BMW and Ericsson as current clients. He asks us all to keep in touch and if we are ever in Sweden to drop him a line.

I heard from David Krauskopf, who is still living in the Washington, D.C., area with his growing family. He put forth a challenge to me to give everyone a much harder time about keeping in touch, so I will have to work on that! I have asked him to visit me in Louisville to play in the Midwest’s best poker room at the Horseshoe. In David’s words: “Things are pretty good for me in the D.C. area. I am swamped with three kids now — Xander, Conrad and Max! Hamanasi Adventure Resort is doing very well and was awarded top 10 in the world for best service this year by TripAdviser.com. Kellogg community gets a discount! I am doing a lot of angel investing and am a founding member of an angel group, Blu Venture Investors, that makes around four investments a year of $400K-1M in D.C.-area startups. I am also chairman of a fast-growing software company, Latista Technologies, that sells quality management solutions to Fortune 500 companies for large construction projects. So I guess you could say I am not bored these days.”

Kevin Hutchins also writes to say that he and his beautiful wife welcomed their second child, a baby girl. His son (2) is enjoying being a big brother. Kevin is still living in San Francisco, working for Juniper Networks in corporate development, and was able to connect with some fellow alums (not in our class) at the Kellogg Impact event there.

My new class hero is Tom Bronz, who quickly wrote me when he heard that we were flooding pretty bad here on the Ohio River. He wanted to make sure my family and I were safe, and if we needed anything that he would jump in his truck, drive over six hours and bring us anything we need. Fortunately, we live high up and far enough from the river that we suffered no damage. However, I was stranded at work for four days when our property became an island (literally) and was only accessible via boat. We had several closures but were able to reopen just in time for our busiest weekend of the year and the 137th running of the Kentucky Derby. I loved attending my first derby and even hit a $2 exacta box. Hats off to you, Tom, for reaching out so quickly and generously offering your assistance. It really kept me positive through those times and I feel so blessed to have such great friends and classmates.

Speaking of Toms. Tom Himmel and his family have moved to Chapel Hill, N.C., and seem to be loving it there. He accepted a big job with Armacell that still has him traveling the world. I saw a picture of Panama on his Facebook page that looked wicked.

Our own Aaron Matos has become quite the triathlete and competed in a few events this year. In the Tempe International Triathalon (1500m swim, 40k bike, 10k run), Aaron finished in 2:31:21, 71st overall out of about 380 and 17th of 53 in the 40-44 age group. Aaron comments, “I’ll take it as my first tri and benchmark.” Way to go Aaron!