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Here’s a slideshow from my San Diego trip a few weekends ago.

Guy Fawkes Day today. Children throughout the empire burn effigies of the Gunpowder Traitor.

She left me last night. “Sent me away,” to borrow her parlance.

Any of you who know me personally have some idea of how head-over-heels I’ve been for the past two months. At her request, I refrained from writing about her on this blog, which has led to some abortive postings. I couldn’t write about the penultimate show on Springsteen’s tour without discussing the joy I felt at holding her close while the band played New York City Serenade.

My entries from Utah last week are incomplete, nowhere mentioning that the trip was the terminal end of a 16-day period we spent apart. They don’t mention that, the moment I landed, I raced through the airport to my car and drove to the ferry at Weehawken, so that I could see her again.

How did I manage to write that Robert Parish entry (Sept. 6) without adding, “Last night, I met the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with”?

I’m not sure how adequately I can write about her (and myself) right now. I feel like a shadow, which is hardly a descriptor of what’s raging inside me. It doesn’t encompass the fury, the futility, the loneliness of going to bed and knowing that there’s no possibility of holding her close again.

Holding her close: the only moments in my life when I felt I was in the right place. I had no idea a person could feel that way. Which is to say, I never really knew what it meant to be in love. Now I do.

Here’s the editorial for the new issue of the magazine I edit for my day-job. Enjoy:

You, Too?
In the Pharma business, there’s no shame in coming in second. Or third

Hardly seems like four years, but that’s how long it’s been since we launched Contract Pharma. We started with a November/December issue back in 1999, so finishing this issue each year feels something like an anniversary to me (which probably helps explain why I’ve never been married).

It doesn’t feel quite like a year-end edition, because of production lead times, which leave us around seven or eight weeks till 2004. It’s hard to get that impending New Year’s perspective when Thanksgiving is still weeks away. So, no 2004 resolutions this issue; we’ll save that for next time around (the Jan/Feb issue). Instead, I’d like to get into the topic of me-too-ism.

A recent BusinessWeek article (“Is Viagra Vulnerable?” Oct. 27, 2003) goes in-depth with the marketing staff for Lilly, which is responsible for handling the launch of Cialis, a competitor to Viagra and Levitra. Cialis will be backed with a $100 million direct-to-consumer publicity campaign, a first for Lilly (which developed the drug with Icos). The campaign is intended to differentiate the new drug from the others in its class, with the long-term goal, according to Lilly chief executive officer Sidney Taurel, of reaching $2 billion in annual sales for Cialis by 2010.

Reading the piece during the flight to AAPS, the line in the article that caught my attention was from Leonard M. Blum, Icos’ vice president of sales and marketing. Expressing the challenges Cialis faces, he said, “There aren’t many examples in our industry of products launched in second or third position that end up becoming the leader. It’s a tall order.”

Doubtless, this line surprises some of my readers, just as it surprised me; it seemed antithetical to the practices of the Pharma industry as we know it. After all, the recent history of the Pharma business is filled with drugs that were second-in-class and managed to perform just fine in the marketplace. In fact, a recent study by McKinsey, published in a Nature Reviews supplement, indicated that, of the 32 biggest blockbuster drugs of the past decade, the number of “first-in-class” drugs was matched by the number of “me-too” products that were launched more than 15 years after the “first-in-class” drugs. The study also indicated that, of the nearly 200 drugs launched by the top 15 Pharma companies during that period, the highest per-drug sales amounts were among “fast followers,” launched between two and 15 years after the original.

Obviously, Nexium is still rolling along just fine, last I checked (which would have been during our July/August Top Companies report), despite being a late-comer in the proton-pump inhibitor market. Similarly, there’s room for more than one statin out there (and AstraZeneca’s hoping there’s room for one more with Crestor). In fact, over at In the Pipeline, Contract Pharma contributor Derek Lowe discusses the reductio ad absurdum argument that drug companies should only focus on me-too drugs, since they’re the most profitable. Of course, the reality is that, if every company did this, no one would put out any new drugs, and the drug cycle would end in one patent period.

Now, this isn’t to say that Cialis has nothing to worry about, or that its success is assured by its not being the first drug in its class. Nor, however, does it seem as uphill a task as Mr. Blum made it out to be to BusinessWeek. It’ll certainly be an adventure in marketing, as the three companies work to differentiate themselves in the marketplace, while remaining within the boundaries of taste and discretion. But, given the American shift to “lifestyle” drugs, and the graying of the population, being “third-in-class” shouldn’t be too much of a hurdle for Cialis to overcome.

A grad-school buddy of mine, writing pseudonymously, offers this column in the Iranian.

Yesterday was the anniversary of the shooting death of Jam Master Jay. And there I was, wondering why I heard My Adidas on three different stations during the day.

I’m back from Utah. I called Ian and Jess out in San Diego, and they’re not in any danger from the fires. And the NBA season has started, so my life can now stop for a few months.

One thing, though: For some reason, many (but not all) home teams are now wearing their dark uniforms, rather than their whites. Most of you readers likely aren’t big sports fans, but this is a subtly disturbing phenomenon. See, normally, you know which team is playing at home when you glance at the screen and see the white uniforms. So it’s kinda odd when the team in dark unis hits a basket, and the crowd cheers.

It’s nothing I’d lodge a protest over (as opposed to the truly freakish, Hefty-bag-esque uniforms the Dallas Mavericks unveiled for their first game).

Went out last night to a hospitality event thrown by one of our advertisers. We went to the Olympic Oval, a training facility for the 2002 skaters. We went curling and shooting hockey pucks. Pictures to come, unfortunately.

Many thanks to Ian for turning me on to Gorillaz and Thievery Corporation! I have discovered many new beats during this trip! Let’s all hope that Ian and his True Love, who live in San Diego, remain safe from the fires.

The iPod holds up! A rambling hike yields some great photos! Salt Lake City on a Sunday is like 28 Days Later, but without the zombies!

The Gil Roth “King of the Road” Tour continues, as I head out to Salt Lake City for the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) annual meeting. Last week was Phoenix and San Diego, combining business & pleasure. After Utah, I’m back for 10 days before heading off to Atlanta for 3 days for the Parenteral Drug Association (PDA) annual meeting. Then I’m back for another 10 days before taking The Big Vacation. All told, 2003 will involve 25 takeoffs & landings. As long as none of them match my Takeoff of Horror last Wednesday from Newark, I’ll be a happy man.

Which is to say, as long as I have the iPod, I should be okay.

According to my webstats, at 4:45am this morning, someone came to this blog by Googling the following:

Red Sox fan commits suicide