Yesterday Was a crazy day… I was focused on Sams birthday.

At the same time, I was in Japan to receive a really nice award. I just received the John Choma education award from the IEEE Circuits and systems society. My good friends Rob and larry nominated me for the award. In the past, it’s always been given to classroom university professors… By giving it to me the IEEE called out my “unconventional methods” for promoting STEM. They meant my videos, builds , talks and tv . It was both nice and humbling to be recognized in that way. I’m hoping that’ll inspire others to find fun ways to engage the public around engineering

It is great to be there in person. I didn’t think I’d know anyone there .. but turns out I knew a ton of folks.. and they were from all over . It remained me why I like the IEEE so much. It’s the worlds biggest community of nerds !

I got to give a short speech where I thanked ieee and my family . I called out Diane and the boys as my inspiration and Co-conspirators. I also called out that it was sams 27th

My good friend Dave got a distinguished service award right after me . He has long been one of my hero’s .. it was great to see him get that recognition.

Afterwards there was a huge banquet with koto music and wonderful food and lots of sochu . I got to talk to so. Many folks ..

Jose M from Cmu was there. He was a pleasure of I knew from back in the day . He’s now the president of ieee . It was great getting to know him better.

The rest of the night was a fun blur of business cards and nerdspeak. I was in my element 🙂

The. A really nice quiet 45 minute walk alone to my hotel

It was a great end to an emotional day..

Now heading home

Nite all, nite Sam

-me