Greetings from Pittsburgh.. home to heinz ketchup. carnegie mellon university, many of my good freinds.. and the pittsburgh steelers.. (or Stilluhs.. as they’re called here) . Diane and I are down here visiting our good friends larry. leah and hannah while I give a talk at CMU. where I went to grad school. Diane, Max and I leved her from 1988 till 1991. Max was only six weeks old when we moved here.. which was.. Gulp// 21 years ago !.. The place really hasn’t changed much. It was nice then.. and it’s still nice now !

Hannah, who’s Max’ age , was wonderful enough to come and pick us up at the airport this morning.. we drove back to her folks Larry and Leah’s house in Ohaara twshp. Larry and I were friends in grad school.. he’s now a porf at CMU.. and Leah is a childrens book author.. they live here with their 15 year old italian greyhound , Bruno..

First order of business today was for Hannah and I to go watch the Pittsburgh Steelers play the CLevland Browns.. I have not been to a professional sports game since high school.. so it was a huge adventure !

There was so much stuff goign on.. so many things to see and watch that it would have been fun even if they hadn’t played !.

in the second quarter Pittsburgh was abotu to score their first goal.. so I got out the Samstone I was carrying. i figured i’d put it somewhere as soon as the Steelers scored… and they did !

Out came the ‘terrbible towels’.. a yellow rag that everyone here twirls when soemthing good happens on the firl. I remember them having terrible towles 20 years ago.. I htink we have one in our house even.

Then came the half time show.. a marching band playing.. among other things.. ‘free bird’ !.. Where’s my lighter ?

The game lasted about 3 hours.. and hannnah patiently answered every quesiton I asked about the rules and the players.. It was an awesome time !   Hannah had a secret parkign place that made escaping super quick.. we got home in no time.. Around 5, folks started showing up for dinner. Leah put out a real feast.. exotic cheeses, a whole salmon, salads, veggies.. It was great.. as was the conversation. It was a really cool and ecclectic crowd tonight.. ..

Our uber-gracious  hists… larry and leah.. larrys a Prof at CMU and Leah writes kids books.

They’re daughter Hannah.. who’s studying statistics and politics at CMU.. (and teaches footbal rules ot clueless vermonters)

Our friedn Steve.. who had drivig in with wife Kate from State college to see us.. !.. Kate and steve were our some of our closest freinds when we lived here in the 80’s. I’d met steve in a grocery store a few days after we moved to town. Their son Mathew is only a month younger than max. ..  Steve teaches Geograpy at Penn State.

My lovely wife.. Diane.. sorry this is fuzzy.. you’re not !

Kerry. a mathematician who helps run the  Entertainment Technology Center (ETC) here at CMU

Don who i’s the director of ETC.. and who dresses up as a a pirate for Pittsburgh porate games just for fun..

Our frind Paul Zaloom a puppeteer  from LA and Vermont.. Paul did the show ‘Beekman’s World’ for many years.. My favorite science show of all time !

A fuzzy version of Kate.. who teaches early child hood Ed at Penn State..

And.. and… and………….

Kate and Steve had to take off for State college.. it was so great getting to see them tongiht !!!!

Now.. It’s really late.. time to sleep.. Mor ein the morning.
Nite folks.. Nite Sam !
-me

Folks,
   Thank you all for all the folks that turned out to help us prep for the party. I know it sounds like over-kill to be prepping for a party that’s a week away.. but amazing things happen when you invite more than 300 folks into your house. We had a a really productive day.. moving furniture.. taking down real cobwebs, putting up fake cobwebs, stringing lights, putting away breakables, clearing the yeard, straigtening the attic landing decorating the tower.. etc..    The place looks great..

Remember.. the party’s a week from today !.. Hope folks can make it.. be thinking of a costume !

OK.. It’s only 9PM.. but I think I’m goign to bed.. Nite folks.. Nite Sam !
-me

ps. Happy Diwali folks ( Shubh Deepawali – शुभ दीपावली) .. It’s the Indian Festival of lights.. Last year I celebrated with my Good friends Ruchir. Rashi and family by painting sand pictures

Already an amazing day.. and it’s only 1PM.. In last night’s entry I described how
I was sleeping in my car at the Beacon train station. Turns out I had a great night sleep. I think I woke up twice to turn on the heat.. but other than that I slept like a baby… albeit an upright, fully clothed baby.    The reason I was sleeping in the car was a complicated mix of poor planning. adventurousness and expediency. I came down here to pick up a piece of equipment form friend Marty.. and then participate in a great face to face meeting at work. The highlight of that day was a great talk byy my hero/,mentor Nick D. He’d retired last year.. and his g-dfatherly presence has really been missed around work. I invited him to come and address a group of our colleagues and he graciously accepted. He’s one of the most passionate and inspiring people I know.. He talked about the need for each person to make a lasting change for the good in the world.. Good message.. The energy in the room after his talk was really good and positive. It’s amazing to see how one persons energy can lift the spirits of so many others..

Again, doing a meeting face to face like this is now sadly a rare treat. It was great catching up with freinds like Dawn (here).. and Chandu (below)

Around 7 I drove down to brrokly to see Max. It was a short but great visit.. we ate weird veggie take out and sat around and played with our granddog Reptar. We also played with Marty’s coin tosser and kept denting the ceiling as we launched quarters at super sonic speeds.

I took off for points north about 11:30.. I decided to do that because my options for catching a train at Grand Central this mornign would have involved waking up really, really early.. So around 1 AM I got to Beacon, paid for parking , blogged.. and slept wonderfully..

Around  7:30 my buddy Bill came by and picked me up. We raided a min mart.. then

We drove over to Newburgh and boarded Scott’s boat .. here’s scott, bill, and most of tom…

We also had my good bud Jim on board.. We took off .. weather was wet and in the low 40’s.. That basically turned us off of skiing or wakeboarding.. which had been on the docket for the day. Instead we just motored south.. talked (actually yelled over the engines) .. and admired the very cool sights.

Like this weird old abandoned castle on an island.. Bill once lead an all night poker game here.

And West Point…

And a spooky old looking Nuke. Bill said it’s a good place to ski since the ater is 7 to 9 degrees warmer near the plant (huh ?!?)

We made good time .. doing between 40 and 50knots  .. in a couple of hours we were near the mouth of the river.. that’s where we started having to dodge big barges and ocean going ships

We even ran into pirates.. well they wern’t really pirates.. but we ‘Arghhhhhhhhed’ ’em

Here’s Brad and the Tappen Zee bridge…   Brad’s the one in the orange hood.. not the girders.

Here I am in a borrowed sweatshirt.. Yelllllllow ?????

Soon we were running down the ide of Manhattan.

Down to the end.. here’s where the World Trade center used to be..    wow..

We pulled up at the Statue of Liberty State park to meet Bill’s brother.. and refuel.. (whihc I don’ tthink they actually did)

Bill and Bob.. they DO look like brothers to be sure !

I looked at the time and decided I neded to jump off there in order to make my train back to the car.. I said good by to the guys and caught the ferry back to the financial district..   The guys took off to get Brad to JFK..

Here’s Lady Liberty.. shrouded in fog.. still looking beutiful..

I got off the ferry and took a few meditative moments to look at the Twin Towers site.. The memorial contruction is going strong.. I really admire the rebuilding that’s going on here.. you can build back from just about anything…    .. even if you’re never the same. Can’t you.

I walked up to Fulton and jumperd a 4 train to Grand Central.. I love the buzz of the crowd… welll.. I loved it as much as my conference calls would allow me. It’s pretty wierd that I can do my work walkign around NYC as well as I can sitting at my desk.. is that a good thing ?

I love the subway music (yes.. I left some money)

I got to my train in planty of time.. I’m on the train now.. just about to arrive at my car. I still have a full day of work ahead of me.. and then adrive back to VT>. It’s been a great day already.. …

Alright.. we’re almost ‘there’ better close up. More tomorrow. Talk to you then folks.. TTYL Sam
-me