We’re here in Endicott.. which means we get to watch TV>. I say ‘get to’ because we don’t really have TV at home.. I mean, we have a TV.. but it’s just hooked up to the XBOX>. no cable or antenna into the house.. It’s not that we can’t get cable.. it’s that we choose not to have it.. because.. we know we’d watch it all the time. So.. when we’re at a place that’s blessed with real live cable.. we dive in like glutton’s.. that means two bad scifi movies last night.. some reality TV (parking wars ? pawn stars ? .. and I thought our show was dumb !).. but today we watched Mad Men.. (never seen it.. it was about the JFK assassination.. it was brilliant !). a movie about Jefferson, a movie about Lincoln.. and a movie about Marie Antoinette… It took me a little while to figure out the theme.. but the frequent lame car dealership ads with Presidents Day themes finally broke through. even the TV channels were doing the presidents day thing (ok.. so Marie Antoinette’s not really a president.. but she wasn’t far off)

I found all of these things strangely moving. The Man Men treatment of the JFK assassination took me immediately back to being 4 years old and watching it on TV… barely understanding what was going on. The Lincoln story resonated deeply with me.. the story of a tortured and principled guy trying to do what he thought was right was deeply moving. More so was the story of how his son Willie’s death of typhus fueled Lincolns depression.. and from that forged his resolve to free the slaves. Jefferson’s pointless bickering with Adams that robbed them both of peace and satisfaction in what they both accomplished..Flawed and great men , all.

I know I’ll never be great.. I just hope to be that interestingly flawed…
here’s my start in that at least.

With that TV priming, I had a really fun president’s day eve.. Diane took off with Linda for a girls night out in Ithaca.. .. so Dave and I hung out this afternoon and went to check out a flea market an used book store in Owego.. .. Later on.. Dave went with me to a talk I was giving at U of Binghampton. About 100 students showed up on a Sunday night in the middle of a three day weekend.. amazing..

It was mostly made up of engineering students.. A great group of geeks and geekettes.

Here’s my hostess and good freind Wendy.. (she used to be at IBM)

 

 

Afterwards one of the students, Jennifer came up and gave me an origami turtle.. I named him ‘Clinton’  because it was almost President’s day.. and because he was red.. I don’ think I’ve ever gotten a cooler after speaking gift !

I ran into several old freinds at the talk.. My freind Tom was there with his wife.. Tom’s now ding a PhD. at BU.. .. He has a very cool ghost in his house…   and sings opera (Tom.. not the ghost) if memory serves.

My good freinds the Chen’s also showed up. It’s Emily the hatted one’s ) birthday.. she  just became a black belt in kkarate.

The talk I gave went fine.. but I talked to long.. I did get to hang out afterwards and tlak to the students which was really good fun..

Then Dave and I drove home… it was great getting to hang out with him for most of the day..

OK.. I need to get up early.. so I’ll end here.. more tomorrow..
nite all, nite sam !
-me