Randy Pausch

In his last lecture, CMU Prof. Randy Pausch described his experience on a youth football team. His coach was riding him pretty hard one day, and an assistant coach noted that with him after practice. The coach noted that that "...was a good thing. When you're screwin' up and nobody's sayin' anything to you anymore, that means they gave up."

What a remarkable perspective that coach had. And what a remarkable thing that Prof. Pausch thought it appropriate to include this perspective in his Last Lecture. (Prof. Pausch had been diagnosed, 3 months earlier, with terminal, inoperable pancreatic cancer, and given at most 6 months to live. He actually lived nearly a year longer.

"We don't beat the [grim] reaper by living longer. We beat the reaper by living well, and living fully."

On the Future of Engineering

Tuesday, I accompanied Joshua to an orientation day at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo ("Poly"). Parents had a separate program from students (an excellent idea: keep the parents out of the students' hair!). We had the pleasure of an address by Dan Walsh (Senior Associate Dean of Academic Programs and Administration) from the College of Engineering, an excellent speaker. One of Dean Walsh's most inspiring, thoughtful, and thought-provoking comments was an observation on the current state of engineering.

Throughout history, Dean Walsh said, engineering has been protecting people from the environment. Now, for the first time in history, engineering must protect the environment from people.

What a remarkable, refreshing perspective. A comment like this fills me with new hope for the future.

Dinner with Joshua

Menu

• Fettuccine with fresh-made purple basil pesto
• Home made bread (whole wheat with a little rye)
• Green beans, sutéed with a touch of butter, olive oil, and garlic
  
• Salad of mixed lettuces and tomato, with Danish blue cheese crumbled
• Chocolate torte with freshly picked blackberries

Why?

Food, company and conversation.

I love to cook, and good food promotes good conversation. Other than my wife, what better dinner companion could I have? (My daughter would be an equally good one: both ladies are away!)

Of Moores, Damsels, and Villains

Yes, Othello, the Moore of Venice.

We saw a very well done Othello last weekend. We'd recently viewed Olivier's landmark performance, on film: in that production, he overshadowed all other players, even a very strong Iago. In the OSF production, the cast was much more balanced. It wasn't that Peter Macon (Othello) or Dan Donohue (Iago) were weak, though. Surely, Macon isn't of the stature of Olivier, but he didn't simply drown the rest of the company with his strength of personality.

If anything, Macon's descent into jealous insanity is more believable than Olivier's. Is it that Olivier seems more in command of the world and his sanity than Macon did, or that the transformation was ever-so-slightly less abrupt? Is it that we'd recently seen Olivier's, and so knew a bit more of what to expect (though I'd seen Othello several times before)? Uncertain.

Enjoyable? Hard to call something so tragic, even in theater, enjoyable. Fulfilling, certainly, and well worthy of the standing ovation received.

Creative Midsummer Night's Dream!

I was wondering just what OSF would do with A Midsummer Night's Dream. It's played so often that it can easily become trite. How do you keep such a popular play that's performed so frequently fresh, engaging? Beyond that, how could they top the performance the did many years ago (was it twenty?) when, on the Elizabethan, Titania and Oberon vanished: disappeared, dissolved as I was looking right at them?

They did it marvelously!

Creative, fun, light-hearted, the production had a completely new, modern take on the fairies (men, all four of them, dancing in black tights and nearly-fluorescent tutus!), a fun-loving rendition of Duke Theseus by Greg Oden, Linda Alper as an offended, protective, not-quite-domineering Egeus, and a VW microbus complete with Richard Elmore playing a hippy Robin Starveling. Josiah Phillips gave a marvelously stiff performance as Tom Snout (and, yes, stiff was appropriate).

We all had a great time.