Wonderful People

I got back from SIGCSE early this morning. It was a quick trip to a CS educator's conference. People whose focus is education are just wonderful people. They are giving, interested in everything, and fun to be with. There wasn't one without a story, an interesting point of view, and a friendly smile.

By the time I got to the airport yesterday, I had three hours to kill and both my books already read. I did jot down a few things on my to do list from the conference. I COULD have done real work, but I was not in the mental frame of mind to do so. I did play Freecell for a bit, and loved the fact that my computer is an effective heater. I would have been frozen in the airport without it. On the way to the conference, I had books to read, work to do, and sleep to catch up on (so I talked to hardly anyone) but on the way home - with a flight that didn't leave until 7 pm on a Saturday evening, most people were ready to visit. I must have talked to a dozen people between the shuttle from the hotel, two flights, and a shuttle from the airport. There were people going on Spring break - skiing or visiting friends, someone coming back from helping her mother with hip surgery, a fellow on military leave. They were fun loving, productive, good people. On the last leg of the trip, I rode with two students - one just starting a PhD in sociology and one just finishing a PhD in Family and Child Development. We visited the entire hour and a half back home - about their research, post docs, how to interview - anything and everything. One gal was from Virginia, here visiting her twin sister (who is also getting a PhD in sociology). She was trying to get back to classes at George Mason, but her flight was canceled and she couldn't get another one she could afford until Tuesday. She was retracing her steps to wait out the delay. The other gal was Taiwanese and just returning from a conference in Philadelphia. She had joined the church during her four years of grad school at USU, and was the PhD student of a good friend of Steve's.

In church today, they were talking about the rapid decline of society - and that church members follow the same trendline as society in general - just seven years behind. I wanted to say, "But people throughout society ARE wonderful. They really are."

These video clips are courtesy of an exercise science professor (I met on the Milwaukee flight) heading to Idaho:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-UoERHaSQg