The golf professional at the municipal course nearest the Microsoft campus in Redmond is called Steve Wozeniak. You strive all your life to be remarkable in your chosen field, safe in the knowledge that your extraordinary name will ensure you stand out. And you become the golf guy that sounds like the Apple guy.
Farewell
We’re all just passing through but the love you generate on the way through is a pretty good measure of a life.
Greatest
Thoughts are with the great Muhammad Ali.
Holder of the record for world’s shortest poem. He took the record from the previous holder, Strickland Gillilan, and his poem “Fleas” which ran: “Adam, had ’em”.
Brexit
Well, a rather poor showing from the Brits today.
Dolby
One of the great things that my workplace does is the Outside In series, bringing extraordinary people to campus to give a talk and, quite often, peddle a book.
Thomas Dolby visited recently. His talk was funny and fascinating. And this is the book he was peddling.
Continue reading “Dolby”
Sounders
The Seattle Sounders won the MLS Cup (soccer née football) this week.
The intense support for the team – record attendance, leading the league in season ticket sales – was built over only seven years. Shortly before the club first played in the MLS, I walked into the café at work at lunchtime to uproar.
Sports
Hitting a controversial topic this week. Limber up your feedback fingers because there is a boatload of cultural bias in this one.
It’s a big sports week this week with the start of NCAA March Madness (basketball) and the ICC Twenty20 World Cup (cricket).
I’ve been auditioning sporting theme tunes for musical merit.
Periodic
Nearly 25 years ago, Jeff Morris, a high school senior in Jeffersonville, Indiana, placed a phone call to his new idol: Tom Lehrer, the greatest musical satirist ever recorded.
“Is this Tom Lehrer?” Morris asked over the phone, working to hide his nervousness.
Drake
The first tune of the week, 4 years ago, was by Nick Drake. It’s his turn again.
Loudon
In 1992 I bought my first CD player and three CDs. One became a favorite: “History” by Loudon Wainwright III. A witty, misanthropic singer-songwriter, father of Rufus and Martha, great performers in their own right. Most of the songs were about his family, what a rotten job he’d done of raising his kids, how bad his relationships were with his loved ones. Very cathartic, setting the scene for a great reconciliation.