Psychometric City

Tara has been cramming for finals and felt the headaches might be reading related (good guess). We were overdue for an eye exam anyway, the outcome being +0.75 diopter reading glasses, $14.95 at Barnes & Noble.

Then we hung out with the Riggs family for lunch, yakking about the not so subtle resemblance between the new Pepsi logo, and stuff Obama was using. The blogosphere is full of such chatter, driving the buzz bots crazy no doubt.

I hearkened back to an earlier campaign, where Pepsi's PR had a political edge to it, albeit in a more classically Roman sense, dialed in to my blog.

My Python for Teachers contains some unabashed boosterism, playing up some of the things that put Oregon on the map: cheese, salmon, coffee, wine, beer... Susan reminded me to include shoes. Claire has some exotic Keens with more brand value than Uggs in the college she's attending.

That's just to warm up my Chicago audience, remind 'em I'm an "alien" i.e. a stranger from a strange land. Then we dive head first into Silicon Forest stuff, the kind of stuff you'll need (and preferably start getting in high school) if you want a good job in the high tech and/or health care sectors (more of what we're known for, Oregon rocks).