The Nerd's Eye View

Pittsburgh is surprisingly pleasant, and I mean that in as nice a way as such a comment can sound. The weather has been lovely (low 60's and sunny) and the proximity to the hotel is an added benefit since it means I can walk to and from the convention center. This is a great advantage because on day 1 I realized there was nothing but registration and some opening ceremonies and so I decided to wander back to the hotel and take a nap before the team dinner with the other representatives of Faceless Corporation.

I woke up from the sleep with hypothermia from being so high up on my bed. The air was so hot mainly because hot air rises and for some reason the heat in the hotel has been turned up to near Saharan levels. In short, I needed a drink. And so I rolled out of bed, cleaned myself up and downed half a gallon of water before calling one of my coworkers and meeting in the lobby to walk down to the restaurant. The dinner was extremely pleasant as I was seated by a particularly engaging manager, and I discovered what other folks of color (as we are variously known) are doing at Faceless Corp. By the end of the night I felt like a part of something good.

That feeling extended into this morning when I woke up, dressed to impress and went to the convention center only to be greeted by a buddy from graduate school who now works for IBM in Tucson AZ. We reminisced and shot the breeze, wandering around the corporate exhibits watching fresh faced and nervous young folks crusing the aisles looking for swag and for jobs. Not too different from SPIE except with an air of youthful desperation. It wasn't long ago that I felt the same pangs and it's a wonder what several months yoked to the harness of a large corporate slave-cart will do. So I smiled and looked at the exhibits and finally went up to the professional development workshops.

Now if you haven't guessed it already, I am a cynic. I don't beleive in much, certainly not the sort of mumbo jumbo frequently espoused in the corporate setting. Yet I was impressed with the messages I was hearing in the workshops. They were positive and and accessible, warm and determined. I was particularly taken by the role of faith in all the presenters lives. But it was, by and large, not that odious self-righteous proclaiming so much as it was a natural extension of their lives. It certainly had me re-evaluating the role of my faith in my own life. Frankly I've been wayward lately - and I don't mean because of the wild behavior, the booze and the women. It's been really due to my own relation with God in my head. Food for thought.

The other striking thing that I noticed was the presence of the military. They were everywhere, and I don't just mean all the cadets (I foolishly forgot that West Point had to have an engineering program if only civil), but the recruiters. It's not enough to have people in the ROTC making their futures in the military after college but they're looking to enlist engineers who have managed to escape their lures thus far. At the Golden Torch Awards ceremony which honored scholarship awardees, former members and current officers there was a table that looked like it had been lifted lock, stock and barrel from a state dinner. Gleaming patent leather and campaign ribbons galore, with crew cut frames made the whole picture complete.