cc: file, Grandma Hafen via Tony Hafen, Pauline Nelson via mail, Sara and Des Penny, Claude and Katherine Warner, Lloyd and Luana Warner. Diane Cluff, and Andrea Shirts
"I remember how important the Sience Fair was to me when I was growing up. Specificaly I remember the year Mom bought me two fresnel lenses and my science fair project was to make a solar barbeque pit. The fresnel lenses were about a foot square, and were about the thickness of the cardboard on the back of a spiral notebook. In the dry heat of a Southern Utah summer they provided a great way to start a fire or burn an insect up. There was this plan that came with the two lenses which showed how by building a simple frame for the two lenses, taking an aluminum sheet and making a parabolic reflector you could cook a hotdog that was centered in the focal line of the aluminum mirror. So at the last minute I decided this was going to be my science fair project and I went to work cutting the wood to make the window frame, and building a frame to hook the aluminum to to create the cooker. At about bedtime I was pushing too hard on the wooden window frame for the fresnel lenses and broke it. I remember the tears. I remember being put in bed. Mostly I remember Dad showing me a rebuilt window frame for the fresnel lenses the next morning. I also remember when the judges asked me if I had used the solar barbeque pit to cook anything and answering no because it wan't finished in time. Guess my science projects were more practical than theoretical, even back in those days.
I remember Ray Gardner and I wining a school or city science fair one year and Dad taking us to St. George for a regional science fair. I'm not sure how we worked it, and yet I remember Kathy Roberts and Teressa Sherrett riding back to Cedar with us. I believe that the parking lot of that science fair was my first kiss. I have no idea what the science fair project was. At our 30 year high school class reunion I learned that Teressa was murdered. Kathy is a successful businesswoman in Cedar City. As I recall, Ray was `experienced' prior to this. I believe he was one of the guys and gals caught in a closet at the South Elementary when we were in 5th grade, which would have been about the time Randy and Andrea Shirts and their family moved back to Cedar after spending a few years in Iran. Grandma Hafen tells me I have too many memories. Maybe so.
These memories flooded my mind after an incident on Wednesday morning. Because I am already almost through my Feburary mileage quota on the new Lexus, I was attempting to save mileage. Since Ed Gray was staying with Paul and I at the house, and since he was going to the North American Prospect Exposition (NAPE) also, and since he had unlimited mileage on his rental car, it made sense to ride downtown with him. However, I forgot that I had faithfully promised to bring a box of give-aways and a poster down to the George Brown Convention Center, and had left them in the trunk of the Lexus. I remembered as Ed and I arrived at downtown. So I got on the company cellular phone, and when I could finally get a signal between all of the tall buildings downtown, called Paul and asked him to bring the stuff down to me (Paul, that way it used up your mileage and not mine). I had the first presentation, and there was no one there to see it except Continuum Resources staff. After my presentation I went outside and waited for Paul. When he arrived I took the box and poster inside to the booth, and had him park his car. Paul, since you have no idea what you want to study, or maybe become I thought it would be good for you to see the business and deal making side of the oil and gas industry I had you use my badge and go into NAPE for a few minutes. It wasn't long at all before he came back out. Paul, I was hoping you saw something interesting to you, and guess this is why I was really suprised when you said `Dad, that's just a big science fair for grownups.'
Monday I got into the office about 8:30. There was a weekly sales meeting at 9:00, the SGI Visualization Summit (.../9904.html) debrief meeting at 10:00, a lunch with one of our new officers at 11:30 to make sure we are on the same page, and then at 1:30 I drove out to Katy to see Dr. Larry about my ring finger (.../9842.html). He says it is healing fine, and doesn't expect the swelling to go down anytime soon. He didn't repeat his previous warning to me that I can not remarry for six months, and I didn't ask. His office is kind of a science fair every day of the week. Then I went to the Lexus dealership and had them check out the car, as per their request when I first picked it up. I got back to the office at about 4:00, and stopped to pick up Rob at 6:30 for Family Home Evening. Paul will be going to Russian classes on Monday evenings and so this is about the last time he will join with us.
Tuesday morning Dr. Dave Monk and I spent several hours talking about using sound in oil & gas exploration & production. He is preparing a preliminary patent application based on some of the ideas we talked about. This is what science fairs are really all about. Although Roger Anderson and Landmark Graphics have been issued several patents on stuff I have been peripherially involved in, this was the first time some of my ideas were the basis of a discussion relative to filing for a patent. I expect you kids will hear more about this over the coming years. Next was lunch with Gary Crouse of MuSE, talking about all we need to do to keep both companies on the same page. Then the afternoon and evening was spent with scientists from Texaco and Unocal talking about the Gulf Coast SEG Spring Symposium (GCSEG), which I am General Chairman of, and all of the stuff that needs to be done for this conference. I sense I am overcommitting again.
Wednesday Ed Gray and I spent the day at NAPE, which I will always think of as a science fair for grownups. It was one of the better and more exciting conferences I have ever attended. I was presenting my subsalt prospect, which I have written about previously here (.../9814.html). It is really a slick science fair presentation to fly around the horizons in 3-D, and then fly down between the subsalt horizons. In addition we set the demonstration up so it could be switched into pseudodepth, and the MuSE flyer can disolve the base salt so the audience just sees where the proposed well path travels as it tracks the five highs trunkating against the salt. There was real interest in the subsalt prospect by about 5 different groups, the most interesting to me being Shell Shelf. Ed and I were able to take the transit lane back to the house, and arrived just before 7:00 PM. I was on the phone with an Evolover conference call until 8:00. Then we watched the two Star Trek shows (Voyager and Deep Space Nine). I was wiped out from my day standing at the trade show, and was ready to go to sleep by the time the shows ended at 10:00.
Thursday was more of the same. It was really a lot of fun to talk to the people who stopped at our booth. We would catch their attention with the graphics, and I would walk up to them and say, `Are you buying or selling?' If they were selling, I described how we can help sell their deals in our immersive environments. If they were buying, I summarized how we plan to set up classes of deals and to invite them in to review these deals on a regular basis. One of the most interesting contacts was a guy from Gillette, Wyoming who is drilling a whole bunch of 2-4,000 foot deep coalbed methane wells. When I worked for field operations at Mobil Oil, the first area I was sent to work with a seismic acquistion research crew was Gillette. The big calcite crystals I have come from there. We were trying to get seismic energy through clinker beds (coal beds that had been lit on fire by lightening and had burned underground). It was a real science fair project. I was wiped out when I got home and went to sleep about 8:30. Before I went to sleep I was checking e-mail, and Paul came in and was playing with my laser pointer. His comment was something like `Dad, you have the neatest science fair toys.'
Friday there was a meeting with all shareholders to start preparing us for a public offering. The rest of the day was spent catching up a little bit on e-mail, and all of the things which need to be done in a start-up organization. I didn't get letters out about the GCSEG, and it sure looks like I have bitten off too much yet once again. Like the follow-up to a science fair, there is a lot of paperwork. In the two days of NAPE, I collected over a hunderd business cards. Paul and Alma and Matt Reynolds went to Dallas to stay with Ben and Sarah, and to go to the temple. Rob had other plans for the weekend, even though I will be gone next weekend (I'm going to Seattle on Wednesday afternoon, and spending Friday and Saturday night in Cedar City). I spent most of the evening filing e-mail and working on cleaning up the office, as well as talking to Andrea.
Saturday I had a reasonably long conversation with your Mom. She is definite she wants to go a different direction from me, and I have decided to stop trying to change her mind. I went for a run to think about it, and spent the day reading, and thinking about the conversation. Ken and Nell Turner and Joe Roberts came by in the late afternoon and we talked about Heritage Galleries On-Line. We have agreed to turn the Beef 'N Bird Rotisserie into a sales gallery for Ken. Ken has been working on the sketches of the paintings of Christ's Name, which I first wrote out in the hotel room in Aberdeen last summer when Melanie and I were there. They are really neat, and I am very excited about these paintings. From 7:00-11:00 I went down to Bering Drive to a PAIRS class party. It is really nice how close I feel to these folks, even though we have little else in common. It was a fun evening. Rick and Dinah came, and it was especially good to see them. I talked to Leonard, one of the teachers, about developing psychological tests of which people work best in an immersive environment (a science fair project Melanie and I talked about last summer), and also about building an interactive course of some of Nancy's materials (Dr. Nancy White is the PAIRS teacher and Leonard's wife). When I got back to the house, Paul was back from Dallas and we talked about possible majors, classes he should take, and a lot of different things. We were both tired, and we both forgot there was a Stake Priesthood Meeting at 7:00 AM this morning. Oh well.
In thinking about my week at the science fair for grownups, I recall Bridget's mathematical proof science fair project, my attempt to help Paul learn about geologic processes with clay models, Ben's plants, and Roice's interest in science. I guess in many ways life is one great big science fair project. I hope and pray each of your individual science fair projects are completely successful.'