cc: file, Andrea, Tony Hafen, Sara and Des Penny, & Maxine Shirts
"Monday morning, the 12th of May, came early. Because of the possibility of the Geoscience Repository at SUU, and to introduce Dr. Ray Levey at The Energy Geoscience Institute to Dr. Steven Bennion, President of SUU, I went to the AAPG in Salt Lake. $365 for a plane ticket, $300 to register for the convention, $150 for a rental car I ended up not using at all except to go to the motel and back to the airport. On the plane ride up and back, both through Denver on Frontier Air, I finished reading `Christianity & The Age of the Earth,' part of my background work for writing `An Open Mind.' I also slept a lot when on the plane. I was finally starting to feel a little better. Still was eating Coldeze and taking decongestants so there wasn't problems with my ears on the plane rides.
I arrived in Salt Lake at 10:00, rented a National Rental Car, drove downtown, checked at the Travel Lodge on North Temple, which was full, then went to City Creek Motel, where I was able to park the car, and walked over to the Salt Palace Convention Center. About when I registered, the phone rang, and it was Ajay Kalsi, whom I had traded a couple of e-mail's with the previous week. He is a shoemaker who owns an Indian Oil Company named Phoenix Hydrocarbons. The 21st of September 2000 I put together an on-line proposal for doing some work for them (see www.walden3d.com/phoenix/21Sep2000_proposal.html). The fact we had discussions starting again gives me hope that some of all of the proposals I've done over the last 2 1/2 years will result in business. Time will tell. Ajay had arranged to meet me for lunch at the Hilton Hotel. He was 20 minutes late. I spent the time waiting mapping out where different booths were on the exhibition floor. We ate in the hotel. I had a Salmon Caesar Salad. Ajay bought a shrimp cocktail and I dropped sauce all over my coat. Oh well!
Ajay is very bright. He is from India, trained at Cambridge. He was very open, and maybe it was in response to my being open about poor business dealings in India in the past. I told him a little bit about my two trips into Dehra Dun to teach at ONGC (The India Oil & Natural Gas Commission). There were layers of information to uncover over the next three days. He owns two large blocks on the west side of India, both adjacent to the Pakistan border. He has never drilled a well. He has disowned his father, one of the biggest shoemakers in India. He left college and spent a year riding his motorcycle with a friend across Europe (9 months in Turkey) to India. He sells the highest quality and best known shoe brand in Germany. He lives on a farm in New Delhi. He has two young children. He is required by the terms of his lease to drill two wells on his RJ-ON/6 Block by February of 2004. He wants to optimize the location of these first two wells. If I help him, he might give me an ORRI (Over Ridding Royalty Interest), and he will not put that in writing. We hit it off well, and had long discussions on both Tuesday and Wednesday.
Audrey did not know I was coming to the AAPG, and was surprised when she had a message saying I was in town for three days and available to meet with her to talk about stuff pretty much any time except Tuesday morning. She was also ill, had to work, and it didn't work out. Oh well! There were several times I was going to call Bridget and Justin and invite myself over to visit or them out to eat, and each time someone walked into what I was doing, and I ended up spending the time being a missionary on Temple Square or talking about business. Hopefully the two of you will forgive me for not calling during my three day stay in Salt Lake.
I met a lot of people, and made several good contacts. Monday afternoon was spent setting things up for President Bennion's visit the next morning. He had invited Governor Leavitt, had not confirmed his attendance, and I had no idea who exactly would be in attendance. As I was leaving the show, Gene Mennich or Magic-Earth started talking to me, and ended up giving me a ride down to Little America. At Little America I went to the University of Utah - Utah State Alumni Meeting. It was really nice to talk to Bob Smith. He mentioned he often felt like he should have figured out a way to keep a tithing from the money his student's made. I laughed, and didn't know how to explain my finances in a reasonable way, so I didn't. I ended up spending quite a bit of time talking to Margie Chan, Department Chair, Geology & Geophysics. I told her about the Geoscience Repositories, and my recommendation they be housed in Cedar. She immediately started to point out why it needed to be in the Salt Lake area. It was a classic fixed-pie approach (../0124.html, ../0235.html, and 0311.html). I talked about this with her a couple of times over the next couple of days, and she softened her approach some. It is a real problem in a time of shrinking education budgets to get people to work together. Oh well!
I left the Little America about 7:00 and walked over to the bar where Landmark had their party at the SEG that Justin and Bridget went to with me last year. It was the same thing as last time. Same packed room. I stopped and ate some of their stuff as a dinner. Then the noise and the crowd were too much, so I left and thought I'd walk up to State Street and surprise Justin and Bridget. I got part way when a friend from Baton Rouge, Jeff Nunn a professor at LSU (Louisiana State University) caught up to me. We were walking the same direction and got talking about everything which has happened since we worked together in the GBRN (Global Basin Research Network). As we were talking Ajay Kalsi walked around the corner, and said he wanted to take me to dinner on Tuesday night. He is superstitious (he paid for my horoscope to be done), said he was thinking about me as he saw me, and said `You will live to be 150.'
Jeff and I kept talking and Jeff said he heard I had given some tours at the SEG and he wondered if I could tell him where to go. So we went to temple square, walked around the statues, I told him the basics of church history, two sisters gave him a summary of the Book of Mormon, we went through both visitors centers, and it was a wonderful evening. It has been too long since I have taken the opportunity to share my feelings about these important things. Jeff was pleased to hear there would be a Mormon Tabernacle Choir practice on Tuesday night, and when I came back to it, we shook hands as I walked up the aisle. It was a really nice evening. I walked back over to the motel, stopped at a corner service station grocery store and ate an ice cream cone, some red licorice and some caramel popcorn. Andrea was all that was missing for a perfect evening.
Tuesday was very interesting. President Bennion flew up from Cedar. He did not get any response from the Governor's office. Blaine Taylor met me at 8:30. While we were talking Bob Sneider walked by. Ramona's cancer has been bad, and this is `why he hasn't responded to my proposal.' After he left Blaine told me his body language said he is afraid of me. I found this very interesting, since I'm the one who is probably afraid of Dr. Sneider. After all he is the only person who has ever fired me, and it was for an unjust reason in my opinion. Blaine was in Utah for the marriage of a young man who had cancer as a baby, and at his parent's request, Blaine flew to Holland to give him a blessing. During the blessing he was inspired to call this baby on a mission even though he wasn't a member. Later the boy joined the church, served a mission, and now he was getting married in the Salt Lake Temple. The timing was such that Blaine was in Salt Lake and able to participate in the meeting with Dr. Bennion and Ray Levey concerning seeking a geoscience repository for SUU.
Dr. Bennion was right on time at 9:00. We gave him a pass, waited for Margie Chan to arrive, and then headed for the exhibition floor. It was a wonderful morning. Dr. Bennion interest is not a science, and he still feigned interest in the booths, the Landmark demonstrations, and other demonstrations we took him to. I feel like he got a good picture of the depth of this opportunity. Ray was very political in what he said. Margie was pushing very hard for this to be located in Salt Lake. The meeting was a first discussion, and I felt it went well. Ray did report to Sneider's committee that he was in discussions with SUU about them being a site for the repository. The University of Oklahoma and The University of Texas at Austin evidently took up much of the meeting describing why they should be the site to host the Gulf Coast Repository. I loved this news, because if this is where all of the emotion and energy is tied up, it will allow SUU to slip in under the haze of battle and grab the Rocky Mountain repository. I definitely felt like it was worthwhile going to the AAPG, just based on this meeting.
After the meeting Blaine, Dr. Bennion, and I sat at a table in the Internet Cafe for almost 2 hours talking through a variety of things. This included J. Golden Kimball stories, and other irrelevant topics. It was fun. Later in the week, I saw Dr. Skip Rhodes, another committee member, and told him about the SUU interest. He said, `I can support that. What better place to have a repository than next to an outdoor laboratory like the Brooks Range. And everyone knows the Front Range in Colorado is simply California transplanted to the Rocky's. It cost too much for folks to do the cataloging, and they won't do as good of a job as farm folks from Southern Utah and Southern Nevada.' Who knows, maybe this will actually become a real project.
I had AAPG badge 4519, and there were about 4,650 registrants at the convention. One of my reflections was that I know many of those attending the AAPG better than I know some of you. Sad. Oh well! And to think, this week was to be Sara's Graduation from UT Austin. Cards I picked up at the convention I would like to mention include: Paul Belanger, who was very involved in our HyperEdge Expert Association; Peter O'Conor who competed in the early days with Landmark when he was at Sitex, and now he works for Mark Zoback's company Geomechanics International; Vladimir Vyssotski, who was in our ward and now works for a large Russian oil company commuting to Moscow; Jack Thomas, who claims to be a `dry Mormon' and whom I whispered in his ear, `Do you want me to arrange for a baptism while you are here in Salt Lake while there were a group of his friends standing around; and Huw James. Huw was at Arco when I applied for a job there in 1978. He is from Wales, and the Christian church in his hometown dates to 400 AD. We had a great discussion about all kinds of things. I would like to spend more time with him. Ray Levey introduced me to Christopher Prince, who is doing competitive stuff to Christian Singfield. Joel Walls at Rock Solid Images asked me to come and meet with him. I haven't had/taken time to do this since the convention. There was a neat demonstration by Duffie White called Teleportec, which is a `holographic' teleconferencing technology. Hopefully in the next few years we will have the resources to set up links with Ethan, Grant, and Colby, so we can be in daily or at least weekly communication with each of these keys to the future of humanity.
Tuesday evening Ajay and I homed in on each other with our cell phones. He ended up choosing a Swedish restaurant, where I had snails (I can't figure out how to spell the French word), and then salmon and shrimp lasagna. It was really good. During dinner, it came up that he does not know anything about the church. He asked if there was any way to learn anything, and so we headed off for temple square, via the mall where he bought some blank CD's. They have these new stoplights in Salt Lake that count down to tell you how much time you have to cross the street, and it was on 7 when we got out of the mall. We ran for it, and as we stepped into Temple Square he stopped, and started to look around. His first words were: `Do you feel it? Do you feel the difference here?' And that was the beginning of a wonderful two hour discussion.
We went into the tabernacle and listened to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir practice. As I mentioned above, Jeff Nunn was in there and shook hands with me as we left early. Two sisters cornered us. One was from Washington State and the other from Sweden with a mother from Italy. It was a good discussion. Ajay told the sisters he had just met me the day before, and he already felt like he might have found a friend for the first time in 15 years. We walked around by the reflecting pool and compared it to the Taj Mahal. We talked about church history, Indian history, and it was a thoroughly enjoyable evening.
Wednesday was more meetings. I went to a couple of papers. Introduced Ajay to Mike Forest and Rocky Roden. We talked about him joining their consortium, and they decided his data did not fit the objectives of their consortium. He agreed to have me do a project and implied that if he likes it I will have my first semi-permenant retainer. Wouldn't that be nice. I took the rental car back to the airport, having not driven it except to the motel, and caught the flight back to Houston. I finally finished the book Christianity and the Age of the Earth. Now I just need to find time to write `An Open Mind.'
I also outlined my thoughts on friendship, and Thursday morning I put them on the web for Ajay to review. The page I put together is at: http://www.walden3d.com/phoenix/friendship.html. This is worth a thoughtlet or two to think through and get comments on. I also put together a proposal for Ajay, which is at: http://www.walden3d.com/phoenix/proposal.html. By the time I went to II&T and was stood up by Marathon again, caught up on e-mail, got flowers for Andrea for our fourth anniversary, and put the proposal together, it was 1:30 AM Friday. And Sara's graduation from UT Austin was going to start at 9:00 AM Friday. Thankfully Andrea did not mind driving to Bastrop, where we had a McDonald's breakfast burrito and an orange juice and I drove on into Austin.
We communicated with cell phones (what did we ever do before them?). Roice and Sara Nemec drove in just after we parked. We met Cole and his friend. Melanie, Jared, and Colby drove past us. Rob and Marti came up to us as we were waiting. There were very long lines getting in. It was because they checked every bag, had officers and screeners everywhere. From a security standpoint, the UT graduation was definitely different from either BYU (0317.html) or SUU (0318.html). There were no opening nor closing prayers. The graduation ceremony had a lot of pomp and circumstance. And it was missing the spirit and family atmosphere I felt at the other two graduations. There was no question the graduates had accomplished something important. And there is something to be said for quality, and a formal atmosphere, especially when it comes to preparing to go into the `real world.'
After graduation we all gathered at the Olive Garden in South Austin. It was a nice meal, and good conversation. I sat next to Colby, and so I probably spent more time with him than Sara. Hope that is OK Sara. He was fun to follow around, and after dinner he went with us to check into the La Quinta Motel, where we took a nap (more about this in Thoughtlet 0222.html. We took Colby back over to Melanie and Jared, and then gathered at Sara's. I had brought my guitar, and it was a lot of fun to listen to Rob play his songs. We had a good evening.
Saturday morning we slept in until late. Andrea went for a run, and I read in bed. We got to Sara's at about 11:00 for a formal brunch, as described on an invitation which read:
It was wonderful food, including Rasberry-Hazelnut
Scones, Herb Tomato Onion Quiche, and Black Bean Sauce.
Sara sent recipes for these three things, and I'm
thinking there needs to be a family recipe place tied
to these Thoughtlets web pages sometime. Another
project for another day. I was disappointed to see
the alcohol served and the gifts of alcohol. I
can't live anyone elses' life, and I must let you
each discover the consequences of your choices. And
it hurts to see folks I love make choices which
limits spiritual guidance and has been shown to become
a genetically fed addiction, specifically in the Hafen
genealogy. It was nice to meet Sara's roommate's
parents and relatives. Rob played the guitar again,
and I enjoyed that. Guess I was a little disappointed
Sara, Rob, Roice, nor Melanie asked me to sing their
songs. However, it wasn't the time. And there will
be times to share, like when Sara and Audrey go to
London with Andrea and me the 7th through the 16th of
June, as a graduation present for a job well done.
And yes, Paul and Kate, your turn will come for a
trip like this.
In the spirit of the two other recent previous college graduation thoughtlets, I will repeat (see 0032.html) the words of Sara's song for your review:
It was a very nice weekend, and a nice summary to a
very fulfilling week for me. We drove back to
Houston in the afternoon, by way of Ken Turner's
place. We dropped off the paintings Sara had
borrowed for her possible marketing project. We
got back to the house about 6:00 PM. I was worn
out. I was thinking this was the night we went to
see X-Men-2, but, according to the tickets, it was
the previous Saturday. I think I spent the evening
writing on the two Thoughtlets I got out the next
day, which was Sunday. How nice the weekend was
came to me later, as I read the words of a thank
you note Sara sent us. It reads:
So even though I'm still two weeks behind on Thoughtlets,
and even though I have these feeling of failure so often,
there are times when everything feels really good. This
week was one of those times. Again, it was a good week,
and it was especially nice to be able to experience
Sara's Graduation from UT Austin."