Student "edition" found at {csi dot journalspace dot com}.

Maybe I shouldn't have started this blog now, not with everything that's been going on.

Yesterday in the middle of the week-long seminar I'm attending I received a text message about the final fate of one of the greatest people I have ever known and probably will ever know.

He was the oldest active member of the local chapter of a high-IQ society and one of his sons is a well known violinist.

Unfortunately right now, a web search will most likely show the exploits of probably his other famous son who bears the same name, and who has been active in the past few years and especially recently in a lot of protests against the excesses of the government, so I'd rather not go into that.

Probably my best personal anecdote about the man and the legend is that when he went to one high school a few years ago to promote a testing session for the the high-IQ society (actually the same high school I visited for the second time only last week), he enthralled the students - more than the physical puzzles that were brought, which after all only one person can play with at one time - with his knowledge of mathematical computation shortcuts that he demonstrated in front of them with an impromptu chalk board.

The image of him sitting on one of the benches while a group of bright young minds - both male and female - stood or sat in front of him of their own volition in their free time to listen to him, like those pictures of storytellers of old, is one that I will hold and remember for the rest of my teaching days.

Now there was one wise maestro, and I will always be looking up to him.