And today, retirees...

It was the President's luncheon for WSU retirees. In attendance, a lot of people I didn't know, but also:

the guy who used to own my house!
and
an Ott!

So it was fun to be there, and tell them all about the awesome things that are going on in the planetarium and the department.

This also solved another problem for me---I'm giving an invited talk at APS Four Corners + Texas in October. I was invited purely because I am a dynamic speaker, not because anyone was particularly interested in my research areas. No really. It's true. They said I could talk about anything I wanted. So originally, I planned a talk about how to do a successful outreach program---I think a lot of people could use some ideas about this. But then I was losing my nerve, given that the audience is, you know, physicists, and would they really be interested? But then, during my talk today, I found my angle. You could look at all this outreach stuff as a way of following the money. It's getting harder and harder to fund research projects unless they also have an E/PO portion that has some kind of demonstrable impact. There you go---the hook I needed. So I came home and submitted my abstract.

Phew.