Monday 02/20/2023
Went for a standard walk in the morning. It was ok.
At 10:30 it was time for the monthly Event Coordinator’s meeting. This is when everyone who sponsors events, about 20 people in all, meet to go over the calendar for the next month. As usual there is a shit ton of stuff happening, much of it needing A/V support.
We also discussed hybrid zoom events (auditorium events that are also carried on zoom for people who don’t want to, or can’t, come to the auditorium). I strongly stated the reasons to avoid doing them when possible: 1, the extra burden on the A/V volunteers, 2, being more complicated there are more ways for things to go wrong, 3, the pandemic is over.
The people who put on lectures and such sympathized but pointed out, sometimes there are people, e.g. relatives and friends, outside CH who would like to attend; there are some people who actually can’t come down, right now there are four sequestered for Covid or Covid exposure; there are a few people who just won’t come to any group because they are afraid of infection.
So things were left pretty much as they were. Hopefully people will be a little more restrained about booking hybrid events.
That done, I headed out to FOPAL to process the week’s accumulation of computer books. Five boxes. Many really old books from the library of a deceased(?) Stanford professor.
Back home I had a couple of hours. I updated the A/V spreadsheet that is our committee’s self-scheduling tool, with all the events on the new March calendar. Then I put out an invite to the team to meet on Friday.
At 4pm I left to meet Harriet at Jimmy V’s Cafe in the Arrillaga family center, across from Maples pavilion. As a major sports donor, she gets a free pre-game meal and can bring a guest, and she invited me. So I had a free meal while talking to five other SWBB fans.
Then it was game time, against UCLA. Stanford had things under control in the first half, leading by 13 at the break, but UCLA came back and the fourth quarter was all back-and-forth swapping of one- or two-point leads. We finally iced it with two free throws, putting us up by 4 with 12 seconds left.
Then it was time for Senior Day honors, saying goodby to Haley Jones, Hannah Jump, Fran Beliebe and Ashten Prechtel. Back in fall 2017, or very early 2018, Marian and I went with some other fans down to Pinewood high school to see Hannah play, and about then also to Archbishop Mitty HS to see Haley play. It can’t have been later, Marian would have been too weak by fall 2018. So we must have seen them as HS juniors, but juniors can commit to a college, so we would have been checking out these future committed players in their junior season.
Anyway, it’s this kind of continuity that makes being a fan seem like having an extension to one’s family. On the other hand, I confess to being a bit weary of it. I am facing a decision very soon: will I go to Seattle to see them play in the 3rd and 4th rounds of the NCAAs? At dinner we were discussing the post-season schedule. Harriet already has booked her flights and hotel. I should also, if I want to go. But do I?
Codgerville 