Derivatives markets....

Just learned that my paper with Evin Cebeci and Rose Baker will appear next month in the Journal of Derivatives Markets:

Passmore, D. L., Cebeci, E. D., & R. Baker, R. M. (2005). Potential of idea future markets in educational technology. Journal of Derivatives Markets, 2(4), 56-66.

Rose and I go to Portand, Oregon, in early October to present our ideas for idea futures markets to the HR Futures Forum sponsored by HRInstitute. Here is the agenda as an Adobe PDF file. HR Futures Forum, which meets twice annually, is for human resource planners who recognize the need for a better perspective on emerging issues that require human resource management. I see an error, though. I am not the David Passmore who is the Research Director for the Burton Group, as the current program indicates. Different guy. We'll get this tuned up!

Thinking about someone in hospital....

Hospitals
--Frank P. Whyte

Hospitals are about living and dying,
And nearly everything that you'll find in between.
They feature comedies and tragedies,
Heresy and lobotomies,
Frauds, fables, and myths.
If your heart has stopped,
Or your bowels are blocked,
Or your erection has lasted longer than four hours,
Then it's time for you to get in the car,
And seek out somebody with amazing medical powers.

Down, but not out...

http://train.ed.psu.edu--nickname, "SmartAlec"--was down for a couple of days. Network problems. This is the server in my office that carries all of the images for this weblog. Up now due to some geeky actions I took. Tough time for a failure because yesterday was the first day of classes at Penn State. I taught two of them, and my primary, personal server was down!

Rhiannon & me....

Saturday was the brithday part of my grandson, Tiernan, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Rhiannon, Tiernan's sister, sat in my lap to avoid the mice I said would come streaming out of the piñata when it was broken. Here is a nice photo of the two of us:

She is four years old, but she took a mad, hard swing at the piñata.

My 40th high school reunion....

I went to my 40th high school reunion last weekend. An interesting event.

I graduated from Bishop Duffy High School, a Catholic secondary school, now called Niagara Catholic, in Niagara Falls, New York (check out the live Falls webcam).

Billy Gallagher, one our classmates who works for Fox News in Detroit (listed as one of Detroit's best TV street reporter here), published a piece in the Niagara Reporter ("The Falls Only Locally Owned Newspaper") about our graduating class of '65. He wrote boldly that our class is "widely regarded as the greatest class in the distinguished history of Bishop Duffy High School." This statement was, of course, followed by several rebuttals in letters to the editor in a subsequent edition of the Niagara Reporter asserting that other graduating classes contained many high achievers but "Maybe what we lacked were journalists who are employed by a local newspaper." Ah, well, sour grapes, eh? You guys get yer own newspaper!

At any rate, the reunion event of our all-boys' school was held in conjunction with the reunion of the all-girls' school that existed right next to our school. A joint reunion was held to increase the size of the attendance, I am sure. Also, many of the graduates of the all-girls' school are married to graduates of our school. Efficiency. and peace at home for many who do not want their spouses going to a party without them that features the spouses' old flames and alcohol.

No one should worry, though. We certainly did not see much of the girls years ago. The girls started school at 7:30 am, while we started after 8:00 am (perhaps administrators believed that girls could get up earlier than boys). And, they finished school earlier, too (perhaps administrators believed that girls had to get home to help mom with supper).

The schools were in such a part of town distant from most students' homes  that busses took most of us to and from both schools. Separate busses. No mingling. Our good priests and nuns knew that there were differences between the sexes, but they just didn't want us to find out before we were 25 years old.

Boys wore suit coats and ties to school. Always. If you forgot your suit coat on any day, there were about five zoot suits in the closet from which you could choose to make your daily fashion statement. And, a full drawer of 1930s wide ties awaited those who neglected to wrap a necktie around their necks. Oh, man, you would never want that. At least we all learned to tie a necktie, except those who wore clip-on ties for four years (much frowned on as not macho). A frequent Mishna and Gemera argument ensued about whether a string tie was really a tie (never completely resolved). On may days I wore a sweater under my suit coat which had such a high collar that no one could tell that I had committed revolution by not donning a tie. Such were the sweet, simple transgressions that we made.

Girls in the school adjoining ours wore blue uniforms with white blouses. The girls were forbidden from wearing anything but black and white saddle shoes. No patent leather shoes allowed because such shoes reflected up-skirt views. It is hard to imagine, but never, never underestimate the keen eyesight of a teenage boy.

 It was in the gymnasium of our high school that boys and girls made their first awkward attempts at romance....well, if not romance, then social meeting. Boys, in suits and ties,would ask girls, in dresses, to dance, mostly slowly. Dance? Rocking to and fro. Most of the time girls said "yes" to dance; other times, the dreaded "no" was heard. All very painful. Then, there was a "Ladies Choice" dance, in which girls could ask boys to dance. Tables turned. At the very end of the night (11:00 pm), the DJ would play:

I'll be seeing you
In all the old familiar places
That this heart of mine embraces
All day and through
...
I'll be seeing you
In every lovely summer's day
In everything that's light and gay
I'll always think of you that way
...
I'll find in the morning sun
And when the night is new
I'll be looking at the moon
But I'll be seeing you

And, my gosh, we did. Again. Last weekend. It was true.