Magic Valley Meditation

The artistry of logic -- that's my new name for the work software engineers do. Although I've always been curious about this work, I assumed for the longest time that the brilliant collection of nerds, geeks, misfits and math geniuses were a species apart, quite different from the likes of you and me.

Okay, from you.

So why am I now in this valley where the grass is always green, trash is never seen, and the only thing marring the otherwise immaculate sidewalks is the large and unsightly poop left by Canadian Geese who proliferate here?



Being Canadians, they know a good thing when they see it. Thus, they no longer bother to migrate with the seasons like the CG I knew in my boyhood, long ago in Michigan. They just honk their distinctive honk, adding their signature "eh?" like an exclamation point as they pretend to migrate above us.

But I know their secret. These entrepreneurial CGs simply fly over to the Land of Oz, otherwise known as Oracle, with its round glass towers just north of here. When they've sated themselves on the abundant food there, they "migrate" over to Electronic Arts Drive (I'm not kidding -- that's the name of that street), where another feast awaits them.



Sure, there are others moving through this suburban landscape. Rabbits. Crows. Seagulls. Here and there a squirrel and maybe even a chipmunk. After dark, when they think nobody will see, the deer sneak down here.



The only other hunter in my company, my buddy Kyle, and I have fantasized about bringing our guns down here. Have you ever tasted a wild goose? Venison?



It makes my mouth water, even though I realize this reveals me as a willing killer of animals (for food), which seems to be a politically incorrect way to be around here.



But, hey, it's only a fantasy. I doubt we'll ever carry it out. Meanwhile, our healthier colleagues like Pat, Dave and Kelsey, run at noon or after work. Kelsey says one of the hazards on her runs are the CG's; they have become so unafraid of humans that they'll suddenly step out right in front of her on the paths where she runs.

Reminds me of my students at Stanford, who complained that their two main hazards while biking around The Farm were (1) squirrels darting in front of their bikes; and (2) slow-moving old professors (the only bikers wearing helmets), upright and oblivious that at their modest rate of speed they represented a true hazard to the youthful crowds crisscrossing their way here and there, this way and that way, weaving in and out, going quickly along the path only they could see -- the path to a future.

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