Bad Cephalopod
This weekend Phil Plait (of Bad Astronomy fame) and PZ Myers (of Pharyngula fame) were in DC for an Americans United meeting, and during their down time Saturday night had a meet-up for readers in the area. There were probably around two dozen or so people there, crouded around a chain of tables of such length as to probably not be favored by the local fire codes.
I know it’s somewhat cliched to point this out, but PZ Myers is vastly more quiet and reserved in person than one might expect from reading his blog. I mean, he hardly even killed any kittens while I was there, though he was sporting a shirt I’m nearly covetous of. I did learn, however, that he may be at risk of becoming the god of zebrafish religion, what with his zebrafish ascending to a tank called “heaven” after their role in an experiment is over to live out the rest of their days.
As for Phil Plait, he was at the opposite end of the table chain from me most of the evening, so I didn’t hear much of the conversations he was involved in, aside from complaining about the baggage handlers at BWI and the lack of direction coming from the upper levels of NASA. He was signing copies of his old book, and PZ was signing (or maybe defacing) them too, for no reason aside from not having published any books himself. (Had I had a copy of the bible handy, I would’ve asked PZ to sign it, if only to see what his reaction would be, considering.)
I also learned there’s still a fair number of people on the Metro even at 11:30 at night.
