Bill Bailey

For a while I've been thinking about which celebrities I'd like to join for a pint. Bill Bailey is definitely one of them.

Street comedy

This last week has been a real eye-opener; at Bay to Breakers, I was surrounded by thousands of people who'd really made an effort to dress up and were having a brilliant time. It just demonstrated how much putting on stupid costumes can add to an event. Bestival, is one of the best festivals in the UK, and I think the fancy dress element has a lot to do with that (it's also usually got a wicked line-up and great weather). So I've been thinking about how important fun and play are as part of our everyday lives. 

Stanford's a pretty serious place; a lot of the students here are so concerned with getting on the corporate ladder that anything but work just seems like a pointless distraction. The whole university is geared up to provide you with the best education for business or engineering, and you're expected to work bloody hard to prove your worth. 

So fun is distinctly secondary. But there are two notable exceptions; the design school and the drama department. They embrace fun, and encourage it as part of the creative process. I think that's why they're my favourite places on campus. I've loved improv this quarter, and learning design thinking has really changed my approach to problems. We've got accept fun as a positive element. It's OK to be childish and silly. In fact it's necessary.

I've posted some some pics below that have made me laugh recently, and totally demonstrate what I'm talking about. They aren't trying to make cash or any particular point. They're just having a laugh. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry summed it up in his dedication to Léon Werth in The Little Prince: "All grown ups were once children - although few of them remember it." Let's have some fun.

Scully when she smiles

I'd almost forgotten how much I love Gillian Anderson.

Sunshine in the City

I'm now up in SF. The sun is absolutely nailing us to the floor, so we've slowed life down appropriately. 

The last week was a good 'un: some interesting chats with NPR bods (Deborah Amos and Ellen Weiss - NPR's vice-head of news) and Neil Chase from Federated Media - and ex-New York Times editor. Usual stuff from both camps: news-production as we know it is dead, but there will always be a place for news-gathering. I'm not so sure, particularly when hearing it from people who've now left the journalism game. Isn't it a bit questionable to say you have faith, while at the same time clambering into a life-raft? Not sure.

I also managed to get quite a lot of work done this last week, which was pretty amazing, considering how much I'm focussed on the job-hunt and visa thingamy. The latest on that, by the way, is that despite getting the finances sorted, Stanford's health centre have now decided to make my life a misery. So I've got to so even more tests to prove I'm not a threat to the US (this is after the half-million forms and tests this time last year). Bureaucratic tossers.

On the good news front, I hit the town with my old mate, Jim Peck, last night. He joined me from Sydney, where it sounds like he's got a pretty sweet life. Maybe that should be the next destination for DWS.

It's also 'Bay to Breakers' tomorrow; SF's annual festival of dressing up like an idiot and running across the city. As it combines two of my favourite things, I'd be a fool not to get involved. So if I can muster the energy, I might head to a thrift store or two later to check out costumes. It is darn hot though; maybe I'll just sit in the park.  

Swift

Happy Cinco de M. everyone,

Just a very quick post to give you a fill in on the latest (in bullet format):

• US authorities are still happy to have me here, which is good news.

• Stanford draws slowly to a close (can't decide whether this is good news or bad).

• Few advances on the job front, but a few potential freelance gigs, which should be sweet.

• Improv is amazing; I thoroughly love it.
  

Other than that, more of the same: occasional excursions up to SF; the first of many wine trips; one proper mountaineering effort (Pyramid Peak - bloody incredible); and a lot of messing around on campus.

We've now got a pretty established supper club, meeting and cooking different shit every week (tonight, obviously, was Mexican). And I'm doing quite a lot of work with the Stanford stand-up society. 

But the main focus right now is improv. I just can't get enough of it. It's genuinely one of the most inspirational classes I've ever taken, and it's really challenging my way of thinking.

For example, one of the main tenets of improv is just putting yourself out there. Working with your partner, that is, to build a stronger narrative, and not just going for the punchline. This, I find, is pretty bloody hard. I'm always going for the punchline, even at the most inopportune moment. But this class allow you to not be the funny one, to just build on what your partner is suggesting, and allow them to be the one in control.

What's more, I'm less nervous about just putting myself out there. It's never really been a problem, but even outside of class, I now find myself volunteering for everything and stepping into the limelight much more than before, and I suspect the improv (or at least my desire to push myself as a result of the learning), is making all the difference.

Having said that, I'm a wee bit concerned about the next step after Stanford. Given the option, I'd be pretty keen to stay in the US. But I'm pretty certain once the year is out, that's my lot, Visa-wise. No word about jobs in the UK or Europe, but I'm sure something good will come up. I just hope I'm not being too optimistic. Fingers crossed, n'est-ce pas?