Earlier today, a friend asked me how long I’d been blogging, which got me to look at my earliest blog entries. In the process, I noticed that I’d left a question unanswered in my May 22, 2000 posting (to be fair, it was only asked implicitly). I was writing about the W3C Advisory Committee dinner at the Amsterdam Grand Hotel, and I noted that Jean-François Abramatic, the W3C Chairman at the time, was seated in the “Legi Gregi” chair but that I had no idea who Legi Gregi was.

But that was then. Today, of course, searching for answers is almost a reflex, so I highlighted “Legi Gregi” in that posting, right clicked, hit “Search Google”, and 400 milliseconds later, I had my answer (courtesy of an article Toni Dabbs wrote for TravelLady Magazine): “Legi Gregi” wasn’t a “who” at all; it means “for law and citizenry” in Latin.

I’m glad to be able to clear up the record.

Oh, and for what it’s worth, my first blog posting was on March 16, 2000, so I’ve been blogging just under 122 months so far.

Since leaving IBM, I’ve developed a few new projects; one of the more urgent is to make our home office usable as my primary workplace; doing that requires sorting out the stuff that’s already in there. And while doing that, I’ve been finding things that had followed me home over the years; today seemed like a good time to return them to IBM. So that’s what I did this afternoon.

The drive up the hill was beautiful, as always; I did have to stop at the gate and use the intercom to be admitted instead of being able to badge in, and that felt strange. Stopping at the reception desk was unusual; this marked the first time I’d had to use my retiree ID card (and it took me a few tries to figure out where I’d hidden it in my wallet). But after few moments, I had a bright yellow “IBM Retiree” badge on my lapel, and I was able to freely wander the halls (though I couldn’t open any badge-locked doors).

I’d arranged to meet my ex-assistant so that she could help ship some items to my ex-manager, so I walked all the way through the building to my ex-office, which, somewhat to my surprise, was undisturbed since I’d left. The office next to mine was also vacant (its occupant was also included in this year’s Resource Action, though he’d been extended for a couple of weeks) — that seemed very odd.

As I walked the halls, I kept running into people I’d worked with; they were busy, but everyone I saw wanted to know how I was doing. I was happy to be able to tell them that I’m doing OK.

And I am; I wasn’t sure how I’d feel when I first drove up to Almaden, but it’s just this place, you know?