The Other Blalock

The Other Blalock writes books on quantitative
analysis and methods.

On Monday I went to a half day symposium to celebrate the academic research of Jim Fairweather. Jim was my first supervisor (or what I used to call, my "assistantship research faculty leader person") during my first year at MSU. And I LOVE him. He is one of the smartest, most caring, kindest, and yet also kind of doesn't give a sh*t person I have met since coming to Lansing. He's simply brilliant and has helped me work through some of my own research interests without me even saying much. He has an uncanny ability to listen, and then toss out some crazy smart stuff. It's pretty cool. Needless to say, I have missed working with him. And missed sitting in his office where I couldn't see the floor because it was covered in papers and books.

While there, I met some new people, and also saw some people from my first year I haven't seen in a while. And when I attend things like this, things like "academic soiree things with smart people" I usually kind of hang back and listen a lot but don't usually say much. There's too much to learn! And there I was, small-talking with a woman I worked with last year when I worked with Jim, and up walks another young woman and we shake hands and she looks at my name tag and says, "It's so nice to meet you. I've read your work, yes, thank you it's so nice to meet you" and I kind of sputtered and said, "Uh, wow? What?" and I'm thinking of course, "What work?!?!? What the heck is she talking about??!?!?" And she responds, "Oh, well, I recognize your last name." So I just left it at that because I didn't really know how to respond and the conversation moved along in a different direction so quickly anyway. Please remember, when I go to these fancy smart people things, I just assume everyone is a crazy intelligent academic professor type. Turns out, I'm not the only who does this and I was, well, mistaken for, oh, you know, the OTHER Blalock.

Coincidently, I was in the education building today picking up a paper, and then decided to peruse some of the "free books" (aka, Jim's old library). And as I scanned, lo and behold... the other Blalock.