Something I had forgotten....

.... in the seven years since my wife and I moved away from Berkeley, CA:

This really is the nicest place on earth.

Yes, you have your Tuscanys and your Cape Towns  and your Vancouvers and all the rest (including Duluth!). But when it comes to a locale that is actively beautiful and human-scaled and full of creature comforts and with mild climate, and where first-rate work of importance to the world is also underway, Berkeley is hard to beat.

Which leads me to: if you happen to be in Berkeley today, Thursday, Sept, 25, I will be there too. Barrows Hall, 4pm, talking about US-China relations. Then.... back to Beijing to keep learning about that topic.