Picto Diary - 21 to 31 August 2026 -Mynduveroan off to School

Above: Advocacy Sign. Park Meadows, Park City, UT. 22 August 2026
LSDM Walkers.

Above: University of Utah, President's Circle, Salt Lake City, UT. 25 August 2026.
Bishop, Trigger and Monk, LSDM ROMEOs awaiting visit with Taylor Randall, President, University of Utah.

Above:  Winder Board Room.  John R. Park Building.  University of Utah.  25 August 2026.
University of Utah President Taylor Randall addresses LSDM tourgoers.
The four major “headwinds” or challenges facing universities/higher education are:
  1. Technological change (including the impacts of AI and related disruptions/accelerations in higher education).
  2. The cost of education outpacing its value.
  3. Political polarization occurring in society.
  4. Mental health and adolescent development, and how these have fundamentally changed over the last 15–20 years. 
Selected Takeaways on "Headwinds"
Tech change/AI - More demand for maturity
Affordability - Higher ed has lost the narrative here.  U will offer a full-ride scholarship to any student with a 3.5 GPA and coming from a family with an income less than $100K.
Polarization - We must address issues that matter:  Gaza, gender, social justice etc.  U profs will be required to hold class debates on controversial issues for one week each semester.
Mental Health - 60% of U students are in treatment or on meds.  Mirrors national trends.   Serious problem.  Social media is the principal culprit.  Disparate impact on girls—anxiety epidemic.
Selected Takeaways - Other
Redtail is Utah’s AI supercomputer (also called an “AI factory” or “AI supercomputing platform”), managed by the University of Utah’s Center for High Performance Computing (CHPC). "Right now, we have more than we need."  Purpose: It serves as a statewide resource for institutions of higher education, state organizations, and (eventually) the commercial sector.  Redtail expands access to advanced AI computing for research, education, innovation and workforce development.  Applications include large language models (LLMs), distributed AI training, multi-node GPU computing, climate modeling, drug design, precision medicine, aerospace, manufacturing, agriculture and more.  Redtail has already discovered more cancer causing genes than any other effort.
AI's impact on critical thinking.  We're learning as we go.  There is an argument for taking final exams the old way: blue books and pens in an analog environment.  On the other hand, AI is a tool students will need to master.  We need to find a middle ground that optimizes both critical thinking and the use of AI.  
Private Equity funding of Athletics.  The University of Utah became the first major university athletic department to partner directly with private equity when it finalized a deal with New York-based Otro Capital in June 2026 (after board of trustees approval in December 2025).
College athletics face rising costs from revenue-sharing with athletes, NIL, conference realignment fallout, debt service, and operational pressures—Utah athletics had faced deficits (e.g., ~$17 million loss in one recent year) and sought alternatives to student fees, program cuts, or diverting academic funds. President Taylor Randall framed the deal as an entrepreneurial, sustainable model to:
  • Stabilize and grow athletics finances (including support for non-revenue and women’s/Olympic sports).
  • Professionalize commercial operations and improve fan experiences using Otro’s expertise in sports/entertainment brands and venues.
  • Free university resources for core academic, research, and student missions.
  • Position Utah competitively without ceding control of the athletic department itself.
It is viewed as a potential prototype for other schools amid industry upheaval, though it carries risks around private-equity involvement in public higher education and long-term alignment of interests. The university emphasizes it retains majority control and is not selling assets or operational authority over the sports themselves. 

Above: Iron Canyon, Park City, UT. 26 August 2026.

Listening to Nirvana (Kurt Cobain).

On a recent motorcycle trip through western Washington, my friends and I stopped at the Kurt Cobain memorial in Aberdeen, his birthplace. The stop was my idea. I knew Cobain as a famous rocker, but I couldn’t claim I really knew the music. My two riding companions seemed far more at home in the early-1990s grunge of Nirvana and Pearl Jam. Back home, in the easy chair, I put on Nevermind via Spotify. I recognized “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and “In Bloom.”

Here's GROK:

Nirvana’s music—and grunge more broadly—is loud, sludgy rock built on punk’s rawness and metal’s weight, then stripped of both scenes’ polish. Distorted, dropped-tuning guitars grind against simple, heavy riffs; drums hit hard and slightly behind the beat; bass is thick and prominent. Songs often lurch between quiet, almost fragile verses and explosive choruses. Kurt Cobain’s voice is the center: hoarse, tuneful, and sarcastic, sliding from a weary mutter into a shredded howl. Lyrically it is alienated, self-mocking, and anti-heroic rather than swaggering. Grunge as a Seattle-centered style shared that sound—muddy production, thrift-store clothes instead of glam, and a distrust of rock-star gloss—but Nirvana made it hookier than most peers, which is why Nevermind crossed from underground to pop radio without sounding like it was trying to. End GROK.

Listening to Nirvana’s Nevermind today, I couldn’t get into it. Why didn’t I know the band? A ZZ Top song from those same early ’90s years tells it: “Got Me Under Pressure.” I was working too hard then to chase popular music the way I can now.


Speaking of ZZ Top, I'll stick with them or with AC/DC. They are not the same genre. AC/DC is hard rock; ZZ Top is Texas blues-rock and boogie. But, both are loud and hard. Both are guitar-driven, riff-first, verse-chorus bands with a working-class image and a live show that delivers. The difference is one line: AC/DC hits you like a sledgehammer; ZZ Top rolls like a pickup with a good stereo. Songs I can listen to over and over? AC/DC: “It’s a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock ’n’ Roll).” ZZ Top: “Sharp Dressed Man.”

Still, it was worth sitting for a while with Nirvana—worth learning Cobain and grunge from the inside of the record, even if it isn’t my cup of tea.

An aside: Kurt Cobain died in 1994 at 27 of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. AC/DC’s Bon Scott died in 1980 at 33 of acute alcohol poisoning. Both lived on the edge of the rock-and-roll life—rock artists so young. Why? Maybe a subject for another essay, when I get around to it.

Above: Willow Creek Park, Summit County, UT. 26 August 2026.
Granny and Freddie.

Above: Springville, UT. 26 August 2026.
Springville, Art Museum.
52nd Annual Utah Quilt Show

Above: Blind Dog Restaurant. Park City, UT. 27 August 2026.
Mynduveroan and Granny on the vielle of Minduveroan's departure for her freshman year at the Univeristy of Wisconsin in Madison. She's signed up for "pre-Veterinary" and, following in her dad's family footsteps, AFROTC.

Above: Fish (Henry Glasheen, turquoise shirt), an early LSDM member, returns to the scene of the crime, Wasatch Bagel, Park City, UT. 28 August 2026.

Fifteen years ago, when LSDM started having speakers, Fish arranged for luminaries such as Mia Love and Jake Garn to speak to the ROMEOs at Wasatch Bagel at 7:00 AM.

Fish, an investment advisor with big swinging d... customers, now lives in Santa Barbara, CA.

Fish says: "Utah becomes California within five years."

Briefly noted:
Advocate (Roger Goldman), formerly of Latham and Watkins, reminded ROMEOs of his (with co-host Kevin Kennedy) interview of Matthew Prince on KPCW’s Mountain Money. The episode was published May 19, 2025 as “A candid conversation with Matthew Prince” — about 56 minutes. He noted another interview may be forthcoming.

Princeton (Pat O'Connell) reported on his whirlwind ball park trip last week, during which he and his daughter attended baseball games in five major league parks.

Big Blue Dragon (Don Stanger) and Esquire (Bill Boyd) effusively praised LSDM's visit to the University of Utah on August 25, 2026, and the meeting with the U's president, Taylor Randall.

Note: LSDM returning to its roots? A few ROMEOs are coming to Wasatch Bagel tomorrow, 29 August 2026, at 7:00 AM. Fish said he's coming too. Join!


La Société Deux Magots (LSDM) is a non-partisan ROMEO (retired old men eating out) group which meets daily, at 7:00 AM at Wasatch Bagel in Park City, UT. LSDM members are the rightful intellectual heirs of a group of authors and artists (Hemingway, Joyce, Sartre, Picasso, Camus, de Beauvoir) who met daily at Cafe Deux Magots, in Paris, France in the 1930's.
http://www.LSDM-Parkcity.com

Above: Iron Canyon, Park City, UT. 29 August 2026.
And then, the rains came.

Above: Gayle DeWitt Taylor (Mom) and Weldon Johnson Taylor. 31 August 2026.
Nostalgia pic circa 1944.