June 6. Test runs of the talk before the conference. In the evening tech check at the Javits Center. I was not prepared to encounter dozens of people in the conference halls whom I have not seen for years. They greet me enthusiastically. It takes me maybe a second not to want to sneak away and play joy as I frantically search my memory for the names. - Later dinner a few blocks north in Hell’s Kitchen. None of the people I see there I can imagine on the Upper West Side. Hell’s Kitchen is a strange wasteland where people seem to live somehow at random.