The Palmer Clan

This is the second of two news stories from Seattle:

A big exciting event for me recently was participating as a volunteer for a dinner to thank the donors to our new Computer Science building which we are inhabiting now. Only the donors who gave more than $25,000 attended. I got to work security at the door to let the authorized students in and out. It was like being at the red carpet when all the Hollywood stars get out of their limos at the Oscars. (Only there was no press, just me and some balloons)

Anyway it was pretty fun because there were only about 80 people at the dinner, and it included Bill and Melinda Gates, and Paul Allen. The #1 and
#3 richest people in the world! Paul Allen had a little entourage that he came in with, but Bill arrived just like any normal person would, except
that he was a little dishelved.

I was about a foot from Paul Allen’s rear end while I was moving some flower arrangements. Talk about the seat of power!
The funniest thing that happened was that as
I was wandering around helping out I ran into the catering chef in the basement. It was after dinner and he was rocking on his heels by the door. I asked him what was going on and he said that his catering truck was blocked from getting out of the loading dock by another car. I asked him which car (because I had the keys to a few of them) and he said a blue Porsche. Well there were two special cars in the loading dock. A silver Mercedes (Gates’ car) and a blue Porsche (Paul Allen’s car). Since Paul gave $14 million for
the building I told the chef he should find a comfortable seat for a while
Here are some official photos of the event: photos

-Don