Bill Scanlon

I am mailing this, my dear Talbot, from Porto de la Luz, where we have put in for a few days of rest.

My principal companion in the voyage has been Bill Scanlon, the head mechanic.

who as a fellow countryman and also as a very entertaining character has become my natural associate however i am alone this morning as he has what he describes as a date with a skirt you see he talks as englishmen expect every real american to talk he would be accepted as the true breed the mere force of suggestion makes me guess and reckon when i am with my english friends i feel that they would never really understand that i was a yankee if i did not however i am not on those terms with you so let me assure you right now that you will not find anything but pure oxford in the epistle which i am now mailing to you you met marocco at the mitre so you know the dry chip of a man that he is i told you i think how he came to pitch for me for the job he inquired from old somerville of the zoological institute who sent him my prize essay on the pelagic crabs and that did the trick of course it is splendid to be on such a congenial errand but i wish it wasn't with such an animated mummy as marico he is inhuman in his isolation and his devotion to his work The world's stiffest stiff, says Bill Scanlon.

And yet you can't but admire such complete devotion.

Nothing exists outside his own science.

He is continually working at papers and charts, which he shuffles away when I happen to enter the cabin.

It is my firm belief that the man has some secret project in his mind, but that, so long as we are due to touch at any port, he will keep it to himself.

That is the impression which I have received, and I find that Bill Scanlon is of the same opinion.

I am mailing this, my dear Talbot, from Porto de la Luz, where we have put in for a few days of rest.

My principal companion in the voyage has been Bill Scanlon, the head mechanic, who, as a fellow countryman and also as a very entertaining character, has become my natural associate.

However, I am alone this morning, as he has what he describes as a date with a skirt.

You see, he talks as Englishmen expect every real American to talk.

Of course, it is splendid to be on such a congenial errand, but I wish it wasn't with such an animated mummy as Marico.

He is inhuman in his isolation and his devotion to his work.

The world's stiffest stiff, says Bill Scanlon.

And yet you can't but admire such complete devotion.

There it is.

Playing in the Zone, that I wrote with Bill Scanlon, who was famous for getting in the zone and beating players ranked far above him.

Uh, he got to number nine in the world, so they weren't that far above, but, um, when he was just in the top 20, he beat John McEnroe, who was ranked number one in the world and seated favorite to win the US Open, and Bill got in the zone.

And we tell stories of his play in the zone and how that reflects a lot of what I'm teaching, uh, of Zen, uh, the Zen princip- the mindfulness principles that help get you there.