A bit sad: Sir Peter Ustinov dead at 82.

(although the man had such a long career, I was surprised he wasn't older).

I always liked Peter Ustinov. Part of it is, I liked his voice - I am drawn to that kind of cultured male voice. But I also liked him because he was, basically, a polymath - did a lot of things, was good at a lot of things, was interested in a lot of things.

I find people who have a broad range of interests - the polymaths - more interesting than people who focus intensely on a single thing. I think that's because I'm basically a scattered person myself, that I get too bored focusing on any one thing, so rather than being the World Authority on one thing (and knowing little about everything else), I'm happier being "pretty good" at a whole bunch of things.

And people like Ustinov are my "patron saints" (in the sense that Madeline L'Engle describes) because they model what I think is a good life, a way to go through the world and enjoy it and learn from it. And I remember people like that as examples when I get down on myself for not being more focused - in the sciences, generally, it is the people who are a mile deep but an inch wide who get looked up to and who get the glory, not the ones who try to lead a balanced life. The Carl Woeses of the world do great things, but I can't be one of them. I can't lock myself in my office and spend my Sundays there and devote 99% of my reading to being right within my topic and having few outside interests, so on and so forth. And it's hard, because then I ask myself "why don't I ever achieve anything?" which is followed hard on the heels by "You don't work hard enough, you need to drop your hobbies and stop reading dumb mystery novels and not plan on going home every day at 5, if you're ever going to make something of yourself in this life"

Which is why I like to remember people like Ustinov, to remind me that it's not just the hard-charging, tungsten-filament types of people who can have a Good Life.