(1) Who was the most memorable (good or bad) graduation speaker at a ceremony you've attended -- not necessarily your own?

I remember two graduation speakers. My younger brother's high school speaker was Terry Anderson, who was interesting to hear, although I remember very little of what he actually said. The more memorable speaker was at my high school graduation. They brought in a former graduate whose mom was a public school teacher and who had made it big in business after going to Brown and Yale. The memorable thing about his talk was despite his obvious successes in life, he used his time to discuss how opressed he had been because of his skin color. He chose to call most of us racists and warn us to go out and call for us to fight against our evil nature that had kept him and others like him down-trodden.

People were so annoyed that that was the last year my high school had a graduation speaker other than the valedictorian.

Actually, my college graduation was memorable because the salutatorian gave his speech in Latin (it's a graduation tradition that usually comes with a lot of last minute coaching from the classics department). As if the person weren't already feeling bad enough that they barely missed being valedictorian, you stick them with speaking Latin in front a crowd.

(2) Approximately how many graduation ceremonies have you been in as a graduate and how many others have you gone to?

I don't go to graduations as part of my job, like certain people, but I sure have been to a lot. My older brother's eight grade graduation and later a foreign exchange student's. My dad's PhD graduation. My older and younger brothers' high school graduations. My high school, college and MA graduations. Justin's college and law school graduations. And one of Justin's brother's high school graduations. That is, far too many, in my opinion.

I skipped my MLS graduation. I was living in another state and it just wasn't a big deal. I kind of regret not going, but not so much.

3) After finishing high school and/or college what did you do for the summer?

I don't think I did much after either one, other than travelling around the country to physics conferences with my family and getting ready to move on to the next school.

Bonus Question:

What was your favorite graduation gift?

I got a great set of basic tools for my high school graduation from my parents. I still keep in my car.