jere7my | Failure is always an option

I managed to surprise

adfamiliares tonight, luring her onto a bus and through Harvard Yard to Memorial Church, where we waited in a light drizzle to get inside. Despite the conversations going on around us, it wasn't until the usher handed her the program that she found out we were there to see Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, aka the Mythbusters. (She's a big fan. It's the most soothing show on television, sez she.)

The boys were there to receive the Harvard Secular Society's 2010 Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award in Cultural Humanism (previous recipients include Salman Rushdie and Joss Whedon), and they gave eloquent and reasoned defenses of atheism and secular humanism in their acceptance speeches — not my bag, but props to them for a well-examined ethical life. (Adam: "I hope you don't mind if I read mine from my...iPad. I'm not just an atheist; I'm an early adopter." Jamie, utterly seriously: "I want to read from Adam's iPad, but it's kinda dirty.")

The hour-long Q&A was more engaging; we got a lot of insight into how they put the show together, what they're trying to accomplish with it, how they interact with each other. I sometimes get the impression from the show that Jamie is doing it as a lark, and would really prefer to get back to "real" work; I was surprised to hear him describe the boundless passion he'd discovered within himself for examining the world around him and answering questions — enough to make him stop doing "real" F/X work because it was taking him away from Mythbusting. I was also surprised to hear that they find the explosions to be among the least interesting parts of the show — Adam waxed more poetic about polishing turds. (But their favorite explosions, hands down: hot water heaters.) I have boundless respect for those guys, and I'm glad I got a chance to applaud them in person.

(Yes, Jamie wore the beret. Yes, Adam did his wiggly-finger-mustache Jamie impression: "Want to come over to the shop? I've just finished making something, and I'm about to strap it on.")