Joe was such a creative thinker, and he was never (that I could tell) embarrassed by the prospect of an idea of his proving to be a poor one, so it was always i

Joe was such a creative thinker, and he was never (that I could tell) embarrassed by the prospect of an idea of his proving to be a poor one, so it was always interesting to hear him talk. Genuinely curious, thinking outside the box (writing a new programming language on top of Prolog?), and he treated people with utmost respect. I was a nobody lucky enough to escort him around Chicago one day when he was attending a conference, and we spent a couple of hours talking about art, Erlang, Riak, and man I wish I could remember what else.