I'm imitating msbelle. I'm bouncing. Will probably be afflicted all weekend. bouncebounce!
Hil, I looked up my physics profs. They nailed one, but you can really tell who were the physics students and who weren't. Those that said he was a tough old bear but he rocked were physics majors. Those who called him a tough old bear perjoratively were not. And Rex is cantankerous. He expects you to work your ass off. He argues with you for the sake of making you think. And he's the same dude that when I was homeless, mailed me his keys so I could stay in his unoccupied house and then his WIFE found me a place to rent, from a distance. His thanksgivings for all the holiday orphans were legendary, in all their boozesoakedness(GROG! GLUWEIN!) and the fact so many of us slept on his floors. When one of the continuing ed students (in english, not physics) was having financial problems, he gave him a stern lecture of interest rates and financial planning...and then floated him an interest free loan (provided the guy wrote a comparative paper on interest.)
He could be a total bastard, but he always started out in your corner. You had to un-earn that.
Man, I need to write him. I think I got on with him like a house on fire because I know his type (just like my dad) but he connected with so many others. Screaming matches in his office were common, but those same screamers showed up in his hospital room after his hip surgery.
(he also pulled a whole pile of us on his lap and bawled along with us after the funeral of another beloved physics prof. How he fit 9 18-21 year olds on his lap at once, some of them not-small people, I don't know. We were just this pile of grief.)