Canto XXXI

Wow, it's been two weeks. Well, as I mentioned in the previous post, school is back in session. And that has certainly put a bit of a crimp on my time. I haven't played FFXII in 2 weeks, and I think it's safe to say that will continue until spring break. But here's a quick recap of what's happening and some other fun bits 'n pieces.

Over the three day weekend Steph & I used our first Zipcar (in Portland they're Flexcars). Not bad. We did a whole bunch of shopping and errands around the town. I miss a car sometimes. It's certainly much easier not having one, but when you really want to bounce around doing a bunch of stuff, one comes in handy. Zipcar will hopefully take care of that need. We also did a lovely dinner at the local Peruvian place and had a good meal. Steph's been missing the South cuisine, and by South I mean South America.

Steph is always worried about how much we'll define the gender roles in front of our future children. She grew up in a more traditional household with Mother cooking & cleaning while Father would dispense wisdom from Mount Olympus. My family not so much, but we also had our traditional settings as well. I dispute the fact that we'll end up like her family (with Steph doing all the house work while I drink beer in my underpants) because I willingly help out with the stuff around the house, and even enjoy it. Then there are times like last weekend where I organized our books, did the dishes and folded laundry while Steph played World Of Warcraft for 4 hours. I think if anything, our kids will just be confused about the traditional gender arrangements.

This came up a little bit ago. It has to do with Alanis Morrisette's You Oughta Know. During the chorus, I heard the line (keep in mind I never look up lyrics until confronted with some situation like this one) "It's not fair to deny me or the cross-eyed bear that you gave to me." Now, this song is about a slightly crazy ex-girlfriend, and that's fine. I just thought that this little bit was highlighting how crazy she was, like she was holding onto some little stuffed animal that her now-ex had won for her at a carnival or something and then promised to love her forever. You know, something stupid and sappy, which she took a little too seriously. Now the real lyrics are "It's not fair to deny me of the cross I bear that you gave to me." First off, this must be a fairly mis-heard quote. Am I the only one who heard this wrong in this particular permutation? Well, Steph thinks now I'm crazy for thinking this. She can't believe I mis-heard it in this way, calling it completely ridiculous. She also thinks the narrator for the song isn't crazy. Just pissed-ff, but not crazy pissed-off. I retorted that if it's not crazy, then will she go down on me in a theater? I think Steph wanted to slap me. Is the singer-woman crazy? Am I crazy for mis-hearing? Maybe in general?

One of our chores from the three day weekend was to do a bunch of spring cleaning and bring old stuff (clothes and some junk) over to Goodwill (using the car!). This naturally led to a treasure trove of old things I haven't seen since we moved out here because they've been buried in various boxes. Pez with a Star Wars Stormtrooper dispenser! Lots of pictures of drunken parties in The Cube! And high school pictures, too! Well, those were all good times, but there was nothing like clearing out my T-shirt drawer. Now, just to make clear right now, I did not give away my old T-shirts. Steph is collecting them and wants to make some kind of quilt out of our used T's in another 10-20 years (roughly the time scale for her projects). Here's a quick list and maybe you can try and picture the shirt and bring back some good memories.
Healy's, Kokopalie, Living Known Animal Species, White Bread 5 for $2.70, Morning Dew, Ireland (black), Celtic Dragons, DeadHead, Carpe Diem, Know Your Insects, Smithsonian (purple), Star Wars TIE Fighter, Jerry Garcia, Athenes 2004, Why I? Why B? Why Me?, Colorado, Guiness, Ireland (off-white), Rabbits, Wassail, Blues Brothers, Lincoln High Seniors, Moon Jerry Garcia (purple long-sleeved)
So many memories...

Back to school, though. I "get" to teach 3 lab sections during the term, 2 nights per lab, roughly 3 hours per night from 6:30-9:30 pm. It really sucks. It's fun to explain how it works the first few times, then you have to do it 50 times to all the different groups and it's really draining. What's so hard about electrostatics? Well, that plus grading and my own homeworks to work on doesn't leave me much time to do anything fun, like research or games. But that little segway gets me to my research point of the day. Starting in January I got a new little thing to work on with the Advisor. It has to do with a conjectured bound on the viscosity of a fluid divided by the entropy density. The conjecture is that this is always greater than or equal to 1 over 4 pi. (Too bad Blogger doesn't support LaTex, I could make this look much nicer.) This was shown to be true for a large class of theories in the AdS/CFT correspondence, and conjectured to be true more generally about 3 years ago. I was reading about how to calculated these things in a general field theory framework (rather than through AdS/CFT) and working out some basic calculations the last few weeks. Then last week someone published a counter-example. So the last week was like the 5 stages of loss. You know, denial, anger, bargaining and so on. At first we didn't believe it, then we were pissed off that such a simple counter-example could be worked out. Now we've grown to accept it and I need to find something else to occupy what little free time I have. So that sucks. Science really blows sometimes. But I learned something that may be useful someday. And now I get to start that all over again.

Well, that's all the news that's fit to print! Peace!

Canto XXX

So now I'm back in school again. Actually, I think my classes will be alright. I've got some other stuff I'm trying to work on, as well. And now I'm even trying to get back into the gym a few times a week. Too much? Maybe. But I'd rather be too busy than sucked into FFXII and not get my PhD. Curse you, Squeenix! Are there anymore Final Fantasies coming out in the next two years? Oh God - what if one comes out Christmas time 2008, just 6 months before I'm suppose to graduate?

Thanks to Tim & Joseph for their music suggestions. I'll have to get around to doing that. Last year I heard the Fiery Furnaces, and they're wierd but kinda fun as well. It sort of depends on the mood I'm in. It always depends on the mood I'm in, actually. But that's just true for music.

Oh, but today is the Pushpinder friday meal! It's going to be a great day! Pushpinder is the Sikh who delivers delicious Indian food to MIT (mainly to other Indian students here, but thanks to my Indian officemate, I'm on the list). His friday meals are the best. If you ever visit, I get Pushp for lunch one of the days. And if you're here for fridays, you get the best lunch of all. I'm already hungry and I just had breakfast.

I'm also TA-ing advanced intro to E&M (8.022 for those familiar with MIT's course numberings). I did this last year and I'm hoping the work I did then will help make sure this year will be less (approaching minimal) work. Today is my first office hours. It's nice, because no one ever comes to these and I can just sit there and listen to music and work on some field theory. I never mind if people come by, though. It gets lonely in that tiny little room.

Canto XXIX

I think this is going to be the post of a lot of short points.

First off, some big news from the CTP bathroom front. They've switchted to 2-ply! This happened last week. This now makes MIT way better than Harvard, which is still using scratchy 1-ply (I had to go after String Theory earlier today). 2-ply, baby! MIT is so cool.

I was originally going to post about this January 25th, and then Febuary 1st, but I kept forgetting. For those wondering, Kermit is still dangling from our neighbors' porch. Still.

It's really cold. Ever since KH showed up, we've had maybe 3 days above freezing. My breath freezes to my beard. In some ways this is really cool to me, but I really just want the snow, but it's been incredibly dry. Just ask Steph how many bottles of moisturizer she's gone through.

I think people may have mis-interpreted my last post. I'm not really that concerned about whether or not I "make it" in physics. I love my life right now, and I'm very happy about what I'm doing. I hope I do become a physics professor, but that's not the whole reason I went into grad school.

The first comment from XXVIII says "You're a good husband", and no one came in with a WTF, so I'm a little disappointed in you guys for not making that observation. Well, this was in relation to the original post in which I aired a grievance about a tiff Steph & I had a little while ago. I wanted Steph to respond, but she said she would not do so in a such a forum (I think because she knows she was wrong, but that's just me goading her), and so I deleted that part of the entry about an hour after the original went up. But it's good to know that some random person was on my side after just an hour. Eric-2, Steph-1.

Super Bowl! An OK game, but nothing too special. Basically everything went the way everyone thought it would. The Bears are who we thought they were! The Colts are who we thought they were! I was rooting for Indy, though not for much particular affection for that team. (Although I did want to see people who kept saying Peyton couldn't win the big game eat their words - there are 22 starters + special teams & backups on a football team, it's not entirely a QBs fault when they lose, nor is it all his doing when they win. Yes the QB position is the most important, but it's not the whole story.) I just didn't feel that the NFC deserved to win a championship this year. That would be like an NL team with 85 wins taking the World Series last year... Oh wait.

I'm totally addicted to FFXII. They're really made having enough gil very hard. And usually the best stuff (especially early on) is on sale, not to be found in a dungeon. Very annoying. I'm constantly poor in the game. I feel a little dirty, but I'm playing with a guide book. I used to play through once, then play through a second time with hints & guides. But the games have gotten just too damn big and my time suddenly seems too precious. Or I'm just not 14 anymore. I've already cleared 40 hours, and I probably have 80+ to go before I consider the game to be 'complete'.

And a quick side note that Joe & Syd brought up a little while ago over at Syd's Thoughts. I really need to get more into the music scene. I know there's some decent stuff out there that I would enjoy and would have a chance to see them in their prime live, but I just don't have the will to do it. I feel some shame about this, but I first heard The White Stipes (bad example since they've made it and are no longer indie, but you'll get the idea) on SNL several years ago when they were doing the White Blood Cells tour. And I kinda liked it. So later I downloaded (illegally) some of their songs. And I kept liking it, so I bought the album. And then I bought the previous albums because I liked them so much. Now they're my favorite band making music and I've even gone to see them live. Really this is a success story for music sharing. But it all started because of some cheesy pop-culture cliche of being the music guest on SNL. I know there are more nifty bands out there I would like, but unless I'm directly exposed it won't do much good (Ben was kind enough to do this for me with Sleater-Kinney). I don't listen to the radio, watch music videos or read much in the way of pitchfork.com and so on. So I rely on you guys to make sure my music world stays open.

Take 'er easy for all us sinners out there! Peace!

Canto XXVIII

Hi Everybody! Not much of a post, but if you don't care about the doings a-transpiring in my life, then why are you here?

So it's been another fun week here in the 'Bridge as I like to call it. Well, actually I haven't even spent most of my time here. Last week the CTP had a retreat to New Hampshire for a series of talks & hot tub sessions. What happens in New Hampshire, stays in New Hampshire. Has there ever been a better motto than adultery doesn't count in Las Vegas? The talks were pretty good, and I got one of my quantum field theory textbooks signed by Michael Peskin. Those in the field (theoretical high energy physics) know how exciting this is. I joked with him before he signed it that the reason I went into physics was to "live like a rock star". He didn't get it, and I told him that it must be fun having adoring students come up to him asking to sign their copy of his book. He just laughed and told me he hated writing this book. Why else do we do what we do? It's all about the ladies & the benjamins. Also, the Inn we were staying at (The Common Man Inn, for those looking for a nice getaway to The Granite State) had an awesome hot tub. During the afternoon free time, everyone went off to eat their lunch, but I decided a nice swim would put me in a good mood to eat, so I put on my trunks and headed downstairs. Well, I turned on the jets and hopped in. It took a second, but they started to roll - and then - the waterfall started up. Yes, the hot tub had twin waterfalls cascading about 4 feet into the middle of the tub. I just hunched under them for about... Well, I don't know how long because you kinda lose track of time under there, but it was amazing. And then I got a massage. Sadly, the CTP didn't pay for that, but it was worth it. I got a lot of tension, you know. Well, I think I learned some physics, too. But it was a good time.

The Advisor gave me the speech that I've been expecting for a while. He told me how hard it is to get a position in theoretical high energy physics and such. And he's right. I don't think my prospects are high for a faculty position somewhere. But that's a bridge I'll cross in a few more years. But this is what I've always wanted to do, and maybe this physics gig only lasts a few more years, but that doesn't mean not do it at all, it just means to enjoy what time there is here. That's why I go to sleep at night reading a Thermal Field Theory book rather than Harry Potter. It's not about the future prospects, it's about loving physics and doing it right now.

Canto XXVII

Okay, so I said the Colts were in the process of choking when Peyton threw that INT for TD. But of course football games are 60 minutes long, not 25. That was a great game. If only more football games were that good. Of course, nothing can compare to the Fiesta Bowl this year (maybe the 2002 Fiesta Bowl). Sigh... Just one more game left until next fall. I'm going to miss football. What else am I going to do for my free time? Oh yeah. I've already logged in 20 hours in FFXII. Damn you Squeenix!

Canto XXVI

Well, suffice to say it's been a while. I can't say that it's been terribly exciting around here. Well, stuff's been happening, some of it exciting. I guess it's been 2 weeks, so there's always something to say.

First up, like I mentioned last post, there was my string test. Wow did that suck. I didn't even finish it. It turned out way longer and harder than I thought. And on top of that I had to ask my Advisor for help. There's nothing like going up and asking for help from someone you're trying to impress. I feel so stupid because I really have no clue how easy or hard some of these things are. I mean, they're all hard to me right now, but how much of this, in a year or two, will be completely trivial? And because I'm asking Advisor about it, and he already thinks it's trivial, I just feel like he's thinking I'm "a retarded kitten". Arg. A very stressful week.

Then there was a nice 3 day weekend. Actually, a very productive weekend. I did some reading for my actual research. Played some FFXII. Lots of stuff done around the house and cleaned everything up. Sadly, due to being out helping Steph run a bunch of errands, I didn't get to watch much playoff action. I'm trying to make up for it this weekend. Watched the Bears destroy the Saints. Well, destroy might be a little strong. But they sure took over in the 4th quarter. And now I'm watching the Colts choke against the Patriots. I'm not sure I can stand another Patriots Superbowl. I must say, there are some things that I just hate about living in Boston. And listening to Boston sports fans is one of them.

Then there was the shortened week. Tuesday morning I got some work done, but then KH was in town. We spent the next few days wandering around Boston & Cambridge. It was very cold. The three of us went out to a couple nice restaurants here, including a nice Italian place in the North End. Lots of gossip I won't bother passing on. I had a good time, although I didn't exactly get much (any) work done. I'll let KH tell you what wonderful hosts Steph & I are. And then friday rolls around and I'm just not ready to do much of anything. I did do some reading, but I've got to say, I think I need some sort of motivation. Like doughnuts. And the possibility of more doughnts to come.

Canto XXV

Hi everybody! So it's been another week. And of course the last post was post-dated so even longer than that when you think about it. But my break is over. I got to see a lot of people while we were back, but still missed quite a few as well. If you were among the group that I didn't get to see, well that just means you need to come see lovely Boston.

I'm not sure there were a bunch of events to write about over the break. I think I spent most of the time trying to catch up with people and sleeping in late. There were the usual Christmas parties and the like to go to. Went to the Pancake House with Ben & his SO. Steph was still in Eugene, so I was third wheeling it, but I think when the two of us get together, anyone else is really the third wheel. Not too much else to report. Played lots of Wii, which I must say is awesome. But I just got Final Fantasy XII, so that will be taking up my video game time for most of the forseeable future. We couldn't find Zelda for the Gamecube, which makes me hate Nintendo slightly. I know you want us to buy the Wii and Zelda to go with it, but at this point you can't get one without paying way too much for it, and there are lots of us out there with just the Cube who want to get the hookshot and boomerang! Our flight back was uneventful, and no luggage was lost. I felt I should point that out after all the stories from certain other travellers this holiday season.

So we're back to work now. Steph is just trying to make it to the weekend to sleep in another 12 hours. I've never really had bad jetlag while travelling in the US (going to Europe on the other hand was a totally different story), but I usually force myself onto the local schedule. For some reason, I didn't do this when we got back to Massachusetts. Slept in over 12 hours until 1pm the first night back. This has really screwed both Steph and my own sleep schedule. Going to work has forced us into a routine we so happily tried to forget the last 2 weeks. I think I fell asleep a half a dozen times yesterday at my desk. I managed to finish all of 1 problem for my take-home final in String Theory all day. My brain was NOT ready for this. I think today will be better, but I will have to actually start working before finding that out. I'll be meeting with The Advisor later today to talk about all the things that I didn't read or work on over vacation. That should be fun. Maybe I'll be so fantastically productive over this weekend, that by monday I'll be ready to talk to him about anything and everything. Oh wait... NFL playoffs are this weekend, and the BCS championship is monday. Not good.

Speaking of football. (How's that for a segway?) The J-E-T-S JETS-JETS-JETS made the playoffs! Of course they're going to get waxed in Foxboro this sunday, but 10-6 is a lot better than 4-12 from last year. They may have made it on an easy schedule, but that means they're better than a lot of those teams on that easy schedule. I don't know if they were really a top-6 team in the AFC, but it's actually plausible that they were (seeding puts them 5th), and that's a huge step forward. The Offensive line really solidified and will hopefully continue to play well next season. If Chad Pennington can stay healthy all off season and build up some more arm strength, the offense will go places (although I still think they need a good running back - Washington, Houston & Barlow aren't exactly a feared 1-2-3, although they did go 395 carries for 1394 yards and 15 touchdowns). Next up is building up a mediocre run defense.

And if you didn't watch the Boise State-Oklahoma Fiesta Bowl, well, you missed out. Big time. One of the best games I've ever seen. I'm still in shock about it. Look for the replay on ESPN Classic or something, it's totally worth it. Go Broncos!

Canto XXIV

This was written a week ago... But I haven't had a chance to post it until now. Enjoy?

So I think my last post was on Kermit. It's been a little while, but I've got some stuff to say for once, so strap yourselves in for a long post. Well, maybe nothing too profound, but that's what you get when this comes at you from 36,000 feet. I'm actually typing this in the sky, and when I get home and have some internet access I'll post it up. I've got plans baby. Big plans for this flight.

My Dad was in town to see how his eldest lives. And see his whole family. The Fitz family Christmas Party was nice. I'm not really sure how well Steph and I fit into these things. The problem is that my parents, my brother and I grew up 2500 miles away from the closest Fitz relation. So I've only met everyone a few times in my entire life. All the cousins seem to know each other fairly well, and I'm still struggling to learn all their names. The net result is that Steph and I are fairly quiet at these things. I talk to everyone, tell them school is going fine and that Steph's happy with her job. But these people, other than looking like me, don't feel like family. It's hard to explain. Steph always wondered why I looked forward to seeing my friends more than my family when we visit people. But now she seems to realize that my friends are closer to me than my family (parents and brother excepted, obviously). For her, she grew up with family and cousins her age all around her, so she's much closer to her family. I think she's knows my cousin's names better than I do. Another reason I'm a little self-consious at these events is that I can't make any dirty jokes. My uncles are cool and all, but there's only so many penis and 'your mom' jokes you can do around them before some social taboo is crossed. And I love the penis jokes. I mean, penises are funny.

Our in flight movie was Little Miss Sunshine. That was pretty funny. Every movie is made better by some Rick James.

And this week Stormy came to visit. Apparently I'm one of the last holdovers to call him Stormy. What's with you people, that has to be among the greatest nicknames/epitets of all time and you're letting it slip away. Some of my favorites:
1) Rosy-fingered Dawn
2) Africanus (or really just being named after a region you conquered)
3)
4) Stormy
5) the Great (whenever this gets added to your first name, you know you're doing alright)

But with him in town, not a whole lot got done around the office or house. They'll be plenty of work to do this January. But we did walk the Freedom Trail, saw some famous dead people's graves, Bunker/Breeds Hill and the USS Constitution. Of course, it being the middle of December, there wasn't much open, but had a good time anyway. And we discovered that we didn't remember as much American History and we thought. Could only name a few battles of the Revolutionary War. Well, it was a good refresher to walk around and try and remember all that stuff...

I saw Monica Lewinsky graduated from the London School of Economics. Good to see that my brother is getting a degree from such a prestigious place.

We flew the day Denver was shut down. Actually we didn't get it too bad. Logan-O'Hare-PDX. We were only delayed by about 5 hours in Chicago and that was about it. Otherwise smooth. Of course, it's always stressful when you're flying standby and there are hundreds of other people stuck in the same situation. But we got through with what I would describe as a minimal amount of fuss. And our luggage made it as well.




It's funny, I've always had rather good flying experiences. I've never lost my luggage, and the longest I've ever been stranded in an airport is about 6 or 7 hours. So nothing too bad. Steph on the other hand has had terrible experiences, in fact her whole family has had to deal with lost luggage, missed flights and day-plus waits. All my worst flight experiences have been with my little lady by my side. So my good flight karma somehow balances her bad karma and we only get a little screwed up. But it always works out, no worries.

But once we arrived we had tickets for the Nutcracker with my parents. Landed at 5:45, made it to the show downtown by 7:15. I've got to say I was a little disappointed. The little girl, Clara I think, was actually played by a little girl, which means for most of the second half with the Sugarplum Fairy and King and such she didn't dance. I mean, ballet is always impressive, and something I could never do. Maybe I just demand perfection from the arts. But this wasn't an issue of execution, it was the directing, casting and choreography. Well, I won't bother with a point-by-point analysis of what I didn't like, but it was only OK.

And lastly, the Ducks game... Well, that really deserves it's own post. I think everyone is a little disappointed with the team right now. It's an issue of consistency. This is now twice in 4 years where the team has ended on a rather lengthy losing streak, bowl game included. In fact, were it not for last year's very special season, I might even think about calling for some changes at the head coaching position. But I don't think it's Bellotti, I think it's who he's surrounding himself with. I never liked the Crowton hire, and I still think Aliotti's only an average defensive coordinator. The quarterbacks haven't really progressed this season. Everyone knows the talent in there, but it's making sure the right players are there and in position to make good plays is all about coaching, and that wasn't true in the second half of the season. Even in the first half of the season there were a lot of mistakes being made, but talent and homefield managed to overcome those issues. But the chickens came home to the proverbial roost. Well, there's always next year.

Canto XXIII

A much less crazy week this time around. Finished up the last of the grading I need to do this term, so now my laptop is all my own. I've got one more assignment to finish up, and then I'm free until January! Of course, now I need to start actually doing some kind of research, so I'm not so much free and much as moving from one kind of indentured serviture to another. But while all of this may be exciting, our neighbors have decided to put up their "christmas decorations". I can only put that in quotes because does this:

look festive to you? I keep thinking about pinning a note to him in the middle of the night that says "Piggy drove me to it" or "No funeral". It's very creepy. They lynched Kermit the Frog! Or the world's greatest frog had problems that never seemed to surface during his show. The other day as I walked into work, he was slowly twisting in the wind and followed me with his lifeless eyes as I walked past. Why, Kermit, why?!? And now I feel the need to listen to the Rainbow Connection... Elliot Smith, he is not.

In other news my dad is in town for the family Christmas party. All the brothers and sisters together again. I'm sure Grandma will be very happy. But for me, it's back to my homework. So close to freedom. Don't the rest of you miss school?

Canto XXII

So it's been a busy week, so sorry for the lack of posting. But it was all worth it because...

I passed! Hooray! That's the last of my qualification exams at MIT! Yes! There were 3 of us, and two passed. So overall good, but not a triumphal day for the CTP grad students. There was one weird thing. Just as my exam ended (and I mean just, I had walked out of the room for maybe 10 seconds) the power went out. The exam committee poked their heads out for two seconds just to see if I had played a joke on them or something, then went back in and began deliberating again. There were still emergency lights for the building, but everyone was out in the halls joking and having a good time of it. After a few minutes, the committee came out and shook my hand and all was good with the world. I don't think it hurt that I brought in some coffee cake for them. Dave decried it as the most suck-up thing he had ever seen, couldn't believe I would stoop to such levels, and as he was saying this, they (the committee) came back by my office to pick up seconds. Then he said he was going to do it next term when he's taking the exam.

There was a big fire in the building two buildings over from us, and one of the transformers blew. A big one. It took out a few city blocks of power. Everyone stuck around for the pizza normally served with a talk at noon, then went home to get some work done. It's amazing how little you can get done without lights, computers or the internet. If we had had power, I would have posted immediately, but now you'll understand.

But that wasn't the only thing this week. On wednesday night there was a physics graduate student event at the Harpoon Brewery. And by event I mean unlimited beer sampling for an hour and a half. So that was fun. And intoxicating. Who says you can't have a little fun in the middle of the week just 2 days before one of the most important exams of your graduate student life? For a little bonus, I slept in 11 hours on thursday to rest up. Steph got her haircut on thursday, and it looks very cute. It's shorter than her shoulders. If you remember her hair back in freshman and sophomore year, it's roughly that length. It looks great and the next time you see her give her a compliment. And yesterday was spent on the orgy of consumer capitalism that is Christmas shopping. I'm about 2/3 done, I'm not sure where Steph is. I'm not sure if a Christmans letter is going to get done this year. I would have to mail it next weekend, and I don't know between everything at school finishing up and my dad visting on thursday if it's going to get done. We'll see. Consider this blog the letter unless you get a real one in the mail. Oh yeah, my dad is visiting this weekend to see the family for the Christmas party. Should be good.

So that's at least part of the news from our end this week. I don't know how much I'll be able to post this week as well, but I'll try and get one in somewhere. I'm sure something funny will happen to me this week.

Canto XXI

Wow. Just watched UCLA upset USC. What a great game. I can't believe USC was held to a single touchdown. And kudos to UCLA's defense. Last year their offense was the big surprise, this year the defense has really come alive. Maybe they'll get their whole act together one of these years. And now don't the look stupid for agreeing to go to the Emerald Valley Bowl? They're #4 in the Pac-10, they should be where the Ducks are (despite the head-to-head loss). I told you that slotting the bowls before the last game was a bad idea...

Otherwise just hanging around the house, wathcing some football, having a white russian, and cleaning up. I think these are my favorite saturdays. No pressure or nothing. Of course, my oral exam is less than a week away. Gulp (literally and figuratively).

Canto XX

I just wanted to get this in right now. So the Ducks are off to the Las Vegas Bowl. Disappointing year for the Ducks I feel, but can only be summed up in one word: turnovers. Hopefully a month of hands drills will ensure a bowl win over BYU. Note the key subplot for this is Gary Crowton taking on his old school. We're all intrigued. I also love that the Pac-10 has set up all it's bowls, including UCLA. They have basically already conceded that they will lose this weekend's matchup with USC. How can the athletic director do that? Who made that decision?

Canto XIX

So if I wasn't trying to get to 100 (C) for my titles, I think the title for this one would be "The Great Equalizer". Which, in this case, is the bathroom at work. It's a decent bathroom, although only 1 soap dispenser works (out of 3). But it's great because I can pee standing next to Nobel Prize winners. Also, otherwise intimidating faculty member will come in and start to raise holy hell in one of the stalls. I mean, it was like one of those comedic scenes with gratuitous farting sounds and lots of splashing. He does drink a lot of coffee, so maybe this is par for the course for him, but after that incident, I've had a hard time not thinking about this whenever I see him. The reason why I'm writing this now, though, is that yesterday a certain faculty member was urinating hands free! I don't think I've gone hands free since second grade. There's always a concern that there could be some kind of backlash and suddenly you can't control where the flow is going. I respect and admire this man, but now suddenly everything is thrown into question. He does wash his hands, which is more than I can say for some people around here, but this is really screwing with me. Are there any other hands-free people in this world?

Canto XVIII

No more weekend. Man I hate mondays. Not that I don't love my work. But still, hearing the alarm on a monday morning will certainly be one of my (many) punishments in Hell.

But it was a good weekend. Got some school stuff done, but not enough to feel "ahead". Did some work around the house, but there's still plenty on the to-do list. We need to get some lights and a Christmas Tree. I insist on getting a cheap smallish plastic one, so it won't burn down our place while were gone. But Steph thinks this is akin to worshipping Baal. She's against it. We also went to the mall for a while doing some window shopping and get gift ideas. And saw the new Bond film. We went to the 10:45am showing on Sunday, which means cheap tickets! In fact, just $6 a piece, cheapest I've been to the movies since Eugene. And the movie wasn't too bad. Too long by a good 20 minutes (very noticable when you have to go to the bathroom), but fun. Would have been more enjoyable on a friday or saturday night, but the price was right. I think I can recommend this. If you like action films. Finally, the leftovers. I made it through the mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, regular stuffing (the vegetarian stuffing is still around), and Steph finished off the beans. Looks like it's just the mountain of turkey that's between me and a new meal. Got to keep eating...

Canto XVII

So Thanksgiving was pretty awesome. It turns out that my starving Indian officemate's plans fell through for Thanksgiving (some "friends" were suppose to come up and visit, but bailed because a bus trip is too expensive from Penn State), so he and his special lady friend came over for some turkey. Of course he's vegetarian, so he missed that part of it (the 3 of us, on the other had, barely made a dent in that bird). But even with twice the number of people Steph planned for, we still have a mountain of leftovers. And you should have seen Indian man eat - like there was no tomorrow. (Not kidding, he made it through 4ths!) I managed two large platefuls and some pie and ice cream. But I was (and still am) stuffed. I introduced them to Alice's Restaurant. And we played some Trivial Pursuit and Monkey Ball 2. Good times all around. I love Thanksgiving. And I just finished up all the dishes, so that leaves the rest of the weekend to watch the Ducks, Jets and everything else. For those gambling, take the over on the turnovers line for the Civil War. Maybe I'll post again after the game. If I'm feeling up to it. It's televised out here, so at least I'll be able to watch it.

[After the game]

So they lost. But at least it was a thrilling ending. I don't really begraudge the Beavers. But the Ducks should have won that game. 2 turnovers -> 14 points. 3 (!!!) missed FGs. Another missed PAT. (Which was made up because the next time they didn't trust their kicker and went for 2 and got it, but still...) Also, the officiating left something to be desired. I think overall the Ducks benefitted, but definitely not the best day for the zebras. The Pac-10 really needs to work on their offciating crews. Stewart was having a monster day. Two huge kickoff returns, and a decent day running the ball (the only thing holding him back was the playcalling, he really needed to get some more carries). The Ducks should have won that game. Arg.

Canto XVI

So it seems that the whole Cube gang is getting this going, so I must carry on. I'm not going to complain about the Ducks on this post though. What's the point. They just like to give the other team the ball. Very thoughtful of them, when you think about it. And a good lesson for kids everywhere this holiday season. We'll see how they do this weekend against the Beavs.

In school related news, there's a bunch of stuff going on. This term seems to be shaping like I had hoped, and I'm getting a lot done. My "oral exam" is "coming up" in just 2 1/2 weeks (Dec. 8th). It's on g-2. Did you know that, in fact, it's not zero? But it's pretty damn close. Real close. I'm also doing a part-time TA to earn some extra cash. That, in turn, let me buy this laptop I'm typing on right now. I love my new MacBook. Sooo pretty. I found an advisor to work with. I need to come up with a clever name for him on my blog. Hmm. Maybe that will be my blog post contest over this weekend. I've still got a while left in the term because I'm taking a few classes at that school up Mass Ave (Harvard, for those who don't know the Cambridge geography), and they go into January for no good reason. So I'll be busy with that crap for a while.

Thanksgiving is coming up, and Steph went a little crazy with the dinner plans. We have a 14 pound turkey in our fridge, plus various veggies, potatoes, sweet potatoes, pumpkin pie, cranberries (for the sauce, but there will be extra), rolls, stuffing, gravy, ... you're getting the idea. THIS IS JUST FOR THE TWO OF US!!! I don't think between the counter and kitchen table we'll be able to hold everything. I like Thankgiving, and I like leftovers, but I think after this year I may never need to eat turkey again. But it promises to be good.

Canto XV

Nobel Prize in Physics was just announced. It was given to two Americans for the COBE satellite, which made the first precise measurements of the fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB). This led to the strongest evidence of the "hot big bang" scenario of the early universe, which is why they were awarded the Nobel. A very good choice because the follow up for this experiment is WMAP which has made plenty of news and done a lot of good physics, and the next generation experiment after that is PLANCK which will continue this work. I can't stress enough how important it is to accurately measure the CMB, it provides a beautiful window into the the early stages of the universe.

The guess around our office was that it would go to the two groups who measured the accelerating universe looking at type 1-A supernova data, which showed that there is a cosmological constant ("dark energy"). Still observational cosmology, and I think there's little doubt that the accelerating universe will win a Nobel one day. Americans continue their dominance in physics.

It's been a week, but not a whole lot going on. Last week my biggest thrill was successfully path integrating something. Not just a regular integral mind you, a path integral. Essentially, the idea is to look at the energy of an object for a given trajectory from point A to point B that it takes ("path"), then integrate over all possible paths to find the quantum mechanical probability for it to travel from A to B. This is not a well-defined mathematical object and it often leads to infinity as the answer ("divergences"), which then need to be cancelled out. But when it all works out and you get a nice, finite answer, it's a great feeling. That problem sucked.

The weekend was great, I could use more like it. Saturday was flag football (we lost 60-something to 0, but I had a nice pass defensed in the end zone. They scored the next play anyway.), followed by college football (Oregon rout of ASU, Ducks looking good heading to the Cal Bears this weekend. I've got a breakfast riding on it with a certain Berkeley alum.), then went to the Red Sox game that night (Sox up 4-3 going into the 9th and lost 5-4 with a blown save. Oh well, it was fun anyway.), and finally wound up at a CTP buddy's "housewarming party" for an hour before I had to get home and crash (Not a real housewarming party - he didn't move but his old roommate did and his new one would actually let him have a party.). Sunday slept in, watched the Jets lose in spectacular fashion, then did some stuff around the house like take down the air conditioner. All in all, not too bad.

Canto XIV

Now I know I shouldn't complain about the Simpsons after all these years (I just got Season 8 on DVD! Hank Scorpio, you are my hero.), but I'm a little annoyed about the last night's episode. It involved Bart torturing Skinner by forcing him to do demeaning things because of his deadly peanut allergy. As a way to get back, it showed Skinner breaking into Dr. Hibbert's office to find out Bart's allergies. I immediately turned to Steph on the couch and said "butterscotch and imitation butterscotch", in reference to the episode "Blood Fued" when the family is quizzing Marge about her knowledge of the family. (Doing the research for this blog entry I also discovered that I had forgotten the extra "and glow-in-the-dark monster make-up".) Would it have been that difficult to make a small reference to the old school episode? I'm sure I wasn't the only person who thought of it when they showed this. And have the climax involve some sort of delicious butterscotch-coated shrimp candy. Mmmmm...

And the Jets are 2-1. Not too bad. Don't be fooled by the record, they aren't a good team. But 2-1 is better than 1-2 and certainly 0-3. Maybe they'll end up 6-10 or 7-9 this year. That would mark improvement, and if the offense can find some sort of player called a "running back" they may begin to get consistently better. One other random thought after watching Sunday Night Football is that Tom Brady isn't looking like Tom Brady of '01-'05. He shouldn't be throwing 55 passes in a game, and I'm surprised by the amount of (what appears to me to be) complaining, both to the refs and his teammates. They're still going to win the division (the 'Fins just aren't living up to the hype the end of last season brought them, and the Bills and Jets aren't good teams), but are looking at another early post-season exit.

Canto XIII

See, this is why I didn't want to blog. Suddenly a week flys by and I feel like I have to talk about a million things. Okay, time for quick shots...

1) Okalahoma-Oregon. Well, OU isn't the first team to get screwed by a bad call and lose and they won't be the last. Sorry 'bout that, hope the Ducks make the most of this season. But man that was a crazy game.
2) Great party for my birthday. Although it went to a weird place and, no, I don't think I'm going to elaborate. And now I'm 26. Just 3 more to the next prime number...
3) My brother has left for jolly old England. I saw him last month, and as of right now I don't know when I'm going to see him again. That makes me a little sad, but I'm happy he's persuing what he wants to do and I'm really proud of what he's done so far. (I moved 3000 miles to do what I want to do, so why can't he go 6000?)
4) Classes have begun in earnest. I'm now a Harvard student. Sigh.
i. Beyond the SM -> Quantum Mechanics and Spacetime. Nima Arkani-Hamed has decided to teach us all about why the cosmological constant is small, but non-zero. We had our first "real" lecture today on Quantum Mechanics. He's very animated while lecturing (which keeps me awake at a minimum), and it was interesting stuff. I think I'm really going to enjoy this class.
ii. Intro to String Theory. Andy Strominger is much more subdued while lecturing. But methodical and very understandable. We may not finish as much in a term with him teaching, but you'll understand what was done, which you can't always say after some classes. And if string theory is in my future, this will obviously be an important class.
5) Watched the Weird Al video for "White and Nerdy", and sadly understood just about everything he was talking about. (Except I hadn't heard the song he was parody-ing. Hmmm.) I particularly enjoyed the Schroedinger Equation for the hydrogen atom in the background, "getting freaky with the bubble wrap" and the Star Wars Holiday Special.

Well, that's enough for tonight kiddies!

Canto XII

So the week has begun. And is now halfway over. I'm trying to teach myself about differential forms, which doesn't seem like it should be too hard (I've got a cute little book from Dover about them) since I already know the math, it's really just learning how to use notation. But it's been slow going. On the up side, yesterday I had one of those "ah-ha!" moments where suddenly the whole chapter made sense. I then finished off the whole rest of the chapter and did all the problems. It felt good. One of my favorite moments is reaching that point where suddenly you understand something that you didn't just 5 minutes earlier. Great feeling.

I need to stop with the hacky sack. At least twice a day we waste 20 minutes kicking that damn bag around. I just learned that hacky sack was invented in Oregon! How cool is that! And we've been playing some squash lately. I need to get a new racket as the old one I'm using (and I mean old, the thing is a freaking antique) is giving me blisters.

Classes start next week which means that I will no longer be able to goof off as much. String Theory and Physics Beyond the Standard Model, up at Harvard. Yes, I'm becoming a Harvard student. This is slightly angering. I'm not mad at Harvard or myself, but really MIT and the CTP - they just didn't offer any extra particle physics courses this fall. Next week also marks the begining of the study group for the Part III exam. And I need to find a research advisor. I feel like if I can get out of this term hitting my goals, then everything else will fall into place. But I've felt like that the last 2 years here. I keep meeting my goals, but more keep showing up. Where's the finish line? I suppose that's the PhD thing they keep talking about...