Tidbits From Today

First, death to the evilness that is the Oxford Instruments Kelvinox-400! Nuff said...

Second, we are having a heat wave. Temperatures in the nineties, and threatening to break one hundred. Wake up, England, and join the twenty-first century. Air conditioners are not new technology!

Third, whist conversing with one of our secretaries (who somehow does have an air conditioned room), the conversation turned to the Royal Shakespeare Company, who is currently performing the complete works. She mentioned that she is going to see Anthony & Cleopatra on Friday. I mentioned that I want to get to see that one, too, as Patrick Stewart is starring in it (and I loved seeing him do The Tempest in Manhattan years ago). She said she knew... because Patrick is her cousin-in-law (and thus they get free seats). That's my surprise moment for the day.

Fourth, though it is not new, I should announce that I have a grad student. When I was a grad student, I benefited greatly from being partnered up with one of the Stony Brook post-docs. However, as a Fermilab post-doc, there were no grad students for me to mentor. Now, however, our Oxford group has three grad students and I have begun working with the youngest one. This is beneficial in many ways: I enjoy being a mentor, for one thing, and I had way too much on my work 'to-do' list... so passing part of the work off on him is a big relief!

Fifth, and finally, I mentioned last October that I had been tracked down by a couple of my old high school classmates because they wanted an interview. I gave the interview and only last week received a draft of the write-up. It was mostly okay, except for the ( last paragraph )

Now I know that this is supposed to be a "feel good" exercise to accompany a request for money... but that last paragraph could not possibly be about me! And that quotation is nothing that I actually said (though the crush was certainly true). But I am one of the people who answered the high school poll by saying that those were the worst days of my life! Hoy vey... Anyway, I offered to help them edit the last bit, or advised them to take it out. I'm not trying to be troublesome (for once), but "happy with his time at Poly" cannot describe the guy who nearly made an attempt on his own life while there.

Anyway, I suppose today would count as a relatively good day if I actually had time to process such things...

Tidbits From Today

First, death to the evilness that is the Oxford Instruments Kelvinox-400! Nuff said...

Second, we are having a heat wave. Temperatures in the nineties, and threatening to break one hundred. Wake up, England, and join the twenty-first century. Air conditioners are not new technology!

Third, whist conversing with one of our secretaries (who somehow does have an air conditioned room), the conversation turned to the Royal Shakespeare Company, who is currently performing the complete works. She mentioned that she is going to see Anthony & Cleopatra on Friday. I mentioned that I want to get to see that one, too, as Patrick Stewart is starring in it (and I loved seeing him do The Tempest in Manhattan years ago). She said she knew... because Patrick is her cousin-in-law (and thus they get free seats). That's my surprise moment for the day.

Fourth, though it is not new, I should announce that I have a grad student. When I was a grad student, I benefited greatly from being partnered up with one of the Stony Brook post-docs. However, as a Fermilab post-doc, there were no grad students for me to mentor. Now, however, our Oxford group has three grad students and I have begun working with the youngest one. This is beneficial in many ways: I enjoy being a mentor, for one thing, and I had way too much on my work 'to-do' list... so passing part of the work off on him is a big relief!

Fifth, and finally, I mentioned last October that I had been tracked down by a couple of my old high school classmates because they wanted an interview. I gave the interview and only last week received a draft of the write-up. It was mostly okay, except for the ( last paragraph )

Now I know that this is supposed to be a "feel good" exercise to accompany a request for money... but that last paragraph could not possibly be about me! And that quotation is nothing that I actually said (though the crush was certainly true). But I am one of the people who answered the high school poll by saying that those were the worst days of my life! Hoy vey... Anyway, I offered to help them edit the last bit, or advised them to take it out. I'm not trying to be troublesome (for once), but "happy with his time at Poly" cannot describe the guy who nearly made an attempt on his own life while there.

Anyway, I suppose today would count as a relatively good day if I actually had time to process such things...