From xkcd: "All you need for a good movie are tornados and scientists. Actually, that's all you need for anything."
In other news, I'm safely arrived at yet another grad school. Once again, I've found myself a Carleton alum (and former lab partner! =) to hang out with a little. Oh, it's one week to my comps talk, and 18 days until grad school decision day.
Spring break has been rather uneventful. I've been testing some blogging software and content management systems in preparation for migrating to something a little nicer than what I've hacked together here upon graduation. When I get to Northfield, I'll probably get that set up at least on a temporary basis, and would like to get some feedback as to reader preferences.
Tomorrow morning I'm off to visit another grad school, and will hopefully be back on time Sunday afternoon, such that I can get down to school before classes start Monday morning. With a group comps presentation on Friday, it'll be an intense beginning of the term. I'm not sure yet whether the laptop (Puck) will be coming with me to visit, but if it does, I'm more likely to post from there. I'll try to get reactions in, as well as possibly hammer out a decision in the next couple days. Comps is looming, though, so I make no promises.
On Tuesday I made it back comfortably from California. I arrived at the airport, checked in, and the ticket agent asked if I wanted to have an exit row. Being rather tall for some seats, I decided that an exit row window seat was an excellent place for me. All the legroom of an aisle, plus all the visibility of the window. As it turns out, the flight was not very full, so I had the whole three seats on my side of the aisle to myself.
Since getting home, I've been up to a lot of not much, which I've enjoyed greatly. The violin has indeed left the case. I also went dancing with a friend who lives within driving distance. Typically, I would take time over break to upgrade the operating system on either of my computers, but with Comps coming up on April 4th, I don't dare mess with the systems. They work now, and I intend to keep them that way until at least the second week of classes. With a new Ubuntu version due out in a few weeks, I think I may wait for the new version.
This afternoon, I decided to take a look at Wikileaks to see if anything of note had happened since the domain name fiasco a week or two ago. Strangely, the server didn't respond. I tried the other names wikileaks.cx, wikileaks.be, and the ip address (88.80.13.160). It seems now that I'm able to access the wiki pages, but that wikileaks.cx is not responding, which hosts the relevant documents. I'm not sure quite what to make of that, but I thought I'd throw that out there. It doesn't respond to ping, which is odd.
Yesterday was a very active day for me. In the morning, my friend and I joined some other people in the area for indoor volleyball (in a recreational, practice kind of way). After a while of that, we returned home. I then went on a walk for quite a while (probably upwards of 5 miles), and managed to get only slightly sunburned (despite the sunscreen). In the evening, I looked around online for nearby social dance places, and found one within walking distance. We walked over, and found a pretty classy dance establishment. We were, of course, the young end of the crowd, but there were other people who weren't too much older. The floor was pretty large, perhaps a little smaller than the one at Carleton, though longer and narrower. During waltz and foxtrot, the rate of traveling around the dance floor was really high, which meant I wasn't able to lead as many moves as I would like (they typically involve slowing down or stopping). Naturally, we danced the first tango but found that (again) it was hard to lead moves given the rate of travel.
Also, as this is California, the number of people doing tango really well was quite high. Both Argentine and American styles were represented, with very good couples for each. Although I have a tendency to dance essentially every song, if possible, we sat out about half the songs, jaws on the floor, amazed by the other couples. While I'm not sure, I feel as though I could probably pick out the dance instructors from the students and normal people in the crowd. The dancers were technically very sound, doing many flashy moves in tight confines, and, even more impressive, were quite expressive. I think that is where the Argentine tango really takes the cake over American, because the two couples we were primarily watching were both technically sound, but the Argentine couple seemed to have so much more expressivity that it was like night and day. We discussed this on the walk home, and figure that the expressivity is probably itself more engrained in Argentine tango.
Well, I've managed to get from my grad school visit off to visiting friends. I arrived last night without incident, and we headed off to dinner and then a coffee shop. With us to the coffee shop we brought a game of scrabble (there were three of us). We drew letters to go first, and my A beat the two Hs that were drawn. We tossed the letters back. When I picked my letters, I placed them along the holder. I had an I, an N, and a G, so I put those at the end. Left over were C, H, O, and E. A quick rearrangement allowed me to play "echoing" on the first turn, the H on a double letter score, for a total of 84 points. While it isn't quite up to my father's standard of "exegete", it did give me a big lead from the beginning. To make matters worse, had someone played a T in the proper place in their first turn, I could come back in the second turn with "porosity". Further amusing, I got rid of an O and an R to see if I could get another chance, and indeed, I drew an O and an R. Still no T. I managed to go the whole game without another 7-letter word.
Today will likely hold some volleyball and some other fun activities, such as walking around somewhere interesting. It may also include some reading for comps, as I really need to get some of that done so I don't fail. Of course, it will also probably entail some general hanging out with people here.
Today has been a long day. One of the grad students picked me and a couple other prospective students up at our hotel, and we joined a bunch of other prospies at a presentation about the department and the graduate program. The chair and vice-chairs talked about the department and the university in general, and then we went to meet with a series of faculty. My first faculty appointment (the only one before lunch) was actually out of town, so I shadowed my grad student host for an hour or so. At that point, we met up with some of the other grad students and prospies and went out to lunch. Following lunch, I had appointments with faculty who were actually around. The first interview was a little weird, as it was not one-on-one like I had expected, but there were two of us prospies meeting with the faculty member. That made for an awkward dynamic, as it wasn't quite personal, but not quite a group setting either. The second interview had four prospies, which put it soundly into the group dynamic. My final interview was indeed one-on-one, and was quite good. After the interviews, there was a poster session, where many of the grad students and faculty were around to talk about life here and their research. As I somewhat expected, I think I could enjoy myself here; I talked to some of the faculty members, and a couple of them know one or two of the Carleton faculty. I also met a couple Carleton alumni (one of whom I knew fairly well).
After the poster session, we split into two groups to have dinner at a prof's house. I was in the physical group, which seems to be a better fit for me than synthetic. Dinner was good, though by the end my introverted, change-averse self was ready to go back to the hotel and unwind. So tomorrow I'm going to see the local attractions before heading off to visit friends for a few days. I'm not sure what the internet/time-for-internet thing will be like there, so this may be it for a while.
Today is pi day. Get excited.
Having just arrived today at my hotel on a grad school visit, and with no plans until the morning, I decided to see if the school I'm visiting has a social dance club. It seems that they do, and they were meeting tonight from 7-8. "Great!" thinks I, "I'll go to that. It's only 6 now, so I have just enough time to get ready and go over there." So I go, and show up just before what I think is 7. Unfortunately, both the clock in my hotel room AND my alarm clock I brought with me had the wrong time. And I was too stupid to check my camera (which I knew was correct), and because the two clocks agreed, I set my computer back an hour, though I thought it strange. So I showed up way too late for the dancing. Which makes me sad (at least it was a lesson not open dancing?). The good news in all this is that I won't be an hour late for activities in the morning, which I would have been otherwise. In short, much frustration at my stupidity, but gladness that I avoided the catastropic failure of being an hour late in the morning.
This morning I took my one and only final exam. I have no papers or projects left this term. Next term begins with a furious attack of the C-monster (i.e. comps). But until then, I have a couple weeks to take a break and get my life into some semblance of order. I leave tonight for home, so I have only a couple hours to get my stuff packed and my room cleaned. So I'm off to work on that. Connectivity may be spotty over break, but I'll try to keep things updated.
Today marked the last day of class this term. I spent much of it doing calculus quickly (only to find I could have avoided some or most of it), then writing up the results. It was all towards completion of a quantum chemistry project, where I was deriving some of the equations used in a computational model by my comps speaker. It was kind of fun, as there were lots of superscripts, subscripts, greek letters, square roots, and integrals flying about. Because I had the time, and because the end-product is much cleaner than I could do by hand, I typeset the whole derivation, complete with commentary, equation references, and article references, in LaTeX. The end result was a very nice looking paper, and typing the equations in using LaTeX is remarkably easy--no mouse is needed, so you can just type the equations in. Had I used an equation editor, I certainly wouldn't have been able to add the 40-some equations in as quickly as I did. That's right, 43 equations, and significant text, all formatted nicely, inside the span of about 24 hours (sleep, class, work, food, and some pencil-paper calculations also occurred).
Yet to go is a quantum exam and a big comps meeting. The comps meeting is crucial, as it's about a week of class to go before the big day (April 4, 3:30). The presentation still needs a lot of work, and I'm also doing work on getting the 3D computational models working at the level we want them to.
And in big political news today, the Wall Street Journal had an article on NSA spying on the front page today. It's highly detailed, and the EFF, naturally, has a response/analysis/thing. This is a big deal. Call or write your representative and tell them to investigate the illegal spying, not retroactively grant immunity to cover it up. Something's rotten in the state of Denmark.
Tenth week has been busy, and the weekend is not looking any better. I have been working fairly constantly on quantum homework, lab, and now a project due Monday. At least I have a topic now? I have to do some math and write about what it means, and have chosen to investigate the work of Clark Landis (the guy I'm doing my comps on) where he uses theories put forth by Linus Pauling to improve computational modeling of small molecules.
Recently I have also been working on plans for next year, particularly as concerns which graduate school I will be attending (or deferring from). Over spring break I'll be visiting all three graduate schools where I'm accepted, and deciding to which I want to go. I might also continue looking around for cool, "different" things to do with my life next year (income required)--being a park ranger has indeed crossed my mind. Of course, I'd want something pretty definite before I defer, which I have to do by mid-April. Yikes. Also yikes: quantum final Wednesday morning before heading out of Northfield Wednesday evening, and leaving Thursday for grad school visiting.
This evening was the winter concert of the A Capellicans, one of the smaller and more contrapuntal a cappella groups. Currently, they are a small group (eight members). They sang a wide variety of songs, with several Disney classics (e.g. Kiss the Girl). On the whole, the concert was well sung. I missed many of the former members, though, who have now graduated and gone off to the Real World (e.g. LA). The 'Pelicans need basses, and will be auditioning next term. Perhaps, if I think I'll have time, I might audition. It would be something Different.
Also today was continued preparation for the first run-through of my comps presentation tomorrow. I'm finding that there was a reason I strongly considered individual comps--not having to work with people on a presentation. I have a pretty specific idea of how I want it to be laid out, but it doesn't always mesh with the other group members' ideas. At least we don't have to meet late at night to rehearse yet.
With the end of the nordic ski season (and my Carleton nordic ski career) yesterday, it's starting to dawn on me that my time at Carleton is drawing to a close. Yikes. That means I'm getting old, am not long for the hill-climbing, and will need to straighten up and get resepectable soon. One thing that has been on my mind about the whole graduation thing is that of this blog. As it is a rather Carleton blog, I think upon graduating it will be retired (though saved), and perhaps replaced with a new (fully php/sql/css) blog (a la Blogger, LiveJournal, etc.). One thing I've been experimenting with is running my computer as a web server. I have it on most of the day as a file server (lest I need something while I'm in class or at work, or if I need to scan something in), so running a webserver as well seems logical. Perhaps over break I'll poke around with getting some interesting stuff onto it, at which point I'll release the address semi-publicly. If you want the address (it currently has an old mirror of this page and some comps stuff), let me know--the uptime is similar to my own, so don't expect it to be up late at night or early in the mornings.
Edit: I just took a look through the stats for the archives. I'm somewhat surprised at the high number of non-search-engine hits on the archive. Interesting.
Today was the Crazy Carleton Relays. We had a very good turnout, and the results are available here (PDF). As I was organizing, I didn't ski (several other volunteers didn't ski either). The weather was great, the snow was good, and a fun time was had by all. Many thanks are due to the many volunteers who came out to support the race, it would've been impossible without them.
In other news, I'm working on figuring out what next year holds for me. Over spring break, I'll be visiting grad schools (and friends in CA!), and probably looking for jobs doing something "totally different" somewhere. Also coming up soon is my comps presentation (senior project presentation). I am in a group of five students who have been studying the work of Clark Landis, a chemistry professor at UW Madison. He has a variety of research interests, and our talk will focus on asymmetric hydrogenation--what it is, why people care, what he is doing to make it better, etc.--and will be given Friday, April 4 at 3:30. The first run-through of the presentation is on Monday, so there is a little panic beginning to build in my life on the comps front.
Yesterday was the day of the Birkie. The Carleton Nordic Ski Club had a good showing, and was augmented with several recent and less-recent alumni. Two '07 alumni dressed up as Torstein Skevla and Skjervald Skrukka, the original Birkebeiners who saved baby prince Haakon from the Baglers. I skied in the 51 km skate race, and did very well. My kilometer pace was 3:51 (anything under 4 minutes is pretty good), with a final time of 3:16:25.6. Full results are available both as PDF and searchable. Yes, I do know the Joseph Mitchell who came in at 2:49:23.1.
My co-captain from last year and I have a bit of a rivalry between us. While for the last few years he has been ahead of me by considerable margins, I have twice this year finished ahead of him before the Birkie. For the Birkie, he started in the wave ahead of me, giving him a 10 minute head start on the course. It also gave me both a rabbit to chase down and separation which would allow me to ski my own race. To "win," I only needed to finish within 10 minutes of when he crossed the finish line. On the bus to the start, I was a little nervous. I had waxed my skis for a fairly warm temperature, as the change in temperature over the race was going to be huge. While on the bus, people were pointing out that they had all waxed a little on the cold side, because it's better to have wax be too cold than too warm. Yikes. I was waxed warm.
On the course, I felt pretty good. My skis were pretty fast at the start (certainly not noticably slow), which was a relief. I managed to ski relaxed for the first 23 km--I have skied that trail many times, so the temptation to go fast is very strong. I was still feeling really good at the half-way point, so I started letting myself use a little more energy; if I was finding the course fast, everyone else probably was too. Around 41 km, I caught Eric. Immediately I knew he wasn't having a good race at all (probably because he was still recovering from a cold). I still had some gas in the tank, so I pushed on. Unfortunately, as I neared 47-48 km, I couldn't push any harder. As I headed out onto the lake, the headwind was almost too much for me. I plodded along, sometimes trying to hold with a pack of skiers, but always gaving up after a couple seconds.
Finally, the end of the lake came, and then only a long, powdery, slightly-uphill climb to the finish remained. As I closed in on the finish line, I gave one last kick. I sprinted, trying to catch one more guy before the line. As I neared the line (I was on the right side of the course), I saw out of the corner of my eye someone flying along up the left. It was Eric. He caught me at a full sprint about 3 meters from the finish, and came across for the sprint-win. Overall, my time was faster by just under 10 minutes, but he still had the pride of beating me in the sprint. It was rather nice, though, that the two seniors finished their last major race with the team together.
After the team (and alumni who were traveling with us) finished and collected, we all ate at Famous Dave's (ribs are wonderful after a race) before heading back to the house where we were staying. The place we were staying had a sauna, and it was not long before the team was occupying it. This morning, we headed out (or at least one van did) at the early hour of 7:00. Much of the work I needed to get done is now done (as of 6:00 Sunday evening), so things are pretty much back on track.
Quantum chemistry is crazy. Quantum lab is similarly crazy. My skis are not waxed for the Birkie, for which I leave tomorrow afternoon immediately after class. And a friend is in town visiting from California tonight and tomorrow, but I may not have time to see her. Oh, and I'm tired. At least I saw some of the neat lunar eclipse last night on my way to social dance. I have my work cut out for me.
Here is my openbox theme, Bluemaze. To use it, extract the tarball into /usr/share/themes. I then recommend using Obconf to manage theme selection and other properties.
Recently, at the suggestion of a friend, I began to try a different Linux window manager called Openbox. While I would make an analogy to Window$ or Mac equivalents, the lack of options for either leave it very difficult. To attempt a description, it is the program that handles maximizing and minimizing windows, and displaying the title bar on the top. It also handles the Application menu and some other various things. For most people using Linux, GNOME or KDE are used as a window manager and desktop environment (including file browser). However, xfce, fluxbox (which I've been using for a while), and openbox are more minimalist window managers. The latter two (fluxbox and openbox) have the feature of being able to right-click anywhere on the desktop to bring up a program menu.
One thing that's attractive about Linux is how fully customizable it is. Not only can you get options for how things "look and feel," but it's usually clearly documented how to change things and the process is designed to be straightforward. In the case of fluxbox, that means having control over the color, font, and gradients (among a multitude of other things) used in the menu and in the title bars. I found a theme that I liked, and I adapted it to match a Carleton color scheme. With a useful script from the openbox website, I converted the theme to openbox, and once I clean things up a little more, I'll have it published here and perhaps elsewhere. I also found a new login screen on art.gnome.org, specifically the Wolf gdm screen. Finding that too to be not-quite-to-my-liking, I went in and modified it to put the password box somewhere less annoying than dead centered. Again, the modified version will likely be here soon (not quite ready).
Last night was the jazz band concert, which my neighbor was playing in. I went and took the new camera and gorillapod. The concert was (not surprisingly) in the concert hall. The good place to take pictures at such an event is from the balcony on either side. I attached my tripod firmly to the railing toward the front of the stage. From there, I could use the low focal-length end of my lens to more than cover the entire stage. By using the higher focal-length (55 mm), I could zoom in on a couple of players.
Unfortunately, it was rather dark in the concert hall. I ended up shooting at ISO 1600 most of the evening because it was too dark to use a slower speed, even with the tripod. The result was rather grainy pictures. One of the pictures I took after the concert did turn out okay (though I forgot to turn the ISO setting back to something reasonable), and that picture is now on display. It has been scaled down significantly, even in its expanded form.
Today the US Senate voted 68-29 to abolish the rule of law and give retroactive immunity to telecomunnications companies who knowningly violated the law and aided the government in disregard of the 4th Amendment of the US Constitution. The three abstaining are both Obama and Clinton (not great examples of leadership on constitutional issues) as well as Graham (R-SC). The shameful Democrats are: Conrad (ND), Rockefeller (WV), Baucus (MT), Webb (VA), Kohl (WI), Whitehouse (RI), Bayh (IN), Johnson (SD), Bill Nelson (FL), Mikulski (MD), McCaskill (MO), Lincoln (AR), Casey (PA), Salazar (CO), Inouye (HI), Ben Nelson (NE), Pryor (AR), Carper (DE), and Landrieu (LA). No Senate Republicans voted against retroactive immunity. This is a sad day in American Politics.
However, the House still has time to stop the madness. Please help avoid a further Constitutional collapse. FireDogLake has a petition urging House leaders to stand up for the constitution and remove the retroactive immunity from the final bill text.
Relatedly, according to the EFF, the White House admits the telcos broke the law. Of course, it was obvious from the ferocity of argument for retroactive immunity that they had; immunity is already clearly available if cooperation is provided in compliance with a court order.
Here's how the power-grab has worked. The Pres appoints friendlies to the DOJ. Those people write opinions supporting the expansion of the President's power. He, acting "in good faith" requests assistance from the telcos. The telcos clearly shouldn't be punished for acting in good faith, so Congress bails them out. Meanwhile, the Pres can't be impeached because he was acting on the information given to him by the DOJ. Impropriety at the DOJ is an internal affair, and is not investigated thoroughly and no responsibility is taken; meanwhile, Congress doesn't follow through on subpoenas and doesn't impeach the AG. So nobody is to blame despite everything going badly. Torture, wiretap, suspend Habeus Corpus, all is "an honest mistake which will never* happen again." *Except if we deem it necessary to maintain National Security, which means we don't have to talk about it.
This weekend's Mora Vasaloppet was cold. Due to the cold weather, the 58 km race which I was registered for was shortened to 35 km, and there were very few complaints. Results are now available, although the 58 km and 35 km races have only a superficial difference. That is, the two races are one and the same, so times from the 35 km race are directly comparable to the 58 km race. And yes, my cousin finished ahead of me by nearly 30 minutes. All skiers from our team returned intact, with only minor cold-related injuries (slight frostbite on face and fingers/toes).
Getting to the race was quite an adventure. We stayed overnight at one of our skiers' houses on the north side of the Cities. As we were leaving Sunday morning, we found one of our two vehicles was not interested in starting. Try as we would, it just wouldn't start. We found (a little late) that it has a block heater, so we plugged that in to try to warm it up. Eventually, we sent one car (with me driving) up to the race, so that some of us could get there in time to get packets and ski. About 5-10 minutes after we left, we realized that we had no skis in our car. We didn't turn around. The thermometer in the car (not to be too trusted) was reading -20 F. We decided that if we didn't ski because the other car didn't get there, we might not be too disappointed. A couple minutes later, and we heard from the other car that they had switched vehicles and were on their way.
The race itself was cold. Supposedly the air temperature at the start was -17 °F. Most skiers were still skiing in warm-ups, myself included. I started toward the back of the pack, by the sign with the pace I intended to keep. As I stood awaiting the start, I noticed that my fully glide-waxed skis had much better stick to them than I liked, perhaps as good as the kick at the classic race last Sunday. That was yet another bad sign. After the start, I moved up in the field (as I typically do), and caught my teammate Eric around 2 km in. Typically Eric finishes several to 15 minutes ahead of me, so I figured skiing with him would probably be good for me. We skied together for the rest of the race, sometimes he would lead, sometimes I would lead, with lead changes between us coming only at soup stops. After the final soup stop (side note: warm gatorade is really good during a cold ski race), I was leading. There were 6-7 km to go, and neither of us had much left. As the energy flowed out of our bodies, we eventually came to the final lake. While the wind had been nearly at our backs for most of the race, across the final lake it was certainly a head wind. Half way across the lake, I knew it was time to let Eric fend for himself. I skied as quickly as I could across the lake, then up the dreaded hill at the end. From there was just a short sprint around the corner and down main street. With that, my race adventure was concluded.
Post-race, we gathered as a team at the high school cafeteria (the race HQ), and had warm chili and turkey sandwiches. Once everyone had arrived and collected themselves, we headed out to the Subway down the street. Most of us then put down a footlong sub. As several of us were still somewhat hungry, the skiers in my car went to Dairy Queen, while those in the borrowed car went to return it and pick up the non-starter, hopefully defrosted now that the heater was plugged in. Then came a long drive home (which I couldn't sleep for, as I was driving).
Last night I went out to the caucuses. Obama won big in the Carleton precinct. We passed a few resolutions about how we're for peace and justice and goodness in the world. While I had a resolution to introduce, as I was finishing some edits on it, someone else offered an essentially similar resolution. I took the chance to amend it to include the part about giving access to human rights agencies, and it was further amended to include the International Red Cross. The turnout from the precinct was extremely high (more than 700 for the straw poll), and the caucus was not really prepared for the turnout. During the presidential preference balloting, the line for the Carleton precinct was two or three people wide and about two hundred feet long. And not moving particularly quickly. In the end, democracy prevailed and some good resolutions were sent on to the county level.
Things have been busy (though sometimes relaxing) in the past few days. Saturday night was Midwinter ball, which I enjoyed. I had a good time dancing with many of my friends, though by the time I left, the floor was so crowded dancing was barely possible. Friday night I went to the one-act plays performed by one of the campus theater groups. My neighbor was directing one, and my floormate was acting in it. There were two plays, which combined for about 50 minutes of performance. Both were excellently produced, especially given that one had only been in rehearsal for two weeks.
Yesterday was the City of Lakes Loppet, a 25 km classic ski race. The conditions were rather icy, though the classic tracks were set deep enough that it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. Copious amounts of klister on my skis also helped, as the stuff is much like bubble gum in stickiness. I did quite well, with a time just over 1:42, just under my expected time of 1:45. Unfortunately, discrepancies in the race distance (23-25 km) prevent me from having a meaningul kilometer pace (it could be anywhere from 4:06 to 4:30). I am generally well pleased with a pace of 4 min/km for a classic race.
Tomorrow is Super Tuesday, and is caucus day in Minnesota. I will be attending such an event, and intend to introduce the following resolution (or back another with similar sentiment).
Whereas the appearance of human rights violations from "enhanced interrogation techniques" by both military and civilian agencies stains the reputation of the United States and aids terrorist recruiting,
Be it resolved that we immediately cease any potential human rights violations and allow human rights agencies unfettered access to detainees captured in the "War on Terror."
I strongly urge anyone eligible to participate in the caucus (or other political events in other states) to get informed and do so, as it is clear to me that politicians today are failing this country. We should not be debating torture. We should not be granting any entity that breaks the law intentionally retroactive immunity if they are already granted immunity under easily met and clearly stated conditions. We should not waste time debating whether global warming is caused by humans or not--if our species is to survive, it is almost certainly in our best interest to act to stop the warming, even if it isn't of our making. And religious radicals who hate American freedoms aren't only Islamic. Just look at the White House. Suspension of Habeus Corpus, prosecution of journalists, and warrantless wiretapping are certainly not defending the freedom of most Americans.
To those politicians campaigning this season: your campaigns would be helped if you stopped blabbering with the media pundits and showed your leadership in Washington. The Democrats control the Senate (on paper), and occasionally voters (especially disenfranchised young voters) think taking a position and standing up for it is a much more attractive feature of a candidate than any campaign promise. So you candidates out there, listen up: show some integrity and thirst for justice. A little uprightness and some spunk would go a long way with a major demographic, one that will be increasingly important in years to come.
Oh, and I nearly forgot: today the creator of xkcd launched a highly amusing (though not-safe-for-work, mostly-amusing-for-college-kids) database of limericks, LimerickDB. Some contain adult content not suitable for children. Some contain advanced mathematics not suitable for liberal arts majors. I recommend the top 150 (again, see disclaimer on content and don't click if you're uncomfortable with it). This one is both amusing and suitable for polite company.
I have now heard back from all three graduate schools, and have been accepted to each. There is much rejoicing. And a complicated decision of what to do next year.
Just yesterday, I finished a design for this year's chemistry department shirts. Or, I should say, the Chem DEPT. Peak assignments come from the cited article, but the spectrum is mine. More information on NMR in general is available from Wikipedia.
Politics continue to be fairly abysmal in this once-great country. A "FISA reform bill" including retroactive immunity for the telcos (an abomination of the rule of law) is being debated (and is likely to pass soon with little resistance from the Senate Democrats), yet the media doesn't even notice. The "journalists" are all too busy speculating about who will win Florida, who will win the presidency, to care about politics happening today. Glenn Greenwald has further commentary on this.
Last night, as I looking for the State of the Union coverage (of course, the actual start time of the speech isn't on the news sites), the "learn how to caucus in Minnesota" presentation assembled in the room I was in. As I didn't really care to hear the speech (which wasn't on yet anyway), I stayed put for the presentation and turned off the tube. Several people from my floor also showed up, which was fun. I'm now seriously considering going to the caucus on Tuesday, and perhaps taking a resolution with me. More on that as it evolves.
Schedule-wise, I'm in the midst of constant chemistry (not unexpected for mid-week). Tomorrow, though, my comps group is meeting with an '06 alum who did her comps on a related topic. I haven't seen said alum in quite some time, and it will be nice to catch up with her again.
Posting pictures to my Flickr page is more exciting than homework. Of the photos I uploaded this afternoon, only one is a "new" one (Snow Tracks), which I took a couple weeks ago. The others are historical, though interesting.
Yesterday there were a pair of exciting objects in my mailbox. The first was a gorillapod (tripod for new camera). I've been looking forward to doing some long-exposure photography, so having a small portable tripod is key.
Another item that showed up in my mailbox was a large envelope from another graduate school. Of the three I applied to, I've heard back from and been accepted to two of them. At this point I have until April 15th to hear back from the third and then decide what's going on with my life.
So far, my comps (senior project) has been going along nicely. I'm discussing the work of Clark Landis, a professor at UW Madison. The work he has done is rather varied, and we have been drawing from the varied backgrounds (computational, polymer, NMR, kinetics) of students in our group in a very constructive way. Being in a comfortable place with the project at this point is critical, as we will be presenting during the first week of next term, with Clark Landis coming the following week. Next week, one of the Carleton alumni from a couple years ago is coming down to help us understand some of the polymer chemistry going on, as she worked on a project two years ago which was very similar to some aspects of our project.
Today there are a couple items of exciting news. First, many alumni (esp. '07) are back on campus, this being a holiday weekend in the "real world." Said holiday also corresponded to the 125th birthday of one Dacie Moses, and accordingly there was a big celebration at Dacie's this morning, where said alumni were present. Social dance last night was populated partially by said alumni, and afterward there was a low-key birthday party for one of the alums and one of the seniors living in Dacie's.
At the birthday party, we played a game known to me as "Ben's Game," in which players sit in a circle and each begins with a blank sheet of paper. Eeach person writes down a sentence on the paper, then they all hand it to the person on their left (or right, it doesn't matter). They then draw a picture to convey the sentence on the paper handed them, fold over the sentence which they drew, and continue passing it to their left (or right). Now each player has a picture before them. Each player writes a sentence describing (or that would generate) the picture. The picture is then folded over, and the paper is passed. This process continues until the page is full. Pages should fill at about the same rate, so everyone should end up with a sheet (ending with a sentence). As a conclusion of the game, each player in turn unfolds the sheet they have and begins reading the sentences from the top. Pages are then passed around so the drawings can be appreciated by all.
In other exciting news, I received my first graduate school acceptance. So I have something to do with my life next year. Details on where are available via non-internet contact. Oh, and they offered me a fellowship, too. Two more applications are currently awaiting decisions.
Of lesser excitement, I posted a couple pictures I've taken on the new camera to my Flickr page.
Last night, the temperature outside was very cold, around -10 °F ( -23 °C), not including the windchill. As I am a fan of science, and to a lesser extent extremely cold weather, I did a little demonstration. I filled an electric teapot with water, which was then heated to boiling, and I filled a mug with room temperature water. With several friends both from the floor and around campus, I went outside with the two containers of water, and flung them into the frigid night air. The boiling water turned into a cloud of steam and ice. The room temperature water fell to the ground as a liquid.
Following that demonstration, some bubble solution was used to blow bubbles (again outside). As the bubbles were whisked away on the wind, they froze. Some that flew less far seemed to show signs of crystallization. For good science's sake, these experiments may be repeated tonight or tomorrow.
In case it wasn't obvious from earlier, the CCCR was postponed until March. A sudden outbreak of common sense was responsible for the postponement, along with uncomfortably cold wind chills.
In a display of incompetence today, I managed to frostbite my left index finger while skiing. The temperature wasn't much below 20 °F, either. Well done me. Relatedly, the CCCR has been changed to a freestyle race, and is in danger of postponement until March. If the temperature this Saturday isn't forecast to be above -5 °F, the race will be moved to March 1.
In other news, I'm enjoying my chemistry classes this term. Quantum is going well so far, though that's certainly likely to change upon this observation. My comps group is really good too, and I enjoy working with them. Today I met with a CS prof and squared away a couple things about a class I'm considering taking next term on artificial intelligence.
Over the last couple days, I have begun "Operation Get Off My Floor," where I try to make time occasionally to see friends who don't live on my floor or in Mudd. So far it has been quite successful. Now that classes are picking up, that trend may not continue, but it has at least seen some success. But now for some homework that I may get off my floor later.
Wednesday night this week I finally passed a milestone I've been hoping to pass for a long time: completion of grad school apps. Unfortunately, with quantum this term, I had little time for celebration until now. In fact, I have relatively little time even now. But I'm glad to be done with applications.
Also going on this week has been organization of the Crazy Carleton Classic Relays. It is a 3x3 km classic ski race held at Carleton next weekend, January 19th. The race is $5/skier and open to the public. The Nordic Ski Team also has a new team picture, taken following the race last weekend. This morning I have completed a reworking of much of the Carleton Nordic website.
I have returned to school, both from my break and from the first ski race of the season. The results are here (and PDF here). Carleton teams are "Git Off My Lake", "The Municipality of Awesome", "Mark Dyson", "Skiers on Fuego", "Poor Choice", "Backside Attack", and "Nordic Fury". Note that Backside Attack and Nordic Fury did actually lose to Matt Aro, who stopped skiing after a little over 5 hours. As he was in the distance lead, he technically wins, because were he to ever finish another lap, he completes the race in first.
Going to the race was fun, and the race itself was fun in a rather masochistic way. Eric and I were racing essentially together for the first 30 km, but after that he went to sleep, I took a break and put down two more laps. After a brief nap, the snow was much wetter, as a warm front had come through, bringing the temperatures close to freezing. I rewaxed, and skied a bit more. At that point, I found Eric, and as he was well behind me, and not seeming interested in racing much more, I took yet another nap. Throughout the race I was feeling pretty weak, probably because I hadn't been eating enough, and was unable to get myself to eat more. We finished another lap together, then he went around for a last lap. I didn't really have much left in me, so I stayed and finished with a couple of the other Carleton skiers. It would be interesting to try this race again sometime with better conditions. I think the anxiety of the race and the wet slushy snow conspired to keep me from doing as well as I could have. That and Eric not even being very close. Had he been mentally with it, I expect he could probably have made the race much more interesting, as I didn't have much more left in me.
This term, I have nothing but chemistry classes. It's nice. I already enjoy them a lot, though they are likely to be a lot of work. Oh, and in case you don't know, 'Backside Attack' is from organic chemistry, synonymous with the SN2 reaction.
This year I got my wish and had a very snowy Christmas. We picked up something like 3" today. Grad school apps are now going to eat my life until I get back to school, but then they should be done. Perhaps I'll manage to get some skiing in there somewhere, too.
I've begun posting pictures to Flickr. There isn't much there at the moment (and most of it has appeared here at some point). Having looked back at my pictures from the last three and a half years, I've found that the picture-a-day idea has been quite good, even if the immediate resoults are somewhat disappointing. For instance, while this last term wasn't good enough to yield a "term in pictures," and I hadn't done that project in the winter or spring terms, I still have enough good pictures (after editing) from the year to come up with twelve pictures from Carleton that would make a better calendar than the one professional photographers put together. While said professional photographs were technically quite sound, they were all much gloomier than I typically see the vivacious and dorky Carleton campus.
The day after tomorrow, my cousin(s?) and I will be introducing our parents to YouTube. We're putting together about 30 minutes of the best videos available suitable for a respectable audience. On the list is the Jon Stewart appearance on Crossfire, excerpts from Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondence Dinner, Daft Hands, and possibly the Diet Coke/Mentos experiment. Unfortunately, because Flash player isn't available on 64-bit linux (in any sort of stable, fully-functioning way), I don't actually have many good ideas for videos.
Oh, and it snowed! Yay snow! Again, pictures may follow (though camera batteries don't like cold weather).
Yesterday there was a huge showdown in the Senate, as Chris Dodd and Russ Feingold led an effort to stall or defeat a bill including retroactive immunity for the telcos. One such telco set to benefit greatly from this immunity is AT&T. Current FISA law has plenty of immunity provisions for telcos acting in response to proper court orders. Apparently, this is massively insufficient, necessitating a huge attack on our constitution. Which is why I found it interesting to find this in their code of ethics:
A Promise to Do What Is Right
AT&T Inc. is committed to the highest standards of ethics, integrity, personal and corporate responsibility and adherence to laws and regulations that govern our business.
Through our dedication to these corporate values, we have gained and retained the public's trust and confidence for more than a century. In keeping with this commitment, we have adopted a number of processes and policies that guide all of our employees and our board of directors in upholding the integrity of the AT&T name.
While we wait for the Senate to bring up the FISA bill again, hopefully to see its full defeat, perhaps someone at AT&T shoud call the ethics hotline and suggest that perhaps some of the directors and executives have been violating the code and crushing the integrity of both AT&T and, through their efforts in the Senate, the Constitution. To give massive corporations (who generate lots of cash for campaigns) retroactive immunity for an aggregious and intentional violation of federal law sets an awful precedent.
This country has been founded on laws. No person or entity is above them. The President does not have the power to break the law with no consequences (legally speaking). Nor does he have the power to direct a third party to break the law, and by his directions free them from any responsibility for actions which they take.
I urge you to talk to your Senators, favorite presidential candidates, and (if you have AT&T phone/internet service) AT&T service rep to ask what they are doing about investigating the potential breach of your fourth amendment rights. I know several (I don't think there are enough of you to call it many) of my readers think I'm crazy because I go on about this. I must say I disagree, and I urge you to take an interest in this. We should not lightly give up Constitutional freedoms. We should not lightly give up the rule of law, and its blind applicability to the country and everyone in it.
This next part is totally speculation and I have no proof to back it up with, other than that it would be in line with the direction this country is heading. This will likely be expanded as I get more time in the next few days.
Assume the telcos and the government are joined at the hip (if they were independent, they wouldn't need immunity). The telcos will, at this point, probably do anything the government asks of them. The entertainment industry, headed by the RIAA and MPAAA, has its hands pretty far into the congressional purse too, trying to protect their old business model. And to shift focus off the war in Iraq, the telco scandal, and the countless other scandals, we have people clamoring that there need to be automated content-filtering programs set up at internet service providers (ISPs) to prevent the spread of child pornography.
Were a corrupt government body to wish to take control of the country, here is how it could work. The government mandates filtering at ISPs not only for child pornography, but also for pirated movies/music/whatever. As long as they're filtering for other illegal materials, they might as well search for more. And if it takes connecting patterns between various media, that's what must be done. Content critical of the government, or of its programs becomes actively blocked (or 'accidentally mixed up with the illicit content'). The few corporations own the country and own the government. Everyone is on the lookout for anything suspicious or out of the ordinary. It's a Cultural Revolution, capitalist style. Perhaps more on that one later.
Recently I have been doing some transplants. One involved a new computer for the family. Parts arrived for it this past week, and we put everything together. We had not ordered a hard drive, as my old computer had a working Window$ drive which we wanted to put in there. When we put it in and powered the computer on, Window$ got very upset. To calm it down, we gave it the computer equivalent of anti-rejection drugs, which is to say Linux. It's now much happier, but would perhaps be better with a (fast) internet connection. A sub-transplant of the data occured before installing Linux, using a local network anda Linux live-cd (e.g. the operating system is on the CD and your computer runs from there).
A second transplant is one taking place at work. I'm moving data from an array of two-dimensional text files into a single higher-dimensional text file. The code is actually written to add an extra dimension to an arbitrary-dimensional file, but the ones I'm working with are two-dimensional spectra. Python has been the language of choice, and it seems that the working version is not far away. The more user-friendly, safer version of code is probably going to follow quickly.
The third and final transplant I have done recently is that of my cactus. I have had a cactus in a small pot for several years, and it is now clearly too large for the pot. Quite a while ago, a friend from Texas described to me how she had just repotted some of her cacti, and I was quite glad today that I knew how one is supposed to re-pot a cactus. Using some newspaper, you grab the cactus gently, and transfer it to its new location. You do not just barehand the thing.
With Congress acting like it's all for wiretapping everybody, I recommend using GPG for encryption and signing. To learn more about it, take a look at The Handbook of Applied Cryptography. My public key is available here, and the fingerprint is 5025 EB96 8C76 3D3F B47E 96BE 1698 1AF5 DF4E C1EE. Strong passphrases are better, as the courts have found that it violates the 5th Amendment to force someone to divulge your encryption passphrase. Note, though, that you should not be using encryption for hiding illegal activity. It is a privacy tool.
As has been evidenced by the long time between posts, I've been keeping busy. Several things in my life have conspired to cause those circumstances. For one, I am working full-time for The Man (or is that Teh Man on the series of nets?). Being somewhat environmentally conscious (and enough so to act upon it), I take the bus to work. That results in an hour-long commute, if things are running smoothly. I have also started training for the 24 Hours of Telemark ski race, where I'll be skiing in a 12-hour race starting at 10 pm (my goal is 100 km). If you're really on top of things, you'll notice that my training probably involves some snow, and that snow will affect the commute. Indeed, you would be correct. There were a couple of 2+ hour commutes in the evening, which left me with less time to unwind than I would have liked.
I've also been poking around with applying to grad school. Yech. Perhaps the most aggravating part of it is dealing with the ETS to get my GRE scores reported. Their website is horrendous. I would seriously think it possible for any reader of this blag (perhaps not the MSN or Yahoo! bots) to design and perhaps create a much more cleanly organized and useful wobsite. If you're looking to find the institution and department codes to figure out where your scores need to be reported, they're in a PDF with the list of test centers, institutions, departments, and country codes. It's almost certain that the PDF is generated automatically from a database. Why don't they just make it searchable from their site? Or put it in a more prominent place? And while they're at it, why not allow people to enter their own credit card information directly into the database and get scores reported online rather than having to either pay to do it over the phone or mailing in a form? Getting people to enter their own data saves money. And it's much more convenient for the score requester. Everybody wins!
At the moment, it looks as though my goal of 100 km at 24T is pretty aggressive. I skied on Saturday at the local ski area, and probably didn't make 30 km in two hours, at which point I was out of energy. I've been skiing once since, at night without a headlamp. Luckily the trails were pretty well kicked in, and there hadn't been many people walking over them, so I didn't have much trouble. Skiing during the week is often troublesome, as I only have a little while between getting home and time to go to bed. The decision to ski needs to be made pretty early so I have time to eat and get out skiing and then ready for bed before it's really late. Plus there's something about losing sleep time to exercise that seems like a bad plan.
Recently, I have started reading a book *gasp!* But don't worry, it's non-fiction. Think of it as an application of the principle illustrated here. The book is Bruce Schneier, who is an information security guy who often has interesting things to say on public policy and security. His blog is good reading. Also good reading (though on a political not security note) is Glenn Greenwald.
So that's what's going on. Lots of stuff to do, relatively little time to do it, but at least some of it is fun. Also, I managed to pass my classes last term, which makes me and the parents happy. And now, my few hours is up and it's time for bed.
Today being Tuesday, and the library thus being open at a reasonable hour for me to stop by, I have spent some time gathering articles for my comps. And yes, I did just refer to comps as "the C-Monster." Strangely enough, I found that the downtown Minneapolis library doesn't have automatic access to electronic journals from the American Chemical Society. To battle said c-monster I ended up using Carleton's library proxy to get most of the articles I needed. Only a couple are going to be somewhat stubborn, and I'm not quite sure how I'm going to deal with the books. Books are inconvenient--or, more precisely, books which can't be downloaded in PDF or (g)zipped HTML are inconvenient.
Also today I started actually filling out applications for grad school. I still haven't quite finalized my list of schools (and specialization within chemistry is a very hard question). On one hand I like NMR, which I think falls somewhere under analytical or physical. On the other, I like some of the materials work I have done in the past, which may fall more under materials, physical, or even organometallic/inorganic. On the third hand, polymers can be fun, and those are their own specialty. Perhaps I should just stick to two hands. I think tonight will be a night of doing very little. I may or may not be back again Thursday, when the library is again open--but shiny new toys could make me go straight home.
Now that I'm on break, I find myself with plenty of time to do things, plenty of things I want or need to do (grad school apps?), and very, very little motivation to do it. For instance, I'm quite fed up with politics, and it's time for another rant--but I just don't have the patience to write anything worth reading. Alternately, I should apply to grad school or work on comps (the major senior project, for which I have some work over break). Instead, I've been mostly just playing games on my computer.
In an effort to get out of the house, yesterday I went to a social dance gathering at a nearby ballroom. It was really nice to be around Carleton kids again. I'm already going through withdrawl. We were almost certainly the youngest ones there by about 20 years. As such, it was our duty to spice the place up a little, with some of the more acrobatic and energetic swing moves. One such move involves the lead crouching down in something approximating a limbo and having the follow step over him. Given that it takes two good knees, a follow who knows what's coming, and sufficient strength in both lead and follow, we were the only ones trying it. Because said dancing was seen as quite a success, it's likely to be repeated (perhaps at a different venue) over break. Anyway, I should go get bread so I can eat lunch tomorrow.
Exams managed to go well enough, and got out of the way by Saturday afternoon. Since then I've done some work on the Term in Pictures project (it's not going to be very good despite the good start). I've also managed to do some running and rock climbing, as well as seeing a bunch of friends before we all headed back home. Plans for break right now look like working full time and applying to grad school. Perhaps I'll manage to throw in some social dance or political activism.
Today I finished my last class of the term. As the last few weeks have been very difficult, I am quite happy that all I have left is a pair of 2.5 hour exams. They can only be so hard. In the mean time, I can do all the things I've been missing out on for the past few weeks: running, rock climbing, watching Get Smart, and other fun things like dealing with grad school. I think I'll get some of the Pictures of the Term picked out, and may continue working on the fugue I wrote (the exposition of) for my composition class.
Only a couple more classes to go. Most of the work seems to be looking as though it will get done. XKCD updates every day this week, which is exciting.
Tomorrow I will not be using a computer except as required by my job. This is as part of a project some people here at Carleton are doing about computer dependence. For once, people are encouraged to turn off their computers not for energy reasons, but for reasons of understanding how pervasive they are in our lives. This is especially true of college students. Perhaps next term there should be a "turn off your iPod" and "turn off your cell phone and leave it in your sock drawer" day. So, no post from me tomorrow, and perhaps not for a while after, given that the term is trying to squish me.
This coming Wednesday is "Turn Off the Computer Day" (at least at Carleton), where people are challenged to go 24 hours without a computer (work excepted, of course). I am intending to take the challenge. Having finished my computer science homework (I think) a little early, I should have no need to use it outside of work. I will, however, continue taking pictures on Wednesday, in conjunction with my pictures of the term project.
If you're looking for my post on Zimbra, please click here to avoid all the babble which spews forth on this blog.
GREs happened this morning. Homework will now happen for the next 10 days, essentially uninterrupted. Questions I recommend not asking "where are you thinking of going to grad school?" In other news, I presented my research on Thursday, and it went pretty well (if much shorter than I had anticipated). While the details of my specific work at 3M remained unspoken, multiple sources (non-chemistry and non-science people!) said they understood the take-home message, which I take as evidence that I succeeded in my goal. Thanks to everyone who came and everyone who were unable to come and offered support. And now to consider tuple nested loop join techniques for my databases class.
Three weeks left in the term. I'm looking forward to relaxing a little. At the moment I'm just hanging on, trying not to get ionized by my classes. To make things just that much better today, when I went to register for next term, the online registration wouldn't let me sign up for comps (big required senior project) complaining that I wasn't a chem major. At least it didn't notice that without comps I don't make the minimum credit load?
Politically, it looks like the telcos may be in trouble. Glenn Greenwald has several good articles on the subject, which I recommend reading. And tell your senator to stand up for their relevance and block the retroactive telco immunity.
Rewind to Friday morning. I came across one of the sysadmins for the Carleton network. As I have a dislike for the current (new) webmail interface, I asked about the possibility of having the old interface connect to the new system. It wouldn't include calendaring and some of the other "features" of the new system, but it would be faster and easier to use for basic email. It seems that despite what I've seemed to find as moderate to widespread dislike of Zimbra among students hasn't percolated (in clear, articulate form) along to ITS and people who can acutally do something about it. However, I had prepared something along those lines to pass along in just such a situation as this. A conversation ensued about the current drawbacks of Zimbra, and how many of them are likely addressed in the next version. Because there isn't a plugin available for Outlook (or is it Lookout!) 2007, the migration is being delayed so as not to break things for staff.
Friday afternoon was the All Science Poster Session, at which I presented my research from the summer. The event is coordinated to fall on Trustee weekend, so during the late afternoon, there were trustees meandering through the posters. There was a pretty steady stream of traffic past my poster, and most people seemed to understand (at some level) what my project was about. Overall, it seemed like the event was a big success. My research adviser came down from the Cities, and remarked that there were a lot of people doing very interesting work, and I have heard that thought echoed by several others as well. I didn't get much chance to wander around, but people seemed pretty excited.
Recently, a couple friends have asked me to teach them some basic usage of LaTeX (or just TeX in general). In case anyone else is interested in learning how to use LaTeX to make worksheets and write reports, here are the useful resources I've found. Of course, using a search engine is good too.
Here are some things related to getting TeX installed, as well as some sort of editor for the platform. This list is non-exhaustive, and again a search engine is probably going to be useful.
This weekend has been Midterm break (no classes today), and it's come none too soon. On Saturday I began battling the C-monster (that is to say Comps, the major senior project) and turned in my proposal. I spent most of the afternoon Saturday and much of yesterday working on non-course-related writing that I need to do, but also took quite a bit of time to go take pictures. I may yet have some good pictures for the term.
Saturday evening, my floor and I went to a showing of The Real Inspector Hound in the small campus theater. One of my floormates was acting in it, and she did very well. After the play we returned to the floor for game night and cookies and cake. I am continuing to really like hanging out with my floor. I'll need to go elsewhere next term when I have more work to do. This afternoon I'm going to a social dance function where we're learning difficult and dangerous swing moves (jumps, throws, flips), and Saturday I may go to an Argentine Tango workshop. But now I'm off to breakfast and work. I have some interesting coments on politics which I think I'll post about when it's convenient.
Update: Okay, here's the thought I have on politics. I recently read on the BBC News website that Australia is holding elections in 6-8 weeks. Also in the media recently is that America is holding elections in 52-56 weeks. Given that there has already been a bunch of campaigning (to the annoyance of many), the Australian system seems to make some sense: Condense the campaign season into a season, rather than having it be a two- or four-year media assault.
A couple items of note came up Wednesday. For one, xkcd was amazing, featuring a SQL injection attack on a database. Given that the comic came out on the day of my databases midterm, it was especially amusing. Also, I have scheduled the presentation of my summer research for 4:00 Nov. 1. It should be interesting.
With my two projects and midterms done, things are getting somewhat more relaxed. However, I'll be spending the rest of the week getting back on my feet in classes I haven't been quite keeping up with. Luckily I'm not too far behind.
Is the sound I make when my classes conspire against me like they did this weekend and into this week. Between fairly large projects due Monday (this one is now done) and Tuesday (distinctly not done, but started), and midterms (both likely to be very challenging) Tuesday and Wednesday, I am doing a fairly good imitation of a relaxed pre-med: that is, only mostly stressed out. Tonight (or early tomorrow morning) I need to write two more variations on a short theme for my music composition class. For those keeping score at home, it's presently around 10:00 pm. Also, the tentative date for my giving an informal chemistry seminar is Nov. 1 (Thursday) at 4:00 pm. More on that as it develops and if it's still necessary after this week.
I heard today that my poster and presentation from 3M cleared review! Parts of today were a little exciting because I needed to register for the Carleton poster session (3:30 Friday, Oct. 19th) but hadn't heard yet about the review. Now, though, I have copies of both the poster and presentation, and know that I can discuss them. Also, my research adviser will be coming down to the poster session. In the next few weeks, I'm going to schedule a time to give some sort of informal seminar where I give the presentation. Scheduling that could be difficult. Regardless, I'm pretty excited to finally be able to discuss this work, display a nice-looking poster, and probably present the well-animated presentation.
As fourth week is now underway, I've noticed that I've finally hit my stride. My schedule has settled in, I've established study spaces, the GRE study group is coming together, and (importantly) Heinrich is one step closer to perfection.
Yesterday morning I was able to compile Mutt (a text-based email client) with support for connecting directly to the Carleton outgoing mail server. This allows me to sign outgoing email from any computer on campus (iMacs are nice, especially with X11) without having to carry around my copy of Thunderbird on a Stick.There are still a few things to work out with my Mutt configuration, such as shortcutting a Move command. Luckily, the guys across the hall are pretty good with Mutt and have offered to help me with that.
One thing keeping Heinrich from perfection is the trouble with the network card. I think there's a hardware problem with it, as it doesn't hold its IP address very long, and will panic the kernel frequently. Fortunately for me, the wireless is working and there are access points in the dorms, so I still have connectivity.
I am continuing to enjoy my classes. Composition is difficult, but very interesting and rewarding. On Friday I went to a world premeire piano concert, where twelve composers had been commissioned to write short works (4 minutes or so) for advanced high-school or liberal arts students. The lead piano teacher then played the works, many of which were quite interesting, if not my style (that's baroque for those who were wondering). Speaking of composition, I should probably go to class.
Yesterday evening I finished my major databases programming assignment. And it's already graded. My code worked (mostly), and I have since fixed the mostly to a full working. So I've been taking most of today off to get my life back in order (and catch up on things like my other classes and doing the reading for chemistry Journal Club.
After class this afternoon, I spent a while doing research, and I'm pretty excited about the project. At the moment, the project is still very broadly defined, and Gretchen and I are doing background research into using hydrophobic interactions between molecules to do organic chemistry in aqueous solutions. These interactions can be used to orient molecules in specific ways relative to each other, so that certain reaction products are favored over others. Furthermore, the use of aqueous solvent rather than organic ones is more environmentally friendly (water is readily available, and much les toxic).
I've also been spending some time yesterday and today getting to know the people on my floor, and have taken a couple walks in the arb. I expect the Pictures of the Term to be fairly good this term, as I have been managing to take a few good ones. Tonight, I'm off to the concert hall with my violin to practice (yay Biber!).
This past weekend, I've been doing a lot of programming. My databases professor told us that this upcoming assignment was going to be big and take a lot of time, and indeed it is living up to that warning. At the moment, I think I have a bit of a handle of what's going on, such that there's just some algorithm implementation ahead. Tonight I'm working on homework for my other classes, as each of them assigned work for tomorrow.
The term in pictures is progressing nicely, and I think there may be some good pictures at the end. Perhaps even a good collection of one for each day. If for no other reason, I find the photography project helps me relax and take a little time each day to get away from work. Perhaps this term I'll actually talk to admissions about whether they're interested in using it for publicity. Well, I should go compose myself (or at least my homework). Hopefully Wednesday evening I can post about the wonderful sense of accomplishment I feel at having finished my computer science assignment.
As classes have begun to gather steam, I realize just how much of a time commitment two of the classes I took are. Composition is taking a lot of time, about half being listening and responding in writing, half being composition exercises. In case I wasn't busy enough, I also have a computer science class (they're known for taking lots of time). So I should probably be working on composition rather than writing this. Note, though, that I am thoroughly enjoying the aforementioned classes.
I have taken a moment this evening and added both new pictures (part of my Term in Pictures project) and fixed the temperature reading. This morning I buckled down and registered for GREs, so now I must only study for them in my "free time" (whatever that is). Well, that's all for now. And happy Talk Like a Pirate Day to everyone tomARRRRRrrrrrrow.
This past week has been somewhat busy. I've started getting loads of homework from my classes, have started preparing a research topic for the term, and work has been much more active than in years past. The homework is already quite thick, and I'm hoping it doesn't get worse soon. So far I'm still coming out on top, but I've got most of a CS assignment to do tomorrow, plus a composition assignment or two for Tuesday.
Friday was the activity fair, where all the student organizations set up tables on the Bald Spot and students then wander around and sign up for the clubs which interest them. I spent the two hours of the fair supporting the nordic ski club by rollerskiing around. That's right, rollerskiing around the Bald Spot for two hours. In traffic. We did manage to get some new recruits, which is great. That and I managed not to fall and hurt myself.
Today, I went to the Renaissance Festival with a friend from the Cities. We walked around, saw some glass blowing, some juggling, looked for presents for peple, browsed through the very expensive things for sale, and had a generally good time. After that, I came back to campus and went for a walk in the arb with some of my floormates. After that and gallivanting this evening, I am rather tired.
As a quick summary, here's how things here stand: classes are keeping me busy(but I really like them), the computer is working (give or take the wired ethernet), I'm still getting some exercise (for now), and having my own room is great. Oh, and I finished the book Godel, Escher, Bach this morning. It was okay, but rather long, and some of the treatment of molecular biology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence bothered me. Definitely not as good as it had been made out to be, and probably unnecessarily long (742 pages of actual text).
The events of the past few days have been many and positive. Saturday evening I ended up going to bed early (somewhat tired after being social), knowing that Sunday morning at 8 was the Jesse James 5 Km / 15 Km run. Sunday I woke up around 6 (no alarm), got ready, and headed downtown for the 5 km race. As I neared Bridge Square, a familiar voice called my name. My co-captain from the high school ski club (now a Junior at St. Olaf) was coming to run in the 15 km race. So we went together to the registration table, got registered for our races, and then talked for a while as we waited for the start.
The weather was perfect for running: cool (50-55 °F), dry, and not too windy. I was quite excited, and noticed that I was among the more competitive-looking of the 5 km runners and started out in the second row. Because the two races were starting in slightly different places, the gun was about three blocks away. There was a noticable delay between the smoke (when I started running) and the bang (which I didn't care about). I managed to have a pretty enthusiastic start (perhaps too enthusiastic), and was fifth as we rounded the corner where the starter had been standing. The course was all pretty flat and pretty familiar, so I didn't have too much trouble. Despite my thought that very few males ages 20-24 were ahead of me, I was somewhat surprised to see the results, which showed that I was 15th overall (yay!), held a 7 minut mile pace (not bad for not having been training before last week), and managed to get 5th of 6 in my age group (drat!).
In the afternoon, I bought textbooks (they weren't super-expensive this term =), picked up my lagnaippe (free quirky planner), got a locker in the concert hall for my violin, and then went visiting friends. In the evening I revisited the violin, and had a good time practicing. Study break went pretty well,l though we never did manage to go around and do introductions (so I still don't know people on my floor).
Today has had its share of craziness. Because it's the first day of classes, someone decided that we should have a weird schedule which will only be replicated again one Friday in late spring. Just to confuse everyone, especially the frosh. I had work this morning, and it was rather busy; I had work to do right at the beginning of my shift, and then had to go running out twenty minutes after my shift was supposed to end when I realized I had class in a few minutes. Class (Database Systems) was great. I really like the prof, and though I expect the class to be a challenge, I expect I'll be able to get a lot of help from the prof and get my coding skills up to where they need to be for the class.
This afternoon was opening convocation, and as I'm a senior, I got to go sit in the balcony and blow bubbles during the processional and recessional. This evening, I went for a nice walk in the arb with my neighbor, and may have managed to get a good sunset picture. Maybe. So far I'm still managing to stick with the at-least-a-picture-a-day project, and am hoping it works out better this term than in past terms. Well, that's all the news from around here. I'm having a great time so far, and am expecting it to continue for a while.
Yesterday I moved in to my luxurious single in the center of campus (on a substance-free floor too!). There's plenty of space in the room, so much so I could easily fit a couch without the space feeling small. The hallway is air-conditioned, so during the fall and spring my door may be open frequently when I'm around to cool my room off.
I have several crazy friends (and sysadmins!) living next door or across the hall. During the term if we have free time, I'm sure there will be a great deal of floor life. Especially during Assassins team rounds. I play, the guys across the hall play, and at least one of the girls next door will play. Plus there may be others on the floor (such as frosh) to augment our numbers. Posting this to Gridley is difficult due to the endless distractions from the neighbors. We all went out for ice cream last night, and tonight are doing dinner together.
Heinrich has been a little weird here. I'm currently connected to the network over wireless (which now works on my custom kernel). I think, though, the ethernet connection is causing massive instability, as when it's connected the uptime is very limited (under 30 minutes) and sometimes the network connection dissappears and won't return. Over the next couple days I'll test this hypothesis further, and then see if I can get a solution. At least there's wireless!
I finished up at 3M late this afternoon. Everything in the lab is cleaned, labeled, put away, and generally in order. It looks nice (give or take some of the havoc even I wasn't compelled to clean). I even managed to get in an additional experiment or two. =D
On the way home this evening, I remembered what it was I was going to remark about yesterday but didn't. At lunch yesterday I saw 15-20 wild turkeys (the birds, not a Republican party!). Two larger ones (I'm assuming parents) and a large number of smaller ones.
Yesterday evening, I began work on my coding project. I still haven't figured out what language to use for it. It's string manipulation, so Perl may be a good choice. I did build some of the text files I'll need to back it up (or to insert into it), which involved some exciting use of regular expressions and the vi text editor.
My internship for the summer is just about over. I think I have all the samples prepared and reactions completed that I will need to, and now it's just a matter of tying up the loose ends. And cleaning. I have some cleaning to do. Yesterday I heard that the lawyer who would review my presentation and poster is very busy with important stuff (if only temporarily), so my stuff may not get reviewed for some time. Luckily it's very likely to pass with no problems whatsoever.
The past couple days have been relatively uneventful outside of work. That is, they've consisted mainly of eating, sleeping, and watching the Twins lose to Cleveland. And Mythbusters. Mythbusters is cool. I'm starting to get some plans together for next week. One evening I'm likely to have dinner/coffee/tea/ice cream with a friend I haven't seen in in more than a year. I've also come up with a neat little computer program I'd like to write, and it seems well suited for writing in Perl. With any luck I'll be able to actually write it by the end of break. Oh, and to get to the title of this entry: one week from today (right now, perhaps), I intend to be in Northfield getting all unpacked. I have a feeling there's a cross-country race open to the general Carleton public Saturday morning, and I'd like to run in it. Mayhaps tonight I'll start training.
I now have only three days of work left this summer (it being dinner time Tuesday night). And they'll be packed with excitement. I have a couple of hard deadlines between now and Friday for my project, and a long way to go to meet those deadlines. With three days to go, my presentation and poster are still un-reviewed, and I'd really like for that to happen. I have heard from Carleton, and I can give my presentation at any time, though it will not be a chemistry seminar--too many people did summer research for anyone to be able to use an official seminar slot.
Over the weekend, I began one of my projects for the summer (and one of the justifications for my new computer): copying our record collection onto my computer so I have "new" (to me) "free" (again, to me) music. This will also allow me to build a digital archive of said collection, so some records may actually be heard occasionally. Unfortunately, recording off records is a very lengthy process. I'm using Audacity to record, and have a cable (it came with my headphones) that goes from the headphone jack on my stereo into the line in on my computer. Then it's just a matter of playing the record and going back at the end to split the tracks apart and adjust the volume.
That's about all the news I have (my life is often boring, if you haven't noticed). As promised earlier, here are my thoughts on email clients, and in particular, webmail.
Recently, Carleton migrated its mail server to Zimbra. This has resulted in some pain and frustration for me as a user who has very specific expectations for a mail client. In the next few paragraphs, I will explain my frustration; if you don't want to read a pseudo-rant on email clients, this would be a good time to stop reading.
I use my email client for, well, email. Plain, simple, text email. In fact, I can't stand HTML email. Automatically displayed pictures bother me in two ways. For one, I want to view the image at my convenience, but speed the page load by not downloading and rendering it. Second, if a spam message is loaded by accident, any malicious images will compromise the system, and all my bits are belong to them (i.e. the hackers). I also like to hang on to my email (though keeping the inbox uncluttered), just in case I need it again. I use a few folders to keep things organized. I find it useful to be able to access my messages from any computer connected to the internet that I happen to use. To such an end, I'd like to be able to have a way of moving a message to a different folder while viewing the message, and when it moves, I'd like to be popped back to the message list in the folder I had been viewing. Finally, as I have dial-up at home (and no intent to get anything else), something text-y and minimal would be great.
Here is a list-based outline of the sorts of things I want and expect from an email client:
One of the things that really frustrates me about Zimbra is its inconsistency. It offers two clients: basic and advanced. To the best of my knowledge (and I've spent quite a bit of time poking around with the very limited options), neither client has all the features I want. The old one, IMP, did (and I'll miss it). I believe all (except perhaps the minimal data transfer) these features are available in Zimbra. The frustrating thing is, though, that neither one of the clients has all these features. Some are only available in basic, others only in advanced. I am further bothered by the addition of excess bloat--games (and other "Zimlets"). I want my email client to work for email. If it can't do email in the simple way outlined above, all the extras in the world (figuratively speaking) wouldn't make me happy with it as a webmail program.
Now that I've outlined my frustrations with Zimbra, it's time to move forward into the constructive part of this criticism. One solution that would be ideal from my standpoint would be to get IMP (the old webmail) to just draw from the Zimbra IMAP server. I don't know the technical difficulties of this, but I will suggest it nevertheless in hopes it isn't hard. I should also point out that of the three programs under consideration, Zimbra is the one I most like, followed closely by Groupwise. Outlook is in the rear, and LotusNotes would be just ahead of Outlook were it an option.
Carleton is using Zimbra, and that's life. Now to move on. With discussion of webmail clients out of the way, I move on to the local clients. My criteria for local clients is a little strange, as I run Linux and am a strong supporter of open-source software. The two main candidates for me were Thunderbird (which can be put on a flash drive) and Mutt (a very flexible and compact command-line email program). I tried Mutt several years ago, though with minimal success. My failure with Mutt I attribute to not knowing how to configure my SMTP server (local) to relay through Carleton's SMTP server (this may not even be possible without a cleartext password). At the time of this writing (disconnected from the network and off-campus), I think I may have solved the relay problem. Assuming I do, Mutt becomes a viable alternative (especially with PuTTY on a flash drive).
Being a command-line email client, Mutt is everything I could ever want in an email program. It does folders nicely, it does IMAP, and is unable to display graphics or render HTML. The drawback is that it is complicated to set up (getting locally sent mail onto the webmail server is tricky). Thunderbird is more user-friendly and less complicated. My testing of these two programs is ongoing, but they seem to be the solution to my frustration with webmail. And they allow support for PGP/GPG, which is something a true webmail client can never do (securely).
To summarize, I don't particularly like Zimbra; it doesn't meet my needs for a mail interface. But all this is mooted (in my case) by the presence of portable email clients. These portable clients offer further functionality (PGP/GPG) that webmail never will, and games can be found elsewhere. If and when I am required somehow to use the calendaring part of Zimbra, I will again be frustrated.
The last few days, I've been keeping busy at work. With only six days left, I'm trying to get my project finished. Given how many people and how much shared equipment is necessary, the project may or may not get done. I have been able, though, to get involved in more steps of the process (if only as an observer) than before. My poster and powerpoint are fairly polished and ready for review by the lawyers. So that's all going well.
I also managed to remember to copy my japh (wikipedia: japh) to my flash drive so I could post it here. As it is, the file is executable, invoking perl itself; to read it as a text file, you may need to rename it japh.txt in order to get your text editor to recognize it. My rant against many new mail clients (especially Zimbra) is still unfinished on my laptop. Now that I think I have Mutt configured in a useful way, I'm not sure I'll need to vent. Perhaps commentary on the sorry state of email these days is necessary anyway. As a quick summary of the solutions, Please don't send HTML emails!
There has also been some recent news on the NSA wiretapping. It seems the spy chief has admitted that the telcos (including AT&T) were helping with the warrantless wiretapping. This may help open wide the door on the various cases against said telcos, as well as the litigation arguing that the wiretapping itself is a violation of the 4th Amendment. Of course, all this will be entirely without purpose if congress doesn't repeal bill it just passed expanding and legalizing this wiretapping.
Over the last few days, there really hasn't been much happening in my life. I went running a couple times over the weekend, and I realized that I have a 24 hour ski race coming up in early January. So I think I should start training for that. Discussions will ensue when I get to school as to whether I'll ski it solo or with a partner.
This weekend, I spent a little time trying to brush up on some programming in anticipation of my database class this fall. While I was mostly looking at Python and Perl, I did manage to learn things which will probably carry over. And if not, I did write an interesting Perl script, called a japh. Mine looks like the fourth example on Wikipedia. Perhaps Thursday I'll remember to load it onto my flash drive. I also spent some time figuring out how I would make a script I wrote more generic. It's a simple checksum program which keeps a list of the checksum of every program that can be run on my computer. That list is then checked against the current list of checksums, and if there are differences, it notifies me what they are. While it doesn't keep the virus from happening, it is an early warning step. Unfortunately, I hard-coded some parameters into it which I think I should be able to leave abstract with definitions in a configuration file.
At work, I have continued preparing my presentation and my poster. It looks like they'll be at least somewhat coherent, if somewhat vague. I've also been making some progress recently in advancing the frontiers of science, which is good. It's hard to believe I have less than two weeks left of my internship (until winter break, that is). Well, I'm off to go get some dinner.
Observation: one should not flame-test potentially sulfur-containing minerals with a kitchen stove while finishing cooking ones' pasta. Burning pyrite doesn't smell very good. However, it will allow a positive identification to be made.
In other news, the FISA court ordered that the government must respond to the ACLU's request for information about the scope of the government's authority to engage in secret wiretapping by Aug. 31, with any response from the ACLU due Sept. 14. Between this and the thorough skeptical questioning from the judges of the ninth circuit, it sounds like justice may yet be done. Perhaps the twisted structure this administration wrought amidst the clouds of dust from 9/11 will fall as the light of truth shines in.
There really hasn't been much going on since Tuesday evening. Work continues apace (I've been working on a different project helping out the tech aide from Olaf), and I'm enjoying it. Yesterday I met with my technical director (a Carl, whom I contacted about getting this opportunity) about a preparing a presentation for taking with me to Carleton. I seem to have a good start, and we'll be meting with lawyers at some point to figure out what details I can talk about. For now, the presentation consists mostly of the background and related work, of ehich there is considerable. Changing topics somewhat, today for lunch, Alyssa (the other tech aide) and I went to lunch at the India Palace, which is not far from where we work and has a good Indian lunch buffet. It's not quite Chapati, but their beef curry and chicken tikka masala were quite good. Even at 7:30, I'm still not particularly hungry.
I have recently acquired a copy of Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber's Passacaglia for Solo Violin (Biber being the namesake of my computer), and have begun working on it. Parts of it seem quite playable; it is more my level than the Bach Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin. I'll probably spend some time tonight playing it, and hopefully can get the first page or so (of four) working well. There are some very tricky chords (namely G B-flat G) which I haven't figured out how to play consistently (and in tune).
If I remember correctly, a while ago someone was asking me about computer graphics programs--especially (legit) free ones. There are two open-source, free (as in speech) programs that I use. One, GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program), is a raster graphics program--that is, it deals with images pixel by pixel. Think Photoshop (or Paint) with that one. The other, Inkscape, is a vector graphics program. With vector graphics, the image is defined as a set of points, lines, and curves. This makes it scalable--a smooth circle 5 cm across is still smooth when expanded to 5 m (or arbitrarily more). Were you to do a scale-up of that sort in Photoshop, your circle would be very chunky. Vector graphics are really the thing to use for computer-generated images; they're just more versatile. Inkscape can also export images as Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) files, which makes it useful for creating figures for use with LaTeX. I'll admit that each of these programs takes a little playing around with to get to know, but so too do Photoshop and Illustrator (the proprietary equivalents). I have found that all the features I use in Photoshop and Illustrator are present in their corresponding open-source programs.
After much thought (including a half-written post on Zimbra (the new email system) which I evidently didn't transfer to my flash drive), I have decided what I want to do about my email client. Zimbra itself is split into two interfaces, the "basic" and "advanced." Each has its share of quirks, and neither particularly pleases me. So I have been faced with a question of an alternate mail client. Thunderbird is the lead graphics-based email client, but I don't use many of its features. A year or so ago, I had experimented with a text-based email client called Mutt. While I really liked Mutt's interface (minimal!) and incredible flexibility and programmability, I was not smart enough at the time to figure out how to relay the mail I sent through the Carleton servers (and thus off-campus). Since then, I have indeed figured such a thing out (and Mutt now supports SMTP in unstable versions), and believe I can make it work better this time. Another issue I had was that my sent mail wasn't placed in my sent-mail directory on the server, but rather stored locally. If I wanted to recall a message I wrote from my computer, I would have to log into my computer, rather than just using the folder in webmail. This weekend, I devised a macro to bcc myself (among other things), so that with a little rule on my Carleton mailbox, I can get the messages into my sent-mail folder.
Also this weekend, I spent some time setting up my old computer, which works as long as you don't have a SATA (newer) hard drive. I have an older hard drive with XP Pro installed, and want to set it up for my parents, as their machine is showing its age. Plus I have an extra, (much) more powerful computer which might as well get some use. Some issues remain (the sound is screwy, as are the graphics in Jardinains!), but what does one expect from Micro$oft.
On the politics and social action front, there's been news in E-Voting, where California found major flaws in its systems (despite very limited time!). Also, there has been and will tomorrow be action on the NSA wiretapping front. Given that Congress recently signed off on the wiretapping, I fervently hope that the EFF case(s) are allowed to move forward, and that justice is done. If NSA wiretapping is the tip of the iceberg, I shudder to think of what lies yet unseen.
Work continues to be very interesting, and I feel like I'm actually getting things done. Tomorrow I meet with my technical director to discuss (among other things) what sort of stuff I might actually be able to talk about. I already have a few slides put together for a presentation which should be entirely a non-issue. Perhaps I'll have to schedule an appointment with the lawyers just to be sure. Sometime soon, too, I need to start looking at grad schools and taking GREs. Yech. But I guess it needs to get done, as it's easier from this side of the Pacific.
I am home safely from Canadia, where I have been all week. Ergo I was not in Minneapolis when the bridge collapsed on Wednesday. While it is fairly near my house, and in a direction I go most weekdays, it is not along my commute, and I seldom use it.
I managed to do some fishing in Canada, and caught a good number of smallmouth bass on one of my favorite flies. Perhaps it's a favorite because it usually catches lots of bass. I also went out canoeing on several occasions, each time solo (though in a two-seat canoe). The trips were short--I've never paddled solo before--just around the island or into a nearby bay. It was fun, once I got used to the whole steering thing. I added a new bird to my life list: a Bonaparte's Gull; it almost qualified for the cabin's life list, but as it wasn't seen on or from the island, the cabin list is yet without it. Perhaps I saw another one or two on the way home near Lake Mille Lacs--there were certainly a pair of hooded gulls out on a dock.
While I would like to perhaps flesh out a little bit of this post and add some details about Heinrich (yay shiny!), I have not the time now, and may not get to the library until Thursday evening. Perhaps I'll try posting from home, but given my history with that, I'd say it's doubtful.
Despite what I said earlier in the week, I've managed to get to the library again. Last night, I spent about four hours assembling my new computer, including some time for dinner and considerable backtracking (put the rear panel onto the case before installing the motherboard). And, as you may have inferred from the title of this post, my computer is named Heinrich, after the Austrian composer Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber.
The specs:
Installation was fairly straightforward, aside from some small matters slipping through the cracks in documentation pertaining to the connections of the front panel audio jacks. That said, I was able to get sound, so it seems to have been successful. I'm quite happy that the system is working, and that I now have access to my primary hard drive again.
Now that Heinrich is here, I'm going fishing in Canada for a week, in a cabin without electricity. That should be fun, and the water should be relatively warm (70 °F?). I suppose I'll probably have some remarks about it when I return. Maybe. Or maybe I'll just spend lots of time playing with my shiny new toy. =D
Once again, I'm at the library on my way home. As I just finished Moby Dick yesterday, I'm in need of a new book (or two) to read at the cabin. So I looked for (and found) translations of Schiller, but decided against them. I guess I'm more interested in the idea of reading Schiller than the texts themselves. But while I was looking for it I did find some potentially interesting stuff.
In other news, my shiny new toy (most of the parts for a computer) is due to arrive on Thursday. I'm getting excited. This is the first time I've actually built a computer, though I've done everything required except swapping the power supply, mounting the CPU, and then mounting the motherboard. It can't be that hard to do these days.
T'other day, Carleton switched its webmail interface to a different one, which somewhat resembles Gmail. I must say that I don't like the new interface, and not just because I'm averse to change. There are some very useful options which I like to excersize which it doesn't let me--never show images, never use html email, and don't use Java or Javascript being the main ones. With this combined with the Lotus Notes interface I've looked at recently, I must say that Groupwise is very good at what it does, and that I strongly prefer to use Mutt (a text-based mail viewing/composing program) if I possibly can. Today I even think I found how to get my computer configured to send mail off-campus through Mutt (I ran into firewall issues in the past which led me away from it).
While I'm gone in Canada (I don't actually leave until Saturday morning), there are a couple webpages that I'll really miss: Electronic Frontier Foundation, Bruce Schneier's Security blog, and Ed Felten's Freedom to Tinker blog. Plus the comics xkcd, User Friendly, and PhD Comics.
Of late, I've been rather unable to get to the library to get good internet access. With birthday parties and medical appointments and the like, my schedule has had little intersection with the open hours of the library. I have, however, made some progress toward my new computer. Last weekend, I was finaly inspired (somehow) to build a computer using a hollow plaster bust of someone (Schiller, Shakespeare, Bach, and Mozart were all candidates) as a case. To do this using the standard 9.5x9.5" motherboard would require a life-size bust, with the torso truncated not tapered from the shoulders. Sadly, I was unable to find one that met my specifications, and upon further study of cases available at newegg, I found one to my liking. I have now established a list of items to acquire, and may well put in an order for the parts I need tomorrow.
In my book, I'm making pogress. I think I've just now reached the beginning of the actual story (400 some pages later). Perhaps I'll be able to finish it before I head to Canadia at the end of next week. It has certainly had its interesting spots, though I must say I'm quite ready for the story to get off the ground.
As regular or semi-regular readers of my blog know, there are only a handful of topics I usually touch on; this summer, I have primarily discussed computers, my work (though only slightly), cartoons which make me smile, and my thoughts on politics (mainly on security and freedom related issues). Today I intend to mention two of those: computers and politics.
Computers: I am intending to build myself a computer this summer. I have been unable to find a commercially available case and motherboard combination that meet my specifications. As I am unwilling to compromise to the degree that a commercially available case would require me to, I am preparing to build my own case. I have not yet formed any feasible designs that I especially like. I have, however, realized that if I am building my own case, I should think outside the box and really make something unique. Yes, I am a little scared at how much my artistic side is trying to express itself. I'm also somewhat scared by the number of times I've typed the 'y' key with my left index finger in the last twenty minutes--I'm usually pretty good about touch typing correctly.
One case that has caught my attention and has earned my respect is a duct tape server. For those wondering, no, I will not be making my computer out of duct tape, tempting as it is now that I know it can be done.
Politics: Recently there was an article published here on "'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy." I haven't finished reading it yet, but it should be a good read, and the title suggests that it is probably something to consider. Also recently, I sent my representative in Washington a letter, as I have been moved to action after having ranted uselessly for too long. I encourage you to also contact your representative if you're finding yourself ranting and raving about politics.
The EFF recently procured and released documents gathered through a FOIA request (and lawsuit) pertaining to abuses of National Security Letters (NSLs), and it seems there may be more hard questions put to Gonzales. Read the documents, consider the implications, and write your representative. When there is no justice in the Department of Justice, the freedom of the nation hangs in the balance. Justice should be (relatively) blind, not keeping you under constant surveillance and scrutiny.
All My Base are belong to xkcd (again) for this comic.
The summer is flying away before my eyes. I'm making some progress in my research and may even have some interesting results to present at the group meeting coming up! Outside of work, I'm still slogging through Moby Dick, which has its moments.
I've also poked around on the internet when I've had a chance (usually fairly brief), and have two recommended reads, both relating to politics. One is an xkcd comic, while t'other is a very interesting blog on security, both national and computer. And of course, you should remember to keep in touch with your representatives (and potential candidates) if there are political issues you feel strongly about.
Well, my time here at the library is expiring, and it's getting toward dinner time anyway. Only two months or so until Carleton starts again. Yikes.
As is evidenced by my not having posted in a week, I've been a bit of a slacker. I continue to spend a good deal of time working and commuting, with some time also dedicated to sleep and food. Thoughts about my computer are starting to form a bit of a plan. Unfortunately, it involves more compromise than I like. Were I to have super-awesome metalwoking and electronics skills, it would be less of an issue (how much power does a DVD drive need at full capacity?). Mainly, I can't find the size case that I wanted while still being able to reuse components when I need to upgrade.
I am very happy to be air conditioned this summer. It's rather warm here in "frigid" Minnesota. Luckily, the bus has been running closer to on schedule the last few days, so I've been getting home at a reasonable hour. This evening, I've stopped at the library again to get this posted and do other things that require fast internet (i.e. looking for the text of a patent reform bill).
This afternoon I got a chance to talk to the Carl who arranged this 3M internship for me. We had a great discussion about the differences between industry and academia, and the great value of industry experience while still undergraduate. And, because she's a Carl, I was able to also discuss the comps process, and I'm pretty certain that I'm going to do group comps; with whom is another question entirely. I was glad to have the opportunity to talk with her, as I was surprised when I started to find just how far removed from the lab bench she was.
Last week, I finished the collection of Dostoevsky's "short stories" (several of which are over 120 pages) that I was reading. They were all quite good, and I especially enjoyed a scene in The Eternal Husband where a young whipper-snapper is arguing with a crochety middle-aged curmudgeon and a free-spirited contemporary of the said curmudgeon. It's possibly the most humorous scene I've read by Dostoevsky. Now that that book is finished, I've been taking a little break before beginning Moby Dick. Well, it's getting on toward (past?) dinner time, so I must be on my way. Life is rather dull and repetitive (especially that which I can discuss), so (and?) it may be a while before I post again. I will try to finish the writing I discussed last time, too.
I started work doing chemistry research last week. It seems that it's more engineering than I had expected--why I didn't expect it to be much engineering is beyond me. It's quite interesting stuff, and it looks as though what I'm doing is going to have a decent chance of succeeding in a relatively short time frame, which is nice. The commute, as expected, is rather long. I work (including lunch break) from 8:15-5. However, the buses work so that I leave home at 6:30 and get home at 6:30. At least I have time to read (and Dostoevsky is such good reading!).
My computer is fully dead. I am in the process of determining whether I can feasibly obtain a new motherboard for it, or if I need to buy a new computer (and if so, what kind). So that's been draining me of the free time I've been able to come up with.
This summer I've been quite appreciative of the air conditioning in which I live. It sure beats the last couple summers without it. Having a nice kitchen is good, too. T'other day I even took advantage of it and made pizza. Tonight will not be so complex, as it's 6:30 and I'm still downtown at the library (where the world wide pipes are big). My plan for tonight after dinner is to possibly write a political essay addressing some of the issues I see in the world today. Also, I should point out that I've been surprised how few people have heard of Carleton before. I mean, St. Olaf some people have heard of, but very few have heard of Carleton (and don't think it's that business school). Anyway, I should be off.
My computer is pretty well broken. There is a small program contained on the motherboard of a computer that tells the computer what to do when the power comes on called the BIOS. There are adjustable settings in the BIOS such as which drive the system looks to boot from first, and whether it counts how much RAM is in the computer. With mine, I changed the latter setting, and now the computer locks while counting its RAM. Unfortunately it doesn't acknowledge its escape command to avoid counting RAM, and won't let me get to where I can set it to not count its RAM. So that's no good. Maybe I'll try to get it reset, and see if that helps.
I survived another academic term and academic year at Carleton. Over the weekend, I finished my inorganic exam, wrote a paper on my research, packed, re-imaged one of my computers, and managed to get some sleep. I now have a week to get some rest and relaxation in before I start my chemistry research with a firm here in the Cities.
On my agenda for the summer is a good deal of practicing violin, possibly arranging some Bach (maybe even some composition), archiving some of my family's record collection, and trying to remain functional as I go through internet withdrawl. This afternoon, a friend and I are going to head out canoing, because it seems like the kind of day to do it (sunny and warm).
With the coming of summer and the going of fast internet access for me, the update frequency of this blog is likely to go down. Email and snail-mail are probably good ways to keep in touch if you feel you need more information than is appearing here.
I finished the triathlon this
