He's a decade younger than me, folks, but in a similar career juncture. Short am_U stocks and invest in Devac. And then please send me a cut of those profits, because doing science ain't good for the monies, especially if you're at least ~50% worse than Devac.
Come on, man. What is this, some weird spin on impostor syndrome or something? There are better ways to start a day. I can tell you this: after diving into plasma physics deep enough to get some sense of it, I am more than confident that I wouldn't be able to do your research. Not because I'm lousy with experiments, which I am, but because I couldn't even begin to develop this kind of intuition. That said, I'd like to read your dissertation someday. If I'm half as smart as you claim, I might have something cogent to say about it after, like, a year.
Those of us challenged by electron shells and tensor calculus appreciate the humility. Having grown up amongst Nobel winners I can say with authority that the humble ones get invited to more parties. Look at Feynman - Physics was this thing he did for money while trying to figure out how to play better jazz and as a result the dude was a must call whenever you had so much as a case of beer. Then look at Teller - I mean, he was Edward Teller so you had to invite him but you hoped beyond hope that he didn't show up. I'm honored to know you both. Go forth and do Great Things.
You can develop an intuition for anything when you spend 2+ years looking at only that thing. I'm very much looking forward to hearing about your research. Enjoy it, if you can :). I think doing research in grad school is one of the most stable jobs out there. It's apparently relatively impossible to get fired, and yet everybody depends on your productivity. I think especially if you want a job in academia, that's the situation to really deliver results. Oh, and I came across this article today, which might be summed up best with this quote from therein: no mathematical formulation provided the author actually works in bedrock physics theory, but attempts to insulate themselves from criticism by acknowledging that they haven't yet come up with a grand unifying theory and can't offer concrete advice regarding a direction to proceed from where we are now OK so I'm only like 10% theorist, and that little op ed triggered me purdy bad. From a capitalist perspective, sure, financially re-purpose all of the relatively unproductive theory efforts into green tech development and fighting climate change, if you can. But damn, if it isn't some kinda statement on the times we live in that society begins to give up on "big picture" endeavors just because the complexity of the universe appears prohibitively yuge at this exact moment in human history.I have spelled out many times, very clearly, what theoretical physicists should do differently. It’s just that they don’t like my answer. They should stop trying to solve problems that don’t exist. That a theory isn’t pretty is not a problem. Focus on mathematically well-defined problems, that’s what I am saying.
You're probably right, but some things come easier than others. I'm less confident in my knowledge about the basics of mechanics of continuous media than general relativity, and the former is actually somewhat related to my specialization. It remains to be seen. I'd like it to be true, but different countries, education systems etc. For sure, I'll write some "this is how PhD in Poland looks like" post in the future, but right now I only know things second-hand. Regarding that article: I can usually at least appreciate most of Hossenfelder's complaints (mathematical beauty != promising physics), but this particular piece is truly terrible. "Two women working in tandem won't give birth to a child in four months" is an almost too perfect rebuttal to those time calculations she brought up. As far as 'mathematically well-defined problems' go, all I can do is to kinda smirk at that idea and ask how she defines well-defined problems. Seriously, where's the cutoff? What's the verdict on Navier-Stokes? Are ill-posed problems OK? What about ill-posed problems where unique solutions are only ensured by the arbitrary choice of norm? 'No' to any one of those means that fluid dynamics and phase transitions aren't physics. 'Yes' to either one of those opens the gates to all kinds of ST. I could go on. /rant, agreement otherwise.You can develop an intuition for anything when you spend 2+ years looking at only that thing.
I think doing research in grad school is one of the most stable jobs out there.
I pretty much finished mike's painting last night. I'm calling it "View of the Fjord". Fjord is a great word. I learned some lighting tricks, as well as some things not to do. This was inspired by a photo that Mike took. I think I'm going to do an original next. Hubski is still on lockdown. I tried to open the gates, but we had about 1 bot per minute signing up. The captcha isn't doing its job. I was working on an email activation, but then a black fly landed in my chardonnay; we've been added to some spam lists that Google and Microsoft reference. I'm now working on that. We just had a wooden fence installed that includes our lot, and the vacant one behind it that we got last year. It would kick Danielsan's ass. Camping this weekend!
We hired another doctor. Her old clinic was lying to her patients and telling them she'd quit to "spend time with her family" because she insisted that the clinic needed to inform people about the importance of vaccines instead of parroting the Infowars line about Precious Bodily Fluids. So we bought a $4k VFC fridge and I put her name up in lights a foot high in front of 50,000 cars a day. Meanwhile our newer midwife just bought a house. Job creation? I HAZ IT. My watch begins tonight. Getting on a plane at a new airport that I could literally bike to. It opened three months ago. It's at capacity now. It's been weird seeing passenger traffic overhead; this place was a sleepy boring-ass suburb but now we've got a convention center and an airport and in three years we'll have a damn Metro. What I've done in the past is buy a one-way down because I don't really know when I'm coming back. This time I bought a round-trip that brings me back in late September when the show is over. It was so much cheaper that way even if I eat the return ticket. Psychologically it's put me in a place of "going on a long journey" instead of "vanishing forever from my home." It still sucks but it doesn't suck abysmally. I remind myself constantly that I'm not deploying overseas or heading out for an offshore drilling rig. I'm flying back often enough that dairy products don't spoil. School collapsed in an impressive way this quarter. I bailed on the last of my jewelry class because the teacher was insulting to the kind of work I wanted to do and was teaching me nothing. I basically dared her to give me an F because she has no power over me but I did it in such a way that somehow we're still friends. I suspect her behavior is related to Alzheimer's or dementia. Meanwhile my CNC program might be collapsing. Their attendance is at about 40% of where it needs to be to be sustainable. Really, school is collapsing in an impressive way everywhere we look. My wife's school basically lost an entire department over the past few weeks. And the place I have my jewelry program? They can't make money selling pizza to college kids so they closed the kitchen. I'm legitimately worried about the future of secondary education in the United States; something big is going to have to shift to counter the mountain of bullshit that's accumulated over the past couple decades. I mean, I hear of constant abuse from the students I know and my school figured they could just up and move a final without any notification. Shit like that didn't happen back in the '90s. But I'm good. I've got a half-dozen watches finished and one on Chrono24. All my tools work and I know how to use all of them. I'm at the place where when I can't diagnose the problem, neither can anyone else and generally the advice I get is "buy a more expensive tool." I'm in a great spot to do my own learning on my own schedule with my own focus. In retrospect, my past journey has been about justifying the time I'm not working. Now that I've seen all there is to see as far as what I want to do I'm comfortable doing it on my own terms. I straightened a hairspring on the FrankenSenna and determined that the movement was garbaged but the balance is now awesome. Of the three jewels I can see, one of them has a piece of lint wrapped around the pivot such that I'm pretty sure the other 22 are in a questionable state of cleanliness. And while there will be a time when I want to rebuild a 7750 that time is not now. I started off not knowing where the journey would end. I still don't. But I know that I'm now qualified to make all the decisions I need to make. And that was probably worth $28k and 60 credits.
I have ticketstubs older than my wife's clients. Took some group photos yesterday. My wife said "crap. I'm the old one." I pointed out that she's half again as old as everyone else and looks maybe a few years older (I believe the phrase I used was "we've been together since before they were old enough to date"). Six months ago a guy in one of my classes went "wait - you're how old? You mean I'm twelve years younger than you?" Diet and exercise and all that shit but not fixating on the number helps a whole bunch.
Heh. At brunch at our favorite Saturday spot a couple weeks ago, we sat next to a lovely lesbian couple and wound up talking with them for 2.5 hours. At some point it became clear my wife and I were MUCH older than they were. We told them we were both 50 and they FLIPPED out. Had to pull out our driver's licenses to prove it to them. We so pretty. :-)
The St. Gereon basilica in Cologne is pushing back the dark! Had a lovely weekend there. Gf and I celebrated one year of being together. It was lovely. I booked us an awesome hotel room in a former water tower, and it exceeded all my expectations. We mostly explored the city streets and sights and had good food. It was not as beautiful a city as I'd hoped, with the WW2 bombing and all, but that didn't matter much. I'm very busy with the Cape Verde project at work. Coordination alone is a lot of work, and then I also need to deliver a report next Friday that's good enough for the presentation the week after on-site. I've also started wargaming my way to a more fulfilling job. The plan is now to get myself some Google-esque 20% development time, or to at least have something of that nature. It's what I love doing, it's what I'm good at and it's what the company needs to stay innovative.
Research Think I've figured out how to split off a reasonable-sized piece of my research that's interesting on its own! It'll be good to get something written up since things have been slow going lately. The other grad student in my research group left on short notice, so now I'm helping to run his project (which has grant funding and project deadlines) until my advisor brings on some new students. It's actually a continuation of some undergraduate research I did mumble years ago, so I'm excited to get to do a bit more with it! Personal It's been a year this week since I publicly transitioned! Cooking Over the weekend I made shakshuka while waiting for my wife to finish mowing the lawn. I ended up simmering it for about 2 hours and the flavors of the spices really came out! I think next time I'm going to try making it with fennel greens and fresh dill. Yesterday night we pitted about a half gallon of cherries we picked from the cherry tree in our yard. Looks like we'll be making cherry pie this weekend!
You look happy and awesome! Love the hat! Glad to hear things are going well for you. Also, cherry pie is perhaps the greatest dessert there is. Followed by blueberry pie. I know it’s disgusting to say, but I love those hostess cherry pies that are in vending machines. They’re my favorite junk food. Anyways, enjoy and thanks for the update!
Thank you! I think the lemon version of those hostess pies is my favorite, but I would eat almost anything citrus flavored! The pie turned out great -- so tart and perfect to pair with some vanilla bean ice cream. We put a bit of thyme in the filling too; maybe mint would be another interesting addition?
Are you still doing homotopy type theory (or was that your side-interest? it's been a while)? Tell more about your research, if only to remind me of some of the details, please. By the way, by the looks, you remind me of my geography teacher. It's definitely a compliment, I had a major crush on her in high school. :)
HoTT is just a side interest -- and actually I haven't had time for it for quite a while, unfortunately. (Although, now that I've learned more abstract math, I might actually stand a chance of understanding what it's getting at!) My research is on models of complex systems -- stuff with both a big physical component and digital control. Mostly I spend my time reading about formal methods in software engineering and then figuring out how to use those ideas elsewhere. It's interesting but slow going.
I am in the process of moving into a house over the course of a few weeks. It is a beautiful place that we pay very little for and I am looking for a job and collecting all the questions for study over the next couple of days. I'm also finally doing my step work with my sponsor. I have been very enthusiastic about how just being a part of people's lives is actually making them stay sober and successful (for the most part.) I want to open a non-profit. I want to do this while I am working on releasing music before the end of the summer. I want to be the person in the room that has helped the most people than to be the richest person in the world. Anyways, I am coming up on a year sober from alcohol and hard drugs. I've been doubling up on meetings and planning when to take my cakes. To all of you, I hope you have a Happy Father's Day weekend.
Sewing I got my second rabbit done. It's actually been done for a while now. Probably about two, maybe three weeks at this point. I keep meaning to share it, but I've just been so burned out and so busy with other things at the same time that just taking a few quick pictures and putting them on Imgur to share on here took more effort than I really wanted to put in. To make the thing more sturdy, I did a blanket stitch around all of the seams. On the one hand, it worked really well, as it's sturdy as heck. The downside of it is though, is that all of the body parts are much flatter. I'm not a fan of the colors, and I'm not proud of the massive forehead it's sporting, and overall it's a bit too plain, but my second effort went smoother than the first, I learned some things, and I'm ready for a new project. . . . Can't think of much to say that's really worth saying today, Pubski. So I'll let things go for now. Hope you're all doing well.
I have a phone interview today. It's crazy thinking about leaving my current company, but nothing has improved since I started going down this path. My supervisor is new to supervision. We were coworkers reporting to the same person. Now I report to him, and he reports to our old supervisor. I think part of the problem is my boss reports out to and gets direction from his boss, then comes and tries to do something with our group, it doesn't really do anything, goes back to his boss, rinse and repeat. He needs to be his own leader. It's been two years of him coasting by on a group that worked pretty well before, but as the wheels start to come off he has no means of righting the apple cart. He was never a natural leader, if I'm being candid. He got the job out of persistence. He should have been more persistent in fostering leadership in himself and spend less time at leadership seminars. His biggest failing has been hiring an engineer who said they had a lot of experience but didn't, not taking an active role in coaching that person, and now left with someone who can't contribute to the group and feels slighted at any suggestion of needing to change because they now have two more years of (valueless) experience. I think he hired them wanting someone experienced, and all he got was someone dragging the group down. It's super frustrating. I don't really want to move, but I also really don't want to work here.
Work. My boss was just fired/laid-off. I'm safe, though. When the sales department doesn't hit their goals consistently for a couple of quarters, the Executive team leans out the operational costs - AKA, the non-revenue-producing middle-management layer - until the Execs remember how much they hate managing day-to-day operations, and hire a new middle-management layer to do the daily work again. And the cycle repeats. Fortunately, my boss was an old friend of mine, and was here long enough to get my role properly compensated, and brought visibility of my myriad contributions to the Executive Team and the denizens of the C-suites. So I'm in a good place. And without a manager. Or really anyone who understands what I do here... everyone just knows that my job is finicky and annoying and should be three people, and I do it happily as one, so they just let me do what I do, and stay out of my way. Home. Tomorrow the oil heating system gets replaced in my home with a ductless heat pump system. And Friday. And Saturday. (It's going to be complex.) I think they are going to have to partially demolish all the work I did in the downstairs with the new reclaimed barn-wood ceiling and walls, because they are going to have to run electrical across the entire house. :-( I'll know more after they show up in the morning, and we talk through Their Plan. Motorcycle. I began the tear-down of the old VX800, in preparation for doing the airbox, spark plugs, and compression testing. Turns out someone wants all the plastic I took off the bike, so the $600 motorcycle is down to $300. I might break-even on this thing, even before I begin working on it in earnest! Rugby. Going to San Diego for the Seattle Seawolves vs San Diego Legion championship game. We are coming in VERY strong, and they have two key weaknesses that we are set up to exploit. The pundits are thinking that Seattle wins this by a slim margin (2-3 points), but that no matter who wins, it is going to be a great game. Our mascot - Rucky the Seawolf - has transformed this season from an awkward dude in an ill-fitting suit, to a real character with a fully-developed personality, and the fans have embraced him whole-heartedly. The team can't afford to take Rucky with them, so the fans pooled together yesterday in an epic FB Messenger thread, and bought his airfare, hotel room, and meals, so he can come with us. It's fucking heartwarming. Seriously. Mid-life Crisis. It progresses apace, and according to all the predicted models and historical precedence. Except I'm not getting a convertible (already have a car I love and a motorcycle, so that box is checked), and don't want/need a mistress. But I am absolutely convinced that I am going to finish writing one of the 4 books I have in the works, or finally get down to drawing seriously and refining my technique, or finding a visionary job where I am fully appreciated - and ridiculously well compensated - for pulling together the exact mixture of weird experience and history that will make some company give me a swanky corner office and a secretary and some highly conceptual job that actually doesn't require much work. Everything is going perfectly to plan. (At least, until it isn't, of course.)
Just be careful. They might decide they know better. I worked for a company that was named to the Forbes Fastest 500 the year before. They held a board-level meeting to figure out what to do with the fact that I was overworked and nobody knew how to do my job. Their solution was to lay me off because it was easier than thinking. It ended up costing them about $21m in lost business. Losing that job was among the best things that ever happened to me but I still lost it on their terms, not mine.So I'm in a good place. And without a manager. Or really anyone who understands what I do here... everyone just knows that my job is finicky and annoying and should be three people, and I do it happily as one, so they just let me do what I do, and stay out of my way.
Good point. Do you know a 20-25% turnover rate is TYPICAL for a tech company? We are at the low end of that, but after 3 years and 2 months, I am more senior than all but 3 of our C-suite residents, and more than half of the other employees in this 400-person company. It's ridiculous. I'm actually going to be petitioning them to close down my job, and move away from the government contracting business. It's not in line with where the company is heading, and I could be a wicked-ass Key Account Manager, or Product Launch Manager. Both of which they need more than a government proposal writer, and both of which actually have a career path. Q2 is ending right now, so I'll be meeting with my leadership next month to make plans, and put together the annual plan for next year. That'll be my opportunity to pitch a job change or move.
KICKS ASS. I've been watching some highlight videos... like: do you know if this game will be televised? EDIT: also - if you ever come to Colorado to watch your team womp all over Glendale, let me know. We'll host you! and yes... by womp all over I mean 53 to 36... The team can't afford to take Rucky with them, so the fans pooled together yesterday in an epic FB Messenger thread, and bought his airfare, hotel room, and meals, so he can come with us. It's fucking heartwarming. Seriously.
Going to San Diego for the Seattle Seawolves vs San Diego Legion championship game.
Glendale is absolutely on my list of away games to go to next season, so we will hit you up! I also have a LOT of burningman friends in Colorado, as well. So I'll need to plan several days, it seems... And hey... the Raptors will get into it again. They just burned out the clutch the first season, and need to do some work in the off-season to get back in shape again. They'll do it.
yah man... lots of burners in Denver... I wonder if the ones I know, know some of the ones you know... or maybe even know you! six degrees of goobster. You know... I watched a fair amount of rugby in college (had a friend on the team) and have watched a bit since, but now that my kids play - I am loving it again. And watching my kids' team play on the raptors field for the championship game (which they won in overtime and was amazing) just made me want to attend their games. I didn't even realize we had a pro team until this season. Getting amped for next year. And SUPER looking forward to watching the national championship game if I can find it. EDIT: I know you didn't ask... but if you want to watch a few minutes of REALLY exciting rugby... Regulation time expired in a tie. First five minute overtime period ended in a tie. Time is running out fast in the second 5 minute overtime period... then this... hmmm. begin at link didn't work. hit the 1:42:38 mark:
My partner and I have spent the last few days making our apartment 'smarter'. His brother bought him a Google Home mini for his birthday. So now we have smart bulbs. Which just seem absolutely ridiculous to me. I can now ask my phone to flip a switch for me, instead of walking two meters to turn off a lamp. I've been taking a short hiatus from A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara. I was warned before I started that it was going to be heavy (literally and metaphorically), but I decided to take it with me on my last holiday anyway. Don't know what I was thinking. It's incredibly well written. Yanagihara is an amazing author. I think I'm almost ready to pick it up again and finish.
Work I was complaining about the slow moving apprenticeship last pubski. My assistant manager pulled me aside and told me to keep doing what I'm doing and I will be able to move ahead at a faster pace. He said there have been other apprentices who have been moved through the program during the time that the two current ones have worked there. I was told it is an issue with their work ethic which is something I can see (long lunches, showing up late, and talking a lot). I don't think it was entirely professional of him to talk with me about other employees but It was motivating to hear. Personal I've made a plan with my friend to make a few signet rings with his bands logo. I don't plan to charge more than cost but it's gonna be good motivation to create a design and figure out how to make use of a casting house. I have been attempting to refine my morning routine. As of late I've had the habit of waking up early just to lay in bed for 30 minutes looking at my phone. I don't think it's a good start to the day. I read once that Jason Alexander (George Costanza) starts everyday by getting up and splashing water on his face for the sake of having some simple routine. I don't particularly look up to the actor but I've been doing it the past two days and it's good for shaking the grogginess off. Beyond, that I'm just making a point of not checking my phone until the few minutes I have between finishing breakfast and heading to work. That 30 minutes I was wasting before I have been trying to spend stretching and doing a simple work out routine. I was going to post the morning routine entry in a thread here, but I wasn't sure if a 5 year old thread was considered lost in the ether.
I've been trying to fix my mornings. I've been terrible since winter started. I just don't want to get up. Which means I end up trying to cram my morning routine into about 30 minutes and feel rushed and disorganised. Not a great way to start the day. I'm going to try out the water splashing. Thanks!
Three weekends ago I was in Albuquerque for an cousins wedding. It was fun, beautiful ceremony, good party, good people. But the humidity is so low my contacts would dry out halfway through the day and my nose never felt normal. Two weekends ago I went camping in east Texas. A little hiking, a little fishing, caught up with friends I only see a couple times a year. It was fun, but the humidity was so high the dew point was in the seventies and in the mornings the forest would steam for a couple hours until it got hot. Last week it rained sideways and the water pooling in the 3rd floor breezeway dripped into our second floor apartment. It wasn't fun, and there's a little bit of old dish sponge funk coming from the carpet still.
Santa Fe in ten days for ye olde annual plasma consortium
I've been through there dozens of times but I think this is the first time I went to Albuquerque. In my head it's an in-between place.
Yeah but I thought New Mexico managed to push Purgatory up into Colorado. Mainly 'cuz I sprained my ankle there as a kid and crutch-walked myself around the the Anasazi ruins near four corners. I thank my family and my own clumsiness for the opportunity.
My childhood bedroom contains a printed-on-wallboard "map" of all the ski areas in northern New Mexico/southern Colorado as seen orthographically and as presented by Coors. It was probably printed in the '70s. By the mid '80s, when I got it, half of them were gone. Three or four of them I'd never heard of. I'll bet there are even fewer now. Haven't seen that map since 2012 'cuz I enjoy not going home. A Texan injuring himself in the snow around Durango? Story checks out. As to the "Anasazi ruins near Four Corners" that was where, for some reason, I had to spend a lot of Thanksgivings. I suspect it was related to my mother's disinterest in spending time with either her family or my father's. As a result, "eating dead buffet as the only family in the restaurant of the Best Western in Farmington" became one of the principle reasons I reclaimed Thanksgiving for my own.