ode to good shepherd

remember a couple weeks ago how i was all excited that my church was looking at starting a singles ministry? tonight was spaghetti dinner night.

first off, they started with a spaghetti dinner just open ended age-wise to singles (i.e. not married) in the congregation... that was tonight. 8 of us showed although more expressed interest. i was the youngest, and the next person was probably mid-30s. at any rate, looking at the congregation demographic, there's about 75 people who fit into the general singles category and 30 of them are 20s/30s, just i was one of like 2 that showed up tonight.

at any rate, what we decided on for now is to meet once a month with a "social activity" of some sort, with it open to singles of ALL ages. our next get together will be the first week in june -- a dessert potluck and board game night, which should be fun.

my goal in attending is mostly to get to know more people in the congregation than i know from my new member class, altar guild, the one seminar i've attended, and who sit near me on sunday mornings, regardless of age. and sometimes it's just nice to chat with other people, no matter what age, who aren't attached to a spouse or 10 children and can just chat :-P

anyhow, the hope is if we do a monthly social activity for a few months to see what kind of interest there is, then we can decide how other activities (bible studies/servant events/who knows what else?) can best be structured, and once we get a decent estimate of how many people are really interested in showing up, if we want, maybe we can partner with another church in the area to have a joint group to get more people involved in bigger things.

who knows.

at any rate, it just makes me excited to see a group starting up that i feel comfortable with (not that i'm uncomfortable with anyone at church, just like i don't belong in a couples bible study, even if i like the topics they're covering, for example), to get to interact with outside of sunday mornings, and i'm really looking forward to seeing how things further develop. :-)

yay for good shepherd and for growing new ministries :-)

hitchhiking and other such fun

this afternoon was a fun time indeed.

eric and i went to see hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, the movie, which came out today. douglas adams wrote the screenplay himself years ago (obviously though he didn't see the movie production since he's been dead for a bit), and as it says in the intro to the ultimate hitchhikers guide (the book that contains the 5 book hitchhikers trilogy), it was made to contradict with everything else. the movie only covers the first book of the series, and that only loosely since there's new scenes and a character or two waaaay more developed than in the book, and some differences in plot, but overall, hilariously good. i liked the way they ended it. eric's comment was "that was so great! amazing though how some of the acting was so good and some was sooo bad... from the same people even". it was also amusing to see how parts of it were staged. i'm glad i went -- it was entertaining.

after that, eric decided we should go to blimpie to use a discount card he had, only to discover blimpies was inexplicably closed... so we ended up at a diner we'd never been to instead... eric's treat :-) (yay friends)

finally, we picked up jared and went to the rutgers university orchestra concert, which was really good. just got home and now am reading myself to sleep (i'm currently in the 3rd book of rereading the hitchhikers series, and i have an 8am oil change tomorrow so my target is to get up at 7... we'll see how this goes.

at any rate, happy weekend... night y'all!

well, *that*'s new

so, if you know me and have talked to me about my classes in the past two years, you know that my combinatorics professor is exceedingly brilliant and gives wonderful lectures, but impossible homework. i have had him for 3 semesters straight, and do not plan to take his class in the fall for fear that it will be over my head, and because i have other interests... generally i'm a little intimidated by him too, so i generally just leave well enough alone, show up to class every day on time, turn in homework on time, say hi when i see him out of class, and that's it.

today, i ended up coming into the building at the same time as him so we talked the whole way down the hall and through the lobby to the elevator, less tense than my previous dialogues with him have been... that's good, right?

then, halfway through class he commented "it's so hard to figure out exactly what goes in the last lecture of a course", to which we were all like "dude, there's still classes on monday", to which he replied, "but we started as a tuesday/thursday class and changed it... this is my 28th lecture, i refuse to come in on monday,... in 20 minutes, this course is done except for your last homework"...

um, ok... i have no problem with that... it was just a bit of a surprise! :-P

today was just off anyhow, besides rutgersfest, there's the annual math prize exam for undergrads and when we came in for our 9:50 class (described above), all the juniors/seniors had been assigned to take the exam in our classroom, so we had to go on a hunt for another room... adventure indeed...

now, i return to my office, and there's computer people rewiring network cables... to get to my office, i had to jump over three large rings of network cables, under two stepladders, and push my way through a cascade of wires coming down from the ceiling... there's a guy right outside my office door with lots of smaller cables he's cutting or doing something to, and i had to have him move his pile of wires 3 feet down the hall so i could get in the door.

i think i'm going to hide in the graduate lounge; it's obvious 5th floor (where my class was *supposed* to be), and 6th floor (where my office and the network cable fiesta 2005 are) are not good places to be right now :-P

yay weekend?

friday, friday

the good:
forgot to mention, but yesterday, there was a math journal in my math department mailbox... i was surprised because it wasn't one i have a subscription to... yet i opened it up, and it was the volume containing my 3rd published paper... i bought a subscription to the one with my first article on my own, and the 2nd one is in a journal that costs like $100 per issue, so this was the first time the publisher just sent me a copy for free :-) i was pleased

today is the last pizza seminar i'm in charge of... i've enjoyed it, but i'm glad to hand it over to phil next year; he'll do a good job, and it's nice to know i survived just fine and it's done now

friday tradition: my clock radio goes off at 7:50am... at 7:55am every friday the radio station i have it set to (the NYC christian station) plays "i believe statements"... their motto is "star 99.1 is a reflection of you", so in keeping with that, if you call in before 7:30 on friday and leave a 1 sentence statement starting with "i believe", they splice them together and play them all at 7:55 to "kick off the weekend"... it's kinda a cool idea... anyhow, waking up to that every friday makes me smile :-)

oh! and hitchhikers guide, the movie, comes out today! woohoo!

here's not quite as smiley news:

the annoying: today is rutgersfest... even though classes still go on through monday, today, every undergraduate on earth will pour into a field pretty darn close to the math building and have a huge drinking party all day... last year they got in smashmouth or someone huge like that... i don't recognize any of the acts this year.... i just know they're really loud and make my head hurt and making getting myself to and from school really hard... oi... i'm glad people will have fun, i just wish that it wasn't so close to my building when we're still trying to work.

the sad: this has been on the NYC news all week:
Heartbroken mom lets boy slip away... it was originally suspected that this 13 year old boy had a tooth infection that spread to his brain, causing it to swell and killing him... he died yesterday afternoon... the news says it was something else now, but still losing a 13 year old so suddenly has to be unimaginably tough... i've been hearing about this all week long and i'm kinda sad for the family every time i hear it... i guess prayers for them.

and that's your friday-morning-news-that-lara's-aware-of update. have a good one.

apprentice, and other such fun

today was a bizarre day.

i had my morning class, but the french man that eric and i took out to eat on tuesday was an unannounced guest speaker, which was fine.

in my reading class, i had no new results to share, but zeilberger didn't know if the project he gave me to do even had a chance at being successful anyhow, so he wasn't upset. instead he had vince lecture to me about some new research directions to go in from where i am now, so that was fine.

i had my reading class early because my friend sarah had her oral qualifying exam (which i get to do my own of in the fall) and dr. z. was on her committee. since my class was moved up so dr. z. could get to sarah's orals on time, i had an hour to kill and went to eric's to play pool. he beat me the first game because i scratched when hitting in the 8-ball but i beat him fair and square the 2nd game, and went nuts over it :-P i beat him for the first time ever the last time we played, so this was only the 2nd time ever i'd beaten him and i was pretty excited :-)

after i got back to campus, sarah had *just* gotten out of her orals and was waiting on the verdict... 15 minutes of listening to her, we headed into the stairwell, me headed upstairs and her headed downstairs when she ran into her advisor, and i heard diane (her advisor) congratulate her, so from 2 floors up i yelled "woohoo sarah!!!!" and clapped... diane took a minute to figure out who was doing that and was amused :-P

after experimental math seminar, dr. z. assumed i was coming to dinner and invited sarah to come and she agreed... after that she wanted to go get a drink or two to celebrate her passing her test, but it was 8ish and still light out, so none of the bars looked that appealing since happy hour was over and they were all moderately dead... i offered my vanilla vodka, which i still have a *little* of, so sarah and i went by riteaid to get coke to mix it with, and she invited aek, (3rd year student from thailand) to come along... not only did he come, he brought teddy (one of dr. z.'s former students who's generally around on thursdays for seminar and dinner) with him... leigh showed up with ben not much after, and the 6 of us sat down to vodka and cokes and watched apprentice... it was entertaining.

i was sorry to see alex go. tana is fantastic in many ways but when she doesn't preform quite up to par i feel like she's rather plastic, and it irritates me. she doesn't take credit for mistakes and just blames them on others. i was hoping trump would go with george and carolyn's votes and fire her, but no such luck... so long as kendra's still in it, i'm happy :-)

post apprentice was a very strange conversation. aek is an interesting character to start, just in that he has some different perspectives on things that i would never think of, and in that he seems to struggle a lot with american culture and more specifically with american social interaction. this is hard to explain properly, but for example... the post-apprentice conversation was aek asking how to properly give a hug without seeming like he didn't know how to give hugs. as you might imagine, this led to some strange conversation, just based on aek's comments, and based on people demonstrating hugs for aek :-P

anyhow.... that's my math people.... they're lots of fun as always.

only 2 more days of class..... AND hitchiker's guide comes out tomorrow! i can't wait!

night y'all :-P

misc.

i'm tired and irritated with math.

last night 4 different times, i thought i solved, (and then proceeded to unsolve my solution to) one of my combinatorics problems due next week... today i finally got it, but last night i went to sleep really irritated with it.

tonight, similar story. my last reading class of the year with dr. z. is tomorrow, and i have absolutely nothing to show him for it. i've been working for the past 6 hours on stuff for him, but absolutely nothing has proven productive. last week i made up for lack of actually proving stuff by showing him my new web book... this week, i have absolutely nothing to show, and i feel bad about it. :-/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
insert 45 minutes of being on the phone with eric
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

eric says that i have no reason to feel bad about my lack of finding solutions and life goes on and that gives me something to work on over the summer too... research... oh joy :-P

in other news, mohamud, the oldest student working for my advisor, had his thesis defense today. i'd never been to a defense, but i figured an "academic big brother" was a good one to start with. other than the jury of professors there were vince, eric, and me (3 of the other 4 of us working for dr. z.), and then a handful of students who came in the same year as mohamud. basically, he talked for an hour about the content of his research, followed by questions from the general audience, followed by all of us except the jury getting kicked out so that they could talk to him. 15 minutes later, the verdict was that he passed. so now there's only 4 of us and mohamud is officially dr. mohammed (yes, both his first and last names are mohamud, spelled differently :-P). i was excited for him. :-)

here's my last random news of the day before i crash... new pictures posted at the usual spot enjoy!

some of my favorites:

random block near my house


dogwoods :-)


john nash and me

(nash didn't pay much attention to who had what cameras when, but besides being me with a famous person, i think it's also a really good picture of me :-P (no bragging intended :-P))

now, to sleep, and hopefully to have a better math day tomorrow...

night y'all!

oh joy

gotta love my advisor. last thursday, he told both me and eric that he has a friend coming in from france today and he'll be unable to take this friend to dinner. instead he asked if eric and i would, and we agreed. then, he made the following arrangement and informed us of it via CCing us on the email to his friend:

Dear Bernard,
Looking forward to your visit and talk. If it is OK with you, my students Lara P------ and Eric R------ will take you out for dinner tomorrow. Lara will meet you earlier, to chat about math, at 5:30pm, at the Rutgers Univ. Inn lobby. Then at 6:15pm, Eric (who has a class until then), will come and you three will decide on a restaurant of your choice.
Best wishes
Doron

(last names dashed out purposely by me :-P)

not that i mind... it should be cool and it's free dinner (dr. z. will reimburse us)... and the guy should be interesting to talk to -- he has his own "math company" in france (see here: http://perso.wanadoo.fr/scmsa/), so just asking him about what he does should be interesting and keep us talking for a bit. i'm not quite sure why he (dr. z.) set things up this way, but eric and me discussing the location of the university inn, the places we'd thought of for dinner so far, and rush hour traffic just decided i'd chat for 20-25 minutes until eric gets out of class at 5:50 and then i'll drive dr. z's friend to the restaurant we pick and meet eric there.

we'll see how this goes.

yay for budapest friends :-)

remember this post from yesterday?... it's about how i plan to go to hungary in august and now have set tentative travel dates... i emailed 9 of my closest (hungarian/expats living in hungary) friends yesterday to tell them i hoped to be seeing them in august... so far i'm 2.5 for 4:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
from the american guy (who married to a hungarian girl and now lives/works in budapest) who co-led the international Bible study I attended while there:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hello Lara,

It's good to hear from you. Thanh here. I'm glad to hear that
you will have something productive to do this summer to keep you out of
trouble...Congrats! Unfortunately Melinda and I, if all goes well, will
head back to the US from early August to early September so we will miss you
while you're in BP....bummer. It would have been good to get to catch up
with you again. At any rate I think many of the other people will be here
like shalom, henk, etc...
Have a good time then...and thanks for keeping in touch.
Thanh

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
from my hungarian friend rita -- psychology grad student while i was there, now psychology graduate looking for a job anywhere in europe she can find one
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lara,

I'm waiting for U!!!! I don't know if I will in Budapest in August or not,
but happy to hear that You come to Europe :))))!!!

Hugs, rita

p.s. I've finished my studies and looking for job in Hungary and abroad.

p.s.2. I hope you like this mandala..
[lara's note: she attached a cool graphic file she made herself]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
from my friend zsofi, who is about my brother's age and was one of my best friends while i was around
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
yuppeeeeee yupppeeeeeeeeee yuppppeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

;-DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
[lara's note: *that* cracked me up :-P]


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
from bernadett, who is 10 years older than me, almost to the day, but was my "prayer partner" through my church in budapest while i was there... so we met at least once a month to chat over dinner and hang out... we got to be pretty close and have been fantastic pen pals since then
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[lara's note: this email came in HUGE blue font, in bold face... can you hear the excitement in it? :-)]

HI DEAR LARA!

I AM SO HAPPY FOR THE NEWS YOU HAVE JUST SENT ME!

OF COURSE I AM LOOKING FORWARD TO MEETING YOU AGAIN ¢¾ !

I AM GOING TO TAKE SOME DAYS OFF AND SPEND SOME TIME WITH YOU. I CAN ALSO COOK SOME HUNGARIAN FOOD FOR YOU! AH, SO NICE TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR VISIT!

LET ME GIVE MY MOBILE PHONE NR: [deleted from mass publication ;-P]

MY BIG NEWS FOR YOU IS THAT OUR SECOND BABY IS COMING AND I AM EXPECTING HIM/HER BY THE MIDDLE OF SEPTEMBER - SO YOU GONNA SEE ME WITH A BIG TUMMY.

WHAT CAN I DO FOR YOU?

GREETINGS, BERNADETT
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

you can't tell that my hungarian friends love me as much as i love them, can you? ;-) i sooooooooooo can't wait to see them all again.

yay.

now to get on with my work for the day :-P

what a night....

oi...

re: the previous post, ben and i were both convinced that scott was really really mad at me earlier, and over something silly.... it didn't seem characteristic, but from the death look i got from him in passing at one point today, i wasn't quite sure what was up... so before i left the office for the day, he was still in class, so i left him a note (and folded it up all funny like in junior high or something :-P) and left it on his desk... on IM a few hours ago i got this response:

scott: yes, i did see your note :-)
scott: no, i'm not mad at you, and of course i don'e hate you, even if that's what you've been telling everyone
scott: i'm just busy and stressed out, that's all. we can talk more later
scott: your note definitely made me smile!

so all's well that ends well... honestly for awhile though i wasn't quite sure how i had managed to offend him so badly, but i'm glad his outward reaction was way more extreme than apparently his inward one was :-P

moving right along... eric is getting increasingly talented at starting long discussions late at night. tonight he emailed me a link about islam's beliefs about who jesus is. eric thought that i should completely freak out that there's a rather huge group of people who profess the islamic faith and thus claim that jesus was not crucified. eric's comment was: "if it's really true and historically documented like you claim, shouldn't someone who believes in islam have caught on by now and there be tons of muslims who argue that jesus was in fact crucified, even if they have different beliefs from you on who he was?" we went back and forth on this for over an hour.

regardless of my arguments, his blanket response is generally "i just find it kind of suspicious that 'western facts' seem to back up your faith... you should find it just a little too convenient too"

the thing is
(1) if i didn't think christianity was the best fit belief system to what i've seen and believe to be true about the universe, i wouldn't be a christian -- it's to be expected that the arguments i present are pro-christian when it comes down to a question of "either this happened or it didn't, no gray", and that's not being catty, grandiose, or thinking i'm better than other people. it's to say that i believe certain things to be true and christianity best models that set of truths, and thus i am a christian,... not the other way around
(2) that is to say... i evaluate what i think to be true and what i don't think to be true and THEN adopt my beliefs and theories about theology and about the universe at large to fit what i've seen to be true; i don't adopt a philosophy and then just choose to believe only the points that support it
(3) like it's good to be reminded (see yesterday's post: here), it's not just me intuiting my faith. it's a gift worked in me through God, not anything i do, earn, or study into myself. sometimes i wish it were that simple and that i could cut and dry be like "so look, this is why the evidence seems to stack up this way, think about it and you'll see and believe too", on days when i'm tired, that would take so much less energy :-P, but the truth is it's not that simple at all.

as always, i just have to remind myself to be as open to discussion (both with being willing to explain myself AND with actually listening to who i'm talking to) and keep on working doing just that.

5 more days of the semester... woo hoo... i'm going to sleep.

my secret talent is....

making math department friends angrier at me than anyone else around here has ever seen them be.

i need a new talent.

exciting plans are afoot!

here's an email i've been waiting for waaaaay too long to send; however, i just got an email from my summer job asking what airport i want to fly back from europe from and when, so my plan of visiting budapest this summer really *WILL* work out!

here's what i just wrote to 9 of the coolest hungarians/expats living in hungary i know :-P

Date: Mon, 25 Apr 2005 10:28:36 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Lara"
Subject: visiting budapest!
To: -------


hello friends!

as you may or may not know, i have a summer job i'm very excited about this year. i'm helping coordinate a math research program for undergraduate students both from the states and from czech republic. the program runs for 6 weeks at my university in new jersey, and for 3 weeks in prague (july 23-august 10).

along with my summer job comes a free trip to prague. i figured if i get a free flight to and from europe, i should make good use of it to see friends while i'm much closer than i usually am. :-) after i finish working in prague, i'm planning to spend a little over
a week in budapest before heading back to the states for a new semester of school.

tentatively i'll get into budapest thursday, august 11, and leave again on monday, august 22. just wanted to give you all a heads up so that hopefully i can catch up with each of you at some point! i can't wait! :-)

hope all is well with all of you!

lara
=)

yay for being useful

me: do you remember how my last glass assignment went?

Auto response from steve: fact 1: i've already sort of given myself one extension on this assignment
fact 2: no class tomorrow
fact 3: it's an assignment for prof. glass
fact 4: i don't care about disk architecture
fact 5: did i mention it's an assignment for glass?
fact 6: i can't not get an A
why should i do this assignment again? ok, good point, i'll put it off for another day

me: my advice is don't do it...
me: tammy and i were a "group" for our last assignment for his class my senior year... we spent like 30 hours on what he thought was very simple ALL freaking week the last week of classes... very little sleep... lots of singing billy joel's allentown in the sun computer lab late at night... finished the darn thing
me: during finals week the power was out in gellersen so no one else in the class did it
me: we all got As anyhow
me: it's not worth it
steve: mine is for 246...it's like 5 problems out of the book
steve returned at 12:08:29 AM.
steve: i just have no motivation to do it
me: still, don't do it :-P
me: i have no motivation either
steve: and even if i do it, glass won't get around to grading it by the end of the semester anyways
me: i have 6 days til end of the semester and i can't motivate myself to do my last assignment for each class
me: i've been mixing new CDs for myself :-P
steve: that's fun too :-)
me: this one has two hungarian songs in it :-)
steve: oh man
steve: that's awesome
steve: can you send them to me?
steve: i have movies
steve: and one cd
steve: but there was this one hungarian pop song that they played a lot while i was there
steve: but i could never decipher enough words to figure out what it was called or who sang it
me: ah, that's what i had hungarian friends for :-)
steve: and it was usually just on the radio, so there weren't hungarians around who i could ask about it
steve: and i'd never think of it when i was around the hungarians
me: lol
me: well my songs outdate yours by a little
steve: what kind of hungarian music do you have?
me: (cd name/group) : (hajnal/groovehouse) (uttalan utakon/unique) (the best of communism/various) (a hegedu hercegnoi/princess)
me: first two are kinda techno/electronic
me: last one is an electronic violin trio that bastardizes famous hungarian classical pieces
me: it makes music majors cry
me: and thus i find it highly entertaining
steve: do you have them ripped on your computer?
me: yeah, they're all on my machine
steve: might you be able to IM me a few choice selections?
me: i guess
steve: i could mail you a party in a box
me: i was getting ready to sleep :-P
me: but i can send you maybe 3 for now
me: more later if you want


................
steve: i would attempt to recreate the song i know for you, but well, i'm bad enough at guessing words to songs in my own language, so who knows what i'd come up with in hungarian :-P
me: it could be entertaining
me: i bet zsofi would be able to figure it out :-P

.................
me: this one was also big on radio while i was there
steve: oh man, i can even understand some of the words in this one
steve: i heard this one while i was there a few times
steve: i've been having a very i miss budapest weekend
steve: this makes me smile a lot
me: good :-)
steve: thanks lara, you're the coolest :-D

..................
steve: i'm not going to get any work done tonight because i'm going to try to translate this whole song

..................
me: would you like "lenin-song", a bunch of communist hungarian children singing how they love comrad rakosi, or "the party, the people, our one way" (my hungarian teacher taught us that instead of the little sheep song we were supposed to learn one day in the crash language course :-P)
steve: does it sound anything like the little sheep song?
me: nope
me: it was because he hated the sheep song
steve: ok...let's go lenin then
steve: we had a parody of the sheep song in our skit at the end

....................
me: glad to have been helpful :-)
steve: very much so
me: enjoy the tunes :-P
steve: i will, have a good night, thanks again
me: if you really do want to send me a party in a box, i don't mind ;-)
steve: email me your mailing address
me: ok, night steve klee
steve: this hajnal song is pretty sad
me: yeah well
me: it sounds decievingly upbeat
steve: i know
me: it's a hungarian song ;-)
steve: i like it :-)
me: awesome
me: that song's why i bought that CD :-P
steve: kosz, jo ejszakat
me: szep almokat

..................................
i miss budapest too... hopefully going back in august :-)

now really, night y'all :-P

let the countdown begin

oi... just 6 more days of classes... that's 3 more combo lectures (1 more assignment), 3 more combinatorial commutative algebra lectures (assignments are somewhat optional, but i'll probably work some next weekend with sarah after she finishes her orals on thursday), 1 more algorithmic discrete math lecture and 2 more computer labs for it, and 1 more reading class meeting with dr. z., plus a meeting with dr. butler to discuss my videotapoing from last week, and then i'm home free.

one could argue that being this close to done and knowing when i finish the current assignment for each class i'm *done* with that class, i'd be all gung ho to get my work done and move on with life... apparently that's not the case... contrary to working yesterday, today i managed to do an awful lot of non-math.

after church and lunch, i went to riteaid and stop and shop and then cleaned the bathroom really good, did laundry and some other random things around the house, then watched a movie and worked on my cross-stitch for awhile (so close to done after 2 years of work... i expect to finish it in the next month or so)

recent discovery? smirnoff twisted watermelon... it's tasty... i need the 6 pack i bought today to last me for a loooooooooooooooooooooooooong time though... i should mostly be drinking water for the sake of my insides :-P

other accomplishments? when my friend nina's away message said
"cleaning, or at least pretending to clean, but I've already spent almost 4 hours talking on the phone when I should be cleaning...so if you want to be next in line and help me out let me know...;-)", it was all too tempting to IM her with "oooh! call me! call me!" and she immediately did and we chatted for an hour (we hadn't talked since i saw her last month in charleston on spring break), so that was quality.

other big accomplishment of the day is making yet another CD... the previous one's been running non-stop in my car for over a week straight now, so i put on a bunch of other songs that didn't make the previous one but that i love just as much... i'm not quite sure what to call this new mix... it's a different personality entirely from either of the previous two CDs (which both had clear descriptions)... different parts of this one have completely different personalities from each other even... here's the current playlist (subject to minor revision/rearragement before i actually burn it:
1. On My Way (Phil Collins) -- from brother bear
2. When the Rain Comes (Third Day)
3. Free (Ginny Owens)
4. He Mele No Lilo (Kamehameha Children's Choir) -- from lilo and stitch
5. Hajnal (GrooveHouse) -- hungarian song; top of the charts most of the time i was in budapest 2.5 years ago
6. Two Sets of Jones' (Big Tent Revival)
7. Truth No. 2 (Dixie Chicks)
8. Born to Fly (Sara Evans)
9. zero measure set (Ben Bunting) -- warning: if you write me a catchy tune and leave it on my voicemail, there's an off chance i'll figure out how to transfer it to an mp3 on my computer, and then you, too, could inadvertently be a track on one of my CDs ;-)
10. csillagtenger (unique) -- another hungarian tune :-P
11. All American Girl (Train)
12. Memory [Dead Winter Dead Intro] (Savatage)
13. Not What You See (Savatage)
14. I Thank You Child (Zakk Wylde)
15. The Downeaster "Alexa" (Billy Joel)
16. Sikulandile (Soweto Gospel Choir)
17. Hallelujah, Salvation, and Glory (Urbana 2000 Worship Team)
18. Side by Side [Youtherial Mix] (Rebecca St. James)
19. What Trouble Are Giants [Live] (Rich Mullins)
20. Love's Been Following You (Twila Paris)
21. Wonderful, Merciful, Savior (Selah)
22. When All Is Said and Done (Geoff Moore)

what does that say about my mood? :-P

in conclusion, lime jello is one of the most wonderful things on the planet.

i'm going to sleep :-P

sometimes it's good to be reminded...

today's church bulletin...
(click on a page and it'll open in a new window where you can actually *read* it :-P)






for some reason the lines highlighted were especially needed for me to hear today... they're things i "know", but "forget" from time to time. i'm so good at getting into long detailed discussions about various and sundry things that when a discussion with a friend who doesn't believe in God calls on me to explain what i believe and why i think it makes sense, there's a temptation to think "oh this is my chance to try to convince (fill in name, there are several) that Christianity isn't just a delusional/whatever world view", even though i know that's not what my job is. i think my goal should be to always be ready and willing to explain what i do believe and in a helpful manner for whoever i'm talking to, but it's not *me* who's going to convince my friends that God makes sense, that's all God's doing. really, none of my faith is my doing, and i'm thankful for all of it. even if i "know" that all already, it's still good and needful to be reminded explicitly from time to time too.

anyhow, yay for timing :-P

stupid kids... :-P

this has happened once before, but i was still surprised when it happened again.

late last night i got an email to the effect of "dear parent, your child has signed up to be a member of (insert name/webaddress of site). our site is completely G-rated and is a forum for girls to discuss fashion and read about the adventures of (insert random character name) and her friends. by joining this site, your child will recieve periodic newsletters from (insert character name), and we will peridicially update you about site news as well. as a parent, we know that you are concerned about your child's safety on the internet. for this reason, if at any time you would like to cancel your child's membership or view her profile information, do not hesitate to contact us at (insert email address). (etc., etc.)"

i figure, if a girl is going to lie and plug my email address in instead of her parents, she's not mature enough to have a website membership. plus it's not like i want update newsletters from the site.

anyhow, both times i've deleted the kid's account, whoever it was. maybe twice is enough times to get a hint? you don't forge "parent info", especially if it's cost you website memberships before.... oi.

ai yai yai

it's gonna be a long week

i worked hard today but to not much avail. after doing some stuff around the house, i ran a couple errands and then picked up ben from campus on my way home... we each worked on our own homework for several hours before i was ready to give up in frustration and he was ready for a break... then ihop for dinner (hadn't done *that* in forever, and then to the mall... since the first ihop we meant to go to had mysteriously been demolished since the last time we were there, we ended up taking longer to get TO dinner than intended, and thus ended up seeing a movie an hour later than intended... with 45 minutes to kill, we spent the time wandering around barnes and noble for fun... i found a fantastic mother's day gift... it's a large book for my mom to write her stories of her own growing up and about our family growing up... she gave a similar book to her mother several years ago but grandma never got to write too much of it before her stroke; nonetheless knowing she bought such a book for her mom, i know she'll appreciate the sentiment and i think she'll enjoy filling it out.

speaking of g-ma -- aunt priscilla called.. the doctor officially says g-ma's intestines are officially infection free, and they could take her off the antibiotics for that; however in the healing process she's somehow contracted pneumonia... not serious enough to take her to the hospital, but enough that she's on a different regimen of antibiotics for a bit... aunt pris said that g-ma was pretty upbeat and cheery today when she visited so that's good.

anyhow, post-bookstore, ben and i saw "a lot like love" -- new ashton kutcher, amanda peet movie that's kinda "when harry met sally"-esque. it was cute and we both enjoyed it even if it's not like "best movie i ever saw" material. so that was a quality way to end a not the most profitable ever kind of day.

on the way home, we talked a lot about ben's qual... well mostly ben talked about it and i responded periodically. he failed in february so he has one more shot. while one of his qual committee members is dr. greenfield (the prof who taught me, colleen, leigh, and eric all analysis all last fall to help us pass our writtens, just because he's that nice and helpful) and he's being really helpful, two of ben's four other members aren't the most helpful, and he's worried that they'll tell him to go ahead and get it over with again and then still not pass him... one of these people is his advisor... commented ben "i never said i had a GOOD advisor, i just said i had one"... i guess i'm super fortunate to have dr. z.

anyhow, ben's hoping to re-take in june, and it's basically do or die... if you don't pass the 2nd time, then you're out of here, which for ben is back to california (where ALL his family is) to get a "real job". i really really really want to see ben pass; not just for the "ben's one of my best friends around here" reason, but even more i've seen all the TONS of hours he's put into studying for this thing, and i want to see it pay off tangibly for him... only time will tell i guess.

in other news, both ben and scott have been chatting lately that they think it would be a fantastic idea for the two of them to get me to go out clubbing with them some night. anyone who knows me well knows my general policy of "lara doesn't dance", but eric's claim that i was dancing when it wasn't my turn while we were playing pool (and had one of my CDs on) earlier in the week gave them hope"... yes i occasionally move my feet to songs i like when in a good mood, but i don't classify it as dancing and generally don't do that in the presence of others who can see me, so i still argue that i don't dance :-P... ben commented that if it weren't for the fact that he knows i could work myself into a panic attack on the way to a club if i were really being dragged against my will, he'd MAKE me do it; but knowing there's a chance of extreme duress on my part he's just going to pick on me until he convinces me it's a good idea :-P boys...

at any rate, even if they suggest preposterous ideas from time to time, yay for friends... :-P

i should be asleep... night y'all.

dreams

i have some strange ones from time to time, and last night was such a night...

i dreamed i had made a new friend and was showing them around... however, i went down to the basement of my house at one point to get my clothes out of the dryer (i did do laundry yesterday), and the washer and dryer were gone -- apparently my landlord had decided to give the dirty cement floor down there a tile flooring instead... he had put up desks and stuff to which blocked views of the furnaces and stuff like that... it looked like a small business office instead... it looked nice, but i wanted to know where my clothes had gone.

later in the dream, me, this friend, and my parents went out to dinner at some middle of nowhere restaurant that was really fancy... there was a whole entertainment program going on throughout... part of it was a huge show outside the windows of the place with native americans and buffalos and other wildlife... it was mighty impressive... i think this part of my dream was inspired by the fact that last night i ended up at the rutgers wind ensemble concert and the last half was a series of 4 movements by Ezra Ewazen (apparently a very famous composer for brass pieces).. Ewazen was even there to talk for a bit about the piece before it was played and the American Brass Quintet played with the wind ensemble for it... it was AMAZING... anyhow, these four movements were based on a series of four photos by a famous American photographer taken 100 years ago of various aspects of native american life. Ewazen talked a lot about the traditions that were trying to be brought to life with his piece (Shadowcatcher), and I guess maybe that's what in my head sparked a dinner show of indians and buffalos... go figure.

in conclusion, my head is a weird place and you should all be grateful that you don't live in it :-P

oi

said a friend to me today "yeah, i guess after i've known someone for awhile, subconsciously i start trying to change them to make them more like me. i know it's bad and not helpful and not even logical, but i have noticed it before. i guess i'm to that point with you; i know you well so my head thinks i should try to change the parts of you i don't understand.... i'm not saying that's good for me to do or that it's helpful, but it is a pattern i haven't managed to stop yet"

said me in response, "yeah, see, i've gotten enough of that all my life, and you saw my response yesterday -- you yell at me for a reason that makes no sense and that i don't deserve and i shut down and put up a temporarily wall until things are talked out over tea... if your subconscious is going to keep lashing out and trying to change me, you better get prepared for a LOT of chats like this over tea"

the end. (and all better for now) :-P

no more explanation to give... night y'all!

p.s. i pre-ordered scrubs, season one on DVD today... as scrubs is my favorite show EVER and i started watching halfway through season two, when season one comes out next month, i'm going to have a complete BLAST with it... i can't wait!

dinner with john nash! :-)

so today's experimental math seminar was packed... normally there's maybe a dozen people in a room that holds like 50 desks? (maybe poor estimating), and showing up 30 seconds early is plenty of time... the talk was not advertised other than on the general math department seminar calendar, yet when i came 15 minutes early, the room was already 2/3 full with non-math people i'd never even seen before!

nash was a very clear speaker, but a very different style from many people i've heard. while in some sense he talked the most in generalities about models and the big idea of what he's studying lately, in another sense he worried a lot about explaining variable names in his mathematica code for example. if you're familiar at all with nash equilibria (loosly finding a point where every person involved in a bargaining game can't have a better lot if they change their strategy and everyone else keeps their current strategy).. he talked about the same kind of cooperative games only where players can elect another player to be an "agent" for them and form coalitions together. it was a good talk.

after the talk, there was the usual dinner with the speaker deal at an indian restaurant. normally there's 8-10 of us, which includes my advisor, me, a few of dr. z.'s other students, past and present, and a few profs from the department. as it turned out i ended up sitting right next to john nash himself! his son johnny was also present, but johnny was kind of in his own world for the evening working on some stuff in a notebook further down the table. john nash though, talked to me a bit about last names, because he had never heard of mine before and wanted to compare ancestries. when he heard me reply to a comment about budapest and gathered i was there for a semester, he compared notes with me about various eastern european foreign languages (as if i'm an expert)... he also commented to vince (who was sitting across from me) when vince asked if he's frequently recognized and made to be in pictures and give autographs, "well, right after the movie, i was pretty popular, but i think the older i get the more incognito i get... actually, i kinda like being incognito". that made me laugh. :-)

so yeah, not only did i hear john nash lecture and get to eat dinner with him, but by random chance of the 20+ish people at dinner tonight me and my advisor were the two who got to sit immediately next to him. it was a quality evening.

i took pictures, but i brought my regular camera, not my digital, so i'll post them when i finish the roll.

later dudes :-P

apprentice, week 13

farewell bren

that's so not how i wanted this episode to end. tana, craig, and kendra's product was so much better, but i soooooooooo wanted tana or craig gone this week after what they pulled last week. craig, regardless of other talents, is a poor communicator in my opinion, and i don't see him winning. tana's a good businessperson and very versatile, but i was just super annoyed with her just checking out on the previous task and then taking kendra's credit -- that was just plain STUPID of her.

i was sad to see bren go this week... he's the memphian on board this season so the hometown connection had me rooting for him all along. i'd been impressed early on with his people skills, and how good he was at resolving conflict, but his creativity has gone down the drain as the season's progressed. alex hasn't been that outstanding, but like bren said in the cab after he was fired, he (bren) doesn't have the same drive that alex does at this point... he came to new york wanting to have the trump job, but the longer he's been in new york, the more he's learned that what he needs and really wants is right under his nose back home in memphis. for a farewell, it was a good one.

now, i still want kendra to win, not sure who i hope should be up against her in the final. we'll see if i get what i want.

new post on dinner with john nash in a minute :-P

fun with graphics

*this* i think is one of the better pictures i've had of myself in awhile -- ta da :-P



and here are my top 4 "artistic renderings" of the above photo just from playing for 15 minutes with my graphics editor :-P

happy thursday?

i was moderately productive last night... check this out: new web book -- too bad my productivity mostly was organizing and presenting math i've already figured out rather than solving new stuff, but it's still something to show dr. z. today....

despite my lack of finishing stuff i'm supposed to have read and my lack of proving things i should have by now at least tried harder to prove, he'll probably be a little distracted today anyhow... today's the day that john nash is coming to speak at experimental math seminar :-)

if the name nash rings a bell, but you can't quite place it, remember a beautiful mind? he's the mathematician that that movie was about. his work made a notable difference in economics and since the movie he's been a celebrity with tons of books about him out, and whatever else have you. he also won the nobel prize back in the mid-90s, so he's widely recognized that way too.

because i have nothing better to type about him coming just yet, here's his autobiography on the nobel prize website: click here; and here's the mouth-ful of a title for the talk i get to hear today:

Speaker: John Nash, Princeton University
Title: The 'Agencies Method' for Studying Cooperative Games and the Resulting Mathematical Problem of Finding Equilibria in a Highly Multi-Dimensional Context
Time/place: Thursday, 4/21/2005 4:30pm in Hill 705

dr. z. also invited me to dinner with the speaker after, so i'm sure i'll have more to say tonight. :-)

later dudes :-P

mock lecturing

it's done!

unfortunately i totally screwed up... even after looking over ALL the problems i could have possibly been asked, i screwed one up and even the impartial dude managing the videotape pointed it out to me. i told lies about math and the non-math student even pointed out i was wrong.... ooops.

i feel silly.

but at least it's done.

i am so going to suck as a teacher.... oops.

go dad!

on the phone just now:

dad: did mom tell you i won the garden club of america award?
me: nope... what does that mean?
dad: it means i had to go to dinner at some fancy country club and wear a tuxedo a couple weeks ago
me: oh really -- i haven't seen you in a tux besides your wedding pictures... how does that work
dad: i look like a blond penguin, that's how it works... it makes me feel old

click here to see my dad, with his award, but not in a tux :-P

oh joy

crazy week

i'm making decent progress on stuff for my reading class today, but that's interspersed with something else...

tomorrow morning i get videotaped while i teach a mock lecture to 3 other math grad students... it's the final step in our TA training program. lecturing for 20 minutes or so on camera, discussing how it went with the TA training instructor, and then i'm officially certified to teach in the fall... oi.

the section i have to lecture on is applications of derivatives (the calc problems that are like "so say farmer brown wants to make 3 pens shaped like in the diagram below and he only has 80 feet of fence -- what's the maximum area he can enclose?")

it's really not a big deal, but i went through this afternoon and worked the 15 problems i could possibly have to present to make sure there weren't any nasty numbers that required a calculator... it should all be fine, i just will be glad when it's over with.

tomorrow 3 other grad students who will ask ridiculous questions, in a few months a room full of undergrads... oh joy oh joy :-P

in the meantime, lots of math, and counting down til my mock lecture is done :-P

later dudes

yuck

for the record buchberger's algorithm is officially my nemesis... buchberger is the algorithm that finds a grobner basis for a polynomial ideal. i'm sitting here in algorithmic math class and we're trying to program the algorithm together in maple, and i already spent 8 hours trying to do it yesterday and couldn't manage to make it work... now, even though i'm the only person who's seen it in another class before, i'm the one person who can't seem to answer anything right.

i can't answer questions about it, i can't program it, i can't seem to do anything about it right no matter how many times i see it.

i officially hate buchberger's algorithm... stupid polynomial reductions...

end of rant.

more quizzes :-P

You Are 40% Normal (Somewhat Normal)

While some of your behavior is quite normal... Other things you do are downright strange You've got a little of your freak going on But you mostly keep your weirdness to yourself

How Normal Are You?

You Will Die at Age 76

76 You're pretty average when it comes to how you live... And how you'll die as well.

What Age Will You Die?

Lara Kristin Pudwell's Aliases

Your movie star name: Orange David

Your fashion designer name is Lara Budapest

Your socialite name is La New York

Your fly girl / guy name is L Pud

Your detective name is Llama White Station

Your barfly name is Grits Margarita

Your soap opera name is Kristin Elmore

Your rock star name is Mints Car

Your star wars name is Larnes Puddan

Your punk rock band name is The Happy Pizza

The Amazing Meganame Generator

You Are Best Described By...

The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh

What Famous Work of Art Are You?

You Are A Good Friend

You're always willing to listen Or lend a shoulder to cry on You're there through thick and thin Many people consider you their "best friend"!

What Kind of Friend Are You?

You Are Incredibly Logical

(You got 100% of the questions right) Move over Spock - you're the new master of logic You think rationally, clearly, and quickly. A seasoned problem solver, your mind is like a computer!

How Logical Are You?

i've always said i've got a mutt accent ;-)

i understand the dixie (grew up in memphis), i guess the yankee is the valpo/jersey years? (then why'd i get 0% midwestern?), but where the heck is the "upper midwestern" from (ah yes, i live with a minnesotan now ;-)... j/k i don't think colleen's speech patterns have affected mine, but i have no better theory :-P)?

Your Linguistic Profile:

50% General American English

25% Dixie

15% Yankee

10% Upper Midwestern

0% Midwestern

What Kind of American English Do You Speak?

it's a BEAUTIFUL day!!!!

so despite not falling asleep until after 4am and waking up at 7:45am, i am having a FANTASTIC morning :-)

first off, it's sunny and like 70F outside. this means during my 25 minute drive to church, i could make excellent use of my sunroof :-) i was the lone car with TN plates speeding down jersey state route 18 this morning, all windows open and BLASTING kirk franklin tunes... it was FANTASTIC :-P

second off, at church from time to time they take surveys of what people would like to see going on through the church that either they aren't aware or that actually isn't going on at the church... the couple times i've filled out such surveys i've commented that a like 18-35 singles group would be a good thing... apparently several other people have been remarking that every time too, but no one's ever stepped up and said they have the time to start spearheading something like that (like me for example, i'd definitely want to be involved, but i'm a ph.d. student 20 miles away.... i don't have time to RUN such an endeavor)

anyhow, don (our coordinator of lay ministry -- he lives in the church office and it's his job to know EVERYTHING that's going on so he can help get people plugged into things they'd enjoy being a part of) finally decided he wasn't waiting anymore for someone to step up and instead organized a spaghetti dinner for two weeks from yesterday for people to show up and discuss what they'd like to see done. that's *just* before the end of the semester, so i can actually make it... i signed up for the dinner and i'm very excited and hopeful that something good comes out of it. i have plenty of friends at church from altar guild, new member class when i joined, spiritual gifts seminar, and just from the service i attend, but by and large they're junior high, my parents age, or my grandparents age. i know there EXIST other singles in the church, but i don't KNOW them. while it's fantastic to have a church FAMILY with friends of all ages, i'm happy to see gears turning to potentially help me find other people in more similar parts of life to me :-P

they're also hoping to have a call list put together by sometime in may -- this is exciting too :-) pastor v. (interim pastor) though did a really good sermon today... it's good shepherd sunday in the church calendar (ironically i attend lutheran church of the good shepherd :-P)... he talked about how people have names, churches have names, lots of things have names that each set us apart and tell the world something about who are are supposed to be, yet with all the diversity and how many billions of people there are in the world, Jesus knows us all BY NAME.... he calls us, walks with us, and talks with us knowing us each and every one BY NAME. pastor v. is nice enough, but he doesn't always have just one thesis statement when he preaches so he isn't always the easiest to follow. when he does manage to stick to just one main topic though, he does a beautiful job.

otherwise, lots of math to do today, most of which involves the computer, but that doesn't mean i can't continue to enjoy the day... i'm BLASTING music throughout the house and have all the windows open around here. just because i have to stay inside doesn't mean i can't enjoy the weather ;-P

later dudes :-)

happy day to all of YOU!

2 freakin 15 am :-P

oh joy oh joy -- i haven't had this issue in awhile.... you probably haven't heard me talk about starbucks in a long time even though for years lara and starbucks have been synonymous... that's because since christmas amongst other things i've made a concerted effort to eliminate caffeine from my drinks... i went from coffee to tea (if you pick right you only get 60% of the caffeine in a mug of tea as you do in a mug of coffee), then to decaf tea, and then to water. being as i mostly drink water, and occasionally decaf tea anymore, and that's about it, there's no caffeine keeping me up late at night... until now...

ben's cousin michelle (aka misha) is considering grad school in NYC and stayed in town long enough to hang out with ben this weekend... ben and i were chatting this afternoon and he invited me to dinner with them... but first misha was dying for some coffee and really wanted starbucks as a prelude to dinner... so around 8pm going based on taste, i got a granda valenia white mocha (this includes 2 shots of espresso)... the halflife of caffeine is 6 hours, so that means here at 2am i've still got half a grand white mocha in my system, and being as i haven't had this much caffeine at once in MONTHS, i can't just make myself go to sleep... ooops....shoulda considered this 6 hours ago :-P

that's probably not the only reason i've been up... i've been thinking a lot lately about random stuff (well i'm generally always thinking about random stuff... can't help it)...

here's a sampling...
*eric's had some really random but good questions lately.... he ate dinner with me on wednesday night and commented that he finds it disturbing that for two people who are both decently well-read and think a lot about things that we have such fundamentally different views of the universe, at least on the theology side of things. he comments a lot about "well, say we both had grown up on pluto, no parents influencing us on what to think or how to think when we're little, no society messing with our heads, then i think we would naturally come to similar viewpoints on the world... even if there's differences i think our beliefs would be more convergent than they are now..."...
he wants to discuss a lot about what concepts are "natural", like although he doesn't believe in God, he can see how someone can say that things existing might be reason to believe in a "creator"... then again he comments, knowing enough science, he knows about how "rule 30" is exceedingly complex even though it follows from 8 simple binary operations, so he can see complexity arrising from different specified very simple laws, and doesn't necessarily see the complexity of the world as evidence for something all powerful and bigger tos start it. (see here about rule 30, or ask me if you're curious what the heck it meants)
on the other hand, eric doesn't think morality or the concept of a messiah are very natural. he argues that morality/conscience comes from thinking "well i wouldn't want someone to do this to *me*, so maybe other people don't want me to do it to them", but it's a human construct, and not very well-defined or formalized, since this definition can vary from person to person and so if it can't be axiomatized then it must not be very real.
i think it's natural to say "people murdering other people/stealing from other people/etc. is wrong; there's something fundamentally screwed up about the way people interact in the world", eric thinks that's just how it is, and maybe it doesn't need fixing because maybe that's just the most natural way to survive, by looking out for yourself.
mostly i think it bothers him that you have to get so deep to fundamentals to discuss where we differ... to discuss closer to the surface issues, we get to a point where "well my view on this follows from my belief in God and that He has an absolute sense of justice", while "eric's belief on this stems from...." it disturbs him that two people who have both seen and read a lot can have such widely disparaging fundamental axioms in our respective views of the world.
i find it intriguing, but not quite as distressing (word choice?) as he seems to find it... it's still some really good chats every time we get around to it.

* i've been thinking a lot about people and friendships. i find it interesting how while i've always had guy friends, i've generally had some really close female friends... now, here in jersey, i have female friends, but they're not who i talk to first about serious things. my primary local support system is 3 guys. and ironically the one i talk to the most about things is the one i share the least personal stuff with, and the one i see the least is the one i'm most comfortable sitting down and chatting about relationships and stuff with. i have a different kind of sister-brother relationship with each of them, and i find it humorous (word choice?) that i've gone in the past two years from having a primarily female support system to a primarily male support system.

* i've been thinking a lot about me and math. the further you go in education, the more you realize that there's more and more people than you ever realized who are even smarter than you (unless you're extremely lucky and in the top fraction of a fraction of a percent)... i'm definitely not in that extremely lucky category. i completely lucked out though. i have an advisor who actually invited me to work with him and is extremely affirming of all his students. i NEED that encouragement, since i'm hard enough on myself already, so personality-wise he's a great match for me to work with. however, he's also in an area where the problems are pretty straightforward to state even though they're hard to solve. this means that my reading class with him is already doing minor research, without much background reading. i'm thankful for this because i thoroughly enjoy DOING new math instead of solving old problems, and knowing i liked that from undergrad is one of the main reasons i'm here in a ph.d. program, however not having to study and do as much reading for my work with my advisor i feel a lot like an amateur compared to friends in areas where they've HAD to do a lot of reading first. i do a lot of fun mucking around, but feel like i don't KNOW as much. this summer i need to do a lot of reading for oral quals for the fall, and that should help, but sometimes i question my ability/knowledge-base. i guess that's a perennial problem for most people... in a top tier ph.d. program, we're all in the top less than like 5% of math grad students in the country, and so i guess it's the nature of the beast to all feel pretty insignificant and incompetant from time to time... oi...

* here's something i've been getting excited about: john nash (the mathematician who "a beautiful mind" was about) is coming to speak at experimental math seminar this thursday. since i'm dr. z.'s student, i'm invited to dinner with the speaker afterwards, so this thursday i should be having dinner with john nash... a couple years ago i never would have dreamed of something like that. not that he's the president or anything, but he is a major name person for my field and i'll get to not only meet him in person, but chat with him over indian food. sometimes my life is pretty unexpectedly fun :-)

* i weigh 5 pounds less than i did a week ago -- stress probably had a bit to do with that, but probably so did me having bought a bag of oranges and apples for my snackfood for the week too... that made my day :-P

* eric watched "in america" with me yesterday afternoon. i hadn't seen it since i saw it in the theater 2 years ago. i had forgotten just how good the ending is. it's all about letting go of pain without forgetting the good that comes mixed in with the bad (if you see it, that statement makes more sense). it's one of the best movies i've seen in the past several years. i've been thinking about it.

* i've been thinking about going home and all the stuff i need to get done before then. semester here ends on may 2... it'll be busy in the meantime, but then summer job doesn't start til june 6. haven't seen my family since christmas and then it was for less than a week (unlike eric, colleen, and leigh who each went home for a couple weeks.. i was the last to leave jersey and beat them all back here by a week for the qual),... the extra study time for the qual paid off and made it a respectable pass rather than a hairline pass or a fail that i might have gotten without coming back so soon, but this means in the past year i've seen my parents and brother all for about 2 weeks total... i haven't seen grandma pudwell since last may either. it'll be interesting to see all of the above again. in a good way... just everything changes over time. mom's transitioning from principal to back to the classroom this year, memphis church is in search of a pastor (pastor mike moved to kansas last fall), brother's getting oooold on me and has a girl friend (purposely not one word) he's spent a decent amount of time with for months now,... i guess it's just my observation that when you only get "every 6 month" snapshots of life, being this far away most of the time, it's amazing the changes each trip, no matter how much stays the same...

so in summary: yeah, i've been thinking... about lots of stuff... and the caffeine is not in my favor :-P and here i've just spent 45 minutes typing away a novel of a brain dump... maybe now i'll go to sleep? (doubtful, but it's worth a shot... night y'all)

more fun with music

apparently i'm just in a mood to be playing with music this week... here's CD #2 i've put together for myself, equally pleased with it as the first one :-P

1. digee dime (burlap to cashmere)
2. beautiful world (colin hay)
3. if i had $1000000 (barenaked ladies)
4. walking in memphis (mark cohn)
5. rest (skillet)
6. colored people (dc talk)
7. don't ask me why (billy joel)
8. i'm so happy (hokus pick)
9. live in stereo (newsboys)
10. huza-vona [ts arpeggios] (princess) <--hungarian electronic violin trio, were popular the semester i lived in budapest :-P
11. we shall be free (garth brooks)
12. the lutheran song (lost and found)
13. long time gone (dixie chicks)
14. standing outside the fire (garth brooks)
15. wide open spaces (dixie chicks)
16. cowboy take me away (dixie chicks)
17. the eleventh hour (jars of clay)
18. number 9 (the waiting)
19. dracula from houston (butthole surfers)
20. hey hey (the elms)

ta da

i should be asleep... night y'all

apprentice final 5

farewell chris -- how often does a contestant get invited back to shake hands with the donald and get personal advice? chris has been a little rough around the edges throughout, so it's appropriate that he was finally fired, but he's grown up a bit even in the course of this show.

what ticks me off is that chris can work his butt off and get fired whereas craig and tana can sleep for 1/3 of the time of their task and be spared by kendra's awesome work. i've liked kendra from week one, and this week she showed dedication. she's guaranteed final four status now since she was the winning project manager this week, and i hope she makes it to the final two. i am concerned though that by seeing her team walk out on her, her response, instead of reasoning with them, was just letting them go and doing the work herself. she didn't have their respect from the start. i'm not sure if that's a kendra issue or a tana and craig issue (probably both)... i would have liked to have seen her exercise more control over them when they mutinied, but nonetheless, she showed as an individual worker she can do an amazing job. she's been in the background but doing something quiet but brilliant just about every week and that's why i admire her.

craig, i'm severely irritated with. when he was project manager, no one believed in his vision with the box and it turned out to be jackpot. now he's on the other side of the coin and it's all kendra's fault? somehow i don't think so. it's clear that kendra and craig don't communicate well with each other at all... and maybe that can't be helped (i can name a handful of people that i mean well towards and vice versa but have never been able to talk on the same page as) personality wise, but they can both give each other the benefit of the doubt. i don't see craig doing that at all, and while kendra might be, she also gives up on him really quickly too... in summary, i'm tired of craig being unclear and ineffective at communication.

tana, i didn't like at the start of the season, then she was growing on me a ton, until this episode, and now i hope she or craig is off next week. besides, like craig, quitting and going to sleep while kendra did their whole freaking brochure, she turned on her "mothering tone" towards kendra. i HATE when people talk to me that way when we're supposed to be equals, and my own mother doesn't even talk to me that way. the whole "what you might not understand is that we don't pull all-nighters like you, we're going to sleep, and you can pay for it" was completely obnoxious. even worse was her taking all the credit in the final presentation. if you didn't do the job, you can't just take over like you did... that happened last season with jennifer once too... completely unhonorable and obnoxious. so tana, i was a fan, but this week you stunk.

down to the final 5... i hope bren and kendra are the final 2 and i hope kendra wins, but only time will tell.

later dudes.

discussion?

re: the comment I got on the previous post

Comment: Maybe becoming "emotionally exhausted" is not because of what is happening for whatever reason but is trying to determine a 'reason' for what is happening. Some things just happen, some for no apparent reason.

Response: maybe....

Comment: For what reason does the sun rise, clear on some days and clouded on others; some leaves fall in the autumn, some do not. Some people like the taste of watermelon, some don't.

Response: the sun rises because of physics, it's cloudy some days because of weather patterns, leaves fall or don't because of the biological makeup of the tree, and some people like watermelon because their chemical makeup is predisposed to positive responses from particular tastes. there are some things we can't see the reason to, but i think by and large most if not all physical things DO have a reason, but this is a completely different tangent than i think you intended.

Comment: Maybe those cycles do not happen because grandma is 'ready to let go.' Maybe they 'just happen.' Maybe you need to stop grieving ahead of time. Maybe there's no 'reason' to do that. Maybe you'll feel better.

Response: I haven't really analyzed why things have happened the way they have with my grandmother. She's repeatedly expressed that she is ready to die whenever God sees fit for her to. However, despite all this talk of reasons, I don't think that emotions are something you just "decide" to do. I don't think it's necessarily under my control whether I feel really sad and wonder "what if..." from time to time. I think it's healthy to feel sad in response to the potential of losing someone you care about in the near future, whether it happens or not. I see it as a natural buffer that prepares you mentally for the shift of losing someone in the event that it does happen. It's not like I've been sitting around crying and writing her obituary in the event that something would happen. It's more I've been wondering more frequently than when she's not in the hospital just what might happen. The reason for such a reaction being, when I get seemingly bad news, my reflex response is to be a little sad and make sure I'm prepared to deal with WHATEVER happens next. I don't seem to think it's a bad system, but maybe I'm missing your point.

discussion?

in other news, dr. z. held class outside today (it's sunny and 60 outside); it was a beautiful day, and 99% of grad classes aren't structured so that that's an option :-P... too bad my reading class just me and him needs the computer :-P

lunch time.

go figure

so my aunt priscilla IMed me last night with "do you have time for a quick note?" while i was out of the room and signed off immediately 2 minutes later.

on one hand, i could infer that she was in a hurry and rushing off elsewhere on account of an emergency... on the other i could just infer that she was busy... i tried her cell and left a message (it was off the 3-4 times i tried throughout yesterday evening), and i got no answer at her house the couple of times i tried... so last night, that question and then nothing... i was severely wondering what was up.

this morning, my mom IMed me to ask if pris had called me last night, because she (mom) had heard nothing... no joke, the instant i closed mom's IM window, my phone rang with my aunt calling.

apparently the whole deal yesterday was that my aunt was NOT going to the hospital to see grandma because grandma was being released back to her nursing home. my aunt plans to visit her there tonight.

both pris and my comment was "huh... go figure... got me"

for all the "she's so frail, and barely breathing, and barely able to eat, everything's so precarious" all week, i'm frankly completely amazed that this happened.

mom's comment this morning (before hearing from pris) was that her gut told her nothing about what's going on, but if this is the end she just wants it to come quickly. ditto from me.

grandma's suffered plenty in the past few years. i think the different thing this go around (bouts of her being "sicker" and then better enough to hang out in the nursing home again have happened in cycles for the past 5 years) is that i'm finally able to say "yeah, i'm ready to let go", in a way my head has been preparing to grieve, for something that's looking like is not going to happen just yet, which don't get me wrong, is good... i'm just emotionally exhausted right now.

gotta get ready for class... later dudes :-P

etc.

mom's version of priscilla's news last night (priscilla called me and then my mom with the same story as i had last night)

----: talked to priscilla last night
----: they were trying to get nutrition going for grandma; but when they started the feeding tube and bag, she complained of pain in her abdomen.
----: the nurse told Priscilla that grandma is in frail condition...at one point Monday night, her breathing got so shallow that the nurse thought she had died.
----: grandma wanted to "talk" last night...and wanted priscilla to make sure Debbee and I knew she loved us even though she wouldn't talk to us when we visited her.
----: that's all i know for now - priscilla didn't mention the CAT scan last night, so I'm guessing they did not do it yesterday.
----: Love ya.

the second line is the only part that was new to me.... my new CD (see previous post) is amazingly good for me right now... we'll see what happens...

later dudes :-P

fun with music

i decided to mix a CD for my car for this week that matches my mood... can you deduce anything from the following playlist? ;-P

1. Sky is Falling (Lifehouse)
2. Fresh Feeling (Eels)
3. Hibernia (Michael W. Smith)
4. Dear Friend (Charlie Peacock)
5. Go Rest High on that Mountain (Vince Gill)
6. The River (Garth Brooks)
7. Everything's Not Lost (Coldplay)
8. Good Life (Francis Dunnery)
9. The Dance (Garth Brooks)
10. Vienna (Billy Joel)
11. My Life is in Your Hands (God's Property)
12. Where the Angels Sleep (Bebo Norman)
13. Lullabye [Goodnight, My Angel] (Billy Joel)
14. My Prayer (Chris Rice)
15. Hard to Get (Rich Mullins)
16. Hymn (Jars of Clay)
17. Hold Me Jesus [Dona Nobis Pacem] (Rich Mullins)
18. Hallelujahs (Chris Rice)
19. All the Way My Savior Leads Me (Rich Mullins)

fun...and unfun

first the fun --

tonight, scott and i planned one of our margarita nights... this just involves going to chilis, on the border, or somewhere that sells margaritas, and then usually involves playing pool, reading a book, or something at one of our houses after... tonight involved all of the above.

months ago, i had read a short article on dr. seuss that claimed that he wrote green eggs and ham on a dare from his publisher that he couldn't write a book using no more than 50 distinct words. scott and i had laughed at this several times and claimed we would count them the next time we read the book -- that happened to be tonight...

here's the official tally:



(each dot represents an additional instance of the word... "if" for example only appears once, while "thank" appears twice, etc.)

notice it took a margarita night and bowls of pineapple jello to inspire us to take on this task :-P

done with that, we watched scrubs and the office and laughed our heads off for awhile... then i drove scott home where we played a few games of pool before i was off... it was a much needed fun/unwinding sort of evening.

here's the unfun...

my aunt priscilla called during scrubs... my grandma (as noted by my mom earlier) hasn't been able to eat for a week now. they finally got her feeding tube hooked up and running again without her vomitting, and gave her 10 units of food today -- she needs to work her way up to 40 units a day again before she can go back to her nursing home. so that way there's hope.

on the other hand, the nurses commented that her breathing was so shallow last night that a time or two they were almost certain she had stopped breathing...

priscilla visited tonight and said grandma made a very big point today of saying how much she loves each and every one of us... she told priscilla to tell me thank you for my visits and my letters and that she loves me a lot... and priscilla said she was crying the whole time. the way priscilla put it, it's like grandma doesn't feel like she'll ever see those of us not already in pittsburgh with her now ever again.

really, the way it sounds, the bulk of crazy things going on has subsided, so in that sense things are looking up... on the other hand, grandma is weak and things *could* end at any time. the last paragraph though is what especially got to me. whether it's accurate or not, the idea that i might not see her again is rather sobering and strange. we'll see.....

i guess that's it. i'm tired.

night y'all :-P

here's something cool... :-)

saw this on laura's blog last week... google does satellite view maps now! (see here)

here's a few i found (note you can search in the top bar and it zooms where you want) of places i frequent :-P (in memphis and in jersey -- unfortunately valpo's part of the world isn't available on quality zoom yet, neither is budapest... oh well..

click to see in a new windowand the file name should tell you what you're looking at ;-)... enjoy :-P


busch campus -- can you find the math building?


my church here in jersey-- it's inside the lower right clover leaf


my house and neighborhood here in jersey


zoomed out view of my town in jersey


my high school


my family's house (really the only thing distinguishable is the waterfowl pond out back)


my memphis church/my grade school


downtown memphis -- i thought the pyramid looked kinda cool from above

running late to meet scott for dinner... happy tuesday all? :-P

g-ma update and lara update

mom's update on g-ma (over IM while i was out this morning)
-----: la, I talked with Cil late yesterday...Grandma is to have a CAT scan of her abdomen today to try to find out what is going on
-----: the nurses are concerned that she has had no nutrition since she was brought to the hospital
-----: fortunately the vomiting had finally stopped, by Saturday/Sunday, I guess
-----: Priscilla said the nurses were"blunt" about whether or not Grandma would "bounce back" from this
-----: Debbie rightly asked what "bounce back" means...it is to survive, or to return to her prior level of health and energy
-----: so we shall see...
-----: Love

that's all i know on that

lara update -- eye doctor appointment today -- after 2 days of headaches my eyes were dry and irritated when he saw me, so he was concerned that they're like that a lot and that i should try a different kind of lenses... he gave me a trial pair of the new 02optix kind (you've probably seen ads on TV... click here) for a week and i have to go back next tuesday.

what weirded me out a little was what my eyes were doing during the tests. when one of the assistants did a peripheral vision test (you stare into a machine at a black dot and have a button to push when you see lights moving at the side of the screen) my vision in my left eye was blacking out in spurts while it was going... like not that i wasn't seen peripherally, i wasn't seeing at all for a few seconds...

also when the dr. had me looking at the eye chart across the room, i could read just fine with both eyes but it was all a blurry mess or no letters at all looking at the same thing with just one eye or the other... when i looked with just one eye writing looked gray and hazy... suddenly when i had both it focused and i could see the writing clearly... it was weird.

he took notes but didn't comment much... the contacts he gave me for this week are the same presciption as before but he said he might decide next week to change it... eyes... they're weird.

now i should be working.

later dudes

stuff

something that make me sad:
headaches that last for 40 hours

something that i'm glad is over with:
me taking my turn "practice teaching" in TA training class this afternoon... the prof even complimented my handwriting (go figure)

something i wish i could remember:
apparently eric called me at 2am last night (i had been asleep for the better part of 3 hours at that point, but had my phone on in case of grandma news... i had emailed him yesterday afternoon to call if he didn't get back super late (he had a family reunion in california this weekend) and he figured i'd be asleep with my phone off and he'd just leave a message being like "hey look at me, i really DID call!"...)... i'm aware he called and we talked for 10 minutes (my phone tells me so... 11 minutes 44 seconds actually), however after i went back to sleep all i vaguely remember is the phone startling me awake, me not being able to read the caller ID without my glasses and being confused until i heard eric, and him laughing at my slurred just-been-startled-awake speech. i honestly have no idea what i talked about for 12 minutes to him in the middle of the night... doht.

something that makes me happy:
jessica IMed me this morning that she had gotten a free itunes code from a pepsi bottle and being unable to use it, she thought she'd share. i finally got my computer to place nice with itunes and downloaded my song of choice -- no complaints... and yay for jessica :-)

later dudes -- maybe tomorrow will be a NON-headache day... that would be soooooooo nice

new stuff

background: at christmas, my parents gave me a fairly large wad of cash and told me it was designated for buying new clothes (this probably had something to do with the fact that at thanksgiving in pittsburgh i purposely wore sweaters with holes and bleachspots and pointed out that i was in need of new clothes to my mom throughout the weekend ;-) )

anyhow, me being perpetually running low on cash, i had gradually spent all the clothes $$ from christmas via putting a $10 or a $20 in my wallet when money was running low.

today as my reward to myself for hitting a major goal i made for myself months ago (to not be named just now as it's an ongoing project), i decided to go clothes shopping and get a few other things i've been needing for a bit -- just in the amount that my parents had originally given me earmarked for clothes.

if you don't pay enough attention to my habits, there's about ONE day a year i'm in the mood for clothes shopping and today happened to be it.

so my day went something like this:
*wake up
*pay bills
*sort through a week's worth of mail
*shower, lunch, laundry, sweep my room
*go to get a haircut but was told there was an hour wait (oops)
*go to kohls, and spend an hour there finding the best pair of black dress pants ever, and a decent pair of khaki's but no luck on shirts and long line to the fitting room so i left with just the pants to start
*met up with ben for a 4pm showing of "the upside of anger" -- quirky film, but worth seeing
*get out of movie around 6:30, tell ben about my morning and that i'm still in need of shirts... he comments that he needs shirts too so if i go somewhere with a men's section he's game... we go to another kohls where i got a black tank top (been in need of one), a nice blue button down shirt, an orangy-pink shirt and a green shirt, and a beige poncho (i've been wanting one for awhile) -- *NOW* i've officially spent my christmas $$ :-P
*went to staples and invested in a decent paper shredder... i've been collecting papers i need to shred for forever, now i can unfill some of the boxes full of such papers :-P
*went to walmart where ben and i each got new sunglasses
*came home and did a mini-fashion show for my roommates -- results below :-P
*am now writing to my blog after 12 hours of running around and getting absolutely no math done.

enjoy: (notice that you can click on the pictures to see them better in a new window)

my new paper shredder -- woohoo :-P


new $5 sunglasses, ben approved


new outfit 1: new khakis and orangy-pink shirt (the green shirt is almost identical)


new outfit 2: new spiffy black pants, new black tank top, and new khaki poncho


new outfit 3: same as outfit 2, only with my new blue shirt instead of the poncho (check out the fabric on it -- it has a cool print :-P)


and that's that.

in other news, on the way home, ben answered the phone when my aunt priscilla called with the grandma update (i was driving in busy traffic). last night the scoop was that g-ma was fairly stable, but her blood sugar (which had been 326 the previous day) was still in the high 200s and they still really needed to get that down before she went anywhere, but mostly it looked ok-ish.

i didn't get to hear aunt pris's tone for myself, but ben's relay of her message didn't sound good -- g-ma's resumed throwing up and it's changed in color from brown to black (i.e. more blood) and although before it was from her esophogas, ben's version of the message sounded like they didn't know the source this time.

we'll see what happens -- this one's nowhere but God's hands.

10pm... maybe i should think about dinnertime :-P

later dudes

breathing is all it takes to be a miracle

it's been a decent afternoon....

after pizza seminar, i read for awhile (started in on hitchikers guide again), then when leigh came home we decided to go to a diner for dinner. jersey diner specials -- oh man! for one price you get a nice huge entree, salad bar, bowl of soup, and dessert, and they give you so much it's basically two meals because you take half of it home with you... it was a party.

afterwards, when we got home, colleen was back too, and they agreed to watch "garden state" with me. i had seen it twice in theaters and bought the dvd earlier this week in a buy 2 get 1 free sale at blockbuster.

as for me, i remembered again why i loved the movie so much last fall. i saw it with eric and scott just a week or two after roommate's mom's funeral, and again a little after that when my friend jessica came to visit. after all the emotion that went along with the summer, that movie especially hit a chord timing wise then and stuck with me. (if you've not seen it, the 1st scene of the movie is the main character waking up to a phone call his mom has died and he goes home for the funeral, where the whole movie takes place (in his hometown) in the week following the funeral).

i love(d) the movie because it's all about real life and real people and about being honest about feelings and about yourself. i also loved some of the imagery and the soundtrack was spectacular.

leigh and colleen on the other hand, saw the movie for the first time. i feel a little bad because i probably could have predicted their reactions but i still suggested they see it anyhow. without matching names to comments....
one roommate said, "i liked some of the ideas it conveyed, i just didn't overall enjoy the way it was put together and all the stuff they went through to convey them... it was ok"
said the other roommate, "i guess i would have been happier if i hadn't seen it. i don't like movies about people with screwed up lives, i'm happier in my bubble world when it comes to movies"

doht.

this is completely fair of them, they each see the world much differently than me. while i enjoy warm and fuzzy happy movies aplenty, for some reason dramas that are about real people with real screwed up lives strike a chord with me and i really like them. after all, we're all screwed up to varying degrees and i have my share of stories in that vein as well.... garden state was well done in this category (of conveying real, true, screwed up life) and i loved the conclusions it drew and the process the characters go through to get there.

life is about feeling, even if it's pain. there's not something better (in this world) to be waiting on, *this* is the time we've got.

i sat put and watched bloopers and deleted scenes tonight too after colleen and leigh went back to their rooms... the title is a quote from one of the deleted scenes, all in the same vein as before, but commented well... i need to replay it and get the exact quote.

the dude who lives in the arc in the quarry said something along the lines of "this is life, even if i'm never famous i'm ok, because i have a family who loves me and i'm doing stuff i love"
zach braff replied with something along the lines of "yeah, i've been looking for a philosophy like that,... i guess for too long i've assumed that if i don't become someone famous or discover something big i'm a waste of energy and the force that created all this will be disappointed with me"
the dude who lives in the arc replied "i think it's more along the lines of the force who created all this would want you to realize that breathing is all it takes to be a mircle... remember THAT"

in my mind, it was quality.

after polluting my roommates minds with an R-rated movie they didn't like, (oops), i'm off to read some more.

night y'all.