Final Thoughts

Well, it was a full day. Since this morning I’ve been putting the last touches on a paper with my student, V. I’ve been working at my home office (something odd going on with my office computer) while he’s elsewhere but present via IM. We can chat, exchange equations, drafts, and so forth, so it is good medium. Then mid-morning, I had a moment of confusion for a while, and progress stopped while I sorted that out. Discussions with V and another student, T, via IM about this and some other matters ensued, and then I was back on track, inputting edits from a session yesterday of reading it with pen-at-the-ready in a bookstore, inputting edits from V, and then another printout and review to add more.

duvel, bike, etc

Every now and again, a check of email, a walk around and a pull out of the odd weed in the garden, and then back to it. Somehow this went on until 3:00 – three hours later than expected – and then it was all done. I submitted it to the arXiv and breathed a sigh of relief as another project and paper was done. Sigh… Tomorrow I switch gears and start work on another paper. Feels like it never ends… They are interesting projects though, so mustn’t complain.

Then I had one minute before a scheduled phone call from a filmmaker who wanted to talk about the speed of light, and Relativity. Grabbed the camera and the phone and wandered outside to take a photo in the garden… phone rang while I was making a photo for a birthday card for my nephew. Talked on the phone for 45 minutes about the arranged topics, and then had 10 minutes to make the card, write the card, address the card, put stamps on the card, grab some other stuff, throw it all into my bike front basket, run out of the house with the bike, unfold bike, and zip off to the post office to post the card. Made it to the post office just in time for five o’clock… – hurrah! – only to then read on the postbox that the last post was in fact at five thirty, not five… sigh.

Next stop, over to the Alcove – another office, of sorts. Time for sitting and some quiet contemplation (see photo above) about what on earth I’m going to put on the final exam of my General Relativity course tomorrow. This started with a glance at what I’d asked them to do on the midterms, to normalize things. I’d share some of my musings, but you never know who’s reading. A nice cold Duvel of celebration of the day (appropriately served with the correct glass) was definitely a help in this delicate thought process…

-cvj

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7 Responses to Final Thoughts

  1. graduate student says:

    Isn’t the name of the famous Italian beer Moretti… it’s one of my all-time favourites 🙂

  2. Clifford says:

    Wow… it has been years since I drank Peroni! Thanks for the reminder.

    Actually, I don’t recall what it was like at all. I shall have to remind myself.

    Cheers,

    -cvj

  3. Adam says:

    ever tried an italian beer called Peroni? its super good…kind of sweet, actually. a little better than the only other italian beer i’ve had, which is Merotti (an italian friend of mine said its an “old man” beer anyway so I’m staying away :p).

  4. Clifford says:

    David,

    Working on hiring agents for lots of things… so sure, you can lobby to be my product placement agent! 🙂

    -cvj

  5. David says:

    Dear Clifford,

    How much do you get for product placement from Duvel and for that matter Brompton bikes. If not can I be your agent?
    Just examined my GR course on Monday. All passed and some did very well, which sort of satisfying. Hope your exam goes well too..

    David B

  6. What a great place to work and what a great beer to enjoy while working! Cheers!

  7. Dimitri Terryn says:

    Duvel! You sure know your beers Clifford 😉