In Which I Am Stricken
November 4, 2014
Today I woke up and immediately knew something was wrong. Some organism had crawled inside my through and dragged a spiny wire mesh along my throat causing inflammation and a little pain. Nevertheless I endeavored to do my best to keep my day as regular as possible.
First up, I read an interesting paper and wrote a quick report on it, before racing over to the music building for a few minutes practice before my lesson later that day.
Next was another great physics lecture on the Feynmann Path Integral, in which we derived classical mechanics from a particular beautiful formulation of quantum mechanics. It also presented us with a new form of integral (over a function space), and a beautiful time and space symmetric formulation of the principle of least action.
Following the lecture was a quick visit to the doctor’s office, followed by a meeting of IPOG (International Partners Outreach Group) – a Penn committee of all stakeholders in Penn’s global presence. While the presentations went slowly, it was worthwhile to meet with many important university administrators and learn about the varied roles they play at Penn.
My piano lesson was enjoyable as always but I felt I had so far to go, despite having worked hard the past week.
I took a nap in the late afternoon, in an attempt to kickstart my recovery process and woke up two hours later to do some research. Dinner was a meeting at Hillel with Joseph Ooi, to talk about security related projects and catch up a little before rehearsal.
Rehearsal itself that evening was very taxing on me due to my weakened state and so I left a little early to recuperate and so as not to do myself any more damage. After a few quick tasks, it was bed again, hopefully for a long sleep.
In Which I Prepare For The Best and The Worst
November 2, 2014
Friday was mostly dedicated to preparing for the midterm. However, preparation went sub optimally and eventually resulted in me taking a significantly long nap. Pipers rehearsal in the afternoon was cancelled, and this didn’t help my productivity as I just went back to sleep.
Friday night I made it to shul on time, for a beautiful kabbalat shabbat. Unfortunately I couldn’t hang around for dinner as I was due to be singing for Amy Gutmann and some prestigious alumni for homecoming weekend with the Glee Club. The gig was a lot of fun and afterwards I had the chance to talk with some of the higher ups at Penn and a number of visiting dignitaries. After the gig I was well tired enough to head home and go straight to sleep.
The next day was all gigs again! We started off with a brief rendition of some Penn songs for the ‘old guard’, more elderly Penn Alumni. We then sung ‘Shenandoah’ for a memorial service and waited around outside for the service to conclude so that we could sing a closing piece. The memorial service ran late, and so I was picked as part of a quartet to sing ‘Amazing Grace’ while the rest of club went off to our subsequent gig. The quartet sung decently, however we lacked a little confidence given the surprise.
The following gig was less thrilling, just standard repertoire but finished in enough time to leave me to go home, each lunch and take a nap before the final performance of the day.
Our last performance was outdoors and the cold and rain, but the space we were in was almost like a natural auditorium and I really enjoyed singing a few choice songs with the alumni present.
In the evening, I relaxed at home, until at about 11PM I went out to the glouse to see if anyone was around and playing the game of thrones board game as promised. When no one was there, I detoured to Platt to pick up Pearl and walk her across campus to a party she was going to. I returned to my room and promptly went to sleep, only to be woken up at 1AM by a friend in need. I raced over to help them out, but ended up sleeping a little less than I had intended.
Sunday I slept in a little, before realizing I was running late and raced over to rehearsal for Penn Pipers. Rehearsal was ok, though we had a lot of work to do. After rehearsal I raced off to the PhD basement to study for the algorithms midterm. I realized that I was less prepared that i would’ve ideally liked to be. We studied for a few hours, and then exhausted I walked back home. After yet another nap, I arranged to eat with Rigel and Nikki, before celebrating our birthdays with our traditional whiskey.
Then again, it was back to my room to chill for a little, some more study, and then an early night before the midterm the next day.
In Which I Take Care of Social Needs
October 15, 2014
My Sunday was largely composed of travel time, with a quick farewell in the morning to Jeannine and Rocky. I got a little lost on the way to the airport but soon enough made it and had just enough time to grab a quick drink and a few bananas from the United Business lounge before hopping on for a jaunt back to Philly. When I landed I was fairly exhausted and had some pressing work, so I unfortunately did not make the regular glee rehearsal. However, for what seemed like the first time at Penn, I went to bed at a reasonable hour.
The following week was right back to it, with intense work required to catch up on missing the past few days of class. Additionally, I had two exams to prepare for, one in Machine Learning and one in Algorithms. Thus, most of my week went by without major event other than many intense hours working and studying, often with the other PhD students.
Two notable points were my short breaks with Steph Li (of previous blog fame) and, Amy Miller. I hadn’t had the opportunity to catch up with Steph since returning to Penn as both of us had been neck deep in work and other commitments, however as with most of my close friends, it didn’t matter that there had a been a time delay, we were still as close as ever. Thursday I caught coffee with Amy Miller, a wonderful woman working for Wharton who had previously helped me remain at Penn for a second semester after I had run into troubles arranging it. We went to a relatively new coffee shop around campus ‘HubBub’, where I had a delicious iced-tea.
Other than that, much of my week was in preparation for Yom Kippur and the further holiday to come ahead.