what the fuck am i getting myself into with this grad school stuff

I got off ILX for an hour and got a good amount of work done. It's nearly over now. To reward myself...I'm gonna get back on ILX for a minute.

Two weeks done, and I am completely digging it. But it has been reasonably smooth sailing so far, and there are choppy seas ahead...

I am happy about one thing, though. The other day I got into a class with David P1m3ntel. For the last 35 years straight, he's had a year-long class where a group of 10-12 students get together and write a paper with him. Each year, it's been published my a major peer-reviewed journal, often by Nature or Science. This year we're writing on the sustainable population of Earth in 100 years, with no fossil fuels. It may prove to be controversial. But it's cool to think that in May, unless my colossal bad luck manages to ruin everything for the first time in 35 years, I'll have my shabby name out there in a peer-reviewed journal (probably for the only time in my life, but hey)!

It may prove to be controversial.

You might want to remove the part about how only members of ILX and your class will survive.

I am scrambling to finish a paper that is due at 2am Saturday (basically late Friday night) COB tomorrow because I procrastinated all day yesterday and my boss dropped the task on me this afternoon. This is dudder than heck.

welcome to the working week already

Shit, I've gotta stop putting fake smartass working titles at the top. Just now, I almost submitted a paper titled "The Worst Paper Ever: My Paper"

when the share drive fails and your 0900 briefing summary winds up retaining your placeholder bullets (e.g. BADMINTON, MARIO KART, CURLING) instead of the actual stuff you spent an hour or so updating, you are allowed to complain

What if I told you that my share drive is failing right now, and my 0900 is in shambles?

Shit though, this title should just be titled "What the fuck am I getting myself into?", and opened up to all

THIS TITLE SHOULD JUST BE TITLED

alright I'm going to bed now

Two weeks done, and I am completely digging it. But it has been reasonably smooth sailing so far, and there are choppy seas ahead...

― Casuistry, Saturday, September 20, 2008 3:58 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

what degree you getting?

sailing

periscope engineer

give me a ping, vasily. one ping only

Medieval studies is the correct answer, but sailing is the better answer.

took only four weeks to go from bushy-eyed optimism to "wtf i am not cut out for this shit"

It never, ever gets better! It only gets worse! haha!

http://www.theminorthirds.com/ilx/latin_homework.jpg

Home: transcribe the first half of that.

"Homework"! Not "Home".

awesome. i am drafting theater plans. not an architect. not a designer. unpacking my dad's drawing board and t square from like 1954 or something. i am just going to laugh at everything from now on.

casuistry is studying.......elvish?

Looks like Greek to me.

srsly i just freaked out over a 5-page paper, and this is the "easy semester"

It's Latin. Those are Roman characters. Those characters evolved into the ones you're reading on the screen in this sentence right now, basically.

I thought I ID'd some lambdas, pis, deltas, and taus, but it seems not.

this is my 'easy' semester and i feel like i am working harder than ever. wtf.
xpost

The pis (the last letter on the first line, say, before the final dash-like-thing) are "a"s. The lambdas (big hooked thing towards the end of line 2) are "b"s. The deltas and taus are "d"s and "t"s.

When was that written, Casuistry, and by whom?

Well, the text is a speech by Claudius, 1st c., but that copy is apparently from a few centuries later, 4th-6th c. That's all the info I have, since it is a homework assignment and all.

Sorry, my bad. It's perhaps a little earlier than that.

WELL JEEZ

I know. It's as if I should be in a class learning how to figure this out.

that is pretty awesome.

yeh. at least the stuff i'm toiling over ... or, rather, meant to be toiling over but not actually reading because, y'know, it's the weekend and really, i'm just going to get up early on monday morning and FUCKING BLITZ IT is in english.

at least, it claims to be.

also, this:

took only four weeks to go from bushy-eyed optimism to "wtf i am not cut out for this shit"

is kinda OTM. although with me it was two weeks to go from "rock! masters here i come" to "fuuuuuuuuuucking HELL there are not enough hours in the day for this".

It's way more fun when it's not in English, though!

^NOT!^

I'm in my second and final year now, but for some reason this semester is waaaay more of a pain in the ass than the previous two, even though on paper it seems like it should be about the same.

^^^this!!!!!!!

on paper this should be easier!!!!! is not!!!!!!!

I have been accepted into Carnegie Mellon. Holy crap I have a so much to do to make myself able to move in january?

Anyone want to rent a very nice central London apartment?

WOOT!

nice one, ed!

Holy shit I only just read below the fold in the email (damned blackberry) and I have a $9000 partial scolarship.

WOOT!!!! That will go far in Pittsburg. You could probably buy a house for that out there.

Holy shit indeed! At all of the following:

That acceptance now comes via the intertubes and not via snails.
$9K!

Pittsburgh rentals are even cheaper than Minneapolis ones AFAIK.

about $600 for a big 1 bedroom with full livingroom and a study knook.

http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/images/00007R-54.jpeg

(congratulations, ed)

caek, is real letter?

xpost as long as you keep the LR and kitchen separate, WINNAH.

yes, it's real (but I was not the recipient): http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00007Q

that is how they roll