Lighted windows

When I started grad school, some other new grad students and I walked through campus one night before the undergraduates arrived. The dorms were empty, but clearly being prepped for students to arrive. Some windows were lit. Bunk beds and empty desks peeked out over the sills.

Every year, I see the students getting ready to move in, and dorms, apartments, and rental houses getting ready to receive them. Living in academia does have a strange cyclical feeling to it. Falls feel like new beginnings, and springs feel like an ending. The end of December is a Pause.

I see students and families scurrying around near the start of the year, buying pens and sheets, paper and wastebaskets, calculators and cans to stock a new apartment with. I see students moving into dorms every fall, and I'll see them move out in the spring. I'll soon see those lighted windows filled with activity, and I wonder what the stories are inside them when I pass by. I wonder too, who was walking past my lighted windows when I was in school, thinking about my stories?

At a new beginning like now, it feels like a good life for all involved.

The Antiphany

I'd like to coin the term "antiphany" or anti-epiphany. It represents a sudden insight or understanding which is not in any way transcendent, but in fact horrible and gut wrenching. A moment in which you put the pieces together, and feel not enlightened, but as though you understand how much you've missed, and that things are much worse than you ever thought. Not just when you feel your stomach drop, but when you know it just entered the express elevator to hell.

I've had two this week.

The lesser was a simple matter of realizing how little success my precalculus students ever seemed to have in understanding transformations of graphs. I thought about the fact that none but the best ever understood this topic very well, and that perhaps a tiny percentage of those going on to calculus would understand or remember virtually any of this. And I thought about episodes in my calculus classes when I would casually, as an aside, mention how some particular result could be viewed in terms of transformations of graphs. Calculus is filled with lovely insights which blend the tools of geometry and the tools of algebra. In many ways, calculus is the blending of geometry and algebra. Analytic geometry makes calculus possible. So I try to share these insights with my students whenever possible. I try to point out the wonderful connections which seemed so magical and delightful to me when I first studied calculus (and which I still find magical and delightful, truth be told). And I thought about how little my precalculus students understood about transformations, just one semester before they might enter my calculus course.

And then... Antiphany. My calculus students don't have the foggiest idea what I'm talking about when I share those insights, do they? They're missing a basic facility with graphs and functions to be able to hear anything other than an impenetrable wall of words, and without that basic facility, there is no way they can hear it. Unless they are able to grasp the basic facts of analytic geometry intuitively, they can't hear an insight about those facts.

The second antiphany was an odder moment, and much worse. Without going into detail, it was the sudden understanding, in a brief revelation, that one project I've been working on for a few years was doomed from the beginning. The effort had generated stress and frustration for me (and for others), and I hadn't been able to succeed. I'd had to deal with the effects of the failure, and keep struggling to try to make it succeed, and then in a single moment, I saw why success was impossible. I had in fact been sabotaged before I ever started, without knowing it. And I found out how I'd been sabotaged, all at once. I could see the past few years flushed down the toilet, wasted effort worrying about trying to push the damned rock up the hill when it kept being shoved back down from the other side.

Antiphany. It's a good word, even if I did make it up.

(By the way, a brief Google search turns up some previous coinages of antiphany, based on the same idea of an anti-epiphany. But I intend a somewhat different meaning.)

Retrospective

Well that's it. This marks the end of National Blog Posting Month (which I mentioned earlier), or at least my participation. So what have the results been?

• It turns out that over the course of November I wrote about 10,000 words for my blog. That's fully 1/5th of the goal for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), so who knows, maybe someday I'll try that too. I can finally write my novel about the smart, hip, jet-setting, handsome mathematician who has men fawning all over him. (Hey, this is my Mary Sue, right?)
• I started this blog August 2005, which is about 4 years and 4 months ago, or 52 months. At the start of November, I had 162 public posts. That means I was averaging around 3 posts a month, until this month when I produced ten times as many. Or, over the course of this month, I've increased by almost 1/5th my total postings.
• Sometimes I faced some writer's block of course, but usually once I picked a topic, I found I had things to say.
• I've written about an enormous variety of things. I've talked about students and teaching (including the good, the bad, and the ugly), holidays, dreams, visiting a conference, and random musings of my own mind. Some days I wish I had a more interesting life, but often I like it fine.
• Not everything I've written has been a gem. But I've definitely written things I've liked, and some of them seem to have inspired other people to chime in. It does definitely convince me that I should write more often. Having an explicit (and public) goal definitely spurs some creative work. I'm not sure if I'll participate again in the project or not in any sort of semi-official way. (As I noted, I wasn't doing anything official this time; I just thought I'd try it.) For the moment, 'though, I may take a pause before I write again.

Well, a good night to all, and a happy upcoming December. Be seeing you!

Hibernation

I don't care for the cold. (I don't know what I think I'm doing up here. Who am I, Nanook?) But I do like burying myself under a heavy pile of blankets to go to sleep at night when it's cold. Flannel sheets, a big artificial down comforter, maybe a quilt, 'til I'm nice and toasty, and trying not to let any part of me poke outside my nest. It's wonderful. The only problem is that it's still cold in the morning when I wake up and have to get out of bed. I think bears are onto something. If I could just sleep through the winter and wake up again when it's spring, I'd be all set.

Or I just need to live someplace warmer.

Baby in a basket

As I passed a shopping cart in aisle at K-mart, I noticed a small foot waving around inside the cart. Laying flat on the bottom of the cart (which was lined with a blanket) was a baby in a sleeper, wiggling about on its back, making that goofy, vaguely smiling face that only babies can. Or at least, when I'm making the face and I think anyone has noticed I stop quickly and look embarrassed. I know people usually say it's just gas, but that's not usually where my gas comes out. Although I guess it can make me smile and giggle afterward, especially if it happens at a really funny time. But how often does one get to meet the pope, anyway? Maybe I should have tried pulling his finger. (The baby's, not the pope's.) But that might have upset the parents. You don't want strangers playing with your baby at the K-mart before you've even gotten it to the checkout yet; they probably went to a lot of trouble to pick one off the shelf that looked fresh.

It's probably a really strange view of the world to the baby in the bottom of the cart. Big orange grids on all sides, and looking straight forward all you can see are ceiling tiles and fluorescent lights. I'd probably be laughing at my gas, too.

Registration

It's registration time at the university again, so (some) of my advisees are coming to see me to get scheduled. Actually they pretty much have to come see me to get scheduled, since I'm the only one with their PIN that allows them to register. The school does that to force the students to actually get advising before they register for classes to help cut down on the students doing foolish things. This doesn't keep the students from doing foolish things, of course, but it might help.

Mostly I advise computer science majors, which I understand because we are a mixed department and most of our majors are CS. Most of the "math" majors are actually secondary education majors, and are advised in the education department. Although I still don't understand why I keep hearing about the few math majors we do have being advised by CS professors. But at least I get an opportunity to see the trajectory of the typical CS major. Or at least, the typical declared CS majors. They really don't have that many more majors than we do, they just get lots of people who think they want to be CS majors. I think some of the students think, "Hey, I love computer games; I'll major in computer science!" For many of those, things don't go so well. I often find myself advising a major who is repeating the introductory programming course and the introductory math class multiple times. Eventually, they usually give up and switch majors. Or fail out.

Some students are not so good at getting around to getting registration done. I had one who stopped by my office suddenly on Monday right before I was about to go to class and want to get his PIN so he could register. (Registration started some time earlier.) I spoke to the student briefly about the fact that he was failing his intro programming class and had withdrawn from his math class (see? I wasn't kidding). He indicated he wanted to change majors. So I took a minute to talk to another professor about a suitable major closer to what he wanted. Then he told me he actually wants to transfer to some other school, so he just wants to take some classes for spring and transfer credits. I asked where he was transferring. He didn't know. I told him I had to go to class, but I could talk to him tomorrow morning. He was worried all the classes would fill up and needed his PIN right away. I wasn't giving in on that, but offered to meet him after my classes finished that night at 8. He decided he could wait 'til tomorrow morning after all. But he didn't actually show up. I didn't see him again until Thursday. Then I could finally sit down and talk to him about what he was going to do, and make some semi-recommendations, which I know he isn't going to take. I suspect he's not going to end up transferring, changing majors, or doing anything else before next spring's registration, when I fully expect him to come rushing into my office towards the end of registration again, telling me he needs his PIN right away.

On the bright side, I do actually have a computer science major graduating this semester. That one, by the way, came to see me early in the registration period, always had a plan, passed his classes, and took what little advice I had the opportunity to give him. I wonder if there's any correlation.

Overpackaging

I was happy to find a great sale over the weekend and picked up some more slacks and long-sleeved shirts. (Which is good, because I always have the fear that my students will eventually notice I keep re-wearing the same things over and over. I know it's unlikely, but it still bothers me.) It struck me while I was trying to get everything into the laundry that shirts have way too much stuff attached when sold.

For the standard (folded) shirt, I had to remove: a size sticker on the back of the collar and another on the front, pieces of cardboard and plastic to hold the collar up just so, three clips and a pin from the back of the shirt so I could get to and remove the big flat piece of cardboard and some tissue paper (for some reason), another pin at the neck, and then two tags attached on the front somewhere (one from manufacturer and one from the store). Some shirts had a few extra clips/pins to stick one cuff out on the front of the shirt.

I'm glad I don't feel the need to store shirts this way in my closet, because I don't think I have the origami skills to put it all back the way I found it, either.

There's a pattern to this

It's that point in the semester. Too much is going on. I end up running from early morning to late at night, with stuff to do piling up during the week. Stacks of papers to grade, assignments to write, lessons to prepare, quizzes to write, meetings to attend, students to talk to, e-mails to respond to, and supposedly at some point I'll do some research, too.

And when my week finally ends (which is around 8 or so on Thursday night this semester), I feel worn down and can't stand to look at anything anymore. I usually have a light Friday (usually just a meeting or two, respond to a few e-mails, maybe grade or take care of some minor task), then consider Saturday "off". (Of course off time has it's own commitments, like the need to go to the grocery so I have something to eat, do dishes so I have something to eat off of, and do laundry so I don't stink while I teach the next week. But I still have free time, and I enjoy it.)

But then Sunday creeps up, and off we go again. OK, what do I have to have finished for Monday? Then of course Tuesday will come, and... how long until Thursday night again? Thursday nights are really good. At least this semester.

Happy Thursday!

Real facsimiles

I've been reading a couple of books put out by Disney (Disney Treasures and Disney Keepsakes) which give brief histories of Disney works, together with reproductions of various Disney memorabilia. Every page or two there is a removable piece which is a replica of something from long ago--a cartoon panel from a magazine, tickets from the opening of Disneyland, a menu from the studio cafeteria, paper toys distributed as promotional materials, and similar items. The books themselves are light, fun, and filled with pictures. I like perusing these before bed to wind down.

The memorabilia is odd in a way, and I enjoy them more than I thought I would. The replicas are often objects that (in original form) are collectors items, the sort of thing people would pay money for at an auction. I understand some of the allure, although I wouldn't be willing to pay what the originals cost by any stretch of the imagination. There is something about getting to hold and examine some little piece of history, even if it's an insignificant little trinket. I was holding one night a copy of a paper Pinocchio mask that was distributed as a promotion by Gillette (of all people) in 1940-1941. It's a weird feeling to hold that mask. Something that floated around almost unnoticed almost 70 years ago. Some child who is now significantly older than me probably played with one just like it. And here it is again, born anew.

Granted, these are fakes, reproductions rather than originals. But most of the originals were quick promotional gimmicks, not intended to be great works of art in any case. So really how much difference is there between the original and the copy? (Maybe the new copy is even made on better material.) So it's sort of cool to see and hold, and think about these being around so many years ago, seen and then quickly forgotten at the time.

I went through a similar phase with pennies once. Every time I found a penny (or really any coin), I'd check to see when it was minted. Then I'd try to think back to what was happening in my life that year. It's like a connection to that time. But sometimes I'd find a penny made before I was born. It's kind of weird and somewhat disturbing to be holding in your hand a penny, generally thought of as small and insignificant, which is older than you are.

Risk taking

So I heard passed on a complaint from some employers: That the current workforce is too risk-averse, that they only want to do what is "safe". Or I guess in the usual "business-ese", that their employees don't "think outside the box." This is, I suppose, seen to be a failure of educators. (That would include me.)

I'm inclined to call bullshit.

There's no question that US public education has an unspoken agenda to produce docile, unquestioning workers who will sit in cubicles all day doing mind-numbing tasks and avoid asking difficult questions at all costs. That's actually part of the history of what the public education system was for. But it's worth asking why this was ever a goal, and the answer is because that's what employers wanted.

I'm also inclined to think that people have been encouraged to take fewer risks because risk taking because they have so little overall security. Most people today worry about being laid off at every downturn of the economy. There is no long-term job security any more. And in a particularly screwed up twist, no one gets health care at an affordable cost without a really good job. Plus we have an otherwise generally eroding social safety net. So no one feels safe, and I think a lot of that lack of security can be laid at the feet of corporations that decided short term profits could be had by regularly laying off employees and trying to squeeze more out of the ones left. And now they're complaining that their employees aren't willing to take risks? Why would anyone take risks in such a precarious situation?

Plus I doubt they really want risk-takers. Risk takers might try some crazy scheme that no one ever thought of before, and that scheme may fail. Actually the crazy schemes probably fail more often than not. (How many start-up technology companies did not go on to become Google, Microsoft, or Apple?) I suspect what they mean is that they want employees to take risks doing things that turn out successful. But that's not risk-taking! I don't know. Maybe an employee that does try some wild new idea that fails spectacularly really does get a "Congratulations! You failed!" celebration a la Meet the Robinsons. Maybe innovations (including failures) are actually encouraged by some (or all) employers. But that just doesn't ring true. I think it's the businesses that are risk-avoiders, and the employees are picking up on that and following along.

And employees are easy to blame. What employee would disagree with his or her employer's assessment of the situation? That sounds like awfully risky behavior.

Feeding my neuroses with technology

First TiVo, then Netflix. There really is no better way to watch television series if you're a little OCD. Either pick a show and start recording, or (better yet), pick something out on DVD and get it. Then sit down and watch a bunch of episodes at once. Total immersion. It's the only way to watch. (Actually I subscribed to Netflix originally because my TiVo was missing a season of Smallville.) Thank goodness everything comes to DVD now. And if you're looking for more details about a series, there is no greater resource for all your pop-culture trivia than Wikipedia.

At the moment I'm "OCD"-ing Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Charmed, which are oddly enough pretty similar when you think of it. (Basically both featuring somewhat reluctant chosen ones with special powers fighting supernatural baddies of the week. And both featuring kick-ass women as the leads, come to think of it.) It's somehow just easier once you start on one thing to keep watching that one thing. And keep watching. Even previous obsessions drop by the wayside.

Thank goodness there are past shows that I like but didn't already watch.

The grass is always greener

I subbed a class for someone who was out sick this morning. It was an algebra class and the second day the prof was out, so I was asked to try to actually teach something. Unfortunately, I never found out what he was doing in class, so I ended up having to ad lib something about graphs of transformations. (You know, a little algebra improv. "Now pretend you're a function translated to the left two units! OK, now you're getting stretched, s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d... AAAAANNNNND freeze! Reflect about the y-axis!" Well, something like that, anyway. Only less entertaining.)

After class I had several students asking me more about who I was and if I taught various courses. (And not in the "Ye gods, I must be sure of who you are so as to avoid scheduling you at all costs, you weirdo!" way, either. They seemed to like me.) This is always a little weird, because usually my own students aren't that crazy about me. They would probably like someone else who came in to sub for me and did some free-form math jazz better. I can just imagine my students all crowding around the other prof, asking if he ever taught the next course they needed to take.

This is why I don't take sick days.

College students can be less than adorable

I was unimpressed on Halloween night by the number of college students I found trick-or-treating at my door. (Seriously, college students? It's questionable by the time the kids are 13 or 14.) I'm thinking I might construct a more age-appropriate treat for college students next year, like a really interesting pamphlet on a cool math problem, and tell them it's their intellectual treat for the night. If they want candy, they (unlike the six year-olds) can drive down to the grocery store and buy some.

But today my math class for elementary education students was working on an activity involving adding and subtracting integers. It uses a cute little paper copy of a clown who walks forward and backward on a number line "tightrope". It's a nice activity. When I was cleaning up after class I found a left-behind clown that some student had taken upon themselves to add genitalia to and portray performing an obscene act. (These students want to teach grade school?)

I am not overwhelmed with the cuteness of my students at the moment.

Networked Copier

Good things about being able to send documents directly to the copier:

• I can make a set of handouts from my office without having to stand and wait for the copier to finish in the office.
• I don't even have to stand and wait for the copier to warm up if it's been shut down!

Bad things about being able to send documents directly to the copier:

• Occasionally I make 35 copies of my class roster or something by mistake. On the printer rather than the copier. I have not yet accidentally done this with a 40 page paper or anything, but I still have plenty of time.
• I also end up looking for things in the printer that I actually sent to the copier by mistake.
• Sometimes I forget to pick up the class handouts that I made the night before. And sometimes I forget on the way down to the office. That may just be a sign of creeping senility, 'though.

Cool changes with the times

I'm in the process of scanning some student solutions to post to the class website, and it just occurred to me: When I was anywhere between about 8 and 15 I thought one of the coolest things a person could possibly own would be a photocopier. I really wanted one. Now I own one. (OK, it's a combination scanner/laser printer that makes copies as a side effect.) I also have access to a really nice copier in the department for whatever I need. They are useful (I'm not sure how many days actually pass without using at least one of them for something during a semester), but I just realized it's not nearly as cool as I thought it would be.

Of course, the other thing that I thought would be the coolest thing ever would be a video camera, and that would be totally achievable too. Every once in a while I think about getting one. I still think a video camera would be cool, but now I feel like it's a kind of cool which would require me to be, you know, creative to get anything out of, and I'm not sure I have enough of that to spare anymore.

Notes from a pre-Halloween trip to Erie

• For craft stores: A large hanging Halloween decoration should not be termed a "Jumbo Dangler." There's only so much I can take.
• I went into one store because the sign said a "Giant Halloween Blowout" was "going on now," and I'm still looking for a few things. I found a few small islands with some discounted Halloween merchandise, and approximately 47 billion aisle filled with Christmas merchandise. (I thought about getting some fake cobwebs, but decided it would probably just confuse all the real spiders that live outside my door.)
• I'm still frustrated by the lack of Halloween clothing for men.
• I found nice materials for my horns this year. While perusing the gory stage makeup at the party store, I saw a boy about 10 or 12 drawn to the kits for a costume. His mother immediately told him "We're not doing any of that" and dragged him off to the rest of the costumes. I always like the sort of gruesome stuff for Halloween, because that's sort of what it's about. C'mon mom; let the kid have some fun. (I just hope she's not making him dress as a fairy princess or something...)

Tutors

After Spring Break, I had a flurry of students coming by to ask me how to get a tutor, which they had suddenly decided they needed. I had not seen any of those students in my office hours up to that point.

I'm sure it's a direct result of students going home and hearing from parents that if they're not doing well in their math class, they should get a tutor or something. Unfortunately, they would have done better if they had just kept up and come in for occasional help when they needed it. This may be related to students who will do just about anything for extra credit but who skipped most of the credit that was offered all semester.

The Perversity of Self-Referential Teaching

When I taught my students version one of the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus (the one which tells you how to take derivatives of functions involving integrals), I said:

Isn't this easy? Don't you wish the whole test was going to be this? Well, I will go ahead and tell you that when I put one of these problems on the exam, half of you will forget and miss it.

I say this every time I teach the section, in the hopes that it might make the material stick. This time I went one step further and added:

That will be true despite the fact that I have just told you this.

I thought possibly that this statement might make at least a few more students decide to remember it. (It seemed to make an impression at least; they did laugh.)

Well I gave the exam this morning, and it turns out that in fact more than half the class forgot it. I think somewhere around 80% forgot it. Maybe next time I will try: "Everyone gets this problem every time, so don't bother to study this at all."

Superpowers

I was just purusing SuperDickery.com, which is a riot, and has as a central premise "Superman is a dick," supported by a wide array of Superman comics covers showing Superman being a... well, you get the picture. But it also includes a great gallery of ridiculous super powers, including heroes such as "Kite Man", and powers like super weaving and super ventriloquism. Which got me to thinking about a conversation I had years ago with a fellow grad student in which we tried to think up reasonably good, but unusual, superpowers we could have. I picked the power to locate any specific penny anywhere at any time. I thought this was reasonably good, actually. You could track anyone by just slipping one tiny penny onto their person. Tape a penny to everything you own, and presto--no more looking for the remote. And pennies are so ubiquitous, no one notices them, but pretty much everyone (in the US, anyway) has them. Plus you'd likely be able to find your keys when they fell out of a hole in your pocket because you probably dropped a penny at the same time, even if you didn't tape a penny to them. I think it's superpower which is just at the right level of being useful without being in any sense overpowered. My friend wanted to the power to inflict pain on men. I don't think she was joking, but I don't think she was really getting into the game, either. I suspect there were unspoken issues with some man or another in particular.

I also remember a good conversation regarding the premise of massive numbers of random mutations granting superpowers in the X-men series. We reasoned that there would have to be a whole bunch of mutants with totally useless powers. Like the guy who can move his nose to any location on his body. Or a woman with unlimited flatulence. (Interesting combination, those two.)

My deep desire for a superpower 'though is to be able to teleport anywhere instantaneously. (And I've had this wish even since before I was living seven hours away from the significant other.) Consider the travel possibilities. (And say goodbye to admission fees at Disney World. :-) ) Commuting would be a snap. Live where ever you found a nice, cheap place, and work where ever you want to. Miss your favorite restaurant in another state? Have dinner there tonight. Or explore the restaurants in Paris, Hong Kong, or Sri Lanka. As an added plus, you don't even have to worry about whether you're walking in a bad neighborhood or not. If you don't like it or someone jumps you, just zap back home. You even have a good entrepreneurial opportunity: no one could beat your very expensive one-hour delivery service. (Although it might be in less demand in a world with e-mail.) Of course, if you're unscrupulous, there are plenty of opportunities to do anything you want, too. Have I spent too much time thinking about this? Yes, of course, but that's what I do. You should hear the elaborate plans I have for what to do if I should ever find a genie.

50 Years of Sitcoms

Lately, I've been watching reruns of I Love Lucy on my TiVo. (This is part of what I think may be a part of the development of a TiVo user: Eventually you see everything you really wanted to see originally, and start trying new things to see if you like them or not. It ultimately broadens your palette, because you never have to miss anything.) It was in fact a darned good show, and Lucille Ball was very talented.

But there's something odd about it. If you watch episodes for a while, you get the distinct impression that you can hear the last 50 years of sitcoms being written. The plots sometimes seem unnervingly familiar, and not just because people like to do "tributes" to famous scenes like the chocolate factory. It's because I think every plot that came to be used in every sitcom may have gotten its start here. Or perhaps earlier. At least according to Wikipedia, many of the plots were rewrites of plots Ball performed earlier on the radio show My Favorite Husband. And who knows how original the material was then. Maybe early humans were sitting around a campfire going "Og think he fool me... me turn tables and fool Og back!" while everyone laughed uproariously. (Who knows, it may have come just days after the first "pull my finger" joke.)

As a downside, it does mean there are few real surprises in the shows, but it's still fun to watch. Sometimes I feel a little like a friend of mine who had never watched It's a Wonderful Life. When I finally got her to watch it, her reaction at one point was "Oh, it's one of these, where he sees what the world would be like without him."