Random rambling...

[jc : guest post]

Ok, so Katie's "ten words or less" may have appeased a small few of you, but I can still hear bellys grumbling and since I am technically on "break" I figured I'd take a moment to add a bit of meat to those ten words.

First topic, Katie's "new" job. Katie has been officially employed for about 4.5 months, and while she still feels like the new kid, it's pretty clear that they've accepted her as one of the gang... gabba gabba. Katie is working on many projects, most of which I can't even blog about (and perhaps shouldn't even know about), but I can say that she works hard and late into the evenings. Those of you that know Katie, know that she's not one to adhere to the "good enough" mentality, and has never embraced the standard 8 hour day... no, she's more of a 10-12 hour kind of gal.

Busy as she is, she's learning a ton, meeting some good people and getting to do all sorts of new and zany things. She even took part in interviewing some of my classmates for summer internships and full-time jobs. Pretty spiff.

As for me, this semester has been pretty crazy... and I'd be lying if I told you it was all good... but it has been mostly good. Mostly.

CMU is a crazy place, it's like what I envision the internet would be if you forced it into reality... at any time of day, you can pretty much guarantee that you can find someone to discuss what ever random ass idea drifts through your head. I love that.

So how have I spent the first 7 days of my spring break? You might not be surprised to hear that I've spent most of that time working. True, I've been able to sleep a bit more and spend a bit more time lounging aound with a book or magazine of my choice, but much of the waking hours get snarfed up by work. Sadly, even my sleep hours are tainted by stressful dreams... just too many pieces floating - needing to be grounded - but I am unable to do so.

Last weekend, as part of an on-going Motorola research project, I built a little web application that lets participants "physically" map items on a matrix. This little app sends all of the collected data to me in a nice clean format for later use... and in the end saves my team many hours of production and data consolidation. Geekery!

I've also spent a chunk of time working out five major issues:
01. An extended independent project (Elders and Ambient Systems)
02. Topics for an extended essay (TBD)
03. Thesis paper topics (TBD)
04. Thesis project topics (TBD)
05. Summer research topic (TBD)

With each of these items there are millions of sub-concerns... with everything from advisors to proposals to figuring out how the hell I can actually wrangle all that I want to do into the small amount of time that I have.

In the list above, you now doubt spotted the four TBD... those I will fill those in once things are settled and signed.

Today I went to one of my professor's PhD defense... Holy Shizzle! Being in a room with clever people isn't that uncommon, but to be in a room with so many "scary-smart" folks makes your brain ache. I couldn't imagine standing in front of this group giving a 50 minute presentation and then fielding questions for the next 20... especially when so many of the questions used unfamilair language and rolled on for over a minute. After almost every question I was struggling just to remember what was being asked. Luckily, my professor is far better prepared for this kind of environment than I am. I was glad to hear that the Master defense is not nearly as painful - although many of the heavy hitters will attend and try to knock you off balance. Better to find out now, rather than during my own Q&A.

The remaining 3 days of "break" will be spent on a freelance project, reading a two inch stack of photocopies, and trying to find the motivation to do some laundry and a bit of tidying. Sigh.

Just so you don't think it's all work here in the Burgh, Katie and I have enjoyed this crazy weather (72 in mid-March!) and the beers that come with it. Tonight Katie is out with Jodi, and I am here avoiding work... downloading music... much much music. My current iTunes data tells me that I could listen to music for 45 days straight, and never here the same song twice. Such joy. Some day I should put all of my music on one giant drive... so much work, but so worth it.

Anyway... I know there is so much more to say... with families and friends and all that jazz, but I am feeling a bit restless, so that will have to wait.

Hope all are well and groovy.

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For the geeks out there I have a bit of a bonus:
My del.icio.us bookmarks and a newly public twitterism.

enjoy.

[/jc : guest post]