Almost Done!

The semester is almost over! After this week, there are just two more weeks of school, and then 3 days of finals. It's sad that it's almost over, but I'm excited to Todd and my winter break plans. Here's what we have so far. I'm going to Rome with Julio for a week, and then leaving for Paris for new years. After that we're going Greece, Turkey, and Egypt. I've bought most of the tickets so far, but I still need to buy the others before the price goes up. I'll post pictures and update this during my traveling.

Today was really exciting (math-wise). My algebra buddy and I spent all day working, and we were able to solve two problems! This may seem silly, but you have to understand that it usually takes me a couple days to solve one, so two in one day cuts the amount of work I have to do significantly. Also, it could be that I'm getting better at algebra, which is another reason to cheer. The Putnam competition is this Saturday, too. For those who have never heard of it, it's a problem solving competition given once a year to college undergrads, and the median score is normally a zero of out 120. My goal is to get an 11 this year. The test is 6 hours long, with a two hour break in the middle, and basically absorbs my whole Saturday, but it should be fun.

Wish me luck on the Putnam! Ciao.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! We have today off, even though thanksgiving is not a recognized holiday here. A lot of us students are getting together for a big dinner today at someone's apartment. I'm going to try to make stuffed mushrooms. That's all I wanted to say, have a happy thanksgiving!

Tomorrow is Friday!

So, up until today, this week has been pretty much a disaster. I did nothing but study the whole weekend and still felt horrible about my midterm performances. I almost missed my number theory midterm because I slept through my alarm and woke up with less than 10 minutes to get to class. It was my first time this semester that I failed to wake up--and of course it happens on midterm day--so I run to class just in time to take the test. But I wasn't quite all-together, being that I've been awake for 10 minutes, and the test ends up annihilating me. This was my second midterm of the week, the first being my algebra midterm, which I also wasn't happy about. All the midterm studying I had been doing, though, took away time for me to solve my conjecture and proof problems, so trying to fit all my C&P problems into the night before they are due, I can end up only solving 3 of 6. I was also completely lost in geometry, now that we've begun talking about projective geometry, which put me at 0 for four classes in which I know what's going on.

Today we got our algebra midterms back, and I got a 27/30! It turns out that a bunch of ridiculous claims I made on the exam which some sketchy proofs all turned out to be true, so I only got points taken off for minor things. So, this whole week I had been in a really bad mood since I don't feel like I know what's going on anymore in any of my classes, but now I got a little bit back, so my mood is better and I can go back to studying without a feeling of hopelessness constantly lingering.

Why Can't the Dollar be Worth More?

I decided to take a break from math for a bit and compute some of the expected costs of traveling Europe over the break. I've since come to the conclusion that I need more money and that I need to spend less. I've been cutting my spending by eating out less and cooking in more, which is hard since we don't have a firm foundation of cooking supplies to work with (all I have is mustard and worchestershire sauce). Basically, for the last couple days my dinner has been composed of four eggs and a banana. My roommate is also fond of the eggs, and we have weighed the pros and cons of buying a chicken to subvert rising egg costs. Plus, then we would have a chicken, which we could train to play tic-tac-toe and make some money to buy eggs with.

On a different note, who else is following Scrubs? Can you believe this is going to be the last season? I'm still in shock. I just know that some multimillionaire fan of the show is going to buy the sacred heart building once they vacate and turn it into a Scrubs shrine. My favorite quote from last episode, courtesy of J.D..

Kim: I hate your hair!
J.D.: Impossible, no one does.