Highlights for 2005

December 2005

• Defended dissertation. Writing an additional chapter.
• Attended Rocky '05.
• Ordered a Yamaha P-60 digital piano from eMusicGear.com.
• Used Wal-Mart's online photo-printing service. Very convenient.
• Skimmed John Gottman: Why Marriages Succeed or Fail.
• Finished reading War and Peace (audiobook).
• Returned without reading Betty Edwards: Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain; Kimon Nicolaïdes: The Natural Way to Draw; Thomas L. Friedman: The Lexus and the Olive Tree; Louis Menand: The Metaphysical Club.
• Had dim sum with Ray in Silver Spring.
• Watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on IMAX at the National Air and Space Museum.
• Brought CR-V to dealer for 10,000-mile maintenance.
• Returned sofa-sleeper to Pier 1 Imports and bought another sofa from IKEA.
• Skimmed John L. Casti: Five Golden Rules.

November 2005

• Attended a lecture by Stuart Isacoff on musical temperament.
• Scheduled dissertation defense for Monday, 5 December 2005. Revised dissertation.
• Finished reading Noam Chomsky: Understanding Power.
• Returned William Pleeth: Cello; Richard J. Trudeau: Dots and Lines; and Norman L. Biggs, E. Keith Lloyd, Robin J. Wilson: Graph Theory: 1736-1936 to the library without finishing them.
• Baked a turkey for Thanksgiving.
• Read Douglas K. Smith and Robert C. Alexander: Fumbling the Future. I wonder, whom would I want to be --- George Pake, Bob Taylor, or one of the brilliant computer scientists?
• Visited Fiddlesticks in New York City.
• Pruned rosemary bush. Raked leaves.
• Submitted an abstract to the APS March Meeting.

October 2005

• Dreamt about my [hypothetical future] first day in class as a professor. Felt relaxed and energized.
• Wrote my first class in Python.
• Started Leo Tolstoy: War and Peace (audiobook).
• Watched Raise the Red Lantern at the Kennedy Center.
• Dined with the Hill's.
• Dined at the Zia Diner with Aric and Wendi.
• Hiked to Jemez Falls.
• Dined at the Santa Fe Brewery with Aric and Wendi.
• Retired the Motorola T730 and transferred my Verizon Wireless number to T-Mobile prepaid service.

September 2005

• Replaced electrical outlets in the house.
• Pruned trees.
• Read Ken Bain: What the Best College Teachers Do.
• Rented a cello from the Violin Shop of Santa Fe.
• Read Malcolm Gladwell's Blink (audiobook).
• Wrote my first function in Python.
• Read George Orwell's 1984 (audiobook).
• Flipped through Richard J. Trudeau's Dots and Lines and Norman L. Biggs, E. Keith Lloyd, and Robin J. Wilson's Graph Theory: 1736-1936.

August 2005

• Visited Steve and Katie in ABQ.
• Finished reading Naipaul's House for Mr Biswas.
• Finished dissertation draft and e-mailed it to Carl.

July 2005

• Refinished floors in the house.
• Attended an "Introduction to IDL" training course.
• Visited Carlsbad Caverns National Park and White Sands National Monument with my parents.
• Repainted walls.

June 2005

• Moved to Los Alamos.
• Started reading Naipaul's House for Mr Biswas.
• Wrote my first function in IDL: quantize.
• Visited El Rancho de las Golondrinas, near Santa Fe.

May 2005

• Read Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner's Freakonomics. Disappointed. The last part of the book focuses on examples illustrating the difference between correlation and causality.
• Rejected from NRC Research Associateship.
• Interviewed at Technology Services Corporation.
• Interviewed at Boeing's Phantom Works.

April 2005

• Interviewed at Bechtel Nevada.
• Went house-hunting.
• Read James Surowiecki's Wisdom of Crowds. Not bad.

March 2005

• Bought daffodils for Xiaoli.

February 2005

• Submitted a proposal for an NRC Research Associateship on "Statistical and Physical Modeling of Sequencing by Hybridization".
• Stopped training at Kaplan.

January 2005

• Researched NRC Research Associateship positions at NIST.
• Moved (effective 15 January) to:

  871 Clopper Rd Apt 871
  Gaithersburg, MD 20878-4412

• Started training at Kaplan.
• Visited the National Library of Medicine.
• Visited IKEA and bought a sofa.