XXX

No, XXX is not referring the movie. XXX is actually my Triple-Ex-Roommate Kim (as opposed to my Ex-Roommate Margaret and my Double-Ex Roommate Eleanor - have I mentioned I move around a lot?)

XXX is awesome. She lets me crash in her spare bedroom and play with her puppy every time I visit Charlottesville. She also occasionally even lets me get a math-fix by helping her write logic tests and quizzes.

If you are a dwarf, then you are an Old Narnian.

If you are an Old Narnian, then you are a dwarf.

Converse, inverse or contrapositive? Anyone?

Work accomplished today:

1) Began debating modifications to my dissertation chapter outline. Not like it's due in two days or anything...

Organization In 21st Century America

So I was reading a book on Benjamin Franklin's book collection yesterday, and his attempts to organize it. This made me realize 1) my book collection is completely uncataloged (and, since it is currently in boxes, very unorganized) and 2) I really ought to consider making up a finding aide for my dissertation research notes.

In other news, my friends at the APS let me go up into the rare book vault and browse the shelves that have all the books I've been requesting, in case I missed something in the catalogue. It makes me realize how much, when I'm in open stacks, I like to do shelf browsing around the books I request. The difference between the online organization and the physical organization is pretty incredible. And I find it much easier to scan a shelf of books than to scan a list of books by shelf number. Of course, I also find it easier to scan/read a book in its original than flip electronic pages. Does this make me the electronic-age version of a dinosaur?

Research accomplished yesterday and today:

1) Read a bunch of political pamphlets.

2) Read through a couple of algebra and Latin arithmetic textbooks

3) Discovered the London Gazette online (thnx Taylor!)

Now I'm taking off researching early to go dissertate. A week to the ACLS deadline and counting!

Probability, Fortifications and Some Moving Math

So this weekend I was proud to field a phone call from my baby brother (I have to add the baby part because he's like six feet tall so I can't call him my little brother anymore, and he looks older than me, so I want to make sure no one's in any doubt that I am the big sister here). He had some questions about probability.

Now, it's been probably eight years since I had much to do with probability, and it was never my favorite subject. In fact, I seem to remember calling a certain course "Probability and Sadistics." Nevertheless, I actually knew what he was talking about! And sorta helped him out! I'm so glad to know that I can still legitimately call myself a mathematician.

On another note, yesterday I was also randomly looking up something re: the US Navy on wikipedia and followed a few links to discover some guy called Vauban, who I'd never heard of before but was a French fortifications expert in the 17th century. Cool.

Then I went into the APS today, pulled the first of my manuscript sources, and discovered it was on Vauban. Creepy, bizarre, coincidence?

At work today, I got to talking with another fellow today about moving. A few quick calculations lead to some very frightening results. I think I need a job. And to not move for a few years. Because here's my current track record:

In the past 18 months I have lived in 8 different cities. Not counting all the moves of the past 18 months, I have still moved 14 times and had 13 different roommates in the past 10 years. (So that all took place in a 8.5 year time frame, for those who are counting.)

Research accomplished this weekend and today:

1) Wrote up more stuff for my current fellowship application.

2) Outlined a chapter of my dissertation.

3) Read a couple of manuscript sources.

4) FINISHED the almanacs at the APS.

Whew!

Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock

If you've ever watched the Big Bang Theory, you know exactly what the title of this post refers to. If you haven't, check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iapcKVn7DdY

You can take the girl out of the math department, but you can't take the dork out of the girl!

Research accomplished today:

1) Read a lot of almanacs, including several that exist nowhere else in the world and one that ESTC doesn't believe exists!

2) Promised my advisor both a revised dissertation proposal and a chapter of said dissertation.

Um, I think I might be blogging a bit less in the upcoming weeks!

Why Units Matter

So I was reading through an arithmetic textbook at the library yesterday, and found a section where some reader had crossed out the word "weeks" several times and replaced it with "days."

Here's why units matter in a math problem.

Suppose 12 men can mow 480 acres in 56 weeks. Note: there are only 52 weeks in a year.

If you do the math, that means 1 man can do 40 acres in 56 weeks, or 1 acre in 1.4 weeks. That means he's doing about 1/10 of an acre a day. What is he mowing with - his wife's sewing scissors??

Now suppose 12 men can mow 480 acres in 56 days. 56 days is 8 weeks, but we'll only work 6 out of 7 days a week (Sundays, gang, can't work on a Sunday) which means really we're only working 48 of those 56 days. So 1 man can do 40 acres in 48 days, which is starting to look like about an acre a day.

Doesn't that look a lot better? Especially since the acre used to be defined as how much a man could plow (which, yes, is a little different from mowing) in a day!

Units matter. And that's my math geekiness for the day.

Research accomplished Friday:

1) Read a bunch of arithmetic books

2) Read a bunch of almanacs

3) Discovered that "Beware the Cat" was an early modern book about talking cats.

4) Decided to call it quits early when I started putting almanacs into the wrong folders and writing about "bencil parks" in my manuscripts.

Have a great weekend!