Tough Start

I had been returning to my works for a week. Today is the date of the first seminar. I was about 5 minutes late, but it took a while to catch up the topic. The slides projected on the screen were yellow, and the slides were not careful made, especially the tables with some words in strange shapes. Later we were informed this was a job market talk. Because this topic is not my field, I didn’t bother to any comment unless I was in the recruiting committee.

After the seminar, just like it used to be, with the guest we went to the on-campus hotel for a dinner. Although there were so many deluxe dishes, the tastes were never amazing. Each dish was either salty or spicy. I found most of my energy had run out while eating and listening to what they were talking. The dinner lasted two hours; however, I felt it was like lasting three hours or longer.

It was 8:30 pm when I came back to the office on old campus. I continued to find a way to extract a variable from a data file. I had spent a few hours today trying Stata and R. No solution found. Finally I came back to MatLab, the one I haven’t used for one year. Because of wasting so much time on the awful internet, it was 10:00 pm when I figured out the way and installed software necessary for running MatLab. Due to the lack of both intellectual and physical proficiency, this was the first time I thought I am getting old.

This was just the first week. It can be expected that there are more difficulties on the way. What else can I do other than praying?

Dreaming a Reality

The stay in Raleigh was memorable. In the morning I woke up, then prepared a simple breakfast, and drove to school. The routes were familiar. No miss in anywhere I should make a turn, stop, and change the lane. The work a day started in the study room, the library or the office. Occasionally, the time was flying away when I had a chat with friends. Sometimes we exchange ideas, sometimes just for fun. In a month I live like a student.

Talley Student Union, was called Talley Student Center