Last night was raining, I could get a ride from my roommate, but not this night, this night I wanted to ride my bike for a couple of reasons:
1) It's raining not snowing, that means it is warm (last week there was a night at -10 degrees Fahrenheit).
2) I chose to live in the wilderness instead of a city, what's the point of that if I take rides on cars instead of biking under the rain?
3) My bike feels new as I just had it in the bike shop.

So I ride my bike. Once I was going a little fast I realized I should put my goggles on, so I stop to get my goggles but realize I left them at my office. Oh well, there will be more adventure with water hitting my eyes.

I reach the first hill and the rain doesn't bother me at all (rain doesn't bother in uphill parts), as I reach the part of the road where I usually turn left to avoid a big hill, I decide I won't avoid it tonight. This night I felt good, the bike was smooth, might as well take on the hill, I hadn't tried it since October (on my first bike ride over here), so maybe I am more fit to do it. The hill was a piece of cake, I guess 4 months of biking does make a difference.

The downhill part felt like a Stan Brakhage movie, lots of colors (streelights), rain on my face making me see blurry, high speed (my highest gear wasn't enough for this speed). It was fun. The strange thing was the huge difference in terms of getting wet between biking slowly in the rain and biking fast. When I was fast, I was getting soaked, my feet felt as if they were in a pond inside my sneakers and my pants were heavy in water, I felt as if I had just gone through a waterfall instead of just biking outside. Now I understand how you can get more wet by running than by walking.

Monday was very good. I went to the Dartmouth Film Society to discuss the movies from the week. Everybody loved King of Kong (hooray), some people liked Knocked Up and others disliked it (I am on the dislike it camp).

After the discussion, Ralf and I had planned on watching Ghost in the Shell. Annalies joined us as we watched it in a big screen of one of the classrooms. I had heard people loving this anime movie and since it is sci fi anime I figured I would love it (more for the sci fi then the anime). I liked it, but I didn't love it. The drawings were very pretty and the story was cool, I guess I was just expecting a lot out of it.

I biked home, and it was the coldest I've biked in (at least that I know of). It was fun. I missed biking. When I got home I watched an episode of "Rome", I got the first five episodes form the library, I've been going to the library very often recently, checking out books to read and movies to watch. I love the library. The first episode of Rome was pretty cool, I have nothing to say, except that I am looking forward to more episodes.

Tuesday started with the Probabilistic Method class (I love this class), the professor took us out to lunch (the college paid for it), the food was good, but the best thing were the cookies. The cookies were ultra delicious. I ate them all, the other students were unlucky to have me in front of the cookies (I sat there on purpose), because I just ate them all up. Delicious.

I did some differential equations and then I left my tutorial early as no one was there (the homework is not due soon, so only two people showed up and left early), I left early to catch the last bus to Lebanon as I didn't want to be in Hanover when the snow storm hits (there will be a snow storm tonight). On the way to the bus I fell down (the snow can be annoying), I was scared that my laptop would hit my head (I almost always leave my backpack at school, but I brought it home today as I figured there was a nonzero chance of me not going to school on Wednesday due to the snow/sleet storm coming up).

My plan for the night is reading the proof of the Erdos-Kac theorem (as I will present it on Thursday), reading some more Crichton (I am reading his nonfiction book "Travels"), reading some other number theory stuff, watching an episode of Rome and playing poker. Hopefully is not too ambitious a plan. I decided I won't play Mario until I pass my number theory qual, the Wii will have to wait another 10 days before I play it (it has already waited 10 days, so waiting 10 more days shouldn't be a problem).

Last night I stayed in my office until 2am working on math stuff. It started snowing just before 2am, so I should have stopped doing math before. I was debating whether I should just call a cab or bike in the snow and I chose the latter as I hadn't biked in a while and it seemed like the weather was warm.

I am glad I biked in the snow, in part of the road I saw footprints of deer, it was really cool, I followed the footprints for a while. I enjoyed it quite a bit. I got home and felt great. I was also thinking about math problems because of my homework and Robert's recent update on Niven numbers. I woke up feeling quite mathy even though I slept less than 6 hours, I worked out a sum while showering and then missed my bus by less than a minute (I could see it leave the bus stop from a distance), it was annoying as I rushed out of my house in the rain to try to make it to the bus stop.

Another annoying thing happened today as my lock in the bike got stuck. So my bike is at the grocery store, hopefully when I decide to go back home, the lock will open (I have lubricant now to open it). This will make my journey home longer as I have to walk to the grocery store first.

The last two days have been fun in a math way, but also all around. I went to film society yesterday and had fun at that and I saw a movie today called "Cobra Verde" by Werner Herzog. The movie is worth watching if only for the performance by Klaus Kinski. I have the theory that I could watch any movie with Klaus Kinski as he is the best actor I have seen on screen. Amazing. The movie was about the slave trade in the nineteenth century and it had some cool scenes of Africans, some dancing, some fighting scenes, and other things. Herzog's filmmaking makes everything seem natural and not filmy at all. He is a great director.

Wii: Finished Super Mario Galaxy, beating Bowser was pretty tough. Four hours of my day went away in the process of getting 17 stars, this game is fantastic. I really love how the complicated the levels are getting: ice-skating, fire throwing, multi-jumping and many more things to get through levels. Awesome

TV: Have been watching more episodes of BattleStar Galactica. This show is really, really good. It might be better than Buffy (it almost feels blasphemous saying it). "Number 6" portrayed by Tricia Helfer is beyond beautiful, don't look for images as the images online aren't as good as how she looks on TV. The show deals with many issues and it has very interesting characters. My favorite is Baltar, the crazy scientist, he is funny, intelligent and unpredictable.

Movies: Haven't seen a movie in a while, I am thinking of watching "Sweeney Todd" tonight. I want to watch "Blade Runner" again to discuss it on a DVD club.

Math: I have been enjoying the class "Probabilistic Method" quite a lot. Here's a recent problem which I liked a lot:
"Pick numbers from the interval (0,1) in a random uniform manner. How many numbers are you expected to pick to get the sum to be bigger than 1?"
We proved it in class, and I came out with an alternative proof (although my proof is not as pretty as the one in class). The class is awesome.

-TAing Differential equations has been fun, I think I have learned quite a bit of stuff I had already forgotten. Today I gave them a review session on linear algebra, simple stuff, but I guess it will be needed for next week's homework and to be able to solve some differential equations. I showed them the definition of an adjoint, the funny thing is that when someone asked what it was good for I didn't know even though I took classes that kept using adjoints (functional analysis, analysis on manifolds), I guess I just don't really like functional analysis.

Books: I finished "What is the What" as I already reviewed it here, and I really loved it. I keep reading about stuff in Sudan. Yesterday I was reading an essay by Dave Eggers on writing the book, it was very interesting, describing how they chose to make it a novel instead of non fiction and how Valentino is doing now, plus talking about parts of the process and a trip Valentino and him made to Marial Bai in Sudan. It was wonderful to read about Valentino's meeting of his parents.

Right now I am reading "Vernon God Little" by DBC Pierre, which won the Booker prize in England (their biggest prize for books). It has been an entertaining read so far (I am half way through).

Biking: I fell out of my bike yesterday as it rained and then froze, so there was some ice. I fell and my front light broke. I decided to catch a ride home instead of biking because of the icy conditions, I rode my bike around town today and it looked much better. There were a couple of "warm" days (in the 20s Fahrenheit) which made biking a little extra enjoyable. I really enjoy riding home. Three nights ago, the moon looked orange and it was wonderful to go through the road being lit by an orange moon. I don't feel the cold when I ride, I don't feel tired anymore, it's mostly just fun. Although on the road from the house to school, it is tiresome, it is surprising how going uphill can make the ride much less enjoyable.

Politics: I am quite disappointed on how Edwards disappeared from the race mainly because he wasn't liked in New Hampshire. It is surprising how from 28% polling plummeted to 12% because one state doesn't like you (although the 28% was his bump from the good run in Iowa). I think he is more progressive than Hillary and Obama. Among them, I like Obama more, but I don't dislike Hillary like other people do. I dislike her foreign policy, but I like a lot of things about her. I really dislike how the media portrays Hillary. I mainly like Obama because he seems like a uniting voice and a force for real change.
Among the Republicans, I watched the debate yesterday (at least a good chunk of it) and I have to say that I'll take Huckabee and Paul over McCain and Romney any day. I like Ron Paul because he likes small government and no wars, I like Huckabee because he seems like a very nice guy. I don't like religion, but I think people have exaggerated on the complaints of Huckabee's religion. I'd rather have a nice, honest guy than a someone like Romney (although I think Romney is not as bad as he might seem, because I think he is saying crazy things just to get the base of the Republicans to like him). McCain doesn't seem so bad if you forget about his hawkishness, but since I like Paul for his anti-hawkishness, the logic follows that I would dislike McCain as president. Yes, he is willing to be bipartisan which is good, but his ideas about war (i.e. Iran) are bad. I don't understand why I have more fun following the Republican nominations process than the Democrat one, I think I just like understanding Republicans more since they seem to think very differently from me.

Football: The Super Bowl is coming up. I don't know if I should root for the Patriots because I live in New England or if I should root for the Giants because they're the underdog (I love the underdogs). I think I'll go with the Giants. If the Pats win they'll be the best team to have played (although they cheated, so that probably should detract some points). As much as I love Peyton Manning, I must admit that I like Tom Brady very much. He is a great quarterback and his funny in interviews. I enjoyed this very much. A reporter from TV Azteca (Inez Gomez Mont) made headlines by going to the Super Bowl Media Day on a wedding dress and asking Tom Brady to marry her, that's Mexican journalism, pulling pranks in front of everybody.

I biked to school in the afternoon. I hadn't biked since last Sunday (due to Lizzie's visit) and it was nice to go back out. I saw an episode of Battlestar Galactica which was good (the show is really good) and I saw the movie Before the Devil Knows You're Dead.

After the movie, I joined Giulio, Luisa and Dafina at a party. The party was packed. I felt out of place as the party was so full of people and the music wasn't the type of music I like. There was a room that people were using for coats and I noticed there were pictures of a white woman with black kids in the open, so I looked at more pictures and assumed it meant she had gone to Africa. She came in and looked annoyed at me looking at the pictures that were in the wall, but when I told her my name she was happy she could practice her Spanish with me. She was a Spanish teacher and lived in Honduras for a while as a teacher and did missionary work in Africa (so I was right). We didn't talk much, but it was nice to meet a person that helps out around the globe.

I biked home late at night and it was nice, but this morning (Sunday), biking to school was annoying because it was snowing. My bike doesn't have fenders so I got mud all over my sweatpants and my jacket (at least these are things I only use to bike).

It was nice to do something different this weekend (and the whole week for that matter). I am also doing a very good job as a tutor, being prepared in advance for a couple of sessions. I have to do some reading for local theory (number theory) as I am presenting tomorrow at 3. It seems like I am having a productive, fun and healthy trimester.

I've been riding my bike daily now taking advantage of the "warm" weather (where warm = not super cold). It's been nice.

I saw the Battlestar Galactica miniseries (3 hours long). It is great. I am looking forward to continuing watching this show. The first episode of season 1 called "33" was fantastic. It had a great idea and it was well executed. Fantastic.

I watched the movie Rules of the Game, the acclaimed French movie directed by Jean Renoir in 1939. I had seen this before. After the movie Annalies and I talked about the movie and in particular how we felt that the description of the movie as "satirizing the hypocrisy of the upper class" seems unfounded. It seems that the movie is more about understanding how different people think and that emotion can lead to quick decisions that aren't the best. In the booklet of the movie there is a letter that Francois Truffaut wrote to Jean Renoir talking about how the movie changed his life and how the movie made him understand the motives of other people. That letter showed me that not all critics thought it was a satire of the upper class. The movie is funny and has its satire, but it is much more than that. It was great to see this movie again.

In other news, a big box full of Choco Krispis (my favorite cereal) was sent by my mom. I am very happy about it. She also sent two "Rosca de Reyes" (King's cake). I shared one of the roscas with the math department on Tuesday, I am saving the other to share with my housemates.

On Saturday I had lunch with Xia and her boyfriend. They made some Chinese style meal. It was tofu and cabbage and rice. It was very good. Then they gave me a ride to school.

Paul got a very good job offer (a postdoc offer) and we went to celebrate to Ben and Jerry's. They were out of many things, so the shake I ordered wasn't the one I wanted but it was still very good. It was also fun to talk with Ben, Ralf and Paul.

I went to dance a little at a latin night thing. Last year it was packed and awesome, but this year it was empty, yet I danced three songs with a girl named Luisa. She's interested in the latin culture because she wants to do research in Bolivia on the impact of drugs on indigenous people.

At night I went to Paul and Annalies's home and watched an episode of Buffy. I headed home after that as it was very late.

On Sunday, I came to school and watched the Colts game. I was very saddened by their loss. My dad and I were planning on attending the AFC Championship game between the Pats and the Colts, but the Colts lost and we don't like the Chargers that much to go. My dad went to the Cowboys game and they lost too.

After the game, I TA-ed for three hours. I am TAing Differential Equations, a subject I took 3 years ago and I don't remember much about, but it looks fun.

I went to see Discreet Charm of the Bourgeois. I was happy that Dartmouth finally showed a Luis Buñuel film, one of my favorite directors. This particular movie is not one of my favorites, but it definitely has several very memorable scenes. The movie got a lot of recognition when it came out and it is a movie that makes you think.

At night I watched half of the miniseries "BattleStar Galactica" since Desmond convinced me in San Diego that I should watch the show. The miniseries was looking good and I wanted to watch it all, but I had to bike home before the snow came (I now follow weather reports to see when I should bike).

On the bike home I saw 5 deer and 2 cats. First I saw 3 deer, two adult and one young one. Then later on the road (about 20 minutes later) I saw 2 more deer. They are very pretty since they are white-tail deer. I heard a cat scream and I noticed two cats in front of me. One of them wasn't moving, I hope it was okay.

It has snowed all day, so I'll get some heavy biking, but the weather is not cold, so it will be fine.

Friday was great because of the qual passing, but other than that, the only thing worth writing about is watching the behind the scenes of the episode "Once more with Feeling" of Buffy. That episode is the musical episode and it is brilliant, it might be the climax of what TV can offer on series. It is magnificent, great songs, great singing (specially Amber Benson, "Tara"), Joss Whedon is just a TV genius. Now I have the songs on my Ipod and I have listened to them over and over again for 4 days.

On Saturday I was supposed to take a train to Amherst, but the taxi couldn't pick me up, so I just stayed home. I went to the comic book store in Lebanon, which is closing in 10 days, so I bought a few comics at half price. I also ate at a nice sandwich place and read a couple of essays on Superman (they were excellent essays) on a book that was on the sandwich place.

I also went to see I am Legend. The story about me going to the movie was pretty funny. I call a friend asking how far the movie theatre is, he says is a bit over a mile, so I bike there. When I get there, I find out I have no wallet, so I go back home. But I don't have my keys. So I knock on the door for over 5 minutes until my roommate finally hears me (house with two floors). I was very cold and couldn't feel my toes (weather was about 10 degrees Fahrenheit), I change my socks, put double socks on and head back out there to watch the movie. It took me thirty minutes to warm up once I was at the movie theatre, but I was there early, so it didn't distract from the movie.

The movie I am Legend was pretty good. It had suspense, it made me feel a little of the isolation of Will Smith (although not all of it) and I really liked the dog. The problem with the movie was that at the end it had "Deus Ex Machina" followed by another and another and another. It compacted too much stuff to make it more action packed. It was good. Worth watching if it is cheaper than $8.

I had my algebra qual this morning at 9:30am. I passed. I am very happy. I studied all day on Thursday (all day = 4pm to 2am). It really help to just bug Paul P. all day with questions. He helped me improve field theory enough to pass the qual. I did a remarkable job on rings, a good job on groups, a so-so job on fields and a bad job on modules (I did a good job on linear algebra though), so I got a pass, although not "thesis ready" which would imply I was "ready" for a thesis in algebra.

The last two nights the weather has been very hard to bike in (sleet two nights ago and snow last night), so I took a cab on both nights. John was supposed to give me a ride two nights ago, but he forgot. I got home and was planning on sleeping 5 hours last night, but I was so hyped about the exam this morning that I couldn't sleep so I played some Guitar Hero instead. I did an almost perfect job on the song "Knights of Cydonia" it is impressive how much I have improved in the medium level, I should really start working on the "Hard" level. I have passed about 8 songs on hard, but only 3 in the career mode (I passed most of them on quickplay because I can't pass one on career mode that prevents me from trying the next ones, as you unlock in groups of 4).

This weekend I'll go to Amherst and Boston and Monday I go to Italy. I'll spent Christmas and New Year's with my mom and sister while we travel Italy. I am looking forward to that.

I am also looking forward to playing some Wii tonight in celebration.

I feel like in a movie or something, the ride on the bike on Sunday night was just crazy. I rode through a snow storm. Ice formed on my right eyelash, ice formed on my "beard" (I quote it since it doesn't grow like a beard, but I haven't shaved in a month, so it is beard like). The ice in my right eye lash was amazing, I took a picture, I haven't seen it yet, but I hope it looks good. The difficulty of riding was in not being able to go fast because I couldn't see with the snow hitting my eyes. Now I have some goggles and even a face mask (although I won't use the face mask yet, since it isn't that cold yet).

After bicycling I stayed home on Monday to study for algebra and I played some Wii.