The 2009 Christmas Diaries I

As the train left the centre of London behind I found myself engulfed in a British winter wonderland. The countryside actually looked rather idyllic clothed in white. The cottages and the rolling hills surrounding them reminded me of scenes from movies, all to rare in the real world. Snow doesn't usually settle in England, sure, there is usually a light snowfall one night close to New Year's Eve, but this was different. The coast of North Wales was considerably milder than the shocking cold London. I even went running with my brother yesterday, unsurprisingly not the most enjoyable experience ever - I felt like throwing up after the first hill... Oh, and on a lighter note - yesterday Fulham beat Manchester United, just thought I'd put that out there; now football results don't get much better than that.

Usually I spend my time at home in Wales lounging in bed engulfed in a novel, or staring at my computer screen; breakfast becomes a distant memory and 1 pm becomes the new 8 am. If I feel the need to eat more than one meal a day I'll have some ice cream or a couple of mince pies. Well, this Christmas that is all going to change (a pre-New Year resolution), not only has my brother decided to put me through a strict work-out regime; I have finals my first week back in January - and 3000 power point slides of notes to cover, in addition to the five last years worth of past papers. So, if I have to suffer - so should you. I'll be sharing some titbits of my studies in every blog this christmas, in addition to a very special christmas cliché.

One thing that has struck me this year is the extent to which science is dumbed down in order for students and other mere mortals to understand. I love the way atoms and molecules are personified and given titles such as chaperones. Humans seem to be the only things we can understand, so why try to pretend that everything is like us in order for us to understand. It's fair enough I guess, after all I do it myself all the time. In fear of boring my readers or indeed scaring you off after reading just one Christmas Chemistry Special, I have decided not to share the intricate delights of spectroscopy. Everyone loves histroy, hence the first Christmas Chemistry Special of 2009 is a brief insight into the scandalous history of modern science.

In 1904 the Austrian physicist Ludwig Boltzmann introduced the Boltzmann Distribution, which today is one of the cornerstones of understanding molecular systems. Many scientists refused to accept his work, however, and devoted their studies to disproving his theories. The attacks became so intense that in fear of his life's work collapsing on him Boltzmann comitted suicide just two years after publishing it; ironically his work was confirmed by experiment ahortly after his death.

Christmas Cliché I: Don't let any single thing become so important to you that if you loose it - you loose it all. (Don't put all your eggs in one basket)

a wake up call

I just had three of the worst hours in quite a while. Three hours filled by frustration, rage and humiliation. The spectroscopy workshop began well enough, untill one of the instructors led me down a path that brought on my foul mood. He suggested I use a formula which turned out to be pretty useless with regard to the question I was working on. Then, almost one hour later, still working on the same problem, I began repeatedly keying in the wrong numbers on my calculator. By this point the satisfactory sensation brought on by being way ahead of the people across the table from me had vanished entirely, not only because of my frustration, but because I was in fact no longer ahead. I had spent almost two hours solving four problems, out of a total of twelve. My professor kindly pointed out that an equivalent question to the one I had been struggling with would have been allotted approximately fifteen minutes for my exam. Clearly there was a problem. To add insult to injury, upon returning later he casually remarked that question six was in fact really easy, on a second glance he remarked "I don't know why I included that question, it is so easy." I'm sure he didn't realise that I had been staring at the question at loss for how to begin; at least I did as well as I could to make sure I was emitting an aura of confidence.

It is in fact incredible, how stupid and inferior a professor like Andrew de Mello can make you feel; one might almost assume his PhD was in intimidatory tactics. Despite my disheartening experience, I find myself upbeat. After all, one of my reasons for coming to Imperial was to discover that I'm not the most intelligent person around. It also reminds me that though my Christmas may not be white, it will most certainly be intellectually enriching...

what a waste

Being sick is such a waste of time. I've been stuck in my room since saturday morning, missed six lectures and one tutorial - which in itself might be the chance to have a blast; it hasn't been enjoyable though. As if that wasn't bad enough I feel really guilty about all the work I should have been doing. There are many pointless things in life, but sickness must be the most pointless of them all. Really being sick that is, "feeling ill" can be great as long as you feel bad enough not to have to do all the things you don't want to do anyway, while still being able to enjoy the things you don't get around to doing as often as you like. It's the perfect excuse, especially if you give it to someone you're not around - they'll never know that your illness isn't half as bad as it sounded in your text. Tomorrow I'm headed back to geek central though - one might safely say I have mixed feelings about the whole thing....