Rebecca, We Salute You

She's been working for almost 4900 hours straight (203 days), survived power outages, and network attacks. This is a salute to Rebecca - my old Compaq laptop. Today we rearranged the lounge room and unplugged her, and the battery couldn't sustain her for the 5 minutes we took to rearrange the lounge room. She'll be going to Canada with me to provide file and network services in my apartment, much as she does here. But I think now is a good enough time to salute her service. To Rebecca!

Prof Under Siege

One of my favourite professors (he teaches logic and number theory) has come under siege from some rather foolish people writing to Column 8 in the Sydney Morning Herald. It started when someone provided a definition of 'even'.

"I don't know what mathematicians Etan Stokes has been talking to!" thunders Martin Bunder, Professor of Mathematics as the University of Wollongong. "The even numbers are 0, 2, -2, 4, -4, 6, -6, … so 0 is even, and there is no smallest even number. 0, 1, -1, 2, -2, … are the integers. An even number is defined to be one that is twice an integer."

The response he received was, at best, confused. As a mathematics student it feels odd to see people get it so wrong:

"I don't know how Martin Bunder became a professor of mathematics with the kind of logic displayed in his argument but, by his own reasoning, he is incorrect," shrugs Robert Gotts, of Winmalee. "If an even number is an integer multiplied by 2 then what did he multiply to get 0? And how can we see by looking at 0 whether it has been multiplied by anything at all? Or if we divide it by 2 enough times would the resulting 0 then be an odd number? Zero is a place marker (note how it functions in binary). It counts nothing and represents the absence of anything countable."

I like the response though:

Professor Bunder is in the highest of dudgeon. "If you will allow me a response to Robert Gotts, you can have a long or a short version. The long is: Robert Gotts questions both my qualifications and my logic. I have a BSc in pure and applied maths, an MA in formal logic and a PhD in mathematical logic as well as over a hundred academic publications, mainly on mathematical logic, but also on number theory. I would guess that the number of Robert's formal qualifications in these areas is 0. The evenness of 0 relies only on the two simple definitions I gave last week. 0 is an integer, 0 = 2 x 0, so 0 is an even number. The short version is the last sentence."

See Column 8 for more. It's kind of like a discussion (refereed by the editor) on all sorts of weird things.

A Real Place to Call Home

Some great people at work found me a place to live. I've attached a map showing a (slightly silly) way to get to work from it. The route shown on the map is about 3.6km, though I expect a shorter path to be about 2-2.5km. It's a one-bedroom place, with fridge and washing machine, but otherwise unfurnished. Will cost me $CA840 per month to rent, plus utilities. Not bad considering it's basically right downtown. When I have more information (like the floorplan) I'll post it.

Careful With Those Hands

After the visa appointment yesterday I found myself wandering (technically the word is 'lost' but nevermind) in Pitt St, Sydney. I realised I was going to miss a train and so had 20 minutes to waste. I'd always wanted to try one of those little Chinese massage setups that you see in malls nowadays, so opted for 'Arms and Hands'.

Started out nicely, all gentle. But then they start sticking thumbs into muscles in ways that are extraordinarily painful. The pain is probably because my muscles don't get used properly, but the question then is, what types of massage are just nice and relaxing? I've heard of Swedish massages, but what about Thai? I want something to relax me, not make my feet sweat from the stress.

If you have one of these painful massages, how can you tell they did a good job anyway? My arms joints feel like they might be a bit looser today, especially the wrists. Which sucks when I try to push on things as the limited flexibility of those joints is what stops them from hurting.

US Visa Process

Today I went and paid for my US Visa. I'm sorry, but the guy there was as arrogant and unhelpful as I was led to believe. I was told by others who were also applying for their visa that some of the people there were nice, and I could see that they were. I just got the aggravating one. Anyway, the process is:

1. Choose your appointment time about 2 weeks ahead from their website.
2. Turn up on the day, and try the elevator to level 59. It doesn't work. You actually have to go to level 10 to pass a screening process which will then let you into an elevator that goes to level 59.
3. One minute later pass a second screening process, almost identical to the first except this time they also have an x-ray machine for whatever you were carrying.
4. Enter the waiting room and take a number. That's right, your "appointment time" is actually "the time at which you will take a number and join the queue to have your appointment". Really sucks for the people from Brisbane who had scheduled their flights based on their supposed "appointment time".
5. About an hour later (not sure, mobile phone had to be off) get called up to hand in your documents. The man is on the other side of a pane of glass, mumbles in an accent and hasn't turned on his microphone.
6. Get exceptionally rude treatment because you are not able to hear his instructions, and for not answering questions on the form for which there is no answer. Then get sent away to the post office to exchange your $130 money order for the correct payment method (some obscure item that the person at my post office did not know about).
7. Come back from the post office (traversing the 2-pass security again), and forcefully explain that you cannot answer the questions he asked because you're not going to the US now, you're going to Canada for a year and the Visa Waiver Program will not apply if you drop into the US and back to Canada. So questions like "when will you enter the US" and "who is paying for your trip" really don't have any answers.
8. He asked that you don't leave the fields blank, but you get abused again as you've now put "-" in all the questions that were previously unanswered. Only "NA" or "Unknown" is understood apparently.
9. Forms are now accepted. Sit down for another half-hour until a pleasant man calls you over to ask you rapid-fire questions about what you're doing in Canada (testing that you have your story straight). I'm pretty sure he has no idea what "constraint programming" is, but he was certainly the nicest guy I dealt with.
10. Be told that your visa will be issued and your passport mailed back to you in the next couple of days. Yes they do keep your passport overnight, and it's your responsibility to provide the envelope with your address for them to post it back in.

I just hope I get Permanent Residency in Canada at some point so that the Visa Waiver Program can kick back in. It doesn't apply at the moment as I'll be a Temporary Worker and would be returning to Canada after any trip into the US.

To be honest I'm more interested in my luggage at the moment. :)