Tuesday, December 14, 2004

One hurdle to go ..

My last Functional Analysis problem set is done, or rather, I decree it to be done. If I ever see it again it will likely be returned with dozens of red marks per page, despite the fact that I took great pains to check the details. Certain things are inevitable, it seems .. and people wonder at the origins of my paranoia and pessimism.

One take-home exam for Differentiable Manifolds is left, then I can start reading the papers that my collaborator sent or suggested to me. More and more I find classes strange .. strange in the sense that the contents of lectures are fascinating and fine things; I'm learning a lot .. but too often I find that at any given moment there are other mathematics, specifically other topics or problems that I'd rather be doing or thinking about ..

On a somewhat related note, my collaborator is coming into town, which in an ideal setting means that we'll have time to catch up and work on the paper oft mentioned before. In the most ideal of settings, we can finally put that paper to rest and to start a new, more geometric-minded one.

Now that is motivating mathematics!

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