from a certain point of view [1], i have no love for the daytime. the late evening and nighttime are far superior: it is quiet, people away to their own agendas of play or sleep, and so doing, they leave me in peace ..
.. and i can actually get some work done.
east hall is too distracting: there are too many undergrads lollygagging along the corridors and making loud nuisances of themselves. do they deem us old, and hence deaf?
there are also too many grads, postdocs, and profs doing too much interesting mathematics. i overhear someone who is fascinated by this or that problem, and describes it in that same fascinating way. i can't help but listen and then i can't concentrate on anything.
absently i might find myself repeating the same steps in proof, and with good reason: my memory is faulty and my mind too easily confused by this stimuli to be any good for anything. this happens far too often for my taste.
for instance, it happened today. i couldn't accomplish anything i planned to do yesterday .. and not because i tried and failed, because i never had occasion for an earnest try ..
paradoxically, afternoons at coffeehouses are amazingly productive, but i have a theory concerning this. you see, noise in such places vary in volume, but it is essentially homogeneous: hence nothing attracts my attention more than anything else, and i don't get distracted.
if i work without my glasses (being nearsighted, it's a matter of lifting books and papers close enough for focus), then i don't have to worry about being distracted by anything, whether it be pretty girls at a distance or a man in a chicken suit running past the window.
it's all a wonderful, forgettable blur. i never thought i'd ever be happy in being unable to see well!
[1] yes. i stole this turn of phrase from "star wars: return of the jedi." it's the scene where luke confronts obi-wan with the truth:
"but you said that vader betrayed and destroyed my father!"
"and what i say is true, from a certain point of view."
sneaky old man, that kenobi. q:
No comments:
Post a Comment