some people plan holidays; others plan work time.

for the last three years, i've developed a kind of december tradition: i stop working on mathematics, except this one particular problem about measurεs on euclιdean spaces and generalised differentιal operators (called "derivatιons") related to them. as for why,

it's the one research problem i would like to solve,
the one obsession among all my obsessions.

it's also the only mathematical thought i can keep in mind,
amidst the happy confusion of family and holidays.

when i was younger i would try to bring my work with me, when visiting my parents. gradually i began to see the futility of it. if anything, i've grown tired of answering the same question.

"why are you working?" they ask.

one reason is that "i have to" but that's not a good reason: it's a small lie. if i were really honest with myself, it's because "i want to." then again, that's not a reason you can say out loud and get away with it.

it's the sort of thing that would reward me with a slap from my grandmother.

it's tempting to plan a retreat -- a working retreat -- before returning to the teaching grind. at any rate, because of bad planning, it's now impossible for me. next week is teaching preparations and the tricky first lectures to give. these matter; they set the right tone for the courses.

maybe i'll go away for MLK weekend (4 days!) to somewhere scenic, and come back with those new papers that i promised to colleagues. i'm thinking already about spring break and whom to visit, a visit to finland in may and what i can accomplish then.

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i never seem to think about what i've done.

in order of increasing frequency, i think about what i want to do, what i haven't done (yet), and what i'm doing.