My (infrequently updated) Blog

My father passed away about ~24 hours ago. We were so close, and always getting closer. God I want to write so much more here, but nothing would do him justice, and I'm finding it difficult to type. Perhaps I'll write more later. It's still quite surreal for me, but I wanted to post this now for friends/family with details about the arrangements (there are so many to call).

He swore he would never die of cancer, and still die with his full head of glorious silver hair. He did just that.

The visitation is this Thursday, July 22 from 4-8pm at Middendorf-Bullock in Covington, Ky, on Main St. The funeral, burial, and reception start this Friday, July 23 at noon at Mother of God Church, also in Covington, Ky. There is an online obituary that is far too short to do justice to the man, but adequate enough for details, located here (Enquirer) and here (Middendorf-Bullock).

He was an amazing guy who knew so many people, so far and wide, so well. I miss him so much already.

Some of my favorite photos of dad, from our Ireland trip
    

Much has happened, and much hasn't. I still haven't posted the pictures & video from the wedding, but they will be coming soon. The last few weeks have been rather busy and, for the most part, very satisfying.

For the last two weeks, UC's Computer Science department held a summer camp for local area high school students, and like last year, I was able to teach most of the kids (18 of them!) introductory programming with Java! You can see all of the examples/notes we covered my section's website, here:

I'll be posting the individual projects of each student shortly.

The camp was a blast. We got some great feedback from the parents, some of which reported that after the first week, their kids had already decided that computer science was the field for them, and they like UC. Even in my beginner section (where few students had any prior programming/CS experience), there were some outstanding kids who learned so much, and even built some rather cool projects. Everybody learned something, and some are still working on their projects now that camp has finished, occasionally emailing me for advice.

Concerning my PhD... I'm still chugging-away, and have a few nice theorems completed already. A few more, and the end will be in sight! I'm so excited!

Also, yesterday was τ-day. You all celebrated, right?

Super-nerd, science writer, math writer, magician, and too-many-more-titles-to-list awesome guy Martin Gardner passed away yesterday. For everyone who enjoyed his writing (which is anyone who ever read his writing), this is a loss.

I read a collection of his Mathematical Games columns when I was a junior in high school (nerd!) and it really started me down the path of mathematical curiosity (Curioser and Curioser! as Carroll said, and Gardner loved to cite).

Sagan inspired my scientific curiosity from an early age, but Gardner inspired me mathematically. Before reading his columns I was an OK student in mathematics, and not terribly interested in the subject. I struggled, and found the subject tedious. After reading a collection of his columns one week, I couldn't help but scream in my mind “Really? Really? Really? It's that easy! And fascinating!” He had a gift, and used it to affect millions. I'm only one.

I'm genuinely sad to hear that he's passed.

If you've never heard of him, or have but simply don't know that much about him, I highly encourage you to watch this video. It's a video containing an interview with Gardner himself at one of the “Gardner Gatherings” that were often held in his honor. This one person connected so many people in such a positive way, all in the pursuit of intellectual curiosity. He really was an amazing person.

Link to video:

We have our wedding & honeymoon photographs finally and they should be posted soon. Thank you all again for attending and making it the wonderful evening it was.

Most at the wedding were surprised by my short hair and shorter beard. Well... I now have shorter hair and no beard. Egads I'm freezing most of the time! I plan to post pictures soon, after my face heals from the first shaving (where I lost ~1 lb of skin). I have a large zip-lock bag full of hair that I plan to give to my father for Father's day... it should please him greatly.

PhD is progressing nicely. I hope to be finished with my proposal shortly and graduate not too long after that (standard grad-student claim: “~1 year!”). It will be at least 7 months (required), but probably not much more than that. In all honesty though, I'm very excited about school and my research. It's really fun, and though the end is in sight and I'm excited to start anew, I will really miss the freedom and routine of grad-student research.

Best News: Neal (groom's man #2) will be visiting us this weekend. Much fun and intellectual intrigue is anticipated.

Meghan & I would like to thank everybody who showed up to our wedding last night and made it the unforgettable evening that it was!!!

We're busy packing now for the honeymoon but we will both certainly write more after we get back.

Thank you all so much!