Mane

Punk rock metal karaoke Visiting the "Punk rock metal karoke" in the Continental club in New York is always really entertaining. Combining a band playing covers of classical punk and metal songs with an enthusiastic crowd of well-listened singers-to-bees is rather novel, but recommendable idea. Many singers are able not just sing, but also otherwise imitate the original singer. And then there are some singers, who just do not know how to sing or anything else; the band is good enough to make their failures not that embarrassing. The best beach in the world Forget Copacabana, Ipanema, and Waikiki beach. They are just boring, unpleasant, and inpractical when compared with spending time on the lawns of the Union Square in New York. In Union Square, one has some great book stores, a record store, some coffee shops, our hotel, public toilets, a food store, newspaper stands, and - frankly- more beautiful people than on the world famous beaches. And, when one gets bored with ta...

The Decemberists At 6.30pm I got a call from Sandra, a friend of Milton as she said. She had two extra tickets for tonight's Decemberist concert - and she insisted in giving the tickets free for us. It is hard to turn down free concerts. And we really were lucky not to do so. The concert was really good. The band played some mixture of folk, Irish-music, and pop. They did everything so well. Do yourself a favor and check them out. Strange thing Having a policy, and a guard enforcing it, which prohibits sitting on the stairs. Squatting, kneeling, and standing is OK, though. (Avalon, Boston). Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs from May to June 2005".

Crono Raining today, raining tomorrow. I think I have to start to do my thesis. Or then I will go binge drinking. Today we got some practicalities done. Otherwise, we just idled. I am off now. It seems that since there is nothing else going on, there is nothing going on here in my blog either. Maybe later. No need to check this blog for some days now. Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs from May to June 2005".

Culture Finally, I have both time and enthusiastic company for going to movies, theaters, and exhibitions. First, we went to see the "Fever pitch", which is based on a novel by Nick Hornby. The novel tells a story about football, or soccer, fans in Britain. The movie tells a story about baseball fans in Boston. It is a funny movie, and well worth the time. The story is good enough to make even Drew Barrymore's acting tolerable. In the evening, we went to Improv Boston in Cambridge. We were a bit late and arrived in the middle of the first act. It was not so good, I did not really get the point. The second act was much better. Some visiting group played some sketches. They were really good, well written and comptently presented. The funniest act, however, was the jamboree. Now it was time for the audience to take the stage, and improvise short acts. We did not dare to do that, since we felt quite a bit uneasy about improvising in English. After a few weeks, I will go th...

S is here Es gibt keines Stilleben noch mehr: S ist hier! And life got better, not least because I do not have to talk to myself so much anymore. Not that I would stop it. At the airport, I was both reading the book about hypomania and observing people. I find airports, especially arrivals waiting hall, very anti-depressing. How could one be depressed when seeing the nervous waiting, all spontaneous, but also surprised, smiles, the hugging couples, women on their toes, tired children running to the long awaited parent. I should go there more often, not to meet anyone, just to read a book, and to gather some joy. I do not understand why people complain about connections to the airport. I took the T from Park Street. It took only 20 minutes to the terminal E. We took taxi back to Back bay, $28, no queue to mention. So, the trick is to leave own car somewhere away from the airport. Air traffic seminar - final presentation On Friday, our seminar group gave its presentation to the J...

Abenteuer Stilleben im Boston: I bin mit dem Rotem T-zug nach Braintree gefahren. Dort gibt es nichts. So, I bin nach Davis gefahren um ein Buchhandeln zu besuchen, und auch etwas zu essen. Das Buchhandeln "McIntyre and Moore" is sehr gut, aber I habe keine Bücher gekaufen. Es war ein sehr gutes Abenteuer. Cape Cod On Monday, we took Kumar's car and drowe all the way to the tip of Cape Cod. Before leaving Boston, we took a quick look at the map and estimated the distance to be about 60 miles. It was 123 miles, and it takes 2 hours each way. The long drive is worth doing: the scenery is really nice, the trees remind me of the wind-beaten shores of Baltic. Along the way, one can take a break in some of the shopping malls. There is no way of telling one from the other; standardization and profit maximization has removed all variation. It makes me sad, and really homesick. Cape Cod is famous for some pilgrims who arrived there in 1620, and established a colony there. I ...

Six important things. I cleaned my cave. It was so dusty, that I started to cough last night. I got a new futon. The spring semester is now over. 81 units! I have now 93 units, which is worth of 1.5 master's degrees. I have 5 courses and thesis left. It is a pity I cannot do all courses in summer. I have a bottle of Jack Daniels. I am so tired. But I am also incredibly happy. Wisdom In Lisbon they say: "Do not run after any women or tram. There will always be another.". I agree on trams and most women, except one. I and Kumar have another saying: "Do not run after money. Do your best and money will run after you". Daily crono I woke up at 11am, had lunch with Kumar, came back, and spent the rest of the day writing the air traffic seminar paper. Now it is ready. It is not as good as it could be, but should be "good enough" for the purpose. The topic itself is fascinating and would make for a good master's thesis. Namely, how is the a...

On meaning of life "The meaning of life is what you make of your time" says Myron W. Evans and is right. I have realized during the last 5 months, that the most important decision is where to use my time - I think that studying, and later trying to use the new skills and knowledge for something, which helps the whole human race (like energy systems, or water systems, or political systems distributing wealth more evenly, etc) is the most valuable thing to do. Just going to work for a some company just to get a lot of money, buying a house in suburbs, two cars, whatever, oh, what a waste, what a meaningless way of living one's life. That is, for me. For someone else, it certainly is meaningful. Also, as pointed out by Kumar today, money does not bring happiness - just imagine suddenly getting 10 million dollars. It would be a catastrophe! It would, at least for short term, devoid life of any meaning. I think I have to make sure I do not get millions suddenly. (thanks t...

Daily crono I wrote the technology strategy final exam in the morning. I have never had less motivation to write anything, and it was hard. I managed to put down some 1500 words in 2.5 hours, and then I submitted it without even proofreading it. There has to be some limit in repeating the same thing. This is not gymnastics, this is academic work. Or at least I think so. We had the final disruptive technologies class today. First, one group gave a presentation about RFID. It was a good presentation, but they clearly did not really know quite enough about the topic. But that is OK in this course, as it is not about technical details but larger picture of emerging industries. I have to say that Kevin is a good presenter - it would do good for him to sometimes say that he does not know instead of talking himself in the corner. In general, it seems that for many of us it us just too hard to acknowledge any ignorance. And still it is so much easier to acknowledge than just BS around it. ...

Daily crono Absentmindedness is on the rise. Yesterday, I forgot a meeting with Francis , and today he forgot a meeting with me. No harm done, we got the things sorted out without a meeting, and have now completed the team part of air traffic policy seminar. I just need to write the official 10-page paper to be all set. I will do that on Saturday. I tried to write my technology strategy final exam during afternoon. I just could not. It really seems, that I cannot write during afternoon. I think I would do well by admitting this, and not even trying to write before 6pm. At least usually. Tomorrow, on Thursday, I have to write the exam, since today I spent my writing time in a bar. I only had 4 pints, but it took the motivation to write something that repetitive away. In a bar, I was asked what I think about SDM@MIT after one semester. My honest answer (are there any other kinds of answers) was and still is: " Well, it is a good way to get in MIT ". A bit expensive though, ...

Disruptive technologies Our team ( Per Morten, Trond, Eivind , and me) presented our research results in the Disruptive technologies-class today. Per Morten was nice and brave enough to give the whole presentation, and he did so well: it is easy to believe that he is a senior manager (and chairman of the board of a large telecom) back in Norway. Really professional, calm, fluent presentation - actually, I have seen no other student presenter being as good. I think the material was good enough, but professor Utterback did tell us that we should have been even bolder. It is not that often I have been told, that I am too conservative - one nice thing in MIT, too. I am just happier every day just being able to be here. Why did I not come here earlier? Stupid me! The other presentation in class was about fuel cells. It was presented by 3 Chinese engineers from Arvin Meritor. It is strange, how peculiar the Chinese way of speaking English is: they tend not to pronounce the latter half of ...

Apollo-class We ( Bill, Spencer , and me) presented our research results in the Apollo-class today. I think we did rather well: we did not (for the most part at least) present anything we have discussed in the class so far; we also had a nice set of slide, which had mostly pictures, no text at all - I think such sets are best, but they require knowing the topic very well, which we do. Other groups about "guidance and control" and "propulsion" had a bit more traditional approach by having text too, and also somewhat repeating things we all knew already. But it is not easy to find new things after having some many great guest lecturers, and also good lectures by professors Young and Mindell. After our presentation many of the audience said "Good jobm, guys". Maybe they were just polite, but I took the compliments by face value. And I am proud and happy. I have to admit, that I was really nervous before the presentation. Having practiced it 3 times just be...

Been busy and lazy. Now, migraine. Many things have happened. I will write more on Monday evening. Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs from May to June 2005".

A free piece of advice: do not drink 2 liters of diet Pepsi after 8 pm. It will spoil your night and even the next day. I drank, and have been rather tired today. Therefore, no more blog today. Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs from May to June 2005".

Apollo-class We, Bill, Spencer , and I, managed to draft an rather good outline for our presentation. Out presentation and our paper are going to be good, and obeying the spirit of the class. We know the engineering details, but we will show them. Instead, we use them to back up our historical analysis of Moon programs and thesis about how to use and not use legacy systems. It will be fun. On the other development, I have helped Bill to write a 10-page report on the LOR-decision for NASA. It is funny to try to influence NASA by telling NASA about the history of NASA. After reading our paper they should know what they did in 1960s. Now they are a bit confused. Double masters? I got some detailed guidance from Dinesh about how to complete 2 Master's degrees in 1.5 years. I may do it. After that I would have 4 of those. The current administrator has 5 and a PhD, so I would just miss one of each. Should be an easy thing to do. Otherwise the day was rather ordinary. I took a walk...

Hugh Blair-Smith and Don Eyles in Apollo-class Again, but unfortunately for the last time, interesting guests in the Apollo-class. First, Hugh Blair-Smith told about the languages (assembly, of course) he designed for "unknown number of unknown computers" in MIT instrumentation lab in 1960s. One of these computers was of course the Apollo guidance computer. The first languages had only 4 instructions, later they got even 11 commands. Quite fancy it must have been to program those machines. Then Don Eyles told how they used the languages, and the related programming tools, for really programming the guidance computer, and how they modified the programs literally on-the-fly during Apollo 14. They told the astronauts to change the mode-register (telling which program the computer was to run) to "abort". This made it possible to launch from the Moon. Daring things. Read more about them at Apollo 11 and Other Screw-Up . Hugh also told, that he used to have a 27-28 hou...

Free newspaper and poetry @ Copley "Free Boston Globe, Free Boston Globe. Here we go, my brother from another mother. What about you, my sister from another mister?" Disruptive technologies and PDD - good lectures Clay Christenssen gave a lecture in the class today. He is a good lecturer, calm, with deep insights. Read his books, he has written at least two, and all his arguments are somehow, if not that well, covered in the books. I took some notes, which I thought would enable me to write more about the lecture, but now the notes looks silly and messy. Professor Utterback and Christensen have a very friendly competition ongoing, they always like to tease each other. They are both literally big shots in management science, both taller than me. I did feel young, small, and insignificant. (right: Christenssen, left: both professors) We also had, for a change, a good lecture in our PDD-class. Professor Roemer talked about his research in DSM (Design Structure Matrix). DS...

Timetraveller meeting @ MIT on 7th of May, 2005, at 10pm This is a must meeting to attend. Since, technically, you would only need one time traveler convention , and MIT is the place in the universe for anything ground breaking in the field of technology, MIT hosts first and only Time Traveler Convention . I will be there, since everyone from all times, past/present/future, are welcome to attend. And there is no dress code, and one can bring own refreshments. Who knows if we will get to use some fancy drugs from some very distant future! Be there, since you are not likely to get another opportunity in your life. Thanks to Lavonardo for pointing this out in time . Make friends, live long According to US heart experts "Being sociable is good for your heart, researchers have suggested. The US study found men who do not have many close links with friends and family have higher levels of a blood molecule which indicates inflammation. " So, it is not good to be too long at ho...

Idling This was an idle day, as I got so convinced of my abilities. I have no hurry, all the remaining work is just pure fun, and when work is going to be fun, I do not want to do it at once. Why should I use up all fun in a hurry? I have so much to say about space history, and I consider it such a fun. So, tomorrow I will have fun. I certainly could have taken at least 1 more course without any real difficulties. I took a long walk by the river (up and down, pacing like a gaged bear), while talking to S . Mobile telephony is a blessing. I saw a hawk, presumably a red tailed hawk, at least according to Mirja , and another bird with a long hair. According to Milton , after seeing birds with long hair, one should check one's medication. I will. Then, the (twice)weekly torment: washing hair. I just cannot understand, how the temperature of the water can vary at least 20C within a minute. It is such a waste of water and energy. But since I am not paying for it, and definitely could ...