Sunday in NYC / Last two weeks of the summer term / Some haikus

Sunday in NYC

On Sunday, S took me to Shiller's for a late breakfast. It is a nice place, very much like some places I have visited in Paris: lots of mirrors, noisy, busy, with good coffee and excellent omelets. I do not usually mind noisy places, but this time the sheer volume and high pitch of a group of American women in the adjacent table was way too much. I just do not understand, which their voices are at least one octave higher than European women's. It is actually terrible, not sensual at all. Hurts my ears. Luckily I do not have to date in America. Otherwise I would have to buy very discrete ear plugs.
We tried to visit some art galleries and museums, but the heat took the edge out of us and I became cranky. Not good. So, we decided to go for lunch to the Grand Sichuan. Good as always.
Any ideas why there are next to no public toilets in NYC? It is very hard to find a toilet, which one could use without paying for a beer or coffee etc. I assume this again has something to do with security, but since it does not make any sense, I cannot figure it out. Maybe public toilets are fire hazards?
Overheard in NYC. A bus driver explained why he keeps on working: "I try to keep busy to keep my weight in control and stay out of trouble".

Last two weeks of the summer term

Two weeks left and quite many small things to do. Yesterday, we finished the System Dynamics HW #6, which was harder that we thought - or we did not use enough time on it. Today, in the morning in the Systems Engineering class we were discussing error budgeting and critical parameter management. Both of which are important when doing things with hardware and also mission critical SW. Then we had yet another repetition of basic statistics - I still do not get it by heart but I can do the HW easily. In the afternoon, 3.5 hours of System Dynamics. It is getting shorter but feels longer. Still two lectures, I assume. Then working with Dave on Finance HW and later on Systems Engineering. So, nominally busy day. Great.

Some haikus

I wrote some haikus last week:

Air hot and humid flows 
small desperate fan blows 
Summer turns into night

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Pieni tyttönen
aamulla kukan löysi 
lumen seasta.

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aseman harmaus
äänesi kaiun lämpö
sateen alle jää

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Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs from July to September 2005".