I’ve been doing a Ph. D. in particle physics for the last four years or so, having about two crisis a year in which I was considering, to various degrees of seriousness, whether to find a real job in the IT business (sometimes including relocating to Berlin). About a year ago I decided that the most reasonable option was to postpone the decision a bit and focus on finishing my thesis, but the question remained: would I be more satisfied in general doing computer oriented stuff or in the academia? After all, the part of my research that I usually enjoy the most is coding, but again, the prospect of a rigid schedule and a bureocratic environment scares me to death.
So a few months ago I set up a plan that would allow me to pursue my Ph. D. to end while at the same time exploring the computer side (hopefully) enough to make a decision by the time it should be taken: I would apply for admission to the Master’s Degree program in Computer Science at the UCM, and take a few courses at the same time that I write my thesis. By the end of my contract (April 2009) I would be able to decide whether to jump to a post-doc in physics or to finish studying CS. The financial side of the second option would be taken care of by the interest-free loans the Spanish Government offers for these MD studies.
And then two weeks ago I found out about the (remote) posibility of a one year position available in Paris, which would probably begin right after my contract ends and would allow me to defend my thesis a bit later. Now, if I, as planned, begin the CS studies this year, I might have some trouble even finishing properly the very few courses I would enroll in this year. On the other hand, it would mean another year of guaranteed income. But it would also mean having to put off the “Computer Question” for another year.
Now, stepping out of the academia sounds like a quite permanent step, but lately I’ve been wondering whether to take a deep breath and jump into the void, or whether to stick to more solid–but maybe not so exciting–ground. There are many things I’d enjoy doing for a science career, but right now I’d be stuck to pretty much what I’m doing right now for a while, which doesn’t thrill me that much anymore. But again, there are no guarantees that it will be better on the other side.
There will be answers, eventually…
Well, I don’t feel like explaining the meaning of each thing… I’ll do it later ;-)
The Aeneid
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
American Gods
Anansi Boys*
Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir
Angels & Demons
Anna Karenina
Atlas Shrugged
Beloved
The Blind Assassin
Brave New World*
The Brothers Karamazov
The Canterbury Tales
The Catcher in the Rye*
Catch-22
[A Clockwork Orange]
Cloud Atlas
Collapse: how societies choose to fail or succeed
A Confederacy of Dunces
The Confusion
The Corrections
The Count of Monte Cristo
Crime and Punishment
Cryptonomicon
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
David Copperfield
Don Quixote
Dracula
Dubliners
Dune
Eats, Shoots & Leaves
Emma
Foucault’s Pendulum*
The Fountainhead
Frankenstein
Freakonomics: a rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything
The God of Small Things
The Grapes of Wrath
Gravity’s Rainbow
Great Expectations
Gulliver’s Travels
Guns, Germs, and Steel: the fates of human societies
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
The Historian: a novel
The Hobbit*
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
[The Iliad]
In Cold Blood: a true account of a multiple murder and its consequences
The Inferno* (I find it annoying that this is considered a book by itself, the whole Comedy should be listed instead)
Jane Eyre
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
The Kite Runner
Les Misérables
Life of Pi: a novel
Lolita
Love in the Time of Cholera
Madame Bovary
Mansfield Park
Memoirs of a Geisha
Middlemarch
Middlesex
Mrs. Dalloway
The Mists of Avalon
Moby Dick
The Name of the Rose
Neverwhere*
[1984]
Northanger Abbey
[The Odyssey]
Oliver Twist
The Once and Future King
One Hundred Years of Solitude (I tried three times, could never make it past the first 90 or so pages…)
On the Road
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Oryx and Crake
A People’s History of the United States: 1492-present
Persuasion
The Picture of Dorian Gray
The Poisonwood Bible
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Pride and Prejudice
The Prince
Quicksilver*
Reading Lolita in Tehran
The Satanic Verses
The Scarlet Letter
Sense and Sensibility
A Short History of Nearly Everything
The Silmarillion
Slaughterhouse-five*
The Sound and the Fury
A Tale of Two Cities
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
The Time Traveler’s Wife
To the Lighthouse
Treasure Island
[The Three Musketeers]
Ulysses
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Vanity Fair
War and Peace
Watership Down
White Teeth
You are The Hierophant
Divine Wisdom. Manifestation. Explanation. Teaching.
All things relating to education, patience, help from superiors.The Hierophant is often considered to be a Guardian Angel.
The Hierophant’s purpose is to bring the spiritual down to Earth. Where the High Priestess between her two pillars deals with realms beyond this Earth, the Hierophant (or High Priest) deals with worldly problems. He is well suited to do this because he strives to create harmony and peace in the midst of a crisis. The Hierophant’s only problem is that he can be stubborn and hidebound. At his best, he is wise and soothing, at his worst, he is an unbending traditionalist.
What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.
Well… haven’t seen yet any jokes on Slashdot, Facebook, Google… other years were more fun indeed.
Hola X.!
¿Cómo va la vida por aquellas tierras? ¿Te defiendes de los ataques de cuerdas, fibrados, y otros seres temibles? ¿Has trabado ya amistad con los campos gauge? En estas tierras estamos bien. Nos llevamos bien con nuestros polos del plano complejo, los cuidamos, los regamos, y en las noches sin luna les contamos historias de tiempos futuros. Ellos, a cambio, nos dan chocolate y resonancias, y a veces una cerveza.
Espero noticias tuyas, y verte cuando vuelva la luna.
Saludos,
R.
Es gibt so Schönes in der Welt,
Daran du nie dich satt erquickst
Und das dir immer Treue hält
Un das du immer neu erblickst:
Der Blick von einer Alpe Grat,
Am grünen Meer ein stiller Pfad,
Ein Bach, der über Felsen springt,
Ein Vogel, der im Dunkel singt,
Ein Kind, das noch im Traume lacht,
Ein Sterneglanz der Winternacht,
Ein Abendrot im klaren See
Bekränzt von Alm und Firneschnee,
Ein Lied am Straßenzaum erlauscht,
Ein Gruß mit Wanderern getauscht,
Ein Denken an die Kinderzeit,
Ein immer waches, zartes Leid,
Das nächtelang mit feinem Schmerz
Dir weitet das verengte Herz
Und über Sternen schön und bleich
Dir baut ein fernes Heimwehreich.
Herman Hesse, Das Lied des Lebens.
Señor,
dame serenidad para aceptar las cosas que no puedo cambiar,
valor para cambiar las que sí puedo,
y sabiduría para distinguir las unas de las otras.
In memoriam
Que la vida iba en serio
uno lo empieza a comprender más tarde
-como todos los jóvenes, yo vine
a llevarme la vida por delante.
Dejar huella quería
y marcharme entre aplausos
-envejecer, morir, eran tan sólo
las dimensiones del teatro.
Pero ha pasado el tiempo
y la verdad desagradable asoma:
envejecer, morir,
es el único argumento de la obra.
– Jaime Gil de Biedma
Ir a Madrid de turista es algo que ya he hecho tantas veces que no se me hace extraño alojarme en mi propia casa como invitado. Pero aún así la vuelta se hace cuesta arriba, y ahora Cracovia se ha manchado de vida rutinaria, ya no tiene ese punto de novedad, de ya-no-soy-turista-pero-casi. Fui a Madrid como hombre libre, ahora me siento prisionero de mis circunstancias…
und alles, das nicht gesagt würde…
wie eine Fragezeichen.
Señor–respondió el león serenamente–¿no sabes que Fantasia es el reino de las historias? Una historia puede ser nueva y, sin embargo, hablar de tiempos remotos. El pasado surge con ella.
– Die Unendliche Geschichte