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Yay Halloween! Boo scary code!
Oct. 31st, 2005 09:10 amI love Halloween! I am somewhat sad that we could not throw a theme party this year... wait! It's not too late! Everybody, we'll have a big party this Saturday, with a... I don't know... ah! A wedding theme! Come dressed as wedding guests!
Anyway.
Not that I trust Washigton weather, but the extended forecast is saying great things - sunny and 70 degrees! The leaves have turned colors later this year - last year, they were almost all down by Nov 5, I checked - so it should be a truly beautiful day. There are still some fiddly bits to take care of before Saturday, but it's mostly coming together. The main stressor is going to be setting up the hall - whether or not we'll be able to do it Friday night, or if we'll be getting up at 6am to set up tables Saturday morning.
(This is where I like being low-maintenance. My hair is going to be down and I'm doing my own makeup. No manicure - just clean buffed nails with some whitening pencil [which is actually the original French manicure, I'm told]. I probably could set up tables from 6-7am, shower and primp, and still be at the church on time. Not that any sane person would want to have that time pressure.)
And the dissertation is officially No Go. This makes me sad. It's a rare, rare thing for me to fail to meet an academic goal. But the code, which should have been working fine, which has worked fine in the past, suddenly has decided not to work. I came in on Sunday, hoping to see three pretty trajectories that would give me the go-ahead to program in runs to generate a dozen or so more, so I'd have adequate data to present in Chapter 6. But... no. The part of the program that's supposed to keep the robot from going through obstacles isn't working well.
If I'd had the data, I could have churned out the dissertation over the next three days, I think. But without the data, it's not going to happen. I need time to track down the bugs, then time to actually acquire the data, and time to process it.
So... failure sucks, but life goes on. The University totally boned me anyway; I can't actually get a diploma until Spring 2006, regardless of whether or not I defend this December. I still want to get this done, since I start a new job in December where they won't be letting me work almost full-time on my own dissertation. But if I need to spend weekends in January doing thesis edits? Big deal.
And now I don't have to flog myself to finish the dissertation by Wednesday. Which is kind of a relief, even though it's also a disappointment.
Anyway.
Not that I trust Washigton weather, but the extended forecast is saying great things - sunny and 70 degrees! The leaves have turned colors later this year - last year, they were almost all down by Nov 5, I checked - so it should be a truly beautiful day. There are still some fiddly bits to take care of before Saturday, but it's mostly coming together. The main stressor is going to be setting up the hall - whether or not we'll be able to do it Friday night, or if we'll be getting up at 6am to set up tables Saturday morning.
(This is where I like being low-maintenance. My hair is going to be down and I'm doing my own makeup. No manicure - just clean buffed nails with some whitening pencil [which is actually the original French manicure, I'm told]. I probably could set up tables from 6-7am, shower and primp, and still be at the church on time. Not that any sane person would want to have that time pressure.)
And the dissertation is officially No Go. This makes me sad. It's a rare, rare thing for me to fail to meet an academic goal. But the code, which should have been working fine, which has worked fine in the past, suddenly has decided not to work. I came in on Sunday, hoping to see three pretty trajectories that would give me the go-ahead to program in runs to generate a dozen or so more, so I'd have adequate data to present in Chapter 6. But... no. The part of the program that's supposed to keep the robot from going through obstacles isn't working well.
If I'd had the data, I could have churned out the dissertation over the next three days, I think. But without the data, it's not going to happen. I need time to track down the bugs, then time to actually acquire the data, and time to process it.
So... failure sucks, but life goes on. The University totally boned me anyway; I can't actually get a diploma until Spring 2006, regardless of whether or not I defend this December. I still want to get this done, since I start a new job in December where they won't be letting me work almost full-time on my own dissertation. But if I need to spend weekends in January doing thesis edits? Big deal.
And now I don't have to flog myself to finish the dissertation by Wednesday. Which is kind of a relief, even though it's also a disappointment.
